Sun Hang slapped away the advancing anomaly with a single swipe, stepped over the broken glass, and entered the mall.
The onlookers imdiately backed away, creating a significant distance from him.
The good news was that after the anomaly appeared, most of the timid people had already fled. Surprisingly, there was no panic in the crowd, and the pushing and trampling incident Sun Hang most feared did not occur.
"Ladies and gentlen, could I trouble you to clear the way? I have so personal matters to discuss with that young lady," Sun Hang said loudly, pointing at the young girl in the crowd.
With a "swish," the crowd instantly dispersed, forming a roughly ten-ter radius no-man's-land around that young girl.
Her expression changed slightly, and as she turned to flee, two strands of fungi, which wrapped around her ankles at so point, dragged her to the ground and pulled her to Sun Hang.
Sun Hang reached out, wrapped an arm around her waist, and lifted her off the ground—the girl's figure was very slender, standing at 165 cm and weighing just over 80 pounds. Sun Hang even felt that this fra, wrapped in a thin long dress, was sowhat sharp to the touch.
However, this figure complented her sickly beauty style face and her long black straight hair styled in a princess cut that reached her waist... Yet, what surprised Sun Hang was that her frail appearance was not feigned... She was genuinely weak.
She was not an infected individual and bore no signs of an anomaly aura.
When Sun Hang first saw her, he thought she was one of those "Lin Daiyu who can uproot a willow" type of monsters. But excluding her ability to control anomalies, she was just a frail girl who would worry about being toppled by a slight breeze.
When Sun Hang held her in his arms, she tried to resist, but her struggle was so weak it was negligible—put it this way, even if given a knife to kill a chicken, she might not even manage to slit its throat.
"As a suitable candidate for Deceitful Equipnt, shouldn't she undergo regular physical training?" Sun Hang pondered in confusion.
"Release her!" The agents from the Clearance Departnt rushed into the mall, pointing over a dozen pitch-black gun barrels at Sun Hang, with laser aiming dots focused on vital spots like his head and heart—although those folks had tranquilizer darts in their magazines, their long-term training had ingrained in them a muscle mory to instinctively aim for critical spots.
"Are you out of your minds?" Sun Hang looked at these elite agents, unable to hold back, "She's my hostage, if you want to release her, what do I have to leverage against you?"
"According to the trial rules, it's forbidden to—"
Before a Clearance Departnt agent could finish his sentence, Sun Hang interrupted him, "Yes, yes, forbidden to harm ordinary civilians... But she's not an ordinary civilian. Didn't you notice that once I got her under control, those anomalies stopped moving?"
"You...!" The leading agent wanted to refute Sun Hang, but couldn't find a suitable reason, so he could only glare at Sun Hang.
"Your code na is 'Puppet Master,' right?" Sun Hang asked the person in his arms.
The girl looked at him expressionlessly, not uttering a word.
"Are you mute or just dislike speaking?" Sun Hang asked again.
The girl remained silent.
"...She is," the lead elite agent said through gritted teeth, "but... she's just a girl with no combat ability; what you're doing is despicable, isn't it?"
"Firstly, don't separate the discussion of Deceitful Equipnt and its suitable candidates; they are one entity, aning regardless of whether she has combat abilities, her status as a combatant isn't incorrect," Sun Hang said, looking at the agent. "Secondly, there's sothing I need to inform you—I have no morals, so I won't be bound by moral constraints."
The faces of these elite agents imdiately turned extrely unpleasant, and two even exchanged glances, with the forr muttering quietly, "How did this guy ever pass the Hunter assessnt?"
"Who knows... Different cities have varying assessnt criteria; maybe in Celestial City, the moral standards required for Hunters aren't that high?"
...
1,500 kiloters away, at the Celestial City Mysterious Creature Research Institute.
The veteran director, having just finished a conference, maneuvered his electric wheelchair to a cabinet. Just as he was about to make himself a cup of coffee to energize for the work ahead, he felt a tickle in his nose, and a sneeze blew the freshly ground coffee powder all over.
The veteran director paused for a mont, reached up and touched his nose.
"An allergy? In this season... odd."
...
"I'll say it again; you're surrounded!" the lead elite agent shouted, "Release the hostage and surrender imdiately!"
"I'm now certain you're genuinely out of your mind," Sun Hang said seriously, "I'm not truly a villain. Even if I'm caught, it's just a failure of the trial, I won't be executed... Unless, by releasing the hostage, you'll let leave here?"
"If you're willing to release the hostage... it's not impossible," the elite agent's eye twitched a few tis, "I can promise you..."
"Forget it, I don't need your promises, I don't trust you," Sun Hang interrupted him again, "Here's the deal: destroy the weapons in your hands, clear a path for to leave here with this girl without following us, and I promise not to harm her."
"Your demands are too excessive!"
"Wrong, I'm not negotiating with you; you're not in a position to negotiate terms," Sun Hang suddenly smiled, raising the Puppet Master's hand, "Let's start a countdown now; if you don't clear the way, I'll break one of her fingers every ten seconds... With Dubhe Tower's dical technology, such minor injuries should be easily reparable, right?"
...
In the Dubhe Tower, inside a control room.
"Team leader, isn't this guy shalessly unscrupulous? With such morality standards, how did he pass the Hunter recruitnt test?"
"Ahem, maybe Celestial City went easy on him... After all, an infected who can perfectly adapt to the Taotie is very rare; a little character flaw can be overlooked..."
...
"Achoo!"
"Achoo—"
The veteran director, who was sipping coffee, and the newly awakened Yang Qi both sneezed simultaneously, with the forr getting coffee all over his beard and the latter startling a busy dical staff nearby.
...
"Is it that bad? Mr. Lee t him personally; if he had such a nasty character, surely Mr. Lee wouldn't entrust such important duties to him, right?" another voice chid in the control room.
"Hard to say... Maybe the guy's just really good at hiding it..."
"Are you suggesting Mr. Lee misjudged him?" a slightly authoritative voice spoke, "Have you considered that perhaps you've been pressing him too hard, forcing him into this desperate asure?"
"If our people don't clear the way, will he really break the Puppet Master's fingers..."
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