33: Chapter 33 The World's Number One Hacker's Legs Glided: This guy could burn me to ashes with a single fire!

The innermost wooden door.

The paint was mottled, the wood grain cracked, and aged dust was embedded under the door crack.

Unlike the renovated courtyard in front, this door hadn't been replaced.

Lin Xiaoman pushed it.

It didn't budge.

It was locked from the inside.

She squatted down, fished out a tool bag the size of a pencil case from the side pocket of her backpack, unzipped it, and six metal needles of different thicknesses were lined up.

Her left hand pinched the thinnest one, her right hand braced against the edge of the keyhole, and her fingertips slightly adjusted the angle.

Picking locks, for her, felt about the same as cracking a four-digit password—the principle was simple, relying purely on touch.

Just as the first needle probed into the keyhole, footsteps sounded behind her.

Lin Xiaoman's hand stiffened.

The tool was stuffed back into her sleeve in a flash, and she slowly stood up and turned around.

At the end of the corridor, against the light.

A woman stood there.

Dark gray suit trousers, tailored to fit, a straight line from waist to ankle.

The white shirt was buttoned to the collar, not a single excess wrinkle.

The low ponytail was tied extremely tight, the hairline clean, revealing her entire forehead and slender neck line.

Standing there, her face was the kind of exquisite that would make people forget to breathe at first glance.

Her brows were angular, the corners of her eyes slightly upturned, her nose bridge high, her lip line firm; when she didn't smile, her entire face was as cold as frost.

But that didn't stop her from being beautiful.

The backlight outlined her silhouette with a golden edge, and a simple platinum button at her collarbone shattered the light in the shadows, cold to the bone, yet so beautiful that one couldn't help but look.

Lin Xiaoman recognized her.

Liu Yuyan.

"Who are you? How did you get in?"

It wasn't the tone of a question. It was an interrogation.

Lin Xiaoman made a prompt decision, the corners of her mouth curved up, smiling to reveal two shallow dimples.

"Hello, Miss! I was wandering nearby, saw this courtyard was beautifully renovated, and the main gate wasn't locked, so curiosity, you know—sorry, I'll leave right now!"

Liu Yuyan didn't move.

Her gaze swept down from Lin Xiaoman's face, swept to the outline of the hoodie pocket, and then landed on her fingers.

"In this place, there are no residents within a two-kilometer radius."

Liu Yuyan's voice was still that same tone.

"The nearest village road is forty minutes away on foot."

She paused for a beat.

"You were just passing by?"

Lin Xiaoman's smile held, but a layer of sweat seeped out on her back.

"Just got off the car, walking around nearby, don't young people nowadays all like to—"

"Stop."

Liu Yuyan walked two steps closer.

"The pads of your index and middle fingers are a layer thinner than a normal person's."

Her gaze didn't leave Lin Xiaoman's hands.

"Your left ankle is slightly everted, that's skeletal compensation from sitting for long periods, not natural. The things in your sleeve... were you just picking the lock?"

She stood still in front of Lin Xiaoman.

Lin Xiaoman closed her mouth.

Alright then.

This woman's eyes were a scanner.

She wiped away her smile, changed her angle, and intended to open her mouth to stall for time—

The locked wooden door in the innermost room opened.

Su Chen walked out wearing a bronze mask.

Lin Xiaoman's spine straightened instantly.

Black trench coat, half-face mask, that sliver of golden light leaking from the door crack fell on his shoulders, then was cut off by the action of the door panel closing.

East Sea.

Flame pillar.

The thing that three destroyers couldn't kill even after emptying their ammunition, the person he burned to ash in two minutes.

Was standing right in front of her, three meters away.

Lin Xiaoman's fingertips began to go numb, her heart rate spiked, and the drumbeats in her chest grew heavier with every beat.

Liu Yuyan's entire demeanor changed the moment she saw Su Chen.

Her spine straightened further, her chin tucked slightly, the cold light in her eyes faded completely, replaced by a kind of reverence that went down to the bone.

"Chairman."

Her voice was half a tone lower.

"Someone broke in here, I'll handle it."

Chairman.

Liu Yuyan called him Chairman.

The head of a multi-billion empire used "I'll handle it" in front of this person.

Lin Xiaoman's brain spun fast.

Run?

Where to run?

There was no signal within a two-kilometer radius; even if she turned and ran now, could she make it out of this courtyard?

The other party could teleport.

She was 1.52 meters tall, and her legs were still shaking.

If this man thought she was a threat, with a casual wave of fire, not even ash would be left.

Curiosity killed the cat.

Literally.

Su Chen's gaze landed on her.

Lin Xiaoman immediately hung the barely-there smile back on her face, smiling even sweeter than before.

Su Chen looked at her.

He didn't speak.

Just looked at her like that.

Lin Xiaoman's smile couldn't hold up bit by bit.

She suddenly felt that all the camouflage she had in front of this person was transparent, seen through completely.

Su Chen spoke.

"No need to pretend."

"I... I didn't..."

Lin Xiaoman's smile shattered.

Su Chen continued.

"If you can find this place, it shows you have ability."

His voice was flat, no judgment, no extra tone, just stating a fact.

"But the things behind the door, once seen, cannot be taken back."

He turned around and stepped into that innermost room.

The space behind the door swallowed his back.

The voice came back from the other side of the wooden board, clear and calm.

"Liu Yuyan, come in."

He paused for a beat.

"As for you—when you've made up your mind, then push this door."

Liu Yuyan glanced at Lin Xiaoman.

She took the bronze piece out of her shirt pocket and pushed the door to enter.

The door closed.

There was an extremely faint flash of golden light in the door crack, gone in an instant, so fast that Lin Xiaoman thought her eyes had deceived her.

Then there was nothing.

She was the only one left in the courtyard.

Her legs finally couldn't hold up, her spine leaned against the nearby corridor pillar, she slid down the pillar a bit, her palm pressed against her chest.

Sunlight cut in obliquely from under the eaves, dust floating slowly in the light beam, shining on the stone slab.

It was warm.

But her back was still cold.

Lin Xiaoman stared at that door.

She had been chasing for two weeks.

From screen to reality, from data to dirt roads, from Jingzhou all the way here.

She had caught up.

The door was right in front of her.

She didn't move.

It wasn't fear.

It was that sentence that got her stuck—"Once seen, it cannot be taken back."

Lin Xiaoman lowered her head, looking at her own hands.

Ten fingers, the calluses on the fingertips were from the keyboard, the calluses on the sides were from the mouse.

These hands had broken through every door with a password in this world.

The Pentagon, twenty minutes. The Kremlin, seventeen minutes. MI6, twelve minutes.

No door could stop her.

But this was just a wooden door.

The paint was cracked.

She raised her head, staring at the door crack.

That sliver of golden light just now wasn't sunlight, wasn't lamplight, wasn't any light source she knew.

It was something she had never encountered in her eight years of keyboard life.

Not in the network cables. Not in the code. Not on the screen.

Lin Xiaoman stood up straight.

She patted her face, not hard, to pat away that bit of hesitation.

She pulled down her cap brim, her canvas shoes stepped on the stone slab as she walked forward two steps.

Her hand pressed against the door panel.

The wood grain was rough, pressing against her palm.

She stood in front of the door for three seconds.

Then she pushed.