Illusion Report

He was meticulous, but this "first" hurdle was already impassable.

Mai Mingle lowered her eyes, her gaze falling to the hem of her shirt.

She had to do something. Words alone wouldn’t get her out of her current predicament.

Suppressing waves of anxiety, Mai Mingle gritted her teeth and said in a low voice, "Alright. Let’s confirm the first point, then."

The words had barely left her lips when she stuck her hands under the hem of her shirt, grabbed the fabric, and forcefully rolled it up. The shirt lifted to just below her chest, revealing a perfectly smooth, bare abdomen.

"W-wait a minute!" Fu Tailan jumped back as if someone had stepped on his foot, his eyes hastily averting. "You don’t have to undress now—Remy!"

"Huh?" The female Hunter, the one with all the studs, was taken aback.

"Take her somewhere and check her," Fu Tailan said, turning his head to stare at the floor.

"It would be awkward for me, too!"

As Mai Mingle lowered her shirt, she saw a flicker of embarrassment on Remy’s face. "Uh, I don’t mind, personally," Remy said quietly, "but I’m worried she might be upset about it later..."

In Mai Mingle’s eyes, these five were no different from kindergarteners. She herself felt not a single ripple of emotion. ’This is nothing.’

’Getting old isn’t scary. What’s scary is losing your mobility and, along with it, your dignity.’

’After her surgery, she had been hospitalized, unable to even get up to use the toilet. She could only lie there as nurses changed her adult diapers. In the hands of those young men and women, she often felt less like a person with shame and a right to privacy, and more like a piece of meat.’

As long as she could protect the Snake Belt and avoid returning to that state of decline and utter indignity, Mai Mingle was willing to take any risk—like baring her abdomen.

The Snake Belt was wrapped around her abdomen and back, coiling around her about two and a half times.

Even with the slender waist of her youth, something long enough to wrap around two and a half times was quite long. If anyone inspected her, it would be impossible to hide.

Mai Mingle wanted to give them the impression that she wasn’t afraid of being searched, hoping to lower their suspicions. Baring her stomach was the most difficult and riskiest move, but it was also the most natural—after all, most people start undressing from the top.

Even if the plan she was currently weighing in her mind didn’t succeed, planting the false impression that there was nothing on her abdomen would certainly be an advantage.

It sounded difficult, but in practice, it was far simpler than Mai Mingle had imagined.

She slipped her hands under the hem of her shirt, tucking the fabric in between the Snake Belt and her skin, essentially sheathing it. Gripping the Snake Belt through her shirt, she peeled the Illusion upward along with the fabric. When her abdomen was exposed, the Snake Belt was coiled tightly around her chest, pushed so close together that there were no gaps between its loops.

When she lowered her shirt, the Snake Belt used the momentum to slide back down to her abdomen, coiling itself neatly in place.

"If you’re not going to search me here, we can go to the changing room by the showers," Mai Mingle offered. "As for who does the searching, you can arrange it. I don’t mind, as long as it’s a woman."

"Then I’ll go get Longzhen," Remy started to say, but Fu Tailan cut her off.

"Wait a moment." He had regained his composure and gestured for the Hunters to take Mai Mingle. "You and Longzhen take her to the changing room," he said as they started walking out. "A Hunter must be present."

Everything was arranged quickly. Two minutes later, Mai Mingle was being escorted to the reception area, flanked by Remy on one side and Fu Tailan on the other. Longzhen was already waiting there, her expression sour, likely because Mai Mingle had deceived her.

Mai Mingle glanced at the young woman at the reception desk. The receptionist was just sitting there, only her face visible, staring blankly at her.

Mai Mingle had noticed it earlier, back when she borrowed and returned the comb from the receptionist.

Perhaps it was because the Morgan Family didn’t want blood-soaked Hunters walking through the office areas. The showers were separate from the offices, with the reception lobby in between.

The office area had restricted access; from the showers, you could only get as far as the reception desk.

When Mai Mingle had borrowed the comb from the receptionist, it wasn’t a case of seeking a distant solution when a closer one was available. From the showers, the only person she *could* have borrowed a comb from was the receptionist. After cleaning up, she also had to wait for the receptionist to lead her in to see Fu Tailan.

Conversely, to get to the showers from the office area, one had to pass through the reception lobby.

"You’re a pretty good actor," Longzhen’s tone was sharp, her earlier misjudgment in front of her boss clearly stinging. "Who the hell are you?"

"I’m just a passerby," Mai Mingle muttered.

"I’m armed," Longzhen warned. "You’d better let us search you without a fuss. Don’t try to pull any more stunts."

"I know."

Mai Mingle sighed and looked back to see Fu Tailan already seated on a sofa on the other side of the lobby. Her heart skipped a beat.

"Can I give the comb back to that young lady? She thought I was a vagrant at first, so she was afraid to take it back. She should be brave enough to take it now."

As she spoke, she started walking toward the reception desk. But Longzhen and Remy were on high alert; there was no way they’d let her just walk over there.

Sure enough, she had barely taken a step before Remy’s hand clamped down on her shoulder, the grip heavy and strong. "Don’t move," Remy snapped. "You’ll have plenty of time to return it after we’re done searching you."

"Let her take the comb out."

Fu Tailan, who had been watching her intently from where he was curled on the sofa, spoke up unexpectedly. "Let me see it. I’ll return it for her."

’Of course,’ she thought. ’Someone so meticulous would definitely suspect I’m using the return as a pretext to hide the Illusion at the front desk.’

Mai Mingle didn’t know if Hunters could identify an Illusion at a glance. But by common logic, no matter how experienced a Hunter was, there had to be times they weren’t certain. It was impossible for them to be right one hundred percent of the time, wasn’t it?

’Even currency detectors make mistakes, let alone the human eye.’

Besides, she didn’t need much time.

She only needed an instant. The instant their gazes shifted from her to the comb...

The reception lobby was an enclosed space with no windows. The only elevator required a keycard.

This was the Morgan Family’s territory. Three people were watching Mai Mingle, and two of them were Hunters.

Add to that her earlier, brazen display, acting as if she had nothing to hide and didn’t fear a search at all. With all these factors combined, Mai Mingle believed that as long as Hunters were still human, their attention would waver, just for that one instant.

Flanked by her two shadow-like Protectors, Mai Mingle walked to the sofa and handed the comb to Fu Tailan.

Fu Tailan sat on the sofa and reached out. As he took the comb, he also, for that same instant, took the attention of Remy and Longzhen.

It was just a miniscule shift of their gazes, but Mai Mingle caught it.

A person pushed to her limits could always unleash great potential.

No one would have expected that to escape, Mai Mingle would choose to run *toward* Fu Tailan. Without a sound, she suddenly stepped onto the sofa. In the same moment the others lifted their eyes from the comb, Mai Mingle was already vaulting over the sofa’s back, leaping straight toward the wall behind it.

Someone’s hand grabbed at her calf, a searing pain shooting through it.

They were fast, but still a step too late.

On the wall, the screen playing the Morgan & Morgan corporate promotional video had already gently opened a Path, swallowing her whole.