I Am Your Natural Enemy

The man in the suit munched on an apple as he crossed to the other side of the conference room. He made eye contact with a subordinate and said with deadpan seriousness, ”We’re both going to die. Not just you, but me as well.”

With a wave of his hand and a slight flicker of his fingers, the two small knives quivering in the wall trembled. SWISH! SWISH! They flew back into his grasp. ”I’ve taken care of it for you this time,” he explained. ”Not to help you, but because I’m afraid of dying. I need to mitigate the risk, bring it down to an acceptable level. Considering you’ve done decent work, this is where it ends.”

The man, his hands wounded, hastily bandaged them with his tie to stem the bleeding. He wrapped his hands in his suit jacket and, enduring the pain, pretended to be alright as he went to tend to his injuries. The company had given him leave, allowing him to take his annual vacation early—ostensibly to prepare for the overtime and busyness that came at the end of the year and during the New Year period. He took his family to Harbor Island for a trip and some shopping. While there, he took the opportunity to visit a familiar underground clinic and seek help from a Foreigner to heal his hand injuries.

After three days of enjoyment, upon returning, as soon as he stepped out of the vehicle, he saw a dump truck with its license plate obscured by dust speeding past. It struck him, sending him flying. Still in mid-air, he saw that his wife and daughter hadn’t been hit, and a sudden sense of relief washed over him. When he hit the ground, his head was askew, and blood flowed continuously from his nose and mouth. His body trembled as he gave one last look to his wife and daughter, and then he fell silent forever. The dump truck crashed head-on into a nearby building, its front caving in so severely that the driver’s seat looked like it had simply vanished. There was no need to check if the driver was still alive.

While this unexpected accident occurred, the man in the suit was elsewhere, sunbathing by the seaside and enjoying the sea breeze. He received a call from the company, and his expression immediately changed. The subordinate he had disciplined just a few days earlier had been killed by a dump truck today. The preliminary findings labeled it an accident. According to traffic surveillance footage, the dump truck’s driver had likely been overworked and fatigued from excessively long shifts. He had apparently died suddenly before the collision, leading to the loss of vehicle control.

Fear started to grip the man in the suit when he heard this. He hadn’t arranged it, and he didn’t believe in such accidents. He set down his phone and looked up, hearing distant cries. ”A child has been swept away!” The already noisy beach became even more chaotic. The commotion on the beach made the man in the suit feel as if his body was beginning to disobey his commands. With a tinge of panic in his eyes, he screamed inwardly, Boss, I was wrong! I shouldn’t have been soft. A mistake is a mistake!

A voice echoed in his mind. ”It’s too late; the Boss is furious. The Boss says your and that fool’s stupidity could expose our company’s branch in Yu State.

”Many people will die as a result of your foolishness; many lives will be lost because of you.

”To prevent this, the Boss has paid a steep price.

”Now, it’s your turn to die.

”To prevent you from turning into a Ghost after death, you must die at sea.

”Rest assured, you will die a hero.

”You’ll receive a certificate for bravery, and your family will get a large insurance payout.

”From this point on, they will have no further ties with the company.

”You can rest easy now.”

The tension in the man in the suit’s body eased, and the terror in his eyes slowly dissipated. He regretted not getting rid of that subordinate who had made the mistake; he had thought he had resolved the issue and eliminated the risk. But the higher-ups hadn’t seen it that way.

There were many people on the beach, and lifeguards were approaching from a distance. The man in the suit’s body, now controlled, grabbed a lifebuoy and rushed into the sea. He saved the child who had been swept away by the rip current, but as the waves rolled over, he vanished from sight. In the blink of an eye, he disappeared beneath the waves.

Seconds later, someone on a jet ski sped over and rescued the unconscious boy, who was being kept afloat by the lifebuoy. Others continued to search the sea but could find no trace of the man in the suit. More rescuers joined the search, while on the shore, people administered first aid to the boy. Two minutes later, the boy began to spit out water and cough. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief, then started to worry about the man in the suit who had been the first to rush out and save him.

But his body had already sunk into the sea, slipped under the protective nets, and was continuing to swim toward the depths. He could no longer hold his breath. His lungs expelled the remaining air, and seawater began to flood into them, yet his body still sped relentlessly toward the depths. Minutes later, the man in the suit’s body still hadn’t stopped, but the light in his eyes had vanished. His body, as if a pre-programmed robot, kept swimming towards deeper and more distant waters. His body only stopped when sea creatures, sensing death, began to swarm around him. In a single day, it was reduced to a skeleton that sank to the seafloor.

「...」

After finishing his meal, Wen Yan casually picked up his phone and started browsing live streams. He was looking for anything unusual among the other hosts affiliated with that company. According to his experience, everything would appear normal until midnight. But even from normal live streams, he could roughly predict what content the subsequent Inside streams might feature. It was like that food explorer stream that reviewed regular eateries during the day but would visit establishments run by Different Races in the dead of night.

Chen Qimo, while helping the Steward clear the table, wondered why Wen Yan had suddenly started watching live streams these past few days.

Noticing Chen Qimo’s glance, Wen Yan immediately laughed. ”Don’t look at me like that. I’m just doing a bit of research and checking out the decor, that’s all.”

”One of my classmates also wanted to start live streaming, but her parents teamed up to quash the idea,” Wen Yan said.

”You guys only have a little over a year until your college entrance exams, and you’re thinking about live streaming?” Wen Yan remarked. ”You’re lucky you didn’t get a ’mixed doubles’ thrashing from your parents for it!”

”Actually, with her, it wasn’t quite like that,” Wen Yan continued. ”She had signed with a legitimate entertainment company, but apparently, she upset the management, and they fired her.”