Chu Zu did not attempt to conceal his movements. He traveled through official channels, his itinerary traceable online at every step.

To everyone except Luciano himself, his journey was an official Esposito delegation.

The moment Chu Zu boarded the train, the conductor kept a wary eye on him. When a woman dressed in Lower District attire took the seat opposite, the man’s heart nearly stopped.

Everyone knew Chu Zu had once silenced all thirty-six sectors of the Lower District. If the god of slaughter decided to act onboard…

Well, the conductor would just have to wipe his tears and scrub the carriage clean, praying nothing escalated to the scale of that train accident from years past.

“I’m Dai Xi’an.” The woman introduced herself without preamble.

She appeared to be in her late twenties, legs crossed, posture impeccable as she faced Chu Zu. “I know of you, Mr. Chu Zu.”

Chu Zu kept his gaze fixed on the window.

The train was halfway through its route. The artificial rain of the Upper District ended abruptly at the midway point. Though the middle and bottom layers were collectively termed the “Lower District,” the disparity between them was stark.

After the train accident, the middle layer’s reconstructed buildings used novel materials in some sections, translucent, glass-like substances disguised as concrete and steel.

The middle layer’s residents had paid exorbitant prices to strike a deal with Upper District administrators. For a few hours each month, the materials reverted to their translucent state, allowing filtered, secondhand sunlight to bathe the gathered crowds.

To those in the Lower Districts, such a luxury was unimaginable. Most had no concept of sunlight, their fantasies of Upper District life limited to full bellies and warmth.

In Chu Zu’s memories, of the thirty-six sectors he’d suppressed, thirty in the Lower districts had required little effort. The real struggle had been the middle layer.

It made sense. Tang Qi had spent too long in the Upper District. Even as a rebel, his rallying cries were things like “Take back our sunlight!”

But what was sunlight?

In the Lower districts, only the rare survivors of the train accident, those lucky enough to avoid the inferno, knew.

And how many were left?

Chu Zu watched the middle-layer crowds until the train carried his gaze into the desolate jungle of scrap metal beyond.

Dai Xi’an seemed unbothered by his silence, unfazed by the lack of response. She continued her one-sided conversation.

“Forgive my bluntness. Are you here to find someone… or to kill?”

After a long pause, Chu Zu answered: “No difference.”

A smile curled at Dai Xi’an’s lips, like a child who’d finally found a crack in an impenetrable stone. Given her age and profession, the expression should’ve been unsettling, yet it wasn’t.

The system finally finished scrambling through its archives.

“Dai Xi’an is an information broker straddling both districts. Claims loyalty only to resources, and she is true to her words, selling intel to both Luciano and Tang Qi.”

“When Luciano had use for her, she was briefly the Upper District’s darling. After he crushed three of the four great families, leaving only the Tangs, she became expendable.”

Chu Zu understood instantly.

Dai Xi’an’s approach was simple: she knew her value to the Upper District had expired, but until Luciano made a move, she was stuck playing both sides.

“In the end, she becomes Tang Qi’s ally,” the system concluded.

In an era of extreme information warfare, an information broker’s unwavering loyalty was an unstoppable weapon.

Luciano’s downfall was his own doing.

“I heard,” Dai Xi’an said, “Esposito was furious you let the Tang heir escape. You vanished for three days, we all assumed you’d been disposed of.”

“Let him escape?”

“Host, something’s off,” the system cut in. “The original novel never had this much ambiguity. Everyone was… straightforward. Blunt.”

“Where’s the ambiguity? She’s hinting that rumors are spreading in the Lower District that I deliberately let Tang Qi go. If it reaches Luciano, I’m finished. She’s trying to recruit me for Tang Qi’s side, which he’d welcome. Simple enough”

Then it hit him. “Wait. The novel’s a power fantasy. Side characters shouldn’t be this cryptic. I almost forgot.”

The system sighed in relief. “Good! You remembered!”

“Even if you and Dai Xi’an are minor characters, the narrative isn’t focused on you right now. But this train is crawling with eyes. Anything said here might reach the protagonist or key players!”

Chu Zu fell silent again.

Dai Xi’an couldn’t tell if she’d overstepped.

Chu Zu was Luciano’s executioner. His silence was the lull before violence, a predator’s stillness before the kill.

To an information broker, Chu Zu had never been hard to read. The true enigma was Luciano, the cardplayer who’d smile as he slid a knife between ribs, eschewing subtler methods for the sheer control of it.

But now, even Dai Xi’an couldn’t decipher Chu Zu.

She knew what had happened these past three days.

Tang Qi should never have survived his encounter with Chu Zu. Luciano should never have handed Chu Zu over to the doctors.

The men sent to retrieve Chu Zu were still standing stupidly in the streets, while the man himself disregarded orders entirely, heading straight for the Lower District.

The specifics were known only to those involved. What Dai Xi’an cared about was the implication.

As an executioner, a tamed beast, a blade, should Chu Zu have thoughts of his own?

No.

But what if he was no longer just an executioner, a beast, a blade?

If he broke free of Luciano and Tang Qi, what was Chu Zu? Could he be used?

The thought made Dai Xi’an second-guess herself.

What if she’d misread this entirely? What if Chu Zu wasn’t this complex what if this was just another of Luciano’s traps?

She didn’t know how long she’d been lost in thought, whether she’d kept her composure or given herself away.

The train’s arrival announcement snapped her back. With dawning horror, she realized she’d squandered a rare opportunity.

Chu Zu stood. When he reached into his pocket, Dai Xi’an’s instincts screamed that this might be her end.

Instead, he pulled out a deep brown leather wallet.

Physical wallets are rare nowadays. Genuine leather was a luxury in the Lower District and gauche in the Upper. The wallet’s purpose was to hold physical currency, yet nearly all tangible assets in the Upper District had long been digitized.

Chu Zu emptied its contents. Most were Upper District bills, issued during a short-lived retro trend. Their value now lay more in collectibility than denomination.

Among them, Dai Xi’an spotted the segregated pile of… scrap paper.

The only currency that circulated in parts of the Lower District.

Chu Zu pocketed the scrap paper and handed her the rest.

“I rarely make deals. The last time was at twelve, with Luci.”

The quiet statement froze Dai Xi’an’s thoughts.

Her heart hammered. The absurdity of it sent her scrambling through memories of Chu Zu’s usual demeanor.

Beyond the executioner’s menace, the fragments she recalled only deepened the surrealism.

The “deal” Chu Zu spoke of had defined his entire life. If this moment carried the same weight

The idea terrified her. She sat rigid, unmoving.

“If it’s not enough, I owe you one.” Chu Zu’s tone was ice, yet the promise was the heaviest Dai Xi’an had ever heard. “Is this sufficient?”

“Y-yes…” Her voice came out hoarse, strained by shock.

Chu Zu gave a slight nod and turned toward the exit.

Dai Xi’an suddenly shot to her feet, clutching the money and the promise. “Sir! Tang Qi bought all your information from me!”

Chu Zu glanced back. “I can’t owe you twice.”

“This is… a freebie.” Her hands shook. “A gift.”

Chu Zu studied her, his crimson eyes darkening to blood.

Then he left without another word.

Only when he’d vanished completely did Dai Xi’an collapse back into her seat, trembling uncontrollably. It took her a while to understand what her instincts had just done.

Her body, honed by years of walking the knife’s edge, had answered the earlier question.

What is Chu Zu, free of Luciano and Tang Qi?

He’d once bathed the Esposito estate in blood, shielded a young Luciano until he came of age, and suppressed thirty-six Lower District sectors through sheer force.

He’d never been modified. A purely human body. So why did everyone associate him only with Luciano’s brutality?

Chu Zu had already proven, amidst neon and rust, that he had the strength to sit at the table whether in the Upper or Lower District.

All he lacked was the right.

And where did one find that?

Clutching the money, Dai Xi’an shivered.

—

“Dealing with information brokers is so satisfying,” Chu Zu mused as he stepped out of the station into Lower District Sector Eight. “Just a meaningful look, some valuables, and they’ll shut up if you want them to. She even threw in free intel. What a professional.”

The system agreed cheerfully. “Yes! Less riddles, more clarity, better for all!”

Chu Zu had long since figured out his system’s thought process. Without comment, he headed for the location it provided.

The novel’s description of the Lower District came to mind:

[A paradise of danger and chaos. Misshapen structures that could hardly be called houses clumped together like trash tossed haphazardly by the heavens, waiting to decompose into the earth’s nutrients.

Here, sunrise and sunset were forbidden. Stars were a myth.

Flickering, feeble lights cast fractured shadows. And yet, if one stared long enough, a faint, trembling glow would sometimes miraculously appear*

The Upper District’s overseers are burning bodies on schedule.

The residents gathered around these flames.

Fire drove away the stench and cold. More importantly, only here could they see something resembling “life” reflected in each other’s eyes.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Lower District.]

Reality matched the depiction almost exactly.

The farther from the station, the darker it grew. Habitable structures were few, easily identified by the tattered sheets hung as makeshift curtains, the Lower District’s idea of “home.”

Clashing violently with the primitive squalor were the markers placed every few hundred meters, like traffic signs. Numbers subdivided Sector Eight into smaller zones, making it easier for overseers to manage the residents like livestock.

Whoever designed them clearly hadn’t understood the Lower District. The numbers were reflective.

Where exactly was the light supposed to come from? Genius.

Chu Zu encountered a few people. Even the occasional shadowy figure vanished like ghosts at his approach.

“Is it my fearsome reputation, or is Sector Eight just shy?”

He’d expected Tang Qi’s influence to make the Lower District fiercer. The novel had described it thus:

[Those who once clung only to survival now burned with primal urges.*

They wanted to scream, to laugh, to tear this damned world apart. To take rather than be taken. To make the sky itself hear their howls.]

The system ran an analysis. “You did recently wreak havoc here. Hiding from you is the sane choice.”

“The novel mostly focuses on Tang Qi’s circle. Most here are even more peripheral than you. Nobody cares about their lives. The author didn’t write it; readers wouldn’t know.”

“Status-wise, they’re no different from the girl you gave the umbrella to.”

“…”

Chu Zu stopped abruptly, his voice dropping. “How are they the same?”

The system didn’t understand his sudden shift in mood, nor did it get a chance to respond.

“Tang Qi’s here!” it warned urgently.

A shadow darted into view. Tang Qi, who should’ve been buried three feet underground, stood before Chu Zu.

“I want answers.” His gaze locked onto Chu Zu’s cold eyes.

—

Translator’s Note:

This is Ink Hub back with another chapter! Dai Xi’an’s existential crisis over whether Chu Zu is a blade, a beast, or something far worse might just be my favorite moment so far.

(As always, your support fuels these translations. Drop a comment if you’re enjoying the ride!)

—

Cultural Notes:
– “Retro trend”: Refers to a brief period where the Upper District romanticized outdated customs, including physical currency.
– “Scrap paper”: Lower District “currency” is essentially worthless outside its zones, hence the term.
– “Owe you one”: In Chinese contexts, this is a heavy promise, implying a life-debt in certain situations.