Rose Boy
by M1zushiChildren are the most emotionally fragile creatures in the world.
When An Yu rationally declined Qiang’s request for expensive items, the boy’s rose-like sores curled and expanded across his face. The flowers in the sores trembled, and an eerie shade of sickly pink spread from his pupils to the whites of his eyes, as if he were so enraged that his brain might burst.
An Yu tried to recall any wisdom Lin Qiu might have shared about dealing with unruly children. Unfortunately, even someone as wise as Lin Qiu had always been at a loss when it came to kids.
While he hesitated, a notification chimed in his earpiece, and Jiang Xiao joined his private channel.
“I’ve noticed something strange,” Jiang Xiao reported. “I witnessed an aberrant child kill a human worker. I couldn’t stop it in time. The child bit through the worker’s neck, but as the worker died, their entire body shattered—like a mirror struck by a boulder. And there was even the sound of glass breaking.”
An Yu listened silently. Though his gaze was still fixed on Qiang’s face, it seemed as if he were lost in thought, ignoring the boy’s attempts at intimidation.
“When someone dies, they shatter like glass,” Jiang Xiao summarized. “Law has blocked our terminal feeds. Please relay this intel to him.”
An Yu replied absentmindedly, “Hmm… what?”
Jiang Xiao’s tone was as direct and ruthless as ever. “I assume you and Law are always together. When there’s no caretaker or Commander around, you’ll get anxious. That trick can only fool someone who’s never been to District 53.”
An Yu: “…”
“Although there are still many mysteries about that day, I was fortunate enough to witness your hunting abilities before.” Jiang Xiao said respectfully: “Rest assured, I won’t interfere with your actions.”
The call disconnected.
At that moment, Qiang grabbed the bandages on An Yu’s right wrist. “Did you hear me? You’re new here—so let’s avoid a possible trouble.”
Accompanying his vicious words, large, sinister flowers began blooming from his face. Their twisting stems coiled around An Yu’s right wrist, and sharp thorns broke out of the branches and pressed against the bandage.
Qiang assumed An Yu would be terrified, like any fragile human.
But instead, those golden eyes seemed to have just come back to their senses and briefly glanced at the thorns before returning to Qiang’s face.
An Yu stared at him and softly asked: “Do all bodies here explode when someone dies?”
Qiang froze for a moment, then sneered. “Want to find out?”
An Yu regarded him for a moment longer. “If I were the one killing, would the body shatter too?”
Qiang’s expression grew colder, his lips curling into a mocking smirk. “That depends—are you owned by it?”
An Yu’s gaze sharpened. “What do you mean? Who is ‘it’?”
He received no answer. Growing impatient, Qiang tightened his grip, and the thorns pressed harder into An Yu’s bandages. The sharp thorns tried to tear through, but the bandages were surprisingly resilient, holding firm against the force.
Qiang was stunned and his eyes narrowed with frustration. “How dare you say this is something from the slums?”
Seizing the moment when the thorns rebounded, An Yu yanked his arm back. “I’d advise you to stop interfering.”
He didn’t want to waste more energy on the small aberrant and turned to leave. As he did, a gust of wind carried icy grains of snow against his face, lifting the hem of his loose clothes. Suddenly, a sharp chill brushed his waist.
A familiar metallic “zing” echoed through the air.
His golden eyes narrowed as he turned his head around.
“Looks like you’ve been hiding something good!” Qiang exclaimed, eyes gleaming with excitement as he examined the short blade he had snatched. “It seems that you come from a wealthy family after all.”
Before he could inspect it further, An Yu lunged for the blade. But Qiang’s flower-like tendrils immediately coiled around An Yu’s wrists, pulling his arms apart and lifting him into the air, his body stretched out like a figure on a crucifix.
Qiang sneered at the helpless figure before him. “Everything about you reeks wealth. Let’s see which is stronger—your bandages or your blade.”
As he said that, he raised the knife and threw it decisively at An Yu’s throat!
The blade sliced through the snowy wind, An Yu’s golden eyes reflected the engraved word [Order], splitting the crimson hue that had begun to spread across his pupils.
The cold arc of the blade drew close and its tip was about to pierce his throat in an instant!
Suddenly, the howling wind seemed to freeze.
A gloved black hand suddenly appeared and intercepted the weapon mid-air.
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Qiang’s gaze passed over him, before looking at the black figure that appeared out of thin air in horror.
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With a sharp zing, the short blade was returned to its rightful place at An Yu’s waist.
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It had been years since Qiang had seen such unwavering human eyes.
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Even though the darkness in his pupils seemed bottomless, they were steady and resolute, untouched by the distortion.
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In the next instant, a person more than ten meters away suddenly flashed in front of him.
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Before the flicker of fear could fade, a blade sliced across his throat. Pale pink blood sprayed across the snow-covered ground at his feet.
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He stared at the corpse, then staggered a step back as if losing his balance.
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An Yu said nothing, and only his chest moved.
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It wasn’t exhaustion—but rage.
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He thought he had suppressed the impulse, especially since he still wanted to ask about the archive room. But Qin Zhilu had asked first, and the moment Qiang responded, that deep consciousness had suddenly broken free. Before he could even react, Qiang was already dead.
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He slowly took the blade from An Yu’s hand, wiping the blood from both sides onto his glove before removing them and tossing them aside.
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An Yu froze.
It wasn’t the first time Qin Zhilu had touched his head, but in previous cases, it was always through gloves. This time, the warmth of his palm seeped through An Yu’s hair.
Qin Zhilu’s tone remained steady. “You didn’t fail to control it—you failed to control yourself.”
An Yu raised his gaze in surprise.
Qin Zhilu continued, “You’re always trying to draw a line between yourself and your deep self, treating it as something to be used or fought against. Maybe it’s because your actions and temperament are sometimes unpredictable, and High Peak has always been suspicious.
“But I’ve always believed that understanding and mastering oneself is a gradual process. For most people, it happens naturally. But for you, part of your consciousness grew ahead of the rest, while another part stayed dormant for a long time. That’s why this process of integration feels disjointed.”
He paused, then added, “And that’s okay.”
The Commander’s voice was gentle, cutting through the wind and snow and etching itself into An Yu’s mind.
For a moment, An Yu’s thoughts felt empty, as if he were staring into the wind and those dark eyes mere inches away dazed him.
He had always thought of Qin Zhilu as someone who scrutinized him face-to-face, just like everyone else—only he stood closer to him.
But somewhere along the way, Qin Zhilu had turned around and stood by his side.
It happened so quietly that he had no way of remembering when it happened.
“Let’s find the archive room and get me a clean pair of gloves,” Qin Zhilu said, striding toward the direction Qiang had indicated.
An Yu silently followed him, and asked in a low voice. “Do you always need to wear gloves?”
“Mn.”
An Yu waited for an explanation, but none came. Hesitating for a moment, he chose not to press further.
Lin Qiu had taught him: if you’re curious about something, ask cautiously. But if the other person doesn’t answer, don’t push it.
They walked quietly side by side in the wind and snow, and An Yu whispered, “Let’s avoid the crowds. Sorry, I don’t have the strength to fold space for you right now.”
Qin Zhilu glanced at him. “You enjoy it, don’t you?”
“Huh?” An Yu was puzzled. “Enjoy what?”
“Using me as a summoner-style support,” Qin Zhilu said in a calm tone that carried a hint of mockery. “There is no such style among the Protectors and you’ve pioneered it—using your Commander as the test subject.”
An Yu panicked. “I didn’t mean it that way, I…”
He stopped mid-sentence because he saw a faint smile in those dark eyes.
There it was again. The Commander was teasing him.
Yet, inexplicably, he felt the same illusion as when they had just left District 53, right after Lin Qiu’s death—that the Commander was deliberately trying to comfort him.
An Yu sighed. “Think what you like.”
“…”
They chatted idly as they walked, and after ten minutes or so, An Yu finally felt calmer.
He repeated Jiang Xiao’s words from earlier, and Qin Zhilu only responded with an “Mm.”
“It seems what we witnessed wasn’t an isolated incident,” Qin Zhilu remarked.
“In the orphanage, when an aberrant kills someone, their death causes them to shatter like a broken mirror. But when we kill people, it’s just an ordinary death,” An Yu said softly. “Qiang mentioned that it’s because we haven’t been ‘possessed by it.’ But he didn’t say who—or what—‘it’ is.”
Qin Zhilu turned to look at him. “Who do you think it is?”
An Yu didn’t answer. He stayed silent until they reached the small house at the end of the path—the one that stored the orphanage’s entire archive. Finally, he said quietly, “I have a baseless hunch. It might sound absurd, but I think it’s…”
“Mirrors,” Qin Zhilu interjected.
An Yu froze for a moment. “Hmm…”
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