Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation
Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
An hour later, the church was packed to the brim.
Old men and women from different towns greeted each other enthusiastically, happily discussing their sons and daughters working outstation, as well as the eggs they had bought yesterday.
There were free sunflowers seeds and fruits at the church, and everyone received three yellow cakes and a few bottles of mineral water too.
Amidst the buzz of voices, the curtains on top of the podium remained down.
Backstage, preparations were bustling along. The gospel band about to perform was currently determining their song list, and the young man in the corner was sprawled on the ground like a dead dog.
Huai Shi was deathly pale and extremely nauseous. He shuddered, again and again.
The piercing cold and overbearing weight were piling onto his back relentlessly.
This was his first time feeling such a terrifying weight of death… He did not dare to imagine how gruesome a death awaited him if the early premonition alone was already this heavy.
“Blergh!”
He bent over the bucket and threw up all the white wheat buns and braised meat he had earlier stuffed into his stomach. He was this close to vomiting tears and snot as well.
He was really starting to hate this peculiar skill of his.
Still, his death was already this close, but Huai Shi was unexpectedly unafraid. He just felt nauseous, as though he had eaten something spoiled.
His gut felt so bloated.
Wiping away his tears, he pulled the old pipa player’s arm. “Sir, if I die backstage, does that count as an occupational injury…?”
The old man took quite a few steps away from him, looking extremely wary.
“Don’t try and accuse us of nothin’, kiddo. You were perfectly fine before eating… I’ll have you know I’m experienced with these things, and if this were a few years ago, we might be arguing it out over our bumpers! If you try anything funny, I’ll lie down right now and accuse you of hitting me. Wanna give it a try?”
“That’s right, that’s right!” The old suona player next to them concurred. “I’ll be your witness. I clearly saw this young kiddo starting a fight for no reason…”
Huai Shi was almost impressed.
Where the f*ck did these crafty old fogeys come from? They were experts at staging crashes!
“Alright, alright, get ready!” shouted another leader, walking over to them. He pointed to Huai Shi and yelled, “Can you still play? If you don’t, we won’t pay you! Young people these days have no conscience to speak of.”
“I can play, I can play.”
Huai Shi picked up the erhu with tears in his eyes. “Where’s the sheet music?”
“We don’t need no sheet music. There isn’t enough time, so our show got canceled. Now we just gotta play some accompaniment for the church errenzhuan folk dance, so just follow the beat and liven it up a bit.”
The old man waved his hand, muttering, “Giving you forty bucks was such a waste. If I’d known, I’d have given you twenty.”
Huai Shi was speechless.
No sooner than he had sat down in the front stage with the old men, he heard someone announce from the stage, “Next, brothers and sisters, please enjoy this religious Yangge folk music performance by the Old Pond Town Arts Association!”
There was rapturous applause from the audience.
Only Huai Shi had to complain to himself, ‘What the heck is that loony Wang Hai trying to pull? He’s making a Deyun She folk performance out of his freaking sermon, and he even invited an opening act? If it’s this flashy, why doesn’t he just go debut as an idol or something?”
Before he could whine anymore, a line of old ladies in cheery costumes walked onto the stage from backstage, all of them surrounding one person and chatting merrily about square dancing poses and techniques.
“Remember, girls, the rhythm here isn’t dong-cha-cha, it’s dong-cha—cha.” Their leader smiled and even flicked his hair narcissistically. When he looked around and smiled, his expression was wonderfully beautiful… and then he froze on the spot.
He was looking at Huai Shi.
Huai Shi was looking at him too.
Both were gobsmacked.
‘—F*ck, why are you here?!’
Huai Shi had been wondering how he was supposed to find this guy, but before he even tried, a church errenzhuan began, with a dance led by the gigolo Liu Dongli and a band involving the idiotic cellist Huai Shi.
The song and dance worked in tandem, making the atmosphere here bloom.
Meanwhile, the two of them exchanged a complicated look, and Huai Shi mouthed quietly, “Where’s my f*cking orange tree?”
“Haven’t gotten around to buying it yet.”
“Have you eaten?”
“No…”
“I have.”
Huai Shi patted his stomach. “White wheat buns and braised meat. You jealous?”
F*ck!
All of a sudden, Liu Dongli wanted to curse. Unfortunately, the curtains in front of the stage had been raised, so he had no choice but to force a passionate smile, dancing a hillbilly disco with the old folk.
Right in front of Liu Dongli, the old sister that Liu Dongli had first approached twisted her fancy handkerchief and sang, “In the house of God, sitting next to the Lord, we become as happy as children, hallelujah, as we enter heaven…”
Pfft.
Huai Shi could not help a laugh.
There was just a single beep.
The phone in his pocket vibrated, and he received a message, Sneaking a moment’s reprieve, he pulled out his phone with one hand and saw Ai Qing’s number on the screen.
He saw the contents of the text as well.
“—Retreat, ASAP! [Closed—5]”
In that instant, an aura of death much stronger than usual surged over Huai Shi, nearly drowning him.
…
Ten minutes ago, in the temporary command center, Ai Qing’s expression was dark.
“The soul radiation recorder has completed its recording. All normal.”
“Depth levels are 0.17. Normal.”
“Border corrosion at 0.03. Normal.”
“Normal.”
“Normal.”
“Normal.”
All the readings were perfectly normal.
For some reason, however, her expression grew darker and darker, until she looked downright livid.
“What’s the matter?” asked the middle-aged man.
“It’s not right.” Ai Qing’s slender fingers gripped the wheelchair’s armrest tightly, her expression stormy. “There’s definitely something wrong somewhere!”
Amidst everyone’s stunned gazes, she reached out her hand and pulled her phone out of her wheelchair pocket. Without hesitation, she pulled off the cover at the back and pulled the red lever that looked like a SIM card.
In the silence that ensued, the middle-aged man’s jaw fell open, and he instinctively stood up. “Are you nuts?!”
Every invigilator had a special phone provided by the Astronomical Association. Naturally, it had an extremely strong signal and battery, and its apps and specs were pretty reasonable too. However, the most important difference between these phones and others was the red ‘highest alert’ button at the back.
It was a function that could only be activated when an invigilator was certain that an incident was beyond their abilities, and when they were sure it involved a border-related threat that was Grade B and above.
It could be compared to a signal flare or a lifesaver. Either way, very few invigilators ever chose to use it.
The moment this function was activated, a signal would be sent right to the command center of the UN Astronomical Association— right to the Governance Bureau’s Extraordinary Actions Unit.
It would be no exaggeration to say that it reached the kings of the world.
If things were serious, it might even alert the Decemviri.
If Ai Qing was an official invigilator, she might even temporarily gain access to a Grade A and above holy relic, or the right to mobilize all the Ascenders in the entire New Ocean area…
Of course, such overwhelming power naturally came with a price.
If it turned out to be a false alarm, the consequences went without saying. However, to everyone on the scene right now, the most important part was the moment this was reported to the Astronomical Association, all the deals and promises they had made earlier would be reduced to nothing.
Victory was at hand, so why was she flipping the entire table now?
What on earth was this woman thinking?
She really must have gone mad!
It was just a minor incident related to a border relic, so was there any need to report it to the Governance Bureau?
This was equivalent to two provincial leaders getting into a little contest and calling the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection to solve it. It was far too grand an action for a small problem.
Besides, they did not have any evidence or signs, and nothing seemed to be going wrong.
“Ah, I might be making a big fuss over nothing, but I’d rather risk that than let anything unexpected happen.”
Ai Qing spun the phone in her hand. Once she made that decision, her expression calmed down, and she did not look so nervous anymore.
Even if her superiors doubted her abilities, she would take it.
That earlier unease had been so intense it threatened to drive her crazy, but now it vanished quickly like it had never happened at all. Only the cold sweat under her clothes, gradually drying off, showed how furious her internal struggle had been before she made that ridiculous decision.
She looked at her phone screen, the corners of her lips curving into a cold contemptuous smile.
It was aimed at herself.
She was two months away from becoming an official invigilator, but things would not be so easy now, huh? If it turned out to be an exaggerated response, she should consider herself lucky if all they did was take away her position as an invigilator.
After all, the Extraordinary Actions Unit was growing ever tighter on manpower. They would never allow a wastage of the Astronomical Association’s resources like this.
A few seconds later, her phone screen lit up.
She did not have to pick up the call. A faint light emanated from the screen, forming a hologram in the air. It depicted a man in a straight-laced suit like a call dispatcher, who looked neither confused nor panicked. He just looked at the girl before him calmly.
“Serial number T9631, invigilator-in-training stationed at New Ocean, part of the East Xia branch of the Governance Bureau.”
The man said, “There are no reports of a depth detection, no traces of border corrosion, and no signs of high-level stigma activity… Please submit your report and application.”
“According to the Law of the Twelve Tables, as an invigilator-in-training, I am applying for assistance under the ninth item of the Border Opposition Laws. I also wish to lock down Old Pond Town, in New Ocean City, East Xia Republic, Asia, and everything within ten kilometers. Please execute this ASAP.”
“Currently confirming your request—”
The printer next to the man in the suit spewed out a long line of documents, and after giving the papers a look, the man picked up the stamp next to him and stamped the documents.
“Application approved.
“Begin adjusting satellite orbits, estimated completion in three minutes. Lockdown orders for Old Pond Town have been issued, awaiting execution— Beginning download of Border Opposition Item Nine.”
After he robotically completed all the processes, the man in the suit, serial number 0075, finally nodded.
“For the sake of the world.”
The call ended.
In the stunned silence, they heard a rumble like a mountain moving in the distance.
In the sky several tens of thousands of meters above, deep in the dark depths of the universe, an enormous satellite orbiting in space sprayed out gases and slowly adjusted its angle, taking in the clouds, ground, cities, dust, and other inconsequential things beneath it.
Deep in the basement sixth floor of the Greenwich Observatory, Old London, an enormous difference engine whirred and slowly produced a ribbon of tin, poked full of holes.
The secretary who had been waiting next to it carefully cut the ribbon and curled it into a scroll. In the process, a copy was saved on video. Finally, the item was placed inside an empty tube and sent down the vacuum delivery chute next to the secretary.
The pulsing of the vacuum sent the tube several kilometers underground, after which it landed in a corner of a busty hall.
Someone was smoking and listening to songs in a chair. Opening the tube with one hand, they expertly shook out the scroll with the other. They stomped the floor with a foot and threw the cigarette aside before walking to the center of the hall.
People were currently milling all through the unimaginably large hall, but the floorboards were uneven, and puddles had pooled in many places.
If you looked down from above, though, you could see the true form of this hall— It was actually a 3D map big enough to record everything in the world.
The smoker walked past their working colleagues and followed the coordinates to the correct position. They took a sheet of markers from their pocket and picked the grey one.
Then they drew a circle.
“Serial number C987778762, lockdown circle complete. File archived.”
With that, millions of miles away, across mountains and seas on another continent, the heavens and the earth shifted.
Under the illumination of evening sun and moon, the mud outside Old Pond Town seemed to boil. There was the scream of metal clashing against rock, creating scorching hot sparks that turned tons of mud into lava.
Immediately, however, the glint of metal appeared through the lava.
It expanded.
Like trees growing, the metal rose higher and higher, inch by inch, growing according to the stroke of an invisible pen. The metal rapidly cooled, revealing shiny black metal that blossomed with countless scale-like metal sheets.
Within ten seconds, the entire Old Pond Town was locked away behind metal walls several hundred meters tall.
Soon, the colors in the sky darkened and turned pitch black,
The removal of the interior had begun.
In that instant, there was a sigh.
A slender and fair hand reached out from inside the church.
It gripped heaven and earth.
There was then a loud explosion in the distance.