"The project cycle is really long, you know that, so—"
"So you were planning to secretly donate your commission to those kids again, weren't you?"
"We've been together since college, over ten years now. I know you're under pressure. I don't push you. When you wanted to leave our hometown, I quit my job and came to Beijing with you. You've been quietly donating money all along, and I turned a blind eye. I've never asked for a single day of luxury. But now that we're having a child, I need you to think about your own family for once, instead of living in the past!"
His wife pulled out a stack of bank statements:
"Don't play dumb. I checked your transaction records for the past three years today. You've been transferring money to those kids every single month, haven't you? You don't even care about your own child—are we even going to keep this family together?"
The table was overturned in an instant—bowls and dishes shattered across the floor.
Victor Hu stood motionless. He knew he was in the wrong and didn't dare say a word.
"If we can't make it work, then let's not! I need some air." His wife stormed out, the door slamming behind her, her footsteps receding down the hall like a sentence.
Long after she left, Victor went to the kitchen, came back, and crouched down to pick up the shards with a rag.
The secret Victor carried came from a terrible medical accident at his family's hospital.
To be precise, his family's private hospital was the region's largest underground broker for artificial cornea transplant surgery.
Artificial corneas refer to corneal endothelial cell layers cultivated in vitro through artificial methods, suitable for transplantation.
Worldwide, approximately 60 million people suffer from corneal blindness, including about 4 million in China, with an additional 100,000 new cases annually.
However, traditional cornea transplants not only suffer from a severe shortage of donor corneas, but in certain cases, the donor cornea can come under immune system attack—so-called rejection—causing the transplant to fail. For this reason, artificial corneas became the hope of the majority of corneal blindness patients seeking to see again.
Because the cornea contains no blood vessel structures, the likelihood of rejection after transplant surgery was quite low, making cornea transplantation one of the most successful of all human organ transplant procedures.
Yet statistics showed that China performed only 3,000 to 4,000 cornea transplant surgeries annually—far short of the actual number of patients in need. The vast majority of corneal disease patients at eye hospitals could only manage with medication, and those needing transplants faced endless waits.
Victor's father's public identity was the director of the region's largest private hospital. Privately, he was the kingpin of this underground operation.
But the artificial corneas themselves were neither stable nor safe. After surgery, dozens of children, having passed the rejection period, plunged back into darkness.
Victor, who knew all of this, gave up the chance to inherit the family business. He gave up being a doctor.
After a bitter fight with his father, he came to Beijing alone, joined an advertising agency, and tried to atone.
For every 10,000 yuan he earned, he kept 1,000 for living expenses and sent the rest to the children harmed by his father's greed.
If only he could get his hands on a huge sum of money. If he could get a fortune, he would do anything—
Victor mulled this over silently, not noticing that the shards of porcelain had already sliced open his hands, blood dripping down his arms.
He was lost in thought, completely unaware of a line of blood-red text coalescing in the air before him.
Outside the window, something like a comet was streaking across the silent sky, threading the needle of fate.
---
Nine
By the time I climbed the rusty service ladder to the top of the Ferris wheel, Sissy was sitting with her back to me, humming a tune.
From somewhere I couldn't see, moonlight spilled across her, giving her silhouette a matte glow.
"First piece of intel: if your Abandoned Object is close by, you'll feel a surge of power. If there's a deeper kind of integration, it enhances your physical abilities and healing—like the Word Spirit ability in Dragon Raja that I once lent you. Those of us who've been chosen might not even qualify as human anymore."
"Second piece of intel: a hunted target is erased at the conceptual level. I checked the company records—there is no such person as Victor Hu anymore. It's as if he never existed."
Sissy turned to look at me, flames seeming to burn in her amber pupils, the corners of her eyes red, as though she'd just been crying.
"About a minute after the hunt ended, his entire body disappeared. Like when my computer crashes and I lose a file—the person simply ceases to exist."
"I—I was just thinking, you're going to cease to exist too, just like him. My best friend in Beijing, Axel Zhou, is about to die, to completely vanish from this world."
"It just makes me so sad..."
I smiled, noncommittal, and scratched my head:
"You remember the Dragon Ball story I told you, right? Anyway, whoever dies, the one who clears the game just has to revive everyone. We're good on that, right?"
Sissy narrowed her eyes, looking at me as if I were some bizarre insect: "Did you even listen to my first piece of intel? Have you considered why I lured you to this place? I've told you so many times to be careful and thorough, and you come here alone, empty-handed. Should I praise your bravery or laugh at your naivety?"
I mimicked her, narrowing my eyes and tilting my head: "Hey, stop underestimating me. You were the same way during pitches—you're a designer but you always had to rewrite my copy, saying this was wrong and that was bad. How about sticking to your own job?"
Sissy raised her hand. The Ferris wheel began to tremble, and her voice changed, an eerie, piercing tone declaring the start of the hunt:
"That's because your copywriting really is that tacky!"
Glass shattered all around me—countless windows cracking, a howling wind. The entire Ferris wheel groaned like an abused child.
This was a dead end. Below was a single rickety, rusted service ladder, and I knew nothing about Sissy's abilities.
What I now knew wasn't light or wind—it had to be some kind of substance.
She could attract a certain substance, like Magneto, transforming it into razor-sharp fragments that could tear a person to pieces.
From Sissy's perspective, this was already a sure-kill setup. She had pre-cracked every window to a half-shattered state, and chosen the highest point of the Ferris wheel, where there was nowhere to dodge.
Under these circumstances, as long as Axel Zhou's "Abandoned Object" wasn't the Ferris wheel itself, he had to die!
Facing an old friend, thinking of their weekend dinners and all the laughter they'd shared, Sissy could only manage a quiet sigh.
"Farewell, Axel Zhou. When this is all over, I'll bring you back. I promise!"
After the dust settled, Axel Zhou's figure vanished.
Sissy didn't dare relax. She spun around, sending her invisible glass shards flying in all directions.
Nothing. The glass flew far out, and only after a long moment did the sound of shattering reach her ears from the ground below.
"That's wrong, that's wrong, that's wrong, that's wrong!"
Sissy realized Axel Zhou's "Abandoned Object" must have already activated, but what was it? How had he blocked the glass storm? Where was he now?
Could it be—"Above you!"
Sissy snapped her head up just in time to see Axel Zhou diving down like a tiger from the top of the Ferris wheel, pinning her flat to the floor.
His clothes had been shredded to ribbons, but a strange metallic luster gleamed across his skin and hands under the moonlight.
"I've told you many times—when I get rich, I'm going to be a whale of a cash-shop player in any game I play." I lifted my head, pulled back my hood, and something like fire was burning in my pupils too.
"What the hell are you wearing?"
"German-imported Black Knight anti-stab chainmail vest and cut-resistant chainmail gloves—top-tier level-3 armor off Taobao, cost several grand for the set. Even a chainsaw would struggle to cut through. Your glass shards? Save yourself the trouble!"
Did you really think I'd come unprepared? I want to live too, Sissy.
Sissy heard footsteps approaching from below the Ferris wheel. A faint glimmer of hope rose in her eyes.
"Credit where it's due, Axel Zhou. But I've got backup too—wait, they'll be here any moment!"
I waggled my finger with mock-playful derision: "You mean those security guards you bribed? They're not working for you anymore. When they get here, it'll just be easier to bag you up."
For the first time, genuine terror crossed Sissy's face: "You—!"
"I found it strange the moment I arrived. Why were your WeChat messages always so perfectly timed? The second I reached the park entrance, you texted. The second I got to the Ferris wheel, you texted. That could only mean one thing: you'd bribed the security guards here, and you could monitor the CCTV feeds remotely from your phone. That's how you tracked my every move, right?"