The world outside Warehouse 7 exploded into a chaotic symphony of sirens and screeching tires.
Armored SUVs tore across the gravel, their headlights cutting through the oily rain like white-hot blades.
"THIS IS THE SPECIAL TASK FORCE!" a distorted voice boomed through a megaphone.
"THE BUILDING IS SURROUNDED! DROP THE CARGO AND COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS UP!"
Inside the warehouse, the air turned sub-zero. **Lao K** reached for his suppressed sidearm, his eyes darting to Lu Xingcheng. He was waiting for the word—the signal to turn this docks into a graveyard.
"Don't," Xingcheng hissed, his voice a jagged whisper. "It's a trap. The Ghost Clan leaked our GPS. If we fire on 'officers,' we give the city a legal reason to execute the entire Lu Syndicate."
For the first time in a decade, the Shadow Emperor felt the walls closing in. But then, he felt something else.
A small, warm hand grabbed his leather-gloved fingers. Her grip was surprisingly, almost terrifyingly, strong.
"If I get caught in a police raid, my scholarship is dead!" Joey whispered, her eyes wide not with fear, but with the frantic energy of a survivor. "My Professor is a bigger monster than you 'actors'! This way, 'Pretty Boy'!"
Xingcheng froze. Pretty Boy? Actor?
"You're… ordering me?"
"I'm saving your life! Move!" Joey didn't wait for his permission.
She dove toward a rusted, circular ventilation grate near the floorboards and kicked it twice with her worn sneakers until the bolts popped.
Before Xingcheng could protest, he was being dragged into a narrow, sludge-filled drainage pipe.
The interior of the pipe was a nightmare of old copper and stagnant water. Xingcheng's five-thousand-dollar bespoke Italian silk suit—hand-stitched in Milan by a man who had dressed kings—was currently being christened by industrial runoff and city mud.
*RIIIP.*
A rusted bolt caught the shoulder of his jacket. Xingcheng flinched in physical pain. It wasn't the skin; it was the craftsmanship.
He tried to maneuver with his usual predatory grace, but the pipe was too small for his 6'2" frame.
*THUD.*
His forehead cracked against a low-hanging plumbing fixture. The Shadow Emperor, a man who had survived assassination attempts by elite snipers, had just been taken out by a pipe.
"I am going to burn this entire district to the ground," Xingcheng gritted his teeth, a vein pulsing in his neck. "Every brick. Every—"
"Stop complaining, 'Pretty Boy'!" Joey's muffled voice came from ahead. "You're getting mud on my favorite shirt! Shhh!"
Above them, the heavy thud of combat boots vibrated through the metal. Xingcheng froze, listening. He heard the "police" shouting, then the sound of the diamond crate being "seized." But his ears, trained in the symphony of violence, picked up the truth.
The sound of the boots... the way they shouted...
*Ghost Clan.* The "cops" were wearing tactical boots that weren't government-issued. It was a heist disguised as a raid.
He had just lost a five-thousand-dollar suit, a ten-million-dollar diamond… and every ounce of his pride.
Three blocks away, they popped out from behind a grease-stained dumpster in a dark alleyway.
Xingcheng stood up, dripping with filth. His hair was matted with grey slush, and his charcoal coat was a shredded ruin. He looked less like a King and more like a fallen prince who had lost a fight with a sewer.
Joey wiped a smudge of grease off her nose and looked at him. To his horror, her eyes weren't filled with awe or terror. They were filled with genuine, heartbreaking pity.
"You poor thing," she sighed, looking at his ruined clothes. "Look at you. You're just a background actor, aren't you? Some stunt double for a 'CEO' drama?"
Xingcheng's chest heaved. His eyes flashed with the power to end lives. "I… am… the—"
"—A hungry man," Joey cut him off, waving a hand dismissively. "I can see it in your eyes. That's the look of someone whose 'agency' doesn't even pay for a bus ride home. You're an intern, aren't you?"
She reached into her pocket and pulled out a crumpled, damp ten-dollar bill. She looked at the money—likely her dinner—and then at him.
"Don't worry, 'Pretty Boy.' I've got a 'palace' nearby. It's small, and the roof is a disaster, but we have rice. And I make a mean fried egg."
Xingcheng looked into the shadows of the alley.
He saw **Lao K** and three elite soldiers peeking around a brick wall, guns drawn, waiting for the signal to "extract" the boss and rain hell on the city.
Xingcheng looked at Joey. She was shivering in the rain, yet she was holding that ten dollars out like it was a king's ransom.
A variable. She was a variable he hadn't calculated. A riddle he couldn't solve with a weapon.
He gave a sharp, microscopic flick of his wrist to his men: STAY BACK. DISAPPEAR.
"I… have nowhere else to go," Xingcheng said, his voice low, humble, and carefully masked.
Joey beamed, her smile cutting through the darkness like a sunrise. "Well, lucky for you, I'm an expert at picking up strays. Let's go, Background Boy."
As she turned to lead the way, Xingcheng watched the sway of her "Save the Bees" shirt. He ignored the mud on his silk sleeves. He ignored the throbbing on his forehead.
Background Boy? Fine, he thought, his eyes darkening with a new, dangerous intrigue. But watch out, Peppercorn. No one picks up a wolf and expects to keep their heart.