Chapter 1: Desert Island

When Tian Yi opened his eyes, he saw the sky. For him, that was not a good sign.

He sat up and found himself on a beach. To his right, blue sea met open sky in the distance, with clear shallows and white sand closer at hand. To his left stood a dense, lush grove of coconut palms. One look at the coastline told him this was an island rather than the mainland.

Tian Yi was still wearing that filthy black suit, with a wrinkled black shirt open at the neck underneath. His pockets had been empty to begin with, but under the circumstances he checked them again anyway, in case a crab or some other creature had crawled into his clothes.

More than ten other people lay on the beach, all still unconscious. Tian Yi could sense no useful information from them. They were all ordinary people, with no ability users or cyborgs among them.

Tian Yi's head hurt badly. He could not remember how he had come here. The simplest explanation was that someone had drugged him or knocked him unconscious, then brought him here. The question was who.

He concentrated, trying to remember and reason it out. If anyone in this world could sneak up behind me without a sound and knock me out, it would be Mirror Face. But falling into his hands would simply mean death. There's no reason he'd send me to some mysterious island. So perhaps I was drugged, or... shot from a distance with a tranquilizer dart? That raises another question. How did anyone discover the bookshop's whereabouts?

That time in Modu in April, there's a ninety percent chance Mirror Face found the bookshop with Wei Sheng's help. Could Wei Sheng have tracked me down again and sold the information to someone else... Then who was that person? And what was the point of sending me to this island?

I can rule out the Empire's people for now. If I fell into their hands, they'd certainly throw me straight into Tidal Prison. As for the other organizations or individuals capable of pulling this off, most don't even know I exist. Why would they do something like this? Wait... could it be...

Could I have been abducted because they took me for an ordinary person...

At this thought, Tian Yi looked again at the people scattered across the beach. Their clothes varied widely, and they included men and women, young and old, of different skin colors and races. They looked very much like civilians abducted at random from around the world.

Tian Yi muttered to himself, “If that's the case, I've only got bad luck to blame... Just when the world is about to change, I get dragged into something strange. Hmph... Fine, then. Gu Wen will think of something once he finds I'm missing. For now, I'll see just what they're up to here.”

About ten minutes later, the people on the beach began waking one after another. Their reactions were much the same: panic, confusion, fear, and obvious headaches.

Once all twelve people besides Tian Yi had woken up, a man in his thirties gathered everyone together and offered a few reassuring words. The gist was that everyone should calm down, he was a policeman, there was no need to worry, and they should first check whether anyone was hurt.

Tian Yi paid no attention to a single word out of this man named Yang Gang's mouth. While the fellow prepared to appoint himself leader, Tian Yi studied the people around him. Reading people was as interesting as reading books. Their ways of thinking, values, personalities, and abilities could all reveal themselves in the smallest movements and in their reactions to the situation before them.

“Does anyone know where we are?” Yang Gang asked the group.

They whispered among themselves for a while, but no one answered him, so he continued, “Does anyone remember how they got here?”

At this, a young Black man dressed in hip-hop clothes spoke up with an unmistakable street accent. “Man, can't you see? It's gotta be aliens! Yeah, I've been keeping an eye on them for years. They can wipe human memories. That's why none of us can remember anything. I bet those bastards brought us here so they can stick metal detectors up our asses tonight!”

“All right, all right... buddy, we can consider that too. Does anyone else have a more constructive suggestion?” Yang Gang asked.

“I've got one.” The speaker was a bald white man with a full beard, broad shoulders, a slight beer belly, and the build of an ox. He walked up to Yang Gang and made a point of looking down at him with contempt. “Here's what I think. Why does a guy like you automatically get to be in charge?”

“That wasn't my intention...” Yang Gang replied.

The bald man cut him off. “Enough. I know the tricks people like you play. You act the hero, act the good guy, and by the time people catch on, you're already giving orders.”

“I just think someone has to step forward and do something,” Yang Gang said. “Sir, if you have a problem with me, or feel it would help everyone if you asked these questions...”

As Yang Gang continued in this vein, several women and two young men who looked like office workers soon voiced their agreement. The crowd began calling on the bald man to stop making trouble.

Tian Yi watched like an outsider, a cold smile on his face. He thought, “In an unfamiliar situation like this, the first thing people do is satisfy their most basic need—safety. The weak need to depend on the strong, and the strong need to make use of the weak. Given that, Yang Gang's pose of moral rectitude is far wiser than the bald man's belligerence. Yang Gang's wording is very sly. ‘Someone has to,’ ‘help everyone,’ and so on... He puts the bald man at odds with the entire group, making any argument pointless.”

Before long, the argument died down. Yang Gang still had control of the situation. He suggested that everyone introduce themselves and give the time and place of their last memory.

He went first. “As I said earlier, my name is Yang Gang. I'm from the Dragon Commandery, and I'm a policeman. The last thing I remember before coming here is being on duty in the street...”

As the twelve introduced themselves one by one, a woman standing just behind Tian Yi and to one side tapped him on the shoulder and quietly said, “Sir.”

Tian Yi turned his head slightly and replied in a low voice, “What can I do for you?”

“I've seen that man before... He's no policeman,” the woman said in little more than a whisper.

Tian Yi already knew this. He simply couldn't be bothered to expose all the holes in Yang Gang's story. But he knew little about the woman beside him, so he replied without giving anything away, “Oh? Why did you choose to tell me?”

The woman replied, “The others have already made up their minds that he's a good man they can rely on. They all spoke up for him earlier. Only you kept giving him this...” She faltered, unable to find a suitably polite way to describe the look Tian Yi had been giving Yang Gang.

Tian Yi understood what she meant and answered directly, “Oh, I see. You think exposing him publicly without evidence might fail and get you into trouble. But you still really want to pass the information on to someone else, so you started with me, since I don't look particularly supportive of him.”

“Mm, yes.”

Tian Yi continued, “Why not tell the bald gentleman? He's already challenged Yang Gang openly.”

The woman replied, “With his temperament, he'd be shouting it out in under five seconds, and he'd say outright that I told him. Coming from him, people would be even less likely to believe it.”

Tian Yi smiled but said nothing more, because it was now his turn to introduce himself.