Qi Xiang woke up in the middle of the night and suddenly felt her heart pound. Her first instinct was to look for Gu Xi, but she couldn’t find her.
Just then, she ran into Qian Shan and Liu Hao as they were returning. When she heard that Gu Xi was in Ye Junhan’s car and had gone to the cliff, Qi Xiang had a vague feeling that sothing was wrong. She wanted to contact Gu Xi imdiately but was stopped by that bunch of brutes from the Special Service Team.
’Are you kidding? Alone together on a mission late at night... There was no way they were letting this young lady ruin such a perfect opportunity for their captain to build a connection.’
This made Qi Xiang so angry she blew up right then and there.
The commotion woke up Shen Yue, Wei Heng, and the others.
Although the n from the Special Service Team swore up and down that with Ye Junhan around, nothing would happen to Gu Xi.
Qi Xiang rolled her eyes the mont she heard that. She admitted Ye Junhan was strong, but not necessarily stronger than Gu Xi.
Just then, Ye Nan ca looking for Gu Xi, saying she had sothing very important to tell her.
Everyone exchanged glances. They all knew about Ye Nan’s crush. And now, with Ye Junhan having taken Gu Xi out on a mission in the middle of the night, she suddenly shows up...
The mbers of the Special Service Team were at a bit of a loss. After all, Ye Nan was their teammate, and for years, they had all treated her like a little sister.
But now.....
In the end, it was Qi Xiang who huffed and sent a communication request to Gu Xi in front of everyone.
As soon as the call connected, Qi Xiang blurted out, "Gu Xi, are you okay?"
Before Gu Xi could say a word, Ye Nan pushed her way in front of the cara on the other end. "Miss Gu," she said, her expression serious, "my mother just inford through an encrypted channel that an unidentified research team left the cliff area a few days ago."
After a pause, Ye Nan gave Gu Xi on the screen a complicated look and added, "She told to tell you to be extrely careful."
’She didn’t know why her mother would use such a respectful form of address for a young girl, but at that mont, Ye Nan’s feelings were incredibly conflicted.’
Gu Xi nodded slightly. "Thank you."
"You’re welco." Ye Nan glanced at the area around Gu Xi.
Ye Junhan didn’t appear on cara. ’Ye Nan couldn’t tell if she was relieved or disappointed.’ She lowered her gaze and silently backed away from the crowd.
Shen Yue and the others seized the opportunity to push to the front. Unlike Wei Heng, who looked like he wanted to say sothing but was holding back, Shen Yue sized up the scene on the other end of the call and asked lazily, "What’s up? Where’s Ye Junhan?"
’If he didn’t know Ye Junhan so well, Shen Yue would have suspected the man was using the mission as a pretext to take their dear Gu Xiaoxi to the cliff’s edge for a romantic night.’
"He’s here." Gu Xi glanced up. The mont the call connected, Ye Junhan had opened the car door and stepped out. He was currently contacting his team.
"Is everything alright?" Wei Heng asked, his brow furrowed as if sothing had occurred to him. "Did you go down the cliff?"
"No, we just observed from the edge for a while." Gu Xi didn’t hide anything from them. "There’s sothing down there. I was planning to go down for a look, but Ye Junhan stopped ."
"What is it?" Qi Xiang asked eagerly, her curiosity piqued as she recalled the intense pounding in her heart from earlier.
"I don’t know. I plan to go down and take a look after daybreak." Gu Xi slowly shook her head. She paused, then dropped another bombshell. "However, I suspect it’s an intelligent parasite capable of devouring high-level mutant plants."
Shen Yue and the others exchanged glances, and everyone saw the grave look on their friends’ faces.
...
「On the other end.」
Ye Junhan leaned against the front of the car, looking down as he opened his personal terminal. He contacted Zhao Qingxiao and told him to gather all off-duty team mbers.
Soon, all the Special Service Team mbers who had been crowded around Qi Xiang’s screen were called away.
Ye Junhan first asked about the matter Ye Nan had ntioned. Unsure whether that team was still lurking nearby, he reminded his n to be extra cautious that night.
Finally, he described what he had felt at the edge of the cliff.
"Felt like you were being watched?" After hearing his captain’s words, Qian Shan instantly recalled what he’d felt when he’d gone down the cliff. "Mr. Ye, I had the sa feeling."
Ye Junhan’s gaze snapped toward him. Qian Shan frowned slightly and recalled, "For a split second, my legs felt heavy and a chill ran down my spine. I was completely frozen. It was only thanks to Liu Hao’s quick thinking in tossing down an explosive that I snapped out of it. But afterward, everything was normal again..."
’Qian Shan found it very strange, too.’
’If that thing had truly targeted him, why would it let him go?’
Ye Junhan turned and looked at Gu Xi in the passenger seat, who was talking with Shen Yue. ’If the crooked-neck tree was what had targeted Qian Shan, then could the thing that made everything go back to normal... be the entity that was always following Gu Xi?’
’Although Gu Xi never ntioned it, Ye Junhan’s intuition told him that she and that entity were likely on good terms.’
Gu Xi sensed his gaze and lifted her head to et his eyes.
Ye Junhan impassively averted his gaze, gave his team a few more instructions, and rearranged the night-watch schedule.
’With both him and Gu Xi gone tonight, and all those defenseless researchers back at camp, who knew what kind of trouble the Guard Team and the research institute might stir up?’
’More importantly—if the team that left earlier was truly connected to the thing at the bottom of the cliff, then... tonight could be a ploy to lure the tiger from its mountain.’
Ye Junhan gave his team a few more instructions. After ending the communication, he didn’t imdiately return to the car. Instead, he walked around to Gu Xi’s side and tapped on her window.
"What do you make of it?" Ye Junhan asked, looking down at Gu Xi inside the car.
Gu Xi t his gaze and said slowly, "I have to stay here." ’Compared to so human squad in the vicinity, the thing in the abyss felt far more dangerous to her.’
’So, whether this was a ploy to lure them away or not, she had to stay here tonight.’
’Besides, her saber was down there.’
Ye Junhan watched her, then relayed what Qian Shan had said.
Gu Xi understood what he was getting at, but ’she wasn’t certain if that entity had actually been the one to intervene.’
’Because, from what she could sense, the entity that followed her around and regarded her as its own kind had always looked down on human ability users.’
’The likelihood of it taking the initiative to save a human was slim.’
’It was more like...’
"What are you thinking about?" Leaning against the side of the car, Ye Junhan tilted his head to look at her, his eyes deep and dark.
Gu Xi avoided his gaze and looked toward the edge of the cliff. "I was just wondering if all these monstrous things that keep popping up are natural disasters or man-made ones."
’If they were natural disasters, humanity would be powerless. But if they were man-made...’
Ye Junhan looked at her. "...Man-made."
For over a year, Gu Xi had done her best to integrate into this world, but she was still missing thirty years of history and was ignorant about many things. Ye Junhan, however, was different.
He had always been at Central Base, the very vortex of power. He had led countless missions and been on the front lines of nurous major incidents, so he knew far more than the average person could imagine.
Gu Xi trusted his judgnt.
She looked up, her eyes eting his. After a long mont, she lowered her gaze, concealing all emotion. "Man-made, is it?" she murmured. ’Good.’
’Man-made disasters... The "man" part cos first. If you get rid of the people responsible, the disaster naturally takes care of itself.’
’As for who that person—or people—might be...’
It was ironic, really. When the apocalypse had suddenly erupted, there was no ti to evacuate much of the high-tech equipnt and scientific personnel. This had caused most of humanity’s technological progress to stagnate, or even regress. Only a few select fields of science had seen rapid, groundbreaking developnt.
Biological sciences were one of them.
’But looking at it now... that might not have been sothing worth celebrating.’
Thinking of the vegetative patients in the labs and the hybrid monstrosities she had encountered before, Gu Xi suppressed her revulsion. She reached out and poked the tender leaf at the tip of Bud. ’Bud, my dear, it’s ti for your Dragon Slaying Saber to see the light of day again. Go on.’
Bud: ’...Isn’t it the Crescent Blade?’
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