Chapter 28: The Interrogation

Zhou Yi ignored the fat man.

Seeing that Zhou Yi neither explained nor spoke further, the fat man hurriedly picked up his electric baton and squatted atop a crate, looming over the woman in red.

Zhou Yi walked over with a bottle of mineral water. Though pity for beauty had a place in his heart, those fragmented memories made him uneasy; the dangerous aura left him breathless.

He poured the bottle of water over the woman’s face, watching her closely. After a moment, her eyelids trembled, and Zhou Yi immediately became alert.

Soon, the woman in red opened her eyes, glancing around as though recollecting everything that had happened. Her gaze settled on Zhou Yi, eyes narrowing with an appraising look, though her voice was soft.

"What are you doing? Is this a kidnapping?"

Zhou Yi leaned in, gripping the tape and ropes binding her.

"Who are you? Don’t try to fool me—I want the truth. What is that laboratory?"

The woman shrank back as if frightened, but she couldn’t move.

"I’m just a regular elementary school English teacher. My name is Sophia."

The fat man waved dismissively.

"Say something in the local dialect!"

Sophia hesitated.

"Though I’m from here, I can’t speak the dialect. My family always spoke standard Mandarin."

The fat man rolled his eyes and shot back, "Enough with that nonsense. I’ll say something, and you tell me what it means. That’s fair, right?

‘En Gui Gui, this thing’s just come here for no reason! I could smack you dead right now!’"

After he finished, Zhou Yi looked at Sophia. There was no need to ask further—she clearly had no idea what it meant.

Those sentences were jokes, very representative of the local dialect. If she didn’t know them, how could she claim to be a local?

"I said before, I want the truth. How do you expect me to handle this? We’ve already killed someone today, another one wouldn’t matter."

Sophia bit her lip, squinting as if testing the waters.

"Are you Zhou Yi? I think I’ve seen you before!"

Zhou Yi smiled, gestured to the fat man, and a blade from a wallpaper knife appeared in his hand.

"Don’t test my limits. I am Zhou Yi, and I’ll be frank: I’ve remembered many things that shouldn’t belong to me now. Otherwise, how would I know that after Wang Shengyu’s death, I’d meet you?

So don’t try to hide anything. My patience is running thin. I don’t know what I’ll do—maybe I can’t kill you, but I can make you suffer. There’s no signal here, no way to contact the outside world, so calling for help is useless. Try it if you don’t believe me!"

With that, Zhou Yi made a beckoning gesture toward Sophia.

This woman would never tell the truth unless pressed. The fat man, wary, flicked on the electric baton, and the crackling sound reverberated sharply in the bunker.

The silent threat seemed effective. The confusion in Sophia’s eyes faded, replaced by a scrutinizing look at Zhou Yi.

"Do you remember my lipstick?"

Zhou Yi frowned.

Many fragmented images in his mind began to merge and clarify—some even connecting together. The carved golden lipstick seemed to appear before his eyes.

"The golden carved lipstick—I remember that. I want to know, have we met before? I don’t mean at the hospital morgue, nor when you took another version of me away, but in another time or another life. In America, in 2020, after my prison break—was it you I saw then?"

Sophia’s face was filled with surprise; Zhou Yi’s words were beyond her comprehension.

"You remember the prison break? How is that possible..."

Zhou Yi stared at Sophia’s eyes. Her expression was genuine, as if it were impossible for him to recall those things, though he didn’t know why.

"I remember the prison break, being framed, Ah Zhu’s disappearance, Jennifer Miller and Gore Roger, and your makeup techniques. And after you saved me, I still recall your attack on me."

He spoke slowly, but with each sentence drew closer to Sophia, until only a fist’s distance separated their noses. At such proximity, Zhou Yi seemed to want to see something deep within her eyes.

While tension crackled between them, the fat man had started rummaging through the items on the crate—belongings taken from Sophia for safety.

After searching, a golden carved lipstick appeared. The fat man picked it up and twisted it open. Sophia tried to stop him but it was too late.

There was no lipstick inside. Instead, a peculiar symbol was revealed. He examined it up and down, thinking it looked more like a USB device, but the port didn’t match.

Unable to figure it out, the fat man twisted the remaining part.

Suddenly, the object glowed like a magic wand. Zhou Yi’s chest seemed to smolder and tear open, his shirt flashing. The fat man jumped in surprise and rushed to smother it, but the flame-like glow vanished instantly.

Seeing Zhou Yi crouch, his face contorted in pain, the fat man grew anxious—not knowing what he’d just touched, but it seemed to affect only Zhou Yi.

"Zhou Yi, are you alright?"

Heat, burning, searing pain—all sensations gathered in Zhou Yi’s chest.

He threw his head back with a cry, then stood upright. A six-pointed star appeared on his chest, its radiance so intense that neither the fat man nor Sophia could keep their eyes open.

After a moment, the light dimmed. Now Sophia was shocked, her gaze changed as she looked at Zhou Yi.

No longer in pain, Zhou Yi shoved the fat man aside, grabbed the lipstick in his palm, and strode over to Sophia, his demeanor transformed.

"Now, tell me about Base Seventy-Two. I’m interested—don’t hide anything. I know more than you imagine."

Sophia’s gaze dropped to Zhou Yi’s chest—the six-pointed star mark.

At its center was an eye. Previously, in the base, it had only been an outline; now, the eye’s center had turned black.

Sophia’s face was filled with shock—and a trace of fear.

"Impossible. How can you know about Base Seventy-Two? You’ve been there, but only in an unconscious state, and your memories were rewritten. As for this world mission, it was an accident—your true self was transferred here. I thought..."

Zhou Yi raised his hand to stop her, staring into her eyes with a flash of fierceness. In that instant, Sophia saw the intent to kill and hurriedly fell silent.

"It doesn’t matter if you tell me. Do you know dolphins? They seem to swim endlessly without rest, but in reality, each hemisphere of their brain takes turns resting for about fifteen minutes. I am that kind of person.

So when you wiped my memory, you only cleared one side of my brain. The rest was just intervals of fifteen minutes of blankness. If you give me enough fragments, I can piece them together.

I only realized this after awakening in the Yangtze River—because I hadn’t slept once, yet felt no fatigue. Those fragments surfaced every so often, and recalling my medical knowledge, I finally understood what’s happening to me.

So don’t try to hide anything. I remember the silver-haired man in a wheelchair—Valdene. I succeeded in that mission and gained energy, which he stole from me.

With that energy, he upgraded himself; his reward was those muscle-like mechanical legs, probably 3D printed. And I am what you called Slave Twenty-Eight. Now tell me something I don’t know.

I’m not good at threats, but I’m certain this place is completely isolated from your Base Seventy-Two. Causing you pain, making you unable to live or die—that’s what I do best!"