Chapter 17: The Goddess of Fortune

Someone is out there!
And it is no ordinary person!
Moving fast and heavy-footed, the intruder only alerted Ember to their presence upon drawing close to the car wash, which indicated that their perception was equally remarkable, managing to cloak their own existence through an invisible contest of senses.
Could it be the perpetrator?
Ember's heart tightened. He swept everything from the hidden compartment into his inventory, then executed a series of agile leaps to quickly conceal himself in the back room. Once his agility reached four points, performing such maneuvers carried a touch of grace, making him as light as a swallow. Qiu Yinong, who had been searching for clues, saw Ember suddenly burst in. Just as confusion bloomed in her eyes, she saw him make a silencing gesture. The next moment, her slightly inferior perception also caught the sound of approaching footsteps, prompting her to immediately crouch down and huddle beside Ember.
"Should we make a move?" Qiu Yinong whispered into Ember's ear.
"Wait and see."
Before Ember was a frosted glass window. With a perception rating of only five points, it was impossible to see the external situation in the dim environment. He attempted to use the Eye of the Shadow Shroud to pierce through it, and through the judgment level granted by his seven points of perception, he vaguely discerned a hulking figure walking up to the entrance of the car wash. The figure abruptly stopped, scanned the surroundings, and roared in a fierce, irritable voice: "Slacking off again! Let's see how I deal with you when I get back!"
Hearing this, Ember and Qiu Yinong exchanged glances, instantly realizing that the newcomer was Jesse Pinkman, the chief of the Maple Leaf Police Department.
"What should we do?" Qiu Yinong asked with her expressive eyes, conveying the doubt in her heart.
Ember shook his head slightly, deciding to watch the developments unfold. His earlier discovery made him suspect there was much more to this case than met the eye, and the police chief might well be playing an unsavory role in it.
Jesse Pinkman did not notice anyone hiding inside the car wash. After cursing up a storm, he walked with an excessively heavy stride toward Walter White's private car. Slamming his palms heavily against the roof, he muttered to himself in a rather grave tone: "Where the hell did you kid go? No sign of you alive, no body found either—you've even made me too afraid to take your sugar mama's missing person report!"
Sure enough, there was something fishy going on!
Now, not to mention Ember, even Qiu Yinong could tell that Jesse Pinkman, the chief of police, was an old acquaintance of the missing Walter White. After the latter's disappearance, Pinkman had been concealing the truth from the citizens of Maple View while deploying the few police officers at his disposal to investigate the case. As for why he needed to cover up the crime, the reason was glaringly obvious: no one casually installs a secret compartment in their car for no reason. Even without a careful inspection, Ember knew the contents of that compartment were contraband. The police chief's next actions instantly verified his hypothesis.

"Where on earth did this kid hide the stash? I turned his company upside down and found nothing. If it's not in the car either, I'll just have to check his house!" Jesse Pinkman's voice sounded somewhat vexed. "Yet I've searched this car several times already. Do I really have to go to his place?"
The police chief began searching the body of the car, turning over every conceivable hiding spot, but to no avail. During the process, he also attempted to search underneath the vehicle, but due to his bulky frame, even lying flat on the ground was extremely difficult, and relying solely on eyesight revealed nothing out of the ordinary.
However, only the underside of the car remained unchecked. Previously, he had been constrained by caution; he dared not let his subordinates handle it, nor could he dismantle the car in front of others. If he acted too brazenly, let alone rescuing Walter White, he would implicate himself as well. Furthermore, he had always suspected that the primary focus of the search should be Walter White's company, leading him to overlook the possibility that the goods might be hidden beneath the vehicle.
Yet, after searching the company all day without success, he ultimately had no choice but to shift his focus to this car. Jesse Pinkman gripped the underside of the vehicle with both hands and muttered to himself: "You three skipping work actually plays right into my hands, saving me the trouble of wasting time to get rid of you... Up you go!!"
With a furious roar, Jesse Pinkman suddenly exerted force through both arms, his neck straining as veins bulged visibly. He actually flipped the sedan completely over in a single heave! He dusted off his hands, looked at the fully exposed undercarriage, and laughed heartily: "Should have done this long ago. You kid know my personality; there's a real chance you might have hidden the stash right here. Let me have a look... Huh? Haha! You actually modified the fuel tank, clever bastard! Wait... why is it empty?"
The police chief's bewildered query left Qiu Yinong equally surprised. She cast a glance at Ember and immediately saw a faint smile on his face, which instantly set her mind at ease. She thought to herself that it was fortunate Ember had discovered the crime scene; otherwise, lagging behind step by step, they would not only have failed to avoid the three police officers but would have missed out entirely on the hidden items in the compartment, invisibly reducing the difficulty of their mission.
"How could it be empty? This isn't the drop-off location! Could the robbers have taken both the man and the goods? But unless Walter told them, there's no way they could know about the cargo... Unless this kidnapping was orchestrated by the kid himself, how else can one explain these illogical events? The owner and employees of this car wash are dead to the last man, yet his corpse is nowhere to be seen, not even a drop of blood! But if he really engineered this himself, it makes even less sense—what could this car wash possibly contain that would warrant him resorting to such ruthless methods?"
Jesse Pinkman reasoned in a low voice as he righted the sedan. He gently pulled open the car door, rested his thick palm on the window frame, and seemed to unconsciously shake the door. However, his gaze was not wandering aimlessly; instead, it turned increasingly frigid as it locked onto the frosted glass of the back room.
"I can be certain the robbers must have had a reason to treat Walter White so specially. So... may I ask what your reason is?"
Rip!
Before his voice even faded, Jesse Pinkman's palm shifted from a push to a grab. His robust arm yanked fiercely, instantly tearing the car door right off its hinges! Then, he swept his arm in a circle, his abruptly tensed and knotted muscles expanding rapidly until the fabric of his right sleeve burst into ribbons of cloth. With that, the car door was hurled outward like a flying saucer!
The sudden change took both Ember and Qiu Yinong by surprise. The two of them had been engrossed in listening to the police chief's soliloquy, intending to gather more intelligence, never expecting that the man had detected their presence all along and had merely used words to lull them into a false sense of security while seizing the initiative!
Thus, they watched as the frosted glass before them was sliced through by the rapidly spinning car door. As the door continued its forward momentum, the frosted glass shattered violently, scattering fragments like a torrential downpour crashing down upon them. This sudden and formidable attack was truly deserving of the word "swift," leaving them with nowhere to dodge. Qiu Yinong only had time to close her eyes to protect her vital areas, while the more focused Ember could merely raise his palm in front of himself, attempting to block the unstoppable, spinning car door.
Humph!

Watching Ember's movement, Jesse Pinkman assumed he was merely indulging in a futile, desperate struggle. He had risen to the position of chief of the Maple Leaf Police Department purely on raw physical strength! Built like a grizzly bear, he had always preferred physical brawn to using firearms. Based on his past combat experience, he could already foresee the miserable fate awaiting these two sneaks.
However, if Jesse Pinkman's sudden strike had caught Ember and his companion completely off guard, the scene that unfolded next caught the police chief equally off guard. For the car door that had been spinning at high speed a moment ago suddenly stopped dead in Ember's hand, while his palm merely shifted backward by a fraction alongside his wrist, his arm remaining completely motionless!
This meant Ember's strength was at least on the same tier as his own. Facing an opponent of average build, Jesse Pinkman found it utterly incredible, and a sinking feeling formed in his chest as he realized he might have encountered an even thornier entity.
A reality bender?
Ember had no idea that while he was mentally labeling the police chief as a strength-based reality bender, his opponent was simultaneously misidentifying him as one as well. However, none of that mattered anymore. What mattered was that Ember knew his luck had exploded, allowing him to narrowly cheat death. In an instant, it was as if he had been blessed by the Goddess of Fortune, successfully passing an extremely low-probability strength check!
[Prompt: Maple Leaf Police Department Chief "Jesse Pinkman" utilized environmental elements to launch an attack against you. You take 53 points of direct damage!]
[Prompt: The target's strength rating is 13. The difference between your strength (9 + 2) and the target's does not exceed 20%, granting a certain probability of blocking.]
[Prompt: You will undergo a strength check. A natural number up to "13" will be randomly drawn. Only if the result equals "13" will you successfully block the secondary damage inflicted by the environmental element.]
[Prompt: The drawn result is "13". You have successfully blocked the secondary damage!]
Despite the car door stopping instantly in Ember's hand, his palm and wrist felt a burning sensation. Yet this pain could not overshadow the joy in his heart, as Ember had never expected that upon his very first collision after acquiring [Grappling Mastery], he would successfully leverage his strength bonuses to avoid the massive damage dealt by the secondary attack. Even more unexpected to him was that Jesse Pinkman, having mistaken him for a reality bender...
Fled.