In the mountain, the wind was blowing.
Laojun Mountain stood at a height of more than 2,000 meters above sea level, located within the Funiu mountain range.
The mountain wind at night was strong and freezing.
The fog was condensing in the air. By dawn, a layer of water vapor would coat all of the outdoor furniture.
Someone threw a new block of firewood into the bonfire inside the yard, and the flames burned darker.
The flickering fire was refracted in the slowly flowing fog, like a wonderful midnight light show.
There was a young man holding a knife in the shadows. He stood silently between the interlacing mist and darkness, sizing up the sole thug outside the gate.
It wasn't until this very moment that he, at last, understood the words Ye Wan told him.
Life was truly very fragile – regardless of how significant a person might be, they would die with a single stab through the heart.
Yet, killing was anything but easy.
Because what you had to face was the most malicious thing in the world.
Qing Chen wordlessly tied a stolen scarf to his face.
The signal at the top of the mountain was intermittent, so in order to ensure the smoothness of their operation, the thugs had walkie-talkies pinned on their left chests.
Qing Chen counted in his heart. Every ten minutes, the thug would lower his head and press the walkie-talkie to answer something.
A gust of wind suddenly blew by, and the bonfire piled up with firewood abruptly grew vigorous, casting the world outside the yard with a bright light.
Hiding in a corner, Qing Chen saw that the thug seemed to have perceived something due to the firelight. He peered at Qing Chen’s direction with doubts written on his face, slowly approaching close.
Qing Chen's heart tightened.
But at this moment, Li Tongyun actually appeared outside the gate of the inn.
She stood at the door and timidly asked, “Uncle police, have you seen my mother?”
The thug was stunned for a second, “Your mother? I haven’t seen her. Come here, uncle will accompany you to look for your mother, alright?”
In an instant, he suddenly realized something was wrong.
An ambush!
The gangster subconsciously raised his left hand, waving his baton as his right hand reached for his waist, about to draw his gun.
The bonfire light swayed past the fence.
The young man within the mist had soundlessly arrived beside him.
Close at hand, a knife's distance away.
Qing Chen swiftly ducked to avoid the baton, dashing in front of the thug alongside the whistling of the mountain wind.
He swung his dagger at the hand that was about to draw the gun. Knowing he couldn’t reach it, the thug shrank back.
The young man's blade was pointing down; the thug instinctively moved both of his arms downward, trying to grab the young man's hand.
Seemingly having predicted the action, Qing Chen took a small step back to let his opponent's hand and baton hit the empty air.
Not good!
The thug looked up in astonishment into the darkness.
But he could only see the boy's exposed eyes, coldly staring at him.
Just when he thought the ferocious young man had exhausted his moves, the dagger once again penetrated the mist through the gap between his arms.
“Breathe.”
Li Shutong said that the most important thing in a battle between beasts was breathing.
It was the key to keeping your body's oxygen level in check, the key to steeling your will. Once you understood the importance of breathing, you would be in control of yourself, and in turn, in control of everything.
To be a hunter or prey, the choice was yours.
In a flash, fire patterns bloomed on the edges of Qing Chen's scarf mask!
It was like all of his power was rushing to accumulate in his right hand, passing to the tip of the knife and ruthlessly piercing into the spleen of the thug.
The thug’s eyes were aghast.
What happened within this short instance?
From the start to the end, the masked boy's movements smoothly glided like flowing water, as if everything had been well accounted for. The youth knew that he would swing the police baton, knew he wouldn’t dare to draw his gun after the feint, and knew the trajectory his arms would take in retaliation.
He knew everything, so he dodged all of his attacks, not giving him any chance to land a hand.
It was only until the dagger plunged into his spleen that the two of them made physical contact.
In this psychological game of close combat, his every step was within the calculation of the opponent.
As if he had acted in a script written by the young man.
His ending had already long been inscribed.
Knowing he was running out of time, the thug struggled to reach for his walkie-talkie.
But the young man shoved hard against his body, pinning him to the wall.
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Qing Chen covered his mouth with his left hand, his right hand vigorously twisting the knife.
The thug wanted to struggle using his mechanical limbs, but the intense pain was transmitted into his brain, blocking nearly all of his working mind.
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In the human body, the spleen was an organ used to store blood. Instantaneously, a large amount of blood gushed out of the thug’s ruptured spleen and flowed down the dagger to Qing Chen's hand.
The fresh blood was warm. In the cold night, its rapidly vanishing temperature reminded Qing Chen just what exactly death was.
He only pulled out the dagger after the thug’s breathing and heartbeat had stopped.
The masked boy stood in front of the corpse, gasping for breath. It was unclear what he was thinking about.
Blood dripped from the drooping tip of the dagger in his hand, drop by drop onto the concrete ground.
So this was what it felt like to kill a person.
Qing Chen was panting not because of exhaustion or lack of air, but because of the inexplicable fear and panic in his heart.
He finally realized why Li Shutong said he must use a knife for his first kill.
If you kill someone with a gun, a shot from a few dozen meters away would take his life.
Under that situation, the distance would haze your emotion and reaction. Rather than killing a person, what you did would feel more like hitting a target.
You couldn’t see the blood, couldn’t feel the heartbeat gradually disappearing.
You would also fail to feel a reverence for life.
As a teacher, Li Shutong couldn't witness his student's first murder, but he had already taught Qing Chen the most important lesson: how to revere life.
“Brother Qing Chen,” Li Tongyun apprehensively called to him.
The voice pulled Qing Chen back to reality as if a hand was tightly pulling his sleeve before he fell into the abyss.
He turned to look at Li Tongyun who was standing not far away.
The little girl was in a wordless daze, stupefied by the scene that just transpired.
She saw with her own eyes the masked boy’s brutal killing, saw with her own eyes the loss of a life.
Qing Chen came and squatted down in front of her.
He didn't take off the scarf covering his face, only asking softly, “Are you afraid?”
Li Tongyun nodded with tears in her eyes, “A bit.”
“Why did you come out, where’s your mom?” asked Qing Chen.
At this time, Jiang Xue ran downstairs in a hurry, seemingly looking for Li Tongyun.
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Even if Qing Chen was hiding his face, she could recognize the boy at a glance, because what he was using was her scarf.
So when she found out Li Tongyun and Qing Chen were together, she immediately let out a sigh of relief.
Jiang Xue walked to the door and explained to Qing Chen, “I went to the toilet just now, but when I came back, she was missing. Xiaoyun, you really scared me!”
Li Tongyun lowered her head, “I just wanted to help brother Qing Chen.”
Qing Chen was surprised – turned out she appeared here not by coincidence, but to help him.
He wanted to raise his hand to pat Li Tongyun's head, but then he remembered it was covered all over in blood, so he slowly retracted his arm.
But before he could fully retract it, Li Tongyun reached out to grab his palm and put it on her head. “Brother Qing Chen, pay attention to safety, mom and I will be waiting for you to come back.”
“Okay,” Qing Chen smiled, “I’ll do just that.”
After speaking, he asked for Jiang Xue’s help to drag the corpse to the yard and then handed her the pistol on his waist, “I plan to sneak into Yunshang Inn. Even with a silencer installed, it’ll still attract attention the moment a shot is fired, so I’ll give this to you.”
Jiang Xue shook her head, “Take it with you, you’re in way more danger. Who cares about attracting attention when life and death are at stake, just shoot if you need to.”
Qing Chen was taken aback initially, then he chuckled and removed the gun holster from the corpse to fasten it around his own waist.
Although he didn’t know how to use a gun and would alert the other thugs to besiege him if he opened fire, it was definitely better to have a weapon than not having one.
Li Shutong said a knight must use a blade to kill for the first time, and he had already done that.
His next kill shouldn’t be counted alongside the first.
So he could use a gun.
Qing Chen patted Li Tongyun's small head, “This time you really have to listen well. Wait for me to come back.”
“Okay,” Li Tongyun nodded.
At this moment, a voice rang out from the walkie-talkie on the corpse's chest: “Start counting now, 1.”
The voices of the thugs relayed coldly: “2.”
“3.”
“4.”
A short pause followed – Qing Chen immediately used his breathing technique and perfectly reproduced the thug’s voice from his memory, “5.”
He was about to turn off the walkie-talkie when a new count was transmitted from the speaker.
“6.”
“7.”
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“8.”
Qing Chen was jolted by a shock.
There were three more thugs!