Chapter 415 - 361: Jin Xueli’s Desperate Straits and Rebirth

Jin Xueli was in a terrible predicament.

Her pistol had just run out of bullets.

The hammer... if she hit someone with all her might, the most it would do—the day after her obituary appeared in the paper—was maybe make her target go buy a pain relief patch.

Call the police? Out of the question. The man had already drawn his gun, slow and deliberate. With the barrel staring her down, did she really have time to finish dialing 911?

Even jumping was out. She was standing in the center of the rooftop, too far from the edge. If she made a sudden break for it, she'd just be giving the man moving target practice.

'What do I do?'

After a frantic second or two, Jin Xueli was out of ideas. Her mouth fell open, and she asked blankly, "Huh? Who's Jin Xueli?"

The man watched her silently, the gun in his hand unmoving.

"I-I have money for you," she said, raising her hands and trying desperately to look like a tourist being mugged. She stammered, "Please don't shoot, I'll give you all my money... I just came up to see the view... You've got the wrong person, haven't you?"

The man started to walk forward, closing the distance to Jin Xueli one step at a time.

His eyes, which had looked like black holes from a distance, gradually came into focus under the gloomy sky. His irises were a grayish-olive green, but now his entire eyes were a hazy, swirling sea of that same color. His black pupils were their original size, but they were not in their original position.

...They were on Jin Xueli's eyeballs.

It was as if two tiny, black-dot ophthalmologists were peering into her brain through her own pupils.

'What's going on?'

Jin Xueli startled, taking two quick steps back. She blinked hard, and the feeling of being spied upon vanished. The black pupils were back in the man's eyes across from her.

"So that's how it is," the man said with a smile. "If you were Jin Xueli, I would've asked a few questions before killing you. Since you're not, I'll just kill—"

"I am Jin Xueli," she admitted at once.

'The Knight Family would definitely shoot an innocent person. Living long enough to answer a few questions is better than dying right away. As long as I'm alive, I might be able to find a way out of this, right?'

The man's expression was calm. "How did you get it?"

"How did I get what?" Jin Xueli knew exactly what he was asking, but she had to play dumb—after all, a few more words bought her a few more minutes. "By the way, uh, what should I call you?"

'If I get his name now, maybe I can use it later at the place with the human-face balloons.'

"I'm asking the questions, not you," the Knight man said, gesturing with his gun. "Stop playing dumb. How did you get the Original Liquid?"

'Don't they know themselves? Impossible.'

Unable to think of a better question to stall for time, Jin Xueli let her thoughts slip out: "You don't know how to get the Original Liquid?"

"Of course we know. But I'm asking how *you* got it." Knight's expression darkened. "You didn't pay the price at the gas station, yet you obtained the Original Liquid."

'In other words... the Knight Family had always played by the rules, buying the Original Liquid at the gas station by "paying the price."'

'I didn't pay a thing, yet I stole a bottle of Original Liquid from the gas station—so the Knight Family wants to know how I did it, right?'

"You're going to kill me over this?" Jin Xueli felt a surge of indignation and injustice. "If you wanted to learn my method, you could have just come and asked me! Offer me some money, and what couldn't you ask? I guarantee I'd tell you everything. But you're going to kill me for such a small thing?"

Even though she was still alive, trading words with Knight, it didn't change reality. As Jin Xueli scanned her surroundings, she still couldn't find the slightest chance of escape.

'Even if I talk to him here for an hour, or two, what's the point? Where's my opening?'

'Even Tian Xi doesn't know I'm on this rooftop—trapped in a hopeless dead end, and all because of a "method for getting the Original Liquid"?'

"A small thing?" Knight licked his lips. "An income in the tens of millions is a small thing to you?"

Jin Xueli froze. "What? I... I only took one bottle."

Knight suddenly burst out laughing. "You've never done a Hunter's business, have you? You must be a solo operator, I take it?"

'It was true, but she didn't want to admit it. It felt vaguely like an insult.'

"I've sold an Illusion before..."

The smile on Knight's face grew wider, squeezing his eyes into two narrow, grayish-green pools. "You really don't know anything at all, do you?"

Jin Xueli stared at him blankly.

"On my way up to the rooftop, I paid a visit to Scott. It was my first time meeting him... Turns out he uses the Original Liquid in brain health supplements. How interesting. Speaking of which, I should thank you for leading us to Scott."

'...What's going on? He didn't know what Scott was using the Original Liquid for?'

Knight shook his head, his black pupils swaying. They floated out of his eyeballs, then drifted leisurely back into their grayish-green depths. "When Chaisi Monroe brought you into his company and gave you shares, we smelled what he was up to right away."

People with an absolute advantage often let their guard down, which was probably why he was willing to say a few more words.

"What was he up to?" Jin Xueli asked.

"The Knight Family has always been the sole supplier of Original Liquid in Blackmoor City. Scott is one of the clients who uses the Original Liquid—only, he's one of Chaisi Monroe's clients. So, our agreement was that he would buy our Original Liquid in bulk and resell it to Scott, with the Kai Family taking a cut in the middle. From start to finish, we never knew who he was selling the Original Liquid to."