Chapter 159 The Way is Ruthless

“You…” Xin Xin was stunned when she saw the prisoner, who had been on a prison-wide manhunt, appear in front of her so brazenly. She stood at the corner of the stairs.

After a long while, her muddled mind finally came to its senses. "Don't think I'll be grateful to you just because you saved me... I'm going to report you! I'm going to report you!!!"

"Hand you over, and I'll complete my mission... I'll..."

The woman collapsed to the ground, her high-pitched voice gradually fading until it turned into a listless sob.

What happens after this task is completed?

Can she be freed from this expendable possession?

No, what awaits her is only endless "work".

Until no more value can be extracted.

"I don't have time to waste with you," Xin Que said, flicking the blood off her knife and ignoring the heart-shaped driver chip that had been shattered into pieces beside her. "So, do you want to cooperate or not?"

She casually pointed to Xin Fengcheng, who she had dragged into the villa, bound hand and foot, his life hanging in the balance, and said, "I've brought you your good father."

"Ah, but when we caught him, he was in a hotel room with Xiao Si."

Xin Xin raised her head, her cloudy eyes flickering. "Was that family photo your work?"

Xin Que remained noncommittal.

Xin Xin slowly stood up from the ground, holding onto the railing, without even glancing at Xin Fengcheng. "You can't even protect yourself, why should I trust you?"

There was a line of code keys engraved on the back of that picture frame.

It wasn't explicitly stated who it was, but the person who reminded her that the prison wouldn't let go of those who assisted in interrogating prisoners could only be Xin Que.

Xin Que gave way to Sun Xinyue, who had already crashed behind her, saying, "I've been dealing with the prison for so long, you should be able to guess that I'm not a loser without any trump cards."

"But you, you've developed feelings for this humanoid program?"

Xin Xin walked over and helped the dazed Sun Xinyue up, saying, "I don't need you to meddle in my business."

Xin Que shook the blood off his Tang sword, his expression calm. "The prison is conducting a massive purge of the entire map. I can buy Sun Xinyue some time, but I can't save her forever."

"Perhaps you can continue to bury your head in the sand and treat the prison as your savior, but I have already shown myself in front of you. Regardless of whether we can reach a cooperation agreement in the future, both Sun Xinyue and you will be suspected by the prison."

"Given the prison's level of caution, what they might do to procedures and inmates who could potentially collude with serious offenders... You, as a long-time employee, should know better than I do."

Xin Que pointed to Sun Xinyue, who was standing motionless like a puppet in Xin Xin's arms, and said, "I used a little trick. They can't monitor us through Sun Xinyue and Xin Fengcheng. You and I are absolutely safe during the rest of the conversation."

Xin Xin slowly straightened up and looked at Xin Que.

...

"Hmm?" Qu Huan turned to look at the man who had appeared beside him. "What's wrong?"

The City King's gaze fell on the Xin family's location. "Madam, one of my clones has been deliberately destroyed."

"In Zone 4, the Xin Family Villa."

Qu Huan was about to get up from the high stool when he suddenly stopped.

A communication request popped up in the air in front of me.

"Prisoner number 56?" Qu Huan frowned slightly.

“Minister Qu,” Xin Xin’s weak voice rang out, accompanied by the image of a woman covered in blood, “Prisoner No. 13 is at my location… I request… your support…”

Qu Huan's emotionless eyes flickered. "Oh?"

She twitched her fingertip, and then a mechanical voice rang out in mid-air.

[Regional movement permissions are now enabled.]

Qu Huan slowly stood up, and as his boot heel touched the next paving stone, he was already in front of Xin Xin.

“She got away…” Xin Xin clutched her bleeding abdomen from a knife wound, leaning against the pool of blood on the stairs, her expression pained. “She tried to turn me against her… but I didn’t agree…”

The information is true.

The City King, who was protecting Qu Huan, looked at the clone corpse on the stairs.

“Madam,” the City King said gently, “it was she who damaged my clone.”

Qu Huan turned his gaze to the clone whose heart had been ripped out. "She actually knew the location of the driver chip."

"The other side is more dangerous than we imagined..."

“But Number 56…this doesn’t make sense,” Qu Huan walked up to Xin Xin, leaned down and stared at the woman whose pupils were beginning to dilate. His voice was gentle, but he pressed her harder. “She could kill even the City King’s clone without hesitation, so why would she let you go?”

Xin Xin desperately vomited out a mouthful of thick blood that was stuck in her throat, making her feel like she was suffocating. A smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. "Ha...because she's stupid..."

Xin Xin pointed a trembling hand at the dead, wide-eyed noblewoman beside her, her mocking voice growing weaker and weaker, "Fool...did you really think that just because I called this program 'Mom' a couple of times...I loved her that much..."

Qu Huan looked at the humanoid program codenamed Sun Xinyue, whose lower abdomen bore the same knife wound as Xin Xin's. "Did she create a scapegoat for herself?"

Xin Xin laughed until tears streamed down her face, blood gushing from between her fingers. "That idiot... in such a hurry to run away... didn't even check if I was really dead..."

"Alright, alright, I don't have time to listen to your bragging," Qu Huan said, struggling to discern the woman's labored breathing. "Which direction did she run off in?"

“…Zhou…” Xin Xin tried to speak clearly, “The Zhou family…”

"Minister Qu..." Xin Xin, her hands trembling and covered in blood, tried to grab her ankle, her unfocused eyes filled with a desperate hope for survival. "I've done a good deed... I've done a good deed... You have to save me..."

"I'm still useful to the prison...you can't give up on me—"

Qu Huan could no longer hide his disgust. "Are you useful? No, no, no, you're still useless... You couldn't even hold back a serious criminal, you didn't confine her to the Xin family, and you even let her escape to other areas..."

“The prison can’t afford to waste resources on someone as incompetent as you… So, goodbye.”

Xin Xin's smile froze, replaced by an extreme fear of death. She blurted out her trump card without thinking, "You can't... I'm a prisoner in Shangcheng Prison... Mental Prisons can't execute people arbitrarily... You can't!"

Qu Huan casually withdrew his hand from Xin Xin's neck, watching the lifeless woman's head loll to the side on the stair steps, his face showing disgust. "I forgot to tell you, you were already bought out by the mental prison."

"Even if we don't lay a hand on you today, given the mental damage you've already suffered beyond the critical threshold, you won't live for many more days."

"Ah, all things considered, you should thank me for freeing you from your suffering."

The woman's voice faded into the distance.

Soon, the villa was empty, leaving only a few corpses lying on the stairs with their eyes wide open in death.

But no one noticed that a faint digital glow flashed across the wound on Xin Xin's lower abdomen.

Sun Xinyue's body gradually fell apart like shattered glass, revealing the true face of the corpse.

It was Xin Fengcheng.