Chapter 22: Ninjas and Evil Organizations Don’t Exist

When Officer Si couldn’t figure something out, he would go to an urban village in the Jiangning District, in the southeast of Nancheng.

It was a bit embarrassing to admit, but a young man he greatly admired lived in those shacks and “handshake buildings.” Whenever Officer Si’s train of thought hit a bottleneck, he would go and chat with him.

The young man mingled in the marketplace, naturally appearing at the pancake shop, the mahjong parlor, and the street-side chess tables, yet he vaguely exuded a detached aura, as if he were a poet who had transcended the mortal world.

Officer Si had never seen him go to school, so he guessed that he was probably a poor hermit who had seen through life at a young age.

He had probably already self-studied all the university courses, so he couldn’t find common ground with his peers. Even while hiding in the noisy and chaotic urban village, he was like an isolated island in a bustling river.

The young man must be very lonely inside.

When Officer Si went to chat with him, he would occasionally bring him some fruit and snacks. When the weather turned cold, he would help him add clothes in the name of donating old items, to avoid the awkwardness of giving him money directly.

The young man would gracefully thank him and accept the gifts, without showing much excitement, which further demonstrated his mature upbringing.

“…You’re saying he moved away?”

In the familiar small courtyard, Officer Si wiped his hands on his trousers again and again, looking very busy.

“He’s on a secret mission,” Xu Panpan added mysteriously, her bare feet propped up on the windowsill.

“A secret mission? Did he tell you that himself?”

“Yes. I can’t reveal the details because I’ve already promised to keep his secret!”

‘He probably just said that to humor you,’ Officer Si thought.

The young man did seem to be shrouded in mystery, such as where his family was and how he made a living, but a “secret mission”…

What kind of secret mission could a teenage boy have?

He couldn’t possibly be a magical girl, could he?

Officer Si’s gaze passed through the plastic-steel window, taking in the entirety of Ren Huazhi’s two-square-meter dwelling. He asked strangely, “But it looks like someone is still living here, and they’re still using his old belongings.”

“His younger sister is living here now.”

“Younger sister…?”

The questions were mounting.

The hermit boy in the urban village had suddenly disappeared, and a family member he had never mentioned had suddenly appeared, seamlessly taking his place, sleeping in his bedsheets, and using his water cup.

Officer Si smelled a hint of a criminal case.

“Can I meet this younger sister?” Officer Si gestured with the bag in the crook of his arm. “I was originally going to give him the tablet computer my daughter doesn’t use so he could surf the internet. Since he’s busy with a ‘secret mission,’ his sister will have to accept it on his behalf.”

Xu Panpan pointed behind him and said, “There.”

Officer Si turned his head.

A patch of brilliant gold filled his vision—almost dazzling him. It wasn’t until a face emerged from the gold, a pair of emerald green eyes peering at him over a pair of round sunglasses hanging on the tip of her nose, that he realized it was a person.

‘How could a Chinese person have a blonde-haired, green-eyed younger sister?’

Oh, wait, she didn’t say it was his biological sister.

Considering the young man was already so unconventional, it wasn’t unimaginable that he had picked up a foreign girl somewhere and adopted her as his sister…

Ren Huazhi was holding a styrofoam sign. Without greeting the uniformed Officer Si, she hung the sign on the wall between her bedroom window and door.

It was clearly a public notice that should have been placed on a lawn or by a sidewalk.

[Nancheng Citizens’ Moral Code]

[Run Red Lights · Park Illegally]

[Use Foul Language · Talk Loudly]

[Litter · Let Pets Disturb Others]

[Build Illegally · Cut in Line]

“What… what is this?” Officer Si was stunned.

“A public notice I saw on my way past Xuanwu Lake.”

Ren Huazhi answered truthfully.

‘It really is a public notice!’

“A public notice, and you just took it down and brought it back… wait, what’s with the content on it?”

What kind of bizarre moral code was this? If word got out, people would think Nancheng was some kind of crazy city of sin!

Ren Huazhi said, “A Nightmare probably passed by and distorted the word ‘not’ out of the middle of each sentence.”

“That’s possible… Then why did you bring it back?”

“I forgot to turn off auto-loot.”

Ren Huazhi met Officer Si’s gaze calmly.

That calmness and composure even reminded Officer Si of an old friend… namely, her brother. Could it be said that they were truly cut from the same cloth? The originally nonsensical brother-sister theory now seemed so credible.

“If I had left it there, it might have taken the road administration several days to notice. The bad influence on teenagers would be immeasurable.”

“That’s true…”

After hanging the illegal and disorderly conduct sign, Ren Huazhi took a step back, felt satisfied with the overall effect, and nodded.

She looked back at Officer Si. “Officer, what brings you here? If you’re looking for my brother, I can pass on the message.”

“Oh, I bought… I found a tablet computer at home that we don’t use much, and I thought he could use it. You two live in a place like this, you probably don’t have many forms of entertainment. With a tablet, you can go to places with free Wi-Fi, play games, watch videos, and so on…”

Officer Si handed over the bag.

“Thank you, Officer!” Ren Huazhi smiled.

Looking at her bright, sunflower-like smile, Officer Si was a little dazed. Once upon a time, his own daughter would smile at him like that…

But after the appearance of Nightmares and magical girls, she had become obsessed with chasing idols, muttering about The Flower Arranger and Mangzhong every day, running all over the city with a modified camera that was said to be able to resist the Anti-Civilization Field. She had barely spoken to her father for a year.

Only on this point did Officer Si and The Flower Arranger reach a united front, desperately hoping that magical girls would never be “idolized.”

“What about me?” Xu Panpan jumped up, dissatisfied.

“You?” Officer Si said disdainfully. “You have everything you could ever want. A rich kid experiencing life, and you have the nerve to ask me for things. Look at these two, living in a place like a gatehouse, yet they love to read so much, poor but unyielding in their aspirations!”

Xu Panpan puffed out her cheeks and went back to her room.

Ren Huazhi casually tossed the tablet computer bag through the window onto her bed and tilted her head to look at Officer Si. “Officer, you seem to have something on your mind? If you came to talk to my brother, I can do it for you.”

“You can tell?”

Officer Si smiled wryly. “I’m so useless, asking a teenager for help with police work.”

“Magical girls are also teenagers.”

Ren Huazhi picked up a bag of cheap fruit gummies from the windowsill, opened the package, and poured out two. She ate one herself and offered the other to Officer Si in the palm of her hand.

“Officer, you’ve already done your best. It’s not you who’s wrong, it’s the world.”

“Is that a line from some Japanese anime…”

Click.

She kicked the small stool from the corner of the courtyard over, went inside, and sat on her bed, her arms crossed on the windowsill, looking at Officer Si.

“Uncle, you’re not revealing police secrets, you’re just telling me a story. I love stories.”

Officer Si felt the sweetness of the fruit juice spread in his mouth, and he was so moved he was about to cry.

How long had it been since he had felt this way?

He was the elder who was providing financial assistance, yet he was being healed by a girl’s gummy candy and gentle words. Looking at her unhurried, composed attitude, his heart, which had been tormented by doubts, miraculously calmed down.

This feeling of being unconditionally accepted and listened to… Officer Si was even a little addicted to it.

“Actually, it’s like this…”