29: Chapter 29: In order to save a little girl, he casually wiped out a gang.
The rules on the streets of San Verde are simple.
First, don't mess with the police unless you can stuff them with enough money.
Second, don't mess with the drug lords unless you want to become fertilizer for cacti in the desert.
Third, and most importantly—don't mess with those Easterners driving black armored Lincolns.
Unfortunately, there are always a few idiots whose brains have been pickled in tequila, unable to remember the third rule.
"Hey, yellow-skin!"
The gang leader with a face full of scars clearly didn't take Chen Yuan seriously. In his eyes, this guy in an expensive suit, looking soft and pampered, was just some young master from a wealthy family out to experience life—all show and no substance.
"This girl is 'Blood Hand Gang' property. If you know what's good for you, scram back to your air-conditioned room and drink champagne."
Scarface shook the steel pipe in his hand, still stained with dark red blood. "Otherwise, I don't mind cracking open that pretty-boy face of yours."
The thugs behind him burst into raucous laughter, their eyes greedily sizing up Chen Yuan's expensive suit and the luxury car beside him.
Chen Yuan didn't speak.
He merely turned his head to glance at the little girl curled up beside the car wheel.
She looked about ten years old, her golden hair appearing dry and dull from the dust clinging to it. Her face was filthy, obscuring her features, but her azure-blue eyes held a stubbornness and wariness that didn't match her age.
Like a wounded wolf pup.
What truly caught Chen Yuan's attention was the necklace hanging around her neck.
It wasn't jewelry at all.
The pendant was a chip the size of a fingernail, forged from some unknown alloy. Its surface was etched with incredibly intricate micro-circuits, shimmering with an eerie blue light under the sun.
[Detected unknown high-density data storage unit.]
The system's prompt sounded in Chen Yuan's mind.
[Preliminary scan indicates the unit contains a large amount of encrypted underlying technical code, pertaining to fields: lithography machines, bio-chips, artificial intelligence...]
Chen Yuan's pupils contracted slightly.
Lithography machines?
That was a true national treasure, a critical lifeline that the Western world had firmly in its grip.
Just who was this little girl?
"Hey! I'm talking to you! Are you deaf?"
Seeing Chen Yuan ignore him, Scarface felt his authority challenged. Flustered and angry, he raised his steel pipe, pointing it directly at Chen Yuan's head.
"I hate it most when people point at my head."
Chen Yuan finally spoke.
His voice was soft, flat, yet it instantly plunged the noisy air around them into an icy chill.
He slowly lifted his eyelids. The laziness and casualness that had been in his dark eyes moments before were gone, replaced by a coldness reserved for the dead.
"Alice."
"Here."
The blonde female secretary who had been standing quietly by the car didn't even turn her head, merely lifting her right foot clad in high heels.
"Three seconds."
"Understood."
Before the words faded, Alice moved.
No one saw how she moved.
In Scarface's retina, dulled by alcohol and drugs, he only saw a golden afterimage flash past.
Immediately after, an irresistible force slammed into his chest.
*Thud!*
A dull thud.
Scarface felt as if he'd been hit head-on by a heavy truck at full speed. The sound of his ribs cracking echoed clearly in his ears. His entire body flew backward uncontrollably, crashing into two of his underlings who hadn't yet reacted.
When he hit the ground, he was already a limp mess, bloody foam bubbling from his mouth, clearly not long for this world.
The remaining gangsters were all stunned.
They hadn't even seen what happened before their boss went flying.
"M-monster!"
Someone let out a terrified shriek, threw down his machete, and turned to run.
But it was too late.
Alice's figure moved through the crowd like a ghost.
Her movements weren't wide or sweeping; they even carried a balletic grace. Every lift of her hand, every kick, precisely struck a vital point on an enemy.
*Crack!* — Neck bone snapped.
*Thud!* — Rib pierced a lung.
No wasted movements, not a single ounce of strength squandered.
Three seconds later.
Alice returned to her position by the car as if nothing had happened, not a single wrinkle in her skirt.
Behind her, the six gangsters who had been so arrogant moments ago now lay in pools of blood, each dead in a different manner, but all killed with a single blow.
The entire street fell into a deathly silence.
The onlookers who had been watching the spectacle moments ago now scattered in panic, screaming as if they'd seen a ghost.
Ignoring the corpses, Chen Yuan walked directly to the little girl.
He crouched down, trying to make his voice sound gentle. "What's your name? You're safe now."
The little girl looked up, her azure-blue eyes still filled with wariness. She didn't answer, just clutched the tattered doll in her arms tightly.
Chen Yuan sighed.
Seemed she was scared out of her wits.
He took off his suit jacket and gently draped it over the girl, then scooped her up in his arms.
Her body was light as a feather and still trembling slightly.
"Come with me to the car first."
Carrying her, Chen Yuan walked toward the Lincoln and opened the door.
"It's not safe here."
Back in the luxurious office on the top floor of the Pharmaceutical Factory.
Chen Yuan placed the girl on the soft sofa. Alice brought over a cup of warm milk and a freshly baked cake.
The little girl seemed truly famished. After a few seconds of hesitation, she began devouring the food, her small face smeared with cream, looking like an adorable little kitten.
Chen Yuan took a damp towel and gently wiped the grime from her face.
As the thick layer of dust was cleaned away, a face as delicate as a porcelain doll was revealed.
Blonde hair, blue eyes, fair skin, a high nose bridge. Though pale from malnutrition, one could still tell she would grow into a beauty.
This face...
Chen Yuan felt he'd seen it somewhere before.
"Red Queen, scan the facial features, cross-reference with the global celebrity database," he mentally commanded.
[Scanning... Match successful.]
A photograph and a personal file instantly projected onto his retina.
In the photo, a man with similarly blonde hair and blue eyes stood triumphantly on the Nasdaq bell podium.
[Name: Adrian Vanderbilt]
[Identity: Founder and CEO of the European top-tier tech giant 'Halo Group'. Estimated personal assets exceed 300 billion euros, ranking among the top three on the Forbes rich list.]
Chen Yuan looked at the man in the photo, then down at the girl who was still eating intently.
The resemblance between their features was at least seventy percent.
"Boss, her identity is confirmed," Alice's voice sounded beside him. "Annie Vanderbilt, Adrian's only daughter. Illegitimate, though."
"According to intel, Adrian suffered a sudden cerebral hemorrhage last month and is still in the ICU. Halo Group's internal factions are tearing each other apart over the succession. This girl was likely kidnapped by one of the heirs, intended as leverage against her father."
Chen Yuan looked at the small figure, his gaze turning complex.
This wasn't just saving a loli.
This was practically picking up a walking lithography machine!
If word of this girl got out, the billionaire lying in that hospital bed would probably trade half his conglomerate for his daughter's life.
"Interesting."
Chen Yuan couldn't help but laugh.
Seems his luck really wasn't ordinary.
Just then, the girl who had been silent all along suddenly looked up, putting down her cake.
"My name is Annie," she said, looking at Chen Yuan. Her voice still held a hint of childishness, but her eyes were unusually firm. "Thank you for saving me."
"But I have one more request."
Annie jumped down from the sofa, walked up to Chen Yuan, her azure-blue eyes glistening with tears:
"Please, save my mother."
"Those bad guys took her too. They said... they're going to sell her to Widows Village."