Transmigrating Into a Book, the Villain Becomes the White Moonlight!

153: Chapter 153 A Pull and a Tear, The Miracle WalkerAccording to the mission requirements, she could have simply taught him some flashy but useless moves, or even deliberately guided Su Bai to develop incorrect habits to make it easier for her to strike later.

This was one of the most common methods used by assassins when approaching a target—a trap disguised as a gift.

But as she stood here now, she was breaking down every move and posture with such meticulous detail, correcting the angle of his elbow with such patience, and even unconsciously using the very teaching methods that had been the most painful yet solid during her own training years ago.

Why?

She didn’t think too much about it.

Or rather, she didn’t dare to.

Su Bai learned incredibly fast.

This was the twenty-seventh time Ran Shu had had this thought.

When she demonstrated a move once, his form was already similar by the second time he imitated it, and by the third, the flow of power was fully connected.

Especially for those techniques requiring physical flexibility and instantaneous explosive power, he performed them without any sluggishness, as if those muscle memories were merely temporarily sealed and were now being awakened one by one.

She grabbed his wrist to demonstrate how to break an opponent’s center of gravity—his lower body was surprisingly stable.

She taught him how to use the opponent’s forward momentum to complete a Sacrifice Technique—his core strength left her secretly alarmed.

Yet on Su Bai’s face, there was always that nonchalant expression, as if he were just playing an interesting game.

”Look, the point of power is here.” Ran Shu turned around and offered her left arm to him as a demonstration. ”Grab my sleeve here, use the opponent’s forward inertia, and pivot—”

Before she could finish, Su Bai did exactly that.

He grabbed the sleeve of her light-colored training uniform and, following the essentials she had just explained, pivoted, dropped his hips, and exerted sudden force using his waist as an axis—this was the rudimentary form of a perfect Body Drop. For a beginner who had only been learning for less than half an hour, the execution was startlingly good.

But precisely because he was a beginner, he didn’t quite understand how to provide enough buffer space for his opponent while giving it his all.

Ran Shu only felt a massive and smooth force being conducted along Su Bai’s back, like being swept up by a gentle wave.

Her body involuntarily took flight and flipped along with that force—

Then, her back hit the mat with a solid thud.

The entire gym seemed to fall silent for a moment.

Ran Shu lay flat on her back on the light gray foam mat. The sunlight streaming in from the high windows fell right on her face, making her squint slightly.

Her first reaction wasn’t pain—in fact, Su Bai’s application of force was very clean, and there was even a faint, clever force-dissipation as she landed—but rather, astonishment.

This astonishment had two layers.

The first layer: she had actually been thrown down.

As the number one assassin of the Dragon King Hall, while her close-quarters combat wasn’t the absolute best, her defensive instincts were etched into her very bones and blood.

When Su Bai grabbed her sleeve just now, she had at least three ways to anticipate, counter, or even pin him to the ground in one smooth motion.

But she didn’t.

In that split second, her attention had fallen on his fingers—the hand gripping her sleeve had distinct knuckles, warm pads, and a moderate amount of force; it had neither the awkwardness of a first-time touch with the opposite sex nor any aggressive hostility.

At that moment, she suddenly remembered many years ago, when a similar boy’s hand had casually stuffed a warm steamed bun into her palm.

She had spaced out.

For a whole second.

In a life-or-death struggle, that was a fatal second.

The second layer of astonishment was Su Bai’s power. That kind of power didn’t seem like brute force purely from muscle explosion, but rather an Integrated Power that rooted from the feet, conducted segment by segment along the spine, and was released at the final moment without any loss.

This way of exerting force was definitely not something that could be mastered just by watching a demonstration and practicing for half an hour.

It required long-term, systematic, and correct training, as well as a certain innate physical intuition.

Ran Shu lay on the ground and didn’t get up immediately.

She gazed at the extinguished overhead light above her, and the question that had been lingering in her heart for so long finally condensed clearly into a single sentence:

Su Bai, who exactly are you?

”Uh...” Su Bai was still holding that pose of pivoting and exerting force, seeming a bit surprised himself.

He looked down at Ran Shu, whom he had flipped onto the mat, a rare look of embarrassment appearing on his face. ”That... you just said to use inertia and pivot... so I... I didn’t hold back my strength. Are you okay?”

He reached out his hand.

The sunlight hit him from the side, plating his well-defined fingers with a thin layer of gold.

That hand hung in mid-air, with slender knuckles and palm facing up, devoid of any hidden agenda.

Ran Shu stared at that hand for about two seconds.

She didn’t take it.

She propped herself up on the mat and sat up, the slight elastic sensation of the foam mat still lingering on her back.

Lowering her eyes, she straightened her sleeve which had been pulled askew, her voice returning to its usual steadiness. ”I’m fine. It was a very clean throw, and I didn’t hit anything when I landed. It’s not easy for a beginner to achieve this.”

She paused and finally looked up at him.

”Your physical coordination is better than I imagined. Have you really never practiced any form of combat before?”

Su Bai withdrew his hanging hand and scratched his temple. ”I’ve really never trained systematically.”

Ran Shu didn’t press him further.

She knew he was telling the truth—at least part of it.

He indeed hadn’t undergone the kind of systematic training she understood; he hadn’t punched a sandbag thousands of times day after day, hadn’t been whipped on the calves with a bamboo sword by a coach to correct his stance, and hadn’t bled or broken bones on that lonely and cruel path.

But that strange, almost instinctive combat intuition he possessed, that refined yet inconspicuous physical foundation, and that hand-chop she had struck with full force last night that hadn’t moved him an inch—these things couldn’t be explained away simply by the word ”talent.”

Unless.

Unless someone had shaped him in a way she didn’t understand, while he was completely unaware of it.

And that person was very likely the currently absent Uncle Fu.

Ran Shu stood up, brushed off the fine dust on her back, and resumed her teaching stance.

She decided to temporarily push these doubts back into the depths of her heart.

”In that move just now, your center of gravity shift was too violent when you exerted force.” Her tone was as calm as ever. ”Try again. This time I’ll cooperate with you. Feel the timing when the opponent’s center of gravity lifts; you don’t need to use full force.”

”Sure.” Su Bai responded readily and got back into his ready stance.

The morning light continued to pour silently through the high windows, casting two shadows at their feet that overlapped and separated from time to time.

The faint wheat fragrance of the steamed buns still lingered in the air, along with something more complex and harder to name.

Next time, she wouldn’t space out again.

Ran Shu told herself this.

”Eh? On your neck... there’s a birthmark near your collarbone?”

Su Bai’s voice carried a hint of casual curiosity, purely the kind of small talk one might make during a break in practice.

It wasn’t that he was deliberately looking in that direction—the collar of the training uniform was already loose, and Ran Shu was only wearing a simple, light-colored camisole underneath. As she leaned over to adjust the position of the mat, her collar naturally dropped, revealing that small patch of skin on the inside of her collarbone.

And since he was more than half a head taller than Ran Shu, from this angle, his gaze only had to drop slightly to see it.

The birthmark wasn’t large, about the size of a fingernail, with an irregular shape and edges like faint red ink bleeding into water, making it stand out clearly against her fair skin.

Almost as a reflex, Ran Shu straightened up, her fingers quickly clutching her collar to tightly cover that patch of exposed skin.

The movement was so fast it carried a trace of panic she hadn’t even anticipated herself.

She clutched her collar, her fingertips pressing against her collarbone as if she wanted to press that birthmark, along with all the memories it carried, deep into her flesh and back into a past that no one would ever know again.

Then, out of the corner of her eye, she cautiously scanned Su Bai’s face.

His face only showed the faint embarrassment of someone who had unintentionally offended and then quickly looked away. He pursed his lips slightly and added, ”I saw it by accident, I didn’t mean anything by it.”

Still... he didn’t recognize it?

The moment this thought surfaced, Ran Shu herself couldn’t tell what exactly was churning in her chest.

She should have been relieved.

Su Bai hadn’t recognized her.

This meant her identity wasn’t exposed, the mission could still continue, and she wouldn’t have to face the desperate situation of having to kill him with her own hands after he pointed at her and said, ”I remember you.”

But beneath that relief was a thin, dense, and nameless bitterness.

She hoped he would remember.

She hoped that the chubby little girl who always hid in the corner wasn’t just a blurry shadow in Su Bai’s memory, not just a passerby who could be easily forgotten.

She hoped that the fragments she had cherished for over a decade—about the steamed buns, the walk home from school, and every piece of candy he had casually handed her—had also left a trace in his mind.

But why should he remember?

That was so many years ago.

Back then, she had been too small, so small that she couldn’t even manage a normal conversation.

He had helped so many children, offered his kindness so casually; she was just one of them, the most inconspicuous one.

Not remembering was normal.

Remembering was a luxury.

”...It’s nothing.” Ran Shu loosened her grip on her collar, her voice very flat. ”Have some water.”

She lowered her eyes and turned toward the table, wanting to use the action of getting water to calm the slight but persistent surge in her chest.

Then, she heard a very soft thud, almost muffled by the mat.

Ran Shu looked down.

On the light gray mat lay a thin Willow Leaf Blade.

The blade reflected the cold white light from above like a stranded silver fish.

Her pupils constricted sharply.

How could this be?

Last night she had checked every fastener; every blade was tucked in seamlessly.

That Purple Strap had been with her for many years and had never failed her at a critical moment.

She had even specifically moved her arms before starting to confirm that all the hidden compartments were as stable as usual.

But it had just slipped out.

In front of Su Bai.

At this very moment, just after they had talked about the birthmark and her mind was in total disarray.

Ran Shu’s brain felt as if it had been filled with a cold fog, operating extremely slowly yet extremely frantically.

”...This is?” Su Bai’s voice came from behind her. His tone didn’t reveal any specific emotion, but the ending was raised, like the start of a question.

”For self-defense, from when I was abroad.” Ran Shu leaned down to pick up the knife, keeping her movements as smooth as possible and her voice as steady as she could. ”After staying abroad for a long time, I don’t feel secure without carrying something. It’s a habit.”

She gripped the knife in the palm of her left hand, the handle pressing against her knuckles, piercingly cold.

But before she could finish letting out a sigh of relief—

There was another ”click.”

This time, she felt it clearly. It was the most hidden compartment inside her right sleeve cuff; the spring latch had been pushed open by the pressure of her arm muscles when she leaned over to pick up the first knife.

The blade slid down the side of her wrist, flipped half a turn in the air, and also landed on the mat, half a foot in front of Su Bai’s toes.

Two knives.

One after another, lying neatly before him.

Ran Shu didn’t look up again.

She didn’t dare to.

She didn’t know what kind of expression Su Bai had right now—was it suspicion, surprise, or that silence after seeing through everything that she feared the most?

She only felt her back stiffen like an icicle, and the blood thundered in her ears as it rushed backward.

”I travel abroad a lot,” she heard her own voice say, airy, as if coming from a great distance. ”Carrying two knives is also quite reasonable.”

She squatted down and picked up the second knife with her right hand.

Holding the two identical silver blades in her hands at the same time, the metal bodies touched, making a very slight, almost imperceptible scraping sound.

”...Mhm.”

A single syllable.

Light and airy, without any embellishment, it was impossible to tell if he believed her or just couldn’t be bothered to ask further.

Ran Shu finally looked up, her gaze darting quickly across Su Bai’s face.

His expression was neutral, showing no ripples. He wasn’t staring at the knives in her hand, nor was he staring at her; he just had his eyes lowered, seemingly looking at the two shallow indentations on the mat.

There was no suspicion in that gaze, no scrutiny.

But there was also none of the relief she had imagined would follow being fooled by a clumsy lie.

She couldn’t understand him.

From beginning to end, she had never understood him.

”I’m going to the restroom.”

Ran Shu dropped those words and turned away as if escaping, walking quickly toward the hallway on the other side of the gym.

Her hand gripping the knives was so tense it turned white. The two small knives pressed into her palm, their anti-slip texture almost embedding into her flesh.

No footsteps followed her.

Su Bai didn’t call out to her.

She walked all the way to the door of the women’s restroom, pushed it open, and pressed her back against the door before finally stopping.

The air behind the door was cool, with only the exhaust fan humming away.

Ran Shu looked down at the two small knives in her palm, warmed by her grip. The blades reflected the fluorescent tubes on the ceiling, shining like two slender, cold white crescents.

She didn’t cry.

She just leaned against the door and slowly squatted down, resting her forehead against her cold knees.

The Purple Strap was still tightly wrapped around her left arm, but now it felt as heavy as lead.

In all her years as an assassin, Ran Shu had never known she could make such frequent and amateurish mistakes.

This was more than the sum of all the accidents in her missions over the past five years.

And she knew better than anyone what mistakes of this level meant in a real assassination field.

If she were facing not Su Bai, but any of the politicians or tycoons she had hunted in the past, her corpse would already be lying on some cold autopsy table in a foreign land, becoming nothing more than an unclaimed death report.