Are You Asking for It

Inside the train car, Smiling Face was completely frozen.

"You! How can you be here! How are you still alive!"

He had personally crushed this man to pieces with the Demon Witch's power—he'd confirmed it.

How could a dead man be standing right here?

Smiling Face instinctively activated his ability, trying to seize control of the other man's emotions.

Fear! Despair!

His most finely crafted combinations of emotions were already woven, just about to be poured in.

Then Piao Guochang's face changed.

The features were rearranging, the contour shifting, that utterly ordinary face peeling away bit by bit to reveal the truly handsome features underneath.

Lin Mo.

Smiling Face's ability stalled mid-course, like punching cotton.

No—worse than cotton. His emotional manipulation simply couldn't find a foothold. The other man's mental world was as flat as still water, not a single ripple to exploit.

Smiling Face's smile was still plastered on his face, but it had frozen completely, like it had been glued on and couldn't be peeled off.

"How... how is this possible... how?!"

"Why not?"

Smiling Face figured it out in an instant. He wasn't stupid. He'd investigated Director Cui, he'd investigated Song Junhe, and naturally, he knew about Piao Guochang, the man Song Junhe had brought into the company. He'd also learned about Piao Guochang and the Tianle Group affair.

But why?

Why was Piao Guochang actually Lin Mo?

Smiling Face wanted to back away, but the chair he sat in left him nowhere to go.

"Actually, I know everything. From the moment you invited me, I already knew. You wanted to use someone else's blade to kill Director Cui, then use the Demon Witch against me, and finally walk away with all the spoils."

Lin Mo walked toward Smiling Face.

"The plan wasn't bad, and the setup was decent too. There was just one small problem."

"Problem? What problem?!"

"You're the mantis stalking the cicada, sure—but I'm the hawk. The mantis hides in the grass down below, while the hawk soars in the sky above. No matter how well you hide, all you have to do is look up, and there I am."

Smiling Face's spine pressed hard against the back of the chair. There was nowhere left to retreat.

His smile could no longer hold. The corners of his mouth twitched, his expression collapsing.

His emotional ability couldn't even control his own emotions anymore.

"Why... if it weren't for you, everything tonight would have gone smoothly. Director Cui dead, the Super Youth Squad would have a new master, the superpower landscape of Great Stick Republic would be reshuffled—all of it, a brilliant future!"

"Sounds pretty good."

Lin Mo nodded.

"But what does that have to do with me?"

A hand closed around Smiling Face's throat and lifted him clean off the ground.

Smiling Face frantically activated his ability—fear, rage, grief, joy.

He dumped every emotion he could muster, like pouring a cup of water into the ocean.

Lin Mo's expression didn't change.

Not a single flicker.

Smiling Face finally understood one thing: this man's mental defenses couldn't even be summed up as strong. His ability in front of Lin Mo was nothing more than a tickle.

"Stop!"

A voice came from behind Lin Mo.

Smiling Face's eyes darted over and saw Han Junhao standing at the entrance of the car.

A savior.

"Brother! Save me! Please, save me!" Smiling Face's voice cracked, that perpetual smile finally vanishing, revealing the rawest fear and will to survive beneath.

Han Junhao frowned, his gaze sweeping over Director Cui's corpse on the floor, over William hanging on the wall, and finally landing on Lin Mo.

He took a deep breath, then spoke in his harshest tone: "Lin Mo! Let him go. If you kill him here on Great Stick Republic soil, you're a murderer. This will affect diplomatic relations between China and the Great Stick Republic..."

Smack.

A slap.

Delivered from across the room.

Han Junhao's head snapped forty-five degrees to the side. Half his face instantly swelled, a thread of blood seeping from the corner of his mouth.

"What's wrong with you?"

Lin Mo looked at Han Junhao with genuine confusion in his voice. "Of all times, you're still reciting diplomatic niceties? Who gave you the right?"

Han Junhao clutched his face, mouth opening and closing, but no words coming out.

"Director Cui is dead. Smiling Face planned the whole thing. Your Super Youth Squad's scheming against me—I haven't even settled all those accounts yet."

Lin Mo's hand tightened.

A broken gasp escaped Smiling Face's throat.

"Do you really think that as long as he stays alive, things can still be salvaged?"

Han Junhao stayed silent.

"Wake up."

Crack.

A very soft sound.

Smiling Face's body went limp, that ever-smiling face's smile finally disappearing for good.

Lin Mo released his grip, and the body slid to the floor.

He shook the fingers of his hand, then turned to glance at Han Junhao.

Han Junhao stood there, his expression complicated. There was anger, frustration, and something else hard to name—but ultimately, he didn't say another word.

"Alright, stop hovering."

Lin Mo stepped over Smiling Face's body, patted Han Junhao on the shoulder. "Clean up what needs cleaning, report what needs reporting. The rest of this mess, your Great Stick Republic can sort it out itself."

Han Junhao finally found his voice: "You're just going to walk away?"

"And what? Stay and help you clean up? Don't be ridiculous. I'm Chinese."

Lin Mo walked out without looking back.

Han Junhao watched his back, lips moving, but in the end, nothing came out.

But just as he reached the doorway of the car, Lin Mo stopped and added one more line.

"Oh, and by the way—remember when I told you not to come after me? This... is the consequence. And I think you really don't want an even bigger one."

In the end, Han Junhao never mustered the courage to fight Lin Mo. Because he knew full well—he couldn't beat Lin Mo. He'd probably be pinned to the ground and utterly crushed.

The reason Lin Mo had left him alive was probably to have someone spread word of his might and his untouchable stance.

And Han Junhao might have been the only candidate left.

No choice. Time to pull back and see if the Demon Witch could be recovered.

Han Junhao walked to the Demon Witch's operating pod. One glance at the screen, and he saw that the Demon Witch's control chip had been severed.

Damn it. This was truly a case of losing both the wife and the army.

He ignored the corpses on the ground and made his way back to the command center's main control room.

Bodies everywhere. These people had all been killed by Ivy and William.

When Han Junhao looked at the control center's main screen, his heart sank to the bottom.

The entire screen was red, with only a handful of green dots.

Red meant the life-signal monitoring had cut out—the watches issued to them when they joined. A severed life-signal basically meant death, with only rare cases being watch damage causing a false alarm.

This meant a large portion of the Super Youth Squad's frontline superpowered operatives had been wiped out.

The sky was falling.

Han Junhao shook his head. "It's over. Everything is over."

Then, suddenly, he remembered that vial of serum.

He felt a surge of renewed energy.

"With that vial of serum, the Super Youth Squad will definitely rise again."