Zu Zhichong had just come back from the accounting office where he received his travel allowance for this season. Seeing that his chief was clearing the desk, he couldn"t help asking, "Chief, you are not working overtime today?"

Li Zong unscrewed the lid of his Thermos bottle. The smell of Chinese wolfberries and slices of ginseng instantly reminded him of what happened in the morning. His lips curved in a smile. Surprisingly, his tone of voice was not as cold as it usually was. "There"s some business I have to attend to, and I"ve got to go back early."

Zu Zhichong became even more curious. What kind of business could Li Zong have to attend to? If there had been any changes worth mentioning in his life recently, the presence of another man in his apartment would be the only one.

Zu Zhichong gave a cough. "Oh. Okay. Chief, has He Zheng made a decision? My sect-uncle is going to finish his closed-door cultivation soon. If he goes back to the sect with me to meet my sect-uncle and starts learning right away, he might be able to partic.i.p.ate in our department"s entrance test this year."

"I"ll ask him after I return."

On hearing this, Zu Zhichong gave a wicked grin, lifting his eyebrows and winking. "Chief, are you serious? I feel that you"ve become a typical married man."

"How so?"

"You"re different from single men like me! Uncommonly charming!" Zu Zhichong hurriedly said.

Tun Shanhai, who happened to be walking by, bluntly twisted his head around, gave a meow, and then commented in human language, "That "single" part is true. Hardly any men remain single at your age. I don"t see that there"s anything to be proud of in it."

"Ha. Tun Shanhai, seriously? You want to do this again?" Zu Zhichong rolled up his sleeves and hurled up to him. "You"ve been single for no shorter than me! If you say that again, I"ll have you castrated!"

Zu Zhichong touched a raw nerve of Tun Shanhai, which led to a fierce fight between them.

The office was unduly uproarious. When Li Zong was about to leave, Zhen Ni delivered some files to him, saying, "Chief, this is the background information we obtained a couple of days ago about those two men. One of them is a common white-collar worker, and the other is an entertainer who entered the industry not long ago. There"s nothing special about them.

I suspect that there"s indeed someone who has been manipulating common people with demonic Qi, forcing them to kill people so as to facilitate his or her cultivation. I looked into the archives of people living nearby and narrowed down the list to a couple of suspects. Han Zhuo has started investigating them."

With a somewhat serious expression on her face, Zhen Ni lowered her voice and said to Li Zong, "Chief, I suspect that this series of events might have something to do with those Demon"s Attendants."

Twenty years before, the Demon King came into the world. Meanwhile, a group of people dedicated to serving the Demon King sprang up, calling themselves Demon"s Attendant. They had caused SMB a lot of trouble.

Li Zong waved his hand, suggesting that he had known about this. "I"ll write a report and submit it to Mr Zhen. All right, everybody. Let"s call it a day. You may knock off."

Zhen Ni nodded. Zu Zhichong cheered. Everybody happily went off duty.

Before departure, Li Zong had called He Zheng to decide where they would meet. After coming off duty, Li Zong drove directly to the agreed place to pick him up.

At a red light, Li Zong put on the brakes. There was a jewelry store nearby with a signboard at the doorway. As if something had just occurred to him, when the traffic light turned green, Li Zong drove past the intersection, parked by the roadside and went into the jewelry store.

He Zheng was waiting in boredom at the side of the road. Originally, he had had no intention to go back to He family, but now he was sort of looking forward to returning to He family. After the red light was over, a black Hummer drove up and slowly stopped in front of him. Beside He Zheng stood a fair-complexioned man, who couldn"t even stand straight, as if some of his bones were missing due to some kind of congenital abnormalities. The man gave a languid wave of his hand and greeted the man sitting in the vehicle. "Hey. I"m Qin Huai. He Zheng"s bosom friend."

Li Zong slightly squinted his eyes and briefly appraised Qin Huai.

He Zheng rolled his eyes, pulled the door open and got in the vehicle. "Get lost. Get the job done and I"ll stand you a meal."

Qin Huai lifted his eyebrows and winked at He Zheng. "Sure, sure. Trust me. I got this."

Then he whistled to Li Zong. "Goodbye, brother-in-law!"

"Brother-in-law?"

"n.o.body has ever addressed me as such." Li Zong briefly raised his left eyebrow. He not only didn"t correct Qin Huai but also gave a nod, as if admitting that he was exactly whom Qin Huai thought he was. "Goodbye."

Having never expected that Li Zong would say goodbye to him in such a formal manner, Qin Huai was sent into a brief trance and then dissolved into wild laugh, but Li Zong"s off-road vehicle had already driven far away.

His chin rested on his hand, He Zheng unconsciously twisted his head aside, but his gaze was drawn to Li Zong. It was shortly after 6 p.m. Light of the setting sun came through the half-open car window and landed on Li Zong"s face, as if his face was plated with a layer of soft glow.

The contour of Li Zong"s chin was unduly sharp. His eyebrows were dashing, his eyes penetrating. And there was something apathetic about him, making people feel it difficult to bond with him, as if he were as hard to access as a n.o.ble and unsullied flower growing on the snowy top of a high mountain.

But the afterglow seemed to have dissolved his apathy, making him real and accessible but also more attractive than the afterglow. He Zheng was unable to withdraw his gaze.

He Zheng was picky and clean. Most of his friends were quite casual about s.e.x, but He Zheng, though seeming like a man of loose morals, still had his virginity. In most cases, he was just going through the motions. But Li Zong was different. Before meeting Li Zong, He Zheng had hated this name. However, after being acquainted with him, he found that Li Zong was exactly his type, both face-wise and body-wise.

A thought struck He Zheng and he abruptly asked, "What did you mean by "the third time"?"