Huan Zixu’s wording had been obscure, but Cen Xiao instinctively felt that something was wrong. He had only dared to come visit Zhen Li and You Zhengping because he had heard Lian Yufan say that Yuan Luori’s glasses definitely wouldn’t fall off. Hearing that Huan Zixu wanted Yuan Luori to check something for him, he immediately leapt up and said, “Since you’re all busy, I’ll get out of the way. I’ll be going.” 

“Officer Cen?” Zhen Li was perplexed. “Are you in such a hurry to go? I wanted to invite you for dinner tonight.” 

Lately he had received a lot of material assistance from Cen Xiao. He had wanted all along to treat Cen Xiao to dinner, but last time he had saved up some money, it had gone to buying Yu Hua the luxury Maldives tickets. Now he had finally gotten a bit of a bonus. After decorating, there was still some left, just right for treating Officer Cen in return. 

“We’ll do it another day.” Instinct told Cen Xiao that if he didn’t leave now, there would be a big problem. He dropped a line and took to his heels. 

Seeing him look faintly rushed, Huan Zixu frowned suspiciously, suddenly remembering that this person was You Zhengping’s comrade in arms. 

The fleeing Cen Xiao had just run out of the livestream room when he bumped right into Yuan Luori, carrying the framed rules and regulations. Feng Kui was following behind Yuan Luori carrying an absurdly small hammer. 

“Running so fast?” Huan Zixu also walked out of the livestream room. Seeing Feng Kui right outside the door, he cried out, “Feng Kui, the glasses!” 

Feng Kui and Huan Zixu had cooperated with each other for hundreds of years. Listening to Huan Zixu’s instructions was Feng Kui’s instinct. Practically when Huan Zixu’s mouth had formed the words, before Feng Kui had heard his voice, his fingers rose. He tapped the air. Yuan Luori’s glasses, which were fixed to his head by an iron ring, fell off in response. 

Before he could react, Yuan Luori saw the brilliant, dazzling fireball at the top of Cen Xiao’s head. He was instantly stunned. The rules and regulations he was holding fell down. 

Luckily, there was a living being with sharp eyes and quick reflexes taking in the whole scene. Director Ha ran out of a corner like an arrow. Before the rules and regulations fell to the floor, it grabbed the edge of the frame with its teeth, preventing the frame from coming into contact with the ground. 

“What do you see?” asked Huan Zixu, who had been closely watching Yuan Luori’s micro expressions the whole time. 

Upon seeing this, Cen Xiao stopped running. He feebly let out a long breath. 

“I-I, I saw…”

Yuan Luori stammered and couldn’t get anything out. But the parrot that longed for freedom flew over with a flapping of its wings and said, “Fireball, big lightbulb!” 

Lian Yufan saw that there was no time to prevent this and shook his head. He stepped up to take the office rules and regulations from Director Ha. He glanced at it and saw that there were three rules written on it with a writing brush—

Rule 1, The company’s staff must strictly abide by the laws and regulations of this country;

Rule 2, They must not do anything that will harm the company or its staff;

Rule 3, Clever people may be victims of their own cleverness. 

He paid no attention to these rules. He tossed them aside and said to the blankly staring crowd, “This is a pretty big deal. Let’s report it to our superiors.” 

Hearing the parrot, Huan Zixu had at first thought that Cen Xiao was a fire type Destroyer. He had just been thinking there was one plain-looking guy among the Protectors who was also a fire type. Of course, that wasn’t important. The important thing was that if Cen Xiao was a Destroyer, why wasn’t Lian Yufan, as a captain, hurrying to capture him?

“Fireball?” Zhen Li looked at Cen Xiao suspiciously. He stared into his eyes for a while, then suddenly saw the light. “It’s you!” 

He hadn’t linked these two people together before. He hadn’t had a single thought in that direction. Now he was a bit suspicious. When he looked closely at his eyes, he really did see some resemblances. 

Cen Xiao nodded somewhat awkwardly. “It is me. I have my duty and had to maintain secrecy. I apologize.” 

“Oh. I was wondering why you would offer to take me home and ask me out to eat from time to time. I even thought…” 

“Thought what?” Cen Xiao asked. 

“It’s nothing, I thought you were a good, warm-hearted policeman looking after a university student who had gone into business.” Zhen Li blushed. “But it turns out you were monitoring me.” 

“There’s already Lian Yufan to monitor you. Why would they need me?” Cen Xiao explained, “It’s because we caught you and beat you up before, and you ignored all that to eat the poison bubbles for me at the amusement park. That’s why I wanted to invite you out.” 

Listening to their conversation, Huan Zixu gradually understood what was going on. He asked Yuan Luori, “So Cen Xiao is that absolutely unremarkable-looking fire type Protector?” 

“Yes.” Yuan Luori covered his eyes, resenting himself for being unable to wear contacts. If he could wear contact, he wouldn’t have caused such a big mess. 

Yuan Luori quickly thought, if he could see anything at all, it meant that Yu Hua wasn’t at the office. It was still all right, it should…

Wait! If Cen Xiao was a Protector, then what about You Zhengping, who had apparently grown up with him, and who worked in the same auxiliary police squad? 

Having thought this through, Yuan Luori was so scared he bit his finger. His teeth chattered incessantly. 

Huan Zixu and Zhen Li realized this point at the same time he did. They said simultaneously, “He’s a Protector, so his captain You Zhengping is…” 

Lian Yufan, just about to call to report to Director Xiao: “…” 

He punched the wall and looked hatefully at Yuan Luori. “Can’t you weld those glasses on?” 

“And you’re still going to tell me that Yu Hua isn’t a Protector?” Huan Zixu said, looking at Lian Yufan. 

When Huan Zixu had just joined the studio, he had guessed that Yu Hua was a high level Protector. He had gotten a negative response from Lian Yufan then and was now bringing it up again. Lian Yufan couldn’t resist rolling his eyes up towards the ceiling. “He really isn’t.” 

“But…” Huan Zixu tilted his head. He kept thinking that with just one more thing, just more tiny little thing, he would understand everything. But it seemed that he could never reach just that thing. 

“Why do you keep getting things wrong today?” Lian Yufan asked, looking pained. 

As he spoke, his eyes inadvertently fell on the rules and regulations propped against the wall. Lian Yufan miraculously ignored the chaos of people around him and picked up the little glass frame. His gaze swept over the three rules. 

Clever people may be victims of their own cleverness. Lian Yufan looked at Huan Zixu. He looked at the writing. A spark flashed through his mind, but he couldn’t seem to catch that light. 

Lian Yufan had a feeling that even if he reached out to grab it, that light would still slip between his fingers. 

“Where’s Yu Hua?” Lian Yufan suddenly thought of the man who was at the center of this controversy but wasn’t on the scene. 

Yuan Luori said, “He just gave me two sets of rules and regulations and told me and Feng Kui to hang them in the hallways. I don’t know where he’s gone now.” 

“Where’s You Zhengping? We’ve been making such a fuss. Where did he go?” Huan Zixu asked. 

They all looked at each other. No one knew where the two of them had gone. 

Without discussion, they all ran upstairs. Yu Hua’s office door was wide open. There was no one inside. Five folders were neatly arranged on the desk. 

On the folders were written the names of Zhen Li, Yuan Luori, Director Ha, Huan Zixu, and Feng Kui. There wasn’t one for Lian Yufan. 

Everyone took the folder with their name on it. Director Ha exerted itself to take its folder with its teeth. When they opened the folders, they found that they were empty. There was no writing in them. 

Everyone had a faint sense that it wasn’t that there wasn’t anything written there, it was that they couldn’t see the writing. 

It was unusually quiet inside the office. Just then, Lian Yufan and Cen Xiao’s communications devices vibrated. The two of them checked their messages. The top one read: The Source Project candidate has been determined. All Protectors and reserve duty Protectors in the Xuyang District report back to base immediately.

Now no one cared about the blank folders anymore. Cen Xiao said, “The power of the Source Project is so vast. Who can bear the gathered power of all the world’s Protectors?” 

Cen Xiao had a candidate in mind, and so did Lian Yufan. Their gazes met. Their expressions were equally complicated. 

They all put down the folders and quickly gathered downstairs. A special car quickly came to take them to the base. 

No one was in a mood to joke. The car was unusually silent. The armed car galloped the whole way. Soon they were at the base. At the door to the conference room, they joined with Luo Huai and the other members of the two squads. You Zhengping wasn’t with the group. 

Lian Yufan knocked on the door of the conference room and said in a ringing voice, “Report—Protector Captains Lian Yufan and Luo Huai, Deputy Captain Cen Xiao, team members Zhen Li, Yuan Luori, Feng Kui, Xiao Ha, and eleven other squad members, as well as reserve duty Protector Huan Zixu are all assembled!” 

“Come in,” Director Xiao’s voice said from inside. 

Lian Yufan opened the door of the conference room first of all. He saw You Zhengping, wearing the handsome uncle mask, standing with his hands behind his back beside Director Xiao. 

“Sit down,” Director Xiao said to everyone. 

Everyone sat down in order, but You Zhengping remained standing. 

Apart from Feng Kui, all the studio’s members examined everyone’s faces and thought that none of them looked like You Zhengping. There was only that standing handsome uncle, and all of them instinctively thought that such a powerful Protector who held natural law power ought to be in his forties or fifties. He couldn’t be as young as You Zhengping. 

“Why aren’t you wearing your mask?” Director Xiao asked Cen Xiao. 

Cen Xiao stood. “I was careless and revealed my identity in front of Yuan Luori.” 

Director Xiao didn’t scold Cen Xiao. “When Yuan Luori’s special ability awakened, I knew that your identities couldn’t be hidden for long. Sit down.” 

Yuan Luori lowered his head, not daring to look at the handsome uncle Protector. This person’s power was too awful. The natural law power would hurt his eyes. 

Director Xiao said, “The leaders of Huaxia’s Protection Organization have spent several days in consultation with those of other countries. They had determined to restart the Source Project. Each country has gone through careful selection. Finally, they have determined that the Source Project candidate will be Captain You, You Zhengping.” 

Since Director Xiao was no longer planning to hide his identity, You Zhengping simply took off his mask and nodded to the members of the studio. 

Thump. Thump. Zhen Li and Yuan Luori slid to the ground. Cen Xiao wanted to pull them up, but it seemed that their knees were rooted to the floor. He couldn’t budge them. 

Yuan Luori’s parrot lay belly up on the table, loudly calling, “God! Take me away.” Then it closed its eyes and looked serene. 

Zhen Li, meanwhile, got out a knife. With tears covering his face, he said, “Do I still have time to disfigure my face?” 

“What are you two doing?” Director Xiao lost his temper with these two willful idiots. “I haven’t finished my announcement yet. Is You Zhengping’s identity such a shock to you? Get up!” 

The two of them had softened into piles of mud. No matter what, they couldn’t get up. Lian Yufan helped Cen Xiao prop them up and put them in chairs. 

“Director Xiao, You Zhengping is a captain who has always fought shoulder to shoulder with us. So is Yu Hua also a Protector?” Huan Zixu asked, not letting go. 

“He isn’t a Protector,” said Director Xiao. 

“But he…” 

Before Huan Zixu had voiced his suspicion, a boundless power suddenly descended from the heavens, pressing on each person’s chest. Everyone was instantly breathless. In front of this power, they couldn’t even lift a finger!