At 11:40, the bus wobbled to a stop in front of the station.

Logan Clark got off the bus, one hand holding a bundled-up jacket, the other in his pocket. He crossed the long street in the deep night, his steps twisting and turning as he slipped into the winding, narrow alleys of the old city district.

Every two streetlights, one was broken. Moonlight shone on the winding stone path, and the already cramped lane was lined on both sides with household clutter: piles of tiles, chamber pots, cardboard boxes, rusted and dusty old bicycles, and tricycles covered with tarps, ready to be pushed out for business in the morning. The row of single-story houses along the street had all gone dark. Logan Clark lowered his head and slipped out of the alley, his steps never pausing, and like a ghost, he turned lightly and vanished into another branch of the maze-like hutong.

A few seconds later, a pair of well-made leather shoes stepped out from the shadows, stopping quietly at the fork. The bluish-white moonlight finally revealed the face of the pursuer—it was the young man in shirt and slacks from the bar.

He frowned slightly, hesitated for a moment, then exhaled in defeat: “Wu…”

A hand flashed out from behind him, lightning-fast, seizing his throat and slamming him hard against the stone wall!

Crash! Plaster and bits of stone rained down like a fine shower.

“I told you not to follow me,” Logan Clark whispered in the pursuer’s ear, “Dylan Morris.”

“Cough, cough, cough…” Dylan Morris choked for a long time before finally managing to stop, but with his throat gripped, he couldn’t speak, so he could only raise his hand and gesture behind Logan Clark.

Logan Clark tilted his head slightly, and sure enough, not far behind him, two plainclothes officers who had just darted out hesitated and stopped, tense and on guard. After a few seconds of standoff, they finally retreated step by step into the darkness, unwillingly.

Logan Clark let go. Dylan Morris exhaled sharply, rubbing his neck and giving a helpless, wry smile: “See, we really mean no harm, we’re just trying to protect you—”

Logan Clark cut him off, his voice flat and emotionless: “Not needed.”

Dylan Morris looked helpless: “They’re just following orders…”

“Get lost!”

Dylan Morris’s eyes flickered. He opened his mouth as if to explain, but Logan Clark turned and walked straight into the darkness.

“Hey, Logan Clark!” Dylan Morris hurried after him a few steps, raising his voice and coughing again, but he didn’t care. Coughing, he called out with a loud laugh, “I really like you—let’s go out for a drink sometime!”

This time, Logan Clark didn’t even look back: “Drink with your damn self.”

Dylan Morris couldn’t help but laugh, then burst out laughing. When he looked up again, that lean, sharp figure had already vanished at the end of the moonlit street.

With a splash, hot water poured down, quickly speckling the plastic shower curtain with droplets.

Logan Clark closed his eyes under the stream. Light filtered through his thin eyelids, tinting the world a hazy yellow. The familiar dull ache slowly climbed from his ribs up to his brain—a brutal over-the-shoulder throw from the Vietnamese fighter. It hadn’t broken any bones, but it would probably take ten days or half a month to recover.

After all, he was no longer in his twenties, able to go all out.

Maybe it was the effect of the swirling steam, but Logan Clark’s thoughts drifted for a moment, and from the deep, dark chaos of his subconscious, a pair of fierce, blood-red eyes slowly emerged—the Vietnamese man from the ring, strangled and struggling in a rage.

“Hit him! Hit him!” “Vietnamese bastard!” “Kill him!”

The colored lights around the ring flashed dazzlingly, and the frenzied cheers rose in wave after wave.

“Hit him!” “Kill him!” “Traitor!”

In the dim torture room, every crack of a club breaking bone, every dull thud of a skull against stone, was chillingly clear.

“Cop’s dog!”

“If he won’t talk, kill him!”

“Beat him to death!!”

……

Countless chaotic curses merged into a deep sea, the pressure rapidly building, stealing the last breath of oxygen from his lungs—

“Cough, cough, cough!” Logan Clark suddenly burst out coughing.

He fumbled to turn off the shower, not even feeling it when he banged his hand. Leaning against the wall, he slowly squatted down, his whole body shaking uncontrollably. His brain and eardrums buzzed so loudly he couldn’t tell thought from reality. It was a long while before he heard the hoarse, urgent gasps echoing in the bathroom, like a trapped beast in distress—it was himself.

No, no, he forced himself to think again and again, it can’t go on like this.

If this goes on, he’ll die.

Whether it was fear or longing from the depths of his soul, he couldn’t say, but he quickly forced himself to calm down. He got up, wiped his wet face hard, wrapped himself in a towel, and walked out of the shabby bathroom. As he left, his silhouette flashed across the foggy mirror, and the faint ink tattoo from the nape of his neck to his shoulder blade rippled slightly with his movement.

A few changes of clothes were messily piled on the single wooden bed in the bedroom. Logan Clark grabbed a pair of loose pants and pulled them on, his lean upper body bare. He took a paper bag from the jacket he’d brought back tonight, dumped all the cash onto the table, and counted it stack by stack, twice. Through this process, he finally calmed his mind, and his chaotic thoughts gradually returned to their usual clarity.