Illusion Report

"...Yes, right in the alley behind 310 Juan Road. That’s right, I heard several gunshots — it sounds like someone may have been killed. Please send officers immediately."

"Sir, could I get your name—"

Brianna hung up.

After leaving Between the Backlight, she had sprinted the whole way, her heart hammering and her breath ragged — she’d been forcing herself to breathe steadily so the dispatcher wouldn’t get suspicious, and only now that she’d hung up could she finally gasp for air.

She’d barely caught her breath when 911 called back, right on cue.

Brianna didn’t even glance at the screen. She dismissed the call, then stopped dead in front of a glass push door blazing with light.

She had never noticed before just how bright the lights inside a Wendy’s were — bright enough to make you feel completely exposed.

Through the glass, Brianna peered inside.

At two or three in the morning, the fast food restaurant was nearly deserted. A homeless man was slumped over a table in the corner, and there wasn’t a single employee visible behind the counter — the night shift staff had probably snuck off to rest while things were quiet.

She glanced back. The dark street behind her was clear, at least for now. No one in pursuit.

Chaisi had forgotten about her — but the people around him hadn’t.

The image of a chestnut-haired girl surfaced in her mind. Brianna shoved it back down.

That thing called Han Liuyue — a resident, probably — was always shifting allegiances, ready to side with whoever made the better offer. Brianna had half-expected her to turn around and sell her out without a second thought.

If Han Liuyue had betrayed her immediately, things would’ve gotten very messy. But as it turned out, that creature — whatever she was — had actually bought her some time by stalling Chaisi.

Which meant Chaisi and his group were still somewhere near the crime scene. If not now, when?

She had no idea whether the police would arrive in time, but she needed to throw as many obstacles in Chaisi’s path as possible.

Still, Han Liuyue could only hold him for so long — Chaisi had almost certainly figured out by now that he’d been played.

Which meant, starting right now, Brianna needed to think carefully.

Pete’s car keys were still on his body. Driving herself out was off the table, and standing on the curb waiting for a ride wasn’t an option either. The Kai Family had likely already thrown out a wide net. If she wanted to slip out of this area clean, she needed a route that her pursuers wouldn’t think to check.

...Like through a fast food restaurant.

Brianna eased the door open just a crack, slid sideways through the gap as quietly as she could, and slipped inside.

She walked up to the counter and stood there for a moment. Still no employee came out — which meant wherever the night shift worker was hiding, they couldn’t see her from there.

Good.

Brianna planted both hands on the countertop, hoisted herself up, swung her legs over, and dropped down on the other side into the kitchen.

The greasy, salty smell of frying oil and the char of beef patties hung thick and cloying in the air.

It was her first time ever setting foot behind the counter of a fast food restaurant. She had no idea where the back exit was. She looked around and tried a door that felt like it might lead out — wrong guess. It startled a middle-aged woman who’d been dozing inside, who shot to her feet with a jolt.

"Don’t be scared,"

Brianna flashed her a quick smile. "I’m not here to hurt you. Actually — oh, congratulations. You’re really lucky."

"...What?"

She realized she was still holding her phone and immediately raised it up. "I’m a content creator. I’m live right now. I have this show where I pick random people and ask them about their wishes — and then I give them money."

The tired, round brown face flickered with a mix of suspicion and barely-contained hope.

These days, all you had to say was that you were a content creator going live, and people would find it perfectly reasonable — even if you peeled off your own skin right there on the street.

"But... at this hour?" the employee asked.

"My followers voted on the time," Brianna said with a smile. "Do you have Venmo?"

That did it. The woman’s attention shifted instantly from anything suspicious to one single question: was she actually about to get paid?

It was something Brianna had never quite been able to understand — how the same number, the same amount of money, could carry such completely different weight for different people.

It was only a thousand dollars, and yet the woman kept staring at her phone, closing the app and opening it again, as if she was sure the money would vanish the moment she looked away.

"For real? That’s for me?" She covered her mouth. "My daughter’s due soon... there’s so much we need to pay for."

A thousand dollars. What was that going to cover?

"I’m glad it makes you happy — my followers will be happy too. I just have one thing to ask: please keep this between us. Don’t tell anyone I was here. You know how it is — some fans get a little intense, and they’ll track down the location from the stream."

Compared to excuses like a 3 AM livestream or obsessive fans, most people found it far harder to believe that a stranger would hand them money for no reason at all — so any explanation that came with the cash, however absurd, was enough to make it feel real.

The employee was nodding vigorously. Brianna asked, "Where’s the back door?"

"I’ll take you," the woman said right away.

But after pushing the door open and looking out at the street, Brianna didn’t move to leave.

She hadn’t gone through all this trouble just to find a different way out.

The layout behind the restaurant was about what she’d expected: a short stretch of road, doors shut tight on either side, open at both ends onto the main streets, with nowhere to hide.

If anyone was out searching for her, they’d sweep through once, see nothing, and probably not bother coming back.

So she couldn’t go out there yet.

"I’ll call a ride," Brianna said with a smile. "It’s raining out — I’ll wait in here for a bit."

"Of course," the employee said cheerfully. "Are you hungry? Want me to make you a combo?"

Brianna nodded. Once the woman had gone, she opened her phone and pulled up the contact information for Westley’s former security detail.

After Westley died, his widow had gone after the security team hard.

She’d said not only had they been negligent, but the bodyguard who’d gone missing — the one named Ivan — must have had something to hide, otherwise why would he disappear? She’d said all of this while dissolving into heaving sobs, barely able to hold herself together.

How much of that was genuine grief and how much was performance, Brianna couldn’t say.

The security company had naturally refused to accept that version of events. Things had gotten ugly for a while. As the executive assistant, Brianna had been forced to step in and mediate, taking on a mountain of work that shouldn’t have been hers in the first place — but her support for the security team had never wavered.

They hadn’t done anything wrong. Not a single thing.

Dad’s — Westley’s death couldn’t be laid at their feet, no matter how hard anyone tried.

Maybe that goodwill counted for something, because the team captain — the one they called Sister Mi — agreed to Brianna’s request without hesitation.

Even at a call that came out of nowhere at three in the morning, her response was crisp and immediate: "Copy that. I’ll send Dylan to pick you up right now."

"Have him wait outside. This number’s going to be unreachable soon." Brianna said.

The captain’s reply was two words: "Understood."

Brianna hung up, peeled off her phone case, shook out the SIM card ejector tool she kept tucked inside it, popped the SIM card out, bent it until it snapped, and dropped it in a nearby trash can.

Chaisi wouldn’t leave Pete’s phone untouched. And the last call Pete had received before he died had been from her.

Nobody really lives as though they might die at any moment — so Pete almost certainly hadn’t cleared his call history. She had to assume her number was already in Chaisi’s hands.

The Hunter Family Faction rarely had a need to track and locate phone numbers, and the Kai Family wouldn’t be able to pull it off on a moment’s notice either. Still, Brianna couldn’t afford to take any chances. The SIM card had to go — and she powered the phone down too.

Was there anything else on Pete’s phone that Chaisi might find?

Brianna thought back.

After the car arrived, she’d gone downstairs, opened the door, and gotten in. Pete had greeted her, started the engine, and reached up to tap something on his phone...

The map. Right.

Pete hadn’t seemed to know where Between the Backlight was, so he’d used navigation — and of course it had to be Google Maps, the kind that saves your route history.

Her pickup location tonight had almost certainly been logged. Chaisi might have already seen it.

The suite reserved for her on the top floor of the Westley Group headquarters — that was no longer an option.

***

"He won’t go back," Chaisi said, leaning back in his seat, eyes on Google Maps open on the big man’s phone. "That location is compromised. Anyone with half a brain would realize we could set up there and wait."

"So we look for another opportunity later?" Tian Xi asked. "Now that we have a name and an identity, he’s not going anywhere."

"No. He’s carrying an Illusion I need."

Chaisi spoke slowly, thinking as he went. "He’s focused on running right now — he hasn’t had a chance to stash it anywhere yet. Before he gets the chance to regroup...we move on him tonight."

***

She still had the Black Cube on her. With that dangling in front of him, Chaisi wasn’t going to let this go easily.

If she checked into some random hotel, it would be nearly impossible for Chaisi to fish her out of Blackmoor City. The city was too big.

And it wasn’t just hotels — restaurants, theaters, subway stations, internet cafes... Blackmoor City had no shortage of places open all night. As long as she could make it off the street without being caught, there was no end of places she could disappear into until morning.

***

"Have them pull up everything connected to Westley in this area. Just this section."

Chaisi zoomed out on the map and pointed to the upper portion where Blackmoor City sat. "The lower half — don’t worry about it for now."

Jin Xueli’s curiosity got the better of her. "Why not?"

"The Kai Family and Between the Backlight are both on this side, and so are we. That’s where we started."

Blackmoor City was divided into the main city and Central Bay Island, and where they currently were happened to sit in a pocket-shaped area at the bottom of the main city.

By instinct and by logic, a target on the run would head away from wherever their pursuers were likely to appear — as far away as possible. Green would almost certainly head out of the pocket toward the rest of the city. Central Bay Island was a real possibility too.

"Why would he even need to go to a Westley Family property?" Jin Xueli pressed. "If it were me, I’d just check into any hotel and you could search until sunrise and never find me."

Chaisi gave a quiet "mm."

***

"Where to?" Dylan turned his head and asked.

Brianna hesitated for just a moment.

"...Central Bay Island," she said. "The Westley Group has a building there."