Security marched Yekase down the hall and into an office, like a log shoved along a cold current.

A middle-aged man sat inside, working, gaze nailed to the monitor like iron to a beam. After shoving Yekase in, the guard reported, voice hard as gravel.

“Liang Bo, we caught the lab thief!”

“Don’t spit blood and call it truth,” Yekase fired back, anger flaring like sparks in dry grass. “I didn’t take a thing. At worst it’s trespassing—”

The man turned, annoyed, eyes skimming her up and down like a sharp blade. “Such a small thief?”

“I said I’m not a thief!”

“Still denying it!” The guard clamped her shoulder, fingers like clamps on a vise. “If you’re not a thief, why were you fiddling with the instrument? Be honest. The missing samples—did you steal them? Where’d you stash them?”

“Huh??” Confusion swept her like fog over water. What samples? Stash where?

“Fiddling with the instrument?” Liang Bo’s eyelid twitched, a ripple across still water. “The machine’s not broken, right?”

“Rest assured. We checked. It’s fine.” The guard’s smile turned oily as a street puddle, then his face snapped back to a thundercloud when he looked at her.

“Spill it. Who sent you?”

“No, seriously, what are you even talking about?” Panic pricked, then calculation cooled her like shade under bamboo. Playing dumb might dump someone else’s crime in her lap. She chose her cards, and she spoke.

“I got to Cloudlong City yesterday. The Cloudlong Overnight Rally invited me. I heard this steel plant belongs to Eternal Green Pages, so I came to see what Alchemy looks like. I didn’t take anything. Your sample? I’ve got no idea.”

“Then why were you by the instrument?” the guard pressed, words pecking like crows.

“That collider sitting there would hook anyone with a pulse. Only someone with your schooling could ignore it,” she said, tone cool as dew.

“You—!”

Liang Bo finally showed interest, like embers catching a leaf. “You… knew it was a collider?”

“Of course. I also know electron–positron annihilation yields two packets of Flash Energy.”

“Don’t spout nonsense, you little—”

Yekase shook off his hand. He flushed, fingers digging back into her shoulder like talons—

“Xiao Li.” Liang Bo’s voice cut like a bell through mist.

The guard froze mid-grab, like a wolf caught in a snare.

“I’ve got the picture. Back to your post.”

“…Yes.” Xiao Li shot Yekase one last glare, sour as old smoke, then left and shut the door with a heavy click.

Yekase rubbed her shoulder, pain pulsing like a bruise blooming.

“Sit,” Liang Bo said, and for some reason a trace of a smile rippled his tone.

His easy smile put her on edge, like silk hiding a dagger. She hunched a little and sat on the side sofa, wary as a cat.

“Are your parents Flash Energy researchers?”

Here we go, still seeing me as a kid—Embarrassment flicked by like a sparrow, then she aimed her words like arrows. “My dad, sort of, but he’s been gone a long time. I study on my own.”

“On your own?” Liang Bo sipped tea, face still as a lake. “And how many summers have you seen, miss?”

“Twenty-seven.”

—Pffft. He wiped the spray from his mouth, coughed twice, and pretended nothing happened, composure snapping back like a fan.

Only the two of them were here, so Yekase dared say her real age. This man looked reasonable. Better to drop a bomb than stack clumsy lies. Guide his eyes away from other questions. And pray these Alchemists know how to keep things sealed. Mysticism 101… no, Ancient Alchemy isn’t exactly mystic. Whatever.

Most important, she still had a trump card tucked like a blade in a sleeve.

“I’m a disciple of Sandryon, and I dabble in Alchemy.”

“…”

“…”

Well? She sneaked a glance at his face, heart tight as a drum.

“Sandryon… who is that?” Liang Bo looked blank, like a stone in the rain.

“You don’t know?!” The shock hit like a dropped bowl.

“Sounds foreign. How many Nature papers does she have?”

Yekase stood there, bewildered, like thunder with no lightning. Sandryon had said she wasn’t close with the kids at HQ. Yekase thought it was just a generational gap. They didn’t even know her name?

“She told me she’s with Eternal Green Pages… I’ll call her. She can tell you.”

She raised a hand for a pause and dug out her phone. He’d already given her a sliver of trust when she’d mentioned two packets of Flash Energy, so he waited, patience like a rock in a stream.

Cloudlong City is small. Old faces know each other like trees in one grove. On the eve of the rally, a stranger shows up knowing Infinite Power, even if it’s just one line—she’s not some random thief.

“Hello? Master, aren’t you with Eternal Green Pages? Why doesn’t a member know you?” She spoke into the phone on the sofa, nodded twice, then handed it over to Liang Bo.

“…Hello?” He took it, doubtful as a cat sniffing a new bowl. He listened for a bit, then jolted upright with sudden clarity, like a lantern flaring. He rose from the leather chair and bowed and nodded toward an empty corner, respectful as frost on pine.

“Yes, yes… I understand…”

After a while he hung up, pressed his nose bridge, then walked to the sofa and solemnly returned the phone with both hands.

“Miss Yekase, on behalf of the Cloudlong branch of Eternal Green Pages, I apologize. We not only failed to welcome you, we frightened you.”

He bowed deeply, spine bent like a willow in rain.

Now that’s more like it. Claiming that bargain of a master really pays off… In the Alchemy circle, lineage and knowledge weigh more than the Sinister Organization’s chains. With the title of a disciple of the Crystal Witch on her brow, and a few results in her hand, if she still ate dirt that’d be the joke of the century.

Satisfaction warmed her like tea. She kept her face gentle, smooth as jade. “It’s true I trespassed first—by the way, where does Sandryon sit in your structure?”

Liang Bo looked embarrassed, a cloud shading the sun. “That lady is our largest, oldest sponsor. She owns an absolute share of the whole organization. I’m not an Alchemist. I only work here on Infinite Power. I’d heard there was such a figure. I never noted the name. That’s on me.”

“No harm done. I only need a favor with your collider.”

“That…” His look tightened like a knot.

“Our schedule is packed tight. Carving out a slot on short notice might be hard…”

She nodded, understanding flowing like water. “I won’t freeload. Let’s make a trade. We’ll show good faith too—because you should know, Shadow Curtain International and Swordforging Manor have both come to this little Cloudlong City.”

He blinked, surprise popping like corn. “Wait. Who and who?”

“Your intel’s really sluggish. So I’ll put this on the scale first—” Her bargaining smile unfolded like a fan.

“—Let’s talk terms.”

…

…

Ling Yi ran into trouble at a lamb joint near the hotel, like a sudden squall on a clear noon.

Strictly speaking, the target wasn’t her. It was the owner, because four guys in floral jackets and sunglasses ate a whole roast lamb and refused to pay, swagger puffing like smoke.

Pure nonsense from a blue sky.

Ling Yi was only there because Yekase had vanished at dawn like dew, and Jiang Bailu went off cursing to cover a rally security meeting in her place. Ling Yi had nothing to do alone at the hotel, so she wandered. Noon arrived like a gong.

She saw the lamb shop on the street. A bowl of steppe-edge mutton soup sounded right, warm as a sun patch. She went in.

Then trouble walked in with knives.

Utterly, sky-splittingly, nonsensically absurd.

Battlefields change people. For Ling Yi, three months into adulthood, surprises no longer rattled her bones. She only thought: I won’t finish this soup. Good or bad, who knows.

The floral-jacket, shades-wearing men called themselves members of “Ghostfire.” In short, the lamb was too gamey to pay for. Each had a machete-length fruit knife, blades flashing silver in the narrow room like fish in a stream.

Ling Yi set down her chopsticks, propped her cheek with one hand, and swept the scene, calm as a crane.

Damn… nowhere to hide and transform.

Sky Striker 2.0 transforms fast, like a flare. Still needs cover. If she popped Flashblade Red in public, their plane back to Shuangta wouldn’t even land before combat troopers packed the airport like ants.

Slip out with the bathroom excuse…

No. They won’t let her go. Even if they did, she’d go out first and Flashblade Red would stroll in right after. Even a brick would get it…

—Snap!

A pair of chopsticks slapped onto a table. The sound was crisp as ice cracking. It wasn’t loud, yet their shouting cut off mid-bark, like a classroom falling silent for no reason.

Every gaze in the shop arrowed toward the owner of those chopsticks, pulled like iron to a magnet.

What kind of person was she?

Eighteen or nineteen by the look, a touch more grown than Ling Yi. Bright gold hair spilled down her back like sunlight, a small braid loose at one temple, half her forehead clear as a crescent. She wore a neat women’s business suit. Cuffs and collar showed a shirt crisp as forged steel. A dark red neckerchief knotted at her chest, the whole look a stormless sky of corporate poise.

Her chest was far more mature than Ling Yi’s—at least a D by eye, the blazer pushed into tiny pleats like waves against a pier.

“Well now, which boss’s secretary are you? Dressed that formal for mutton soup?” one jeered, words greasy as smoke.

“Want big brothers to teach you what a Sinister Organization is?” another laughed, knives wagging like tails.

They moved in and ringed the blonde, a fence of wolves.

She looked troubled, a small furrow smoothing hair from her temple like a breeze.

Ling Yi’s first instinct was to risk exposure and save her. Sky Striker was already warm in her palm like a hidden ember. Then Yekase’s street-wise voice chimed in her ear like a bell.

If someone who doesn’t look like a fighter still pokes combat troopers, they’re 80% a big shot in casual wear. If they’re surrounded and still putting on airs, it’s 100% a big shot.

By that math, this blonde was absolutely a big shot. Ling Yi thought so, and her butt dropped back into the seat like a stone.

“The little lady is unworthy,” the blonde said, smile fine as silk. “Still, I’d love to learn from the four of you. What is a Sinister Organization?”

She picked up her chopsticks, spun a simple flourish, soft as a willow switch—and then—

Crack.

No one saw how.

In a single blink, the chopsticks stood in the back of one thug’s hand, dead center, sunk halfway down like a nail in pine, pinning him to the table.

“Wha—”

He didn’t even have time to feel pain. The blonde lifted her eyes, serious as moonlight on water.

“For example… like this?”