Chapter 23: The Troupe

"Little Cheng, I've landed you another big job."

Cui Yi called, his tone excited. "A little over a month from now, at the China World Trade Center Tower, there's a super-lavish wedding that wants our ms company to handle it. The daily wage for full-time staff is five thousand! Plus each person gets a wedding favor, and the gifts inside are worth over four thousand."

"Even the staff get wedding favors?" Li Cheng was a little surprised. "And why would it be a little over a month away? For a wedding this expensive, don't they normally plan half a year or a year in advance?"

"Because the bride is from the mainland, the groom is a Malaysian Chinese, both families are super rich, and neither wants to be outdone by the other, so they just decided to hold a banquet in both places. That's why the timing's a bit tight. The normal wedding is expected to cost tens of millions, and the wedding favors for everyone invited are just a tiny fraction of that."

As Cui Yi spoke, he realized Li Cheng's tone wasn't as eager as last time, and asked, puzzled: "What's wrong? Something on your mind?"

"Nothing." Li Cheng shook his head. "I'm just wondering if there's any work with a low barrier to entry and quick money."

"Haha, all the ways to make big money fast are written in the criminal code."

Cui Yi laughed. "A senior once told me that in modern society, there are only four legal paths to making big money. Have connections and backdoor access. Be smart enough. Be fast enough. Be ruthless and bad enough."

As a young striver who had been thoroughly beaten down by society, Cui Yi had his own set of life philosophies.

After repeatedly emphasizing that Li Cheng should find a chance to apply to be a full-time employee at ms company (full-time staff earn much more than dispatched labor), he hung up without waiting for an answer.

I haven't even said whether I'm going or not.

Li Cheng helplessly put down his phone. Of course, with a five-thousand-a-day wage and wedding favors to boot, there was no reason not to go.

Thud!

His heart lurched violently. The sensation of 【Gene Hunger】 struck again. Li Cheng's expression grew slightly serious, but he wasn't too panicked.

He had already prepared a thorough contingency plan, and immediately pulled a paper tube about as thick as a thumb from his pocket.

The paper tube was filled with wood shavings, and deep within the shavings sat a female cricket.

A male cricket's forewings have a sound-producing organ, made up of a scraper on the wing vein, a file vein, and a sounding mirror. The male cricket raises its forewings and rubs them together, vibrating the sounding mirror and producing a tone.

The female cricket, however, has no forewings and no extra organs, and cannot chirp, which is why Li Cheng had kept her on hand as a backup option for resolving 【Gene Hunger】 in special circumstances.

With no time to bike home now, Li Cheng took the paper tube and ducked into a toilet stall, poured the cricket into his palm, and began absorbing its genes.

Buzz—

A WeChat message came in on his phone, from Yuan Zhixia. Last time she had substituted for Li Cheng as the school paper's photographer, interviewing and shooting Xue Luomeng, and was very pleased with the result, so she demanded that Li Cheng request leave again next time — she wanted to take an indirect approach, using her next interview subject, Xue Lingyu, to get close to his sister Xue Luomeng.

Sis, you couldn't actually be a les, could you?

rainbow, woman, hand. gif

Li Cheng wanted to reply, but the violent changes in his body kept him from making any move.

In the not-very-spacious stall, dense ant-like bristles began sprouting from his arms, mantis-like bone blades extended involuntarily, and the muscles in his thighs kept swelling and spasming, completely beyond his control.

What's going on? Didn't the previous few times go pretty smoothly? Why isn't it working this time?

Li Cheng was sure he hadn't gotten the procedure wrong. He fought desperately against the searing pain of the muscle spasms, screaming soundlessly in his head, and quickly stripped off his clothes and pants to keep them from being torn.

At the same time, he had to use all his strength to suppress the urge to smash the entire stall to pieces.

Boom!

That familiar muffled sound came again from high above, and the lights in the toilet flickered on and off.

Someone — or something — had opened the Shadow Realm.

————

Half an hour earlier, Zhuyuan Force, a single-occupancy hospital room.

A middle-aged man slowly pushed open the door, his gaze sorrowfully fixed on his eight- or nine-year-old son, who lay on the bed wrapped head to toe in bandages.

From the patient card on the bedside table, the little boy's name was Cai Zixuan. The middle-aged man was his father, Cai Yongyuan.

"Zixuan? Are you awake? If you're awake, just look at Daddy once. Daddy knows he was wrong."

Cai Yongyuan's eyes were grief-stricken and sorrowful as he sat down beside his son.

"It's all Daddy's fault for you. Daddy was a gambling addict, and drove your mommy away."

His left hand gently gripped his son's right wrist, while his right hand quietly slipped into his pocket and drew out a syringe filled with a clear liquid.

"Daddy didn't take care of the family, was out playing mahjong all night, every night, and left you to cook for yourself."

He flicked the syringe with one hand to expel the air.

"Daddy drank and then scolded you and hit you, blamed every mistake on you, until you couldn't take it anymore and jumped off the building."

He gently pulled out the IV needle from the back of his son's hand and wiped away the excess fluid with a tissue.

"The doctor said you'd wake up eventually. When you do, Daddy will turn over a new leaf, and we'll live a good life together."

Gripping the syringe, he slowly inserted it along the puncture hole on the back of his son's hand.

Perhaps it was an illusion, but Cai Zixuan, who had fallen from the seventh floor and been in a coma for several days, seemed to slightly open his eyes, gazing at his father with a weak look.

Cai Yongyuan instinctively broke out in a cold sweat from fright, but immediately after, he caught himself and forced an ugly smile onto his face.

"Son, Daddy will love you forever."

He gently kissed the boy's forehead, but his finger pressed the plunger handle and pushed it all the way in.

Once it was done, Cai Yongyuan pocketed the syringe, restored everything to how it had been, and quietly walked out of the room — just like any ordinary father worn down by his child's serious illness — going to the window at the end of the corridor to catch the night breeze.

And in the single-occupancy room, the clear liquid known as cationic detergent had already flowed through Cai Zixuan's bloodstream to every part of his body.

The so-called cationic detergent is a positively charged surfactant, also called an invert soap. It's not suitable for washing clothes, but works very well as a fabric softener, antibacterial agent, emulsifier, antistatic agent, and so on.

When absorbed by the human body through the mouth or skin, it interferes with the function of the body's tissue cells, causing nausea, vomiting, collapse, respiratory paralysis, and even death. It must be treated on the spot, with vomiting induced as quickly as possible.

But if it's injected intravenously, then there's no cure. And it's extremely difficult to detect through ordinary forensic means.

"."

Cai Zixuan lay on the bed, a single tear rolling down from the corner of his half-open eye.

Time ticked by. An intense, searing pain swept through his entire body, but he couldn't even cry out.

Crackle. Crackle.

Above the hospital bed, a black rift suddenly split open, and a strangely shaped clown mask poked out from within, tilting its head as it stared at Cai Zixuan, and said in a low, laughing voice: "Do you want to live?"

Cai Zixuan blinked hard.

"Even if it costs a tremendous price? Your emotions, your humanity, your—soul."

A soundless blink.

"So be it. The contract is sealed."

From within the rift, the clown extended a palm and smeared black grease across the boy's face, sketching out a wildly laughing visage.

"Cry, scream, kill. The 【Troupe】 shall witness your rebirth and welcome your arrival."

Along with the whisper, the clown withdrew its palm and vanished along with the rift.

(End of Chapter)