Chapter 070

Chapter 70: Contact

In the Special Affairs Bureau, Deep Divers are battle elites chosen through strict selection and harsh training. They pass many trials to rise above ordinary operators. They are sent to the most dangerous places, face challenges that push past Human reason, know how to survive in lethal alien environments, and chase mad Angel Cultists through lawless zones. They can charge into the Otherworld to fight the most dangerous Entities, or go deep into nightmares to rescue lost souls in a maze woven from mind and awareness. This work is called a Deep Dive, which means diving from the calm present into the dark layer under reason.

But there are always things in this world that Human minds cannot fully understand or fight. Even the best Deep Divers sometimes fail, and that happens more often than people think.

Even so, what was happening now went beyond Song Cheng’s experience, and it seemed to have gone beyond the Director’s expectations too.

The six Deep Divers were moved out of The Tank at once. The instant they returned to the real world, their Powered Armor ran its emergency care. The armor’s injection System pushed a large dose of Sanity Blocking Agent and other protective drugs into their bodies so they calmed down fast. Support staff rushed in, checked each person’s contamination level, and confirmed that their awareness had come back with their bodies into the physical world. They also checked whether anything else had followed their awareness “back.”

Song Cheng and Bai Li Qing stood to the side, watching with tight brows.

After a long heavy silence, Song Cheng could not hold it in and asked: “Math problems? Can a math problem hitting your brain really mess you up like this?”

Bai Li Qing gently shook her head.

She said: “Professors at Terra Academy can attack by pouring an overload of knowledge into a normal person’s brain in an instant, but it would not look like this. Our Deep Divers are trained for ‘knowledge’ type attacks. Besides strong learning ability, their brains can enter a safe sleep if the input goes past their limit.”

Song Cheng frowned and asked: “So you mean…”

She said, face grave: “The ‘math problems’ that Deep Diver mentioned before passing out might have been a concrete image they saw while diving. The actual source of the pollution should be something else. The passage was The End Web. There was no Night Valley. But why math problems?”

Song Cheng did not dare speak, afraid of breaking the Director’s train of thought.

After a short quiet spell, Bai Li Qing suddenly turned her head and asked: “Little Song, you have not contacted ‘Yu Sheng’ yet, have you?”

He said: “No. I planned to reach out today, but then all this happened.”

She said, voice cool: “Do not go.”

Yu Sheng heard a faint noise. He looked up and glanced around, but he could not find where it came from.

Business was slow. The café was almost empty. Two or three guests sat at far tables, and two clerks nearby were scrolling on their phones. The place felt cold and quiet.

Now and then someone looked over with curiosity, probably wondering why a guy in his twenties was sitting in a café at this hour copying a thick stack of high school homework.

Yu Sheng sighed at the half stack still left. His hand felt a little sore.

He had been faking his way through, and many big questions looked like chicken scratch under the solutions. He was used to a keyboard and had not written this much by hand in years. This job was more tiring than he had expected.

He could not decide which was worse: writing homework for a high schooler, or dragging a clueless fox to a mall to buy clothes.

He thought about it and decided copying tests was better. He truly did not have the courage to take Foxy into a lingerie store. That would make him feel like a creep. If Foxy showed that clear, innocent confusion again, the clerks might call the police on him.

Just then, Irene’s voice sounded in his head: “Hey hey, Yu Sheng, how much have you written?”

Yu Sheng kept his hand moving and said: “Halfway. High schoolers really have it rough. Why is there so much homework!”

Irene said: “Keep going! I heard Little Red Riding Hood say she actually has a physics workbook too, but she forgot to bring it…”

Yu Sheng said with a huff: “She can go home and do that one herself. I’m not touching it. How are things on your side? Going okay?”

Irene said, clearly in a good mood: “Pretty good. Foxy isn’t good with zippers. Little Red Riding Hood taught her for a long time. They went to the fitting room together. I’m on a stool by the fitting room door. Little Red Riding Hood even bought me a hair clip. We got it at the doll store. It’s red.”

Yu Sheng thought for a second and said: “That was my money.”

Irene hurried to say: “I know, I know. Just think of it as a gift from you. I didn’t ask for anything else, just a clip. It wasn’t expensive.”

Yu Sheng said with a helpless laugh: “Fine, I didn’t say you couldn’t buy it. I’m just reminding you two not to go overboard. Also, don’t forget to buy toiletries for Foxy, and bed sheets and covers. You remember the bed size, right?”

Irene said: “Oh, I remember, I remember, trust my brain…” She stopped, then her tone shifted. “Foxy’s brain…”

Yu Sheng’s mind fell into an odd, awkward silence. [This is what happens when your team is hard to manage.]

Irene asked in a small voice: “How big was the bed again?”

Yu Sheng sighed and said: “One point five meters by two meters. Tell Little Red Riding Hood and let her remember it for both of you. Also tell her everything else to buy. She is in high school. Her brain works better than yours.”

Irene said: “Right. Right…”

Yu Sheng ended the mind chat and lowered his head to keep writing.

At that moment, he felt something off around him.

Quiet. The room had gone so quiet that even the soft talk from the few guests was gone.

He snapped his head up and scanned the room.

He was still in the café.

Countless tables and chairs were lined up neatly. They stretched forward without end, and backward without end.

The endless café was empty. All the way to the limit of sight, there were only rows and rows of tables and chairs.

To his left was the street window. It now also stretched without end. There was no street scene outside, only white fog.

A huge shadow moved slowly in the fog. Now and then it came close to the window, as if it were peering into the café. No matter how he looked, he could only see a vague outline.

Yu Sheng stared in shock and rose from his chair.

He was about to push the door open and leave when a voice came from the seat across from him and said: “Hello.”

It was a slightly hoarse young woman’s voice.

Yu Sheng was surprised to see that at some point someone had sat across from him. She looked under thirty. She wore a fitted white suit. Her gray white hair was tied into a ponytail. She was very pretty, but her air held a distant, cold calm.

Yu Sheng’s attention went to her eyes. Her irises were a pale gray, almost drained of color. Even the line between iris and white looked blurry. At first glance, they did not look quite like a normal Human’s eyes.

Then he noticed something unbelievable. Everything around the woman was losing color fast. The nearest table and chairs, the floor, and the other furniture all turned a light gray white. The colorless zone spread more than ten meters out, then slowly faded. In the end, only the woman herself and Yu Sheng still held their original color.

He steadied himself and remembered what Irene had told him. In the Otherworld, there can be rational Entities. No matter how Human they seem, they show clear, uncanny signs that give them away. This woman looked a bit strange, but she was not that far from normal. That meant she should be Human.

Since she was Human and had greeted him first, they could talk. Yu Sheng let go of the plan to push the door and leave, sat back down, and asked with curiosity: “You are…?”

She said with a light nod: “Bai Li Qing, Director of the Special Affairs Bureau under the Borderland Council. I am sorry to meet you this way. It is for maximum secrecy and for safety.”

Yu Sheng froze.

So the Special Affairs Bureau really had come to find him. And at a very high level. The Director herself.

While Yu Sheng stared, Bai Li Qing’s gaze slid to the table in front of him.

She saw the pile of test papers. Her expression stalled for a second.

Math problems. All math problems. Full real big questions from past college entrance exams.