The afternoon practice continued.
Today, Xuena didn't go to the hospital, and Changying never left their side. After casually settling for lunch in the downstairs restaurant, the three of them returned to the dance studio.
Along the way, Qiuzi kept trying to strike up a conversation with Xuena, but Xuena consistently gave her the cold shoulder, even occasionally responding with a snide laugh.
But the girl was tireless, persistently and one-sidedly cheering her on.
It was so disheartening that Changying lost her appetite for food.
And Xuena, constantly harassed by the insincere flattery and feeling like she was being coerced, was also gritting her teeth in displeasure.
Conveniently, Shuo hadn't been able to eat his medium-rare steak today, and his immense craving left him extremely irritable, not minding sickening the two of them with his mood.
If he couldn't enjoy his meal, then no one else should either!
Shuo didn't go to the hospital to treat his foot injury, and Changying never mentioned it,
so while the two outside were practicing their dance, he sat in the rest room, occasionally looking on with envy, then burying his head in his phone.
...
Qiuzi: [There's a big surprise tonight!]
The message received by Officer Zhang: "???"
She was stunned for a moment, then her expression turned stern as she inquired carefully again, but waiting a good while with no response stirred some worry that something might have happened on the other end.
A big surprise? What kind of thing would be a big surprise?
When the priest returned covered in the black sticky substance, he saw Officer Zhang looking very solemn, as if something very bad had happened.
"What's happened?" he asked.
"Qiuzi seems to be planning something, but there's no response now," said Officer Zhang, relaying the content of the message.
The priest remained calm: "Oh, is that all?"
"Furthermore—" Officer Zhang didn't mind his reaction and handed over new information from her subordinates, her expression growing more serious as she spoke in a low tone, "The number of ordinary people missing last night has increased again, and the fear in the city is almost reaching its peak. We can't suppress it."
"That's probably what they're planning on," the priest said offhandedly, looking over the information. But when he saw the number of missing people, his expression changed.
That's a bit much...
With the rain, the windows weren't opened, so a stifling, oppressive air seemed to fill the car.
Raindrops pattered against the windows, their multitude of sounds like countless hands knocking from outside. Through the rain-blurred windows, only darkness was visible, sporadically pierced by neon lights.
Xuena's head hung low, her hands clenched tightly on her knees, her facial expression giving no clue as to her thoughts.
Xu Shuo tried making conversation to break the silence, but soon seemed to realize neither of them was in the mood for talking, so she stopped her relentless chatter and boredly took out her phone to play with.
After playing for a while, she suddenly yawned and then leaned against the window, starting to doze off.
Beside her, Xuena: "..."
Her fingers trembled slightly with tension, as she struggled to control her facial expression, avoiding any abnormality. Her eyes betrayed an internal struggle, as she silently cursed the green tea b*tch sitting next to her over and over again!
After a while, she seemed to come to some realization, bit her lip, and closed her eyes, leaning back in defeat against the rear seat.
The car moved steadily through the rainy night; the back seat plunged into dead silence, and Changying, who was driving, remained unresponsive, her face expressionless as she continued to stare ahead.
The rain grew heavier and heavier, the wind howled, and rain beat down fiercely on the darkened city.
After circling around for quite some time, the car, its headlights off, finally stopped at the entrance to a pitch-black alley, blending perfectly with the night.
Changying opened the car door, covering herself with a black cloak that she wasn't wearing before, the hood shrouding half of her face.
She walked to the back seat, opened the door, and lifted a girl in a white dress out of the car.
The pouring rain hit her, trickling down the girl's pallid cheeks, water droplets clinging to her clear skin, creating a haunting, shattered beauty.
Changying, with her head bowed, paused, casually pulled the cloak over the girl, and then covered her with it.
Without attending to the other person still asleep in the car, Changying stepped through the streaming puddles and carried the girl toward the tightly closed iron gate. She knocked rhythmically a few times, and the door automatically opened into dense darkness.
Changying disappeared into the darkness, and the metal door closed silently behind her.
The torrential rain thundered on the roof, countless hands appeared to be frantically beating against the windows, their muffled sounds oppressively intense.
In the black car parked on the roadside, Xuena, who had been sleeping on the seat, suddenly opened her eyes, panting rapidly, as she began to struggle once again.
Leave now or stay and take a gamble?
To leave might mean mission failure; to stay was to face life-threatening danger and those ghostly entities!
Damn that green tea b*tch!
Xuena cursed in her mind once more.