Before Nanjing fell, the military intelligence service picked up Shen Aqi, a beggar girl by the Qinhuai River, from a pile of corpses.
She thought they'd saved her life. She never imagined they'd pulled her into a deadly web.
The military intelligence service wanted her as a weapon, the Japanese puppet regime wanted her to talk, and the underground Communist Party called her by a name she'd almost forgotten herself.
The man who'd picked her up off the street, Gu Chenzhou, never trusted her. He only said, "I'm not arresting you for now." He taught her to disguise herself, track people, and kill. She learned to make every face she wore seem real.
When Nanjing fell, the two lost contact. Everyone assumed she was dead.
Three years later in Shanghai, she was the most expensive hostess in the dance halls, the gentlest nurse in the hospital, and the most capable interpreter at the Japanese puppet regime's bureau. Gu Chenzhou reappeared under a new identity, ordered to arrest her.
She had a hundred identities she could use to escape, but only asked him:
"This time, are you going to arrest me?"
I really like this spy novel! The heroine has grown from a low-level beggar to a thousand-faced agent, and her character design is very novel. The tension between the love and confrontation between the male and female protagonists is particularly poignant. The background of the Republic of China has a strong sense of atmosphere. The multi-party forces are competing with each other. It is full of suspense. I am still catching up!