"How?" asked Yang Qing, cutting straight to the point. The cat was already out of the bag, and there was no room for delicacy. Drawing it out would only make things harder on Duan Ting and Liu Ying. It was better to address it head-on and get it over with, especially now that the topic had been broached.
"When we realized Jiang Hao had missed his three-hour check-in, we imdiately inford the boss and decided to wait for the next window to try contacting him again.
Occasionally, one of us—whether it's Jiang Hao, Liu Ying, , or even the boss—might miss a check-in for one reason or another. So, while his initial silence raised so concern, it wasn't an imdiate cause for concern.
But when the six-hour mark passed without any communication, that's when we knew sothing was definitely wrong," Duan Ting explained, pausing briefly to collect himself.
"I was out at the ti, wrapping up my commission… Ideally, it should have been who went to look for him since I was the closest. But because…" Duan Ting's voice faltered as he clenched his fists, bitterness flashing across his face.
"Because I was weak, the boss had to go instead," he added, a pitiful smile tugging at his lips.
"I understood the logic at the ti. Whatever had stopped Brother Jiang Hao wasn't sothing I could handle, so it made perfect sense for the boss to make the trip.
But still… I can't help but feel frustrated," Duan Ting admitted, covering his eyes with one hand as he leaned forward slightly, his voice thick with emotion.
"Maybe if I had been the one to go, even if I couldn't have done anything about it, I might have found so clues in good ti. And even if I didn't… it would have been better for to disappear than the founder.
I'm replaceable, but he isn't…" Duan Ting's voice quivered with deep turmoil, every word heavy with guilt and self-reproach.
"Don't say that, Brother Duan Ting. The owner wouldn't approve, and neither would Brother Jiang Hao," Liu Ying said softly, her tone both firm and comforting.
"He'd be the first to tell you that a life is a life and that none of us should ever treat it lightly.
Even if you'd insisted on being the one to investigate, we both know the boss would have gone anyway. He likely would've rushed to get there first, just to shield you from whatever risks might have been waiting.
There's nothing you could have done to change those events," she continued, gently patting his back, her touch as reassuring as her words.
"The best we can do now is hold the fort and protect the agency they both loved so dearly, for when they co back…" she added, her eyes glinting with a desperate hope, clinging to the possibility that things could still turn out well.
She too had spiraled through countless what-ifs, combing obsessively through her communication log with Jiang Hao, searching for sothing—anything—that might have foretold what happened to him or held even the faintest clue.
As sharp as a cultivator's mory was, the chaos of worry and guilt gnawed at her confidence. She began doubting her recollection, no matter how many tis she reviewed it. To counter that doubt, she burned incense after incense, hoping to improve the clarity of her mory.
When the results stayed the sa as before, her doubt shifted from her mory to the clarity incense itself. "They must be low quality," she told herself, "that's why they aren't working."
And so, in her desperation, she spent 150 high-grade spirit stones—years of painstaking savings—on better treasures designed to enhance recollection.
The results didn't change.
When tragedy strikes, especially one so monuntal and hopelessly out of reach, it's easy to find yourself drowning in an endless cycle of what-ifs.
You relive the monts over and over, replaying the sa choices and wondering if there was anything—anything at all—you could have done differently. And no matter how much you prepare, there's never a shortage of imagined alternatives.
For Duan Ting, his tornt was thinking, "Maybe if I'd gone to Jiang Hao's last known location instead of heading straight to the headquarters, I could've found sothing—or even found him."
But in his fixation, he ignored so crucial facts: the incident might have occurred imdiately after Jiang Hao's last call with Liu Ying.
That would an the disaster struck nearly three hours before anyone even realized sothing was wrong.
For Liu Ying, the fragile straw she clung to was her mory and the incense sticks she burned to sharpen it. But when even that failed to keep her afloat, she grasped at sothing even more tenuous—hope.
Hope that, at the other end of this tragedy, a happy ending awaited. Hope that things could sohow return to how they were before. Yet, deep down, another voice whispered—a cold, mocking reminder of the ruthless and unforgiving nature of the world she lived in.
That voice told her it was her fault.
Everything that had happened—the disappearance of Jiang Hao, and even their boss, Bai Chen—was because she was weak. Her weakness had implicated them in whatever caught them.
As the days passed, that voice grew louder, insistent, impossible to shut out. Rationally, she knew it wasn't true, but reason was no match for the crushing weight of guilt. Her rationality was feeble, and all she could do was cling to the irrational hope growing within her, using it to counter the suffocating despair.
The words she spoke to Duan Ting, weren't just for him, they were just as much for herself.
..
On hearing Liu Ying's words, Duan Ting looked up, his gaze eting hers. A weak but appreciative smile flickered across his face.
"Thank you, Sister Liu Ying," he said softly. Liu Ying responded with a nod and a gentle smile of her own.
Duan Ting cleared his throat, apologizing for his emotional display before continuing with the story.
"So, the Boss went to Jiang Hao's last known location in Buzhe Hills, within the Azure Sapphire Mountain Kingdom. There, he encountered mbers of the Red Gale Fists rcenary Agency, who were already on-site..."
Yang Qing interjected with a question. "Is that the rcenary agency you always contract for these scenarios, or does who you contact vary, depending on the location?"
"No, we exclusively use the Red Gale Fists for all our needs," Duan Ting explained. "Though their branches aren't everywhere, they have a considerable number of outposts scattered across nurous regions around the continent. We also make it a point to provide them with a general route outline for our commissions so they can have soone on standby near those areas. That way, if sothing happens, they can respond quickly."
Yang Qing's expression grew pensive as he asked,
"When Jiang Hao missed the first window, did you inform the Red Gale Fists imdiately, or only after he missed the second window?"
A brief trace of coldness flashed in both Duan Ting's and Liu Ying's eyes.
"I inford them just a few minutes after Brother Jiang Hao missed the first window," Liu Ying replied, her tone laced with anger.
"But those money-grabbing idiots took their sweet ti responding. It took them four hours for the first person to arrive on-site.
By then, Brother Jiang Hao had already missed the second window, and the boss ended up arriving at the sa ti as them," she added, clenching her fists in visible frustration.
Yang Qing's gaze sharpened as he drumd his index finger thoughtfully. "Is this delay typical of their behavior, or was this the first ti they acted that way?" His thoughts drifting off to the nature of Azure Sapphire Mountain Kingdom, wondering if it could have been a factor in the delay.
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