"Xiao Qi, has your teacher left?"
Only after Zhao Kongcheng was gone did Auntie come hurrying out of the kitchen. "Aiya, why didn't you make him stay for dinner before going! You child..."
Lin Qiye shook his head. "He has business to see to. He wouldn't have stayed."
"What did your teacher want?"
"Nothing much. Some PE assessment coming up—he came specially to ask about my eyes."
"That Teacher Zhao is truly a good man, coming to a student's home in person. Oh—and before you got back, he even helped me wash the vegetables in the kitchen. Big burly fellow like that, who'd have thought he'd be so meticulous with housework."
Auntie wiped her hands on her apron, switched off the roaring range hood, and said to Lin Qiye:
"Dinner's just about ready. Go call your brother to the table."
"Okay."
A little later, the family of three sat neatly around the table. Seven full dishes crowded its surface—color, fragrance, flavor, everything—enough to set anyone's appetite raging!
"Stir-fried tomato and egg, stewed chicken soup, dry-fried green beans... and sweet-and-sour ribs?!" Yang Jin swallowed as he surveyed the spread. "Mom, how long has it been since we ate this well?"
"Xiao Qi's eyes are healed! That's a bigger happy occasion than New Year's—of course it deserves a proper celebration!" Auntie said, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
Lin Qiye glanced down at Little Blackie, tail whipping like mad, and smiled.
"Looks like tonight Little Blackie feasts too."
"Lucky mutt." Auntie laughed and raised her teacup. "To celebrate Xiao Qi's recovery—cheers!"
"Cheers!"
"Cheers!!"
...
Beneath the leaden clouds, the last glimmer of dusk had long since vanished. Heaven and earth seemed draped in black gauze.
Rain wavered in the wind.
Light burned bright in the far-off city center.
Through this squat old residential quarter, a figure in a dark-red cloak was sprinting through the rain, a large carrying case in his hand.
Rainwater streamed down Zhao Kongcheng's cheeks. Summer rain, yet somehow cold to the bone.
"You're certain the Ghost-Faced King really came this way?" His brow was locked tight.
Wu Xiangnan's voice sounded in his earpiece.
"Not certain. Ten minutes ago a search team found the Ghost-Faced King's blood in the drain network nearby. Judging from its trail, its destination can only be that old residential quarter—or the city center."
"Two possible destinations?"
"Correct."
"So what's the plan? Split into two teams and hold both?"
"In theory. But the city center's foot traffic is enormous—we can't evacuate a crowd like that quietly. If the Ghost-Faced King surfaces downtown, we're looking at mass casualties and, worse, mass panic. So we've sent the bulk of our combat strength to hold the city center."
"Then what about the old quarter?! If the Ghost-Faced King shows up here, these people are in danger too!"
"The old quarter has few residents, spread thin. Compared to downtown it's far easier to evacuate. And besides..."
"And besides, even if the Ghost-Faced King comes here, the losses won't be too great. Is that it?" A thread of anger ran through Zhao Kongcheng's voice. "The people living here are living, breathing human beings too!"
"Old Zhao, calm down!" Wu Xiangnan's voice was deadly serious. "I never said we were abandoning the old quarter. Hongying is already on her way there with people. Your task is to evacuate the residents—as fast as you possibly can.
"And one more thing. Even if the Ghost-Faced King really does surface on your end, do NOT engage it head-on. The Ghost-Faced King is not something you people can handle. If it comes to it, deploy 【Unrestricted Airspace】 and pen it in."
Zhao Kongcheng's clenched fist slowly loosened, and he sighed.
"Copy."
There was resentment in his chest, but he knew perfectly well: this was the correct call.
If the Ghost-Faced King reached downtown, where the crowds ran that dense, it could duck into any dark corner, kill a few people, and recover its wounds—and the moment it was seen by the public, panic was guaranteed.
Downtown could absorb any number of reinforcements and still want more.
The old quarter, by contrast, housed few people, scattered far apart. Even if the Ghost-Faced King came here, recovering its strength would take time, and the odds of exposure were slim.
Given all that, the fact that Wu Xiangnan was sending anyone to the old quarter at all was already more than fair.
Right now, his job was to evacuate the residents, fast.
This was a race against time!
Zhao Kongcheng's figure wove through the rain at astonishing speed, raindrops bursting into crystal blossoms against the case in his hand.
Not far ahead, through the haze of rain, that familiar squat building grew clearer and clearer.
He had walked out of it only minutes ago.
His heart was a tangle. By his count, that little family should just be sitting down to dinner about now. He remembered there were sweet-and-sour ribs. Tomato and egg. Dry-fried green beans...
Right—he'd washed those green beans himself.
Damn it all. One minute he's showing off in front of the kid—leave guarding the world to me—and the next he has to go knock on their door and tell them to run for it...
Do you know how bad that makes me look?!
But the time for worrying about face was over.
Zhao Kongcheng flew forward through the standing water—and at that moment, a stench of unspeakable foulness flooded his nostrils!
His pupils snapped tight, and he slammed to a halt!!
The clamor of rain filled Zhao Kongcheng's skull. Slowly, carefully, he turned his neck, eyes wide, terrified of missing a single detail.
Then his gaze fell on a manhole cover not far away.
The stench was thickening.
Zhao Kongcheng's hand clamped around the case's handle. He drew a deep breath, bent slightly, and set the case down on the ground.
He knew exactly what that stench meant.
"Reporting. Watcher Zhao Kongcheng. Ghost-Faced King located—old residential quarter..." He keyed the earpiece, his voice perfectly calm.
As he spoke, he pressed the latch on the case.
SNAP—!
The case sprang open, revealing three brand-new signboards in a neat row.
Zhao Kongcheng hefted the three signboards, planted one on the spot, and tore off toward the far side at a dead sprint!
Almost the instant he finished speaking, Wu Xiangnan's voice burst from the earpiece.
"Copy! Orders are out—every Night Watchman is converging on the old quarter. Hongying's team is nearly there. Ten minutes at most!
"Ten minutes! Old Zhao, deploy 【Unrestricted Airspace】 and hold it in place!"
Zhao Kongcheng set down the second signboard and, sprinting for the triangle's third vertex, answered helplessly:
"Xiangnan, 【Unrestricted Airspace】 hides battles. It doesn't cage things. It won't hold a Ghost-Faced King for ten minutes."
Glug. Glug. Glug...
Rainwater sheeted down the sloped ground, pouring into the manhole—when suddenly the entire cover began to shudder violently, and the water that had been draining in came boiling back out like a geyser in full eruption!
"Whatever happens, do NOT fight the Ghost-Faced King head-on!" Wu Xiangnan's voice had gone openly urgent. "Old Zhao—the old quarter is huge. Even if the King surfaces, it won't necessarily do real damage right away.
"Ten minutes—even if it kills a few people in that window, it won't recover much strength!
"Civilian casualties from 'mysteries' happen every hour of every day. We Night Watchmen are not gods; we can't stop every death. But trading a core team member for one badly wounded Ghost-Faced King is an absolute, unqualified loss!
"Old Zhao. Old Zhao! Can you hear me?!"
BANG—!
The manhole cover launched skyward like a cannon shell. From the black mouth of the drain, a hideous arm punched out—and then a monster several times the size of any Ghost-Faced Man vaulted up into the rain!
Zhao Kongcheng watched it come, perfectly calm. He slowly set down the last signboard in his hands, bit his fingertip open, and smeared one stroke of blood across the sign's face.
"Xiangnan. Do you remember the oath you once swore..."
Zhao Kongcheng held the Ghost-Faced King in his gaze, sinking into a slight crouch, the corner of his eye resting on that squat little residential building not far away.
"If the dark night should fall at last, I shall stand before the ten thousands of thousands...
"This time, there are no ten thousands of thousands at my back.
"But—
"behind me...
"stands the whole world of that child."
His palms clapped suddenly together.
An invisible canvas dropped over that small triangle of earth.
"Forbidden Ruins... 【Unrestricted Airspace】!"