If their positions were swapped, Zhang Chenze knew she would absolutely never sever her own hand for the other person's life. But Officer Li really did it. His initial idea was very simple.
As long as he dislocated his own hand, it would be very easy to slip out of the handcuffs. But he made a mistake. Qi Xia remembered that when Officer Li saved Han Yimo from the harpoons, the situation was just as incredibly urgent, yet he had not made a mistake then.
Perhaps this time he was truly a bit panicked. While striking his hand, he accidentally hit the handcuffs with the wooden stick. And the mechanism of the handcuffs worked like this: if force was applied from the outside, the handcuffs would only tighten further.
He knew that even if he shattered all the bones in his hand, it would be impossible to pull it out. Seeing that the water in the fish tank had already passed Lawyer Zhang's neck, Officer Li made a prompt decision. He abandoned the plan to smash his hand and instead turned toward his own forearm.
This time, his force was even greater than before, so great that he nearly fainted several times. Lawyer Zhang could only tilt her head back, constantly seeking air above the water's surface. Just as her consciousness was about to blur, that man arrived.
He immediately turned off the water valve and used the wooden stick to smash the fish tank. Then, using his only remaining left hand, he untied the iron wires on Lawyer Zhang's body. In just that short span of one or two minutes, the severed stump of Officer Li's right hand was already bleeding madly.
Zhang Chenze hurriedly snapped off a piece of iron wire and tied it tightly around his arm. With this, the two of them finally managed to escape from that hellish place. Lawyer Zhang looked at Officer Li's corpse with sorrow and spoke, "Just as he said... he is a policeman, so he couldn't just stand by and watch someone die."
"No..."
Qi Xia slowly shook his head.
"He might just be making up for a mistake he made in the past."
"A mistake he made?"
The crowd looked at Qi Xia in confusion.
"What do you mean?"
Qi Xia originally wanted to say something, but he swallowed his words back down. Officer Li probably wouldn't want too many people to know about the things he had just narrated. Since he was already dead, it was better to let this secret be buried with him.
Lin Qin took off her outer coat and draped it over Lawyer Zhang.
"Lawyer Zhang, you are completely soaked. Be careful not to catch a cold."
Off to the side, Old Lu felt like a spare part. After standing at a loss for quite a while, he finally brought over that aluminum pot and said to Lawyer Zhang, "Sigh, little girl, my condolences. Do you want to eat something?"
Lawyer Zhang paused slightly and asked, "Who is this?"
"I am Lu... just call me Old Lu."
Old Lu smiled foolishly.
"People are like iron and food is like steel, you'll be starving if you skip a meal."
"He's someone we met while participating in a game," Lin Qin explained.
"Lawyer Zhang, you must be hungry, right? Qi Xia specifically brought this pot of meat to find you."
"Meat..."
Lawyer Zhang was indeed a bit hungry. Counting from when she first arrived here, she hadn't eaten anything for a full two days. She hurriedly took the pot, grabbed the cold, gamey, fatty meat inside, and began to eat it in large bites.
Looking at her completely drenched, with her hair in a mess, gobbling down the food, no one would have imagined that she used to be an arrogant lawyer. After swallowing a few pieces of meat, Lawyer Zhang spoke with her mouth full, "Qi Xia, thank you..." Qi Xia did not speak.
After all, this pot of meat was meant for Officer Li. Now that Officer Li was dead, giving it to Lawyer Zhang wasn't inappropriate either. At the very least, she seemed a bit more reliable than Xiao Ran and Doctor Zhao.
"Qi Xia, I originally had my doubts about you," Lawyer Zhang continued.
"But not only did you bring us food, you even brought smokes for Officer Li. You are truly very thoughtful."
She reached out and pointed at the cigarette dangling from Officer Li's mouth, and said, "It took him a long time to find two moldy cigarettes..." Hearing this, Qi Xia pondered for a moment, walked forward, and took the cigarette from Officer Li's mouth. Qi Xia had never seen this brand of cigarettes before.
On the filter, there were four words written, "Cordyceps Sinensis." Putting it to his nose to smell, it had a rich milky scent mixed with the aroma of Chinese herbal medicine.
"That's right, this is the cigarette I brought."
Qi Xia said with a complex expression.
"It's just a pity that Officer Li died before he had a chance to smoke it."
Lin Qin felt a bit puzzled. She had been practically inseparable from Qi Xia, yet she didn't remember him ever finding cigarettes. Qi Xia then picked up the metal lighter from Officer Li's hand.
"I also brought this lighter to give to Officer Li. Now it seems I can only use it myself."
Naturally, no one objected, though Lin Qin was somewhat confused. Qi Xia walked to the side, picking up the lighter and the cigarette, examining them continuously. He kept feeling that there was an unspeakable weirdness about this matter.
Could it be that all of this was related to that bell chime? Thinking of this, he picked up the old cigarette box from the ground and carefully inspected it, but did not find any hidden mechanisms.
"What's wrong?"
Lin Qin walked over and asked softly.
"Is something not right?"
Qi Xia frowned, completely unable to answer. How was he supposed to tell Lin Qin? That Officer Li pulled a cigarette out of a cigarette box?
Or that Officer Li pulled a lighter out of his own pocket? These unremarkable events wouldn't sound strange at all if spoken out loud, yet they somehow left Qi Xia completely baffled.
"Perhaps I just saw it wrong."
Qi Xia put both the cigarette and the lighter into the cigarette box and turned back to say, "How is Lawyer Zhang?"
"Her mood has stabilized. What should we do now?"
Qi Xia nodded and said, "Our goal has only ever been one thing, hasn't it?" After saying that, he slowly walked towards Lawyer Zhang and said, "Lawyer Zhang, I'll be blunt... Could I borrow a Dao from you?"
"Borrow... a Dao?"
Lawyer Zhang raised her eyebrows, a bit puzzled.
"That's right."
Qi Xia nodded.
"To tell you the truth, our Daos were burned by someone, and now we don't have a single one left."
Upon hearing this, Lawyer Zhang slowly lowered her head, seemingly pondering something.
"Qi Xia... I can give all my Daos to you."
Lawyer Zhang lifted her head and said with a serious face.
"Let's form a team."
Qi Xia pursed his lips and said, "It's not that I don't want to team up with you... it's just that staying by my side seems to be dangerous..." He briefly and concisely told Zhang Chenze about what happened to Qiao Jiajin and Tian Tian, and then said, "I am being targeted right now.
They will kill the people around me to stop me."
"Qiao Jiajin and Tian Tian died, were you affected?"
Lawyer Zhang asked.
"This..."
"You won't be affected at all," Lawyer Zhang said.
"Which means that killing the people around you to threaten you is a tactic that won't work."
"Theoretically, yes."
"Then I will be safe."
Lawyer Zhang slowly stood up.
"Let's make an agreement. I will give all my Daos to you, and I will also help you in the time to come. But in exchange, you must help me escape."