The underworld underlings held their own nasty reputation that would force down chills down everybody’s throats. But only before Yang Mingshen would their frightening aura turn into puppy mode, especially now when Mingshen was in a bad mood. The kind where his fingers twitched with the thirst to use his scalpel. The kind where his eyes looked darker than the abyss itself, yet the calm within them signaled a storm that would wreck havoc.

"Boss..." They gulped, trying to stand straight.

Only his black orbs darted towards them, the icier threat growing severe. "What is the meaning of as soon as possible?"

"T-To be the earliest!"

"So have you wasted nine whole minutes to give me that man man’s biography?"

The timer was still clicking. Every second was precious. And every second took them closer to death.

"Sorry Boss!" They cried and lowered their heads.

Despite it being a little unreasonable request to unearth every single detail in a matter of minutes, nobody dared to complain.

"Do I need to give an invitation to start talking?" The temperature dropped sharp and dark.

"Boss! His name is Qiu Dai and he lives alone at XXX. He is an accountant and he has no immediate family. Then..."

Mingshen closed his eyes to reel in his temper. He knew his men were only doing his job and his lack of patience was completely upon him.

"Skip to the part where he became a psycho bomber. I don’t care about his damn history."

"From what we came to know about him, he was pretty normal and lived a normal life until he clashed with the cops some years ago. The woman he was dating was arrested on charges of a hit-and-run case. The woman fled and that man died on the spot."

"Why was it a clash with the cops then?" 𝐟𝗿𝐞𝚎𝚠𝐞𝚋𝕟𝐨𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝕔𝕠𝚖

"This boyfriend, the bomber man, was trying to defend her and fight for her case, to give the least punishment possible. But the cop in charge refused to dial down any charges. The case got very ugly in the court and eventually, the cops and the other side won and the woman was sent to life imprisonment."

He stared acutely. "Who was the officer-in-charge?"

—

"It’s you. "Qiu Dai."

Jia stared at him just as acutely as how Mingshen was outside, the recognition finally dawning upon her.

"Took you quite some time," he sneered.

Obviously it did, Huojin thought. He looks so different.

The first time their paths had come across was five years ago and at that time, Qiu Dai looked a prim and proper man. A regular salaryman working hard to earn money and live his life. But now as if time took a complete flip, he looked nothing like his past self. A beard on his face with messy hair and dark circles under his eyes that had brought forth a drastic and stark change in whole personality.

’I am Song Jia.’

’I know.’

’Am I that famous?’

’Very.’

It now occurred to her why she had felt a little off about that manner of speaking. It felt known. A little too personal.

Her gaze remained fixed at him. "Is this about revenge?"

"Don’t you think you deserve it?"

Silence. She looked at the time.

00:29:44

Less than thirty minutes.

"Yan Xiang drove over that man while being drunk, then fled from the scene. If this is not a crime, then what do you count as one?"

Outside, Tang Haitao asked, "You know, that kind of a tone could make him press the boom button pretty quickly."

Huojin smiled. "When was Jia the one to back down?"

"How are the special ops officers doing?"

"We are here."

A group of men in crisp black uniforms came inside. Through the one-sided glass screen, they saw and heard Jia and Qiu Dai talking.

"She has to get him out somehow. If this was a place with a window, we could have tried with a sniper to subdue him. But in a closed interrogation room? Our hands are tied."

Huojin said, "I am pretty sure he planned for this. Feigning to have some information at hand and secure himself and Jia in a room where nobody could touch him from outside."

Inside, Qiu Dai was unaffected by her counter question. "I understand that punishment was inevitable. But life imprisonment? She didn’t kill him like some cold-blooded murderer. Your law was too harsh on her. You were too harsh on her."

Jia said, "Okay. So tell me. If someone had run over Yan Xiang, drunk - and then fled the scene, leaving her to die in the middle of the road and snatching away the tiny hope of taking her to the hospital and probably saving her life - pray tell me, what would have been your reaction?"

No response.

"Now it sounds very difficult to not feel like the victim, isn’t it?" She smiled. "That’s how Shen Huo’s family felt. They lost their son because of someone’s poor decision to drink and drive, flee the scene and then you have the audacity to ask for a lighter punishment? It’s very easy to say what you said when the shoe is not in your foot."

She tracked his thumb again. It stayed where it was. Her passionate and hard speech didn’t make him press the boom button.

"But that happened five years ago. What brings you five years later to take revenge on me? I don’t think making that bomb would have taken you that much time."

He stared at her. "You want to say that I should have come to take you down much sooner?"

"I am saying that you didn’t have any plan to take me down at all. Revenge wasn’t on your agenda."

"Excuse me?"

"We have hardly twenty minutes left. We had around an hour when you came in. Considering your history, my assumption was that you would demand Yan Xiang’s release. Probably force some court order to pardon her life imprisonment. But you didn’t and now it’s too late. Even if we rush now, getting a formal court order wouldn’t happen in just twenty minutes. The time will be up and you will blow the building, but what will you achieve? Nothing. Your girlfriend will still be in jail and you will be dead, so who’s there to fight for her?"

No response.

Jia clasped her palms together and leaned forward, her eyes locked at him.

"Do you know what this tells me?"

No response.

"I think you want to set Yan Xiang free. That much is obvious from the blind love I see in your eyes. But you aren’t demanding her freedom from me, which means...somebody else has promised you that, haven’t they?"