Tang Qiaoqiao’s eyes went wide, and tears slid down from the corners of her eyes. She could feel the tip of the knife hovering right above her heart, as if one stronger heartbeat would make it touch her.

Fate…

What fate? She had said that if their fate changed, she would tell him. But after saying those words, she never contacted him again, leaving him alone to think and stay on guard.

If she never contacted him, then did that mean his and Zhang Simiao’s fate had not changed? What kind of fate had it been in the first place? From the way she spoke—or from the situation he and Zhang Simiao were already in—they both knew very well. They had always been walking a hopeless road, a tragedy they wanted to escape from but could not.

Wen Yuxian stood there in a daze as reason slowly returned. If not for what that information broker had said, what would he have done? He would have killed Tang Qiaoqiao. He would never have stopped. And then what? No matter where he fled with Zhang Simiao, the Tang family would hunt them to the ends of the earth. Not only them—other Atavist families would help too. Atavist families had always been united when it came to this kind of thing. The Tribunal Division would chase them down. Even ordinary people would keep searching everywhere until they dragged them out.

Hopeless. No way out.

He could not kill Tang Qiaoqiao, no matter how badly he wanted to. Wen Yuxian realized that at this moment. Even if the chance was tiny, he still wanted to hold onto it. He refused to accept that this world had no room for someone as good as Zhang Simiao.

Since they might die either way, he might as well gamble once. That information broker had no reason to go in such a huge circle just to toy with him. He did not believe he was worth that much.

“You… why are you here?” Wen Yuxian finally remembered to ask.

Tang Qiaoqiao cried as she answered, “It… it was Long Ling. She said you were in danger and told me to come. She… she lied to me. She’s a bad friend. Wuuu…”

Wen Yuxian felt as if his heart had stopped for a second.

He pulled the knife back and stood up. Since he had not stabbed her heart, for an Atavist with a fairly high purity level like Tang Qiaoqiao, the wound at worst would heal in a couple of days.

At some point, four people had appeared in the trees around them, surrounding them in a ring.

“Tang Qiaoqiao, if you don’t want to die, run the moment you get the chance,” Wen Yuxian said in a terrifyingly calm voice. At this point, there was no need to think anymore about what would happen after Tang Qiaoqiao left alive.

Tang Qiaoqiao clutched her bleeding chest and looked at those people, extremely tense. Enemies?

“At a time like this, you’re still thinking about your student’s safety? Wen Yuxian, weren’t you just trying to kill her? You’re full of contradictions,” the woman said. “Why don’t we skip the extra steps and jump straight to the end? Hand over Zhang Simiao.”

“Why waste words with him?” The scar-faced man spat and suddenly roared, “Zhang Simiao! Come out, or we’ll kill Wen Yuxian!”

A powerful sound wave burst out at once, startling birds and beasts in the forest. Even though the rain weakened it, the echo still spread everywhere.

In the next instant, Wen Yuxian’s cold blade was already at the man’s throat. The man had not expected him to be this fast and barely dodged. When he touched his neck, he found a cut and a hand full of blood.

Hatred surged through Wen Yuxian’s chest.

These were the people who had attacked Zhang Simiao that day, turning her into a monster and driving her into pain and despair. If he could, he wanted to kill every single person in this organization. But he was too weak, and he had no one he could trust for help, so all he could do was hide with Zhang Simiao.

But now, even the road of hiding had been cut off. There was no road forward, and no road back.

The four-against-one fight began just like that. Even the wind seemed sharp now, scraping across the face like blades.

Their first goal was to capture Wen Yuxian and force Zhang Simiao out, so they did not care about Tang Qiaoqiao for the moment. Tang Qiaoqiao climbed up from the ground at once, pressed a hand to her wound, and stumbled down the mountain as fast as she could.

But as she ran, she slowed down and looked back in hesitation. “Teacher Wen…”

…

Inside the little Bubble.

Zhang Simiao was pacing anxiously by the entrance. She wanted to go out and look, but she was also afraid that doing so would only harm Wen Yuxian. In her anxiety, she bit at her nails.

She knew it. Sooner or later, she would drag Wen Yuxian down to his death. She knew it…

“Zhang Simiao! Come out, or we’ll kill Wen Yuxian!”

Zhang Simiao stopped at once and whipped her head toward the outside of the Bubble.

…

The rain looked like it might stop, but it was still strong enough to keep washing away Wen Yuxian’s blood. He moved quickly through the dark while four figures chased behind him.

Wen Yuxian knew they were after Zhang Simiao, and he was afraid she would come out, so of course he led them somewhere else. He left the mountain very quickly. But as his gaze swept across the roadside, he saw a parked car. It not only carried the Dragon clan emblem, but the plate number also looked very familiar.

But he had no time to think. He was blocked off. Someone stomped hard on that car, and the body instantly caved in. If someone had been inside, their neck would probably have been crushed at once.

The scar-faced man had already turned into something like a hyena beastman. Standing on top of the ruined car, he showed a mouth full of sharp teeth, spotted fur, and a pair of eyes full of cunning, malice, and greed as he stared hungrily at Wen Yuxian.

His teammate’s hands had become mantis-like arms, except the blades on them were clearly made for taking lives.

“Wen Yuxian, give up. Do you still not understand? Giving up is the best choice. Struggling for nothing will only bring pain, whether for you or Zhang Simiao,” the woman said with a sigh.

“You don’t get to make fake kind speeches like that,” Wen Yuxian replied. Surrounded on all sides with no opening to escape, he was burning with anxiety.

Miaomiao, don’t come out. No matter what, don’t come out!

Three men pressed Wen Yuxian from all sides. The woman stayed where she was, scanning the area. When cars approached from a distance without knowing better, she actually adopted the pose of a traffic police officer and gave a sharp, professional signal telling them to stop and leave. Maybe because they could see Atavists fighting up ahead, those drivers really did quickly turn around and leave.

People in this world had a strong sense of danger. Their curiosity was much weaker than their instinct to stay alive.

At the same time, she opened her mouth as if speaking to the empty air. “Zhang Simiao, still not coming out? How about this—you come out, and we let Wen Yuxian go. You don’t even have to die. You’re a valuable experimental subject. We won’t let you die so easily. If you cooperate, maybe it’s even possible to let you two desperate lovers stay alive together in our organization…”

“Shut up!” Wen Yuxian shouted. Not one word from these people could be trusted, and he was terrified that Zhang Simiao would be tricked into coming out.

Wen Yuxian’s Atavist purity was low. He did have healing ability, but it was not strong. The injuries he got during the human bone case had not fully healed, and now he was being attacked by four capable Atavists at once. He was already starting to lose, and wounds kept piling up across his body.

Hiding in the dark, Zhang Simiao almost could not hold back from rushing out. Then a hand grabbed her. She startled and turned her head, only to see a girl with twin ponytails and bits of spiderweb, leaves, and dry grass stuck in her hair.

Tang Qiaoqiao had actually come back.

“Stay here and don’t move. I’m going to help Teacher Wen,” Tang Qiaoqiao said with red eyes. She glared hard at Zhang Simiao with the look of someone ready to risk everything.

So this was Zhang Simiao. At that moment, Tang Qiaoqiao suddenly understood why Wen Yuxian had exploded in anger and wanted to kill her. She was hurt, and jealous too, but no matter what, she could not just stand there and watch Teacher Wen die!

With that thought, Tang Qiaoqiao charged out. As she moved at high speed, her hands began to change shape.

The Tang family’s ancestor was a rabbit demon. But this kind of creature from another space was nothing like the cute little rabbits of the human world. It had no fur at all, like a hairless cat among rabbits, with a mouth full of sharp teeth, a body that loved meat, long arms and legs, and razor claws. Only the symbolic rabbit ears and rabbit-like face made it recognizable as a rabbit.

During the Great Cosmic Convergence, it had also been a ruler in its own right.

And Tang Qiaoqiao’s Atavist purity was not low. Once she used all her Atavist power and brought out her claws, every fingernail was a blade.

“Tang Qiaoqiao?” Wen Yuxian cried out in surprise as they ended up back to back. He had not expected her to return when he had just tried to kill her a short while ago.

“I won’t tell anyone,” Tang Qiaoqiao sniffed and said. “She’s never eaten anyone, right?”

Even though Wen Yuxian had almost killed her, Tang Qiaoqiao still believed he was a good person. A good person would never bear to watch someone they loved stay alive by eating people. Killing such a person would only free their soul—it would never mean keeping them penned up.

Wen Yuxian froze. He had never imagined that the first person to believe Zhang Simiao had not eaten anyone would be the student he disliked most right now. But at the same time, he also felt a little relieved. Tang Qiaoqiao had many flaws. Sometimes those flaws made her deeply unpleasant. But he had always felt that, at heart, she was still a good child. And it turned out he had not been wrong.

“…Thank you.”

“Great. Another one came here to die,” one of the enemies said coldly.

One against four became two against four.

Once Tang Qiaoqiao calmed down, her fighting strength was very impressive. But she was still too young. Up until now, the missions the school assigned had always been team missions, so she had never fought in a battle like this, where there was no way out and life and death were on the line. Her Atavist power was stronger than theirs, but her close combat skills and battle experience were not, so wounds quickly began to pile up on her too.

The more she got hurt, the crazier she became. While fighting, she screamed insults at them. “I’m telling my parents! You ugly freaks, you trash who treat life like dirt, all of you go die, go die! Don’t you dare hurt Teacher Wen!”

Then she was hit hard and sent flying, smashing into the mountainside so hard that a deep crater formed and trapped her inside. Tang Qiaoqiao’s head spun, her awareness faded, and she muttered “Teacher Wen…” before finally slumping unconscious.

“Damn, that brat was a pain!” the man whose arm had almost been torn off cursed.

At the same time, one kick sent Wen Yuxian flying like a cannonball. He slammed into a car that had just been about to switch lanes and flee. The body of the car caved in instantly and skidded several meters. The driver in front had nearly been crushed to death by that sudden disaster and screamed in terror before scrambling out of the car and running.

Wen Yuxian was embedded in the car, blood pouring from his mouth in heavy streams. Who knew how many bones had broken.

Without anyone noticing, the rain had stopped.

Both he and Tang Qiaoqiao had clearly lost the ability to keep fighting.

Then, with a monster’s roar full of pain, Zhang Simiao burst out of the mountain.

“That bitch finally came out,” the scar-faced man said.

“Who are you calling a bitch?” the woman mocked. “Do you call your mother that too? No, wait, I forgot—you don’t even have a mother.”

The scar-faced man flew into a rage. “You—”

“Alright, alright, don’t start fighting among yourselves now. If you want to fight, wait until later,” the mantis-armed man hurriedly said.

Zhang Simiao could no longer speak human words. Even her crying looked almost strange. But even so, anyone could feel the pain coming from deep inside her soul.

Wen Yuxian trembled as he took her hand. The ring he had not managed to give her rolled away unnoticed into the corner by the road. “M-Miaomiao… let’s…”

“Let’s go to hell together…”

In despair, he thought that he could not leave Zhang Simiao behind to face these people—this hopeless world—alone.

Zhang Simiao hugged him tightly and nodded without hesitation.

But neither of them knew yet that Zhang Simiao had incredibly strong vitality and regeneration. She would not die easily. So the only one who died was Wen Yuxian. Zhang Simiao survived and was taken away. In the future, she would be turned into a weapon of war, forgetting Wen Yuxian and even forgetting that she had once been Zhang Simiao.

[Wen Yuxian died after the rain stopped.]

Zhang Simiao had five hands. At this moment, one rested on her own chest, and another lightly rested on Wen Yuxian’s chest, her sharp nails seeming able to tear through flesh with ease.

“Not good! They’re trying to kill themselves!” The mantis-armed man noticed her movement and swung his blade as he rushed forward.

“I was just about to say,” a gentle female voice suddenly rang out.

The four of them froze in shock and whipped their heads around. What? There was someone else here?!

A figure holding an umbrella slowly stepped out from the shadows.

“You wrecked my car like this. You’re paying for that, right?”

The umbrella folded closed, and the raincoat hood was pulled back, revealing the beautiful face of a young woman. Her cat-like eyes looked at them, bright and mysterious.

Wen Yuxian’s bloodstained eyes widened slightly. Long Jin? Why was she here? Right—the car, that plate number. No wonder it had looked familiar. It was the car Long Jin always rode to and from school. He had even ridden in it once.

Jing Pei walked step by step toward Wen Yuxian and Zhang Simiao while speaking. “I’ve been doing an experiment on whether fate can be changed. The people investigating were stopped, the hiding place was changed, the people involved changed the way they thought, the person who was supposed to die didn’t die, and even came out to help. Yet things still reached this point, and even the time of death had to line up. This rebellious child is really strong and utterly inflexible. So now it’s time to add the final variable into the experiment.”

She sounded like she was talking to someone else, but also like she was talking to herself. The other four had no idea what she meant. Only Wen Yuxian’s eyes widened further.

“I hope the four of you can give me some face and let this end here,” Jing Pei said in a solemn tone.

“Hahaha, little girl, you talk big. Give you face? Who do you think you are?!” In the next instant, the mantis-armed man slashed toward her, his blade dropping straight down.

Jing Pei did not dodge.

The mantis-armed man was just about to smile in triumph when Jing Pei simply lifted a hand and caught his mantis blade barehanded.

That hand was already covered in a layer of deep, beautiful blue dragon scales.

What?!

He was stunned.

Jing Pei gave him a gentle smile, but her cat eyes were cold. “If you won’t give me face, I’ll take your life.”

She put a little force into her hand. With a sharp crack, the mantis arm that had cut countless wounds into Wen Yuxian snapped instantly in two.

“Ahhh!” The man screamed at once.

When the scar-faced man charged at her, Jing Pei grabbed the shrieking mantis man, swung him around, and hurled him like a baseball. In an instant he flew like a cannonball, smashed into the scar-faced man, and sent them both crashing into Jing Pei’s car. Like Wen Yuxian before, they sank deep into the metal, and car and bodies rolled together several times.

“Be careful. She’s a Dragon Atavist. The Long family’s first in two hundred years. Atavist purity ninety-five percent. She’s basically not human anymore,” the woman said, body tense, with the first sign of retreat in her eyes as she warned her partner.

They did not even need to fight to know they were being crushed. Just those few easy moves were enough to show it. This was a dragon—a legendary creature. Atavists like them could not compare to her at all, either in species or in purity.

Jing Pei did not seem to care about them. She took a small turtle shell from her pocket and poured Atavist power into it. As more power flowed in, the shell quickly grew larger in her hand.

It was Wu Ying’s shell. The Black Tortoise clan’s defensive power was said to be the greatest in the world, and the shell of someone with Wu Ying’s high purity was beyond mention. Even if every nuclear bomb in the world were dropped on it, it might not break.

Wen Yuxian recognized it as something from the Wu family. Swallowing the blood rising in his throat again, he asked with difficulty, “What did you trade Wu Ying for it?”

Zhang Simiao had gone completely still. Her huge eye stared round and wide at Jing Pei.

“That’s none of your concern.”

The more Atavist power she poured into it, the bigger the shell grew. Soon it was huge enough to cover both Wen Yuxian and Zhang Simiao. At that moment, the woman and her partner lunged at her, only to be smashed away by a swing of the shell. Their skulls almost split open like walnuts hit by a hammer.

Before the shell dropped over them, Wen Yuxian asked with difficulty, “That final variable… what is it?”

Jing Pei smiled. “Me.”

If guiding things from the side, and the efforts of the people involved themselves, still were not enough—then what about direct intervention by her?

The four people who had been sent flying staggered back up and screamed as they rushed to surround Jing Pei again.

The heavy rain had fully stopped. Jing Pei sat on top of the turtle shell and looked down at them. Her cat eyes were cold, and the curve of her mouth looked like the gentle smile of death itself.

…

Wen Yuxian and Zhang Simiao lay pinned under the shell. They could not hear a single sound from outside. All they felt was the ground shaking violently. If Zhang Simiao had not been holding him, the shaking might have thrown him up into the air.

What was happening outside? It should be fine, right? Someone like her must have made full preparations.

Not long after, the shaking outside seemed to stop. Then the heavy shell—which no human arms and no normal machine could possibly lift—was raised a little by a single hand, and the light from the street lamps spilled in.

Jing Pei was crouching outside, looking at them.

“It’s not time to come out yet. The Tribunal Division will be here soon.”

Wen Yuxian tensed at once and tried to say something, but blood surged up from his mouth again.

“I’ll leave the choice to you,” Jing Pei said. “Do you want to keep running and hiding, or hand your future over to me?”

“…What kind of guarantee can you make?” Wen Yuxian asked.

Jing Pei smiled. “I make no guarantees.”

Even though she would do everything she could—for them, and even more for herself—why would she put chains on herself for no reason? Besides, the Young Master of the Long family didn’t make empty promises. Only a shameless information broker did that.

“How sly,” Wen Yuxian said with a bitter smile. That way, if he chose wrong, he would not even have the right to blame her.

…

Several Tribunal Division cars drove in silently and fast, quickly reaching the area.

But before they could even get close, one car suddenly pitched forward, its rear lifting high into the air like a beetle that had fallen nose-first into a pit. Its rear wheels spun helplessly. The cars behind had to stop. When the people got out and looked ahead, they were stunned.

The entire road here had been destroyed. No one knew what kind of force it had taken, but several deep trenches cut across the road, looking as if a giant beast had slashed them open with its claws. If they had been any wider, a car would have plunged straight in.

And besides those trenches, there were several pits four or five meters deep. Looking into them, each one held a twisted body—either unconscious or dead.

Their eyes all turned toward the giant turtle shell, which still looked small compared to those huge craters, and toward Jing Pei sitting on top of it.

Jing Pei greeted them, “Hi. Please send the road repair bill to the Long family. But I’ll be applying to the government for a reward and compensation.”

There was no way she was paying a single cent out of pocket. She had been catching criminals. She was doing a good deed.