“Who is so eager to meet the King of Hell that they have to disturb me while I’m reading?”
Ling Yan glanced at the surveillance monitor, where several unwelcome guests had just appeared.
Her sharp gaze was as cold as if she were already looking at corpses.
With a click, the hidden compartment in the desk opened, and Ling Yan took out a delicate bow and arrow.
Another click sounded behind her as the bookshelf inside the hidden compartment opened. Her slender, fair fingers gently brushed over the rows of firearms concealed within.
There were rows upon rows of the latest weapons, including the world ranked number one Glock 17, weighing 710 grams, with a range of 50 meters and a muzzle velocity of 360 meters per second.
There was also the well known Desert Eagle. In fact, all the firearms ranked within the top ten could be found here.
“My little darlings, it’s been a few days since we last met. You missed me, didn’t you? Today, I’ll let you all come out and stretch your legs.”
She casually picked up a CZ-75 fully automatic pistol and even attached a silencer to it so that she would not disturb the neighbors.
“I’m a law abiding citizen, after all. It’s so late, I can’t disturb the neighbors, right, darling?”
Ling Yan slipped the pistol into the holster strapped to her leg.
She then moved some things aside, pulled up a chair, and sat directly opposite the front door, waiting for her prey to come up.
Hearing the sound of the doorknob turning, Ling Yan looked thoroughly unimpressed.
“At this speed, how did you even become assassins? This batch of prey is far too pathetic. You’ve ruined my mood to play with you.”
“0228, don’t get too arrogant. This is a weapon newly developed by Dr. Jin. There’s no way you’ll escape this time. To spare yourself some pain, I advise you to come back with us obediently.”
The black clad men were furious after hearing her arrogant words as soon as they entered.
One by one, they raised their weapons and aimed them at Ling Yan.
“Then you’ll have to see whether you’re capable of it.”
The moment she finished speaking, Ling Yan was already gone from the chair.
“Aah! Aah! Aah!”
Before the black clad men could even react, they had all fallen to the ground, crying out in agony.
“Dr. Jin is getting worse and worse. He actually sent a bunch of useless trash to capture me. I’m in a good mood today, so I’ll spare your lives. Go back and tell him to send me some more advanced prey next time.”
After saying that, Ling Yan picked up the book she had not finished reading and prepared to leave.
When she reached the door, she stopped, turned around, and looked at the black clad men sprawled across the floor.
“Go back and tell Dr. Jin that my name is Ling Yan now, not his experimental subject 0228. Don’t get it wrong next time, or I can’t guarantee that his laboratory will remain safe.”
With that, she walked away without looking back.
What? You’re wondering why she was not worried that those black clad men might attack her from behind.
What was there to worry about? For them to launch a sneak attack, they would first have to be able to move their hands freely. With the tendons in their hands severed, they could forget about launching any sneak attack. They clearly had not woken up from their dreams yet.
“Darling, I’m sorry. You didn’t even get a chance to make a move. I just didn’t expect this batch of prey to be so pathetic, so I even brought you out specially.”
Ling Yan stood inside the elevator with the pistol in her hand, apologizing to it.
After that encounter with the black clad men, Ling Yan did not encounter any more prey.
They say that people should be careful what they wish for. The moment she finished saying that, her phone rang.
Ling Yan glanced lazily at the incoming call from Dr. Jin. It was not until the final ring, just before the call was about to disconnect, that she leisurely pressed the answer button.
“0228, you’ve been living quite comfortably lately, haven’t you? You’ve been having so much fun out there that you don’t even want to come back anymore, is that it?” An aged voice came through the receiver.
“Tsk, Old Man Jin, didn’t those useless idiots tell you that I have a new name now? Or does your laboratory really not want to exist anymore?”
Ling Yan poured herself a glass of red wine and sipped it leisurely, as relaxed as though the person on the other end of the phone were an old friend she had not seen in years.
“Haha, Ling Yan is a very good name indeed! ‘Two white cranes fly high, spreading their wings beyond the mist. Ling Yan, soaring straight into the clouds.’ Ling Yan, rising directly into the heavens.”
The old voice sounded to be in rather good spirits.
Yet the more cheerful he sounded, the more something felt wrong to Ling Yan.
“Old Man Jin, just tell me why you called today. You can forget about making me come back.” Ling Yan did not want to waste any more time talking to him.
“Nothing much. I just never expected an assassin who gives both the underworld and the legitimate world a headache to be kind enough to sponsor an orphanage. 0228, tell me, what kind of spectacle do you think it would be if an orphanage exploded? Would you like to see it?”
Dr. Jin’s demonic voice came through the receiver.
With a bang, the wineglass in Ling Yan’s hand shattered from the force of her grip.
Numerous shards of glass pierced into her palm, yet she seemed completely unaware of the pain, her eyes fixed coldly on the phone.
“Old Man Jin, isn’t it enough that you want me to come back? Fine. As long as you can bear the consequences, I’ll be at the laboratory tomorrow on time.”
Not wanting to hear another word from the person on the other end, she expressionlessly hung up.
Ling Yan looked at the shards embedded in her palm, calmly brought over the first aid kit, and began cleaning the wound with practiced ease.
After cleaning the wound, she stood up, walked to the balcony, and lit a cigarette. Watching the smoke curl through the air, she fell into deep thought.
Dr. Jin was a mad scientist who conducted experiments on living people in order to achieve the results he wanted.
In fact, Ling Yan had grown up in a family that favored sons over daughters. In order to provide a better life for their son, her parents had sent Ling Yan into this madman’s laboratory.
She had been young at the time and always believed that her parents would come back for her, but year after year passed, and she never saw them again.
As she grew older, she came to understand that she had merely been a tool for that family to make money. Once they had received the money, there was no longer any need for their tool to exist.
Did she hate them?
Of course she did, especially whenever those experimental instruments were tested on her. She had hated them with every fiber of her being.
Perhaps it was that overwhelming hatred that had given her the strength to endure.
When she was twenty, she escaped from the laboratory, taking with her a chip that Dr. Jin had painstakingly developed.
The moment she escaped the laboratory, she went straight to find that family, only to discover that they had already disappeared.
That did not mean there was nothing she could do, however. Using the hacking skills she had learned, she investigated the family’s circumstances.
“Looks like you’re living quite well with the money you got from selling me. You even opened a company. But if that money doesn’t belong to you, you shouldn’t be taking it so freely. The three of you can reunite in prison.”
Looking at the family portrait of the three of them, the malicious side of Ling Yan took control, and she pressed a key on the keyboard.
The next day, when she saw the news that the family had been arrested and imprisoned, she felt neither joy nor anger. In her eyes, the fact that she had not dealt with them personally was already the greatest mercy she could have shown them.
After dealing with that family, she began playing a game of cat and mouse with Dr. Jin.
Now, it was time for everything to come to an end. There was no longer any need for that laboratory to exist.
“Is what I asked for ready? Good, I know. I’ll need it tomorrow.”
After hanging up, she went to rest.
Once she lay down on the bed, she still had no desire to sleep.
She casually picked up the book from her bedside table and began reading.
“This second male lead is pretty good. He’s ruthless and not much of a talker. It’s just a shame that the author killed him off to make the male and female leads stand out.”
After seeing the second male lead die, Ling Yan lost interest in the book.