After two months of high-intensity “training,” Zi Qin’s body had gone numb, and even her mind had grown sluggish along with it. Now, even if someone hurled a stone at her, she would only dodge it perfunctorily—if she evaded it, good; if not, she would simply serve as a human punching bag. It was no worse than being treated like human livestock.
But Ji Tingxi’s arrival struck her dulled mind like a hammer, jolting her wits back into motion and summoning every ounce of brainpower to fend off any potential “deception and trickery.”
Ji Tingxi might have looked upright, with impeccable poise and bearing, but in the eyes of Sern people like Zi Qin, she was no different from a human trafficker. Wherever she passed, living people vanished. In that sense, she was even more terrifying than any trafficker.
And now, Ji Tingxi had come in person with a demand.
She wanted Zi Qin to recount the events of their escape two months earlier.
Zi Qin did not know much about the Giel Organization. Back then, members of Giel had approached her and her sister on their own initiative, promising to smuggle them across the border but requiring them to wait for a time.
In the end, however, Zi Qin and Zi Cen could no longer endure their circumstances. They fled ahead of schedule and made their way to the noodle shop that had served as their point of contact. The Giel members were forced to activate their emergency protocols and hustled the sisters out of the city overnight.
Thus, Zi Qin had always known that their capture was her own fault for failing to stick to the plan. At the same time, she was well aware that a group of her Sern compatriots lurked in the unfathomable underworld, doing everything in their power to lift lives from the depths.
Life in the Labor Training Camp had ravaged her body, but it had also tempered her resolve. Her and Zi Cen’s hope of survival did not rest on their brother Zi Wan. It lay with that shadowy, elusive organization.
As long as it existed, they had a chance at salvation.
“We’ve already answered this question fully before,” Zi Qin said. “Does the Commander have any further doubts?”
“Of course I do,” Ji Tingxi replied. “You didn’t head to the North Suburbs of your own accord, and you didn’t hide yourselves. Someone else hid you there, planning to smuggle you out of the country.”
Zi Qin feigned confusion, her eyelids fluttering rapidly. “Why would you say that?”
To Ji Tingxi, her pretense seemed rather childish.
“Because we have evidence proving the existence of the Sern Organization right here in North County City,” Ji Tingxi explained. “Its members are scattered throughout every corner of the city. They keep watch over the lives of Sern people like you. If your survival comes under serious threat, they reach out to you.
“Two months ago, you fell ill and suffered harsh treatment from your employer. You were even forced to perform on stage. That’s when they made contact, offering to get you out of the city. So how did they instruct you? That if you were caught, you must never give them away?”
Zi Qin fell silent for a long moment, clearly struggling to choose her words.
“Commander,” she said at last, “I truly want to provide you with information—if it means I can leave this place, I’ll give you anything. But I also know that giving false information, only for it to be proven wrong later, would make our situation even worse. So my best option is to be honest.
“I’m not familiar with any organization operating in North County City. No one helped us escape. But we did have unavoidable reasons for fleeing, as you yourself just pointed out. I can guarantee you this: if you give us a chance to leave, we absolutely won’t run again. We’ll work obediently and actively report any suspicious activity around us. As Sern Hired Workers, we’ll help you track down the Sern Organization.”
Ji Tingxi remained perfectly still, her tone unyielding. “No. You know about the Sern Organization. You’ve had contact with them. You need to be honest—for the sake of not wasting your brother’s efforts, right?”
Zi Qin looked up, her eyelids trembling despite her efforts to control them. So this “Sern trafficker” had not brought an olive branch after all, but a death threat. She held not only their lives in her hands, but their brother’s as well.
The entire family was neatly in her grasp.
Faced with the implicit threat, Zi Qin hesitated. Her survival instincts churned, urging her to cooperate with the interrogation, to reveal the truth in exchange for that faint glimmer of hope.
But as her thoughts raced, she considered the mysterious Sern Organization. Even if it could not save them, it could still rescue others. New arrivals kept pouring into the Labor Training Camp. She could only hope the place would shut down for good and be cast into hell.
“Commander,” she said, “I’ve already told you the truth. I hope you can see that.”
The interrogation room was wired for listening, and the Camp Leader had monitored the entire exchange.
Once the questioning ended, he knew the outcome without needing Ji Tingxi’s report. Drawing on years of experience, he could not resist offering some advice. “Chief Ji, don’t you think it’s time to employ some harsher methods? You’re being far too lenient!”
The Labor Training Camp had no shortage of “methods.” Consider the inmates at the start: a batch of stubborn troublemakers, every one of them. Yet within a few short weeks, they emerged transformed, model citizens content with their lot.
The efficiency of those “methods” was self-evident.
As head of the Special Action Department, Ji Tingxi was intimately familiar with their effectiveness. But in response to the Camp Leader’s well-meaning suggestion, she glanced at Zi Qin’s emaciated form inside the room and declined.
“Not for the time being. We haven’t reached that point yet.”
“But she’s denying everything. Isn’t that enough? These Sern people might seem stubborn, but once we apply a little pressure, they can’t hold out.”
After all, no one wanted to endure flayed skin and gut-wrenching agony. Since they had to survive in the camp anyway, it was better to do so comfortably.
Ji Tingxi shot the Camp Leader a glance, her expression betraying little. Back at the Guard Institute, no one dared suggest such things to her. They knew her style all too well—she was the epitome of the “elegant interrogation school,” quick with her words but never laying a hand on anyone.
Even in an action-oriented department, Ji Tingxi preferred contests of intellect. As she often said, violence compromised the authenticity of information. The truly valuable intel could not be beaten out of someone. Now, faced with a proposal that might tarnish her refined image, she would not make an exception.
“You make a good point, Camp Leader,” she said. “But I have a method of my own. I wonder if it might work.”
…
The Camp Leader learned the results first, followed by Institute Director He De.
The two sisters—one feigning composure, the other evasive—both insisted that they had fled on their own, with no outside help and no knowledge of any secret organization. Zi Cen had even gone so far as to declare that they would do better to ask the owner of the Amo Inn than to waste time questioning her and her sister.
He De was not angered by the news. Instead, he pondered it for a moment before pulling Ji Tingxi aside.
“I’ve been wondering if we’ve gotten our direction all wrong,” he said. “Maybe there’s no secret organization at all. Perhaps it’s all a smokescreen created by the Libo Faction. The assassination attempt on you and Wen Du proves they sold information on your movements—they’re still active in North County, just operating more covertly now.”
As he spoke, Institute Director He De gazed out at the fields before them. Wheat stalks stood tall, their green ears swaying in the breeze as if urging the wind to blow harder, to better display their plumpness. They stood deep amid the wheat, unconcerned about eavesdroppers, and his thoughts rippled like the grain in the wind.
“Let’s review from the beginning,” he continued. “It started with the Swan Palace leak. Someone exposed your confrontation with the Kangman Representative and the forced vehicle search. What was the purpose of that?”
“To stir up public resentment against the Guard Institute,” Ji Tingxi replied. “To accuse us of abusing our authority.”
“Exactly. Our Guard Adjustment work inevitably disrupts their daily lives, so resentment is natural. Once the media publicizes it and fans the flames, it ferments into outright outrage. But that’s not the key point. There’s more.”
He paused, waiting for her to connect the dots.
“There’s also the damage to Baikang relations and the disruption of normal tourism trade,” she said. “A contract may have been signed, but the exposure creates public pressure. Kangman Country loses face, which could derail the cooperation.”
“Right. The leak’s goal was clearly to sabotage the partnership. But according to our earlier assumptions, if it was the work of the Sern Organization, the logic doesn’t hold. Their primary aim is to smuggle Sern people out of the country. Cross-border cooperation creates more opportunities for them. From a motivational standpoint, the Swan Palace leak couldn’t have come from the Sern Organization.”
Buoyed by the wheat-scented breeze, Institute Director He De’s reasoning flowed more freely. “So which factions both want to attack the Guard Institute and block our cooperation with foreign powers?”
“The Libo Faction, Gailie Country, and the Jili Organization,” Ji Tingxi said.
“And with this assassination attempt,” he pressed on, “doesn’t the Libo Faction’s suspicion grow? If they could obtain your itinerary, they have the means to access Swan Palace intelligence as well.”
“Moreover,” Institute Director He De continued, his gaze drifting toward the distant, hazy contours of the hills, “Sha Jiali’s Sern Hired Worker, Luo Zi, went missing. The Police Bureau mobilized to search for her. Then a patrolman was attacked, and we naturally pinned the blame on the Sern people, which led to our suspicions about a secret organization. But why couldn’t the Libo Faction have killed that patrolman? Muddying the waters is their classic ploy, isn’t it?”
A leader’s deduction demanded rigor and profundity, and Ji Tingxi was skilled at playing along, ensuring his words never fell flat. But at this point, it challenged her own airtight logic, so she ventured her own thoughts.
“Director, it’s certainly possible. But I can’t fathom why the Libo Faction would risk killing a patrolman. And it doesn’t explain how Luo Zi simply vanished.”
If it was the Sern Organization, everything fit neatly: they disguised Luo Zi’s disappearance as a kidnapping, put her on a tour bus at Hoof Lake to flee the country. The searching patrolman discovered them in Hoof Town, so the organization silenced him, and Luo Zi slipped away across the border.
But if the Libo Faction was behind it all, why would they help a lone Sern person?
Institute Director He De chuckled. “You know the Libo Faction’s character. They champion justice and equality. When the genetic report came out, they were the first to object—even more vehemently than the Sern people themselves. Though they are Homer People like us, they sympathize deeply with the Sern. If we set aside the Sern themselves, the Libo Faction’s hot-blooded youths become the prime suspects.
“All that talk of equality and the Bailunting community! They never stop to think: three years ago, the Sern people colluded heavily with Gailie Country. The Yingli Faction, backed by Gailie, was growing stronger by the day. If left unchecked, all of Bailunting would become Gailie Country’s playground for intrigue. Even the Libo Faction would end up as puppets, living at the mercy of foreigners!”
Once he started on the Libo Faction, Institute Director He De could not stop. As a veteran Rui’er official, he despised their radical, reckless ideals. It was like a hardworking elder who had built a home from nothing, only for a pack of immature youngsters to emerge, spouting grand notions of improvement without the ability to protect what they had. He was exasperated by their failure and yearned to root them out before they squandered everything.
Ji Tingxi listened to his tirade impassively, nodding in agreement.
She held no particular hatred for the Libo Faction over the Sern Organization. To her, they were all adversaries, mere objects of her work. But since her superior loathed them so intensely, she gave face by chiming in.
“Indeed,” she said. “In the face of the confederation’s safety, prattling about ideals and morality is nothing but self-destructive shortsightedness.”
With his frustrations vented, Institute Director He De cleared the stale air from his chest and regained his measured demeanor. He resumed his display of incisive leadership.
“Back to the Hoof Lake incident,” he said. “Think about the location of the trouble. Was there anything sensitive about it?”
Ji Tingxi turned to regard him, pondering briefly before realization dawned. “It was one of the tour bus stops, crowded with Kangman People at the time.”
“That’s it,” Institute Director He De said, pleased. He always enjoyed conversing with her; her quick mind meant he never had to belabor his points. “After the incident, divisions arose within North County Station. There was even talk of suspending tourism. See? Our cross-border cooperation with Kangman took another hit. Doesn’t that align perfectly with the Libo Faction’s aims once more? All these events in sequence—they can be linked together, can’t they?”
Ji Tingxi fell thoughtful, her gaze dropping to the wheat field as she mulled over his logic.
Taking her silence as tacit agreement, Institute Director He De grew more confident. He surveyed the expansive fields once more, his thoughts clearing along with his broadened view. He could even make out their next destination in the distance.
“Once we’re out of here,” he said, “we need to touch base with the Merle Guard Institute again. We can use those Jili Organization thugs to dig up more useful information. Our current mission is to return to North County and trace the source of the intelligence leak.”
With that, he turned toward the camp’s office building to bid farewell to the Camp Leader—for now, the interrogation of the Zi Qin sisters was at an end.
Ji Tingxi lifted her eyes to his retreating back.
Once they left this place, the investigation’s direction would shift entirely. Suspicion would pivot from the Sern Organization to the long-dormant Libo Faction. All her previous efforts might have to be scrapped and started over.
Standing in the field, her hair caught by the long wind and streaming backward, brushing against her jawline. Ji Tingxi tilted her head, letting the strands whip fully behind her. At the same time, she strode forward, her mid-calf leather boots trampling the green wheat until she reached the concrete in front of the office building.
“Director,” she called, “my interrogation of Zi Qin and Zi Cen isn’t over yet.”
“The results are already in, aren’t they?” he replied. “They insist they know nothing about any secret organization.”
“The Camp Leader picked up on their evasiveness. He wanted to use special methods, but I politely declined.”
Institute Director He De had lost interest in the sisters, but this piqued his curiosity anew. “What, planning to use torture now?”
“I have a way to confirm whether the Sern Organization truly exists,” she said. “But… I’ll need your help.”
