Chapter 445: Prologue

The whistle for the interval drill rang explosively over Qiu Ce Yuan, and more than two thousand students surged onto the field like dumplings being dropped, the running formation turning into a chaotic mess.

Lu Yu stood at the tail of Class A, bowing his head to tie his shoes.

Chen Yao passed by him, her fingertip lightly brushing his cuff, and a milk candy whose wrapper had been torn in half rolled into his palm.

The movement was so smooth that even the PE teacher leading the drill beside him didn't notice.

Lu Yu pinched the candy.

The inner side of the candy wrapper bore characters.

He didn't rush to read it. When the gymnastics music started, he followed the formation through two rounds of chest‑expanding exercises, and at the instant of the third torso‑turn movement when his body twisted sideways, his gaze swept over his palm.

Six characters.

"Lock onto target, Zhang Yuanqing."

Lu Yu clenched the candy wrapper into his fist.

The chants of the over two thousand people on the field, the sound of shoe soles scraping the plastic track, and the distant, wind‑rattled squeak of the basketball hoop all receded.

Zhang Yuanqing.

The name spun in his mind three times—no, not three times. It was the flood of all fragmentary information from his past life about that 'god' surging all at once.

In his previous life, Su Ming, on his deathbed, gave only one instruction: return to the past, and while that thing hadn't yet matured, kill it.

But Su Ming didn't tell him who 'it' was.

Because no one knew at the time.

All of humanity was clueless even about the enemy's appearance. There were only endless Weirdness, endless Rules, endless death, and a lofty will that treated all beings as chess pieces.

Lu Yu spent every day after his rebirth piecing together that face.

He infiltrated the Investigation Bureau, got close to Chen Yao, and used Eden Garden's intelligence network to scour Jiang Hai City's old archives, all to locate the source.

Now, the clues point to Zhang Yuanqing.

The candy wrapper in his palm grew hot from his grip. Lu Yu's expression remained unchanged, and he even performed a standard kick in time with the beat.

But deep within his pupils, something was burning.

The apocalyptic scenes from his past life arrived uninvited.

The office towers of Jiang Hai City's CBD were uprooted, and reinforced steel bar concrete twisted into braids in the air.

After Liang Wen's final Rewind, his whole body had shattered into dust, white bones exposed beneath his windcoat.

Jiang Yuan's Shadow Legion was devoured completely, and even he himself was assimilated into the Weird, leaving only his right hand retaining human form, clutching the deck of poker cards tightly.

And Su Ming, who sent him back...

Everyone had died.

All of them.

And the mastermind, that thing that claimed to be a 'god', never moved a single finger from start to finish.

—It merely edited the Rules and created the Weird.

Lu Yu clenched his jaw, and the blue veins at his temples pulsed twice.

The candy wrapper silently shattered in his palm.

The old life's vengeance, this life's scheme.

Finally, the time to end it all had come.

He touched his finger and hacked it.

The interval drill whistle sounded. Lu Yu stuffed the pulverized candy wrapper into his pocket and jogged with the formation back to the teaching building. As he passed Chen Yao, his gaze stayed level forward, and his lips twitched almost imperceptibly.

"Received."

Chen Yao lowered her head and tied a shoe‑lace that didn't need tying.

At the same time, the Federal Weird Investigation Bureau headquarters, Data Center floor.

Su Ming sat at a curved workstation surrounded by twenty‑six screens, his fourth cup of black coffee already ice‑cold.

He stared at the screens for nine hours.

The case files of Jiang Hai City piled on the desk like snowflakes, half physical dossiers, half encrypted electronic documents. He enlarged a high‑resolution photo of Song Dénian suspended by sutures on a city sculpture seventeen times, measured the chest‑opening angle frame by frame, and the data filled three sheets of draft paper.

Forensic autopsy technique.

Standard, textbook‑level.

Even the model of the hemostatic forceps used to fold and fix lung lobes could be reconstructed—Koni Ximan No. 12 titanium‑alloy butterfly forceps, discontinued in 2039, standard equipment of Jiang Hai City's political‑legal system forensic identification center.

The murderer not only understood forensic medicine, but also used that very forensic kit.

Su Ming leaned back against his chair, massaging his sore eyes. He dragged the residual energy spectra from three crime scenes onto a single page for overlay comparison.

Peak‑matching rate: 97.6%.

The same kind of Weird.

This wasn't what made him restless.

What made him restless was something else.

Three hours earlier, the Intelligence Division intercepted an encrypted transmission—Eden Garden received a rallying order, all personnel on standby, target direction: Jiang Hai City.

The order came directly from Chen Shao.

Su Ming pushed the coffee cup aside. He tapped a few keys, pulling up Eden Garden's activity heat map for the past three months. Data points were evenly scattered across the national map, except Jiang Hai City's density surged to six times the normal value within forty‑eight hours.

Six times.

This wasn't routine intelligence gathering; it was the deployment of combat forces.

Su Ming closed his eyes.

The instinct honed over two lifetimes rang alarms in the back of his head—something was wrong. A serial‑murder case, a suspect with a forensic background, and Eden Garden's anomalous mobilization, three threads converged at the same temporal node.

Coincidence does not exist in his dictionary.

He opened his eyes, took a compressed biscuit from the drawer, tore open the wrapper and took a bite, chewing while dialing the encrypted channel.

The other side answered quickly.

"Lord Wei, I need to lead a team to Jiang Hai City."

After two seconds of silence, the earpiece replied with a single word: "Speak."

"The Jiang Hai City serial case may not be a simple folklore crime. Within forty‑eight hours, the entire Spade Unit of Eden Garden was transferred toward Jiang Hai, under a rally order issued by Chen Shao himself."

Su Ming brushed the biscuit crumbs off his nose tip, then said: "If Chen Shao only wanted to catch a folklore case, he wouldn't bother the Spade Unit. He's robbing—he's robbing something."

"What do you think he's robbing?"

"I'm not sure. But one possibility keeps me awake at night."

The earpiece fell silent.

About five seconds later, Lord Wei's voice came back, bearing the calm resolve Su Ming knew well before making a decision: "Take Liang Wen with you. Jiang Yuan has another mission; you two go first."

"Understood."

Su Ming hung up, shoved the compressed biscuit into his mouth, swallowed it in three bites, stood up, grabbed his coat and walked out.

Jiang Hai City, First Hospital, Cardiology Outpatient Department.

2:40 p. m., Examination Room No. 7.

Chu Che was consulting a woman in her sixties. The elderly lady, surnamed Fang, suffered hypertension combined with atrial fibrillation; three medicines had all proved ineffective, and she had come specifically for Chu Che's specialist appointment.

"Aunt Fang, your atrial fibrillation can't be suppressed by medication alone. I recommend a radio‑frequency ablation—minimal trauma, quick recovery."

Chu Che's voice was as gentle as a spring breeze, and his pen traced neat, beautiful regular script on the medical record.

"I'll prepare the pre‑operative exams; discuss them with your family, and you can be admitted next Monday."

Aunt Fang clasped his hand, grateful beyond words: "Dr. Chu, you're so kind; you speak more patiently than my own daughter."

Chu Che smiled. The smile was perfectly measured—friendly yet not fawning, warm yet not false.

"Your daughter will surely care for you more than I do. When you get home, eat fewer salty vegetables; your last urinary sodium index was a bit high."

Aunt Fang left in high spirits.

The door closed.

Chu Che's smile vanished completely.

It didn't disappear; it "exited stage." Like an actor leaving the stage, when the lights go out the role no longer exists.

He took off his gold‑rimmed glasses and gently wiped the lenses with a cloth. The fluorescent light in the Examination Room slid a cold‑white arc across the curved surface of the lenses.

He flipped his phone with his left hand, and an encrypted message popped up.

It was a report sent back by Xu Chen.

Eden Garden's Spade Unit had completed its assembly and would depart in an hour, targeting Zhang Yuanqing. Xu An would command on site, and Chen Shao might join the operation at any moment.

Chu Che placed his phone flat on the desk.

He stood, walked to the permanently closed door at the very back of the Examination Room, and pushed it open.

Inside was a tiny inner room of less than six square meters, originally used for storing odds and ends. It had now been cleaned thoroughly, leaving only a whiteboard.

Nothing was written on the whiteboard.

Yet when Chu Che's gaze fell upon it, lines began to appear on the surface.

A red line extended from the left side, its end labeled "Eden Garden·Spade Unit."

A blue line snaked out from the right side, its end reading "Investigation Bureau·Su Ming."

Near the lower middle, a thin gray line lay quietly, its label "Zhang Yuanqing·Adam."

Three lines, different paths converging.

All pointed toward Jiang Hai City.

Chu Che tapped lightly on the blank area in the upper left corner of the whiteboard. A black dot appeared, unmarked, nameless.

That was himself.

All the lines sprouted from that dot.

He withdrew his hand, nudged his gold‑rimmed glasses on his nose bridge, turned and walked back to the consultation desk. The electric kettle had just boiled, bubbling steam. He took out a white porcelain cup, added a pinch of pre‑Qing Longjing tea, poured hot water, and the leaves unfurled, spiraling at the bottom of the cup.

Outside, the sky over Jiang Hai City churned with dark clouds, pressing the whole city as if it could barely breathe.

Chu Che lifted the tea cup, gave it a gentle blow, and took a sip.

The tea entered his throat, crisp and bitter, then sweetened on the way back.

He looked through the Examination Room's glass window at the dim sky, the lenses reflecting the rolling clouds.

"The audience has already taken their seats."

The voice was soft, spoken to himself.

He set the tea cup down; the white porcelain touched the desk with a faint sound.

"Then, Adam—"

Chu Che's mouth corner twitched slightly, the curve measured as if with a vernier caliper.

Not a laugh.

But appraisal.

"Perform to your heart's content."

"Don't let my guests feel disappointed."

The steam from the tea cup rose lazily, dissipating quickly in the air‑conditioned cool breeze. In the Corridor outside Examination Room No. 7, the next patient was already knocking on the door.

Chu Che readjusted his perfectly fitting, gentle Mask, put it back on, and rose to open the door.

"Please come in, what brings you discomfort?"

Outside stood a young couple with a child, their faces full of anxiety.

Chu Che crouched down, smiled at the three‑ to four‑year‑old little boy, extended his slender fair hands, and gently placed them on the Child's pulse.

Under his fingertips, the pulse beat steady and strong.

His smile was still warm and gentle.

And behind him, within the tightly locked door, the three lines on the whiteboard were silently converging toward a single point.

The sky over Jiang Hai City grew darker.