“Everyone, fall back!”
After combing the scene for a while, they found nothing but severed limbs and meat pulp, strewn like butcher scraps on a cold slab.
They went back the way they came, like an ebbing tide. Captain Chen sat silent in the Audi, replaying the blonde girl’s fight with the young man, lightning on dark glass. After seeing that power, helplessness weighed on him like lead. Against people like that, a hundred men are straw; even a thousand might burn out like moths.
“Tsk, this ending works.” He flicked his hand, and a blue cloak bloomed on his shoulders like a splash of sky. With a snap and a whoosh, he vanished into the block like a ripple swallowed by night.
After that, the battle was buried under a blackout, topsoil over a grave. Even Xiao Qianxue’s wanted notice, files, and related news were erased like chalk in rain. That day, people only heard fierce gunfire and heavy booms rolling like thunder through the district, then silence as deep as a pond.
A week later, Lin Fan showed up at Longteng Community like a shadow returning at dusk. He pushed open Xiao Qianxue’s door. Footprints tracked the floor like reeds in mud; the place was rifled, and dust filmed the furniture like frost. He brushed a table; gray coated his fingers, proof the house had sat empty for a week.
He stepped into the left room. Pink wallpaper, cute knickknacks, and a few photos of Xiao Qianxue glowed like little lanterns. On the pink sheets, a big stuffed bear lay quiet, a patient sentry waiting for its owner. The wardrobe gaped, clothes spilling like loosened ribbons. He slid a drawer open, flushed, and shut it; the contents needed no words, like secrets folded in silk.
“As expected, nothing...” His sigh left his chest like winter steam. He lifted his phone. “Send people to clean this place and close the windows. Now.”
He ended the call. “Wait, there’s one place I haven’t checked.” Memory rose like a tide: the cave where they first spent the night. The cute girl had curled in a corner like a small animal. At the thought, the corner of his mouth lifted, spring thaw edging ice.
“Let’s go take a look.”
Soon, a sports car’s roar shook the forest like a bronze bell. A discontinued Lamborghini tore down a narrow path, then froze in a clearing after a perfect drift, dust spiraling like smoke. “I remember it’s this way.” Lin Fan leaped out and sprinted into the trees. Red light surged from both hands; trunks before him fell in chopped segments like bamboo. Urgency drummed in his chest; his gut said the cave held answers like stones under clear water.
At the cave mouth, snack bags lay scattered like shed skins; empty chip packets crinkled underfoot like dry leaves. Deeper in, a pink suitcase lay open, holding folded clothes and daily things, all lightly dusted like flour.
“Xiaoxue!” He crouched, scanning the items like a hunter reading tracks. “Looks like after I called, Xiaoxue hid here.” He turned and saw a sleeping bag. A few golden strands clung to it—bright threads in the dim cave, like sunlight caught on moss.
Memory snapped back to days ago. The blue‑cloaked young man faced Lin Fan like a wave of cold water. “Tell me exactly what happened that day, or I don’t mind breaking the rules.”
“Alright, alright, can’t be helped.” Seeing red and yellow light burning in Lin Fan’s hands, he shrugged, a leaf in wind. “That day she soloed a hunting squad of over a hundred, soldiers and SWAT alike, cut like wheat. Then I stepped in. Tossed a couple little water balls and she was done; the blood she spat... even I felt a twinge, like a pin in the heart.”
At that, the light from Lin Fan’s hands sharpened like knives. The young man conjured a few water spheres and toyed with them like glass marbles, but his eyes stayed wary, a fox measuring fire. “After that she seemed to enter a second phase, vicious as a storm; head‑on, I wouldn’t have a sure win. Then the army’s support rolled in, and she just teleported away. It was only a blink, like a fish slip, but I saw it.”
“Teleported?” Lin Fan asked, confusion rippling like wind on water.
“Yeah. Teleported.”
“Oh right, she did say, ‘Lin Fan is my boyfriend.’ She smiled pretty sweet. Landing a beauty like that—you’re lucky.” A mocking smile cut across his face like a thin blade.
“She really said that?”
“Lying to you does me no good. Your lovers’ business isn’t mine. As for who sent me, you know. I’m just a hired hand. I’m leaving.” He rose and pushed the door open, the hinge whispering like dry grass.
“With your level you still rank top ten in the organization? That’s cute, even if it’s dead last.” On Lin Fan’s handsome face, provocation and killing intent gleamed like cold steel.
“Tch.” With his back turned, the young man clenched his fist, knuckles pale as bone, and left without another word, a shadow slipping off a wall.
He stood before the cave and looked toward the distant sky, a blue sea beyond stone. “Xiaoxue, even at the ends of the earth, I’ll find you!” Lin Fan slammed a fist into the cave wall; stones rattled down like hard rain. Island memories flickered: her smile arrowing through his heart, the softness and warmth in his arms like a small fire in night wind.
“I will!”
