12th January, late afternoon.
Just moments after Wang Xiao stepped out of the villa and vanished into the thin winter mist, a light mist had settled over the neighbourhood like a dull silver veil.
Bare branches rattled quietly over the roofs, and every breath condensed into pale clouds.
Ten minutes down the road from the villa, beneath a streetlamp casting a hazy golden cone of light, three figures stood frozen.
Their faces were tense, yet soft with relief.
A strange mix of melancholy and hesitant happiness.
The woman in the center stood out immediately.
Curvy frame wrapped in a neat beige coat, long dark hair cascading in lush waves down her back, her posture elegant despite the cold. Her face carried surprise, disbelief… and something like longing.
It was Lin Xue.
Over forty now. A woman who had spent nearly a decade behind bars.
And yet, after a bath, clean clothes, and the silver jewelry Zhang Sisi had lent her…
she looked nothing like a former inmate.
