Chapter 52

Chapter 52: What’s Wrong?

Feng Ling had always been curious about aberrants.

Curious why they appeared. Curious how they vanished. Curious what their ability cards could do—and how much pain those gene-twisted bodies could take. In that kind of curiosity, she could be frighteningly cold.

But facing an aberrant curled on the deck in human form—bleeding, armless, shaking like something cornered—she still felt it: the wrongness of killing something that looked too close to human. The dull boredom of bullying the helpless.

And maybe—just maybe—there was something else in her blood, too. Some irritating tug of warmth from that overly “maternal” ability card.

She would’ve preferred the fishman to turn back, snarl, curse, lunge at her with hate and desperation. That, at least, would’ve been interesting.

“Don’t kill me…” the fishman whispered.

Feng Ling was already fully dressed. She watched it with a patient, almost encouraging gaze, as if coaxing it to speak.

“I was hired,” it said, voice trembling. “The one who wanted you dead was him…”

Feng Ling’s eyes stayed flat. “How did you know I’d be on the river?”

“The employer bought your intel on the forum,” the fishman said quickly. “Two thousand points for your name, what you look like, the main abilities of your ability card… and your movements.”

“My movements?” Feng Ling tilted her head. “So the seller has a tracking ability?”

“I don’t know,” the fishman said, swallowing. “I only know they do offline trades with players at Meng Jia Hotel. If you pay enough points, you can buy anything. I’ve only gone once. I don’t know which player has the search ability.”

That interested Feng Ling far more than it should have.

“If a player wants to trade,” she asked, “who do they contact at Meng Jia Hotel?”

The fishman hesitated—just two seconds, but it was there. Then it lowered its voice. “The front desk. Ask for a room above the fourth floor. The attendant registers you—your forum nickname. Then someone sends you a friend request and tells you which room to go to for the trade…”

It glanced up at her and immediately looked away again, pride crushed into nothing. “If you want to know more, I’ll tell you. Anything. Just… don’t kill me.”

Feng Ling studied it for a moment, then asked softly, “The person who sold my intel—she’s in Meng Jia Hotel right now, isn’t she?”

“Probably,” the fishman said, after a beat. “Her name is Moonshadow. I heard she’s close to the hotel boss.”

Feng Ling’s eyes narrowed.

“I need to know if you’re lying,” she said. “Go back to Meng Jia Hotel. Find whoever handled that deal. Tell them their bad intel got two of your partners killed—and you want compensation.”

“They won’t pay,” the fishman said, brows knotting. “If they trade offline, it means they aren’t afraid of any player coming after them.”

“I know.” Feng Ling smiled, but there was nothing warm in it. A bone blade slid out from her shoulder and caught the night, a thin line of cold light. “You’re still going. And you’re going now.”

She leaned in slightly. “Or you can die here.”

The fishman’s face tightened. It feared Feng Ling, but it feared the people in that hotel, too.

“If I do what you say,” it tried, voice thin, “will you let me go?”

Feng Ling’s smile didn’t change. “You get two hours. If you aren’t at Meng Jia Hotel by then, I’ll kill you.”

The fishman didn’t ask how she planned to find it. It knew better.

Its lower body shifted back into a thick fish tail. It slammed the deck, launching itself into the air, and plunged into the river. Silver-gray scales flashed once over the black surface—then it vanished into the waves.

In the distance, a helicopter circled, rotors grinding the night. A floodlight carved bright, moving rings across the river.

Feng Ling stood alone on the small fishing boat.

The wind skinned the water off her. Her body finished returning to normal, but her long hair still hung wet and heavy, clinging to her shoulders. In the hard light, her face looked too clean, too cold—like something that had crawled out of the river pretending to be human.

The helicopter’s beam finally locked onto the boat.

From above, the blood-smeared deck looked like a single crimson flower blooming on black water.

“Deputy Captain!” a team member shouted, tense as a drawn wire. “Aberrant spotted!”

Zhou Zhou snapped, “Aberrant my ass—that’s Feng Ling! Drop the ladder!”

A team member scrambled to grab the rope ladder, but Zhou Zhou stopped them at the edge.

“Wait.” He leaned out, staring down, face twisted with conflict.

He wanted her safe. Desperately.

But the stink of blood and fish was thick enough to choke on. The deck below was a massacre. Feng Ling looked calm—but calm didn’t mean sane. Not after a fight like this.

If she’d snapped, letting her onto the helicopter could get everyone killed.

The thought iced his back. And yet—was he really going to leave her out there?

He gritted his teeth and barked at the others, “Any of you bring perfume?”

They stared at him like he’d lost his mind.

Who brought perfume on an operation?

Zhou Zhou swore under his breath. “Useless. All of you.”

One team member coughed and said, “Uh… I’ve got… cologne. The mosquito kind.”

Someone else blurted, “Why would you carry that?”

“Night patrol,” the team member muttered. “The mosquitoes are brutal.”

“Hand it over,” Zhou Zhou snapped.

He snatched the bottle and sprayed himself down hard, ignoring the looks. Then he pointed at the team and said, deadly serious, “I’m going first. If she attacks me, you pull out immediately. Tell Captain Su to bring a destroyer. She cannot be allowed to reach shore.”

With that, he grabbed the rope ladder and swung out of the helicopter.

The ladder swayed in open air, then dropped onto the fishing boat.

Feng Ling tilted her head up, watching him descend, and said, almost casually, “That’s a big helicopter.”

Hearing her voice—steady, normal—Zhou Zhou finally breathed. “Captain Su pulled all the boats back and brought the helicopter in. He wouldn’t let us enter the water. Too many ways that goes wrong.”

Then his eyes fell on the bodies and the ability card on the deck, and he wiped a hand over his face. “You did right not touching that ability card. You’re at twenty-nine percent. Don’t digest anything else.”

“There are two more dead down there,” Feng Ling said. “No idea if their ability cards can be retrieved.”

“Forget it,” Zhou Zhou said, lips twisting. “We won’t get them. Some fish will absorb them sooner or later. If the news ever breaks that Qing Jiang has a water monster—some ‘Fish Monster’—that’ll be the poor bastard that swallowed an ability card.”

He held the ladder out to her. “Come on. Let’s get you back to shore.”

Feng Ling didn’t move. She frowned, eyes narrowing slightly.

“What now?” Zhou Zhou asked, impatient and wary at the same time.

Feng Ling pinched her nose and took a step back. “You stink.”

Zhou Zhou blinked.

“Go up first,” she said, voice flat with disgust. “I’ll climb after you’re on.”