Chapter 833 - 5: Shelter (Part 2)

The crisscrossed wooden frames made it harder for people outside to see into the room, while he could monitor what was happening outside through the narrow gaps.

...

By the time he finished tidying up his "residence" of the past few days, daylight was already blazing.

Aware that his current getup was far too conspicuous, Chen Zhou didn't dare go out in broad daylight; he could only stay hidden in the room, watching the outside world and waiting for night to fall.

The view from the second floor was wide open. From the window he saw that pickup truck with the metal drums drive away, saw other vehicles enter the small town, and also saw a police car.

None of the people coming and going along Route 66 noticed the subtle changes to the abandoned house, nor did they have any idea that someone was secretly watching them.

...

At noon, perhaps because the energy he'd replenished last night was nearly spent, that chill surged up from all parts of his body again.

But there were still several hours until dark, and Chen Zhou didn't want to take risks; he could only lie on the wooden bed for a while, hoping to ease the discomfort by cutting down on movement.

Roughly another three hours passed. When Prescott was bathed in the golden glow of the setting sun, Chen Zhou heard the roar of a car engine.

The sound started outside town, rapidly closing in on the small town, catching his attention.

When Chen Zhou got up and lay against the windowsill to look outside, he unexpectedly saw an "old acquaintance."

The Chevrolet from last night sped down the highway and quickly darted into the small town.

"It's been almost a full day and night—why is he only coming back now? Could it be that driver never called the police?"

As the hidden observer riding the pickup, Chen Zhou knew the driver had brought the little girl into town; once the truck stopped, in order not to be discovered, he'd slipped off the vehicle before the driver started unloading.

He had no idea where the little girl had gone afterward, nor whether her father, who'd been in the car accident, had been rescued.

He felt a bit puzzled, guessing that this urgent drive was most likely because the driver had discovered his daughter missing and wanted to hurry into town to search for her.

He had a vague premonition, suspecting the driver's daughter had probably run into trouble—maybe taken by the pickup driver, or perhaps something else had happened to her.

But Chen Zhou didn't want to stir up any new trouble.

Right now he was like a clay idol crossing a river, barely able to save himself; he didn't even know where tonight's food and drink were coming from, so how could he be in the mood to help someone else look for their daughter?

Yet when he thought about the money tucked against his chest and the snacks of that little girl he'd eaten last night, Chen Zhou ultimately couldn't bear to sit by and watch a tragedy unfold.

"After dark I'll head into town. If I see that car or run into that man, I'll just give him a reminder."

With that thought, Chen Zhou snapped off a thin wooden board and used his Military Saber to carve a line of letters on it, marking the approximate time the pickup truck driver had arrived in town.

Below the letters, he also carved out, from memory, several streets and the precise location of the house where the pickup had stopped to unload.

These clues were important enough, and his warning was clear enough.

As long as the little girl's father was familiar enough with the town, once he found the house where the pickup had unloaded, he should quickly be able to find out who the pickup driver was, and from there track down his daughter.

Either way, it counted as "repaying a kindness." Without exposing himself, Chen Zhou felt this was already the limit of what he could do.

He slipped the wooden board into the pocket of his overcoat. Seeing the last light before sunset grow dimmer and worried that the shops in town might close too early, Chen Zhou began preparing to go out.

...

This trip, he planned to buy some food and newspapers, and if possible, casually inquire about Ambrose.

As for the underworld, he wasn't planning to have anything to do with it for now.

With his physical condition not yet recovered, he had no sense of security at all.

Someone like him, a strange face with a skin color that easily drew discrimination, was already likely to suffer under local bullies who preyed on the weak and feared the strong. If he then showed he had money, there was a good chance he'd be robbed or even shot dead the very day he made contact.

He had to wait until he had the ability to protect himself before figuring out a way to obtain an identity. Before that, he couldn't take risks—

Chen Zhou kept reminding himself of this.

...

The Long Saber was far too conspicuous; even with the overcoat covering it, more than half the blade would still be exposed. Chen Zhou left it in the room; he didn't even bring much money, taking only 20 US Dollars.

He figured that amount would be plenty for expenses and not too much or too little; even if he was robbed, he'd still have funds to live on and could continue lying low.

After all, chances to stumble into a windfall from a car accident didn't come every day. If he burned through this money before completing his modification, he'd have no choice but to turn to robbery, and once the police locked onto him, he'd most likely end up on the receiving end of a "magazine-emptying" treatment.

For a weapon, he only brought the easier-to-conceal Military Saber. After putting his weapon and money in order, Chen Zhou tore a strip of ragged curtain and wrapped it around his head to cover his striking black hair.

When leaving the abandoned house, he deliberately circled to the right side, found a piece of charcoal, and blackened his face, neck, and hands.

With this series of measures layered on, he now looked like a tall, burly vagrant, his exact skin color and race hard to discern at a glance.

Feeling it was safe enough, Chen Zhou deliberately adjusted his walking posture and bearing.

Once he'd gotten used to this new set of movements, he carefully fixed a few branches in inconspicuous spots at the two doorways of the abandoned house, and planted some broken bits of wood along the path leading to the house.

These things would be hard for others to notice, but they could alert him to whether there had been any uninvited guests "at home."

If he discovered he'd drawn attention, Chen Zhou would immediately switch to another hiding place.

He didn't know whether the serial-killer family had realized that the Rift Tribunal was hunting them, so he had no way of telling if they'd planted watchers in various places to look for suddenly appearing outsiders.

Considering that he could easily end up in danger because the enemy was hidden while he was exposed, Chen Zhou could only prepare as thoroughly as possible, so he wouldn't be turned from Hunter into prey.

...

By the time he finished all this, the sky had fallen completely dark.

The streetlights in the small town flicked on. There were still plenty of people on the streets who hadn't gone home yet, mostly teenagers and young men and women in their early twenties.

At that age, most young people were in high school or college and had lots of free time after class to kill.

The boys loved to show off, and the girls yearned for romance.

Some were dressed and styled like biker gangs, some had sneaked out in their fathers' cars to pick up girls, some were riding motorcycles, strutting down the street, some were strolling hand in hand along the roadside…

Roughhousing, chatting—these people were all immersed in the glow of their youthful days, paying no attention at all to the unusually tall vagrant slipping quietly past in the dimmest pools of light.

...

Heading straight on, Chen Zhou observed this 1947 United States town.

The first thing he noticed was the prices.

He could gauge this just by looking through a bakery's glass window at the price tags on the cakes inside.

After watching for a while, Chen Zhou was startled to discover that the 455 US Dollars he had on him was actually a substantial fortune.

All the cookies, cakes, and candy in the bakery were priced in cents. Converted, his four hundred-plus dollars were roughly equivalent to over forty thousand units of currency.

And pastries were considered relatively expensive food; items like bread, donuts, hamburgers, and milk should be even cheaper.

With that in mind, Chen Zhou quietly took out his money, stuffed the extra four dollars back into his pocket, and kept only a single one-dollar bill in his hand.

"A vagrant shouldn't be carrying high-denomination bills."

In fact, even pulling out a one-dollar bill didn't really fit his vagrant persona, but he had no choice; he didn't have any smaller coins on him.

Reminding himself to ask the shopkeeper to give him more one-cent coins when he bought something later, Chen Zhou slowly walked toward a small shop at the corner of the street.

As he crossed the street and gradually saw more clearly what was happening on the other side, his footsteps grew slower and slower—

He saw the wrecked Chevrolet parked by the curb, and the driver—his face still streaked with blood—standing beside the car, surrounded by four men wearing work jackets and jeans.

Their jackets all had skull emblems sewn on; they looked like members of the same gang.

The driver they'd surrounded wasn't tall; his face was twisted with anger and anxiety, yet he was utterly helpless.

He unbuttoned his coat, pulled out his pockets, and showed the four of them that he didn't have a cent on him, but they still refused to let him go.

These punks, who had joined a gang at such a young age and learned to block roads and rob people, bullying the weak and fearing the strong, looked him over, and actually set their sights on the driver's Chevrolet. The tallest of the four shoved the driver aside, yanked open the car door, and climbed in.

Seeing their leader get into the car, the other three burst into laughter and scrambled in after him, completely ignoring the driver's pleas.

At that moment, the driver—who had lost his daughter through his own negligence and didn't have a penny to his name—listened to the sound of the engine starting and felt only utter despair.

He had no idea what he could do to set any of this right; a man in his forties simply collapsed onto the ground and began to wail.

The streetlights were dim; the only things beside him were the gang members' shrill laughter and the roar of the engine as they stomped on the gas.