For a moment, no one moved.
Not the Hunters.
Not Kai.
Not Qin Mian, who held Yin Lie's limp body so tightly
that her knuckles had turned white.
Only the wind moved—
pushing grit across the shattered asphalt
like grains of time slipping between fingers.
The last command still echoed through every Hunter's earpiece:
Bring the girl back alive.
Kill the aberration.
And although the blue shimmer of Qin Mian's Anchor Field had faded,
its afterglow hung in the air—
a lingering pulse of warmth and pressure
that made the Hunters' breaths feel unsteady
and their hearts beat just a second off-rhythm.
The street was silent because everyone felt it:
The next decision
would redraw every line between them.
Kai was the first to move.
She stepped forward—
not aggressively,
but fully, decisively,
placing herself between the Hunters and the two figures on the ground.
Her boots crunched over broken concrete.
Qin Mian exhaled shakily.
"Kai…?"
Kai didn't look back.
Her voice dropped into the tone that commanded squads and silenced panic:
"Lower your weapons."
Her order did not shake.
Her hands did not tremble.
Her back stayed straight.
But her breath—
a silent exhale—
carried years of buried conflict.
The closest Hunter stiffened.
"Captain Kai…
You're directly obstructing a Priority 0 operation."
Kai didn't blink.
"You don't understand what you're pointing those weapons at."
Another Hunter—older, seasoned—
firmed his stance.
"We understand perfectly well, ma'am.
That thing in her arms destabilized a city block.
The girl stopped an ontological collapse with her bare hands.
They're not civilians.
They're—"
"You finish that sentence,"
Kai interrupted softly,
"and I'll knock your teeth out."
Tension snapped across the group like taut wires.
Qin Mian pressed Yin Lie closer to her chest,
feeling his faint breath against her shoulder.
Kai's eyes flicked to him for a heartbeat—
and something inside her tightened painfully.
She remembered.
The boy standing in rain outside headquarters
because he didn't want anyone seeing him cry.
The young agent who apologized
for passing his qualification test too quickly,
because he thought it made the others uncomfortable.
The teenager who asked her quietly one night:
"Do you think someone like me can be real?"
She swallowed.
She didn't know when she'd lost him.
Or if she ever truly had him in the first place.
But she knew one thing:
She could not kill him.
---
The Unit Reacts
A Hunter on the right raised his rifle a touch higher.
"Captain, please…
Don't force us to restrain you."
"You won't."
Kai's answer was immediate.
Calm.
Flat.
Final.
Because it wasn't a prediction.
It was a threat.
The Hunter's voice cracked slightly.
"You're asking us to betray the Directorate."
"No," Kai corrected sharply.
"I'm asking you to stop being mindless drones
and actually consider what you're about to do."
Another Hunter snapped:
"Our orders are clear!"
Kai's patience thinned visibly.
"And my orders were to keep this city intact.
Killing that boy will not keep anything intact.
It will tear reality open all over again."
She pointed at Yin Lie—
or rather, the space around him,
still faintly warping,
still humming with unstable power.
"Look at him.
He's not attacking.
He's struggling to stay in one dimension."
Qin Mian's eyes stung.
Because the truth of those words
hurt more than any threat.
Kai continued, voice lower:
"And she—"
She nodded toward Qin Mian.
"—just anchored an ontological anomaly
with her will alone.
If she panics?
If she loses him again?
If she gets hurt?"
Kai's fingers tightened around the hilt of her blade.
"You won't be able to run far enough
to escape what happens next."
Silence.
A deep, suffocating one.
---
Qin Mian Studies Kai
For the first time,
Qin Mian didn't see Kai as a hunter.
She saw a woman whose world was unraveling in her hands.
Someone who'd built her life on certainty,
obedience,
and cold precision—
and now was watching every rule collapse
in front of her.
Kai wasn't an enemy right now.
She was a human being
standing on the edge of a cliff
trying not to fall.
Qin Mian softened her grip on Yin Lie
just enough to speak.
"…Thank you, Kai."
The words were small.
Fragile.
But real.
Kai's jaw tightened for a moment—
as if those words hurt her somehow.
Then her shoulders eased one notch
and she nodded, barely.
"Don't thank me.
I'm not doing this for your comfort."
Qin Mian smiled faintly, tiredly.
"I know."
---
But the Hunters Weren't Swayed
Three younger soldiers stepped forward,
boots scraping across the ground
in perfect synchronicity.
Their visors glowed brighter—
the signs of combat mode activating.
"Captain Kai,"
the leader of the trio said,
"you are compromised."
Kai raised a brow, unimpressed.
"Because I'm thinking?"
"Because you're attached," the Hunter corrected.
That hit deeper than he realized.
Kai's eyes hardened.
"Don't assume you know me."
"You trained him,"
the Hunter continued.
"Your file shows six years of mentorship.
Your emotional bias makes you unfit to lead this operation."
Kai's expression turned cold.
"Bias keeps you human.
Shame you weren't issued any."
The Hunter didn't flinch.
"Our mission stands.
We take the girl.
We neutralize the boy.
If you resist—"
Qin Mian felt her heartbeat spike.
Kai moved.
Just one step.
One step forward
that felt like the entire street tilted toward her.
Her voice dropped into lethal quiet.
"If you touch that boy,
you will never touch anything again."
The threat was not shouted.
It was whispered.
Which made it worse.
The three Hunters tensed, weapons locking into position.
The rest of the squad wavered—
fear, doubt, and duty twisting in their expressions.
One of them finally asked, voice shaking:
"Kai… please…
don't make us fight you."
The wind howled through the broken street.
Kai answered without turning.
"You couldn't."
---
Inside Yin Lie's Mind
Though unconscious,
his body reacted.
A faint tremor ran through him.
His fingers curled weakly into Qin Mian's sleeve.
A breath escaped—raw, shaky.
"…don't…
hurt… Kai…"
Qin Mian froze.
Kai froze too.
Because he recognized her voice.
Even now.
Even here.
Qin Mian whispered to him:
"It's okay.
She's not hurting anyone.
She's helping us."
He breathed out:
"…good…"
And slipped deeper into unconsciousness.
The street went still again.
Kai exhaled—
a sound that wasn't relief
so much as heartbreak.
---
The Ultimatum Becomes Real
The Hunter leader tightened his grip on his rifle.
"Captain Kai.
Final warning.
Move aside."
Kai lifted her head.
Her posture straightened.
Her eyes sharpened.
And when she spoke—
It was the clearest decision she had ever made:
"No."
A single syllable
that broke every chain that had ever held her.
"We protect them," she said.
"We find another way.
We do not kill that boy."
Her hand slid to her blade.
"If the Director disagrees,"
she added softly,
"she can come down here and fight me herself."
The Hunters stared at her—
in disbelief,
in fear,
in something bordering on awe.
Qin Mian's arms tightened around Yin Lie.
Kai's shoulders squared.
The street braced.
And the world chose that moment
to stop pretending it wasn't breaking.
---
Chapter 112 End