The Creatures That We Are

Gao Yang believed it would be unwise to stay here for long.

He turned to Lithe Snake. “Let’s get out of here first and talk on the way.”

“What do we do with him?” Officer Huang looked at Dick’s body.

“I’d like to take him with us and bury him when there’s time,” said Chen Ying.

Gao Yang didn’t disagree.

Chen Ying was going to lift Dick’s body. Officer Huang sighed. “Allow me.”

“Thank you.” Chen Ying nodded, taking off Dick’s watch.

They quickly left the warehouse of the beverage factory and returned to Dick’s car, placing his body in the trunk. They drove to another street block.

On the way, Chen Ying called the police with a burner phone, sending them to rescue the wanderers in the basement under the warehouse.

They left the car hidden in a rundown alleyway without surveillance cameras before getting out, entering a bar crowded with a mixed crowd to change their clothes in the restrooms. Then they left the bar.

With Shapeshifter, Nainai turned into a local woman and used the fake ID they had prepared beforehand to book a room for two at a small hotel.

Nainai went in and closed the door, drawing the curtains before opening the window. Lithe Snake jumped in, followed by Qing Ling and Officer Huang. Then Gao Yang teleported to the window while supporting Chen Ying by her arm.

Once they were settled down in the temporary safehouse, Nainai ordered some food. Ten minutes later, milk, coffee, and sandwiches were delivered to the door.

Drinking coffee, Gao Yang got right to the point. “Lithe Snake, tell us about your old friend.”

With one hand in his pocket, Lithe Snake leaned against the window while playing with a dart. The dim yellow lamp on the wall illuminated one side of his sculpted face. The long scar running from his left eye to his right cheek was half hidden in shadow.

“Twenty years ago, I...”

“Wait,” Chen Ying couldn’t help but cut him off. “Twenty years ago? How old are you now?”

“Thirty-nine.” Lithe Snake frowned. He didn’t know why she would ask that.

“What?!” Chen Ying was shocked. “I thought you were no more than thirty.”

“Haha, you’re right.” Officer Huang took out a cigarette and kept it between his fingers, not in a hurry to light it. “Perhaps those with Life-type Talents age more slowly?”

“It’s possible.” Gao Yang remembered something. “Elder Vermilion Bird isn’t young, but she looks to be around twenty-five.”

“Ha, ignorant mortals.” Nainai sat on a high-back chair in the corner in a pretentious posture, her upper body awash in shadow. “This Empress has lived thousands of years, yet still retains the youthful appearance of an eighteen-year-old...”

“Alright, let’s get back to the topic.” Gao Yang clapped.

“Let me finish, hey!” Nainai jumped up, vexed. She had finally found the chance to chime in. “Don’t ignore me...”

“Shut up,” Qing Ling snapped.

Nainai immediately closed her mouth.

Lithe Snake’s eyes turned cold as he reminisced in a low voice, “Twenty years ago, I was a merc in Rogue Cape. You know Rogue Cape, don’t you?”

The others nodded.

Gao Yang had never been to Rogue Cape, but he had long heard of it.

It was the most dangerous place in the mundane world, the land divided by warlords and ravaged by wars. The economy was built upon drug trades, humantrafficking, and gunrunning. Criminals called it home, and regular people would never go there unless they didn’t have a choice.

Lithe Snake spoke in monotone like he was telling someone else’s story. “My parents did borderline illegal business in the Rogue Cape and died in a local riot. I was twelve when I got taken to a plantation for forced labor.”

“Three years later, a group of mercs destroyed the plantation. I got saved, and their leader took a liking to me, keeping me around and raising me. I became a member of the group then.”

“Benson was the name of the leader. He treated me like a brother. His deputy was Hyena, the one responsible for the welcoming gift tonight.” His tone grew sharp with unbridled hatred when he spat out the latter’s name.

“It’s the same old story. I stayed with the group for four years. We were either killing people, on the way of killing people, or on the way of getting killed. We would take any job as long as it paid—but Benson had a rule. We didn’t go after innocent people, the old, weak, and disabled. Those we killed were criminals themselves.”

“Hyena was a two-faced man. He seemed friendly on the outside, but was in truth cunning and cold-blooded. He was our bookkeeper and took jobs for us. He seemed to have a strange charisma that made every negotiation for a job and its pay go smoothly. Only later did I learn that it was because of his Talent.”

“Do you mean,” Officer Huang took a drag of his cigarette, “That Hyena was already an awakener then, while you were still a regular human, and the other mercs were wanderers?”

Lithe Snake nodded, turning to Gao Yang. “I told you before that a friend of mine took joy in torturing wanderers, and that I once visited his ‘wonderland’.”

“That’s Hyena?” Gao Yang asked.

“Yes.” Lithe Snake scoffed. “Among our group, Benson and Hyena earned the most, but Benson always took the boys outside for alcohol and entertainment, splurging as much as he had earned for instant gratification. He thus never had much savings.”

“Hyena was different. He rarely came with us to our outings and instead bought a large mansion for himself with a big basement. That was where he imprisoned and tortured wanderers. That was his idea of a fun time.”

“Once, Hyena made the mistake of exposing himself and almost got killed by a devourer. I happened to be there and shot the monster to save him.”

Lithe Snake paused, his gaze pained. “That was the biggest mistake I’ve ever made in my life.”

“Seeing that I neither went berserk nor lost consciousness, Hyena realized that I was human too, only I hadn’t awakened. He told me about the truth of the world and gave me a tour of his wonderland. When I got home, I spent the night having nightmares.”

“A few days later, we got another job to assassinate a rich man. He was a well-known human trafficker. That night, we killed the rich man and his bodyguards. Then we found many slaves getting tortured in his basement.”

“One of the cages seemed different. Inside were a pair of twins who looked about six or seven. They had silver hair and red eyes. I remembered them well. Unlike the other slaves, who had been tortured, they looked like purebred pets carefully watched over, locked in a large birdcage made with special metal, which was made to resemble a cabin from a fairytale.”

“It was clear that the rich man didn’t dare lay a hand on them. He kept them well taken care of, which must be for a different reason.”

“Seeing the twins, Hyena perked up and said that he would give up the pay. He wanted the twins instead.”

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