"Good morning sir,"  the woman said when she saw Ma Qianle had emerged from the bedroom.

Ma Qianle stood there blinking for a moment.  "You...you're Xiao Wu, right?  What are you doing in my apartment?"  He'd only seen the woman the previous evening, when it had already been dark, and it took him a moment to place her.

Xiao Wu grinned.  "That's right.  I'm here as a bodyguard."  

Ma Qianle raised an eyebrow.  "I have a bodyguard now?"  This was more than he wanted to deal with before breakfast.

"Well, strictly speaking, you have several,"  Xiao Wu replied.  "My brother and I are taking shifts in here, and there are a few more around the neighborhood."  Seeing the expression on Ma Qianle's face, Xiao Wu apologized.  "I'm sorry sir, it's Commander Luo's orders.  It's obvious someone is targeting Mortal Agents, so everyone nearby is being guarded.  You'll have to discuss it with him if you don't like it."

'Am I going to be followed around like some VIP now?'   Ma Qianle wondered.  'They can't intend to go to work with me, right?'  In the end, it was something he'd have to deal with later.  Right now, he was hungry.

He waved a hand dismissively.  "Don't worry about it.  I'm going to buy some breakfast."

Xiao Wu, seeing that her presence had, at least for the time being, been accepted, relaxed.  "Yes sir.  I'll come with you."

Ma Qianle grimaced at the form of address.  "Fine, fine.  But there's one thing.  Can you stop calling me sir?"

Xiao Wu looked a bit flustered.  "What else should I call you?  It would be inappropriate to call a superior by their name."

Ma Qianle hadn't realized there were people among the impermanents who were still this strict with hierarchy.  The rest of the Courts, certainly, but all of the impermanents he'd had close contact with so far had been more relaxed. He'd put up with the stiff, formal address when he was dealing with the court officials, but with someone who'd be hovering around him day and night it was just too uncomfortable.

"Wei Yaling calls me 'kid' as often as she uses my name.  I'm not so formal, I won't be offended."  

Xiao Wu fought with her discomfort momentarily.  "Then, would Agent Ma be alright?"

"I can accept that," Ma Qianle replied.  It wasn't much better, but at least it wasn't too different from how he interacted with colleagues from different departments at work.  A thought occurred to him.  "That's right — I don't know your full name.  I don't feel right just using a nickname."

"I'm Wu Shiyuan.  My brother is Wu Hansheng,"  she replied.

Dispute over names solved, Ma Qianle went back into the bedroom and struggled into some clothes.  Wu Shiyuan followed him as he headed downstairs.  A couple of neighbors greeted him as they passed, but didn't comment on Wu Shiyuan.  It was clear that she, like Wei Yaling typically did, was currently hiding her presence from the sight of mortals.  Not wanting to look like he was talking to thin air, Ma Qianle was content to remain silent.

When he got downstairs, he asked for two steamed buns, then looked questioningly at Wu Shiyuan, silently offering to buy for her.  She shook her head.  Ma Qianle reached for his phone to make the payment, before realizing that he didn't have it.  'That's right, what did Ruan Ye do with my stuff?'  He fished a bill from his wallet and paid in cash instead, then headed back up to his apartment.  

When he returned, he looked around, grumbling to himself in between munching on a bun.  It didn't take long to find the things he'd been wearing the previous night.  His tattered clothing had been folded neatly and placed in a pile just outside the bathroom, with his pouch and the contents of his pockets on top.  The talismans were there, seemingly miraculously clean despite having been soaked in blood the night before.  Of course, this was simply an innate property of the magic they held, protecting them from damage until they were activated.

Ma Qianle's phone wasn't so lucky.  The screen was spiderwebbed with cracks, and when he turned it over Ma Qianle saw there was a large dent on the back.  Hoping against hope, he plugged it in and tried to turn it on anyway.  Nothing happened.  He sighed.

'I suppose I should have expected this,' he thought to himself.  He'd been bitten, clawed, and tossed into walls and across floors last night.  Any cell phone that could survive that sort of abuse had the right to be called a magical artifact all on its own.  'The next one is staying in my pouch!'

He was just getting ready to go out to buy a new phone when there came a knock at the door.  Ma Qianle stood to answer it, but Wu Shiyuan stopped him.

"I'll get it, it could be dangerous,"  she said seriously, then went to the door to see who was there.

A moment later, Wei Yaling strode into the living room.  Unlike her usual attire, today she was wearing jeans and a blouse under a cozy sweater.  It was clothing you could see on any woman on the street on an average day this time of year.

"When did you start knocking again?" Ma Qianle asked, surprised both by Wei Yaling's dress and her manners.

When you were assigned guards under orders to attack anyone who enters without permission." Wei Yaling replied.  She didn't bother sitting down.  "Come on, we've got somewhere to be."

Ma Qianle frowned.  "I don't get a day off to recover after yesterday?"

"It's nothing difficult, we're going to the hospital," Wei Yaling said.  "Deng Xiuwen is awake."

Deng Xiuwen was the other Mortal Agent who had been injured by the members of the Xiong clan yesterday.  In truth, her injuries were actually less gruesome than Ma Qianle's own had been, but since she didn't have a supply of wound closing elixirs and she'd been brought to a mortal hospital, her recovery would be much slower.  She'd be given better medicines, but her recovery couldn't be so quick as to make the doctors suspicious.

Downstairs, Wei Yaling, who was clearly visible to others this time, hailed a cab.  She filled Ma Qianle in on what Xiong Yucheng had said on the way.

[Should we be talking about this in front of the cab driver?]  Ma Qianle sent to Wei Yaling via spell.

Wei Yaling laughed and replied out loud.  "There's a privacy spell.  The cab driver just hears us speaking a dialect he doesn't understand."

"Ah," Ma Qianle said.  "What happened to Xiong Yucheng after that?"

"You didn't ask Keeper Ruan?  He has a few properties around the area for when he needs to detain someone or do business with mortals."  Wei Yaling shifted in her seat, crossing her legs.  "We're guarding Xiong Yucheng at one of those until we get this case resolved."

Ma Qianle shook his head.  "I haven't seen him since last night.  Wu Shiyuan was the only one there when I woke up."

"Strange,"  Wei Yaling said, but refused to elaborate further on why.

Upon arriving at the hospital, Ma Qianle bought some fruit from an opportunistic vendor who'd set up nearby, and then the two of them went up to the visitor's desk.

"We're here to see Deng Xiuwen,"  Wei Yaling told the young woman manning the desk.  "We're her colleagues."

"One moment please,"  the woman said, then made a brief phone call.  After that was done, she took their names, then handed them each a visitor's badge.  "Go on up, she's in room 831."

Ma Qianle and Wei Yaling rode up in the elevator.  Upon reaching the ward, a nurse showed them where Deng Xiuwen's room was.  She was sharing it with another patient, who was currently sleeping.  After checking to make sure Deng Xiuwen didn't need anything, the nurse pulled the privacy curtain for them, then left.

Deng Xiuwen was, to all appearances, an ordinary middle aged country woman.  Her hair was beginning to turn grey, and the corners of her eyes crinkled into fish tails.  One arm was in a cast, and bruises could be seen around the edges of her hospital clothing.  An IV line ran to the back of her hand.  When Ma Qianle and Wei Yaling arrived, she had been watching the news.  The headline read "Mysterious mass disappearance near Dongqiu City".

"Aiya, 30 years as a Mortal Agent and never have I heard of one of us failing our duty so badly,"  she said.  She turned to her two visitors.  "You've come from the Mortal Realm Liaison Office?"

Wei Yaling summoned her tablet, and a moment later Ma Qianle did the same.  "I'm Impermanent Wei, and this is Ma Qianle, the Mortal Agent for Dongqiu City."

"Were you the ones who went to the village after I escaped last night?" Deng Xiuwen asked.  "What really happened?"

"It's a long story, I'm afraid,"  Wei Yaling said.  The important thing is that you weren't the only one attacked yesterday.  In the past 24 hours there have been two ghost practitioners from demon clans that have attacked Mortal Agents.  Both of them had one of the Zudang Jades, and both of them had contact with a powerful demon named Jiang Ci.  He may be from one of the Ancient Beast clans.

"No wonder…" Deng Xiuwen mused to herself. She looked at Ma Qianle.  "Young man, when I first met your predecessor, he told me a story.  I've told it to more than one newly appointed Mortal Agent, and now I'll tell it to you.  Listen carefully, because if those things Impermanent Wei said are true, it could mean life or death."