?Jun Qingcheng checked into her hotel, ordered a precise selection of dishes from room service, and ate with a predator’s calm. After a brief rest, she double-locked the door and slipped out into the night.

  ?By her calculations, this city required only twenty-four hours.

  ?The names on Xiao Ranran’s hit list were etched into her mind—their routines, their vices, their vulnerabilities. She didn't need elaborate conspiracies; she needed only a catalyst. Her philosophy was simple: use the environment as a weapon. Minimal effort, maximum lethality.

  ?Her first target was a corrupt businessman, a man with deep roots in both the boardroom and the gutter. He was a sycophant of Ji Kai, one of the many who had lined up for a "piece" of Xiao Ranran when she fell from grace. To him, an exiled heiress was just another high-end commodity.

  ?As she neared his location, the fractured soul of Xiao Ranran within her pulsed with a jagged, phantom pain. Rest easy, Jun Qingcheng whispered into the void of her subconscious. I am the hand that balances your scales.

  ?She stood in the shadow of a high-end sauna club. Moving with the invisibility of a ghost, she bypassed the staff and reached the businessman’s private suite. She didn’t enter. Instead, she jammed the lock from the outside and cranked the thermostat to its lethal maximum.

  ?Fifteen minutes later, when a staff member finally tried the door, they found it bolted. Inside, the "titan of industry" was found collapsed against the door—boiled alive in a prison of his own luxury.

  ?By then, Jun Qingcheng was already in a car bound for the outskirts. She had two more to go: a regular at a local brothel and a patient in a nearby hospital.

  ?[WARNING: Potential threat detected in the next target. Abort mission?] The System’s voice rang in her head, cold and mechanical.

  ?“No,” she whispered, her lips barely moving.

  ?[Proceed with caution, Host.]

  ?She reviewed the dossier. The target was a brawler—a drug-addicted sociopath. Standard fare, yet the System was twitchy. She pivoted, stopping at a boutique to buy a revealing dress and applying heavy, dramatic makeup. In this world, beauty was a camouflage.

  ?She slipped into the nightclub like a viper in tall grass. No one noticed the extra player on the board.

  ?In the rafters and dark corners, undercover cops and informants were sweating through their shirts. They had been tailing a drug lord for months, expecting a major deal tonight. The air was thick with tension—every "john" could be a dealer; every "working girl" could be a fed.

  ?Jun Qingcheng sensed the shift in the atmosphere. Police. If they took her target, he’d be buried in a legal system she had no time for.

  ?But the cops weren't there for her man.

  ?She waited in the stairwell, a shadow among shadows. When her target appeared, she struck. They tangled in the dark, a silent, frantic dance of violence.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  ?“We’ve got a scuffle!” an informant hissed into his radio. “Too dark to identify.”

  ?“Hold your position,” came the reply. “Do not blow the sting.”

  ?Seconds later, the struggle ended. A man slumped to the floor. A hooded figure glanced toward the hidden cameras, then vanished through a window. When the feds finally moved in, they found a corpse with a crushed windpipe.

  ?The building was swarming with police. Trapped, Jun Qingcheng abandoned the immediate escape and drifted into the panicked crowd as gunfire broke out in another wing. In the chaos of the evacuation, she slipped out the front door and into her waiting car. A lone officer caught her eye for a split second, but before he could react, she was gone.

  ?Next stop: the hospital.

  ?A forty-something man lay in the VIP ward, guarded by a rotating shift of goons. Jun Qingcheng stole a nurse’s uniform and slipped into the pharmacy. With practiced hands, she injected a lethal, self-formulated toxin into a saline bag destined for the VIP suite.

  ?As she was exiting, a senior doctor stopped her. “You. Which department? I haven’t seen you around.”

  ?She ducked her head, adopting the timid, wide-eyed look of a terrified amateur. “Director Li... I’m a new intern in OB-GYN. I just started a few days ago.”

  ?It was a calculated gamble—she knew a fresh batch of interns had arrived that week. Director Li nodded vaguely and waved her off.

  ?By the time the saline bag was empty that night, the man was dead. The hospital descended into madness as the family demanded an autopsy. They found the toxin—a sophisticated, unknown substance. While the hospital scrambled to avoid a lawsuit, the blame naturally shifted to the "missing intern" Director Li had encountered. By then, the suspect was a ghost.

  ?The following morning, Jun Qingcheng stood at the edge of a windswept cliff. For the first time, she wasn't wearing a mask.

  ?Unfortunately, fate had brought an old acquaintance into the crossfire.

  ?Zhou Qian, the girl from the train, was tied up on the ground, her face bruised and smeared with dirt. Standing over her were two armed guards and a man sitting in a lawn chair—Jun Qingcheng’s target.

  ?The man looked up, his eyes widening as he studied Jun Qingcheng’s face. She looked hauntingly like Xiao Yuan’s late wife.

  ?“What kind of day is this?” the man laughed, looking at the sky. “First, I stumble upon the daughter of the Police Chief on the street, and now, the daughter of my old enemy Xiao Yuan walks right into my lap. Is my luck finally turning?”

  ?He knew the score. Xiao Yuan was overseas, weeks away from returning. He had two prize pawns, and no one was coming to save them.

  ?Zhou Qian looked at Jun Qingcheng, her eyes screaming a silent plea: Run! Get help!

  ?She had no idea she was looking at the most dangerous person on that cliff.