contemporary romance
Chen Simu sat on the sofa as he watched the daily news. "My goodness, can you believe how many people have joined this craze of hunting the Musi clan? Someone's even developed a device for testing for Musi blood! Wait a moment, this device looks surprisingly familiar..."
He shouted toward the kitchen, "Lily, why does this device look like the virus scanner you used on me yesterday?!"
"What? Oh, what I used on you was the Musi blood-testing device."
"What?!"
The beautiful girl draped in an apron walked out with a platter of food. She couldn't help laughing. "I borrowed it from a friend for fun."
Chen Simu frowned, feeling that something was wrong. The beautiful girl in front of him was heralded as one of the beauties of their campus, and she had only recently become his girlfriend. He had admired her for a very long time, and although she had rejected him whenever he confessed, she suddenly accepted him a few days ago, and she even agreed to move in with him. Chen Simu felt as though he was about to reach the pinnacle of student life.
"What did the test reveal?" he couldn't help asking.
Lily placed the food in front of him and smiled mysteriously. "Guess."
Chen Simu didn't have to. His parents loved and cared for each other, and he knew his ancestry quite well. How could he have anything to do with the once-majestic Musi clan?
Nevertheless, he replied, "Lily, if I really were a member of the Musi clan, would you chop off my head?"
Lily smiled, a beatific expression on her face. "Of course I would!"
"In that case, what should I do? I've brought you right to my house!"
"Does that make you unhappy?"
"Oh, no, I'm very happy!"
Lily smiled even wider as she went back into the kitchen to prepare more food.
.
Chen Simu continued looking at the news. "What? Our planet's decided that the hunters of the Musi clan aren't to be considered human beings, so killing them won't result in legal punishment... that's far too cruel!"
In the kitchen, Lily replied placidly, "Believe me, our planet won't be the first or the last one to do so. The moment the champion of the Void Cup announced his bounty, the Musi clan was done for. I even heard that, a few days ago, an organization wanted to designate the Musi clan as a critically endangered species, but the head of that organization was assassinated the day he made that announcement—and that was that!"
Chen Simu sighed as he glanced at the ceiling. "Lily, when do you think we might be able to encounter a member of the Musi clan? Killing one would be sufficient to pay your tuition, and if there were more, we could even get a big mansion on a better planet!"
"There's no need to daydream. Come, wash your hands and let's have dinner."
As Chen Simu walked into the kitchen and smelled the mouthwatering dishes, he murmured in bliss, "It's so fragrant! Lily, I can't believe you're such a talented cook as well."
Lily pointed at one particular dish. "Quick, try some of this. I've prepared each of these specially for you!"
Chen Simu had a bite, then asked, "Lily, just what did you add to this to make it taste so good?"
"Guess."
Upon failing to guess the secret ingredient a few times, Lily had him taste a few more mouthfuls. In the end, Chen Simu gave up. "I can't tell."
Lily leaned over and whispered in Chen Simu's ear, "Actually, I added a sleeping pill inside."
Chen Simu's eyes widened. "What? Surely you must be joking, Lily..."
"Chen Simu, didn't you say that you loved me? That you were willing to die for me?"
Lily pulled out a cleaver from underneath the table, causing Chen Simu's eyes to bulge in fear. "Lily, w-what are you planning on doing?"
"Didn't you want to encounter a member of the Musi clan?" Lily's smile gradually turned horrifying. "He was right by our sides all along, because... you're from the Musi clan."
"That's impossible, impossible!" Chen Simu scrambled up and tried to flee, but he found that his limbs were almost completely paralyzed.
"Don't struggle futilely. I added quite a number of drugs in this food, so you'll be paralyzed for quite some time."
Chen Simu shouted urgently, "Lily, Lily! Believe me, I'm really not a member of the Musi clan. My surname's Chen!"
"Remember how I used the Musi blood-testing device on you? Its false positive rate is negligible."
"Could the result have been—"
Lily smiled. "To be frank, I'm a bit surprised myself. I can't believe that you were actually a bastard son of the Musi clan—or, well, perhaps it's to be expected."
"That's impossible! I'm not a member of the Musi clan, surely not!"
Lily countered, "Don't you think it strange? Your mother doesn't have to work, but there's always money in your bank account. And what of your name? When I heard about this from your friend, I suspected that you were someone's bastard son—and it turns out that I was right!"
By this time, Chen Simu had been entirely paralyzed by the poison. "Y-You've never loved me? You only got close to me because you thought I was part of the Musi clan?"
Lily rolled her eyes at him. "Love? What's there to love about you? You were nothing but a loser, but now, you're a moving vault of gold! Well, then, I hope you enjoyed your last few days with me, my darling gold vault," Lily crooned, then chopped his head off with her meat cleaver. The fountaining blood stained her pale hands red, but she didn't stop what she was doing.
Chen Simu's encounter wasn't unique; similar situations were playing out all throughout the Milky Way.
It seemed likely that the Musi clan would go extinct within half a month—and all this had been caused by one single bounty and vials of Potion #1. The impact of the bounty shocked the world federation.
The Musi clan was a massive conglomerate that had taken over multiple planets, but it had collapsed in a matter of days. Except for the clan head and several other powerful members of the clan, who were isolated in secluded cultivation somewhere in the third realm, the clan had almost died out entirely.
No matter where they hid, it seemed that someone was always able to find them. Those hiding in the dimensional world found that their locations had somehow been divulged; those hiding in the real world found their houses broken into.
The Musi clan had, overnight, turned into Public Enemy #1. The members of the Musi clan, no matter how they hid, found one confluent fate waiting for them: beheadment.
done.co