Chapter 392: Familiar Joint Operations

The moment the door was pushed open, the darkness inside seemed tangible, thickly smearing Jiang Yuan's face.

The air conditioner was off, and the air floated with the distinctive mixed odor of a middle‑aged man's dorm—dirty socks, tobacco and leftover instant‑noodle residue. The blinds were pulled tight, and the only light source was the pea‑sized indicator lamp on the bedside charger, flickering on and off.

Mo Shu followed behind, stepping over the threshold, and Jiang Yuan lifted his left hand and pressed down.

She stopped immediately.

This was the tactical gesture they had used in Chicago—silence, target acquired.

Jiang Yuan's right hand slipped into the Card Bag, drew out three Poker Cards and tucked them between his fingers. The metallic cold light flashed briefly in the darkness.

At the same time, he produced the True‑Sight Eye.

The speed of the filter overlay was faster than he expected. The visual shift took less than a second, but that second was enough for him to see the full shape of the thing on the bed.

Zhang Deming was lying on his side, the blanket pulled up to his shoulders.

Through the filter, the area beneath the blanket was not humanoid at all. It was an expanded, pallid torso, its surface covered with dense suction‑cup‑like folds that expanded and contracted with each breath. Above the neck was a mass of static signal noise, a gray‑white snow‑flake pattern faintly glowing in the dark.

Jiang Yuan flicked his right index finger.

It wasn't flicking a Poker Card.

It was snapping his fingers.

Silently.

The vibration of the snap entered the Shadow Ghost's frequency, and the Shadow Legion surged simultaneously from the seams beneath the bed, in the corners, and on the ceiling. The black shadows solidified, denser than ink, quieter than a snake.

Three shadows coiled around the body on the bed at once: one around the neck, one around the waist, and a third—piercing straight through the blanket, passing through the exact center of the noise‑signal mass.

There was no scream.

Because its mouth hadn't had time to open.

The shadows tightened so fast that the whole process from activation to completion lasted no more than 0.8 seconds. The blanket collapsed, and the outline inside shrank dramatically, like a punctured balloon deflating.

Then came the smell.

A foul stench of burnt plastic mixed with rotting seafood burst from beneath the blanket; Mo Shu instinctively covered her mouth and nose, her eyes bulging wide.

Jiang Yuan reached out and lifted the blanket.

Below there was no blood, no bones, no any human tissue structure.

Only a pool of gray‑white material was smoking black, resembling the charred remnants of cheap foam after being burned, its surface still twitching in tiny fragments, popping and bubbling outward. Each bubble's burst sprayed a small clump of gray noise particles that lingered in the air for less than half a second before evaporating.

"What is this..."

Mo Shu's voice was muffled behind her palm, slurred, but the instinctive disgust and shock could not be hidden.

She stared at the pool on the bed.

It was not the appearance of a human corpse. Any trained investigator, even on first encountering a Weird death scene, could distinguish between a "human body" and "non‑human residue."

Zhang Deming— or rather the thing that once wore Zhang Deming's face while working a year in the Investigation Bureau's logistics warehouse— was not a carbon‑based organism at all.

Mo Shu and Jiang Yuan had jointly carried out that Fake Person elimination mission, and for her the answer was already practically obvious.

"Fake Person." Jiang Yuan shut off the True‑Sight Eye, his voice pressed down to a whisper, almost exhaled. "It's not Zhang Deming."

Mo Shu's hand dropped from her mouth and nose.

Her face was hard to see in the darkness, but Jiang Yuan noticed she had stepped back half a step. She was still a little dazed.

Jiang Yuan's right hand still held the three Poker Cards. The direction the card faces pointed was never toward the bed, from start to finish.

It was Mo Shu.

He had spent an entire Corridor's worth of time preparing for this. From stepping out to the elevator, from the elevator to this dormitory, at no point did his Card Bag close; the metal cards at his fingertips constantly faced the chattering figure behind him, and the Shadow Ghost's infused power was enough for the three cards to pierce her head and neck within 0.1 seconds.

As long as she showed any abnormality at the moment Zhang Deming was killed—signal noise, bodily distortion— he would act.

But nothing happened.

After stepping back that half step, Mo Shu steadied herself; her short boots clicked lightly against the doorframe. She glanced down at the last wisp of black smoke rising from the wreckage on the bed, frowned, and lifted her head.

"The Investigation Bureau... infiltrated by them?"

Her tone changed. It was no longer the sweet, soft Mo Shu from the Cafeteria. The ending of her words no longer rose; her enunciation became crisp and decisive, the innocent warmth in her almond eyes receded, revealing cold, focused pupils beneath.

The switch to combat mode was exactly the same as the Mo Shu she had been before.

Jiang Yuan's fingertips twitched.

He collected the cards.

The movement was so slow that even he found it absurd.

Mo Shu—or the entity existing under Mo Shu's identity—when she had just seen that pool of Fake Person debris, the disgust in her eyes could not be acted out. The rate of pupil constriction, the subtle twitch of the brow muscles, the hurried normalization of her breathing after it had been thrown off, all physiological signs led to the same conclusion.

She didn't know.

She didn't know that she and the smoking trash on the bed were of the same kind.

The Fake Person's cognitive distortion may not only affect surrounding humans; it may even affect the Fake Persons themselves, causing them, when undetected, to sincerely believe they are the person they are impersonating.

The thing standing before him now, from subjective consciousness to behavioral logic, was Mo Shu.

The Mo Shu who would hand him hot coffee. The Mo Shu who would block him in the Sewer. The Mo Shu who, after two cans of beer, would slump on the table muttering "you need to watch out."

And he was unwilling to betray "Mo Shu."

Or rather, he hadn't prepared himself mentally to do so.

At least for now Mo Shu was still Mo Shu.

Deep in his heart… he was selfishly still wanting to spend more time with her.

Jiang Yuan had no idea that his choice at this moment would make his future self suffer even more.

He shoved the cards back into the Card Bag at his waist; the zipper's sound rang especially crisp in the quiet room.

"The Investigation Bureau has indeed been infiltrated by Fake Persons," he said, nodding, his voice steady. "Lord Wei gave me a list; tonight we need to clean it all up."

Mo Shu digested that information quickly.

She didn't ask "how do you differentiate," nor did she ask "who's on the list." She merely glanced at the tactical dagger at her waist, checked the spring latch's position, and then nodded.

Alright, let's go.

Straightforward and efficient.

When Jiang Yuan turned and pushed the door open, the Corridor lights swept over his face again.

Mo Shu didn't see his eyes. Those eyes, backlit, were filled with a struggling light.

The next hour and seventeen minutes became the longest hunt Jiang Yuan had ever endured.

They followed the list order, starting from the logistics floor's duty room and sweeping upward floor by floor.

Jiang Yuan handled opening doors and confirming targets. The Shadow Legion handled the kills. Mo Shu watched both ends of the Corridor, ensuring no one was accidentally seen.

Each dormitory followed almost the same procedure: universal card applied to the access control, green light lit, door pushed, Shadow surged in, the fight ended in a fraction of a second. Then came the foul smell of burnt plastic and a pool of gray‑white debris emitting black smoke.

Mo Shu stopped frowning from the third room onward.

Her adaptation speed was absurdly fast. By the eighth room, she could silently slash with her short blade, cutting off the Fake Person's mutated tentacle trying to reach out the window, precisely timed with Jiang Yuan's actions. The knife work was exact, the angle cunning.

Room fifteen. The target was the night‑shift technician in the east side communications hub on the third floor.

The instant Jiang Yuan pushed the door, that Fake Person suddenly woke up.

Mo Shu's short blade entered from the side, precisely piercing the vocal cords beneath its jawbone.

The shriek turned into a hoarse airflow sound, and the Shadow Legion followed up, grinding the entire Fake Person into powder.

Mo Shu withdrew her short blade, flicked the gray‑white liquid off its edge amid the black smoke from the Fake Person's remains, and gave Jiang Yuan a "cleared" hand sign.

Fluid as drifting clouds. textbook‑level coordination.

Jiang Yuan was momentarily dazed at that instant.

He recalled Chicago. Two juvenile Spider Humanoids crawled out from the pipe seams in the ceiling of the adjacent floor; Mo Shu flipped past his right side, her short blade drawing two arcs in the air, severing the Spider Humanoids' forelimbs at the roots. As she landed, she turned back and shouted something at him.

What did she shout?

"Don't just stand there, Flying Cards guest."

Right. That's the line.

Same tone, same rhythm, the same impatience wrapped with a hint of swagger.

Jiang Yuan's hand gripping the True Sight Eye trembled.

He hadn't activated the filter.

If he turned it on now, he feared he would truly collapse.

One hundred seventy‑nine.

Two hundred forty‑six.

Three hundred seven.

Each time a plume of black smoke rose from a Fake Person's remains, the counter in Jiang Yuan's mind ticked up. Mo Shu stayed consistently 1.5 meters behind his side, maintaining tactical spacing to the millimeter, occasionally exchanging a glance at a corner to confirm each other's status.

At the three hundred first corpse, Mo Shu finally asked.

"How many are on the list in total?"

"Three hundred eighty‑six," Jiang Yuan said without turning.

"Only about eighty left..." Mo Shu lowered her voice, speaking slowly, "May I see the list?"

Jiang Yuan shook his head.

"Why?"

"Do you remember? The Fake Person's Murder Rule is triggered by perception," Jiang Yuan continued without pausing, "Once you know who the Fake Person is, it will mark you as prey. We're this smooth now because they don't realize they're exposed before being killed. If you know the names in advance and meet acquaintances in the Corridor, their Murder Rule will trigger."

Mo Shu's eyes widened, "Got it."

She asked no further. She didn't press.

This clean trust made Jiang Yuan's chest feel even tighter.

They kept moving forward.

Three hundred forty‑two.

Three hundred sixty‑eight.

At the end of the Corridor stood the Data Room's massive iron door, its handle bearing an expired maintenance ticket with the corners already curled up.

The last concentration zone on the list—Zone B Night Office. Seventeen of the remaining eighteen targets were gathered here.

Meanwhile, the sky was already turning gray, and the window time was approaching.

He reached for the handle; the iron felt so cold it numbed his fingertips.

Behind him, Mo Shu drew her short blade, still dusted with gray powder left from the previous Fake Person's evaporation.

Jiang Yuan shoved the iron door open.

The hinge emitted a harsh screech, like a muffled sigh.

Darkness surged from behind the doorway.

Then—

Over a dozen pairs of grim green eyes lit up simultaneously.