Chapter 147 — The Long-Awaited...

But since Yang Ce was determined to go through with it, Wang Yanqiu had no way out. She waited a while, then slowly raised the lipstick pistol and aimed it at Yang Ce.

After a long moment, Wang Yanqiu gave a faint sigh. She really could not bring herself to do it. If it had been yesterday, perhaps she truly would have fired the shot—but now the relationship between them was different. Wang Yanqiu was no cold-blooded creature; she could not possibly put Yang Ce in danger.

Wang Yanqiu was nervous, but Yang Jiyan was even more so, on guard at every moment against the bullet's arrival while also watching his own mind to see whether a warning from his ability would surface.

Unfortunately, just as before, there was nothing special at all—no danger signal flashed in Yang Juehuan's mind. Just as Yang Ce was about to give up in disappointment, he suddenly heard a gunshot. Yang Ce started, hastily gathered his focus, and used his ability to probe behind him—only to see a bullet graze past his leg and vanish into the vast night.

In the end Wang Yanqiu had not been able to bring herself to do it. Though she fired a shot, she pressed the muzzle very low, sending it skimming along the edge of Yang Juehuan's leg—and she had not aimed at Yang Ce to begin with, so the shot naturally went wide.

"Looks like your reaction speed isn't much to speak of." Wang Yanqiu was sweating too, though she forced her tone to sound casual.

Yang Jincong shook his head with a smile. A failure—the experiment had failed. The ability he had hoped for had not appeared, not even the slightest sign. Why on earth?

Yang Wenru furrowed his brow, unable to make sense of it. But for now he could only set it aside, because continuing to test this way would likely yield nothing. Both trials had failed, and Yang Shuoxuan no longer intended to keep testing.

It seemed that either the ability appeared only by chance, or his estimate had been wrong—the conditions that triggered the ability were not as simple as he had imagined.

"No more testing. Let's go back," Yang Ce said with a sigh.

"I really can't figure you out. I don't know what on earth you're trying to do." Wang Yanqiu put away the lipstick pistol. "Wasted a bullet—that's dozens of yuan, you know."

"You don't exactly look like someone short of money," Yang Jiyan shot back.

Wang Yanqiu smiled faintly. True, one bullet was nothing, but leaving evidence behind would not do. "Help me find the shell casing. This place is out of the way, but it's best to be careful."

Yang Yu nodded. Back in Macau, he had used this very lipstick gun to take out several people. Though the two places were thousands of miles apart, it was best that no clues linking them should surface, lest unnecessary trouble follow.

Yang Ce had already determined the bullet's direction; now he need only follow the path the bullet had traveled and search with his farsight ability—no difficult task at all. Barely had the thought crossed his mind when he had already found the shell casing.

"Go turn on the headlights—how am I supposed to find anything in this pitch-dark?" Wang Yanqiu looked left and right and said with some difficulty.

"Heh, how about we make a bet? If I find the shell casing within a minute, you agree to do one thing for me." Yang Ce thought for a moment, then said.

"Tell me what it is first." Wang Yanqiu was no fool. If Yang Ce told her to go jump off a cliff, she was not about to jump.

Yang Ce gave a sly grin, leaned close to Wang Yanqiu's ear, and whispered a few words.

The moment she heard them, Wang Yanqiu's face flushed red. She knitted her brows and scolded him in a coquettish voice, "Go to hell. Using your mouth—how filthy."

"A bet always costs something." Yang Jiyan said this with perfect solemnity, not a trace of lewdness anywhere on his face.

"Then what if you can't find it within a minute?" Wang Yanqiu thought it over. The odds of Yang Ce finding the shell casing in under a minute had to be next to nothing, so she threw the question back at him.

"If I can't find it, then I can't find it. Same deal—if I lose, I'll help you that way, and I won't think you're dirty." Yang Ce said this with an utterly straight face, not a blush, not a skipped heartbeat, as though they were chatting about the weather.

"Get lost!" Wang Yanqiu was furious. "Either way it's you getting the better of it!"

"Then you tell me what to do. Or name your terms—if I lose, I'll do as you say," Yang Yanzhou said.

"Fine. If you can't find the shell casing within a minute, then—mm—from now on you have to do everything I say." Wang Yanqiu said this with a crafty look. If Yang Ce agreed to that, it would be no single condition but hundreds, thousands of them. Anything I, Wang Yanqiu, put forward, you'd have to obey.

Compared with that other condition, Wang Yanqiu felt she was getting a tremendous bargain. After all, the odds of Yang Puqi finding the shell casing within a minute were almost zero—so why not take the gamble?

"Deal. It's settled." Yang Ce agreed without so much as a moment's thought.

Seeing how readily he agreed, Wang Yanqiu grew a little suspicious. This guy's chances of winning were practically nil—so why was he so pleased? Could there be some scheme in this? Had she been tricked? Was victory already in his grasp?

But no, that did not make sense either. She was the one who had fired the bullet. Yang Yongjin might know where it fell—but she herself had no idea, let alone Yang Ce. So what did he mean by this? Was he deliberately putting on an air of not caring?

Yang Juehuan's behavior today was simply too strange. Wang Yanqiu could not make sense of it. Ever since the reaction training earlier, he had been baffling, so by now she was no longer surprised.

"All right, I'll give you a little time to get ready. Whenever you're set, tell me, and I'll start the timer," Wang Yanqiu said.

"Let's start now, then," Yang Yanzhou said.

"Start now? Aren't you going to turn on the headlights and shine them over here?" Wang Yanqiu said in surprise. "I'm warning you now—don't come up with excuses when you lose."

Yang Xutang gave a bitter smile. "Do I look like that kind of person? You've said that line many times since yesterday. Let's start now."

"Since you put it that way, let's begin." Wang Yanqiu took out her phone, pulled up the stopwatch function, pressed the start button, and with it said the word "Go."

Yang Jiyan ambled unhurriedly toward a spot not far ahead, swaying as he went. Even Wang Yanqiu, watching him, began to grow anxious on his behalf. Was this fellow giving up because he knew he would lose?

If that were so, even winning would leave Wang Yanqiu feeling embarrassed—as though Yang Ce had deliberately thrown the match to her. If it really came to that, they could just forget the bet. Yang Ce seemed off his game today anyway; she could simply chalk it up to him acting strange.

Wang Yanqiu was just about to speak when she saw Yang Ce stop in his tracks at a spot in the distance and bend down, reaching out as though picking something up from the ground.

Wang Yanqiu's eyes went wide, fixed unblinkingly on Yang Ce. She watched him straighten up again and raise his hand, in which something metallic seemed to glint faintly in the moonlight.

"Found it!" Yang Minlan waved at Wang Yanqiu and said excitedly, "Not even a minute, right?"

He really found it? Wang Yanqiu felt her brain short-circuit for an instant. How could it be so fast? She glanced at the phone in her hand—only thirty-odd seconds had passed. It truly had not been a minute.

"How did you find it? You're not just picking up some random shell casing to fool me, are you?" Because Yang Ce had found it so quickly, Wang Yanqiu could not help suspecting he had cheated. "Let me tell you right now—the bullet this time is not the same as the one in Macau. I know the batch number on it, so don't try to fob me off with an old casing."