Lin Xie was still crouched on the grass, eyes locked on the squirrels fighting over bread like it was a crown jewel. She'd seen cleaner kills in a combat pit.
Her phone buzzed in her hoodie pocket.
She answered without checking. "Who died?"
"That's not how you answer a call," Shen Rui said, voice tight and unmistakably irritated.
"I only have one contact. If it's ringing, it's you. So unless you're suddenly calling from the afterlife, someone probably died."
He ignored that. "Your documents are ready. Fake ID, background records, citizenship, digital enrollment access. Everything."
She blinked up at the clouds.
"Impressive. You do criminal work too?"
"Only when provoked," he said flatly. "You're now officially Lin Xie. Seventeen. Transferred from a Hong Kong international school. You were homeschooled overseas prior to that. Smart, clean, no red flags."
"Homeschooled. Sounds lonely. Fitting."
"You'll still need to register in person to receive a test slip for next week's Senzhou National University entrance exam."
"Slip?"
"For the exam," he said. "You can't just walk in."
"Shame."
"I've also arranged for the initial fee to be covered. You'll receive confirmation by tonight. Apply tomorrow morning."
She glanced ahead at the university gates from where she sat, a bit down the street. A massive, sprawling institution at the heart of the capital—tall buildings with glass panels, solar-paneled roofs, large LED bulletin boards that flashed things like "Innovation Through Discipline" and "Welcome Transfer Week."
Senzhou Imperial University.
Nothing like the sterile, steel-spined research towers she grew up in.
"I don't have a uniform," she said.
"It's a university," Shen Rui replied. "They don't wear uniforms."
"So I get to be the weirdo in regular clothes while everyone else looks like they just stepped out of a minimalist lookbook."
"That's not inaccurate."
"Do I get a pencil?"
"I'll have testing materials sent to you," he said. "And a bag."
"Am I allowed to doodle threatening messages on it?"
Click. He hung up.
Lin Xie snorted softly and stood, brushing off her jeans.
The students wandering in and out of Senzhou Imperial University looked so… casual. Bags slung on one shoulder, heads ducked as they texted. Some laughing. Some yawning.
So noisy. So unfocused.
So free.
No security scanners. No retinal codes. No silent guards with gloves and tranquilizers.
She tightened her hoodie and walked toward the registration hall, boots crunching softly over the stone path.
Senzhou Imperial University was the kind of place that carried its own gravity. One of the oldest, most prestigious institutions in the capital, it stretched over several hectares of prime city land—its gates a blend of traditional stonework and sleek steel arches. Generations of the country's brightest minds had walked its wide tree-lined paths. Its engineering labs were funded by national research grants, its politics department had produced cabinet members, and its entrance exam was considered one of the hardest in the country.
Lin Xie stood at the gates of Senzhou Imperial University the next morning, a beat-up canvas messenger bag slung over one shoulder, her hoodie wrinkled from sleep and mildly grass-stained from last night's squirrel surveillance. She hadn't changed. She didn't see the point.
The campus was buzzing with people—students pouring in and out of lecture halls, chatting in clusters near vending machines, professors walking with tablet cases and caffeine-dependency in their eyes.
She watched them like an anthropologist studying a new species.
So many expressions. So much noise. So little purpose.
Still, she followed the arrows that pointed toward Registrar's Office – Entrance Exam Inquiries like a good little future applicant. Sort of.
Inside the glass-walled admin building, the air conditioning blasted too cold and the walls smelled like freshly printed paper and mild stress.
She stepped up to the information desk.
The girl behind it blinked at her. "Uh… can I help you?"
"I want a slip," Lin Xie said.
"A… slip?"
"To take your university's entrance exam. You're Senzhou Imperial University, yes?"
"Yes, but… do you have a reservation or—?"
"I am the reservation."
The girl looked startled, typing quickly. "Name?"
"Lin Xie."
A pause.
"Ah… Yes. It says here you're applying from an international transfer. Your file's already in the system. That's fast."
"I move efficiently."
"Right. Well…" The girl shuffled papers. "Here's your exam slip. The written entrance exam is scheduled for next Friday. Orientation, if accepted, is the following week."
Lin Xie took the slip, staring at the paper like it might bite her.
"Do I have to bring anything?"
"Just your ID and test kit. We provide backup materials if needed."
"Will I be monitored?"
The girl blinked again. "We… have proctors, yes?"
"Armed?"
"…No?"
Lin Xie nodded thoughtfully. "Progress."
She turned to go, then paused, half-twisting on her heel. "Do all students here look like they haven't killed someone?"
"I—I guess?"
"Fascinating," she said, and left.
Outside, the sun had climbed over the rooftops. Students lounged in the courtyard, some eating buns, others reading. One boy was crying quietly near a bush, face turned away. A girl crouched beside him with a lollipop and a sticker sheet.
Lin Xie walked slowly past them, her exam slip folded neatly into her pocket.
This world was strange.
Its pain wasn't sanitized. Its joy wasn't synthetic. Its people… leaked emotion like it was nothing.
She didn't belong here.
And yet, for now—
She would be part of it.
This wasn't her world.
But it would be.
At least for now.
She didn't leave campus right away.
Instead, Lin Xie wandered to a shaded bench near the central courtyard fountain, letting the paper slip rest loosely between her fingers. Her eyes weren't really on the passersby anymore—not the girl in glasses rehearsing debate arguments aloud, not the guy sprinting with a stack of handouts, not even the drone flyer hovering above the rooftop garden.
Her gaze drifted inward.
Some children in the world, she remembered, grew up in apartments. In small houses with leaky faucets. Some had birthdays and scraped knees and homemade food. Some cried when their parents yelled. Some had tantrums when they didn't get a toy.
She didn't have any of that.
She had four white walls, a reinforced door, and a biometric lock that didn't open unless someone wanted her out.
Her "room" was a cell. The kind with no sharp corners, a narrow cot bolted to the floor, and lights that never fully turned off. Every minute of every day had been logged—heart rate, blood oxygen, brainwave activity. The silence in that place wasn't peaceful. It was clinical. Sterile.
Sometimes she watched the other kids from the reinforced glass panels during isolation drills. Some broke within weeks. Some turned mean. Some didn't talk again.
She remembered one girl—a code name, not a name—who used to hum quietly when the med-bots scanned her. She didn't last long. Too soft.
Lin Xie was never soft.
She didn't get gadgets or screens like normal kids. If she was given anything, it was a tracking implant. Or a shock cuff. Or a needle. The only times she was allowed out of the facility were for field missions—targets to observe, objects to retrieve, systems to infiltrate. And always under surveillance. Always controlled.
So yes—this world was strange. The open space, the sunlight, the way people walked without guards behind them.
But she was adapting.
She always adapted.
"Hey."
The voice broke her thoughts. She turned slightly.
A boy was leaning on the side of the bench. Not older than twenty, probably. Tall. Smiling with the kind of confidence that came from either natural charm or very good mirrors.
"Senzhou, right?" he asked, pointing at her exam slip. "You taking the entrance next week?"
She said nothing.
He sat down beside her anyway, a little too close. "I'm a third-year in engineering. If you need help or a tour or something—"
She didn't even blink. Didn't bother responding.
He smiled like it was a challenge. "Silent type, huh? That's cool. Mysterious. I get it."
Still nothing.
"I mean, it's a big campus. Gets confusing sometimes. Happy to show you around."
No reaction. No acknowledgment.
"You got a name?"
Silence.
"…You're kind of intense. I like that."
Her eyes flicked to him once—empty, unreadable—and back to the fountain.
"I bet you're smart," he added. "The quiet ones always are."
He reached out then, just casually, like it was nothing. A hand toward her arm, maybe to tap, maybe to brush—
Too slow.
Too stupid.
In one swift, clean motion, her fingers locked around his wrist, twisting it back with mechanical precision. The joint cracked. The bones shifted.
There was a sharp, brittle snap.
The boy screamed, dropping to the ground with a choked curse.
A few students nearby turned. One girl gasped. Someone backed away.
Lin Xie stood, completely still. Her face blank. Her eyes unmoved.
"Don't touch what you don't understand," she said coldly.
Then she walked off, exam slip folded in her pocket, hoodie sleeve creased, steps steady and unhurried.
No panic.
No guilt.
She hadn't even looked back.