novelraw Chapter 301: Incidentally
Chapter 301: Incidentally
After the outdoor time ended, the patients were herded back to their rooms.
The corridor became somewhat crowded and chaotic for a moment.
Su Zhan seized the opportunity. He deliberately staggered and violently crashed into the orderly who had pushed him earlier.
The orderly smelled the foul stench on him and instantly flew into a rage. "Damn it! Looking for death, you stinking beggar!"
He raised his hand and slapped Su Zhan hard on the back of the head, the force not light at all.
Su Zhan took the momentum and lunged forward, making himself appear even more pathetic.
During the physical contact, he took a key from the keychain hanging on the scar-faced orderly's waist and swiftly hid it inside his own tattered sleeve.
The entire process was completed within one second.
The orderly was solely focused on venting his anger and didn't notice the slight change to his waist keys at all.
"Get up! Stop playing dead!"The orderly kicked him one more time before cursing and walking away.
Su Zhan lay on the ground, his head bowed low.
Key obtained. Step one, complete.
Late at night, the sanatorium fell into dead silence.
After confirming the corridor was empty, Su Zhan gently inserted the pilfered key into the lock.
Out of the room. Based on his observations during the day, he headed straight for the area where the orderlies were on duty and rested.
He was lucky, or rather, that orderly was unlucky. Tonight was exactly his turn for night duty, and he was currently dozing alone in a small break room.
Su Zhan approached silently, covered the man's mouth and nose, and with his other hand, precisely snapped his cervical vertebra.
The scar-faced orderly didn't even have time to struggle before he completely lost his life.
Next, Su Zhan began to stage the scene.
He arranged the orderly's corpse into a curled-up position in the corner.
He cleaned away any traces he might have left, and his figure completely melted into the night outside.
A patient missing, an orderly dead.
That should be enough to delay them for a while.
This was his plan. Because while he could certainly break the door open by force, doing so would expose his true strength.
That would speed up the transmission of the news of his disappearance to the Aberrant Purge Division.
So the best option was to leave here silently, without damaging anything.
Dealing with that orderly was incidental.
It was mainly to vent his anger.
Another point was that the mental hospital absolutely wouldn't dare to let these incidents blow up into a big scandal, which was why he dared to kill the other party.
The night wind was biting.
Su Zhan took a deep breath of the free air and once again set out on the road heading south.
He didn't stop his footsteps, traveling day and night.
Time passed day by day as he delved deeper into the southern heartland of Daxia.
The north was already far behind him.
He passed through several cities with vastly different styles. He was now separated from the starting point of his initial escape by countless rivers and mountains.
This geographical remoteness brought a tangible increase in his sense of security.
While the Aberrant Purge Division's power was vast, it wasn't infinite, and the organization couldn't possibly mobilize all its forces to capture him.
In the north, they could lay a tight net and conduct high-intensity, dragnet-style searches.
But as distance increased, the projection of their power would inevitably diminish.
Here.
The Aberrant Purge Division might still have a bounty out for him, but they couldn't possibly mobilize large numbers of personnel like they did in the north.
At most, they could only set up surveillance at key nodes.
That was no different from fishing for a needle in the ocean...
Now, he had truly managed to blend into this vast sea.
The cities in the south were denser, the population more mobile, and the ecosystem at the bottom was more complex.
A vagrant like him, mixing among them, was like a drop of water entering the sea.
As long as he didn't actively expose his abilities or cause large-scale disturbances, the possibility of being precisely located had greatly decreased.
Su Zhan pulled down the brim of his worn-out hat and glanced at the faintly visible outline of mountain ranges against the southern sky.
Black City was not far now.
...
Aberrant Purge Division branch command room.
The atmosphere was heavy. Over four months had passed since "Chen Qing's" disappearance. All conventional and unconventional methods had been exhausted, and the trail had gone completely cold.
"Boss, it's not that we aren't doing our best. It's been over four months, and there's not a single damn trace."
Han Xiao slumped in his chair, rubbing the space between his eyebrows. "I think that kid has probably holed up in some godforsaken mountain hollow, or simply died in some remote corner. Continuing like this is purely a waste of manpower and resources."
Ling Shuang gave a slight nod, forced to acknowledge reality. "Looking at the situation now, him choosing long-term concealment is the outcome we least want to see, but it has the highest probability.
If that's really the case, we truly don't have any good methods."
Most of the people participating in the meeting also showed agreement on their faces.
Several months of all-out pursuit with zero progress had already made many people slack off, thinking resources should be invested into more urgent cases.
Qin Bai, however, slowly shook his head, his eyes stubborn.
He gently tapped the tabletop, pulling everyone's attention back. "Concealment is the greatest possibility, but it's not a foregone conclusion.
Moreover, the secrets behind this Chen Qing prevent me from giving up easily."
Qin Bai stood up, walked to the light screen, and called up the records of the abnormal Mist incident in the northwestern Gobi. "I just received information from elsewhere. He is not a Transcendence Society Aberrant. The Transcendence Society is also looking for him, just like we are.
Don't you find that strange?
A non-Transcendence Society Aberrant who has mastered a method to summon the Mist is itself extremely rare.
What's even more abnormal is that he didn't summon it in densely populated areas to hunt efficiently, like other Aberrants or the Transcendence Society would.
Instead, he wasted that precious summoning opportunity in an uninhabited zone with no people at all.
What was he after?
There must be a motive or secret behind this that we don't understand!
I am very interested in this secret.
The Transcendence Society is clearly also interested, and they acted earlier than we did, with a more resolute attitude.
For this kind of Aberrant who has stolen their core technology, their policy has always been to eliminate them without exception.
So, let's think from his perspective.
A high-risk target being pursued simultaneously by the authorities and the Transcendence Society, wanting to hide long-term, what is the best choice?
Is it merely hiding in some remote mountains and forests?
He would still face the risk of being discovered there."
Everyone was intrigued by this new information. Their faces turned serious, listening attentively. No one spoke of giving up anymore.
Qin Bai's finger slowly moved across the map, finally stopping on a point in the southern borderlands of Daxia.
Black City.
"He needs a place, a place that can simultaneously block us and also make the Transcendence Society hesitate to act.
Prohibiting external official forces from entering to enforce the law means our bounty notices are worthless there.
Extreme hatred for the Transcendence Society, where members entering will be hunted by the entire city—this provides him with a second layer of protection.
And that place doesn't discriminate against Aberrants. He wouldn't have to constantly hide his true nature."
Qin Bai smiled. "If he's smart enough, if he truly wants to find a safe zone that can free him from the pursuit of both sides, Black City is his most likely, and only, choice."
The meeting room fell into silence.
Qin Bai had pointed in a new direction.