At a few minutes past seven, Chen Ningyun glanced at her watch and asked if Heifeng had plans for the evening. When he said he did not, she smiled and told him to come see the world of the gods. He asked where, and she told him Starroad Arena. She rose, calm and direct, and added that it was time to head to the lounge.
Heifeng hesitated, saying he was an outsider and it might be inconvenient. She brushed that aside. On the way, he finally put it together and blurted that she was the Black Widow of the circuit. Chen Ningyun's face did not change. Heifeng said Acheng would know, and she answered that Acheng had never told her. They were not that close, she said, and then told Heifeng to come along.
They walked into the club's rest area together. When Ningyun appeared, eyes followed her, some pointing, some whispering. Awe and a hint of fear flashed in more than a few looks. She did not waste words. When she worked, she said, she preferred not to talk much. Heifeng asked if the Ning family ran a car factory. Not yet, she said, perhaps in the future. She had her own company.
He pressed if that was also a carmaker. It was a part of the car, she said, something like brake systems. He circled what he cared about and asked if she planned to build complete cars. All true car people, she said softly, end up on the path to building whole vehicles. He wondered whether this was her father's business or her husband's. My father's, she said, and the man you mention is my ex-husband. He apologized. She told him it was fine.
Her teammates filtered back. They spoke to her in low voices. She nodded once. The warmup heats would end at six thirty, the main event would start at eight, and they needed to get ready. She asked suddenly if he could drive. He said he could. Then follow me, she replied. They left the lounge. Night had deepened outside.
Though Starroad Arena sat in the city, it had its own circuit carved behind the grandstands. Acheng pulled open the passenger door. Get in, he said. He asked if Miss Ningyun would be taking the start herself tonight. Go do your job, she told him, do not worry about me. He agreed. She told Heifeng that if he asked Acheng, he would know who she was. The engine fired, and they rolled out of the arena.
At the corner where the service road joined the track, she stamped on the throttle. The car bellowed, a sharp shriek cutting the air, and the speed leaped to one hundred in a heartbeat. Heifeng clutched the grab handle, not afraid exactly, but alert, braced against the sense that the car might sling him into the night.
The tail stepped as she clipped the apex. A long squeal seared across the pavement, and the car stopped as if struck by thunder. Heat soaked up from the front end. The brakes were near glowing.
A performance car, he asked. She said yes. A GTR, he asked. The chariot of gods, she answered. You modified it, he said. New-generation GTR, 3.8-liter V6 with direct injection, she recited. You are not supposed to do pulls on the course, he said. This is a warm-up, she answered. What did you do to it? He asked. Stage three ECU reflash, she said lightly, then a complete workflow pass to crush everything end to end. What else. Dynamic balancing, an adaptive differential matched anew, and the fiberglass interior stripped.
Saved a lot of weight, he said. Not only that. She had fitted lightweight suspension components and stiffer anti-roll bars. What else. A high-angle camshaft, lightweight intake valves, high-strength valve springs, a custom exhaust manifold, colder grade spark plugs in the intake tract, and OKD ignition modules with a reworked coil pack. You did not change the cylinders, he asked. That would make it no longer a 3.8-liter V6, she said. If I swapped in a whole VR38 race block, then it would be a tyrant on the track. How much power does yours make? He asked. A bit over a hundred horses, she said. He stared. You are kidding. She shook her head.
If you want to cross Shu roads, you want torque more than peak horsepower. Power figures do not win mountain passes; control does. Are you not skewing a bit far? He asked. Midnight forest runs need quiet, she said. An engine that shouts ruins how your eyes catch light and shadow in the dark. A woman racer, he ventured. Ask my old rivals, she replied.
They eased back through the infield gate and into the paddock. When they returned to the lounge, a man in a tailored suit with blade-sharp eyes came toward them, familiar with Ningyun at a glance. Has the Rain City grandmaster, the King of the East, Fujiwara Ichiro, arrived, he asked. So you heard, Ningyun said.
Their flight should land at eight, he said; they will reach Starroad by then. Break them, she said. Miss Ning, he cautioned. I said this would be the last time, she answered. I know, he said. The company affairs are wrapped up, and everything in Jingjiang is stable. Are you ready, she asked. I started remapping the course three days ago, he said. Bring the parts in, she told him. We are doing a full swap. Too many changes will trigger a ban, he said. Strip every non-stock part inside and outside the cars, she answered.
He nodded. In a real race, who could stand in front of me? With Miss Ning on track, he said, everyone else will lose their nerve.
She asked about factory cars. Hyundai, Genesis, Infiniti, Detroit Ford, which teams had he reached, and could they loan a chassis? He could not get through, he said. The Pearl East plants were all rushing orders these days; no one had pulled a car off the line. No hurry, Ningyun said. We will take the vehicle out of the city, run tests, and come back late. He agreed.
Only then did it sink in for Heifeng that tonight would not be a friendly show or a bit of social theater.
This would be a real fight. The heat in the brakes, the list of parts delivered without flash yet with purpose, the way she considered torque and silence, and the way light moves in trees at night, all of it told him she prepared for more than a street duel. This was a woman who had already decided the terms of battle. She would race where the course favored nerve and rhythm, where braking at the last inch mattered more than a dyno sheet, where the wrong note from an exhaust could make you miss the flicker of a shadow at the edge of your vision.
Even her talk of removing every add-on hinted at a purity she demanded. Either win on the merits of the machine and the driver, or do not race at all.
Heifeng kept thinking about the names. Rain City's grandmaster, the so-called King of the East, Fujiwara Ichiro, figures that sounded more like legends than rivals. If they were flying in for the main event, then the track would be loud with reputations and quiet with fear. He felt that none of Ningyun's followers looked at him as a guest anymore.
They weighed him now as someone she had invited into the circle. He heard the mechanics in the garage lanes lifting crates, the dry clack of ratchets, the dull thud of tires being rolled. Somewhere, a compressor spat air, and the tang of hot brake pads lingered like metal on the tongue.
They pulled out again, this time not for theatrics, but for the practical work of checking what mattered. Ningyun took the service road toward the edge of the city. She drove in a way that erased the gap between motion and intent, every input small, clean, patient.
When the car needed to speak, it did. When it needed to stay silent, it did that even better. No one watched them in the dark. There were no flashbulbs in the trees. The steering traced a line that would be there tomorrow even if the asphalt changed. There was no swagger in it. Only precision.
By the time they turned back, the arena lights had entirely swallowed the sky behind them. The city's pulse climbed toward eight. Somewhere above, a plane began to descend, and the night felt like a held breath. Heifeng looked at Ningyun and understood why people went quiet when she walked in. In a world of people who brag about power, she had built a car to see in the dark.
In a world of shouts, she had chosen to listen. And in a world of game nights and sponsorships, she treated this as a last time. He did not know whether that meant previous race or last promise, only that she meant it.