Even the most heinous criminals exude a strong sense of corporate drudgery when they gather together for work.
"Good morning."
Someone leaned back in their office chair with a grin and waved a hand, pushing the backrest to a dangerous angle.
Shen Yi, still wrapped in her coat, rubbed her eyes.
She had been carried all the way back by Shen Ruxu, resting on her brother's shoulder, and was only now belatedly feeling a bit sleepy.
"Good morning," she mumbled in response.
A girl kicked off the floor, sliding over chair and all. "Hey, Xiao Yi, have you used up the stuff I gave you?"
"Here you go."
Shen Yi instantly woke up, quickly opened her backpack, rummaged around for a moment, and handed the item back.
The girl took it, weighed it in her hand, raised an eyebrow, and slid away without asking any questions.
The entire base was permeated with a faint sense of decadence.
Staying cooped up in the base all day long could make anyone grow mold.
Only a very few hardcore homebodies could stand sitting around like this.
On the way back, Shen Ruxu had first taken her to get something to eat to fill her stomach. Shen Yi had originally been a bit sleepy after eating, but upon returning to the base, her brain automatically replayed everything she had done that night, and she found herself unable to sleep.
Shen Yi hugged her backpack and returned to her room.
Seeing her second brother acting all sneaky as if he wanted to follow her inside.
She decisively shut the door.
"Don't go into a girl's room."
The door slammed shut. The young man let out an ah and persistently clawed at the door. "After such a huge thing happened, do you really, really not need my comfort? Xiao Yi, Xiao Yi..."
What a desolate cry, like a cat howling after being locked outside.
"..."
When the others saw this, they couldn't help but cover their eyes.
Everyone in their base didn't really like interacting with Shen Ruxu.
People like him who smiled all day long seemed approachable, but in reality, they were completely unfathomable.
When a companion they spent day and night with died, everyone would feel somewhat devastated.
At the very least, they would feel sympathy for their kind, but he was the only one who could smile and ask if they wanted to eat as if nothing had happened.
Having him as a companion was fine, but getting any closer was out of the question.
His level of apathy towards emotions made him seem like he wasn't a normal human being.
After being shut out, Shen Ruxu still refused to budge.
He simply sat down, quietly bowing his head and waiting at her door.
...
Shen Yi entered the room, recalling the thrilling and dangerous night, and decided to chat with her family first.
After grabbing her phone, she first carefully sent a message to Shen Sixing: 'I killed someone.'
After typing these few words, she stared at the screen for three seconds, hesitating whether to add an emoji to soften the tone, but finally gritted her teeth and hit send.
Shen Sixing replied instantly:
[Do you need me to help dispose of the body?]
Shen Yi replied with a voice message, her voice very small and light: "No need, Second Brother will help me handle it. Dad, don't you have anything to say to me?"
Shen Sixing immediately gave her a very old-fashioned response:
[Xiao Yi is so awesome (Thumbs up Thumbs up Thumbs up)]
Shen Yi stared at those three thumbs up, unable to tell for a moment if he was genuinely praising her or just brushing her off.
Immediately after, another message popped up out of the blue:
[Your second brother is dead meat.]
It was inexplicably murderous.
Shen Yi blinked.
Had he actually guessed that it had something to do with Shen Ruxu? She hadn't even said anything.
She looked down at the message she had sent. It was just four words, containing no information at all.
Shen Sixing was truly frighteningly perceptive about certain things.
Shen Yi pondered for two seconds, then called Wen Ya.
She drooped her head, her childish voice soft. "Mom, Mom."
"What's wrong, baby?" The woman was in a good mood. "Do you want to come home?"
"No."
Shen Yi stammered, her fingers unconsciously twirling the zipper of her coat. "I... I killed someone."
In an instant.
Her mother's voice went up several pitches.
"What did you say?!!"
In Wen Ya's mind, Shen Yi was a very well-behaved child. How could she possibly kill someone?
Her daughter would struggle just to kill a chicken!
"Is today April Fool's Day?" Wen Ya subconsciously flipped through the calendar.
Shen Yi: "I'm not joking, Mom."
Wen Ya took a deep breath, sorted out her emotions, and upon realizing that her daughter really had no intention of kidding around, asked in a low voice, "Are you scared?"
Shen Yi put up a tough front. "Not scared."
"That's wonderful!" Wen Ya wasn't as perceptive as Shen Sixing; instead, she began to feel proud of her child's growth.
"Did you take photos at the scene to commemorate it, Xiao Yi? What's the date today again? I must record this down; it's a day worth commemorating."
Shen Yi: "..."
Her dad and mom were completely on par with each other in terms of their sickness.
Next, Shen Yi tilted her head and thought for a moment. She scrolled down her contacts and decided to call the busybody of the family.
Looking at her parents' reactions, neither seemed particularly surprised.
So what about Shen Wenta?
She waited a long time for this call to finally connect.
The background noise was chaotic—people talking, the rustling of papers, and the sound of chairs being dragged.
Shen Yi stated flatly, "I killed someone."
"..."
A long silence.
The silence made Shen Yi couldn't help but reflect: had she been misjudging Shen Wenta all along? Was he actually not a scumbag with a low sense of morality, but rather a good person with a strong sense of justice, and therefore deeply disappointed by her actions, leading him to fall silent?
After a long while.
Shen Wenta asked in a soft voice, "Are you not joking with me?"
Shen Yi: "Why do you all think I'm joking?"
"You're really not joking?" Shen Wenta controlled the urge to raise his voice. "Because of who?"
He paused for a moment.
He quickly realized because of who it was.
Shen Wenta quickly changed his tune and stopped asking: "Forget it, I don't want to hear it. Don't tell me."
Then, he started cursing Shen Ruxu over and over again.
"Stop scolding Second Brother. Aren't you going to praise me?" Shen Yi straightened her back a bit, her tone carrying an uncontrollable hint of smugness. "I set out at 2:30 AM today to lie in ambush, and I didn't miss a single shot. Second Brother even praised me for being a sharpshooter."
The other end of the line was quiet for a moment.
And then it exploded again.
"2:30 AM?!"
He gripped his phone tightly in anger. Shen Yi could imagine the veins popping on his forehead right now. "You are a little girl, Shen Yi. Can you even realize that you are a little girl? Going out in the middle of the night? Is your brain broken?"
"Your brain is broken." Shen Yi didn't yield to the pressure. "What if I went late and something happened to Shen Ruxu?"
"That has nothing to do with you." Shen Wenta wished he could completely reshape her thinking. "Everyone has to pay for their own actions. Can you understand that?"
"..."
Shen Yi listened to his endless stream of lectures, dumbfounded.
Countless times, she felt that Shen Wenta acted more like a biological father than a brother.
"Dad has said similar things to me before," she said carefully. "But in reality, rational judgment cannot measure a person's feelings."
"If something really happened, I would still be very sad."
"Shen Wenta, you used to always laugh at me for being a coward, but I was brave for once, can't you just praise me?"
Shen Yi really wanted to beg him to stop nagging, just stop nagging.
Shen Wenta pressed a finger lightly against his lips. After two seconds of silence, his voice softened. "Are you trying so hard to prove yourself because of what I said before?"
"Just ignore what I told you back then."
"I was out of my mind at the time. You don't need to take it to heart."
His tone sounded as though he were coaxing her, yet it also carried a hint of an apology.
"I can understand that you wanted to save someone," Shen Wenta said slowly, trying his absolute hardest to maintain the facade of a gentle older brother. However, the moment he remembered her running out in the dead of night, his true colors quickly slipped through. Unable to hold back his exasperation, he snapped, "But you could have at least taken someone else with you! I swear, you are going to be the death of me."
