<h4>Chapter 247: Mysterious Forces, Matthew Strikes</h4>


    <strong>Trantor: </strong>As Studios <strong>Editor: </strong>As Studios


    Cheng Huo narrowed his eyes as soon as Cheng Shui finished speaking.


    Then he lowered his head and took out his phone from his pocket.


    The Underground Alliance...


    He had never heard of it.


    ncing at Cheng Huo, Cheng Shui knew without thinking what he wanted to do. “Cheng Huo, there’s no point checking the Inte. Even the Hacker Alliance doesn’t have records of them. You might be able to find news of them from 129 Detective, or from Matthew. Other than that, you can only check the files of therge families in Continent M.”


    Cheng Huo didn’t believe him. He clicked to the client page of the Hacker Alliance and went through aplete search, but it was to no avail.


    “This is impossible!” He put down his legs and stood up directly.


    “Nothing is impossible. The Underground Alliance hasn’t surfaced for nearly a year. When you joined the Hacker Alliance a year ago and ventured around Continent M, the Underground Alliance had already faded out,” Cheng Shui exined lightly. “Cheng Tu said before that news of the Underground Alliance won’t be circted on the Inte. We have some business with the Underground Alliance, but we’re not very consistent with it.”


    Cheng Mu couldn’t understand what they were doing.


    He didn’t interrupt them and just stood at the side, turning his head to stare at each of them in turn.


    Cheng Shui wouldn’t joke about such matters. It wasn’t that Cheng Huo didn’t believe him, he just found it hard to ept.


    After a moment of silence, Cheng Shui continued exining, “Boss originally wanted to temporarily stop the business at the mine and leave Continent M after this matter, but something happened today...”


    At the thought of this, he frowned slightly.


    He exined the matter of Yang Shuyan to them.


    “I know that Miss Qin is from the IT department of the Yunguang Consortium, but what does it have to do with Continent M? The Yunguang Consortium is in Beijing.” Cheng Huo nced at Cheng Shui.


    “Do you remember when Boss was injured?” Cheng Shui poured himself a cup of tea.


    Cheng Mu froze. “Master Juan has been injured before?”


    “He returned to China and went to Yun Cheng half a year ago partly because of his injury,” Cheng Huo exined. Then, he turned to Cheng Shui and frowned in understanding. “Yang Shuyan had something to do with it?”


    “Yang Shuyan beheaded three of his trusted aides! He’s probably the boss of the Underground Alliance. I’ve seen him before more than a year ago when I was looking for Cheng Tu. I don’t know the specifics, but when I joined them, Boss’s condition wasn’t very good.” Cheng Shui pondered aloud.


    This was why he had been so surprised to see Yang Shuyan.


    This person was simply too dangerous. On the surface, he looked like a celestial being, but in reality, he had the blood of numerous people stained on his hands. The people around him were all kept in the dark, especially Qin Ran, who didn’t know of Yang Shuyan’s true identity.


    Cheng Shui hadn’t exined this to her.


    No matter how powerful and mature, Qin Ran was still young in their eyes. Cheng Shui wasn’t willing to let her in about all the dark matters, so he had chosen to find Cheng Mu instead.


    He already estimated that Cheng Juan would have to abandon his ns of withdrawing from Continent M.


    **


    Cheng Shui continued talking about Yang Shuyan.


    Downstairs, Cheng Juan also went to talk to Gu Xichi alone.


    The two of them stood on the edge of the big training ground. Gu Xichi held his phone and looked out at the group of people there with great interest.


    “Brother, what’s the matter?” It was windy outside, so Gu Xichi wore a coat and had his hands wrapped around it for warmth.


    Cheng Juan took out a cigarette and sandwiched it between his fingers. He narrowed his eyes slightly. “The old man told me before that you had ransacked all of his experimental drugs more than a year ago as well.”


    Gu Xichi froze. He didn’t dare to look at Cheng Juan and just said vaguely, “Really? I don’t remember.”


    “Gu Xichi, how many billions do you owe me?” Cheng Juan lowered his head and turned on the lighter. A blue fire burst out from it.


    His voice sounded casual.


    Gu Xichi was speechless.


    “I want to ask you something.” Gu Xichi turned and stared at Cheng Juan seriously. “What is your intention towards our Xiao Ran?”


    It was getting dark outside.


    Cheng Juan bit on the cigarette, and the cigarette butt shone with a clear light. Hearing this, he smiled casually, hiszy eyes soaking in the night scene. “An unmarried man and an unmarried woman, what do you think?”


    His words were careless, but ording to Gu Xichi’s understanding of him, it was considered sort of a promise.


    Nodding, he remained silent for a long time before saying, “A year and a half ago, I suddenly received an emergency call from her. You know she’s a hacker. When she contacted me at that time, she used encrypted codewords. By the time I found her at the address, she was already at death’s door.”


    Cheng Juan propped his hand on the woodpile and waited for Gu Xichi to continue.


    Gu Xichi put his phone back in his pocket and fell into deep thought.


    Qin Ran’s mental state had been in breakdown more than three years ago. Gu Xichi only found out from Chen Shn that, at that time, Qin Ran’s friend had stayed in the mental hospital for a year.


    Later on, Gu Xichi only received bits of pieces of news. Qin Ran never took the initiative to contact him again, until more than a year ago when she suddenly reached out.


    Her mind had already been in a state of confusion when he found her, so he had brought her to Continent M directly.


    At that time, Qin Ran had no desire to live.


    Hence, Gu Xichi had stimted her with words, telling her to get well soon so that she could torture the man who had injured her.


    At that time, he had really turned to anything and anyone he could find...


    Who knew that Qin Ran would really rely on the spirit of revenge and gradually regain consciousness...


    Gu Xichi managed to pull her back from the King of Hell.


    But after that, she walked around like a living corpse and had even gone to the ck boxing ring to fight.


    Because of that, Gu Xichi had taken medicines from the old man like crazy.


    While muddle-headed, she had basically been taken care of by Gu Xichi the whole year.


    He had even taken many calls from Qin Ran’s phone at that time.


    It had all been calls from Continent M. Gu Xichi had always regarded Qin Ran as his younger sister, so he had been furious that she had suffered such a big wrong silently.


    He never probed further about her matters, but he had once acted on his own ord and flushed Qin Ran’s phone card into the toilet.


    Qin Ran only recovered more half a year ago, when she received news of Chen Shn dying.


    She hadn’t asked for her phone card when she returned to her senses.


    She had even thrown the phone in the trash can.


    Dressing lightly and carrying nothing, she had returned straight to China.


    Since then, Gu Xichi felt that Qin Ran had be more indifferent.


    He finished exining.


    Cheng Juan was silent for a long time.


    The cigarette was still burning quietly in his hand, the fire flickering in the wind.


    “With her strength, who could have injured her that badly?” Cheng Juan said lightly after a long period of silence.


    Under the night sky, his expression couldn’t be seen clearly.


    But after hearing this, Gu Xichi couldn’t help but shudder. “I don’t know. When I found Xiao Ran, she was in a slum alley.”


    Cheng Juan nodded.


    He put out his cigarette butt and threw it into the trash can.


    Narrowing his eyes, he started counting the number of people who could possibly be her opponent.


    Other than the crouching tigers and hidden dragons in Continent M, Cheng Juan also knew of a few powerful people who weren’t so well-known. He quickly counted a few who were powerful enough.


    Most of them weren’t easy to provoke.


    Cheng Juan asked Gu Xichi about Matthew again.


    “Wait.” Gu Xichi froze and stared at Cheng Juan. “What does it have to do with Chief Matthew? He has nothing to do with Xiao Ran, how could it have been him...”


    “What if it was really him?” Cheng Juan nced lightly at Gu Xichi.


    He wouldn’t ask Qin Ran who it was, but he would make a list of those who could possibly hurt her and then seek revenge in various ways.


    Naturally, Matthew was on his list.


    He would rather kill a hundred people by mistake than miss out on that one person.


    He nced at Gu Xichi again and asked, “Do you think it’s okay?”


    Gu Xichi was wondering if he had ever offended Cheng Juan in any way.


    After wrapping up their conversation, Cheng Juan returned to his study.


    On the way, he took out his phone and called Cheng Tu.


    **


    At this time, Qin Ran was in the study, having a video call with Lin Siran, Pan Mingyue, Qiao Sheng, and the others.


    Lin Siran was clearly outside and had fireworks behind her.


    “Sister Ran, aren’t youing back when school reopens?” Qiao Sheng looked weak when he heard that Qin Ran would onlye back for the college entrance examination. “ss 3.9 misses you terribly, Teacher Gao as well!”


    Qin Ran put her phone down on the table and leaned it against a pen holder.


    She was practicing writing while talking to them.


    Hearing this, she couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow. “Are you sure that they miss me?”


    Qiao Sheng was speechless.


    She was right. After Qin Ran’s departure, the teachers seemed to have heaved a sigh of relief, especially Teacher Gao, who seemed much more refreshed.


    Qiao Sheng almost copsed at the mention of this.


    But Pan Mingyue chuckled instead. “It’s okay, it’s just a few months. It’ll pass in the blink of an eye.”


    “How could it be so easy?” Lin Siran looked sad. “I heard that the second semester of senior high school is hell...”


    Pan Mingyue propped her chin on her hand and smiled. She said in a soft voice, “I can tell you’ve never seen hell before.”


    Qin Ran was about to say something when a ck dialog box popped up at the top of the video.


    She narrowed her eyes.


    Then, she reached out quietly. “You guys can talk. I still have some matters to attend to, so I’ll hang up first.”


    She nced at the study door.


    No one was there.


    She walked over to the window and took out her headphones.


    It was Matthew.