America: The Cremator

Su Long walked down the dimly lit stairs into the parking lot, eventually arriving at the Ford hearse that had been burned alive.

The car door opened, and a woman was sitting in the passenger seat; she seemed to have been waiting there for a long time.

Su Long was somewhat stunned.

Caucasians typically have striking and aggressive features, but her face possessed an unusual gentleness and softness: a rounded oval face and a small, pert nose, along with fair and full cheeks, reminded Su Long of the famous painting, "Girl with a Pearl Earring."

Unfortunately, the girl in front of him had short, neat black hair, and her clean, small earlobes had no earrings or even pierced ears.

However, on such a clean and pure face, her clear eyes were painted with dark smoky makeup, a style that clearly didn't suit her.

What's even stranger is that while typical smoky makeup usually comes with brightly colored lips, lip studs, and heavy foundation, she only had makeup on her eyes, which looked extremely incongruous.

Su Long leaned against the car door and asked, "Hey, you're the first girl I've ever seen get into a crematorium van."

The woman turned to look at him and asked in a flat tone, "Sir, didn't Supervisor Watkinson tell you that you have a new partner today?"

Su Long shrugged, got into the driver's seat, and slammed the car door shut with a bang: "He did tell me, but he didn't tell me it was a little girl who came."

The woman's eyebrows furrowed in displeasure behind her glasses: "Hey, you're not that much older than me, no need to pretend to be an old hand... I've probably done more jobs than you've eaten meals."

"Alright," Surong didn't argue with her. He casually placed the mission report on his lap and started the engine. "Have you received any job training?"

"No," the woman answered quite readily. "Supervisor Watkinson looked at my resume and said there was nothing he could teach me."

"He just gave me a set of equipment and told me to learn everything else from him."

"Oh my god, that Watkinson guy..." Surong muttered under his breath, then turned to her: "What's your name? What do you do? How did these people end up contacting you?"

"Hannah West, a temporary worker," she replied. "They didn't approach me; I came to them."

"Leon Sue, you can just call me Sue," Suelong asked while adjusting the rearview mirror, "Are you short of money? Why are you doing this job?"

Hannah nodded without any attempt to hide it: "Yes, I'm really short of money because I have to support myself and my brother through college, pay for food, rent, and the student loans that I'll never be able to pay off."

Su Long's fingers paused on the steering wheel: "You and your brother are both college students?"

"I'm a biology graduate student at the University of Seattle," Hannah pushed up her glasses and continued, "and my brother is studying economics at Yale."

Upon hearing this, Su Long let out a soft gasp: "Where are your families?"

"My parents died very early, and my brother and I were raised by a priest at St. James's Cathedral."

She calmly recounted her heartbreaking experience, and the atmosphere in the carriage became somewhat quiet for a moment.

Su Long stepped on the gas, and the vehicle slowly drove out of the parking lot.

"I don't care about your financial situation, and I don't care how many jobs you've had. If you want to work for me, you have to follow my instructions completely."

"In the business of collecting corpses, people can die if you're not careful."

After saying that, his gaze fell on Hannah fiddling with the protective mask behind the seat, and he reminded her, "Do you know how to use this thing? You have to make sure it's airtight when you wear it. There was a newbie who didn't do this step properly before and inhaled highly putrefied corpse gas. The consequences were terrible."

"I know how to use it," Hannah replied without looking up. "My research group often goes out to collect corpses, and I've even smelled the stench of death. It's not as scary as you say, is it? Are you trying to scare me?"

Upon hearing this, Su Long shrugged: "That guy had a lung infection, developed scurvy, and was taken to a hospital not on the insurance list after he collapsed."

"That hospital not only failed to cure his lungs, but also billed him $53."

Hannah stopped fiddling with her mask. "Okay, that's horrible."

Su Long smoothly drove the car onto the main road, then pointed to the glove box in front of her.

"Here's a handgun for self-defense. It's public property of the Department of Corpses. If you lose it, it will be deducted from your salary."

Hannah opened the glove box and took out a black Glock pistol.

The next second, Su Long heard a series of crisp and dense sounds of machine parts rubbing together.

He turned his head and saw Hannah disassembling the pistol into a pile of parts with dazzling speed, and then reassembling them back together with the same speed, the whole process flowing smoothly.

Su Long's eyebrows involuntarily twitched: "You know a lot about guns?"

"I work part-time as a receptionist at the Yurievich family's gun shop," Hannah said, slamming the last magazine into her grip and expertly cocking it. "The weapons in the shop are much more advanced than this. Those Russians can even resell .50 caliber heavy machine guns all the way to Washington."

Su Long cleared his throat, forcibly steer the conversation back to his familiar territory: "If you know about guns, that would be great. Now you just need to learn how to muster the courage to shoot at the eerie creature."

"The front of the magazine holds seven Luger rounds, and the back five are silver-plated bullets. If you encounter something strange, just fire the bullets at it until they're all gone, and the silver plating will have some effect."

"If it doesn't work, we'll have to give up."

Hannah did as instructed, ejecting the magazine and popping out the brass Luger bullet. Looking at the thin silver plating on the bullet head, she showed a hint of disdain: "The bullets you have here are really bad."

"When I was working part-time for the Federal Bureau of Odds and Paranormal Activities, the weapon they issued me for self-defense was an FN57, and the bullets they issued were all made of pure silver."

"Hannah, just how many part-time jobs have you done?" Surong felt his temples throbbing. "If you hadn't changed jobs so frequently, you probably would have saved enough money by now."

"I didn't change jobs," Hannah said, looking at him with a puzzled expression. "I did all these part-time jobs at the same time."

Su Long nearly slammed on the gas instead of the brake: "You mean you're working as a sales assistant in a gangster's gun shop, a temporary worker at the Federal Bureau of Paranormal Investigations, and also coming to our Bureau of Corpses to burn corpses?"

"One person receiving three salaries, is that right?"

"You haven't even counted my salary as a nun at St. James's Cathedral and my salary as a research assistant to my advisor," Hannah added. "It should be five jobs."

Su Long fell silent.

He looked at the pretty young girl beside him and was momentarily speechless. His gaze eventually fell on her heavy, somewhat eerie eye makeup.

Not right.

"So... that's not smoky makeup, it's dark circles under your eyes?"

"What is smoky makeup?" Hannah asked blankly.

"It's alright," Surong refocused his attention on the road ahead. "I now acknowledge your abilities. Watkinson's judgment was correct; you do indeed have the skill to directly handle corpse collection."

"However, our task today is not simple. I hope you can use the knowledge and skills you've accumulated from your other four jobs and not let us down at this crucial moment."

Hannah casually stuffed the Glock 19 into the large pocket of her hoodie, then leaned over Sulong and looked at the task sheet he had casually placed on his lap.

The strange and awkward position made Surong shift his buttocks uncomfortably.

"Hey Su, do you want to earn some extra money?"

"If I come across a corpse with a particularly peculiar death, I can contact my mentor. He'll offer a high price to buy it, and we'll split the profits fifty-fifty, how about that?"

Surong shook his head expressionlessly: "I'm not interested in money."

"Creating corpses is more important to me."

"To send those miserable people to the afterlife, to let the flames purify their sins and uphold their dignity, that is what I should do."

"I call it... integrity!"