Chapter 73: Chapter 52 (part 1)

The bullet didn't hit Yao Chen, because Yao Chen's throwing knife left his hand first and scraped the arm Han Yanyan was holding the gun with. Beads of blood flew up in a string.

Her arm had been injured the moment she pulled the trigger. The shot went wide, the pistol clattered to the ground, and the bullet embedded itself in the ceiling. In pain, Han Yanyan fell off the sofa and rolled onto the carpet.

Yao Chen picked the gun up and aimed it at her.

Sanhu rushed in, hearing gunfire, and was relieved to see the situation. "Eldest Brother, hurry!" he shouted. "The police will be here soon!"

"I know." Yao Chen's eyes were fixed on Han Yanyan. "Go out and keep watch."

Thinking that he wanted to torture Han Yanyan, Sanhu turned and left.

That woman should be torn to pieces, and her bones ground to dust.

Yao Chen thought the same thing.

She had unexpectedly tried to kill him. Just now the way she had held the gun was extremely orthodox - she had obviously received professional training. Who the hell was she? Why on earth had she done it?

Yao Chen ground his teeth, steeled his heart, and brought the muzzle down. A bullet went through Han Yanyan's ankle.

Han Yanyan screamed and nearly fainted. Enduring the pain, she crawled away from Yao Chen.

"Tell me, why?!" Yao Chen asked through gritted teeth.

Her face pale and her sweat cold, Han Yanyan turned to look at him.

"You murder, traffic in drugs, gamble, practice usury, force women into prostitution…" she said.

He shot again, piercing her other ankle.

"Don't give me stupid shit about crime and justice!" he snarled. "You yourself know best if you're the embodiment of justice or not!"

"I'm just saying that y-y-you're where you are today because of what you've done." Han Yanyan was in so much pain that it hurt to breathe. "Of course I'm n-not the embodiment of justice."

"Then why?!" Yao Chen howled.

Han Yanyan's face was as white as a sheet, but at such a time, she unexpectedly smiled.

"Because you… are you, and I… am me." Her smile was strange, yet gorgeously bright.

Bright and beautiful, yet indescribably bleak and desolate within.

Because you're "Yao Chen" and I'm "Han Yanyan". You and I are not ourselves. In this world, we play the parts that others have ordered us to play, in spite of ourselves.

Yao Chen didn't understand the meaning of Han Yanyan's words, but he was shocked by her smile.

Even if he did it all over again, he thought, he would still have fallen in love with this woman.

At that moment, Han Yanyan's hand... finally touched a handle.

Death here was not the end. You and I... might still see each other again.

Han Yanyan's knife left her hand and flew toward Yao Chen. Yao Chen's eyes widened. Raising his hand, he aimed between her eyebrows and pulled the trigger.

Time went stagnant.

It was the second time.

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Han Yanyan watched as the bullet and the throwing knife passed each other by. Bullets were swift, and knives were sluggish. But in her eyes, everything happened slowly and distinctly.

The knife rushed to a throat, and the bullet to the brow. If they both hit, then she and Yao Chen would have killed each other. Would Leo be happy, I wonder?

But Han Yanyan was not happy at all.

She watched the bullet tear through the air, its tail streaked with white air, slowly making its way to her eyebrows. She heard the sound of her heart beating and blood gurgling in her veins.

She was afraid of death.

It was like when you were ready to dive off a 10-meter platform. You weren't afraid. But if you weren't yet ready, and you were caught off guard and pushed off, at that moment you would surely scream in fear.

If Han Yanyan had been determined to die, then of course she could have been fearless. But she hadn't wanted to die. She had only wanted to resolve this world. That bullet coming straight toward her made her afraid of death.

Even though she knew that death here wouldn't be the end.

Stop! Stop!

I am the architect!

I built this world!

Listen to me! Stop--!

An invisible shield of air formed before her. The whistling bullet met the shield. It leapt forward, then stagnated, then stopped, the collision with the white air current making it stir and rotate.

But in the end, it stopped.

In the depths of Han Yanyan's eyes, from deep within the recesses of her body, it felt as though a power was about to erupt. It was a power like a flame that would burn her to ashes, and then bring her back to life, reborn!

The instant before it burst out, Han Yanyan lifted her eyes. Her gaze skipped over the bullet, skimmed over the throwing knife also intercepted by an air shield, and fell onto Yao Chen.

She saw a pair of eyes.

They were clearly Yao Chen's eyes, yet at the same time, clearly not. Han Yanyan had seen those eyes before, more than once.

His eyes also met hers over the bullet and knife, but within them was no hint of Yao Chen's love and hate for her, only indifference.

In a flash, Han Yanyan understood. At this very moment, the person she was face to face with was beyond "Yao Chen", beyond this world. At this very moment, she was facing his true selfLiterally, his "ID", or his mass of basic instincts. We don't really use that word much in English, but I may come back and change this later if it's the more accurate translation.!

In the wake of this 'true self', Han Yanyan felt a wave of terrifying coercion from the man opposite. A powerful force rolled over her like an avalanche. If the power within her own body broke out, it would collide with her head-on, and the result of the collision would be...

Death!

True death!

Intense fear gripped Han Yanyan, but she couldn't stop the eruption of her own strength. Nor could she resist the terrible crushing wave rolling over her.

This time I might actually die, she thought.

Then... like a TV suddenly turning off, like a computer suddenly being unplugged, like the breaker of a house being triggered, the lights went out. The world didn't collapse, nor did it end.

The world had been forcibly disconnected.