Transform into a human

"Yue Lai, no wonder you sang a song from outside the department during the performance just now. So you raised him."

Li Yu said earnestly:

"The bad apples in the police force haven't been found yet. You can't abandon the greater good for a little personal honor or disgrace. You must show some awareness!"

"It's just a verbal acknowledgment of fatherhood. Miss Xia was just being impulsive. Don't take it to heart."

"Easier said than done," Yue Lai waved his hand irritably. "Never mind her, let's go look in the lobby. There are plenty of information brokers in the parking lot."

Inside the Octagonal Pavilion, although the performance had ended, the revelry tonight seemed to have just begun, with the aroma of wine filling the air and the sounds of people filling the ears.

Thanks to the restaurant's open-air design, patrons can easily pour their drinks into the wine pool on the first floor, where several dancers perform a sea sprite dance.

At a table on the third floor, a man leaned closer to his drinking companions:

"Zheng, those two guys seem to have just come out of Third Sister's dressing room."

Zheng Gui's expression changed drastically. He quickly turned his head to look and breathed a sigh of relief upon seeing that it was a man and a woman.

"Why are you stirring things up? It's not like we're alone together. Does Third Sister not want to do business anymore?"

"Couldn't you be a little more careful? Didn't you see how terrible Third Sister's face looked when she came out?"

Zheng Gui raised an eyebrow:

"I understand what you mean."

He pretended to be drunk, staggered to his feet, and bumped into Li, who was passing by.

Yue Lai reacted swiftly, pulling Li away and narrowing his eyes:

"Playing the field is the way of a playboy."

"Oh, you're an expert," Zheng Gui said bluntly, no longer pretending. "You've angered Third Sister, and I won't even ask why. Just let me beat you up and that'll be the end of it."

"Yue Lai, what's going on?" Li was still a little confused.

"This guy used a trick on you. If he had actually touched you just now... you'd be running around naked."

The policewoman was furious; the temper of a young calf flared up instantly!

Yue Lai quickly stopped him and whispered:

"Don't forget who you are!"

Just kidding, the "Chizi Menjing" is practically equivalent to the police, so their whereabouts can't be exposed!

The policewoman reacted instantly:

"You go?"

Yue Lai was immediately at a loss. He hated going head-to-head with people the most! He could only choose one of the five paths, and it only had 60% of the mystery. Any practitioner who only mastered four paths could easily overpower him.

Judging from the tone of this guy in front of me, it would be strange if he wasn't a quack!

Zheng Gui didn't care at all whether it was one against one or one against two. Before Yue Lai could reply, he gently brushed his palm across the six wine glasses on the table. As if they had come to life, they leaped into the air and smashed towards Yue Lai and Li.

Yue Lai shoved Li aside, pulled out a knife from somewhere, and smashed the wine cups with a clanging sound, not giving them a chance to touch his body.

While flirting and philandering may be a novice's art, once you're touched by it, it's hard to get rid of!

In the blink of an eye, Zheng Gui had vanished from everyone's sight, as if dissolving into the crowd of onlookers.

As long as there is room for the Wanderer to perform, he will be the top assassin!

Suddenly, a lantern in the distance swayed gently. Without saying a word, Yue Lai threw his short blade like a throwing knife, slicing the lantern in two with a "whoosh".

But Zheng Gui appeared from behind him!

A sharp dagger pierced Yue Lai's nape, and another face appeared behind his head, with his left and right hand joints twisted strangely. One hand held a knife to block the dagger, while the other hand also held a knife and stabbed it fiercely into Zheng Gui's chest.

Two-faced!

The short sword pierced through without any resistance, but the opponent scattered into a puddle of wine, still a fake body created by the White Stripe in the Waves!

However, this time the real body did not launch a sneak attack from behind, but instead applauded from a distance:

"Very well, you are indeed a master of the four arts. I underestimated you."

"I'd like to offer you a pot of wine!"

He used his dagger to lift a wine jug from a nearby guest's table and tossed it lightly towards Yue Lai. Yue Lai instinctively deflected it with his knife, and the jug landed at his feet. Suddenly, a figure shot out from the jug!

The one who just spoke was actually a fake; the real one had been hidden inside the wine jug from the very beginning!

But Yue Lai was incredibly experienced, and his reaction was swift. He arched his back and extended his tongue to meet Zheng Gui's long-awaited attack.

A miraculous thing happened: the sharp dagger deflected when it touched the tongue, inexplicably sliding to the side.

He's just glib and smooth-talking!

The assassin retreated immediately after his failed attack, and Yue Lai echoed this sentiment:

"I'd also like to offer you a pot of wine!"

Zheng Gui joked:

"What, you're not planning to secretly spit in there, are you?"

"Hahahaha..." The drinkers laughed heartily, clearly aware of the tricks of the conman; honeyed words and a dagger in the heart are indeed difficult to use in real combat.

Yue Lai snorted and tossed the wine pot over. Zheng Gui, of course, couldn't catch it and used his dagger to deflect it aside.

But the wine jug fell to the ground without making a sound, and a shadow suddenly expanded.

The shadow stretched out its cold hand and gently pinched Zheng Gui's neck, while Yue Lai in front of him was like a punctured balloon, bursting into a skin and slowly falling to the ground.

Only then did everyone realize that the other face on the back of his head was long gone.

All of this happened so suddenly, it was beyond the expectations of all the bystanders, and even Zheng Gui himself was stunned for a long time.

He said bitterly:

"I overestimated myself..."

"Sir... was it that face you threw at me?"

I'd also like to offer you a pot of wine...

You can't believe a single word a liar says! This guy only said one sentence from beginning to end, and it turned out to be just psychological suggestion!

Once he starts thinking about whether the other person will spit in the pot, it's as if he's implicitly assuming that what's being thrown at him is a wine pot.

This is the first trick of scammers—creating an air of mystery!

After a long silence, the patrons suddenly erupted in a deafening cheer, with countless shouts of praise echoing through the air.

This play is even more stunning than San Niang's Flying Dance!

Yue Lai left the distraught Zheng Gui behind and waved to the dazed policewoman.

But Li... didn't understand a thing just now!

She began to doubt once again whether her choice of the Pure Heart Path was correct. Compared to the methods of the prodigal son and the swindler, the Pure Heart Path was like a little white rabbit!

"Let's go. Combat experience needs to be accumulated."

"oh."

Since the building was no longer a place to linger, they went straight downstairs, only to be stopped by a mysterious person who was wrapped up tightly.

The man was wearing a large cloak and a mask, and seemed to be there specifically to wait for buyers who would stop downstairs to finish their leftovers.

Looking at the cloaked figure's clumsy disguise, Li's eyes twitched, and she mentally cursed:

"Such a big chest can't be covered at all!"

The mysterious man spoke up: "Didn't the customer buy what they wanted?"

Yue Lai pretended not to recognize him: "Oh? You have connections?"

"Why don't you tell me about it?"

"Ninth Star Port, how much do you know about that high-ranking police superintendent who died?"

"How much can you give?"

"Fifty thousand New Federal Dollars."

"One hundred thousand."

"Deal." Yue Lai took out ten coins made of chain crystals and placed them on the ground between him and the mysterious man.

The cloaked figure pretended to close his eyes to investigate, then opened them after a moment:

"Someone saw him in Esvergne a few days before the incident."

"How many days exactly?"

Five days.

Yue Lai cracked his index finger knuckles; that day was the very day he accepted Mrs. Casti's commission.

"Is it possible to find out his reason for leaving the police headquarters?"

"It was a normal vacation, but it seemed to happen suddenly. Passenger ferry tickets for that day were sold out, so he took a private spaceship to Esfri."

"However, that spaceship isn't exactly 'private' to us," the cloaked man sneered in a hoarse voice. "It belongs to the illegitimate son of a high-ranking executive at the Pacific Group."

"Taiyang Group?" Li was somewhat surprised. It turned out that this wasn't just an internal matter within the police force.

Yue Lai nodded: "Thank you."

After saying that, he patted Li on the shoulder and turned to leave. The policewoman looked at him, then at the cloaked man, feeling that she was just a part of their game.

He hesitated for a moment, then quickly followed.

After the two had walked a distance, the woman who had led the way for them emerged from the side:

"Father, you're still taking money?"

"That guy's annual revenue is about this much. I'm going to make him work for free for a whole year."

"Um... okay, but isn't your disguise a bit too hasty?"

"I did it on purpose," Xia Du sneered, "I just wanted him to remember the good things I did for him."

……

After avoiding Xia Du's sight, Yue Lai and the other person did not leave Langhua City as she had expected, but instead came to the entrance of a stationery store not far away.

Yue Lai glanced back at Qietinglou, and Chi Zi beside him keenly sensed his emotional fluctuations.

"What's wrong? You can't bear to part with it?"

"Of course not, that little brat doesn't attract me as much as you do."

"What nonsense are you spouting!"

"After all, I didn't raise you, so there won't be any emotional barriers when we get close."

Li had gradually gotten used to Yue's way of speaking. With her personality, she even managed to think rationally when faced with provocation.

For some reason, she always felt that the more he said that, the more indifferent he seemed to be towards her.

"We are both innocent children; your emotional fluctuations cannot be hidden from me."

"I'm just a little worried. There aren't many intelligence brokers in the police headquarters, and the police higher-ups should be aware of the existence of the Qieting Building."

"Even if those behind Malfoy don't know our whereabouts, they can still target Splash City."

Yue Lai's gaze was deep and unfathomable:

"Taiyang Group, this is bait."

Li wasn't stupid; he instantly realized what Yue Lai meant and was shocked.

But the man showed no interest in further discussion. Instead, he turned and went into the stationery store, handing the counterfeit pen to the shopkeeper.

"Boss, do you have a similar pen?"

The shop owner, a middle-aged man who was somewhat balding, put on thick glasses upon hearing this, took the pen from Yue Lai's hand, and examined it closely.

He opened the pen cap and focused more attention on the pen tip.

"Sir, if I'm not mistaken, this should be a fake."

"A fake?"

"If you don't open it up, its appearance is almost indistinguishable from the real thing. But I happen to remember this one. It was a couple's commemorative edition launched by Ma Liang Pen Industry twenty years ago. The nib is made of chain crystal and it usually comes in pairs."

Chain crystals are a type of memory crystal, which, together with tearstone, form the cornerstone of steam technology. The former provides algorithms, while the latter supplies energy.

Li, who had just graduated from university, was quite clear about these things:

"Using a crystal nib can record the handwriting of couples' letters. People usually use this pen to write letters. In this way, even if the letter itself cannot be preserved, the emotions carried by the letter will not be lost and can be used to reminisce many years later."

"Because of the special manufacturing process of the nib, this type of fountain pen is often quite expensive."

The shop owner nodded:

"Although the nib of this pen is also made of chain crystal, it does not have any inscriptions personally carved by Qi Shi, so it can only record a bunch of gibberish."

He returned the pen to Yue Lai:

"These rare commemorative chain pens are too expensive to produce, and our small shop can't afford them. They might not even be sold in the entire Wave City, which is disappointing to our customers."

Yue Lai and Li exchanged a glance; the real focus of the case had emerged.

As the two walked out of the stationery store, Li immediately made a judgment: "There is something wrong with the serial murder case from twenty years ago. I even suspect that the murderer only had one target, Mr. Casti, who had the commemorative pen. Other victims may also be a layer of disguise."

Yue Lai nodded in affirmation, and was about to say something when suddenly a deafening explosion came from afar.

He looked up abruptly and saw that the upper half of the building was slowly collapsing, with thick steam billowing out from the large hole in the middle.

"What a grand display!"

Li looked to her side, but Yue Lai had already disappeared.

……

Meanwhile, the patrons in the building were stunned by the sudden explosion. There were quite a few capable people in this kind of place. Although most of them were novices, it was not difficult for them to join forces and extinguish the fire.

At this moment, almost no one offered to help; they all fled outside like madmen. Anyone with eyes could see that Third Sister had offended someone she shouldn't have!

Tearstone bombs are among the most controlled items, and besides, this planet is the spies' lair. Who would dare to get involved in something like this?

Among those fighting the fire, besides Xia Du and the building's staff, Zheng Gui also stayed behind. He tried his best to control the water flow, constantly washing away the various points of fire, but the flames were mixed with Tear Stone vapor, which could not be extinguished by ordinary water.

"Third Sister, what's going on?!"

Xia Du pursed his lips, vaguely guessing the reason.

Before she could answer, a tall figure emerged from the thick fog, its entire body enveloped in flames, obscuring its face.

Flames are a symbol of barbarians.

This is a path that is explicitly blocked by the Federation among the twelve capable individuals. If swindlers and scoundrels are strictly restricted by law, then barbarians are to be eradicated as soon as they are discovered.

Even the true name of this path is unknown.

Unlike the previous "fight," Zheng Gui didn't say a word of nonsense. He immediately disappeared into the steam, silently sneaked behind the fireman, and stabbed him hard in the back of the neck.

"Ding!"

He felt as if a stone had been driven into him!

The opponent's response was merely to throw a backward punch, and a shockwave blasted both his real and fake forms out of the steam.

Then with another powerful punch, Zheng Gui was slammed against the wall by the ripples, coughing up a mouthful of blood.

He found it incredible:

"Why are there barbarians in the police headquarters?!"

Xia Du also wanted to ask this question. She pulled out a gleaming silver gun from her chest, clearly a creation of a master craftsman.

Not only her, but all the workers who stopped at the building pulled out their pistols and filled the tear stones.

"Shoot him to pieces!"

Gunfire erupted immediately. After each shot, the gunmen refilled their Tearstones. The seemingly defenseless dancers were now ruthless butchers, precise and deadly.

That's the Godfather's way of managing subordinates.

After several volleys, Xia Du tapped the pipe in his left hand, exhaling a wisp of smoke that seemed to brush aside the tearstone vapors created by the firearms, like two large hands.

The barbarian's head had been blasted apart, but flames completely filled the gap above his shoulders and neck, making him look like a headless knight straight out of a story.

Zheng Gui rubbed his eyes in disbelief. He didn't find any flowers on the barbarian's head—the other party was clearly just a novice!

"Third Sister, let's go!"