Chapter 165 - 163: Plenty of Strength and Means

Chapter 165: Chapter 163: Plenty of Strength and Means

It was four in the morning, and the sky was still dark.

A cool breeze swept across the riverbank, making the willow branches sway slowly.

At this hour, the old men hadn’t come out for their morning walks yet.

Everything was quiet. The willow branches swaying in the darkness gave off a strange, eerie feeling.

Su Miaoyi’s gaze was vacant as she walked, step by step, toward the river’s edge.

She didn’t react at all as the branches scraped against her head and face.

The phone in her pocket was ringing.

She didn’t seem to hear it.

She just kept walking forward, and forward.

The guardrail on the bank blocked her path.

She stood there blankly for a few seconds, then climbed over the rail and jumped into the river.

SPLASH! Water flew everywhere.

Su Miaoyi sank toward the riverbed.

As the icy water touched her skin, Su Miaoyi vaguely heard a cool, clear voice.

It was a woman’s voice, cold yet gentle and sacred.

"Are you sure you want to go back? I can send you back, but it violates the rules of your world. You will have to pay a price."

"I have to go back," Su Miaoyi heard herself say.

"Even if this price could cost you your life at any moment, you still want to go back?" the woman asked, her words unhurried.

"Yes. I still have things left to do. If he doesn’t die, more innocent people will."

"I can only grant you one request. You can ask for anything, including living in this dimension, free from aging, sickness, and death. You need to think this through. If you go back and die again, you won’t get another chance to make a request."

"I want to go back."

"Alright, I’ll grant your wish."

These voices flashed through her mind like an electric current.

Su Miaoyi’s eyes shot open. She choked on a mouthful of water and struggled instinctively.

But that only made her sink faster.

"Hold your breath," the voice in her head, seeming to know what she was thinking, said immediately. "You’re not Su Miaoyi. You know how to swim. Get up there."

She immediately held her breath, forcing herself to do so even though her throat and windpipe burned from the water.

After a quick look around, she kicked her legs hard, and after a few strokes, she broke the surface.

As soon as her head was above water, she coughed uncontrollably.

After a few coughs, she swam to the bank.

She grabbed the guardrail, coughed hard a few more times, caught her breath, and surveyed her surroundings.

She recognized this river.

"Your phone," the voice in her head said again.

Su Miaoyi quickly pulled the phone from her pocket. Water was streaming out of the case and the holes for the microphone and earpiece.

Her heart sank.

"There’s something at the bottom of the river," Su Miaoyi said, panting. "I just saw it. A black plastic bag. For me to have been brought here, there’s an eighty percent chance it contains a body."

"Mhm," the voice in her head responded.

Just then, Su Miaoyi’s phone rang again.

It was Zhuang Yanzheng.

Su Miaoyi looked at the water dripping from her phone, hesitated for a moment, then placed it on the bank, answered the call, and put it on speaker.

"Su Miao—"

Su Miaoyi cut him off, speaking as fast as she could, "Captain Zhuang, I’m in the river between Hedong and West River! There might be a body in the water! My ph...one!!!!!!"

It was a shriek worthy of a stepped-on rubber chicken.

Su Miaoyi screamed as she stared at the now-black screen of her powered-down phone.

She’d only had that phone for a day!!!!!!!!

’I wonder if Zhuang Yanzheng heard any of that,’ she thought.

Su Miaoyi placed the phone on the bank. With no time to mourn its loss, she took a few breaths and dove back under.

This river wasn’t very deep, just very long.

The black plastic bag was tied to a large rock. She untied the rock.

She dragged the black bag to the surface.

Su Miaoyi realized that while she was still in the water, she couldn’t get the black plastic bag onto the bank by herself.

It was too heavy.

So, holding the black bag with one hand to keep it from sinking, she grabbed the guardrail with the other, pushed off the bank with her feet, and climbed out.

Then she grabbed the plastic bag with both hands.

One, two, three, HEAVE!

She hauled it up.

Exhausted, Su Miaoyi sat on the ground, gasping for air.

"Pathetically weak," the voice in her head commented.

Still catching her breath, Su Miaoyi retorted, "Oh, you’re so tough? Then you do it. Come on. Can’t you control this body? Didn’t you say this body is yours, too? Huh? What’s the matter? Backing out of the hard, tiring work again, are we? I get all the dirty work while you get to sit back and relax, is that it?"

"Yep," the voice in her head said. "You’re willing to do it, so why should I exhaust myself?"

"Fine, fine, fine," Su Miaoyi said, her eyes narrowing.

The voice in her head added, "If you’re so capable, why don’t you try controlling me?"

Su Miaoyi gasped.

’This is infuriating!’

She put her hands around her own neck. "Let’s just end it all."

"You can’t kill a person like that," the voice in her head said dryly.

"Then you do it," Su Miaoyi dared.

"Am I crazy?"

"So you’re saying I am?" Su Miaoyi shot back.

The voice in her head let out a small laugh and then went silent.

Furious, Su Miaoyi punched her own leg. "Just you wait. I won’t let you off the hook next time."

She took a few more breaths.

Su Miaoyi felt her pockets.

’Good, I still have a pair of gloves. Soaked, though.’

Putting on the wet gloves, she stood up and looked around.

It was freezing.

She was soaked to the bone.

There wasn’t another soul in sight, and the nearest houses were far away.

She shivered, hopping in place to shake some of the water off.

After another few shivers, she went to open the plastic bag.

The stench of a rotting corpse hit her full in the face.

She didn’t have a mask, and even though she had braced herself, the smell made her gag twice.

The black plastic bag was huge.

Su Miaoyi took a few steps back, took a deep breath, held it, and walked back to look inside the bag.

It was filled with body parts.

They were already decomposing.

She examined the parts on top.

There was a pelvis, but it wasn’t intact.

The body had been hacked to pieces.

There were also rotting internal organs.

Su Miaoyi backed away again, took another deep breath, and went back for another look...

After repeating this a few times, she grew accustomed to the smell.

...

Zhuang Yanzheng and the others arrived quickly.

After Su Miaoyi bought her phone, she had synced it with the tech department, so locating it was fast.

On the way over, Zhuang Yanzheng had been calling Su Miaoyi repeatedly.

By the time Su Miaoyi answered, Zhuang Yanzheng was already on his way.

They arrived in about ten minutes.

"Su Miaoyi!" Zhuang Yanzheng shouted.

Su Miaoyi had just spotted an old man out for an early morning stroll and was about to ask to borrow his phone when she heard Zhuang Yanzheng’s voice.

She called back and walked toward him.

Zhuang Yanzheng and Lu Zhishen saw that she was completely soaked.

They both quickly took off their jackets and gave them to her.

They made her put on both jackets.

"You’re lifesavers," Su Miaoyi said, not standing on ceremony as she pulled on both jackets. "Did Yan Cheng not come?"

"We were already halfway here when you answered. Yan Cheng went somewhere else," Zhuang Yanzheng said.

Yan Cheng took some people over to Luo Min’s place.

Su Miaoyi nodded and pointed to the black plastic bag by the river.

The three of them walked over.

Lu Zhishen caught a whiff of the smell and stopped in his tracks.

Zhuang Yanzheng leaned in for a closer look. "You pulled this up? By yourself?"

’The bag is still full of water.’

"I’ve got plenty of strength and know-how," Su Miaoyi said, patting the muscle on her arm.

Zhuang Yanzheng nodded, and after a moment, gave her a thumbs-up.

Su Miaoyi nodded, satisfied with his praise. "From now on, just call me ’sis’."

Zhuang Yanzheng looked at her. "Show-off."

...