You're Strong But Now You're Mine
Chapter 34 Card Playing and Sewer Combat Technique

Chapter 34: Chapter 34 Card Playing and Sewer Combat Technique

The ability "Substitute by Death," Leyu had only triggered it once so far.

After all, the activation conditions of this skill were insanely strict. "There’s nothing scarier than being on the edge of life and death." The first time, Leyu had successfully crossed over from his original body into Qian Yuliu’s, but what about next time? "Will the skill fail to activate? Will there be other hidden requirements? Are there any side effects? Is there a limit to the number of uses?"

Because the activation condition was death, Leyu didn’t dare to test it at will. "A normal human’s basic instinct is to survive—who would deliberately seek death? This skill itself goes against every human impulse."

And "Substitute by Death" stated clearly that Leyu could only cross into the body of his killer. Without any other examples, Leyu had no choice but to trust the skill description.

Which meant, with no killer, or in cases like suicide, illness, or dying of old age, Leyu would truly be dead for good.

In that final clash with Lin Xue, sure, Leyu could have snapped Lin Xue’s neck, but Lin Xue’s blade sheath light could’ve pierced straight through Leyu’s own body at the same time.

If Leyu killed Lin Xue first, and then Lin Xue’s sheath light delivered a fatal, blood-loss wound to Leyu, would Leyu’s "Substitute by Death" still fire? "He’d be jumping into a corpse with a shattered neck—it’s still just death all over again!"

Although "Substitute by Death" claimed it’d work for not just direct but also indirect killers, Leyu wasn’t at all sure what exactly counted as "indirect."

For example, the real mastermind behind the vendetta was actually Yin Yinyin—if Leyu died during the vendetta, would that count against Yin Yinyin? And Yin Yinyin placed the vendetta request because the Lin family had a mole, Lin Xue’en—so would it shift to Lin Xue’en if he was the catalyst? And then, Lin Xue’en only became a mole for some underlying reason, and surely that was because...

"If you keep chasing it down like this, the indirect circle is infinite. Instead of trusting his soul to trace this endless chain for another takeover, Leyu figured it was safer to guarantee he could cross into the last killer’s body."

So even if Lin Xue really did kill him with the blade sheath light, Leyu would never have gone for Lin Xue’s life.

"Are you kidding? This body’s about to be mine, why on earth would I break it?"

He just didn’t expect Lin Xue to have a sudden conscience attack, and Leyu’s "possess a beautiful girl" plan naturally fell through. "He was still just a bit bummed about it...just a tiny bit."

Of course, there was no way he could tell Lin Xue any of that.

Actually, Leyu didn’t even have to answer Lin Xue at all.

"You just said you had a question for me, but this is your second question." Leyu smiled, signaling for the female Medical Officer to wheel him away.

This time Lin Xue didn’t try to stop him. After watching Leyu’s wheelchair disappear around a corner, she finally turned and left.

...

...

"Take care of yourself, Captain Qian."

"Captain Qian, I brought you some fruit."

"Captain Qian..."

After four p.m., the members of Team One from the Statistical Department all showed up at the Medical Bureau to visit Leyu. Leyu, lying in bed, pondering his Battle Card decks, raised an eyebrow. "You guys get off work early today?"

"The Director gave special permission for us to leave work early so we could visit you, Captain!" Ailili’s eyes sparkled with little stars. "It’s just the best!"

"Is that ’the best’ because you get off early, or because of Lan Yan...?" Leyu glanced at Chen Fu, who only shrugged. "Our whole job today is basically to smooth out the aftermath of your vendetta. Anyway, here’s my little get-well gift. Hurry up and drink it."

Chen Fu placed a wooden bottle on the bedside table. Leyu picked it up and felt how deliciously cold it was; condensation misted the outside. He uncorked it, took a sip, then licked his lips. "Oh, chilled honey Five-Flower Tea."

Zhou Guangshi looked surprised. "Captain, you like sweet tea?"

Leyu grinned. "I like a lot of things—you just don’t know about them yet."

"True enough. If it wasn’t for the department’s internal Battle Card tournament this week, who knew the Captain was secretly an ace with the Wolf Eagle deck?" Zhu Junjie joked.

"These past few days, Leyu had just let himself go, no longer weighed down by the restrictions of Qian Yuliu’s old identity. Other people felt like Qian Yuliu suddenly became a different person, but no one thought it was that weird—after all, he’d just killed his mentor. A twisted personality change seemed almost reasonable."

"And seriously, who could imagine body-swapping, soul transfer, or reincarnation stuff? At most, everyone just quietly mocked Captain Qian for looking all icy on the outside and actually being soft and fragile inside. Kill your own teacher, and you get a total personality flip."

"Some of the female agents at the Statistical Department, who low-key had a thing for Qian Yuliu’s hot face, instantly gave up on their crush after hearing about his change—figuring he probably had sicko tendencies. But some actually got more proactive, because they thought ’sicko’ was cute."

"Leyu realized, back when he first crossed over, he’d been overthinking it. As long as he acknowledged Qian Yuliu’s identity and clocked in like a normal person and sent money home, no one really cared—if anything, people would just invent their own explanations for why he’d changed."

After chatting for a while, the team left—except Chen Fu, who stayed behind to play Battle Cards with Leyu.

Chen Fu was no slouch at cards, and his deck, like his Combat Technique, was the Lingxu Battle Technique.

What was Lingxu? "Walking on snow without leaving a trace, riding the wind as if weightless—that’s Lingxu."

The Lingxu Battle Technique was one of the rare footwork-centric arts—flight, evasion, rapid movement, all top notch, and the kicks were especially powerful. "If you said the standard Combat Technique’s kicks were like ’constant, flowing force,’ then Lingxu’s kicks were just ’shaking the heavens.’"

But previously, the Lingxu Battle Technique used to be total trash—Martial Artists would, at best, supplement their training with a little Lingxu footwork, but they rarely majored in Lingxu. "Only after Firearms became mainstream did the Lingxu Battle Technique suddenly get popular."

"Back then, Martial Artists practicing Lingxu could at best hold short daggers for support—their killing power was low, more suited for Scouts or Assassins. But now, Martial Artists could dual-wield firearms; close-range rapid-fire was still accurate, and armorless enemies would be devastated. Lingxu’s old weakness had basically vanished."

"Times change. Thirty years East of the river, thirty years to the West. Some Combat Techniques fall out of style while others rise up."

The Lingxu deck got buffed too, thanks to those changes. "The Royal Academy now assumed anyone using the Lingxu Battle Technique also used firearms, so the Lingxu deck had the skill, ’after a successful counterattack, play a direct attack card for extra damage.’ On top of that, its Critical Strike cards were monsters (unmatched for kicks)—so overall, the Lingxu deck became one of the strongest options now."

Chen Fu opened with a face-down card. "The whole Lingxu deck’s power was all about countering in the dark and striking back. You go direct, and the opponent punishes you with a counter plus follow-up in your face; you try to pull a Critical Strike, and they hit you even harder."

But Leyu used a Wolf Eagle deck. If his direct attack card was countered, his next direct attack card would deal bonus damage. "So in round one, he’d always start with a direct attack—it was always worth it!"

Back and forth they went for a few rounds, until Chen Fu suddenly said, "Caliber 5.66, one of three standard issue Firearms rounds. Judging by where you were standing, the shot came from a building at least 150 meters away, but nobody nearby heard a gunshot. Not surprising, I guess—it’s a noisy place, so maybe no one noticed. Or maybe..."

"They had a noise disruptor, scrambling the gunfire," Leyu said, covering another face-down card. "Any flash marks on the bullets?"

Chen Fu played a direct card—’Lingxu Flying Kick’—and said, "Nope. If we rule out intentional concealment, then the shooter probably isn’t a Martial Artist trained in the Feihua Combat Technique."

"Anyone who can make accurate shots from 150 meters out, using a 5.66 caliber firearm..."

Leyu revealed a face-down card—"Wolf’s Gaze, Eagle’s Watch," a counter—knocking 3 HP off Chen Fu.

Chen Fu raised a brow. He was down to his last hit point, while Leyu still had four. He just slammed his last face-down, giving up on the duel, and got serious: "Only three kinds of official Firearms can hit from that far, and all three—you have to pass identity verification to use them!"

Not all Firearms required identity verification. "Actually, aside from the fancy Luminous Stone-certified ones from the Imperial Court, homemade civilian Firearms could be used by just anyone. Gunpowder was tricky to get, but not impossible; making your own Firearm wasn’t rare. All big families and rural towns kept homebrew guns for defense."

"The Imperial Court couldn’t stop civilian Firearms, but they could control their own. Not only did official Firearms need Luminous Stone identity certification each use, but the rifling and bullet sizes were so weird, civilian guns couldn’t use official ammo and vice versa."

"Plus, homemade civilian ones only got you so far—the only guns that could shoot past 100 meters accurately were Imperial Court factory models."

"Even in these chaotic times, with Governors running their own fiefdoms, nobody ever canceled the factory Firearms’ ID systems—no way, they needed those weapons to control their guys. Letting super-guns loose for anyone to use? No way."

All the stuff Chen Fu just said was leading to one point, anyway,

The person who shot Leyu didn’t use some mysterious off-brand Firearm, but an official agent’s standard-issue weapon!

"There are only three kinds of people in Star Engraving County with the right to verify themselves for official Firearms beyond 150 meters."

Leyu said while showing his hand to Chen Fu—both direct attack cards. Chen Fu stared at his own just-spent pair of counter cards and punched his thigh in regret.

Leyu stuck up a finger: "First, the Linjiang Army’s sniper operatives. But all those snipers train in the Feihua Combat Technique—if they were after me, I’d have been torn in half by now."

The Feihua Combat Technique was an art for throwing concealed weapons, letting you "load explosive light" into objects and detonate them on target. "Feihua, like Lingxu, used to suck—after Firearms appeared, it became elite. Every army’s sniper team trains Feihua; the real legends, they say, can shoot bullets like missiles."

"Second, the Imprisonment Department’s mobile agents," Leyu said, raising two fingers. "But since the Statistical Department formed, the Imprisonment Department’s mobile squad was merged here—no idea if they built a new team again."

"And the third possibility is..."

"Our own special operatives in the Statistical Department."

The answer suddenly came from the doorway. Leyu and Chen Fu turned to look, and saw a sharp-looking man in a blue-violet uniform smiling at them. He pushed his silver-rim glasses up his nose and spoke gently,

"Good evening, Captain Qian, Deputy Captain Chen."

It was Lan Yan!