Early in the morning, the first thing Zhou Meng did upon opening her eyes was to press her back against the wall, hide by the window, and—in a highly suspicious posture—peer through the gap in the curtains to carefully observe what was happening outside.
At this early hour, the street below was empty, with little traffic. The buildings looked perfectly ordinary. No problems.
The neighbor’s room was still dim and shadowy, with just a faint glow of an electronic screen visible.
Safe!
She let out a sigh of relief and flopped limply back onto the bed.
[?] Light Orb: [Are you checking whether the neighbor has moved out?]
“It’s not just that,” Zhou Meng said. “I need to make sure no one else is watching me.”
Based on past experience, Eden probably wouldn’t do something like that.
But that was before she’d accepted this kind of job—cleaning up these scenes.
Now, though… would things be different?
[Relax a little, Xiao Meng.] The Light Orb floated up. [You’re being a bit too tense.]
“This is called being cautious.”
Zhou Meng slowly pressed a hand to her chest and murmured, “Though being this wound up isn’t pleasant either…”
[Right, right. Even if they wanted to keep tabs on you, they couldn’t watch you every single day, could they? It’s not like they’re a security camera.]
Zhou Meng: “…”
Zhou Meng fell into thought.
The Light Orb’s drifting motion paused. [What kind of expression is that?]
Zhou Meng sat up. “I’m going to install a camera at my door.”
[Huh?!]
The Light Orb flopped onto the bed with a pat, then floated back up, its electronic voice brimming with excitement: [Are you about to walk down the dark path?!]
“No, I’m not.” Zhou Meng smiled, tying her hair up as she walked toward the sink. “I’m just installing one at the front door, enough to capture the elevator entrance… That way, I’ll know if anything happens.”
[That’s terrifying too!] Light Orb: [Why not let me do the stalking instead?]
Doing that would be an actual crime.
“No.” Zhou Meng held her toothbrush like a knife, speaking softly and gently: “Neither you nor the neighbor are getting rid of me.”
Light Orb: […You’re so scary.]
“Mhm.” Zhou Meng smiled slightly. “After all, I’ve worked at Eden for sixteen years.”
And the night before last, she’d cleaned up a room full of blood for her boss.
She was already a ruthless villain’s subordinate.
After finishing her morning routine, she picked up the jacket she’d worn the day before from by the door and fished a torn-open wrapper out of the pocket.
The wrapper from the wet wipes Sun Zhen had given her.
[Forgot to throw it away?]
The Light Orb floated over curiously, only to see Zhou Meng pull a small sealed bag out of the torn wet-wipe wrapper.
Inside the sealed bag, a few strands of brown fiber glinted in the sunlight, carefully preserved.
The hair she’d found at the crime scene.
As for whether it belonged to the victim or the killer… unknown.
[Xiao Meng?!] The Light Orb was shocked. [When did you collect these?]
“While I was cleaning.”
Zhou Meng casually cut open a padded jacket, tucked the sealed bag inside, and patiently sewed the opening back shut.
She considered herself someone with normal moral values, more or less.
Even though she had to be an Eden employee and work for a villain… she had no intention of doing anything that went against her principles.
Even if her boss was Mikhail, that didn’t change anything.
[Why put it in the wet-wipe wrapper?]
“That’s the only thing Sun Zhen gave me. Everywhere else could be searched… I think it’s better to be careful.”
Though, if the System dared to talk to her at home, then at least there probably weren’t any cameras here yet.
Zhou Meng snipped the thread, pulled out the needle, and put the seamless padded jacket back in the depths of the wardrobe.
With that done, she changed into her running shoes and headed out the door.
The morning sunlight had only just begun to spill onto the streets, carrying little warmth yet—just a faint touch of coziness settling on her cheeks.
It was a weekend morning, and there weren’t many people out yet.
Breathe in. Breathe out.
Her feet kept moving, the scenery falling away behind her.
As her body heated up, the air grew thinner, and her mind gradually burned hot, going blank.
Zhou Meng ran four laps around the nearby park before her stamina started to give out.
She pushed through the last stretch on sheer willpower, finally stopping by a roadside jianbing stall, leaning against it to catch her breath.
Seeing her pale face and trembling legs, the stall owner got a bit worried and reached out to steady her:
“Little sister, are you okay?”
Zhou Meng gasped for air, looked up, and shoved two bills into his hand: “Boss, one—one jianbing, please.”
The stall owner silently took the money she’d handed him: “Oh… oh…”
Zhou Meng stood by the stall, recovering a little. The stall owner spread the batter on the griddle and was about to crack an egg onto it when his face suddenly changed. He rushed to the front of the cart, swung a leg over, and hopped onto the bike:
“The inspectors are coming! Run!”
The other vendors did the same—the breakfast sellers who’d been working their stalls all jumped onto their carts and sped off onto the road in a line.
Another customer waiting for breakfast: “Hey?! Boss, my buns!”
Before they could react, the experienced Zhou Meng had already taken off, sprinting after them with all her might.
“Ugh—!”
Her legs were powerful, her arms swinging forward, fingers together—her running form could have been in a textbook, if not for the fact that she was chasing after a jianbing stall.
She even had the spare energy to grab the scraper from the stall and flip the pancake on the griddle so it wouldn’t burn.
The young man on the rooftop by the roadside choked at the sight, unable to hold back a laugh.
The person on the other end of the phone paused. “Sun Zhen? What are you doing?”
“Watching my partner,” he said, curling his fingers into a circle, mimicking a sniper scope aimed at the girl making jianbing. He squinted one eye and smiled faintly. “How adorable.”
Under his slightly lowered dark gaze, the stall owner was driving his electric tricycle while looking back. “Follow me!”
“???”
The bewildered crowd finally snapped out of it at the sight of Zhou Meng’s actions and began chasing after them one by one.
“Wait up!”
“My chow mein!”
“Go ahead, go ahead!”
The city patrol vehicle trailed not too close, not too far behind. The stall owners sped ahead in their tricycles, fleeing, while the breakfast buyers ran frantically in the middle.
This scene was nothing new to Zhou Meng.
In the first eight loops, she had been just as panicked, but now she was someone who could easily predict the stall owners’ moves!
She endured the soreness in her legs, feeling like she couldn’t run much longer. Confirming that the pancake batter wouldn’t burn for now, she broke away from the crowd and cut through another alley.
This was a small alley entrance, with barely anyone around. Zhou Meng wasn’t worried at all. She waited by the roadside for a few minutes, and sure enough, the stall owners came riding over on their tricycles one by one.
She calmly found her jianbing stall and approached. “Boss, my jianbing.”
The stall owner was startled, only then realizing she’d been waiting here all along. “Oh, oh…”
The stall owner deftly finished making the pancake that had somehow flipped itself without burning, added lettuce and crispy cracker, brushed on a layer of sauce, wrapped it in a paper bag, and handed it to Zhou Meng, remarking curiously, “Little sister, you run pretty fast.”
Zhou Meng took a bite of the jianbing, mumbling “mm-hmm, mm-hmm” to brush it off.
Though she hadn’t actually run ahead of them.
But she would in the future.
Zhou Meng dragged her legs, aching with muscle fatigue, toward the dance studio.
The morning run was just one part of building stamina; next came core training.
During the break, she had to adapt to her body’s condition as quickly as possible.
In the dance studio, Zhou Meng’s arms trembled as she supported her body on her forearms, sweat dripping from her forehead onto the floor.
There were still two years until Ning Qing turned twenty. This time, she absolutely had to—
“Thud—”
Her arms gave out, and she flopped face-down onto the floor.
[Little Meng, pull yourself together!!]
The Light Orb hastily pressed a bill against her face, letting Zhou Meng inhale it a couple of times before she barely recovered.
[Ning Qing can do a hundred alternating toe-touch crunches in one go,] the Light Orb said. [Looks like it’s still too much for Little Meng…]
“Ugh—”
She pushed herself up again with a burst of effort. “I can keep going!!”
Ending was out of the question.
Even working a hundred years wouldn’t end this!
…
The five days of the break passed in a cycle of training-gaming-training.
During that time, Zhou Meng made no attempt to contact the police, maintaining a calm, ordinary daily life.
Five days later.
At 15:00, Zhou Meng’s phone received a message from her boss right on time.
[Mikhail: [Location]]
[Mikhail: Leaving it to you.]
[Zhou Meng: Okay.]
Zhou Meng was already familiar with her boss’s style and didn’t ask questions—that was her professional attitude toward him.
She planned to grab an electric scooter by the roadside and ride it to today’s work location.
Zhou Meng hadn’t known how to ride an electric scooter before, but sixteen years of working had taught her many life skills.
After finishing this ○-shaped plot mission, if Mikhail ever got arrested in the future, she could, for the sake of their sixteen-year friendship, ride an electric scooter to pick him up from prison and offer him an alternative way of living.
But this time, the plan had shifted slightly.
She had just walked downstairs with her messenger bag when an unremarkable gray Jeep pulled up in front of her.
Sun Zhen leaned over from the driver’s seat, reaching out to open the door for her.
He held that leaning position, looking up at her from below, a smile on his face. “Good afternoon, partner.”
Zhou Meng blinked.
“Good afternoon, Sun Zhen.”
She responded politely and bent down to get into his car.
“Didn’t I get here super fast?” Sun Zhen watched her buckle her seatbelt, then started the car with ease.
“Yeah, you showed up the moment I came downstairs.” He was definitely watching her, wasn’t he?
“Haha, I told you I’d come whenever you needed me!” He grinned, impossible to tell if he’d caught her meaning, and handed her a bag of potato cakes with his fingers. “For you.”
Was this guy a child?
Zhou Meng took a bite without blinking, chewing.
This one was delicious too.
Bliss.
…
Today’s assignment was at a high-end apartment building.
Good thing she hadn’t ridden the electric scooter… riding that thing would’ve felt impossible to get in here.
Eden had clearly made the arrangements already. Sun Zhen had just pulled up to the entrance with her, and before they’d even unbuckled their seatbelts, someone came to escort her to the destination.
“We’ll leave it to you from here.” The person in charge led her to the corresponding elevator floor, gave a nod, then shut the elevator doors and went back down, with a somewhat hurried air about them.
Zhou Meng: “…”
She had a bad feeling about this.
Zhou Meng carefully put on her gloves before slowly swiping open the door.
“Eden Housekeeping, door-to-door service.”
“Beep-beep—”
Once the smart lock opened, what greeted her eyes was a tidy living room. The entire space was done in a pristine white tone, the carpet was clean, and on the table sat withered flowers and a few pieces of cutlery. Aside from that, there was no trace of anything suspicious.
…Haha, she’d said so—how could the black parts possibly fall to a newcomer every single time?
Last time was probably just a ritual to rope her into the fold.
Zhou Meng’s mood relaxed, but she still dutifully put on her shoe covers and hair cap, changed into protective gear, and only then carried her toolbox into the apartment.
Anyway, let’s get some water first.
She took out the mop and assembled it, then carried the bucket and pushed open the bathroom door—
“Shhh…”
Inside the bathroom, there were still the pristine white tiles, floor, and gauze curtain.
But now, the originally white gauze curtain lay fallen in the bathtub, bearing traces of having been soaked through with liquid. Large patches of red liquid had climbed up the upper portion of the fabric through capillary action, drying into a glaring, sticky reddish-brown.
Inside the bathtub was a large area of blackish-red blood residue left behind after the blood water had dried. Outside, traces of dragging and struggling remained, extending all the way to her feet.
Snow-white tiles, blackish-red grime—the contrast was stark, enough to make one dizzy.
“…”
“…”
“Beep,” her phone chimed, receiving a new message.
Zhou Meng expressionlessly pulled out her phone.
[Mikhail: Scared? You can have Sun Zhen join you.]
Zhou Meng: “…”
She’d become a crime scene cleaner now?