Chen Miemie pondered for a long while.
In the end, he nodded at Yi Shuangzi. “All right. I’ll help you this time.”
A delighted look appeared on Yi Shuangzi’s face. She hadn’t expected Chen Miemie to agree without even naming his conditions.
Once they had settled the matter, she didn’t stay long and soon left.
Chen Miemie sat on the sofa and sent Fengling a message, asking to meet under the pretext of catching up.
The reason he had agreed to help Yi Shuangzi wasn’t their former classmate relationship. It was because of the way Yi Shuangzi handled things—it was genuinely comfortable dealing with her.
She hadn’t held on to crucial information and tried to sell it to the highest bidder. Instead, she had openly shared everything from the start, then made her request afterward. Whether he agreed or not, she would have given him the information regardless.
Besides, strictly speaking, she had also uncovered important information for the city this time, which counted as a contribution. The Yi family had merely been caught in the crossfire and shouldn’t be allowed to fall victim to Moretti’s schemes.
3:50 p.m.
Chen Miemie arrived at the academy.
The same old place.
The academy infirmary, Room 1 in Area C on the third floor.
The moment Chen Miemie entered, he began complaining. “Teach, you’re the acting dean now, yet you’re still working out of this tiny infirmary? You don’t even have your own office yet. Are people trying to push you out?”
As soon as Chen Miemie stepped inside, the door behind him slammed shut.
More than a dozen eyes appeared all over Fengling’s body, while hundreds more emerged from the walls around the room.
Every single eye fixed its gaze on Chen Miemie.
The sight made his skin crawl. “What are you looking at? Never seen a handsome man before? Keep staring and I’ll start charging admission.”
Only after a full minute did the eyes gradually vanish from the walls.
Fengling returned to her normal form as a young girl.
“You really can’t tell just by looking, but once you take a closer look, you’re clearly no ordinary person. You’re practically carrying the military strength of an entire organization on you.”
Chen Miemie flatly denied it. “Don’t slander me. I’m just one person.”
“True. You’re just one ‘person.’ So, why did you come to see me?”
Fengling was straightforward, and Chen Miemie got straight to the point as well.
“Yi Shuangzi came to me. She said you were pursuing her and asked me to plead on her behalf—to have her wanted notice withdrawn.”
“Then you’ve come to the wrong person. I’m only the one pursuing her. If you want the wanted notice withdrawn, you should go to City Hall.”
“Seriously? You’re passing the buck to me too?”
“Want me to kick you instead? Go learn some basic common sense. Wanted notices are issued by the city government. I work for the academy!”
“Then why are you pursuing her?”
“You think I want to? Old Man Deng assigned me the job.”
“Dean Deng? Isn’t he the one who looks after Yi Shuangzi the most… Oh, I get it. So you’re actually protecting her.”
Chen Miemie immediately caught on. What Dean Deng and Fengling were doing now was much like what had happened at the Moon Library, when the underground world had issued a contract to assassinate Chen Miemie and [Silence] had taken the job himself.
It was called a pursuit, but in reality, they were claiming authority over the operation so they could quietly go easy on her.
“How boring. So you’ve all been throwing the match this whole time. Then why did Yi Shuangzi say you were pursuing her so relentlessly that she had to ask me to plead for her?”
“Because I really do want to catch her.
“Yi Shuangzi is different from you. Her shapeshifting ability is an auxiliary-type [Mystery]. Apart from catching people off guard, it gives her very little combat power.
“She only graduated six months ago and hasn’t grown much stronger since then. Yet she keeps charging into dangerous places. If she slips up even once, she’ll lose her life. Someone like her should be caught and locked up.
“There isn’t even a bounty on her wanted notice. You don’t need to worry about it. Aside from me, no one is actually pursuing her.”
“Yi Shuangzi said she sent Dean Deng and City Hall messages about what she saw in the cellar. You still don’t believe her?”
Fengling shook her head.
“How could we completely dismiss something that serious? We’re simply lying low for now so we don’t alert anyone. This Bishop Moliti is an exceptionally difficult opponent, not someone ordinary. He came to Sixiang City alone and, by himself, stood against every faction in the city without falling behind. He absolutely cannot be underestimated.”
Chen Miemie nodded in agreement. He rarely lost an argument, but Moretti had managed to outargue him while leaving him no excuse to flip the table and start a fight.
After thinking for a moment, Chen Miemie offered his simple and brutal solution. “No matter how powerful he is, he’s still only one person. Can’t we just wait until night, throw a sack over his head, and deal with him?”
Fengling shook her head again.
“If only it were that simple.
“Moretti is extremely deep and ruthless. He’s equally adept at conspiracies and open schemes.
“His first move was Rainbowlight Brew. He openly told every faction that he could make the injured addicted to it and control them, while also having a large number of believers backing him. That’s an open scheme.
“His second move was the mysterious ritual in the cellar. He carried it out in secret. No one knows what he’s actually planning, when it will erupt, or how much damage it could cause. That’s a hidden scheme.
“At that point, as you suggested, we could simply use a decapitation strategy and kill him.
“But he has a third move.
“After analyzing the situation, we suspect that the blood he’s collecting in the cellar may not be for some sacrificial ritual at all. He may have deliberately exposed it to Yi Shuangzi so that we would make a move against him.”
The cowlick on Chen Miemie’s head sprang upright. “Why?”
Fengling let out a long breath.
“By now, the whole city knows that he provides free medical treatment in exchange for only a tiny amount of blood. He has already spread the idea that the rich and powerful don’t want poor people to receive treatment.
“If we make a move against him—whether openly or through some covert operation—as long as he disappears from sight, everyone who can’t afford medical care will rise up. That’s his third move: another open scheme.”
Chen Miemie felt a headache coming on.
People in Sixiang City always played so dirty. Compared to them, the wiser and more powerful Moon Library seemed as innocent as a bunch of children.
“So you’re saying you really have no way to deal with him?”
“We had one option before. But things are different now.”
“What’s different?”
“There’s one more person among ‘us’ now. You, Chen Miemie. You’d better contribute.”
“Hey, why am I involved?”
“Because you walked right into the trap yourself and started asking questions. Besides, Sixiang City is part of the territory of the new race behind you, isn’t it? You can’t just let people run wild here, can you?”
“No, I can’t.” Chen Miemie also wanted to get his dignity back. “Tell me your plan.”
“Moretti’s open schemes are impressive, and he’s powerful in his own right. We can’t move against him directly.
“But suppose some monster that doesn’t understand all those principles happened to wander into the cellar and accidentally destroyed the blood he had stored there. Then, when we heard about it and rushed over to help, we just happened to expose his true nature.
“What do you think? Wouldn’t that make his hypocritical mask come crashing down?”
young master of the Shen family—a figure of immense power and wealth beyond measure—and awakened the "Destined Ultimate Villain System"! His starting scenario? Running into his icy fiancée who shows up with a mountain-descending divine doctor to break off their engagement. The divine doctor arrogantly taunts: "What does your Shen family have besides a bit of stinking money? You're not even worthy of tying Qingxue's shoelaces!" Shen Fei just smiled. He completely defied the usual script: "Fine, I agree to break off the engagement. Also, notify the finance department to withdraw all investments from the Su family." Minutes later, with its capital chain severed, the Su Group teetered on the brink of bankruptcy! The once aloof and proud ice queen CEO was thrown into utter panic. That very night, she went to Shen Fei's villa, casting aside all dignity to beg and plead desperately... From then on, in this world teeming with Sons of Destiny, Shen Fei embarked on a path of extreme dimensional suppression! A mountain-descending divine doctor? Peerless medical skills? Shen Fei: "Reporting you for practicing medicine without a license! I'll gladly take your ancient medicinal cauldron and twin sister assassins." The Crooked-Smiling Dragon King? Commanding a hundred thousand soldiers with a single order? Shen Fei: "Illegal assembly and suspected treason! Let a fleet of attack helicopters sanitize the area and teach you what the state apparatus really means!" A reborn tycoon? Knows all the golden opportunities of the next decade? Shen Fei: "A trillion in capital to reverse and pump the stock market, making you blow your margin and jump on the very first day of your rebirth!" What Chosen Ones? What bearers of Heavenly Fortune? In Shen Fei's eyes, they're all just chives (i.e., suckers/marks) waiting to be harvested! Shen Fei: "Sorry, but as the Destined Ultimate Villain, I don't play by the rules of honor. I only play the game of dimensional suppression."
nd fell into a coma while saving his younger sister from an out-of-control car. He became a vegetable. No one knew that his consciousness had crossed into a world of cultivation. Over the course of sixty years, he began as the lowest kind of mine slave, struggling to survive amid mountains of corpses and seas of blood. By sheer chance, he eventually obtained the complete memories of a fallen Immortal King. Alchemy, medicine, formations, feng shui, physiognomy, artifact forging… Every great inheritance of the cultivation world was now his. But when he opened his eyes again, he discovered that ten full years had passed in the modern world. To pay for his treatment, his father had sold the family’s shop and house, leaving himself covered in lasting injuries and illness. His mother had cared for him day and night, and more than half of her hair had already turned white. His younger sister, who had been only fifteen back then, was now twenty-five. To help repay the family’s debts, she had been forced to lower her head and put on a smiling face in places of glittering lights and endless revelry. Only then did Chen Xuan understand that what he had lost was not merely ten years. He had lost the life his entire family was meant to have. The good news was that he had brought back the memories of an Immortal King’s entire lifetime. The bad news was that his soul had returned alone—his cultivation had not come with him. Spiritual energy was scarce, resources were depleted, and the modern world still had firearms, surveillance, capital, and laws. If he wanted to protect his family, break free from everyone’s control, and become truly invincible beneath the heavens, he would have to start all over again.
uld barely embark on the path to immortality. Just as he was on the verge of death, his golden finger awakened. No matter whether it was poison, drained blood and vital energy, diminished lifespan, or any other physical debuff caused by paying a price—once midnight passed, everything would be refreshed. From then on, whenever someone asked what kind of person Chu Ran was, the answer was simple: Forbidden arts that other cultivators dared not learn? Chu Ran would learn them. Prices that even demonic cultivators dared not pay? Chu Ran would pay them. Lifespan that even righteous cultivators dared not burn? Chu Ran would burn it. All the blood essence in his body? Take it. Want both his hands and feet? He would cut them off and send them to you. You say he’s finished? He wasn’t built to sit idle. You think he’s gone mad? No—he was simply waiting for midnight. From that day onward, Chu Ran would respect neither Heaven nor Earth, bow to neither gods nor ghosts. He had only one wish: For midnight to arrive a little sooner.
s the Eldest Princess, renowned for her cold and aloof detachment, became the most docile of lambs, obeying his every command without question. But when the final move was played on the chessboard, as Gu Chenghan seized everything and ascended on the verge of apotheosis, that very Princess suddenly embraced him from behind, her tone carrying a dependence never heard before: "Wait... you haven't yet... commanded me to love you forever." Gu Chenghan froze abruptly. She... hadn't been hypnotized?! ... [The Eldest Princess's Diary] [When my soul was extracted, becoming the sole spectator outside my own shell] [At first, there was overwhelming fury, until I saw] [How he used my sword to effortlessly shatter my inescapable doom] [How he wielded my authority to eradicate fatal conspiracies I had never even detected] [Like a deity, he rescued me from the deep mire I was trapped in] [If not for those annoying vixens, he and I would be a match made in heaven] [I think I am ill, gravely ill] [My deity should belong to me alone] ... "Hypnosis? Oh, it succeeded, my dear Master." "Only this time, it's my turn to hypnotize you."
