When the incident happened, Shen Yi was crouched by a low table in the corner of the living room, trying to sneak some food from the cabinet.
She had just broken off a piece of bread and stuffed it into her mouth. Before she could even chew, she heard a muffled thud from outside.
Shen Yi paused mid-motion, the dry bread still in her mouth, not swallowed yet.
She knew that sound too well. It was carved into her bones. She could tell the direction, distance, and even the type of gun with her eyes closed.
Without blinking, Shen Yi finished the bread quickly.
Even if she had to run for her life, she needed to eat first. An empty stomach wouldn't get her far.
Her foster parents showed no reaction.
Neither of them paid any attention to the muffled sound. After all, this was their territory. It had been over two months—there was no way those people could have tracked them down.
Night had fallen, and everything outside was pitch black.
Shen Yi turned and crept to the kitchen door. When the woman wasn’t looking, she pulled a small knife from the knife rack, tested its length, and slipped it into her sleeve. The handle pressed against her wrist; she covered it with the cuff of her sleeve.
The cold metal against her skin gave her a sliver of reassurance.
Her foster parents didn't keep a close eye on her. The door was simply locked, without extra chains or padlocks.
Shen Yi stood on her tiptoes, just barely reaching the latch. It made a soft click when she twisted it open.
She held her breath and listened. Neither of them stirred.
The reason she hadn't escaped before was that this place was the heart of the organization. It was crawling with their people. An eight-year-old girl running out alone would be caught in less than ten minutes, and the consequences would be fatal.
Shen Yi wasn’t confident she could slip past all those eyes unnoticed, so she had been waiting, watching.
But with chaos erupting now, this was her best chance.
If she stayed, she was afraid she'd end up buried underground along with her lunatic foster parents.
Shen Yi pulled the door open just enough to squeeze through, then quietly closed it behind her.
She hadn’t run twenty meters before a thunderous explosion erupted behind her.
Debris and dust burst outward as half a wall collapsed, bricks and stones crashing down and kicking up clouds of gray-white smoke.
Shen Yi didn’t look back. She quickened her pace, ducking into a narrower alley, pressing her body against the wall and holding her breath.
Gunfire erupted from all directions.
Nearby and far away, it all blended together.
A man leaned half his body out of a second-floor window to shoot, only to be hit and fall, crashing onto a metal roof below.
Shen Yi hunched low and slipped past a pile of debris, broken glass crunching under her feet.
She tried to step as lightly as possible, using her small frame to weave between broken walls and collapsed structures.
Out of the corner of her eye, Shen Yi caught movement at the end of the alley.
A group of people moved in unison, guns raised, their movements disciplined and practiced.
She didn’t stare. She squeezed herself behind a half-collapsed corner of a wall, curling into the smallest possible ball, blending in among the scattered bricks.
The smell of gunpowder hung thick in the air, sharp and acrid, mixed with dust and the scent of rusted metal.
Buildings in the distance trembled with explosions; window glass shattered and rained down in a chorus of shattering sounds.
Shen Yi curled up in her corner, gripping the knife in her sleeve tightly.
She didn’t know if she’d be lucky enough to survive this.
After all, if those people swept through the area, she’d just be another target.
Being a child didn't mean safety. Her small stature didn’t protect her.
She bit her hand, listening to the footsteps drawing near and fading away, counting her breaths nervously.
One. Two. Three.
A voice suddenly spoke in her mind, its tone light and strangely out of place:
[Good news—you’re safe. Your dad’s here.]
Shen Yi froze.
"Shen Sixing?"
Shen Yi: "Doesn't that mean I'm screwed?!"
[Yeah, the bad news is your dad is currently the biggest threat.]
[Run, Shen Yi.]
Shen Yi didn’t even have time to curse. She scrambled out of the pile of rubble, ducked low, and slipped into a half-collapsed building next door.
She found a deeper corner to squeeze into. A fallen partition wall stood in front of her, with a half-intact floor slab above her head for cover.
The little girl curled up, covering her ears with her hands.
Time crawled by.
Shen Yi stayed hidden for seven or eight hours, from the dead of night until the sky began to lighten at the edge of the horizon. By the time dawn broke, the gunfight was finally winding down.
It had been a breathtaking scene—gunfire had barely stopped all night. Shen Yi’s eyes were bloodshot.
From exhaustion.
She hadn’t slept a wink.
Around six in the morning, the sky was fully bright, but her ears were still ringing.
The adults on the scene were probably all dead. Bodies lay scattered across the ground. The only survivors were a handful of children.
They were all frozen in shock, too frightened even to cry. Their eyes stared blankly in a single direction, as if they’d carry this trauma for life.
Shen Yi peeked out from the crack and saw the children being pulled one by one from their hiding spots.
But none of them were killed.
She relaxed a little.
At least these people really didn’t kill kids.
That meant she was safe.
Soon after, she heard a familiar voice.
Lazy, a little tired, sounding half-dead.
"How many are left?"
Someone answered, their voice respectful and brief.
The familiar voice just hummed in acknowledgment, not asking for more details.
Shen Yi sneaked a peek through the crack between the bricks.
Outside stood a crowd of men in black, tall and imposing, looking like trouble.
And at the center of them all was a young man, one hand in his coat pocket. The hem of his coat lifted slightly in the morning breeze. He tilted his head just a little.
The light was still dim at dawn, catching his profile and outlining it in a bright, shifting edge.
His looks weren’t particularly striking, but with the atmosphere around him—broken bricks and fresh bloodstains underfoot, early light filtering through gaps in the gunpowder haze—it was a scene that was both shocking and unforgettable.
That face—
It was the exact image of her father in his younger days.
The difference might have been that the Shen Sixing she knew had more warmth to him. This person here, in front of her, had an faint, almost inhuman quality to him.
Seeing Shen Sixing like this, Shen Yi felt a bit like she was watching someone she knew showing off.
But she had to admit, the scene was impressive.
Watching Shen Sixing make his entrance like a textbook villain, a rhythmic tune started playing in her head.
The System jumped at the opportunity, immediately adding background music to her father’s grand entrance, playing it with flair:
[A bird in the woods, in the end, can't escape the world's karma. The flowers are flowers, the grass is grass. By the stage, a singsong girl sings of sorrow—]
Shen Yi: "?"
Before she could even complain, the System decisively switched tracks to something even more upbeat and rhythmic:
[You should know, a guy this handsome could only exist in an anime. To understand, aren't you my standard accomplice—]
Shen Yi finally lost it and snapped in her mind: "...Get lost!"
The System went silent.
Shen Yi buried her face in her knees, forcing herself to calm down.
Through a tiny gap.
She watched as Shen Sixing kept one hand in his pocket while the other hung loose at his side, a gun held loosely in that hand, his finger resting casually on the trigger.
This person was clearly in a bad mood right now.
And, sure enough—
He raised his hand and fired several shots into a man, most likely a core member of the organization there, turning him into a sieve.
The piercing screams made countless people lower their heads, eyes fixed on the ground, minds inward.
Shen Yi watched this scene without blinking, then realized with horror that Shen Sixing suddenly swung his gun mid-action, without any warning, and fired a shot toward where she was hiding.
?!
The bullet flew over, hitting the stone slab less than half an arm's length in front of her. Debris splashed up, grazing the back of her hand with a searing sting.
The bullet landed precisely at the edge of Shen Yi's hiding spot.
No more, no less.
If it had been two inches off, it would have hit her in the forehead.
Shen Yi still found the composure to admire it.
—Such sharp shooting!
“Here,” the young man said softly, with a slow smile tinged with surprise, “it looks like something is hiding?”
