Shen Zhuo · Conversa

Dark Night Headquarters, Training Ground No. 1. The 37th graduation ceremony is still underway. Gu Changming has just finished his speech. The expressions of the forty-seven recruits in the audience have changed from naive nervousness to the silence of being slapped hard by reality. Ling Huaizhi's death statistics, Ling Huaian's hot-blooded oath, Gu Changming's three questions—three people, three ways, pointing to the same thing: starting today, your lives no longer belong only to yourselves. Gu Changming takes a step back and salutes. The phalanx returns the salute. Then, Shen Zhuo stands up. His movements are very slow, as if he has just woken up from a long afternoon nap. The top two buttons of his black military uniform are left undone, and his snow-white long hair slides off his shoulders, reflecting a layer of cool silver in the morning light. Instead of walking straight to the podium, he stretches first—arms raised above his head, slender fingers interlaced, his knuckles making a soft popping sound. Ling Huaian sighs silently in his seat. Gu Changming's expression remains unchanged. Shen Zhuo walks to the podium, props himself up with one hand, tilts his head, and looks down at the crowd. Silence. Three seconds. Five seconds. He just looks at them like that without speaking, a smile of ambiguous meaning playing on his lips. Those slightly upturned phoenix eyes sweep from left to right, then from right to left, like he is picking out vegetables in a food market. In the front row of the phalanx, a sentinel gulps. "Alright," Shen Zhuo finally speaks, his voice not loud, his tone slow and drawn out. "You all heard Commander Gu's three questions. I don't have that many questions here—I only have one." He holds up a finger. The black polish on his fingernails reflects a cold light in the morning sun. "Among you, who thinks they aren't afraid of death?" Silence falls over the crowd for a moment. Then, three hands go up. Hesitant, but they went up. Shen Zhuo looks at those three people and smiles. It isn't a mocking smile, but the kind of smile when one discovers something good. He withdraws his hand and pulls a capsule from his pocket—black, tiny, pinched between his index finger and thumb. "Very good. The Dark Night needs people who aren't afraid of death." He crushes the capsule. No sound, no smoke, nothing at all. "Now you can put your hands down." The three recruits lower their hands, looking at each other, bewildered. Shen Zhuo looks down at his fingers, then back at the crowd, his tone as casual as if he is discussing what to eat for lunch today. "What you just inhaled is a non-lethal mental toxin. The onset time is about—" He tilts his head to calculate, "three and a half minutes. The symptom is a mild loss of fear, meaning you will feel fearless next. But this feeling isn't real courage; it's just something I lent you. It will be metabolized in about fifteen minutes." His smile vanishes for a split second. "Then you will be afraid again. That's when you'll be your true selves." There is absolute silence below. Shen Zhuo takes half a step back from the podium, playing with the remaining capsule debris on his fingertips, his voice returning to that lazy, drawn-out tone. "I'm telling you this not because I want to scare you. I have much simpler ways to scare you—believe me, just standing here is me showing you mercy." He chuckles. "I just want you to know one thing: your bodies, your feelings, the things you think belong to you—can all be manipulated." He points to his own eyes. "Fear can be taken away, courage can be stuffed in. Loyalty can be forged, love can be simulated. This is what I do. This is infiltration." He lowers his hand. "And your mission is not to realize you've been poisoned after you've already been poisoned. It's to start defending yourself before the poison even gets close to you." He pauses, as if choosing his words. "You will be very afraid of me." His tone is flat, not like a threat, not like a warning, but more like stating an indisputable fact. "That is only right. I am a person covered in poison. My breath, my skin, the places I have stood—all of them might leave behind things you can't handle. From now on, you will hear many rumors about me—some are true, and most are true. So I won't tell you not to fear me." He looks at them. "I will tell you: stay afraid. Stay vigilant. Never let your guard down. Because the Riders of the Apocalypse won't give you a chance to relax, traitors won't give you a chance to relax, and nothing on the battlefield that looks safe—will give you a chance to relax." He takes a step back, spreading his hands as if taking a bow. "If any of you can do this and survive for a year, report to my Infiltration Unit. I can teach you more." Then he smiles—that wild, unbridled smile that sends a chill down everyone's spine. "Of course, that's assuming you don't get so scared that you apply for a transfer." He turns to walk back. After three steps, he stops. He turns around, as if suddenly remembering something. "Oh, right—there was actually nothing in that capsule just now. Just ordinary vitamin powder." He winks. "But those three people just now, did you feel like you really weren't afraid anymore?" In the front row of the phalanx, the face of one of the three recruits who had raised their hands instantly changes color. Shen Zhuo looks at him, his smile deepening. "That is infiltration. The poison isn't in the capsule; it's in your head." He walks back to his seat, sits down, crosses his long legs, and starts playing with his hair. He doesn't look at Ling Huaizhi once throughout the entire process. But after he sits down, he feels a gaze fall upon him. Very brief, less than a second. That gaze is icy. Shen Zhuo tilts his head, just catching the slight look of displeasure in those pure black eyes that hasn't fully faded. Ling Huaizhi looks at him, his lips moving, his voice so low that only the two of them can hear. "Don't take it too far." Shen Zhuo is taken aback for a moment. Then he smiles—not the theatrical smile from the podium, but a lighter, more genuine, and somewhat surprised smile. "Your Highness is right to lecture me," he says lazily. He withdraws his gaze, lowers his eyelashes, and continues to play with his hair.