Early in the morning, Jiang Fu left the hotel where she was staying and went to a breakfast stall not far downstairs.
The stall did brisk business. It was right next to several hotels and inns, and directly across from the Public Security Bureau. On top of that, the food was good. But today, it was unusually lively—customers were heatedly discussing something.
“Did you see the wanted notice yesterday?”
“See it? The inspection team searched my neighborhood back and forth several times! Took away a lot of people. The whole scene was terrifying!”
“How could it not be? It involves a ninth-tier crystal core!”
“I bet that crystal core really was stolen.”
“Who would’ve thought the former governor actually left behind a crystal core?”
“The new governor hasn’t even gotten over losing her mother. Isn’t this like provoking someone at the worst possible time?”
“I think our young base commander is just using this as an excuse to eliminate political opponents!”
Hearing the discussion, Jiang Fu didn’t even twitch a brow. She was still disguised as the person on the ID she carried. Calmly, she ordered soy milk and fried dough sticks, and bought two tea eggs for the evil spirit kitten. One woman and one cat sat at a small table by the door and began eating.
The evil spirit, still in the form of a kitten and not fully awake, yawned widely. It pawed at the two tea eggs and meowed in dissatisfaction. “You got up this early just to listen to these people talk about this?”
Jiang Fu ate her fried dough stick unhurriedly. Though she could no longer taste anything, she still liked the crisp texture. After a few mouthfuls of hot soy milk warmed her stomach, she said, “If you get up early, it’s natural to eat breakfast.”
The evil spirit didn’t believe a word. It bit into a tea egg and got a mouthful of shell, spitting it out furiously. “By the way, the you here is really bold—publicly saying there’s a ninth-tier crystal core. Not afraid someone will try to snatch it? Did you do the same back then?”
Jiang Fu replied flatly, “Back then, I was terrified anyone would discover my mother’s body. I hid it as carefully as I could. I only dared to secretly capture people like Zhou Jia, and once I caught them, I silenced them immediately. How could I have made such a public spectacle?”
“Then what about the you now?”
Jiang Fu smiled faintly. “She’s guarding against me.”
To the current Jiang Fu, a mysterious person had discovered her mother’s body and seemed to understand her thoughts rather well. Naturally, she would worry that this person might use the secret to threaten her—or reveal it at any time. So she might as well expose it herself, claiming her mother had left behind half of a ninth-tier crystal core.
If someone later claimed that her mother’s body still existed, she could dismiss it as slander—an attempt to muddy the waters in order to steal the crystal core.
“So the mass arrests across the base—are they really just a chance to round up her opponents?”
“She’s definitely taking advantage of the situation. But the full-base search for this ‘mysterious person’ is real too. Tightening base defenses, replacing key positions with her own people—it all has benefits.”
Not to mention planting doubt about whether the crystal core had actually been stolen.
In short, killing multiple birds with one stone.
The little black cat snickered maliciously. “You left her a message telling her to follow your arrangements, and she didn’t listen at all. Instead, she’s consolidating power as fast as she can. Looks like you can’t control your younger self at this point.”
Jiang Fu looked toward the Public Security Bureau across the street and said evenly, “What’s wrong with consolidating power? She can make as big a move as she wants. Arrest as many people as she likes. Kill ten thousand in one go and become a true tyrant—I’d welcome it. I told her to pause that ‘killing to prove the Dao’ plan because on her execution list right now, there are some people I intend to save.”
The black cat shot upright, its amber eyes wide. It glanced at Jiang Fu and then at the sky, as if wondering whether the sun had risen in the west. Had this Asura really changed?
Just then, a string of desperate cries for help rang out from the street.
A thin teenage boy, covered in blood, his clothes slashed into strips, ran barefoot down the road, screaming as he fled.
Behind him, a drunken, burly man brandished a cleaver, chasing and roaring, “I’ll chop you to death! You unfilial brat—I’ll kill you!”
Customers rushed outside to watch. “What’s going on?”
“It’s that drunk Zhang Biao again! He already beat his wife until she ran away. Now he’s even beating his own son!”
“That’s a cleaver! Someone save the kid!”
They didn’t need to act. Officers from the Public Security Bureau had already rushed out. Leading them was a young policewoman. With a raised hand, a streak of green light flashed. Thick green leaves shot out like strips of cloth, binding the drunkard’s hands and feet. The cleaver clattered to the ground.
The officers subdued him. The young policewoman pulled the boy into her arms. “It’s okay. It’s okay. You’re safe now.”
The boy trembled violently, clutching her arm, and burst into tears. “My dad wants to kill me! He killed my mom too! She didn’t run away—he buried her in the yard!”
The crowd was stunned.
Amid the buzzing commotion, Jiang Fu slowly rose from her seat and looked at the boy sobbing uncontrollably. A smile curved her lips. In her eyes flickered a red gleam of excitement, like a demon spotting prey.
Zhang. Tong.
The one who had stood before her bronze statue and declared that she had murdered his father—who had endured silently at her side for revenge.
The one who, when she was gravely injured and unable to oversee matters, joined forces with others to ambush and poison her trusted subordinates.
The one who opened the base gates and let Sheng Yinghua and the others in, trapping her in layers of encirclement and sealing her defeat.
The one who cut off her head and pinned countless crimes upon her.
The one who, after her death, slaughtered her followers and anyone who tried to defend her.
Jiang Fu breathed carefully, afraid that a deeper breath would reveal the turbulence within her.
Her hands clasped together, fingertips digging into the back of her hand until they turned pale. Yet her lips remained curved in a faint smile—the thrill of exacting her first revenge.
The little black cat’s fur stood on end as it quietly edged backward.
Right now, Jiang Fu was terrifying.
Fortunately, she soon wiped away that eerie smile. Her gaze shifted to the young policewoman.
Han Xiaofei.
She hadn’t known this person in life. But after Jiang Fu’s death, Han Xiaofei had led a small squad in an attempt to retrieve her head from the city wall.
At that time, Jiang Fu’s bronze statue hadn’t yet been erected. Her residual consciousness still lingered in her severed head—chaotic and dim. She only vaguely saw those people wiped out.
In the end, Zhang Tong personally chopped off Han Xiaofei’s neck with a cleaver. Even as blood sprayed out, she was still cursing him.
Now, Han Xiaofei held Zhang Tong protectively and comforted him, issuing orders to her officers at the same time. “Take this drunk into custody. The rest of you, come with me to search the Zhang residence!”
Suddenly, she felt a gaze fixed on her and immediately scanned the surroundings.
But it was just a crowd. No one seemed to be staring. She only noticed, in front of a breakfast stall, a woman in a gray coat lowering her head, her eyes hidden beneath the brim of her hat, turning away quietly.
A small black cat jumped down from the table, stumbled, got up with dust all over itself, and hurried after her.
Han Xiaofei’s instincts told her that something about that person was strange. But in the blink of an eye, both the woman and cat had disappeared.
…
The Zhang family case was easy to investigate. Within minutes of arriving, the security team dug up a woman’s corpse from the yard. Judging by the level of decomposition, she had died about half a month earlier. Some of the wounds were still identifiable—clear signs of prolonged abuse.
The poor woman had been beaten to death.
Although in the apocalypse people’s moral bottom lines had fallen considerably, the survival conditions in Fu’an Base had always been decent. Law enforcement was strict, and criminal punishments severe. No one expected such a horrifying tragedy to occur. The news spread instantly.
The Public Security Bureau took just one day to clarify the entire case and obtain Zhang Biao’s confession. Before the end of the workday, the case was formally handed over for further processing.
Han Xiaofei had been busy all day. Now she was starving—but the tragic state of the female corpse left her with no appetite at all.
Holding the sandwich in her hand, her mind kept drifting back and forth—one moment to the horrifying condition of the body, the next to that strange woman dressed in gray.
They were clearly two completely unrelated people. The gray-clad woman had nothing to do with the case. And yet, for some reason, Han Xiaofei couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something similar about them.
Was it… the aura of death?
Should she look into that woman? She was probably a nearby resident, or perhaps a guest at the hotel?
“Do you think this Zhang Biao will get the death penalty?”
Her colleagues were still discussing the case.
“Definitely. How could he not? They might even fast-track it and chop him right away.”
“I heard the new Base Commander is planning to execute a batch of criminals soon. Hope this Zhang Biao catches that train.”
“Xiaofei, what do you think?”
Han Xiaofei snapped back to attention and nodded. “He definitely will. Domestic abuse, murdering his wife, destroying the body to conceal the crime—any one of those is unforgivable. Didn’t you read the neighbors’ testimonies? In the days before her death, the victim was beaten and cursed at daily just because she cried at home over the former governor’s death. The final trigger was that on the seventh day after the governor’s passing, she burned paper offerings for him, which enraged Zhang Biao…”
As she spoke, Han Xiaofei couldn’t help but feel sorrowful. “That alone—the Commander will never let him off.”
…
In fact, due to the case’s sensitive nature, it went through the formal process the very next day and was submitted to Jiang Fu.
At the time, Jiang Fu had just finished interrogating Zhou Jia, Wang Mianzhi, and the others, confirming that they had indeed conspired to steal her mother’s remains.
She stepped out of the interrogation room, changed out of her bloodstained clothes, and methodically wiped the blood from her fingertips with a damp towel. Throughout it all, her face remained expressionless, her entire being radiating a chilling killing intent.
The secretary stood nearby, her calves trembling slightly. When Jiang Fu glanced at her, she hurriedly handed over the file. “This was just submitted from below. They said you might want to review it personally.”
“Murder and concealment of a corpse?” Jiang Fu flipped through the file. When she quickly came across testimony involving her mother, she tightened her grip on the folder, veins bulging on the back of her hand.
“Damn it! Absolutely damn it!”
A woman grieving her mother’s passing. A woman who burned paper offerings on the seventh day after her mother’s death to mourn her.
And this was the fate she met?
Zhang Biao! Beast!
And the neighbors had heard that while beating his wife, Zhang Biao had repeatedly spoken disrespectfully about her mother.
Was he angry at his wife—or was he angry at her mother?
When he lashed out at that poor woman, was he venting his dissatisfaction with her mother’s governance?
Had he even secretly rejoiced at her mother’s death, thinking to himself that no matter how powerful and high-ranking that woman had been, she had still died young?
No. There was no need to question it. He must have thought that.
And there were many, many others who thought the same as Zhang Biao.
Including those neighbors—perhaps they had even mocked the victim for bringing it upon herself.
Anyone who held even a shred of respect for her mother should have reported such a situation immediately!
Jiang Fu’s eyes instantly reddened. For a brief moment, her expression twisted with fury before she forcibly suppressed it.
After several deep breaths, she said to the secretary, “Chen Yinyu.”
She pointed to the victim’s name in the file. It was a beautiful name—tragically attached to a life that had not been.
“Her devotion to my mother was precious. Prepare her body properly. Bury her in the public cemetery, somewhere closer to my mother.”
In her next life, let her be sheltered by Mother.
“Yes.”
“Does Chen Yinyu have any family?”
“She has no remaining relatives. But she and Zhang Biao have a son, Zhang Tong. He’s currently in the hospital recovering.”
Zhang Biao’s son…
Jiang Fu frowned. “When Chen Yinyu was being abused, what was this son doing?”
The secretary hesitated. “He’s only twelve.”
Twelve wasn’t that young.
“Zhang Biao sometimes beat his son as well. When Zhang Biao lost his temper, Chen Yinyu would push her son out of the house to protect him.”
So she had loved the boy deeply.
Jiang Fu sighed. “Very well. Let him recover first. Then send him to the Charity Orphanage. Have people keep a closer eye on him. If he proves worth cultivating, I’ll give him a chance.”
Given Chen Yinyu’s devotion to her mother, what was it to grant her son a future? Provided he didn’t inherit Zhang Biao’s rotten genes.
Jiang Fu’s tone turned cold again. “Issue orders to all district security bureaus and relevant agencies. Thoroughly investigate domestic violence cases—no, abolish the term ‘domestic violence.’ Any intentional injury within a household is simply assault. Every single case—handle them with the utmost severity. Anyone who dares to smooth things over will be charged with dereliction of duty!”
The secretary hurriedly took notes.
Jiang Fu sat down, pressing her fingers to her temple. “The laws still need revision. They’re not harsh enough…” Otherwise, perhaps introduce collective punishment—to prevent neighbors from shielding criminals again…
The secretary cautiously asked, “Should this Zhang Biao be added to the upcoming execution list?”
“Do you even need to ask?” If not for her remaining rationality, Jiang Fu would have wanted to carry it out herself—slice him into a thousand pieces.
Then something occurred to her. She frowned. “Bring me the list.”
She opened it. The list was updated daily. Today, it had grown to more than three thousand names: officials guilty of corruption, those abusing their power for personal gain, bullies leveraging influence, killers treating lives like grass, human traffickers, manufacturers of fake medicine—and those who had recently been stirring up trouble, threatening the base’s security in opposition to her.
Anyone who had crossed the legal threshold for capital punishment was on it.
There were also some who might escape death under the law—but whom Jiang Fu deemed morally unforgivable. Those who abused the elderly, abandoned children, sold their wives or daughters, attempted murder with extreme malice, indirectly caused deaths without personally striking the blow, repeatedly escaped punishment by feigning mental illness… She had added them all.
And there were the traitors, spies, fugitives captured in the base-wide sweeps over the past two days.
If it were up to her, Jiang Fu would have killed them all. Three thousand was already the result of her restraint.
She intended to execute them together—to let heads roll, to carve out a world of clarity and righteousness through blood.
But that mysterious person had told her not to kill anyone for the time being.
Said to wait for their arrangements. Yet two days had passed without news, and the searches had uncovered no suspicious individuals.
This feeling of being constrained by someone else…
Jiang Fu grew increasingly irritable. The pressure in the office seemed to drop with her mood. The secretary shrank into a corner, sweat beading on her forehead. Fortunately, at that moment, someone knocked on the door, breaking the oppressive atmosphere.
Jiang Fu looked up, her expression softening slightly.
“Senior Sister Shiyue.”