Chapter 429

Chapter 430: The Mountain of Focus

Deep inside the Special Affairs Bureau building in Boundary City, in the Director’s office, Bai Li Qing let out a soft breath. She rubbed the thigh that had just hit the desk, stood up, and walked to the wide floor to ceiling window.

Outside, an invisible fog began to flow. Under her gaze it turned into many scenes. Most were images Xu Jiali had recorded at Garrison-3, including surface sampling work and, far underground, the Crystal Husk Heart. The rest were pictures rebuilt in the depths of her mind. All the files on the Youth Form and the fresh intelligence from the Featherwing star region gathered in her thoughts, wove together, and spun into the planet’s possible futures.

A vast crystal structure surged up from the planet’s core. Crystal clusters bloomed like flowers across torn crust. A huge Ascension Body pushed out of the world. Unchecked crystals, cut off from their “core,” grew wild. Cities were swallowed by crystal. Billions drowned inside a dream where a planet burst from its cocoon.

The flowing mist rose and rolled. Images formed, broke apart, and formed again. At last the fog fell quiet, and a pair of pale gray eyes floated in its depth.

The eyes looked at Bai Li Qing and said: “Sister, trying to deduce infinite outcomes from our limited intelligence on the Dark Angels is pointless, especially when this time the wildcard is Yu Sheng.”

Bai Li Qing breathed out and said: “I know.”

The eyes asked: “What are you thinking about right now?”

Bai Li Qing was quiet for a moment, then tugged at the corner of her mouth and said: “Mostly that I’ve found that overtime feeling again.”

The eyes asked: “What else?”

She said: “My leg hurts.”

The eyes replied with calm regret: “That can’t be helped. I don’t have hands right now.”

She murmured: “I know.”

…

Yu Sheng skimmed the files Bai Li Qing had sent to his phone and, while reading, deepened his understanding of the Youth Form.

Just as Bai Li Qing had said, the strangest and most dangerous part of the Youth Form was not its physical body. It was the growing cognitive interference that came with deeper parasitism, and the “reality reconstruction” built on top of that interference.

Under a surface where “everything looks normal,” the Youth Form’s crystals had likely already covered the planet and filled every corner of Ink City. The abnormal sat right under everyone’s eyelids, yet always hid in the blind spot of the subconscious.

In theory, if the cognitive interference came only from the Youth Form itself, that level of “perception block” would not fool Immortal Yuan Hao. It might not even fool Xuan Che’s Divine Sense. But this planet also held hundreds of millions of people. The shared “observation” of ordinary residents under interference directly rewrote the reality of Sentinel Silence’s surface.

This covering at the level of reality went beyond traditional Illusion Arts. Even if someone gifted like Zheng Zhi could briefly see through the Youth Form’s cognitive screen, or like before, when Yu Sheng tore a short-lived crack across the sky while facing that Great Sage of the Hermitage Order, he still could not truly pierce the entire curtain.

Because the shared cognition of countless “dreamers” on this world would instantly repair any tear and correct the world back to what their subconscious believed was “normal.”

The only good news now was that this curtain, once flawless, had clearly gone wrong. The planet-wide dream, built on collective cognitive blocks, was clashing with reality. The two pressed and ripped against each other, creating the warped Ink City before Yu Sheng’s eyes. Inside this twisted city there was very likely a rent big enough to tear the curtain open for good.

As for how this “clash” began, Yu Sheng did not know. [Maybe it was the battle at Garrison-3. Maybe it was something Zheng Zhi and Yuan Hao did here in Sentinel Silence. Maybe both.] Either way, it was clearly an opportunity.

Yu Sheng put away his phone and looked into the rain ahead.

Crooked buildings stacked like fallen frosting at The End Web of his view, then gathered and bulged in the same direction. Piled structures rose into a strange mountain. Its skin heaved like a living thing in the rain. Deformed neon and broken projectors flowed over it like water. Between those flashing lights, you could still make out a few landmarks and the shapes of the city’s main roads.

Another thunderclap without lightning rolled from the mountain’s direction and crushed across the sky.

Since leaving the Hotel room, thunder like that had kept sounding from there.

Yu Sheng did not know where Immortal Yuan Hao and the others had gone, and he had found no clues near Immortal Conclave Isle. But the rolling thunder felt like a guide, pointing him onward.

With Bai Li Qing’s files, Yu Sheng could now judge Sentinel Silence’s state.

The Youth Form’s parasitism here had entered the late stage of Metamorphosis, only one step from becoming an Ascension Body. At this stage, its cognitive interference covered the entire planet. In theory, all of Sentinel Silence was now distorted.

But the distortion was not even. Its source was the Youth Form, yet it was powered by countless “ordinary people” under interference. So this planet-spanning dream had many “support points.”

Every dense population center was a support point.

Ink City was the largest city on this world.

The most crowded part of Ink City was the “support of the support.”

That mountain should be it.

Foxy changed again, becoming a giant Nine-Tailed Silver Fox. The Protective Spiritual Aura around her beat back the rain and wind. Yu Sheng and Irene sat on the silver fox’s back. Luna’s figure flickered in the rainy shadows like a ghost, close on all sides. The hazy shades of twelve Bronze Knights showed up from time to time in the rain.

Here in this border where dream and reality pressed against each other, the line between real and unreal blurred, so even the Knights near Luna could project into reality more easily than usual.

Irene sat beside Yu Sheng. Gripping the fox fur tight, she frowned and said: “There’s noise everywhere. Did you notice those human shapes that flash by on the road? And the colorful figures hanging in midair? They’re minds at the dream’s edge. My head hurts.”

Yu Sheng nodded and said: “I saw them. The closer we get to that mountain, the more there are. Looks like we’re on the right path. Ink City’s reality reconstruction focus is ahead.”

Irene blinked, then suddenly stared up at Yu Sheng as if she had noticed something.

The little doll on her shoulder said with a crisp voice: “You seem fated for blood again.”

Yu Sheng was caught off guard, then could only smile and say: “You… fine. Blood disaster it is. I’m used to it.”

The doll chirped: “This time, the bleeding is huge.”

Yu Sheng muttered: “Thanks for the blessing.”

Irene hummed: “Mm hmm.”

Yu Sheng fell silent.

By then, Foxy had crossed the last broken stretch along the city’s central axis. The Nine-Tailed Silver Fox leaped over a floating Plaza and reached the mountain’s foot.

The mountain seemed to have grown again. The buildings fused to its skin had twisted into even stranger, more chaotic shapes. A broad strip that might once have been an elevated rail lay over the slope, winding toward the peak.

Countless humming noises rose all around, and Foxy slowed on instinct.

Yu Sheng saw more shadows than he could count. They were translucent, colorful human shapes. They gathered at the mountain’s base like passersby from another dimension. Some walked along the road. Some sat at ease on crooked benches. Some floated as if reading newspapers. Others sat cross-legged like they were cultivating in silence.

These were minds hovering at the edge of the dream. Right now they might still be doing normal chores in Ink City, talking with family, or busy at work. But their subconscious had begun to sense what was wrong down in their perception, and a basic need for self-protection made part of each mind drift here and gather toward other minds.

A giant outdoor display stood jammed into the buildings at the mountain’s foot. Its hologram flickered on and off above it.

On the projection, broken lines of text scrolled: “…sleepwalking is spreading across the city, Qi Deviation cases have surged again… do not go near the City Outskirts at night…

“The shadows wandering near the old Refining Tower have been confirmed as mass hallucinations, residents who see strange things should not panic…

“The storm has arrived on time, a new wave of cold air is entering the south… wind and rain in the city will strengthen, citizens who have not reached Qi Inhalation should not stay outdoors for long…

“This city is good, this planet is very #%@… everything is good, everything #? good, everything ?@#% good…”

Yu Sheng stared at the half-buried projector, watching the shaking text change and the weird, almost-but-not-quite Ink City scenes flash between the lines.

Steep on the mountain, more and more billboards lit up. One after another, shimmering Illusion Arts rippled like a line of welcome flags in the rainy night: “Welcome to Ink City. This is the most prosperous city in the Border.

“Today, Ink City is safe and sound.

“Today, Sentinel Silence has nothing to report.

“Welcome to Ink City, welcome to Ink City, welcome to…”

A thunderclap exploded. The sky roared.

The hazy human shapes at the mountain’s foot seemed to sense something. Many lifted their heads in confusion. The long line of holograms up the mountain shook hard. Words dispersed at that one peal of thunder and faded into the air.

Yu Sheng looked toward the sound. With eyesight far beyond normal, he saw a cool, distant woman standing on the peak. She wore a black long dress and held a sword. Her jet-black hair was swept into a high bun. She looked down with a cold stare at the foot of the mountain.