Outside the interrogation rooms, several international police helicopters hovered. Officers verified rosters, while armed police and snipers stood ready.
Bai Chunian was pulled from the transport vehicle and ushered into the building.
The hall contained a few other experimental subjects—not all of them. Along the way, he saw Eris and the bee Pastry Chef, each escorted to separate interrogation or waiting rooms.
Bai Chunian was first placed in a small, bulletproof glass room, with only a chair equipped with a table. He sat, hands cuffed to the table, movement severely restricted. Two bright, harsh lights shone on him. For a long time, no one attended to him.
He exhaled softly through his nose and brushed his finger over the air. The chip that Bilangxing had delivered landed on the pad of his index finger and automatically adhered to his skin.
The device couldn’t stay in the nasal cavity too long—if it accidentally traveled down the airway into the lungs, retrieving it would be a serious problem.
He glanced around. The walls were painted a solemn black and plastered with warning signs in multiple languages. Though worded differently, they all carried the same message: confess and receive leniency; resist and face severity.
The entire island was tropical, with average temperatures around 35°C year-round. Inside the prison, only the guards’ lounges and dormitories had air conditioning; in the prisoner areas, only a few fans were installed where people frequently gathered to help circulate air.
Bai Chunian sat in the interrogation chair. The heat alone was oppressive, and the two searing lights aimed directly at his eyes didn’t help. These officers were certainly adept at making someone uncomfortable.
Still, compared to how he interrogated others, their methods were mild. Bai Chunian often relied on private tortures or subtle, untraceable psychological methods to extract information.
He sat in the interrogation room for an hour while Officer Zhang and Du Mo spoke outside.
Du Mo ignored the cigarette offered by a nearby officer, arms crossed, and raised his chin slightly. “That one’s a troublemaker,” he murmured.
The officer beside him patted his chest. “Officer Zhang is an interrogation expert—no criminal dares to lie under his questioning.”
Zhang was tall and imposing, with an icy visage that commanded authority. He was determined to succeed in this interrogation.
The International Police had long been monitoring the experimental subject organization “SOW Firewall,” founded by the Reptiles. Classified as a catastrophic-level terrorist organization, all key members needed to be controlled swiftly. Intelligence suggested Bai Chunian had dealings with them, so they hoped to extract reliable information from him.
Du Mo was unimpressed. He lit his cigarette and inhaled. “9100… a messenger-type experimental subject, with a probability of three in a hundred thousand. Not so easy to handle.”
Zhang, confident in his interrogation skills, disregarded Du Mo’s warning. He and another assisting officer passed through the barred corridor and entered the interrogation room. The two officers were separated from Bai Chunian by bulletproof glass, communicating through a speaker and voice transmission hole.
As soon as Zhang sat down, Bai Chunian greeted him.
“Hi, officer. Nice ring,” he said with a playful smirk.
Zhang wore a simple ring on his pinky, clearly part of a matching pair—a small omega-sized wedding band. A hint of white silk handkerchief peeked from his jacket pocket.
In mere seconds, Bai Chunian’s gaze had assessed him from head to toe, and his greeting targeted a recent vulnerability—widowhood.
Zhang’s already stern face grew even colder.
“Ex-IOA special operations chief… just as sharp and cold as the rumors suggest,” Bai Chunian murmured.
“Who’s spreading rumors to tarnish my image? Definitely not from IOA,” he continued, leaning back, hands interlaced on the table, legs crossed casually.
Zhang asked him to state his crimes. Bai Chunian admitted to his actions, including detonating the ball near the Mingzhu Tower.
“Since you pledged loyalty to the IOA Alliance, why defect? From what I know, President Yan Yi trusted you greatly,” Zhang pressed.
Zhang possessed lie-detection abilities akin to those of Dr. Samoyed at the Aphid Island training base—another reason for his reputation as an interrogation expert. He could determine truth or falsehood by subtle changes in the color of Bai Chunian’s aura above his head.
“You’re being offensive. How have I defected?” Bai Chunian patted the table. “I didn’t defect—just a mission mishap. That day I went to capture Eris, but he’s an A3-level mature experimental subject. Everything I did wasn’t voluntary.”
Above Bai Chunian’s head, a white halo appeared—unseen by others—which confirmed the truth of his words.
Another officer recorded notes, coldly asking, “City surveillance shows you condone experimental subjects using curses to kill. How do you explain that?”
“I had no intent to harm anyone,” Bai Chunian said. “I intervened mid-way to stop Eris from moving into crowded urban areas, guiding him to a closed subway station to minimize casualties.”
Zhang watched him closely; the halo remained white. If it turned red, it indicated falsehood, with deeper red meaning lower credibility.
“I heard IOA’s public agent Lan Bo apprehended you. You’re rumored to be lovers. Why didn’t he stop you?”
Bai Chunian laughed. “That fish? How much do you think I like him? We’re just casual playmates. In this line of work, pressure’s intense—everyone needs a release, right?”
In Zhang’s eyes, the halo shifted from white to red.
“Besides, his possessiveness is extreme. I hate being ordered around, and I dislike omegas with dominant personalities.”
The halo grew redder.
“How about this—he probably caught me out of long-standing grudges. He hates me for blocking his promotions.”
The halo turned a blazing crimson. Bai Chunian now appeared as a fiery red archangel to Zhang.
Zhang knew he was speaking nonsense but couldn’t interrupt; exposing the lie would alert Bai Chunian to the lie-detection, making subsequent interrogation far more difficult.
Thus, the interrogation lasted twelve hours, half of it spent with Zhang and his colleague forced to maintain composure while Bai Chunian playfully reversed the conversation.
As he finally left the interrogation room, Bai Chunian sighed softly, “Ah… I really don’t care about him at all.”
Officer Zhang’s remaining glandular energy had been completely drained by the blazing red halo above Bai Chunian’s head. He stumbled out, supported by his colleagues.
Du Mo took over again, watching Zhang, pale and unsteady, leave, and let out a small, mocking laugh.
“Seems like International Prison and the International Police don’t get along too well?” Bai Chunian casually jabbed at the wall and chatted as they walked.
Du Mo snorted lightly. “Everyone wants results. You experimental subjects keep us busy seven or eight times a month—who’d enjoy catering to that? You take up spots in the prison, eat meals without visitors or benefits, and stir up trouble from time to time. If it weren’t for duty, I’d have thrown you all out long ago.”
Bai Chunian chuckled. “When do I get a visitor?”
“You?” Du Mo glanced at him. “Direct relatives can apply for a visiting permit with ID; three months later, it’s possible. Do you have any direct relatives?”
“……”
“Then quit asking questions.” Du Mo grabbed his arm and escorted him back to the cell.
As Bai Chunian glanced back, his hands were quick—he slipped the cafeteria card from Du Mo’s pocket and quietly pressed it to the wall, letting it slide down to the floor.
The other experimental subjects’ interrogations had ended. In the hall, the bee omega known as the “Pastry Chef” clutched an officer, pleading in a trembling voice: “Sir, I’ve confessed everything. I’ll wear the suppressor forever. Please reduce my sentence. I won’t hurt anyone again. I can control myself. I want to open a small shop in a quiet town and live properly.”
The officers couldn’t grant such requests lightly. Maintaining protocol, they responded officially: “We will consider it accordingly.”
The Pastry Chef collapsed to the floor, crying like a child, silently wiping his eyes, shoulders shaking.
Eris stood nearby, laughing continuously, kicking scraps of paper toward the Pastry Chef, and muttered to Bai Chunian: “My god, this is the most hopeless one I’ve ever seen. Just die already—he’s polluting my air.”
Du Mo swung his riding crop and struck Eris’ calf sharply, sternly commanding: “Back to your cell.”
Eris recoiled from the pain, his dark, curious eyes drawn to Du Mo. “Sir, omegas shouldn’t be this strict.”
Bai Chunian watched the scene, reminding Du Mo: “Cursed users hold grudges.”
Caught between two alphas, there was no mistaking the pressure. Du Mo handed them off to the armed police: “Take him back.”
Then he bent down to the Pastry Chef, lifting him up. The omega flinched at the crop in Du Mo’s hand, who retracted it and patted him on the back. “You keep crying your way back every time. Get up—let’s go.”
Once the armed police escorted the experimental subjects away, Du Mo checked his pockets and realized the cafeteria card was gone. He returned to the corridor to search—just a few steps, less than two minutes.
Bai Chunian had been escorted out, while nearby, the blindfolded Wu Xiang Stealther stood with hands cuffed in front, subtly gesturing with his fingers toward Bai Chunian. Bai Chunian didn’t understand the meaning, but memorized the gestures with his superhuman memory.
Back in the prison, Bai Chunian resumed the monotony of daily life. Prisoner jobs rotated rather than being fixed. He spent a month in the clothing workshop before being reassigned to cleaning the office building.
They couldn’t enter the administrative areas. Their tasks included scrubbing toilets, mopping hallways, and washing the exterior windows. Though seemingly easier than the clothing workshop, the work was meticulous. Any unclean spot could fail inspection, resulting in point deductions and a repeat of the work.
After three days of cleaning, the guards assigned someone to organize the old book storage.
Prisoners disliked this task. The “library” was really a storage room for books. The previous warden, fond of reading, had left over three thousand old books. The new warden respected his predecessor and regularly assigned cleaning, but dust had accumulated over time, and many books had been nibbled by rats. Any damaged books needed to be recorded and replaced.
Many prisoners were illiterate; writing was harder than cleaning. Sweeping floors or wiping glass was much easier.
The library only needed cleaning once a year. B-District had just finished last month. There was normally no need to do it again.
Bai Chunian raised his hand. “I’ll do it.”
The guard, impressed by his dexterity, readily assigned him the task.
Bai Chunian took the elevator, each requiring fingerprint authentication, inaccessible to outsiders. Many locks in the building were fingerprint or iris-locked, eliminating the chance of stealing a key. Bai Chunian had never bothered with such low-tech methods.
The library was indeed a storage room. Bookshelves were densely packed. The room had been cleaned previously, with books stacked neatly, but only by size. Proper organization required categorizing by content, confirming Bai Chunian’s suspicion.
The previous organizer was likely Wu Xiang Stealther, blindfolded and able only to arrange by size. While neat enough to pass inspection, a stricter auditor would require a full reorganization.
The guard locked the door, leaving Bai Chunian alone. He started in a corner, arranging books carefully by content, checking for missing or folded pages, and placing books of the same category on the same shelf.
After three hours of organizing, Bai Chunian pulled out a leather-bound book buried at the bottom. The cover bore no title—only a series of small raised dots.
He ran his fingers over the dots, at first thinking it was just a unique cover design, until he noticed the familiar arrangement at the bottom of the spine. The pattern resembled the raised dots on elevator buttons designed for the visually impaired.
It was a braille book. Opening it, the left page contained English explanations, while the right page featured tactile dots, with tracing diagrams of sign language at the end.
Though Bai Chunian couldn’t read braille, the English text was sufficient. It was a book teaching sign language—the braille on the right was simply a translation of the English explanations.
The few hand gestures Wu Xiang Stealther had made outside the interrogation room were likely learned from this very book.
Bai Chunian compared the gestures he remembered with the diagrams in the book and, to his surprise, managed to piece together a complete sentence:
“Please let me see his fingers and eyes.”
He had already witnessed Wu Xiang Stealther’s mimicry skills back at the triangular prism hut. If he had studied this book, even by tracing the braille with his fingertips, he could memorize it perfectly. Wu Xiang Stealther could replicate an entire library or archive with ease; knowing braille wouldn’t have been surprising at all.
“Please let me see his fingers and eyes,” Bai Chunian mused, understanding the message.
He hadn’t expected Wu Xiang Stealther to cooperate so fully. He had only spoken a tentative, unsupported suggestion in his ear, and yet the little one clearly wanted to see the major.
While organizing the library, Bai Chunian held the heavy sign language book in one hand and stacked books with the other, silently memorizing every gesture in it.
The reorganization took about three days, after which Bai Chunian returned to sweeping and cleaning windows.
During this time, a violent incident erupted in the maximum-security prison: a former Red-Throated Bird member used a shard of tile to stab Jin Lüchong. He was restrained in time, and attempted to commit suicide with the shard, but was prevented and taken to the interrogation building.
Jin Lüchong had sustained an injury to the major artery in his leg but survived. Doctors managed to stop the bleeding and suture the wound, leaving him bedridden for a period.
Bai Chunian was all too familiar with these schemes. The trapped Red-Throated Bird member had been coerced by their organization with threats against their family—to kill Jin Lüchong and die afterward, whether successful or not. A desperate life-for-life gamble.
The Red-Throated Bird boss clearly had considerable reach, even into the international prison—a fact Bai Chunian hadn’t anticipated.
This also meant that Jin Lüchong held valuable information. For now, any attempt to contact him could only go through Wu Xiang Stealther.
Bai Chunian lay on his bunk, one hand propping his head as he stared at the water-stained, rusty ceiling.
The other hand slipped into his waistband, grasping himself—an alpha’s idle amusement. His suppressed moans echoed in the small cell, and the other prisoners respectfully kept quiet.
His head tilted back, breaths growing heavier from heat and exertion, sweat rolling down his throat into his collar. His mind flashed to the words he had spoken to Lan Bo in the bathroom—“give me a little fish.” He blamed the research facility’s reproductive indoctrination for making him say such things, worried that Lan Bo might have felt uncomfortable but hadn’t corrected him.
Yet he genuinely wanted a little fish. No one could suppress such private desires. He had always envied those with families—or perhaps envied anyone with a family.
Bai Chunian turned over, used some paper to clean his hand, hugging a pillow between his legs, imagining holding Lan Bo and the little fish together as they drifted off to sleep.
After three long months, Bai Chunian had grown accustomed to the repetitive routine, learning every surveillance spot, patrol route, and sniper position.
Now he only needed a chance to intersect with Wu Xiang Stealther.
Unexpectedly, early that morning, a guard burst in: “S-9100, you have a visitor.”
Bai Chunian’s spirits lifted, though he realized this wasn’t part of his plan.
He was escorted to the visitation room, facing a pane of bulletproof glass and a telephone. A round stool sat at the counter. He perched on it, fiddling with the phone and tapping on the glass, unsure if it was someone from the IOA or if they had managed to get a visitation pass.
An electronic bell on the wall chimed, and the door outside swung open. Something quickly crawled inside.
Lan Bo, carrying a file bag, scaled the wall, then the ceiling, finally reaching the bulletproof glass, sniffing around for a gap to slip through.
“That’s a relative! Stay away from the glass!” an officer outside shouted, quickly pulling him down onto the stool. “You only have thirty minutes—don’t go over time.”
Lan Bo dusted off the bandages wrapped around his arm, lifting his eyelids slightly: “Understood. Step back.”
The officer froze.
Bai Chunian stared, baffled. “How did you get in?”
“Just swam over properly, then climbed in,” Lan Bo replied calmly, pulling a visitation pass from the file bag.
Bai Chunian was confused. The IOA had the authority to visit him, but they would normally use a work ID, not a visitation pass.
“Yan Yi said, under human law, only direct relatives can visit you,” Lan Bo continued, rifling through the file bag. “I asked him what counts as a direct relative, and he told me I need this.”
He pulled a set of marriage certificates out of the file bag.
Bai Chunian’s eyes went wide the moment he saw the red covers, his mouth dropping open. “…Wait, this… can you even get this done without me being there?”
Lan Bo cupped his cheeks in his hands. “The office said the same thing, but when I showed them a gun, they said, ‘Sure, sure, of course we can do it.’”