Contamination Prelude

Chapter 48

He actually swallowed the words he was about to spit out?

Shen Wang gave Drifting Fish a curious once-over and, for the moment, pulled back his hostility.

When Drifting Fish said he was a contaminant, Shen Wang nearly laughed out loud. Honestly, forget Zhou Xiangzhe — even Shen Wang, who's half-contaminant, knew: never listen to a contaminant's words, especially a Grade S one.

What? They'd trust some Grade S contaminant likely trying to sow discord over their own teammate?

Shen Wang was just about to mock him, but the guy actually changed his tune first.

Alright, how boring.

'So why exactly do you think you can open a company among humans?' Zhou Qing looked at Drifting Fish. 'They don't even trust the Anti-Contamination Center, so of course they won't trust a contaminant like you.'

'You're wrong about that.' Drifting Fish shook his head. 'What you're saying is as pointless as asking why people back then believed in the Deer God.'

'Humans are the most pointless creatures.'

Drifting Fish seemed to understand the situation now, and he sighed softly.

'Since your Anti-Contamination Center won't agree, I guess there's no choice. I'll do it in secret; you can't find me anyway.'

As soon as he finished speaking, Drifting Fish melted into water and fell into the river. Zhou Xiangzhe and Zhou Qing rushed forward, but the river receded right before their eyes, and in an instant the ground was dry, only the drizzling rain from the sky still wetting the asphalt.

'What's his deal?!' Zhou Qing kept fuming. 'A Grade S contaminant actually wants to open a company among humans!'

'Not just opening a company, but he even wanted to get a legitimate license from the Anti-Contamination Center? And after being refused, he's determined to just do it underground?!'

'What the hell! What kind of twisted logic is that!'

'But the situation now is: he plans to run this logistics company in secret.' Shen Wang looked at them. 'What is the Anti-Contamination Center going to do about it?'

Zhou Xiangzhe stood beside Shen Wang and asked Zhou Qing, 'What are you going to do?'

'This humble monk will first ask the Anti-Contamination Center what they think. Once the higher-ups come up with a plan, I'll see how to handle this.'

After returning to headquarters, Zhou Qing and Zhou Xiangzhe went to report to the Anti-Contamination Center. Shen Wang didn't tag along; two Grade S mutants reporting was more than enough.

By the time the report was done it was already dark. Squad Two had a fixed roster, but that didn't mean there were no spare rooms — Qiang Li'an was just sharp. He lied that there were no rooms and arranged for Shen Wang to stay in Zhou Xiangzhe's room, telling Shen Wang to make do for one night and they could return to Central City first thing in the morning.

Fortunately, though Squad Two 'had no spare rooms,' they still had clothes. This trip to investigate Zone 3 had gotten everyone's clothes soaked again.

'White?' Shen Wang looked at the clothes Qiang Li'an had found for him. 'The dispatch team's combat uniforms are all pitch-black like crows — didn't expect they also come in white. How did they manage to make a style that shows every speck of dirt?'

'Could it be because Zhou Xiangzhe, the neat freak, likes wearing white, so they made him a custom version?'

Shen Wang really did rarely wear white, not because of preference, but because he'd worn hospital gowns for who knows how many years. Blue-white was a color he still hated to this day. In fact, he even thought the dispatch team's black combat uniforms were more likable than white.

Of course, Zhou Xiangzhe was the exception. With his silver hair and golden eyes, wearing all white gave him an aura of the divine.

Shen Wang loved teasing people with that kind of temperament.

He sat back down in the chair he'd been in earlier and casually pulled open a drawer, only to unexpectedly find a faded photo inside.

Shen Wang took out the photo and saw himself in it.

In the photo he was wearing a hospital gown, standing at the window and looking back. Shen Wang found it familiar, then recalled that this was the photo Zhou Xiangzhe had carried with him three years ago when he devoured the Deer God.

He had kept the photo close to his heart, cherishing it as if it were his own life.

Shen Wang suddenly thought: when he knelt on one knee back then, pierced by countless golden threads, had he worried about whether the threads would pierce the photo over his chest?

Just then, click.

The door opened — Zhou Xiangzhe had finished reporting and returned.

He saw Shen Wang sitting in the chair, now changed into those white clothes, holding a photo where Shen Wang also wore a blue-and-white striped hospital gown. Shen Wang turned to look at him, and the expression in his eyes was strangely identical to the one in the photo.

'So it's here.'

Zhou Xiangzhe walked over and took the photo from Shen Wang's hand. 'I've been missing it for three years.'

'Missing?'

“Yeah, after devouring the Deer God I actually passed out for a while. When I woke up, the photo was gone, and at the time I thought it had been destroyed in Yutang South City.” Zhou Xiangzhe looked at the traces of the Passing Years Squad on the photo. “It seems this photo wasn't lost. But Ming Guang felt like I'd been affected by it, and thought throwing it away would be worse, so in a fit of frustration he left it here for me to find.”

Unfortunately, after Zhou Xiangzhe recovered, he hardly ever visited Squad Two. Even when he did, he never stayed overnight, so he never discovered it.

Unexpectedly, the same year he found Shen Wang again, he also found this photo.

Shen Wang propped his chin on one hand, his black peach-blossom eyes reflecting Zhou Xiangzhe's face. He clicked his tongue. 'You only have this one photo?'

Zhou Xiangzhe: ...

'Really just one?' Shen Wang said. 'With the way you carried yourself when devouring the Deer God, if there were only one photo, would you have not looked for it for three whole years after losing it?'

Zhou Xiangzhe glanced aside, a bit afraid to meet Shen Wang's eyes.

'Come on, how many copies did you print?'

'Fifty.' Zhou Xiangzhe coughed. 'I go on missions way too often, so considering the rate of wear and tear, printing a few extra is pretty normal, right?'

How novel, 'wear and tear.'

Shen Wang laughed and crooked a finger at Zhou Xiangzhe. 'Besides this photo, what else is there?'

'Not much else, I guess...'

'Really?'

'The newspapers about the hospital accident from back then, the ones about the orphanage from my early years, all kinds of umbrellas that look a lot like the one you gave me... does that count?'

Shen Wang looked at him and thought: and that storage card full of music you gave me.

Zhou Xiangzhe's longing was secret and silent. They had been separated far too early, so early that they hadn't left behind anything to remember each other by. So Zhou Xiangzhe could only make fifty copies of that single photo, collect newspapers from that time, search for similar umbrellas, and look for music items on every exploration mission.

To anyone else, Shen Wang's past experiences would have been written off as dead and buried. Yet even with such an ending, Zhou Xiangzhe had quietly continued to gather everything.

Should I call him stupid?

Yeah, Little Seven is exactly that kind of clever fool.

/

In the end, Shen Wang and Zhou Xiangzhe still didn't get proper rest, because at four in the morning the Anti-Contamination Center's special alarm rang throughout Squad Two Headquarters.

Zhou Xiangzhe opened his eyes. By then Shen Wang was also awake, frowning as he pressed his fingers to his temples, a dangerous glint in his black eyes.

'So loud!'

A little black cat who hates noise.

Zhou Xiangzhe reached out and covered his ears. 'It's a communication from the Anti-Contamination Center — something might've happened.'

Shen Wang closed his eyes, leaned into Zhou Xiangzhe's embrace with a yawn, and his voice softened. 'So sleepy.'

'Sleep a little longer. I'll go check.'

'Can't fall back asleep after being woken up.' Shen Wang opened his eyes, sat up and stretched. 'And this bed is too small. It's fine for one person, but too cramped for two.'

Zhou Xiangzhe thought: indeed, this bed really is too small.

After going to bed last night, the tiny bed had forced them to press close together, a warm body right beside him. Zhou Xiangzhe felt his whole body go stiff — he didn't dare move, didn't dare breathe too deeply, and turned straight into a 'vegetative state' in the middle of the night. After finally falling asleep, he'd only slept an hour before this alert woke him up.

He was even more resentful than Shen Wang.

The two got up and made it to Squad Two Headquarters as fast as they could. By then, Zhou Qing and Qiang Li'an were already there.

Qiang Li'an was still in his pajamas — a pink rabbit-patterned set on a nearly two-meter-tall man, with the chest buttons undone to reveal chest hair, such an extreme contrast it was practically an eyesore.

'What on earth could have happened for them to contact us at four in the morning!' Qiang Li'an stomped his foot. 'I was working overtime until two last night! Finally took a shower and went to bed, and just one hour later I'm woken up!'

Zhou Qing stood nearby and yawned. This time he wasn't wearing his monk's robes, and with his bald head he actually didn't have any of that fake-monk aura from the daytime.

At first glance, he just looked like a rebellious young man with a shaved head.

As he yawned, he spotted Shen Wang and Zhou Xiangzhe and waved them over to hurry up.

'Alright, everyone's here.' Zhou Qing said. 'So what's going on?'

When Shen Wang walked over, he realized that the communication in the headquarters wasn't just audio — it was a video call.

The person on the other end had graying hair, but from Shen Wang's life experience, he figured the man wasn't that old, maybe under fifty, just that stress had turned all his hair white. In the hospital, many patients were like that — white-haired overnight, testament to the power of mental and emotional strain.

He was wearing the uniform of the Anti-Contamination Center's guard force, his face stern with heavy bags under his eyes — clearly he hadn't slept for days.

'Bad news.' he said. 'The Outer Wall has problems.'

'The Outer Wall?' Zhou Qing frowned. 'I've only been gone a short while and they're already causing trouble?'

Unexpectedly, the man shook his head. 'No, it's not a security issue.'

'Tonight, across all areas of the Outer Wall, lots of blue flyers suddenly appeared, falling from the sky with no one visible scattering them, as if out of thin air.'

'What was written on the flyers: Drifting Fish Logistics.'

The Anti-Contamination Center quickly had someone send over one of the flyers, and after multiple verifications confirmed it was exactly the same flyer Shen Wang and the others had picked up in Zone 3, down to the same phone number.

After being rejected by the Anti-Contamination Center, the Grade S contaminant Drifting Fish chose to do business underground.

But he openly advertised throughout all areas of the Outer Wall.

...An ad from a Grade S contaminant.

This was beyond people's wildest imagination.

And this version of the flyer had an extra line compared to before.

[If you can't trust the Anti-Contamination Center, then a Grade S contaminant is at your service.]

That one line set the entire Outer Wall ablaze.

'The Outer Wall has rioted.'

The man said, 'Zhou Qing, you need to return to the Outer Wall immediately to suppress this riot.'

Zhou Qing sighed softly. 'Anything else? What about this new Grade S contaminant — what do we do about it?'

The man fell silent for a moment before speaking.

'We've studied this contaminant overnight and officially named it Drifting Fish. Until it shows aggression again, our conclusion is: do not antagonize it.'

'What about all the people in Zone 3?'

'That's why it's before it shows aggression again.' The man said. 'Drifting Fish is too close to Central City. Central City has the largest population among the five High Walls, not even counting the Outer Wall. If something goes wrong, it'll spiral out of control, so we need to handle it quietly.'

'What we lack most right now are time and clues.'

Zhou Qing frowned and let out a string of curses. 'You always do this.'

'Zhou Qing, obey orders.'

'Fine, I get it.' Zhou Qing agreed with a grumble. 'I'll head out soon to deal with the Outer Wall issue!'

Shen Wang watched in amazement.

Zhou Qing in monk robes was a fake monk, but damn if he didn't play the part well — speaking calmly and serenely, and with a nice-sounding name, he seemed extremely refined. Who'd have thought that once he took off the robes, he'd swear worse than anyone.

'The boss is showing his true colors.' Qiang Li'an sighed, still in his pink bunny pajamas, shaking his head.

Shen Wang glanced at him. 'True colors?'

'He was always a hot-tempered guy. In the early days he was a dispatch team member — he was famous for cursing up a storm while hacking at contaminants, the harder he cursed the harder he hacked. He was a terror everyone was scared of at first glance. Who'd have thought he'd suddenly have a mental episode and put on monk robes in the middle of the night to become a monk.'

As he spoke, Qiang Li'an wore a look of existential doubt. 'A man with a butcher's knife wanting to become a monk — it shook a lot of people at the time.'

Zhou Xiangzhe gently tugged at Shen Wang's finger. 'Those monk robes of his are like a seal — with them on he acts human, take them off and he's a rage monster. Don't talk to him right now.'

'What's that supposed to mean, Zhou Xiangzhe!' As luck would have it, Zhou Qing was standing right next to them and had heard every word. 'What do you mean don't talk to him right now?'

'Am I really that annoying?'

Zhou Xiangzhe thought for a moment, then nodded. 'You are indeed a bit annoying.'

Zhou Qing: ...

Damn, this double-standard asshole!

Picking a fight with Zhou Xiangzhe was a mistake, because Zhou Xiangzhe was emotionally flat. No matter how much you cursed him, he'd just look at you coldly, not getting mad in the slightest. That unflappable calm would make the person doing the cursing feel like they were about to explode from rage. And if you got so furious you wanted to throw a punch, you'd discover: fuck, you can't beat him!

Having suffered this lesson before, Zhou Qing forcibly suppressed his desire to argue.

He was absolutely not going to let himself get tied up by Zhou Xiangzhe and hung from a tree again!

'Since you're heading back to Central City anyway, come with me to the Outer Wall.' Zhou Qing said. 'Just in case anything goes wrong.'

After all, this whole mess was stirred up by a Grade S contaminant.

Zhou Xiangzhe thought for a moment and agreed. 'Alright, there's a route back to Central City that way. Shen Wang and I will go with you to the Outer Wall first.'

Zhou Qing breathed a sigh of relief and glanced at the time. 'Then we leave in an hour. No point trying to sleep now — better go back early and deal with it before more trouble brews.'

'Thanks.'

...

'This is a flyer from a Grade S contaminant! Anyone who touches it will be contaminated!'

'The Anti-Contamination Center won't care about us — we're all going to die!'

'Why?! Even if we're just people from the Outer Wall, the Anti-Contamination Center can't abandon us!'

'Protest! We protest!'

This was where the Outer Wall connected to Central City's High Wall, with countless people gathered. The gates to the High Wall were tightly shut, and a row of Anti-Contamination Center staff stood in front.

Shen Wang wore a long black robe, the hood hiding his face, and his Anti-Contamination Center marker tag had been taken off and put in his pocket. Not only him, Zhou Xiangzhe beside him was dressed the same.

This was to avoid provoking the rioting crowd.

They were arguing, and from time to time even trying to push their way inside.

'At least let the children in! It's fine if we have problems, but not the children!'

'That's a Grade S contaminant!'

'Please save the children!'

The Anti-Contamination Center staffer shouted through a megaphone: 'Everyone rest assured! We've found no contamination on the flyers at all! These are just ordinary flyers!'

'Please don't panic, the Anti-Contamination Center will definitely give everyone an answer!'

'What answer! This flyer was sent by a Grade S contaminant! You people don't care about our lives at all!'

'Everyone charge! If we break through this door, we'll be in Central City! Once we're inside, they won't dare ignore us anymore!'

'The Anti-Contamination Center has abandoned us!'

Zhou Xiangzhe frowned slightly. 'It looks like they've been incited.'

'While a Grade S contaminant would indeed cause great insecurity and even panic, all the current anger isn't directed at Drifting Fish — it's focused on the Anti-Contamination Center abandoning the people.'

'Zhou Qing, you need to investigate whether the Outer Wall has been infiltrated by any forces.'

Zhou Qing, at the far side, let out another string of curses.

'How am I supposed to control that? The Outer Wall has no restrictions — all sorts of people can come and go.'

'Contaminant incidents in the Outer Wall are ten times those in Central City. Where do you think that number comes from?'

'I've said long ago we need to properly manage the Outer Wall, but the old fogies up top just say the Outer Wall is uninhabitable and want to just kick everyone out in one fell swoop — it's like throwing out the baby with the bathwater, brains up their asses!'

Compared to driving out all the poor souls in the Outer Wall, maintaining the status quo had actually become the best solution.

'I heard! Everyone around the contamination source died, so many dead! If we stay here any longer, we'll die too!'

'Back then, the Grade S contaminant in Yutang South City wiped out an entire city!'

'Let us in, I don't want to die!'

'Fuck.' Zhou Qing yanked off his hood, then tore open his jacket, popping all the buttons in one go, even losing two from the undershirt. Such a wild mannerism made Shen Wang couldn't help but look a couple times.

Then he was stopped by Zhou Xiangzhe.

'Don't look at him.' Zhou Xiangzhe said. 'He's about to go crazy.'

Shen Wang shot Zhou Xiangzhe a couple glances, his tone slightly mocking. 'Oh, when he goes crazy he tears his clothes and hits others, unlike you — when you lose it, you hurt yourself.'

Zhou Xiangzhe: ...

That hit a sore spot.

He turned to look at the charging-off Zhou Qing, didn't say anything further, but kept hold of Shen Wang's hand.

Yeah, he'd admit the fault, but he wasn't letting go.

The bald Zhou Qing stomped one foot onto the Anti-Contamination Center staff's table — yes, he actually jumped right onto it.

He coldly stared at the troublemakers in front. 'Let's see who dares keep making noise here.'

With that one sentence, all the clamor vanished.

The Anti-Contamination Center staff wanted to rescue the documents under Zhou Qing's feet but didn't dare, and seeing the previously noisy crowd fall silent gave them a strange sense of satisfaction. The two expressions mixed on their faces, looking especially comical.

As for the Outer Wall people, they looked at Zhou Qing in terror, even more scared than when facing a contaminant.

'Want into Central City? Sure, no problem.' Zhou Qing said from on top of the table. 'The containment center still has plenty of space — more than enough to stuff you all in.'

'Anyone volunteer?'

The crowd that had been a noisy mob instantly took a step back.

'We're... just scared...' someone finally spoke up. 'Mr. Zhou, you can't stop us from being scared, can you?'

'I really can make you unafraid.'

Zhou Qing pulled a pair of scissors from his pocket. 'Anyone who wants to be completely unafraid, come sign up with me.'

This time, truly no one dared to speak up.

'What? You think I, a Grade S mutant, can't protect you?'

The scene fell dead silent.

'Get lost!'

Immediately everyone turned and ran on the spot, terrified that if they were a second slow, Zhou Qing would grab them and throw them into the containment center.

It wasn't like Zhou Qing hadn't done this before. When he was first assigned to manage the Outer Wall, countless people had stirred up trouble covertly. Zhou Qing rounded them all up one by one and, regardless of whether they actually had issues, slapped them all with a suspected mental contamination label and shoved them into the mental contamination containment center.

The ones who came out were all docile, and when asked what happened, they'd just scream in terror.

'This is just a temporary measure.' Zhou Xiangzhe watched the fleeing crowd. 'Right now Zhou Qing is forcefully suppressing them, but once he leaves, they'll rise again.'

'In the end, it's still the problem of Drifting Fish.' Shen Wang said. 'If Drifting Fish hadn't existed in the first place, it wouldn't have come to this.'

Shen Wang also looked at the panicked running crowd. Suddenly, he raised an eyebrow, because he spotted someone walking unhurriedly among them.

People passed him one by one, while he strolled leisurely in a black coat.

As if noticing someone was looking at him, the person turned his head and with a gloomy expression flashed Shen Wang a peace sign.

Shen Wang: ...

Shit, Lan!

What's he doing here?!

After flashing the peace sign and making his presence known, Lan disappeared into the crowd with his book, reappearing later in some corner of the Outer Wall.

Crouched in that corner was a man in a tie, staring at his phone as if trying to bore a hole through the screen.

'Well?'

Drifting Fish looked at Lan resentfully, then showed him his phone.

'Damn, that's ugly.' Lan looked at the blue-background flyer image on the phone. 'I wasn't expecting something eye-catching, but at least make it viewable for people!'

'I never studied design.' Drifting Fish grew even more aggrieved. 'I think you're harder to please than my boss.'

'One minute you send me into the desert, the next you want me to make flyers, and after I've scattered them all over the Outer Wall, you complain that the flyers aren't pretty.'

'Are you sick in the head.'

Lan dangled the phone and looked down at him. 'Who are you calling sick?'

'...I'm the sick one.' Drifting Fish swallowed his anger. 'But I really never studied design — I can't make flyers!'

'Tch, useless.'

Lan tossed the phone back to him. 'Forget it, we've caused enough trouble for the Anti-Contamination Center.'

'Too bad though, I couldn't make Zhou Xiangzhe work overtime too. Gotta find a way to keep him from clinging to my cute little brother.'