“Miss Qin, it’s been a while,” Kunwu Si said, his voice like wind-borne sand under a pale streetlamp.

He took off his hat and dipped a small bow, his shoulders sagging like wet reeds after rain.

“What are you doing in my home?” Huaiyue Qin’s breath steadied like a held blade, then chilled like frost on tile. “Breaking into a private residence is a heavy crime.”

“Hey now, don’t get riled,” Kunwu lifted empty palms above his head like white flags in moonlight. “I came uninvited because I had no choice.”

“What could leave you with no choice?” Huaiyue Qin shrugged on a coat like armor, her eyes sharp as winter rivers under ice. “At the Si Family’s main house, you snap a finger and storms part.”

“This time’s different.” His smile tasted of copper, thin as paper in a fire. “I lost a sizable shipment of arms from headquarters.”

“Arms? What kind?” Her pulse skipped like a startled deer in brush. “Your Si Family moving guns inside the country is nothing new.”

“If it were ordinary goods, I’d swallow the loss like bitter tea,” he said, then cut himself short, his gaze combing the room like a hunter’s lamp. He leaned in and whispered, voice like a moth’s wing. “This batch was stolen from the state and meant to go overseas.”

“What!” The word burst from Huaiyue Qin like a stone breaking still water.

He’d stolen from the country and planned to smuggle it abroad—his path was a cliff edge slick with rain.

When did the Si Family’s hand stretch this far, like a shadow crossing the sea?

They weren’t leaving even overseas forces untouched, like a net cast to the horizon.

Huaiyue Qin didn’t believe a trade like this came without a deeper scheme, like a hook hidden under calm water.

“So I need your help, Miss Qin,” Kunwu said, anxiety beating at his ribs like a trapped sparrow. “I lost a major shipment. If I go back now, the Si Family will kill me.”

As the Si Family’s number two, he knew the price, like a ledger written in knives and salt.

He knew their methods better than anyone else, like a man who’s tasted every spice of pain.

If he returned, death wouldn’t be the only thing waiting, like a gate with teeth behind it.

“I want out of the Si Family.” Kunwu met her eyes, worry burning there like a fevered lantern. “Only if I leave can I live, so I came to you tonight like a man in a storm grabbing a mast.”

“And what’s in it for my Qin family?” Huaiyue Qin’s tone was cool, like porcelain that never warms.

She was a merchant of the Qin line; the abacus of her heart clicked like rain on eaves.

Helping Kunwu Si flee meant drawing the Si Family’s hate like thunder to a bell tower.

That kind of trade was loss dressed as profit, like gilded poison in a cup.

She wouldn’t take that deal, not for an empty sky and a noisy promise.

Kunwu, who’d crossed swords with the Qin family often, knew this too, the knowledge heavy as iron keys.

Without a power equal to the Si Family, he couldn’t leave X City even with wings, like a bird in a silk cage.

So he bit down and laid it all out, words falling like dice on a cold table. “There’s one thing the Si Family doesn’t know. Not all the stolen arms were lost. I kept a small portion.”

“If you help me leave X City, I’ll give you forty percent of the profit,” he said, the offer bright as bait in clear water.

“Oh?” Huaiyue Qin arched a brow, interest glinting like a fish turning under sun. “What’s the lowest valuation on that remaining batch?”

A merchant’s heart listens when coins speak, like leaves turning toward rain.

Earning from a nemesis tasted sweeter, like plum wine after snow.

“At least this much.” Afraid of ears in walls, Kunwu only held up three fingers, the gesture stiff as carved wood.

“Thirty million?” Her heart thudded like a drum in an empty hall.

“Three hundred million,” he hissed, voice trembling like a bowstring drawn to the cheek. “In U.S. dollars.”

“What?!” Her eyes widened like lanterns suddenly lit.

Three hundred million dollars—no wonder the Si Family wouldn’t let him go, like wolves circling a stag heavy with fat.

What kind of arms were these, to weigh the scales so wildly, like gold bricks stacked to the rafters?

Even the conservative number sat there like a mountain, unmoving and cold.

Huaiyue Qin knit her willow brows, risk gusting around her like a night wind before storm. “I need to discuss this at home.”

The stake was too huge to hold alone, like a river too wide for one bridge.

At forty percent, it was over a hundred million, her own worth a shadow beside it like a candle before dawn.

“Miss Qin, you’ve got to hurry,” Kunwu said, urgency scraping his throat like gravel. “If we drag this out, nobody gets this deal.”

This was his life on the line, bright and fragile as a thin-necked vase on a ledge.

He was more desperate than anyone, like a swimmer counting heartbeats under ice.

“I’ll go back to the clan tomorrow,” she said, her voice steady like a plumb line. “Once I have an answer, I’ll contact you.”

They talked a little more, words slotting into place like tiles under a careful hand.

At last, after fixing contact within a week, Kunwu Si slipped away under moonlight like a shadow leaving the wall.

...

Elsewhere, Yiwei Yang tossed on his hospital bed, anxiety crawling his skin like ants in summer.

Tonight was his first time failing a task from the System, a stain spreading like ink in water.

By the rules, he’d lose one ability, and 999 points would vanish like petals in wind.

He’d spent most points to sharpen himself, so the deduction would drive him below zero like a boat dragged under.

The System, weighing his past performance like a judge weighing jade, waived the ability loss this once.

It also dropped a special mission into his lap like a sealed letter stamped in red.

But if he failed this one too, he’d lose the System forever, like a temple with its flame snuffed.

Every ability would be reclaimed, clean as tide wiping a shoreline at dawn.

All money and assets gained through those abilities would go too, like leaves swept from a stone step.

Each time he pictured that end, fear climbed his spine like cold vines at dusk.

Losing the System felt like losing air, like drowning inches from shore.

He’d tasted poverty before, a hunger that gnaws like rats in the walls, and he’d never go back.

If it came to that, he’d rather die, like a moth diving into flame by choice.

“This time... I can’t fail again.” He clenched the thought like a talisman in a storm.

He accepted the special mission, blame sparking in him for Nana Toki and Qingyu Si like flint to tinder.

His greed for that mistress and maid swelled, dark and hot like summer thunderheads.

Qingyu Si, Shutong An... he named them like charms he meant to pocket.

This time, he’d make them both his, like rings locked on two pale fingers.

With those visions draped over him like silk, Yiwei Yang drifted into sleep at last.

...

Ding! Hidden Mission triggered: Yakuza Destruction.

Mission: As a maid of the Si Family, join Qingyu Si to wipe out the strongest powers on both sides of the law in X City.

On the easier front, Nana Toki had just returned to the Si Family when the System’s prompt bloomed in her mind like a red stamp on rice paper.

She’d thought this world held no hidden missions, so the sudden drop startled her like a sparrow at a slammed door.

“What is it?” Qingyu Si glanced over, her gaze cool and clear as a mountain pool.

Nana had been twitchy since a moment ago, like a cat hearing distant thunder.

Nothing strange had happened on the drive back, the road smooth as black silk.

“N-Nothing.” Nana stole a glance at the mission description, her eyes flicking like minnows.

As a Si Family maid, team with Qingyu Si to take down X City’s strongest black and white forces—words sat there like knives wrapped in paper.

Wasn’t that the same as crushing the Si Family and the Qin family, like uprooting two old pines at once?

Nana slid a sly look at the woman beside her, the glance quick as a swallow’s wing.

Her young lady was Si Family too; by the mission’s logic, was this me killing myself like a snake swallowing its tail?

“What are you looking at?” Qingyu Si caught her peeking, the act obvious as snow on ink.

She turned her head, face calm and cold like a jade mask. “Do you have something to tell me? You keep looking my way.”

“I wasn’t looking at you,” Nana said, denial smooth as rain on bamboo. “My vision’s a bit skewed. If I don’t look like that, I can’t see straight.”

“...” Qingyu Si held the silence like a shut fan, unconvinced but unwilling to pry.

She rose and went to shower, steam blooming like mist over pines, and decided to sleep in Nana’s room again tonight.

The reason was the old one, trotted out like an old umbrella: she didn’t want to go upstairs.

Nana had heard it a hundred times, the refrain soft as worn cloth.

“But my bed’s cramped,” Nana protested, her voice small as a sparrow in a palm. “We’re both girls. The villa staff will gossip like wind through reeds.”

At home, the cold goddess became stubborn, like a cat that picks a lap and won’t move.

“I don’t care.” Miss Si slid into Nana’s quilt, only her head showing like a peony above snow. “Anyone who gossips about you, I’ll fire.”

“...” Being the heiress is something, like carrying a thunder seal in your sleeve.

You don’t care, but I do, Nana thought, worry fluttering like moths at a paper window.

Since the first night they shared a bed, she hadn’t slept well, her dreams tangled like thread in the dark.

“Don’t just stand there daydreaming,” Qingyu Si said, shifting to make space like a tide pulling back from rock. “We have to hit the Public Security Bureau early tomorrow.”

Nana stared, speechless, her thoughts scattering like sparrows at dawn.

Why are you so practiced at this, she wondered, the question beating against her ribs like a trapped bird.