Clover Hall.
"By the way..." The masked Mrs. Lai said slowly as she looked up at Jia up and down, "you remind of soone or at least your voice does."
Shit, did she recognize ?
She peeked at Mingshen’s side, seeing him still rrily talking to the leader without a care in the world. Suddenly she felt that she was at a greater chance of being exposed than him.
Quickly thinking it through, Jia decided to act like investing her curiosity in it rather than suspiciously deflecting the question.
"Is that so?" she leaned in a bit. "Who that might be?"
She scoffed. "There is a woman. We used to be neighbors. Her parents were cops who all acted like the torchers of justice but in reality, they were just a bunch of bastard traitors!"
Jia froze.
"I hated them. They always acted like such goody two shoes, but it seed like everything was a farce. Their sense of duty, their love towards their children - everything was just a ruse to hide their ugly faces."
She looked left and right and leaned in a gossiping mode. "You know what? There was a rumor in the neighborhood that their second daughter was smuggled or sothing. There was also a rumor that perhaps the wife cheated on her husband because the little one was just suddenly brought to ho after so long gap. I think there was definitely sothing about her that made the parents betray."
Jia sucked in a silent breath, an uncomfortable sense of gloom spreading in her chest.
"Their attitude towards the second daughter always felt a little different to . Sotis I used to hear fights between them," she snorted. "The perfect couple was not so perfect after all. And now there is their elder daughter who is trying to act just like them. Righteous and virtuous. As if trying to act just will wash away their cris. It won’t. The reputation of her parents is forever destroyed. People cannot forgive traitors, you know? She will forever be the daughter of traitors and she will beco just like them!"
Jia stood still but couldn’t help but let her breaths tremble. She felt a loud noise in her head. It felt random and chaotic but she could do nothing to stop it from consuming her mind.
But her daze soon broke with sobody’s loud voice crashing down in the hall.
"I saw cops outside!" A man exclaid.
Everybody jolted with the abrupt announcent and looked left and right in confusion. Murmurs hushed from here to there.
"We need to run!"
Many frowned.
"So what? They must be here for sothing else. Why should we run away?"
"No, no, they are definitely here to catch us!" The anxiety in his voice grew.
The leader stepped in, listening to the chaos. "Calm down, child. Nobody is going to harm you."
But the man’s paranoia refused to calm down. "Y-you cannot be so sure! This is my f-first ti here. I knew this was sothing shady! I shouldn’t have co here...!" he cried, trembling hard.
"Hey!" Everybody voiced their dissatisfaction. "How dare you call our gathering shady?"
"I saw the cops outside! They are definitely here for us!"
Jia slightly panicked.
How is that possible? Huojin and team wouldn’t be so irresponsible to expose themselves. They are not even in cops’ uniforms so why does this man think that the cops are here?
The man breathed hard. "I-I cannot be here anymore! They will arrest us! They are going to arrest us all! I-I should have known..."
The leader tried to talk so sense into him, but he refused to heed. The man’s fear and panic started to stir unrest among the other mbers too. If nobody thought before that anything was wrong with this gathering, they were now beginning to have their doubts. Additionally, getting involved with cops was always a ssy business and hard to get out of. They started to squirm out of uneasiness. More than half of the mbers wanted to leave and they started to push everybody around.
Jia was watching her plan crumbling and her anxiety touched through the roof. This was the only chance to catch them.
Mrs. Lai on her side paled as well. It was her first ti at the gathering too and it finally dawned upon her that perhaps she got involved with sothing crazy. She wanted to move but was too panicked to walk out.
Mingshen reached Jia’s side and cocked his brow. "I think this is a good ti to warn your boyfriend."
"H-Huh? Who?" Jia looked at him blankly.
Mingshen stared at her her. "Mo Huojin. He needs to be in his position to stop people from getting out."
Oh shit yes!
"You stay here and I will go out and try to contain the situation!" Jia sped away without a further thought, making Mingshen frown.
Guess it’s my job to catch the big fish then.
He heard a gasp from his side. "Y-you...what did you just say to her? Stop people from getting out?"
Mingshen’s one eye was always tracking the leader, who was still trying to bring calm to the situation. He smiled at Mrs. Lai, whose horror-laced expression was pure joy for him.
"You said sothing to her again."
"What?"
"My wife who you were talking to right now. It threw her off her pace. Normally, my wife wouldn’t have made a silly mistake like that."
"I don’t know what you are talking about. W-why are you here? You are really the cops?" She panicked.
"Wiser than them. Worse than them," Mingshen smiled. "What did you talk about?"
"What does it matter!?"
Mrs. Lai tried to escape now that she definitely knew the cops were here. But Mingshen held her arm and pulled her back. "Not so fast."
"L-Let go!"
His eyes tracking the leader’s movents caught a change.
"Well, sobody here needs my intervention so I will take my leave. Good night," he whispered the last two words and seemingly out of nowhere pushed a small needle right into Mrs. Lai’s arm. The effect took a few monts to kick in and eventually she collapsed back on a chair, unconscious.
"Well at least we will have one person to interrogate. Ti to catch the big fish now~" Chuckling to himself, he started to follow the leader, who was disappearing into the shadows.
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