Chapter 86 - 81: Curse

Chapter 86: Chapter 81: Curse

On July 24, the unrest in Guan City had subsided, and everything had returned to normal, except that discussions about the Blood Clan remained fervent on the internet. Since the news had been completely made public, the higher-ups no longer deliberately restricted or controlled the web.

With her fourth crossing scheduled for seven o’clock tonight, Yin Zhen had three final things to do.

First, make a phone call for Ian.

Second, send a gift to Nan Jiamu.

Third, use Plot Kill.

Yin Zhen took out the phone belonging to the Ding Yi Identity and dialed the number Ian had given her. This number shared the same format as Ancient Abyss’s; it was from a southern coastal city. Even though she knew it was impossible for the number to exist, Yin Zhen surprisingly felt a jolt of nervousness when she pressed the dial button.

The number wasn’t out of service. The call went through.

Yin Zhen’s mind went blank for a moment, not knowing what this meant.

"The number you have dialed is temporarily unanswered. Please try again later."

No one was answering? Yin Zhen continued to call, but there was still no answer. She called three times in a row, all with the exact same result.

After some thought, Yin Zhen released Lucy from her game inventory once again. During her recent contact with Lucy, Yin Zhen keenly discovered that the android couldn’t lie—this was definitely part of her core directives. However, the little android was smart. She had learned the human trick of beating around the bush and would deliberately conceal certain information or cleverly change the subject.

Yin Zhen reopened her laptop, allowed Lucy to connect, and gave her the phone number and Yi Xingchuan’s name.

The indicator light on Lucy’s temple began to flash, and she started to broadcast emotionlessly. "Number location: Sea City. Owner: Yi Guanfu. Male, fifty-six years old."

"Also surnamed Yi?" Yin Zhen was very surprised. "The name and age don’t match, but... keep looking into what this Yi Guanfu does for a living, where he lives, and his family relations. Check everything in detail."

As Lucy continued her search, lines of information appeared on the laptop screen, and Yin Zhen started to feel a bit bewildered.

Yi Guanfu was the founder of Sky Martial Arts Hall.

Similar yet dissimilar. Yin Zhen couldn’t figure out what all this meant, whether there was some internal connection, or if she was just overthinking it.

"Forget it. Leave this alone for now." Seeing the indicator light on Lucy’s temple still flashing, Yin Zhen closed the laptop, and the light in Lucy’s eyes dimmed a fraction. "I will send you back to Night City tonight. I won’t go back on our previous agreement, and I hope you will also keep your end of the bargain by deleting all information about me and Lucia afterward."

"Victor will suspect you. What are you going to do?" Lucy looked up at Yin Zhen.

Yin Zhen’s expression didn’t change. "That’s not something you need to worry about."

"Understood."

At this point, Lucy no longer had any bargaining chips and could only place her hopes on Yin Zhen’s integrity.

Yin Zhen put Lucy back into her game inventory and took out a pale red crystal shard—Item: Power of Love Brain. She held the shard in her hand, scanned everything in her home, and began to stimulate the strongest emotions buried deep within her heart.

The old sofa was covered with a floral cushion her mother had mended over and over again. When she was little, she would lie on the cracked dining table doing her homework while her mother sewed beside her, complaining that she had worn out the knees of her pants again. There were many scratches on the bedroom door frame. Every Chinese New Year, her mother would mark her height there—one line per year, with the date written beneath each scratch.

She remembered her mother humming in the kitchen, the frying pan SIZZLING. She remembered her mother setting up a stall at the night market, her hands frozen red in winter, yet still tucking Yin Zhen’s hands under her armpits to warm them. She remembered her mother putting the last piece of braised pork into her bowl.

She remembered her mother lying in a pool of blood...

Why wasn’t it the people who truly deserved to die that died?!

Hatred seeped from her very bones. Yin Zhen gripped the shard tighter until blood oozed out. The shard greedily sucked it up, its pale red slowly turning into a deep crimson. Those warm memories acted like knives, bloodily carving open her heart, making her eyes turn bloodshot from the pain.

Since she had made up her mind, she would move forward without hesitation, by any means necessary!

Yin Zhen pulled up her left sleeve and, without hesitation, used the shard filled with blood and hatred to carve the three Chinese characters of a name into her arm, stroke by stroke.

Nan Jiamu!

At 100 words per stroke, the twenty-seven strokes of the name consumed a total of 2,700 words.

Yin Zhen knew that Nan Jiamu wasn’t an unforgivably wicked person. She could even understand everything Nan Jiamu had done and the sorrow of being a CEO romance heroine. Yin Zhen also knew that Nan Jiamu had protected Guan City, fought against the Blood Clan, and saved many people’s lives.