My Heart Is Not a Stone

Dao | An intern police officer from a family of practitioners X a cool-headed captain with strong boundaries

Author's note: I've been sick and the medication has affected my thinking a little, so please excuse any problems with my writing (bows). I'll finish this novel before summer vacation ends.

[Please Note]

The early chapters contain some traditional cultural elements. The leads are not each other's firsts, and Captain Wen has had a girlfriend before. One of the leads has a psychological disorder.

When Wen Yu was cornered and had already prepared herself to make the ultimate sacrifice, a young woman rushed over with a mop handle wrapped in electrical tape and brought it down hard on the attacker's head. His eyes went starry on the spot.

"This is an arrest in progress. Kid, get out of here."

An Yong Sui held a stick in one hand and made a sword-finger sign with the other. She glanced back and added, "Could it be that I'm a detective too?"

The girl looked barely old enough to have graduated. In her police uniform, she looked like a child who'd put on an adult's clothes. Wen Yu pressed a hand to her wound and closed her eyes, waiting for help. Before help arrived, a small, soft hand reached her.

An Yong Sui had been on the job for a month. Old Zhou from the squad couldn't stand watching her anymore and found her. "Xiao An, you carry that stick around all day like Sun Wukong. It's not very professional. Even Uncle Zhao at the gate has standard-issue gear."

An Yong Sui spread her hands helplessly. She'd applied for it already, but the higher-ups wouldn't approve it. Besides, Captain Wen didn't have any, either.

Old Zhou looked troubled. "She has her reasons. But that stick of yours..."

The twenty-four-year-old rookie, fresh out of police academy, was actually the granddaughter of Qing Weizi, the person who controlled half of Bailin Harbor in the sixties and seventies.

Wen Yu was speechless. The reason An Yong Sui wasn't allowed to carry equipment was that, during the martial arts competition, she'd used the Sixteenth Form of Military Boxing combined with the mountain-patrol staff techniques of Qingwei Temple. The judges had no idea how to score her, because the test standards had no category for "combined use of Taoist martial arts and traditional military boxing."

"Where'd you get the mop handle?"

"Thirty-nine yuan at the supermarket downstairs, and four yuan for a roll of tape."

Wen checked the receipts. "I can reimburse you for the electrical tape. The rest is on you."

Wen Yu would never have believed she'd get involved with a "remarkable woman" who could hold a knife in her teeth and climb trees to pick apricots. Until one night, when a panic attack made her accidentally dial An Yong Sui's number. In the middle of the night, the girl raced over on her little electric scooter, picked the lock on Wen Yu's door, and got her medication into her mouth.

When Wen Yu opened her eyes again, An Yong Sui was sitting there, covered in bruises and nodding off, still clutching her mop handle. She'd rushed over too fast the night before and been hit by a Porsche running a red light, sending her flying several meters. Her little scooter had met its glorious end.

"I'll reimburse you. I'll buy you a new scooter. Stay at my place."

Author: I'm really not very good at writing crime investigation stories. If you want cases with tightly woven logic and pacing, I'm afraid I may not be able to deliver, sorry. Orz.

Theme: My heart is not a stone, it cannot be turned. My heart is not a mat, it cannot be rolled up.