Wednesday – 10:42 AM, East District – Abandoned Flower Market
The sky above Nancheng was a deep steel gray. A fine mist settled over the cobbled courtyard of the old East District Flower Market, once a bustling hub of weekend color. Now, it was a hollowed ruin of its former self — shuttered stalls, broken tile roofs, moss creeping over the cracks.
Qiulan stood beneath a rusted archway. Alone. Exactly as the note had instructed.
She checked her phone: 10:42 AM.
Right on time.
Her breath was steady. She wore a dark trench coat, a scarf tight around her neck, hair coiled professionally. She looked like a university professor waiting for a late student. But her eyes betrayed her — sharp, calculating, darting at the slightest movement.
Then, a sound.
Not footsteps. The squeak of wheels.
A man appeared from behind a column, pushing a delivery cart. He wore city worker coveralls, a facemask, and gloves. His posture was stiff. Familiar.
Qiulan frowned. "You're not who I expected."
He said nothing. He parked the cart between them and stepped back.
Qiulan reached in cautiously — and pulled out a plastic-wrapped book.
Inside, a note, like before. Just three words:
"Lang Wen watches."
Her stomach twisted slightly.
She looked up, but the man was already retreating — back into the mist, vanishing like fog curling through broken glass.
Qiulan turned and left.
But she felt it now.
A pulse.
A ghost.
Lang Wen was supposed to be dead.
Meanwhile – Shen Group, IT Surveillance Division – 11:15 AM
A quiet hum filled the sealed data room. LED lights blinked on wall racks. Screens lined one side, each showing grids of facial recognition logs, heat maps, and movement tracers.
Zhenyu stood behind two techs, arms folded, eyes locked on one feed: a timestamped video clip of Qiulan in the bookstore, placing the note.
He spoke without turning. "Run an AI scrub on her posture. Cross-reference with 2022, 2020, 2019 footage. Look for deviations in her movement rhythm."
The younger tech blinked. "You think she was coached?"
"I think she's acting. And actors need scripts."
He paused.
"Pull Lang Wen's file again. Compare known associates from 2017 onward. I want three levels of separation mapped in the next six hours."
Behind him, the system beeped softly.
A face match.
Unknown male. Recent street footage. Matched 82% to Guo Ze, a former fixer linked to Lang Wen.
Zhenyu's expression didn't change.
But his silence chilled the room.
Elsewhere – 12:40 PM, Wen Liang's Cubicle
Wen Liang sat rigid as Shen Jinhai stood beside him, one hand on the cubicle wall, the other holding a red flash drive.
"Upload it to the internal whistleblower archive," Jinhai said calmly.
Wen looked at the drive. "This isn't the real data."
"No," Jinhai replied. "It's a cleaner version. One that highlights mid-tier corruption and clears Hongfei."
"But—"
"You'll still be a hero," Jinhai cut him off. "But the narrative will be controlled. That's how power works, Wen. Not through chaos. Through curation."
Wen looked down.
His hand shook as he reached for the USB.
Jinhai smiled faintly and walked away, not needing to see whether the boy would comply. He already knew.
Nightfall – The Penthouse, Zhenyu & Yinyin's Apartment
Yinyin arrived home late. The apartment was dimly lit, cool jazz playing on the sound system. Zhenyu was shirtless in the open kitchen, slicing citrus for cocktails, his suit jacket draped over a nearby chair.
She slipped off her heels, the tired tension in her face softening as she walked up behind him.
He poured her a drink without a word, handed it to her. Their fingers brushed — and held for a second longer than usual.
"You're distracted," he said.
She took a sip.
"Wen Liang hesitated."
Zhenyu raised an eyebrow. "He uploaded the report?"
"Yes. But something's off. I think Jinhai got to him."
Zhenyu nodded slowly. "Of course he did."
She sat at the bar, legs crossed, one arm loose over the backrest. "Sometimes I wonder," she said quietly. "If we're all just swimming in someone else's current."
He looked at her, then leaned across the bar slowly, brushing her cheek with the back of his fingers.
"You're not," he said. "You're the one who decides where the current goes."
She smiled.
But her eyes were heavy.
He leaned closer, lips grazing her ear.
"Let me remind you how powerful you are."
She didn't resist as he pulled her into him, their lips meeting like fire against water. His hands slipped along her hips, guiding her across the kitchen counter, where the rest of the world — politics, lies, war — dissolved in sweat and breath.
For a moment, they were just man and woman again.
Not husband and wife.
Not soldier and queen.
Later That Night – 1:30 AM, Outside the Shen Group Tower
Zhou Xi stepped out of a taxi near the underground loading docks. He had a black envelope in hand — Lang Wen's updated profile, compiled from ghost traces and old surveillance footage.
Before he could walk inside, a car pulled up beside him. Tinted windows.
The backseat window lowered.
A man inside, face in shadow, spoke one sentence:
"Tell your master he's not the only one with archives."
Then the window rose. The car vanished into the night.
Zhou Xi's pulse didn't rise.
But he felt, for the first time in months, like the ground beneath them had shifted.