My sister, whom I raised, has turned evil after faking her death for three years.

The alley was narrow, with towering old building walls on both sides, cutting the afternoon sunlight into fragmented pieces.

The further you go in, the stronger the damp, musty smell becomes, mixed with some unknown stench of decay.

In the corner were piles of discarded cardboard boxes and a rusted tricycle whose original color was no longer recognizable, and crooked graffiti covered the walls.

The laughter coming from the depths of the alley grew clearer and clearer. It was a rough and reckless laugh, unique to teenagers going through puberty, mixed with the crisp sound of sticks hitting the walls and faint sobs.

Su Qing turned the corner and saw the scene at the end of the alley.

Four teenagers, around fifteen or sixteen years old, formed a circle around a little girl, cornering her against the wall.

The child was huddled in the gap between the trash can and the wall, his school uniform skirt covered in black ash.

The schoolbag was ripped off and thrown aside, and the textbooks and pencil case inside were all emptied out, covered with shoe prints.

A skinny guy with a buzz cut, as thin as a bamboo pole, squatted in front of her, poking her shoulder repeatedly with a half-twig. Every time he poked her, the three people next to him would burst into laughter.

The little girl buried her face in her knees, her shoulders trembling violently, but she bit her lip tightly, afraid to make a sound, only a very faint sob leaking out from between her teeth.

Su Qing stopped, the dim light in the alley casting a thin shadow on her face.

The tall, thin boy with straw-colored yellow hair turned his head and looked her up and down.

His gaze slid from her face to her shoulder, and then from her shoulder to her waist, as sticky as a piece of spoiled candy.

The man in the black T-shirt next to him spoke first, his voice shrill and cloying: "Sister, have you come to the wrong place?"

The one squatting on the bamboo pole chimed in, still poking the little girl with the twig in his hand: "You didn't go to the wrong place, you didn't go to the wrong place. You came here to play with us, didn't you, sister?"

The blond-haired man smirked, took a step forward, and brazenly swept his gaze over Su Qing's neckline: "Sister, you're so beautiful, even prettier than our school's beauty queen. How old are you, sister? Do you have a boyfriend? If not, consider me. I'm really good at fighting."

As he finished speaking, he casually flicked his bangs, thinking he looked cool. Several people around him joined in the laughter, which echoed through the narrow alley like the barking of wild dogs.

Su Qing suddenly smiled.

That smile was beautiful; her eyebrows and eyes were curved, and the upturned corners of her mouth made her whole face brighter.

  

The blond guy was stunned by her laughter, his heart skipped a beat, and he thought his flirting was surprisingly effective.

He opened his mouth, about to say something even more cheesy, when Su Qing spoke up: "Has anyone ever told you...?"

She tilted her head slightly, her tone as soft as if she were coaxing a child, but every word carried a chilling calmness: "Should we be polite when speaking to elders?"

The blond-haired man still had that slick smile on his face when Su Qing raised her hand.

Starting from the waist, the shoulder leads the elbow, and the elbow leads the wrist, twisting the force of the entire upper body into a single, forceful strike.

The slap landed precisely on the blond-haired man's left cheek, with a force far beyond what one would expect from a girl who looked so delicate.

The blond-haired man flew sideways, spun halfway through the air, and crashed into a pile of cardboard boxes against the wall. The boxes collapsed with a thud, burying half of him.

He covered his face, his terrified eyes peeking out from the gap in the cardboard box, a stream of bright red liquid slowly trickling from his nostrils, his lips trembling several times, unable to utter a single word.

The alley fell silent instantly.

The laughter of the other three seemed to have been cut off; their expressions hadn't yet shifted from playful banter, and they froze, looking particularly comical.

Su Qing withdrew her hand, flicked her wrist, and scanned the faces of the remaining three people one by one. The smile on her lips had not yet faded, but there was no smile in her eyes, only the excitement of a hunter eyeing his prey.

"The law protects minors," she said calmly, as if explaining a simple principle to them, "not to protect you bad kids. Since no one has taught you to be polite to your elders, I'll take the trouble to teach you today."

The man in the black T-shirt to her left reacted, cursed, and charged forward, fists swung.

Su Qing dodged to the side, grabbed his wrist with her left hand and twisted it, then slapped him across the other side of his face with her right hand.

The black T-shirt spun halfway around like a top, then stumbled and bumped into the rusty tricycle next to it, making its bell ring a few times.

Another person tried to hug her from behind, but she hit him in the nose with her elbow. He covered his nose and squatted down, blood trickling from between his fingers and dripping onto the dusty ground.

As he turned to run away, Su Qing grabbed him by the back of his collar, pulled him back, and slapped him across the back of the ear.

He didn't even utter a sound before collapsing to the ground, his head buzzing and his vision filled with static.

The alleyway was quiet again.

Su Qing dusted off her hands, looked down at the four people who were slumped over, and suddenly seemed to remember something. She walked over to the blond-haired man and squatted down.

The blond-haired man covered his face and shrank back until his back was pressed against the wall, with nowhere left to retreat. He mumbled "sorry" incoherently.

Su Qing reached out and pinched his chin, turning his face around. She looked him over from side to side and then nodded in satisfaction.

She stood up, turned and took two steps deeper into the alley, then turned back, looking down at the four people on the ground. Her tone remained indifferent, like a homeroom teacher assigning homework: "From now on, call me 'Big Brother,' understand?"

The four people nodded frantically, their swollen eyes, narrowed to slits, filled with fear.

The program arrived at the end of the alley at this time.

After making the call, he told the driver to put the two little ones in the car, and then he chased after them into the alley, running all the way here.

The mask was pulled down, the hat was off, and the breath was still ragged. The person was holding a phone, and their face showed a kind of anxiety, as if they were ready to help but didn't know where to start.

Then he saw a scene that silenced him: four teenagers kneeling in a corner, their faces so swollen they were unrecognizable.

The blond-haired man had a wad of tissue stuffed in each of his nostrils, and his black T-shirt covered one of his reddened ears. The other two kept their heads down, not daring to look at anyone.

Su Qing stood in front of them, bending down to lift out the dirty little girl who was huddled in the corner.

Her movements were very gentle; one hand supported the child's back, while the other protected the back of her head, making her seem like a completely different person from the ruthless woman who had just slapped someone away.

The child's little hands gripped her collar, and he curled up in her arms, his shoulders still trembling slightly, but he didn't cry out. He just buried his face in her shoulder.

Cheng Xuyan stood there, watching Su Qing carry the dirty little girl out of the dark alley.

The afternoon sun slanted in from the alley entrance, pulling her out of the shadows.

For a fleeting moment, an inopportune thought flashed through his mind: she looked so delicate, yet she was fiercer than anyone he had ever seen in a fight.

The thought only lingered in his mind for a moment before he forcibly suppressed it, but his ears still involuntarily turned a little red.

As they approached, Su Qing's expression changed from her previous relaxed excitement to a subtle and complex one.

She gently pulled the child's face out from under her shoulder and glanced at it in the light from the alleyway.

The child's face was streaked with tears, his dirty cheeks were smeared with ash, one and a half of his two braids were undone, and the stray hairs on his forehead were stuck to his brow with sweat. His large, terrified eyes were filled with tears, and his pupils visibly contracted the moment he saw Su Qing.

Cheng Xuyan recognized her as well, his brow furrowing slightly: "Jiang Yi?"