A real killer playing a villain; the guy surnamed Zhen in Detective, run!

"Boss, how's business?" He casually sat down across from the gambling table and started trying to get information out of the other person, following the script.

Lu Yuan answered while dealing the cards.

His voice was lazy and harmless. He deliberately slowed down the dealing speed, sending out the cards one by one with large movements, just like an ordinary extra completing a task.

Xu Mingzhe relaxed. "It's just a slightly handsome extra, right?" He Rihuo made a big fuss.

Then Zhang Jianing asked the crucial question from the script: "Did you see the victim on the night of the incident?"

Lu Yuan stopped playing cards and looked up at Zhang Jianing.

Just one glance.

His facial expression remained unchanged. His voice was the same. He leaned back in his chair, playing cards between his fingers.

Zhang Jianing's smile froze on her face.

Xu Mingzhe also fell silent.

They both felt they had been seen through.

Lu Yuan spent a fraction of a second dissecting the two people in front of him from head to toe.

Micro-expressions, breathing rate, pupil changes, and subtle finger movements—all this information is processed and the conclusion is written directly in his calm eyes.

"Yes, I have."

Lu Yuan withdrew his gaze and continued dealing cards slowly, as if nothing had happened.

The lines have been spoken. That concludes the information delivery for this scene.

But Zhang Jianing couldn't continue the lyrics.

She sat there blankly, her fingers gripping the corner of the script so tightly that her knuckles turned white.

"Cut!" The director had to call "cut" again. "Jia Ning? What's your next line? Jia Ning?"

"Ah, right, right, I'm sorry." Zhang Jianing snapped out of her daze, patted her face, and said in a weak voice, "I just... spaced out."

Xu Mingzhe turned to look at her and whispered a line that later became a famous quote: "You're just out of your mind, aren't you?"

During a break, Lu Yuan leaned against the gambling table and drank goji berry water when someone approached from the side.

The footsteps were very light and evenly spaced. I was wearing size 38 standard leather shoes. My right foot landed a fraction of a millisecond heavier than my left. I had an old knee injury, but it was recovering well.

"Hello, I am the security advisor for this event."

Lu Yuan looked up and saw a young woman in a black coat standing in front of him. Her ponytail was tied tightly, and she had honey-colored skin. Her amber fox eyes should have had a hint of allure, but they were completely suppressed by her sharp gaze.

A bulge in his jacket concealed a gun. Thin calluses clung to the second joint of his right index and middle fingers, marks from years of trigger-pulling.

"Hello." He smiled.

Jiang Yan didn't respond. Her gaze shifted from Lu Yuan's face to the playing cards in his hand, and then to the fingers holding the thermos.

"You...have you studied card skills before?"

"No," Lu Yuan shook his head, "I'm not even very good at playing Dou Dizhu (a popular Chinese card game)."

Jiang Yan stared at him for three seconds.

She couldn't find any flaws. His micro-expressions, breathing, and eye movements were all as still as a stagnant pool. Jiang Yan had been a police officer for eleven years, interrogating drug cartel leaders, economic fraudsters, and professional killers; no one could remain completely unmoved in front of her.

Jiang Yan's phone rang. She glanced at the screen, nodded, and turned to walk to a corner.

The call was from Xiao Liu: "Captain Jiang, the information on Lu Yuan that you investigated is out."

"His background is as clean as a blank sheet of paper. He's an orphan who spent three years in Hengdian World Studios, always working as an extra, and has no criminal record."

......

knock off.

Lu Yuan took back the two hundred yuan reward and put it in his pocket. Adding it to what he had saved before, he had a total of two hundred and fifty-three yuan.

He walked out of the back door of the studio. Outside was an open-air parking lot, and the late autumn evening wind carried the smell of diesel fuel. Several film crew trucks were parked on the gravel ground, and the generators were still humming.

He heard a cat meow.

It was very faint. It came from under the roadside green belt.

Lu Yuan stopped in his tracks.

He crouched down and parted the leaves of the bushes.

A small orange cat lay in the mud. Its hind legs were bent at an impossible angle, and its fur was covered in blood and dirt. It was breathing rapidly, and its mouth was slightly open.

There was a tire track behind it.

The little orange cat's eyes were half-open, watery, and it was trembling with pain. When it saw Lu Yuan squat down, it let out a very faint "meow," and then tried to rub itself against his hand with its front paws.

Lu Yuan didn't move.

He stared at the cat for three seconds.

In his past life, he had seen too much blood and wounds. Human and animal. In his thirty-two years in the Syndicate, his hands had been stained with many things, some out of necessity, some for survival. He thought his heart had hardened like stone.

The way this cat looked at him was the same as the way that girl looked at him.

The girl he wanted to save.

The organization assigned him one last job. The target was evidence of an arms deal. He obtained the evidence and also discovered a little girl being held captive at the deal site. He didn't retreat as planned; instead, he went back to rescue her.

The organization fired a shot in his back.

The bullet pierced his back and exited through his chest. As he fell to the ground, the girl's eyes were the last thing he saw.

It's very bright.

It looks exactly like this cat.

Lu Yuan reached out and carefully scooped the cat up.

He looked down at the little orange kitten in his palm. It looked back at him with its cloudy eyes and meowed.

In his past life, he had witnessed too much death. He had killed and been killed. In the Syndicate's training system, everything soft was ground away. Pity, hesitation, and a soft heart were the Achilles' heel of field operations officers.

Thus, he became the Syndicate's chief con artist, the underworld legend "Joker," a master of various killing techniques, card tricks, and psychology.

But he still died.

He died protecting an innocent little girl.

Then everything returns to zero.

The little thing was as light as a wad of damp cotton, trembling in his palm.

Lu Yuan stood up, took out his phone, and checked the nearest pet hospital. There was one three kilometers away, with nighttime emergency room fees starting at one hundred yuan.

He had a total of 253 yuan in his pocket.

After deducting tonight's lunch money, tomorrow's transportation costs, and the extra's registration fee for the day after tomorrow.

not enough.

None of them are enough.

Lu Yuan tucked the little orange cat into his arms, zipped up his windbreaker, leaving only its orange head showing.

He walked towards the pet hospital, with 253 yuan in his pocket, intending to spend 100 yuan.

With 153 yuan left, it should last for a few more days.

The lights in the pet hospital were very white, so white they were blinding.

Lu Yuan sat on a plastic chair in the corridor, clutching the payment slip. The 100 yuan emergency room fee was paid; the little orange cat was inside having its leg immobilized. The vet said it was a tibia fracture, not the most serious, but further treatment would cost several hundred more.

A few hundred yuan.

He stared at the numbers on the payment slip and sat quietly for a while.

Then fold the payment slip and put it in your pocket.

The operating room door opened, and the doctor carried the little orange kitten out. Its hind legs were wrapped in gauze and splints, and it was crooked and twisted. The little guy was clearly dazed from the anesthesia.

Lu Yuan bought a cat treat and held it to the cat's mouth. The little orange cat licked it twice, then buried its head in his palm and stayed still.

"Sixth Brother," Lu Yuan named it. "From now on, you'll be with me, and you'll be called Sixth Brother."

The sixth brother responded with a yawn.

By the time they left the pet hospital, it was completely dark. Lu Yuan tucked Lao Liu into his arms, zipped up the zipper, and walked towards their residence along the streetlights.

He rented a partitioned room in a village in the city of Hengdian for 350 yuan a month. When he opened the door, Lao Liu was already asleep in his arms.