When Senior Changpu returned from under the bridge carrying the bag with her male clothes inside, Qiuluo had already obediently followed my “suggestion” and was hidden behind a utility pole a good ten meters away, maybe more.

What I told her was: “We’ll tell Changpu that you went on ahead. You can follow behind us quietly. Oh, and since the riverside road is pretty open, better keep your distance or you’ll get spotted.”

Of course, that was just a ploy—to buy us a solid head start for the escape.

“All right, time to run?” Senior took off according to plan.

At first, I felt kind of guilty about tricking Qiuluo, but once we started running, there was no time to dwell on that. More importantly, I seriously underestimated the upper limits of elite security personnel—and my own physical bottom line.

I had a proper sports bra on and everything, but even then, my chest still bounced with every step, gravity pulling down painfully, throwing off my balance. I lagged behind badly. Forget shaking off Qiuluo—I was barely keeping up with Xiao Lei and Changpu.

Note to self: I really need to work out.

“Hang in there, Commander!” Xiao Lei shouted back to me. “We’ll loop through the alleys on Mifeng Street!”

Qiuluo was still keeping her distance for now. When I glanced back, she even waved at me—like we were just playing some kind of game. Did she seriously not realize we were trying to ditch her?

Worse still, she looked totally unbothered, like she could swoop in and catch me at any time.

She was tailing us, not just blindly running. She had to plan her cover, watch for obstacles, everything. Did the school’s security team train like special forces just to live up to the top class title?

Fortunately, just like Xiao Lei said, once we entered Mifeng Street, we’d be on our turf. That place was a maze of one- and two-story self-built homes, no zoning, no order—just narrow alleyways zigzagging everywhere.

I used to play hide-and-seek around here with Haitang and the other village kids. It’d been a while, sure, but the layout was still etched in my memory.

If we dragged senior around a few turns in that maze, Qiuluo would lose track of us for sure. Once we were in the clear, she could text her saying she’d made it home safe. And boom—mission accomplished.

The sight of those familiar streets gave me a second wind.

“Commander! Left side, up ahead!” Xiao Lei tugged senior into one of the side alleys.

“On it!” I followed right behind.

Wait—wasn’t this the same alley where Lei Laohu’s gang tried to corner Zhao Zhao and me?

“Follow me!”

“Left!”

“Now right!”

Want me to give you a slow-mo play-by-play?

Zipping left and right after Xiao Lei, we quickly plunged deeper into the alley maze. Qiuluo was nowhere in sight. The narrow paths were dimly lit—she’d be lucky just not to trip, let alone keep up.

“We… can take a breather now, right?”

I spoke in a whisper—not because I thought Qiuluo was nearby, but because I was literally wheezing. I barely had the strength to talk.

“Just a bit longer!” Xiao Lei encouraged me. “If we head forward, we can exit from the other side and sneak back to the village!”

Clearly, she wasn’t counting on Qiuluo losing us so easily. She knew better than anyone what school security was capable of.

“Wait, hold on. If I remember right… isn’t the alley up ahead a dead end?”

Senior suddenly pulled free from Xiao Lei’s hand and looked hesitant.

“No way, I swear it goes—uh…”

Before Xiao Lei could finish, we hit a tall wall—way too high to climb. She stared in disbelief.

“This can’t be right… Why?!”

We looked around. Three sides walled in. No way out. Moonlight slanted across the bricks, casting an eerie white glow.

“So it really is a dead end. Phew.”

Oddly enough, being trapped gave me a moment to catch my breath. With some oxygen finally hitting my brain, I started thinking straight again.

“Guess the place changed while we were gone. Not too surprising.”

Senior was panting, too. She pulled out a bottle of water from her backpack, took a sip, then handed it to me.

“I did food deliveries here all summer,” she said. “I know the area pretty well. Behind that wall is the urban village you both live in. The wall is probably newly built for security reasons.”

She always looked kind of frail, but her stamina’s clearly better than mine. She still had enough sense of direction to correct us. I had no idea where we were going—I’d just been blindly following the others.

“Food deliveries, huh… Wait, your first time coming to my place was for pizza, right? You were completely wiped out.”

She’d been two hours late. Our lunch turned into dinner, and Haitang and the others went hungry.

“I have low blood sugar,” she said sheepishly. “Didn’t have time for lunch that day.”

“You did have lunch today, right?”

“Yeah, late lunch, but I had an omurice.”

Working part-time is rough.

I took a few sips from the bottle and passed it to Xiao Lei. She stared at the mouth of the bottle for a second before finishing the rest. In the moonlight, I could see her cheeks slightly flushed… Why is she blushing from drinking water?

Senior asked, “So, what now? Try another route?”

“Nope.” I shook my head. “If we turn back now, we’ll probably run straight into her.”

“Send your sister a message,” I told her. “Tell her you’re home. She’ll go back then. We’ll wait here a bit, and after that, I’ll take you to my place to switch back.”

Not the most comfortable hideout—mosquitoes were already biting me.

“Okay!” she nodded and pulled out her phone. It was dual SIM, so she had a private work number her family didn’t know about.

Maybe her screen was dirty, because she wiped it on her shirt—accidentally lifting her hem and flashing her flat little stomach.

“All done. Message sent.”

Right as she said that, we heard a faint ding above our heads.

…

“Who’s there?! Don’t tell me—!”

“I wanted to listen a bit longer, but oh well. That last part confused me, though.”

Qiuluo leapt down from the rooftop, phone in hand. The moonlight didn’t reach her—she was just a silhouette in the dark.

“So that’s it. We got lost in the alleyways, but from the rooftops, everything’s visible. She never lost sight of us… Tch. I got outplayed.”

“And it was your idea, wasn’t it, Little Lingmeng?”

Even in the shadows, she didn’t sound angry. In fact, she seemed almost smug.

“My idea? Oh—right, the ninja thing…”

“Explain something to me. Are you saying… Changpu here is actually my brother?”

“…Yeah.” No use denying it now.

“Honestly, I did suspect Jianlian was crossdressing to get this job. I even paid extra attention while helping her change… but everything checked out. That’s a real girl’s body. My brother’s definitely not that soft.”

She suspected it? How sharp is her intuition?!

Well, not everyone’s as oblivious as Zhao Zhao.

Caught red-handed, senior scratched her cheek, unable to meet her sister’s gaze. “Sorry, Sis… I wanted to keep it secret a little longer—”

Before she could finish, Qiuluo charged forward and swept her up into a bear hug, grinning like a kid and… sniffing her?

“That scent… it is Jianlian!”

She can tell by smell?!

“Wonderful! This means you don’t have to go to school with those monkeys anymore!”

Wow. She really hates men from the core of her being.

“Snap out of it, Sis! I still have to turn back!”