Calling a Deer a Horse

Did they mean her?

By the time Song Weishi got on, the bus doors had already closed.

Outside, through the front windshield, a man and a woman were cursing and trying to push their way in. The man led the charge while the woman yanked him back, trying to hold him still.

They seemed to be having some kind of disagreement. Song Weishi sensed the man's agitation, but no one else on the bus so much as stirred, so she didn't pay it any mind.

The security guard below raised his gun without warning. The man immediately caved, slinking off under the woman's exasperated gaze.

What a paper tiger. Song Weishi rolled her eyes internally. If you're that cowardly, you shouldn't have been running your mouth. Better to keep your tail between your legs.

The bus's loudspeaker crackled to life. "Passengers heading to the quarantine zone, please review the handbook in front of you."

She plugged her phone in to charge, then casually pulled a small tablet from the pocket behind the front seat. Every seat had one. She opened the brochure and started reading.

The new government of Huihai City had organized protective measures as soon as disasters erupted across the region.

This city had been fortunate—it had banded together with nearby areas that weren't hit as hard to build a defensive wall and launch rescue operations within its capabilities.

They had evacuated residents from the scorching cities around them and kept funneling refugees in without pause.

It was a model city. The federal government center was even shifting its focus here. Originally a hub for economic transport, it had now become the heart of the region.

She had to admit—just looking at that, the city seemed impeccable. Song Weishi kept flipping pages.

There was a unified management system for refugees.

The handbook laid out where people would go from here. Huihai City's capacity wasn't infinite; it would reach a saturation point eventually.

Refugees would stay in quarantine for three to seven days, then be assigned work. There was no such thing as letting them in for free. Everyone had to contribute their labor value.

Refugee numbers had already passed ten million, basically at the population limit. Even with the neighboring provinces taking some in, they couldn't absorb more.

Song Weishi had been lucky to arrive when she did.

The old, weak, sick, and disabled got no government subsidies, which was a harsh reality. Their labor value was lower, and the jobs they could get barely covered food and shelter.

Only those with an overall rating of 80 or above could land decent work. Someone like Song Weishi, rated above 90, would be considered for the city's security team.

Most of the people on this bus were in the same boat as her. The more she read, the deeper her frown sank.

She'd originally planned to seek out the aunts' relatives in the city, secure a place to stay, then figure out the rest.

But that plan was clearly dead on arrival now. The security trainee program was mandatory conscription. Once selected, you were locked in; no one even thought about leaving.

Under those circumstances, her attitude would've seemed pretty ungrateful.

Song Weishi searched online. The network crawled, but eventually she found the security team's recruitment page.

Only people with exceptional physical fitness made the cut. Almost all newcomers who got in scored around 90 on the physical exams. Locals did somewhat better.

But no one with stats as high as hers was listed anywhere.

She supposed it came down to her diet. She'd eaten better than most people out there, better than the refugees, and her body had been honed through countless trials. It wasn't exactly a fair comparison.

Song Weishi's thoughts drifted to Xie Yi. She wondered if Xie Yi would score even higher if she came here. That woman's body was terrifyingly strong.

But Xie Yi wasn't here now, so there was no point dwelling on it.

Song Weishi kept reading. The security team's perks were genuinely good—private suites, top-tier pay, comfortable living. If she got in, she'd have a solid standard of living.

Compared to everywhere else, this place was practically paradise. Both online and offline, the reviews were unanimous.

She stretched her arms above her head, feeling pretty good about things. She'd been through rough times before, but the hard days were behind her now.

She looked at the recruitment process. Locals mostly handled internal logistics—reception work, low-risk jobs. The city's original security teams took care of the easy stuff.

Outsiders like her were assigned to field missions: hunting monsters inside and outside the city.

Song Weishi tapped on that section and read closely. The monsters she'd encountered earlier were now clearly categorized. Mutated humans, plants, animals—all had illustrated records.

Apparently, monsters weren't a secret anymore.

In a densely populated city like Huihai, such incidents were even more common.

The monsters in the snowy wasteland, the parasitic girl—those were textbook cases.

But the ones inside the city didn't seem as dangerous as what she'd faced.

The little girl she'd met had been nearly unstoppable. The spider that slipped in through cracks and crevices—if she hadn't had the System, she'd probably be dead.

Her expression dimmed at the thought. The System had been silent for days, and she couldn't reach it no matter what she tried. She wondered if she needed to kill a few people to wake it up again.

It was a last resort. That said, if someone provoked her, she wouldn't hesitate.

She finished reading the Huihai City intro and put the tablet back. Most of the people around her hadn't even bothered to look at it. Some were trying to see if they could play games on the devices.

They all seemed to have arrived with a plan. Their purposes for entering the city were far clearer than hers.

A while later, more people boarded, filling the bus almost entirely.

The pack beside her kept the seat next to her empty.

The last person on was a tall girl. She scanned the aisle, then walked over to Song Weishi. Song Weishi lifted her bag and stood up to let her pass.

The girl flashed a bright grin. "Thanks. I'm Ke Shaoyi. You?"

Her smile was infectious, showing a row of white teeth. Her wheat-colored skin looked healthy, and her messy hair didn't do anything to dull her sunny demeanor.

Song Weishi shook her hand. "Song Weishi."

Then she sat back down and quietly waited for her phone to charge.

Ke Shaoyi noticed Song Weishi wasn't much of a talker and stole a few glances at her. She was dying of boredom—she hadn't had anyone to chat with the entire trip.

The bus rumbled to life, and chatter filled the cabin. Though no one really knew each other, the mood had loosened, and conversations broke out everywhere.

Except for Song Weishi, no one else had a phone.

Ke Shaoyi couldn't hold back any longer. She ventured cautiously, "Song, are you from another province too?"

Song Weishi looked clean, almost out of place compared to the rest of them.

Song Weishi nodded, and seeing the girl's desperate need for conversation, she humored her.

"I heard everyone on this bus is headed for security training. Once it's done, we go out on missions. I wonder if field and desk work are split fifty-fifty."

From their conversation, Song Weishi learned that Ke Shaoyi was from a nearby city, much closer than Song Weishi's point of origin. Her city had become unbearably hot, and most people had already fled. She'd stayed behind at first to care for her cat, but eventually, she couldn't hold out any longer and set out with the animal in tow.

She'd run out of water and food along the way, barely making it here.

As she spoke, she unzipped her bag. A black cat head poked out—a tuxedo cat with a white collar around its neck. It was perfectly calm, just staring at Song Weishi.

Ke Shaoyi lovingly patted the cat's head, and it ducked back inside after a breath of fresh air.

Song Weishi shattered her illusion. "The internal roles are for locals. People like us only get assigned to field work," she said, relaying what she'd just read on her phone.

Ke Shaoyi: "..."

Ke Shaoyi silently covered the cat's ears. Not listening, not listening.

She switched topics, trading info for info. "I heard the final test is also field work. Song, do you have a contact in the city?"

She'd come here because a friend had told her Huihai City was doing better than most places, and she'd trusted that. Her phone had fried in the heat long ago, but she'd just filled out the security registration form in hopes of finding someone here who could pull some strings and help her settle in.

Song Weishi blinked. So that sort of connection mattered too. She hadn't seen anything about it online. If you counted them, the aunts were probably her network in the city.

But that was probably negligible. Given the current circumstances, it was unclear whether the aunts themselves had any security.

She planned to contact them once she reached quarantine. They were being watched closely now, and even if she tried to reach out, the aunts didn't have phones anyway.

She shook her head. "I have friends here, but they're not on my bus. They said no one can switch buses, and I haven't been able to get in touch with them yet. I'll figure it out once we're in quarantine."

Ke Shaoyi nodded, pleased that Song Weishi had finally opened up a little. "I see."

The two chatted a while longer, exchanging information from the outside. The bus cleared the checkpoint and merged onto the highway.

The road ahead was all clear, and the passengers kept yakking away.

Song Weishi looked out the window. It was nearing noon, and honestly, she was getting hungry.

Everyone else was starving too. Besides the air conditioning, there was only a bottle of water on each seat. No food.

Ke Shaoyi dug through her bag next to her, producing dry flatbreads she'd made at home and washing them down with water. When the heatwave first hit and the power was unreliable—they'd lost electricity twice, making it impossible to cook—she'd learned to make food from an online tutorial. She'd made a huge batch, and there was still a lot left. Her cooking wasn't great, and the results were barely edible—bland, dry sheets of dough that you had to choke down with clean water.

Song Weishi sat without any intention of eating. The hungry people around them were starting to stir. Their food supplies were basically gone, and watching someone eat dry bread was making their mouths water.

Ke Shaoyi dipped her bread in vegetable juice. It tasted awful, but it looked decent enough. A few shameless types even approached her to beg for some, offering their bus-provided water in trade.

Ke Shaoyi rolled her eyes and refused every single one.

The beggars muttered insults and looked ready to make a scene. Song Weishi, annoyed, pulled a knife from her bag.

Within seconds, everyone had sat back down and pretended nothing was happening.

Ke Shaoyi stared, dumbfounded, shoveling bread into her mouth.

She chewed too fast, choked, and drained her little bottle of water to wash it down. While she was patting her chest, she looked down and saw a sealed bottle of water held out before her.

She turned to see Song Weishi looking at her. Before she could react, Song Weishi unscrewed the cap and gestured for her to drink.

She was choking so badly she gulped down half the bottle before she could breathe.

The other girl turned her head away, looking straight ahead, without asking for anything in return.

Her face flushed red—whether from choking or something else, she couldn't tell.

Ke Shaoyi broke a piece of untouched bread into a plastic bag and offered it to her. Song Weishi didn't even notice until the girl nudged her arm. She looked down at the green-tinted bread.

She wasn't short on food or water. It was just hard to pull supplies out here. Everyone else was eating whatever scraps they had, and if she started eating well, it could cause unnecessary trouble. After all, even Ke Shaoyi's plain bread had drawn beggars.

She hadn't expected the girl to voluntarily share. Song Weishi tried to wave it off, but the girl just shoved it into her moving hand.

Song Weishi: "..."

She could only mutter a thanks and wrap it in paper.

Ke Shaoyi thought Song Weishi was just too proud to eat. Food was precious these days; even Huihai City wouldn't feed outsiders for free. She gritted her teeth and broke off another piece. She liked this cold-faced girl who gave without asking for anything back.

Song Weishi stared at the extra half-bread in her hand, speechless. Was this girl too naive? Expressionless, she fished a compressed biscuit out of her bag and pressed it into Ke Shaoyi's palm, stopping her from offering any more food.

Ke Shaoyi's face burned with embarrassment, and she nearly buried her head in her backpack. So Song Weishi hadn't been unwilling to eat—her situation was far better than Ke Shaoyi's. She didn't dare speak to Song Weishi again for the rest of the ride.

Song Weishi stifled a yawn behind her hand and popped a few cherry tomatoes into her mouth. No strong-smelling food on the bus. By afternoon, nearly everyone was asleep, worn out from the long trip.

Song Weishi locked her bag in the storage compartment under her seat to keep it from being swiped, though most of her stuff was in her spatial storage anyway.

She leaned back and closed her eyes, ready to rest. The bus was peaceful.

But things were far from peaceful on the blue bus. The aunts sat in the back row, growing anxious as time passed and Song Weishi never boarded.

They'd told the security team they had relatives in the city, but who they ended up riding with wasn't their call.

Song Weishi hadn't shown up. Maybe she'd failed her physical. Maybe she was on a different bus. They'd heard quarantine zones weren't all together, and it would be ages before they could see her again. The thought made them more anxious by the minute.

Xie Huiying, after some discussion with the others, got off to ask the security officer who'd escorted them. Her younger sister had some influence in the city, but even contacting her would require going through quarantine first.

She got nothing. Not even information about which bus Song Weishi was on.

It seemed they'd have to wait until after quarantine to find out where she was.

The others saw her return empty-handed and slumped back into their seats, disheartened.

Sister Chen's eyes welled up. "What are we gonna do? If she's alone in the city, will something happen to her? A young girl like that, what if someone robs her?"

Robberies happened all the time, and the security team couldn't police everything. She'd had something lifted off her just a moment ago and couldn't get it back. She just had to accept the loss.

If even the five of them were like this, she didn't want to think about what would happen to Song Weishi alone.

The other four, however, simultaneously pictured Song Weishi with that knife of hers. If they hadn't stopped her, she might have cut down those thugs all by herself.

Xie Huiying's lips twitched. She patted Sister Chen's shoulder. "Chen, you don't have to worry about that. I'm sure Weishi can take care of herself."

The others chimed in to reassure her too.

"That's right, Chen. Song's definitely fine. Once quarantine's over, we'll go find her. Besides, we're all inside the city now. There shouldn't be much danger here," Aunt Huang said, feeling like she could finally rest easy.

"Yeah. Once quarantine's done, we'll have Huiqing ask around for where Song is. Don't worry."

"No problem. I already told the security team."

Compared to Song Weishi, the five of them felt far more vulnerable. They didn't have her combat ability; they just relied on numbers. They had endurance, but their strength and agility were unremarkable. Their combined scores barely crossed the passing line.

The loud young couple from earlier had boarded their bus. One silent, the other loud and rambunctious—yet Xie Huiying felt the one lurking behind was the real danger.

The man was volatile and seemed to be the leader of their pair, but his body language deferred to the woman at every turn.

The pair strutted onto the bus like they owned it. This blue bus was full of people with connections; you never knew who was inside. When they saw anyone else, the other passengers were polite, guarded.

With the aunts looking the oldest on board, the five of them had taken the back row, steering clear of everyone.

The couple scanned the cabin as soon as they boarded and headed straight for them, settling into the seats in front.

Xie Huiying glanced at them and watched quietly.

They made no move for a while. The aunts rested until noon, when the cabin stirred with hunger again.

The seats were modern, with folding trays that slid out from the armrest. After waking, they got ready for a meal.

The water from their crate had been split into bottles. They quietly pulled one out and took a sip.

The bus's air conditioning was weak, barely cooler than outside, but the water had gone properly cold. It tasted wonderful.

Only a few people ate; quarantine would require paying for food and lodging, so they conserved. Most people here had eaten through their supplies on the road.

They were in the minority. Everyone tried to be discreet about eating. The spring water they'd heated and cooled earlier tasted fine alongside the bread.

Most passengers tried to sleep through their hunger, saving the meal. Xie Huiying sat in the middle of the five, pulling the plastic bag of bread from her backpack, when a shadow fell over her.

The man who'd been sitting in front of them had stood up and turned to face her directly.

She looked travel-worn, not particularly attractive, with exhaustion on her face showing her age.

She looked like a simple middle-aged woman. Xie Huiying looked at him with confusion. He was tall, broad-shouldered, with muscular arms that hinted at training. His face was twisted into a vicious scowl as he stared at her bread.

"Give it to me," he said in a low voice.

Xie Huiying thought she misheard. She frowned at him, tightening her grip on the plastic bag. She had no intention of handing it over.

The man saw her lack of response and repeated himself, louder and less politely. "Give it to me!"

The people around them turned to look, the voice jarringly loud in the cabin.

The woman who'd been sitting in front turned around too, staring hungrily at the bread in Xie Huiying's hand.

When Xie Huiying still didn't move, he lunged to snatch it.

The surrounding passengers quickly looked away, pretending not to see.

"Give it to me! You deaf?"

The man's vicious expression lasted two seconds before the short middle-aged woman in front of him set her bread aside. He grabbed at empty air, and the next second, a fist slammed into his face.

"What's wrong with you? No shame, huh? If you don't want it, I'll rip it off you."

Sister Chen's gloved hand sent the man crashing to the floor. She was already in a foul mood, and the man picked the wrong target today. The punch carried her full strength, and the big brute crumpled unconscious.

No one moved to help him. Everyone craned their necks to see what had happened.

The woman who'd been in her seat shrieked and ran over to the man, trying to shift the blame. "Why did you hit him for no reason!"

The passengers' eyes darted between the two and the aunts behind them.

"A dog came begging for food, tried to bite me, and I hit the dog. Why are you squealing?" Xie Huiying said coolly.

Smiles spread across the watching faces as they enjoyed the scene.

The woman was livid. "You just wait! My husband is the second-in-command of District One, Xie Huiqing! When quarantine's over, I'll make you pay!"

The aunts exchanged weird looks, then turned to Xie Huiying, who sat in the middle looking bewildered.

"Sister Xie, since when did Huiqing become a man?"

"And how does she have a wife? She never told us about that."