Chapter 1 — Fire Behind the Line

The sirens blared at two twenty in the morning, tearing apart the restless sleep of the entire fire station. Nguyen Thien Ly jumped up before the bell rang, her feet touched the cold cement floor while her brain had not yet fully woken up. It was a reflex trained for six years, an instinct that was more ingrained than fear: when the bell rang, the body had to move before the mind could ask why.

She rushed out of the break room, slipped her feet into the rubber boots placed next to the bed, and pulled her reflective orange protective suit over her shoulders in just a few seconds. The station corridor was brightly lit, the loud footsteps of the entire squad echoed throughout the rows of rooms. On the central notice board, red letters flashed: THANH LOI WOOD FACTORY — ROAD 7, TAY HOA TRACH INDUSTRIAL PARK — BIG FIRE.

"If the wood workshop burns down at this hour, it will be difficult to clean up." Ngo Bang Tam ran parallel to her, his voice completely awake even though just half a minute ago he was snoring in the next room. Bang Tam is the only person in the team who understands that Thien Ly doesn't need much explanation — they are the only two female firefighters of Fire Team No. 3, and their friendship has been forged through countless nights on duty like this.

"Dry wood, PU paint, solvents left in the workshop - the fire must be level three or higher." Thien Ly said as she put the oxygen tank on her back, feeling the familiar weight of nearly twenty pounds pressing down on her shoulders. "Have you called for backup yet?"

"Three vehicles, including a ladder truck." Captain Phan Van Dinh appeared at the garage door, his voice rang like a bronze bell, without any remaining drowsiness. Fifty-four years old, his hair is more than half gray, but he is still the first person at the garage when there is an alarm, his razor-sharp eyes scanning each team member to make sure no one is lacking equipment. "Thien Ly, Bang Tam, Manh Cuong got in car one with me. Tan followed in car two with the support team."

The fire truck roared out of the garage, sirens piercing the night of Hoa Trach city. Through the glass window, Thien Ly watched the dark rows of houses pass by, the yellow streetlights shining on the dew-wet road surface. This port city never really sleeps — cargo ships dock all night in the eastern port area, and the western industrial zone always has a few factories running night shifts. But at two o'clock in the morning, when a wood factory caught fire like this, a small question appeared in Thien Ly's mind, almost like a professional instinct: does the factory work overtime at night, or does it burn when no one is watching?

She brushed that question aside. It's not the right time. A fire awaits, and all speculation must give way to reflexes.

When the car turned onto Street 7, the whole sky in front was dyed a bright red orange, a billowing column of black smoke rose dozens of meters high, swirling in the headlights of the rescue vehicles that were present in front. Thanh Loi Wood Workshop is a row of corrugated iron houses about eight hundred square meters wide, three sides were on fire, the flames licked up to the roof, the sound of wood exploding was interspersed with the rumble of the corrugated iron roof collapsing piece by piece.

"Is anyone stuck?" Team leader Dinh shouted to the factory manager who was standing trembling behind the fence, his face pale, his head in his hands.

"There... there are two workers on duty overnight! They're in the back storage room, the main door is all burned out!" The man screamed, his voice completely lost.

Thien Ly did not wait for orders. She checked the factory floor plan in her head — this type of wood factory usually has an emergency exit on the side, near the raw material storage area. She quickly informed Captain Dinh via radio and then turned around with Ho Manh Cuong in that direction, dragging a roll of water cannon and a demolition ax.

The heat hit their masks as soon as they were ten meters away from the factory wall. Thien Ly clearly felt the intense heat through the thick fireproof jacket, sweat drenched her back in just a few seconds. The side door was locked from the inside with an iron bolt — an absurd detail for an emergency exit, but she didn't have time to wonder. She swung the demolition ax three times in a row, the sound of metal hitting wood rang out amid the roar of the fire, until the door burst open.

Black smoke billowed out like a cornered animal. Thien Ly crouched low, followed the wall, used a flashlight to penetrate the smoke to scan every corner. Visibility was almost zero, only flickering orange flames reflected through the thick layer of smoke.

"Is there anyone? Firefighters here!" She shouted loudly through the mask, her voice muffled but still loud enough.

A weak cough echoed from the corner of the storage room. Thien Ly quickly crawled towards it, her hands groping among the scattered wooden bales, until she encountered a body curled up under the desk. The worker was unconscious from smoke inhalation, and the second person was trying to shake his colleague, he himself was exhausted.

"Manh Cuong, I found them, two people, one unconscious!" She screamed into the walkie-talkie.

Without waiting for reinforcements, Thien Ly lifted the unconscious worker onto her shoulders in a rescue position, putting all her strength into her legs that were shaking from the weight of the oxygen tank plus the weight of an adult man. Manh Cuong rushed in immediately after, supporting the other person. The two of them helped each other stagger towards the side door as a corner of the roof above collapsed, sparks splashing like fireworks.

Once outside, fresh air rushed into my lungs like a slap to consciousness. The medical team was waiting and quickly placed oxygen masks on the two victims. Thien Ly knelt down on the asphalt, her chest still panting, but her eyes had already glanced at the side door she had just broken - that iron latch, bent by her force, was now lying on the ground. A small detail, someone will certainly explain that it was locked by the workers themselves to prevent theft at night. But there was something in the look of the latch, in the way it was so firmly placed for an escape route, that she couldn't help but notice.

The fire took nearly three hours to be completely controlled. As the sky began to dawn, the whole squad stood blankly looking at what was left of the Thanh Loi wood factory - a huge pile of ashes, the rafters burned black like the ribs of a giant dead animal. Team leader Dinh walked around the scene, his face pensive.

"Good job, Thien Ly." He patted her shoulder, his voice low. "But stop barging in alone like that. You make me look ten years older every time you report over the radio like that."

"I don't have time to wait, Uncle Dinh. If you're thirty seconds late, you'll lose a life." Thien Ly took off her mask, revealing her soot-stained face, her eyes still shining with the familiar fierceness.

Mr. Dinh sighed and said nothing more. He knew better than anyone else where that personality came from — from her deceased father, who was once the captain of this very fire brigade, and also rushed into the fire with an unshakable determination.

On the way back to the station, sitting in the car amidst the smell of smoke that covered her clothes, Thien Ly looked out the window, the first sunlight was dyeing the ancient roofs of the Dong Kieu neighborhood pink that the car was passing by. A row of decades-old two-story wooden houses, shops still hanging wooden signs with peeling paint, all were silent in the early morning light as if they had never known about the fire that had just burned down a corner of the city not far away.

There are three more days until the anniversary of her father's death.

Eight years. Eight years since the night the Vinh Thinh warehouse caught fire, eight years since she stood outside the blockade perimeter, eighteen years old, watching her father's teammates carry out a tarpaulin-covered body, and eight years since she read and reread the flimsy investigation conclusion, only three pages, concluding that her father — Nguyen Khai Binh, the most experienced team leader she had ever known — died because of "willingly returning to the scene against protocol" in a fire. due to electrical short circuit.

She never believed in those three pages. Not a single day in the past eight years.

Returning to the station, when her teammates took turns going to the bathroom to wash off the soot, Thien Ly lingered alone in the locker room, opened her personal locker, and took out a worn leather notebook. That's the notebook she started recording at the age of twenty, when she had enough professional knowledge to recognize unreasonable points in her father's fire records. She turned to the last page she had written, where it read in neat letters: "Unknown catalyst — characteristic burning smell, not like a normal electrical short circuit. Witness: no one was fully questioned."

She picked up the pen and wrote a new line below, her hands shaking slightly: "Thanh Loi wood workshop - the secondary emergency exit is locked from the inside with an iron bolt, unusual. Need to check again."

Closing the notebook, she sat quietly for a moment, listening to the sound of running water from the bathroom next door, and the tired but relieved laughter of her teammates after a long night. That's the sound she loves most in this profession — the sound of people who have just crossed the boundary between life and death together, returning intact. Her father didn't have it on his last night.

Outside the dressing room window, the sun had risen higher, shining its first rays onto the fire station yard, where the red fire truck still smelled of smoke, waiting to be washed and ready for the next sortie. Thien Ly stood up, closed the notebook in the drawer, and locked it carefully. She had three more days to mentally prepare for the anniversary of her father's death, but this city, she felt very clearly, seemed to be preparing for something much bigger than a single lumberyard fire.

She did not know that, just a few days later, the fire would find its way to the heart of Dong Kieu old town - where her mother still sold fabric every morning, where her childhood grew up amid the noise of sales and the smell of rotting wood from hundred-year-old houses. And this time, the line between an accident and a deliberate conspiracy will be so blurred that no one, including her, can deny it anymore.