Jiang Nuan’s heart gave a lurch.
They knew her name. They knew exactly who she was.
All her previous claims of being “just an ordinary person” must have looked like a clown show to them.
But she couldn’t admit it.
The moment she did, there’d be no turning back.
Jiang Nuan tightened her grip on the empty aluminum foil in her hand. The edge of the paper cut into her palm—a faint sting that helped her hold onto her composure.
“Even if… even if the person you’re talking about really exists,” she said, trying to come up with a plausible excuse.
“There’s more than one person in this world who awakened a purification ability.”
She wasn’t making this up.
From the fragments of the original owner's memories, purifiers weren't an extremely rare type of supernatural ability.
There were plenty of awakened purifiers at various levels. Most of them performed purification through forehead touches, clasped hands—normal, dignified physical contact.
Only she—an SSS-rank.
Deep physical contact.
Jiang Nuan forced that thought down into the deepest corner of her mind.
“You can find other purifiers,” she said. “Why do you have to—”
Before she could finish, the car door was pulled open from outside.
Qinian.
He still carried the residual heat from the battle just now. A small patch of his combat suit sleeve was singed.
He dropped into the seat, his shoulder pressing directly into Jiang Nuan’s space, squeezing her closer toward Jiang Ce.
Now she was sandwiched between the two of them, with virtually zero room to move.
Qinian tilted his head, that pair of slightly upturned eyes scanning her, then shifting to Jiang Ce.
“What are we chatting about?”
“Explaining the situation to her,” Jiang Ce said.
“Oh.” Qinian draped one arm over the back of the seat, his fingertips nearly brushing the tiny hairs at the nape of Jiang Nuan’s neck.
He didn’t pull back. Just left it there.
“Go on, then. I’ll listen.”
Jiang Nuan kept her neck stiff, not daring to move.
Jiang Ce was silent for a few seconds, as if organizing his words.
“Zero Squad has been on long-term, high-risk missions in restricted zones,” he said. “The team’s cumulative alienation value is rising far faster than normal. It’s nearing the critical threshold.”
Jiang Nuan’s eyelashes trembled.
Alienated value?
"The monsters in the restricted zones produce corruption energy. Anyone who enters the zone accumulates corruption. If it builds up too much—"
Qinian raised a hand, pinching two fingers together into the shape of a gun.
He pointed the tip at his own temple and tapped it lightly.
“Boom,” he said.
“You’re not human anymore.”
His tone was especially light, like he was just saying there was a new dish in the cafeteria today.
Jiang Nuan’s chest tightened.
She looked at Qinian’s handsome profile, a chill creeping up her spine.
"Purifiers with purification abilities can indeed remove the alienation value," Jiang Ce continued, pulling Jiang Nuan's attention back.
“But if their rank isn’t high enough, their own endurance has a ceiling.”
“Low-level purifiers can only withstand a few times—five at most—before their abilities go out of control.”
Jiang Nuan instinctively wanted to ask: what happens after they go out of control?
But she caught sight of Qinian’s carefree expression out of the corner of her eye, and forced the question back down.
No need to ask.
It definitely wasn’t anything good.
“A-rank and B-rank purifiers can last a bit longer,” Jiang Ce’s voice turned unusually low in the quiet cabin.
With rare items, they can slowly reduce the corruption value, but there’s still a limit. As for S-ranks—there aren’t more than five in the entire region.
He paused.
Looking straight into Jiang Nuan’s eyes.
“SSS-rank? Only one.”
He didn’t say her name outright.
But Jiang Nuan knew exactly who he was talking about.
“We’ve had S-rank purifiers assigned to us before,” Qinian suddenly spoke up. This time, a hint of his usual laziness faded from his voice, dropping half a tone deeper.
He leaned in abruptly, his overwhelmingly aggressive aura enveloping Jiang Nuan.
But we’re constantly deep inside SSS-rank restricted zones. The anomalous contamination is too strong.
His warm breath hit her ear.
“Those two S-ranks only performed a complete purification for us once.”
“And then?” she heard her own dry voice.
“They got corrupted,” Qinian said, looking into her eyes. “They’ve been recuperating for almost a year and still haven’t recovered.”
“Later, they transferred three A-ranks over. Their purification speed couldn’t even keep up with the growth of our mutation level.”
Qinian continued, his tone offhand.
“Even so, those three A-ranks can’t perform purification anymore. If they did, they’d be finished.”
The cabin was silent for two seconds.
Wind crept in through the crack in the door that wasn’t fully closed, a chilling draft sweeping inside.
Jiang Nuan suddenly understood why Zero Squad had come to capture her.
It was because they were about to die.
Without a qualified purifier, they were walking time bombs, liable to turn into the very creatures in the restricted zones at any moment.
And she—perhaps—was the only person who could defuse that bomb.
Just then.
Outside the window, that suffocating darkness suddenly changed.
Without warning, it receded like a tide.
Gray-white daylight streamed back into the streets of the old city.
The collapsed walls, the twisted utility poles—everything was clearly visible again in the light.
In the distance, the survivors were first dead silent, then burst into ecstatic cheers.
“It’s bright! The sky is bright!”
“The restricted zone is lifted! We’re alive!”
Some fell to their knees, sobbing into the ground; others held each other tightly.
Jiang Nuan was stunned.
Lifted?
She had been inside this restricted zone for less than an hour.
A restricted zone… just disappeared like that?
She turned to Jiang Ce in disbelief.
Jiang Ce’s expression was calm, as if he was accustomed to this kind of speed.
Qinian didn’t even lift his eyelids.
“They’re still that fast,” Jiang Ce said casually, withdrawing the defensive light shield.
A cold sweat broke out on Jiang Nuan’s back. This was Zero Squad’s strength.
“Zzz—”
The communicator in the car crackled to life.
After the static.
That calm, utterly emotionless voice sounded once again in the enclosed space.
“The restricted zone is resolved. Bring her back.”
A half-second pause.
“I want to confirm it personally.”
Jiang Ce glanced at Jiang Nuan.
There was a faint hint of apology in his eyes.
He moved to the driver’s seat. “Let’s go.”
The engine started again.
Jiang Nuan sat in the back seat, her back ramrod straight, fingers unconsciously twisting the hem of her clothes.
She was thinking about one thing.
Lu Shiyan had said “confirm it personally.”
Confirm what?
Confirm whether or not she was that SSS-rank?
How would he confirm it?
She didn’t dare to imagine.
