Kindling on a Lonely Island

I am Chen Muyun, the youngest interpreter at the Japanese military's Xuxi headquarters in Shanghai, with a bright future ahead of me.

I am also the Military Statistics Bureau's ace agent, code-named “Nightingale,” the deepest-buried blade of all.

Every day, I smile as I translate the Japanese orders for slaughter. Then, when I turn away, I carve tombstones for my countrymen in my heart.

Everyone calls me a traitor, including my daughter in her hospital bed and my wife, whose heart grows colder by the day.

Then my handler is electrocuted to death right in front of me. My contact can't endure the torture and tremblingly points in my direction.

Two top-secret lists are placed before me at once: one is the Japanese army's purge plan, with my wife and daughter's names on it; the other lists twenty-eight nationally treasured scholars I must get out.

And Kagesa, the Japanese spy chief, more cunning than a fox, is already smiling as he presses a gun against my lower back.

“Mr. Chen, guess who's going to be the next ghost among us?”

With a gun at my back, I respectfully light his cigarette, while in my palm I clutch the fuse that could blow up Shanghai's entire intelligence network.

This is a wager I'm bound to lose.

I stake my life, my dignity, and the hatred of the person I love, all so that before dawn...

I can get the flame safely across on a ship that will never make it to shore.

(High-stakes from beginning to end, this story focuses on psychological warfare and the choices people make under the pressure of deep cover. Every page walks the edge of exposure!)