Quicksilver Threads

Ji Jue shifted slightly. He shifted again, then moved once more. Dodging left and right in a helpless retreat, he pressed down on the dog's head. "Stop licking, bro, stop—" President grinned with his tongue hanging out, tirelessly digging his head into Ji Jue's chest. Undeterred, he nudged Ji Jue's hand onto his fur again and again, wagging his tail like mad. His coat was sleek and glossy. Once a hand landed on it, instinct took over, and Ji Jue began petting him. From head to tail. President panted happily. Having enjoyed the strokes, he generously flopped onto his back on the floor, exposing his belly and nudging Ji Jue to keep going. Ji Jue sighed heavily, too burdened with worry to focus on petting the dog. From last night until now, he had stayed up the entire night in a state of utter turmoil. The bizarre upheaval in Quancheng was secondary; the real issue lay with himself. After all, even if others hadn't noticed, how could he not know? How had he gone from having a grand old time looting workshops and running wild in Quancheng—where everything had been progressing steadily in the right direction—to inexplicably getting struck by Revolution?! Hadn't it been completely uninstalled last time?! Why were there still leftover residual files? It had even gotten him all worked up… Granted, it felt pretty thrilling, and he hadn't come out on the losing end—his understanding of Embers had jumped a whole notch—but the crux of the matter was that the timing was all wrong! Quancheng right now was overrun by abominations, far from any sanctuary of Sovereign Virtue. It was quite literally a demonic realm. Last time, before Stagnant Rot could even poke his head out, Ji Jue had greeted him with a slash across the face. Who knew how many stitches that took, but Stagnant Rot had undoubtedly been beating his chest and stomping his feet beneath the vortex—*you little brat, you'd better pray I never catch you!* And not long after, here he was again, using nail clippers to give big brother Stagnant Rot a pedicure… Fortunately, Du Deng was such an utterly useless nobody that Stagnant Rot hadn't even spared him a second glance, completely unbothered. Ji Jue could only pray that big brother Stagnant Rot had a grand enterprise and wouldn't care about such petty losses. If he actually caught scent of a trail, he might just fly into a rage, call in several vanfuls of goons, and do him in on the spot. Ji Jue let out a long sigh and rubbed the dog's head vigorously. "Tell me, who in the world invented this garbage called Celestial Rail?" he muttered under his breath. "I'm just a temp, you know? A temporary worker! Understand? I haven't even signed a contract… "Treat your draft horses and beasts of burden better, bro. Forget about not paying a single day of social security, I even have to cover my own work injuries out of pocket! So how come I suddenly got put on duty and made an inspector?" President grinned, licking his sole current employee. Even if this employee might be mentally deficient, he showed zero disdain. Ji Jue grew all the more resigned. Several times, he had felt the urge to rip the watch straight off his wrist, shove it into President's vest, and advise the hound to seek higher talents elsewhere. Yet he genuinely couldn't bear to sever the bond and sentiment built with Cousin over all these years. Besides, trying to cut ties now was already far too late. Where was that thought earlier? From the moment Cousin had saved his life from under that truck, he had been welded fast to this enormous mess. Even if Ji Jue wanted to shirk the debt and freeload, Non-Offensive had sought him out on its own. The Non-Offensive matrix originated from Sage Quicksilver, Quicksilver belonged to Mo, and the watch came from the Celestial Rail Group, which in turn traced back to the Central Empire… They appeared to hail from two completely distinct lineages, perhaps even entirely incompatible, yet Non-Offensive and the watch merged seamlessly together—and it was even compatible with Revolution! Ji Jue even suspected that all these things might have originally been part of a single, complete set! God only knew how many bowls of beef noodles those mad Mohist craftsmen had whipped up on a whim, or what kind of lethal contraptions they had dreamt up with their peerless intellect. Just thinking about the crazy stunts craftsmen could pull off in ancient alchemy gave Ji Jue chills. Right now, trapped in Quancheng and fighting for survival, his life was miserable enough. Yet right after Revolution had finished mooching off him and pulled up its pants to leave, President had come knocking at his door. You can't do this to people! Meanwhile, President merely smiled, sticking out his tongue to lick Ji Jue's chin and hand, wagging his tail as he rested in his lap. It was as if he were presenting an award to a model employee. *Calm down, Ji Jue, calm down!* *Being approachable is just a capitalist's disguise!* *Greedy executives will wring the very last drop of sweat and blood from their beasts of burden, then ruthlessly toss tools aside like worn-out shoes. How could you fall for such sugar-coated bullets?* Even if President suddenly opened his mouth in the next instant and said, *"You, go wipe out those Abyssal craftsmen,"* Ji Jue wouldn't be surprised at all. Still, his fur felt amazingly smooth to stroke. Sleek and silk-soft. Better pet him some more to soothe his wounded soul and calm his nerves. "Don't you dare swindle me, got it? Or I'll go to the Central Empire for labor arbitration… Hear that? Dogs are man's best friend, but capitalists aren't…" Ji Jue kept babbling, but his eyes never once lifted from the crude temporary smelting furnace before him, quietly waiting for the blessing within the flames to surge and the miracle to condense. He failed to notice, however, that his teammates had drifted farther and farther away at some point. In this spacious hideout, they had practically huddled into the opposite corner. Crowded together, they craned their necks to peek at Ji Jue in his corner, watching him stroke the empty air and mutter under his breath, goosebumps rising all over their skin. "Has he lost his mind?" Jiang Xuan murmured with deep concern. "He might be possessed by something nasty!" Ji Xue stated decisively. "When Ji Liu ran off to play on someone's grave during summer break as a kid, he came back just like this. Crying, laughing, tearing up all his homework, and crazily eating shit! A good beating fixed him right up, and once he woke up, he forgot everything." "I didn't eat shit!" Ji Liu snapped in fury. Ji Xue threw up her hands, looking all the more smug. "See? What did I say? A good beating fixes everything!" "You're itching for a beating yourself, aren't you!" Furious, Ji Liu lunged to grab her hair, and the two siblings tumbled together into a brawl for the umpteenth time. Once things finally calmed down a bit, Xu Guan sighed and tried to mediate. "All right, all right, don't talk about people behind their backs. Nobody's perfect. Brother Ji Jue is so honest and friendly; it's only natural he has a few quirks. We should be respectful and understanding. Maybe all Embers are like this." "What's that supposed to mean about Embers?" This time, it was Lou Feng's turn to glare. "We Embers are completely normal! You can't just generalize!" "Ah, right, right, totally. That's true." "Normal, completely normal." "We're all on the same team, one big loving family!" For the first time in his life, Lou Feng felt how powerless a person was in the face of slander and prejudice. He could only watch helplessly as the meager shred of good reputation craftsmen possessed was utterly ruined by Ji Jue. Meanwhile, on the other side, Ji Jue's 'fit' finally seemed to draw to a close. He rose respectfully, bowing and scraping toward empty air, waving toward the wall corner as he saw off something that did not exist. Watching this, Lou Feng felt an overwhelming wave of exhaustion. "What the hell are you doing?! Did you take the wrong medicine!" "This is the workplace," Ji Jue sighed heavily. "Working for a living humbles a man." He had already given up on trying to explain that *there was a dog here just now, the President of Celestial Rail Group, who came to check on me, thought I was an idiot, licked me twice, and then wagged his tail and left*… Neither reality nor reason would permit it. Besides, he would rather believe it was just his own hallucination. For one thing, his connection to the Mohists was far too dangerous to speak of openly. On top of that, reality was already troublesome enough; there was no need to cause extra panic for everyone else. *Boom!* Beyond the temporary spiritus isolation, through the observation slit, a distant rumble echoed once more. Ever since last night, it hadn't stopped! Beneath what felt like an eternal curtain of night, harsh sounds of fracturing rang out from time to time. Broken spirits roared, evil creatures rampaged, and all of Quancheng had devolved into a boiling mess. The good news was that they no longer needed to deliver any warnings. The Evil Transmutation Cult had launched its plan ahead of schedule; now, forget the outpost, the military strength of all Haizhou was likely converging upon Quancheng, and even the Federation's gaze was fixed here… The bad news was that the Evil Transmutation Cult seemed to have lost its mind. Casting aside its usual shadowy style of fleeing at the first hint of daylight, the cult had rallied such a massive force that it was actually relying on its extensive groundwork inside Quancheng to arm-wrestle directly with the Security Bureau. Amidst continuous tremors that shook heaven and earth, both sides were locked in fierce combat. This time, the cult had adopted an attitude of having nothing to lose, determined to fight the Security Bureau to the bitter end. Meanwhile, the lockdown within Quancheng had tightened by several degrees. All routes were tangled into an intricate labyrinth, while surveillance and detection arrays formed a dense, seamless net, as impregnable as an iron fortress. Before the situation became clear, to avoid having their heads lopped off in passing by some roaming powerhouse of Vile Folly, they could only hide away as quickly as possible and squeeze into whatever crevice they could find. This was where Tong the Vegetable proved his worth. Relying on his telekinesis, he moved an entire ruin aside, dug out a basement beneath it, and after Jiang Xuan reinforced the structure, Ji Jue and Lou Feng temporarily converted it into a workshop, sealing off the interior and exterior spiritus. Xu Guan then erased all records and traces, laying down an obfuscation. Finally, they set the ruin back in place exactly as it had been. In this way, they cobbled together a hideout. Though it wouldn't withstand someone scouring the ground inch by inch with a magnifying glass, it was at least enough for them to lie low temporarily. While the others rested or re-equipped, an overachiever like Ji Jue immediately threw his time into processing their stolen loot, racing against the clock to liquidate it. Here was where Young Master Lou's value shone through as well. Aside from giving a hand at critical moments and helping process materials, he could even pull a luxury item like a miniature mobile smelting furnace from his pocket—and a top-tier model calibrated by a master craftsman, no less. Though he had repeatedly warned that bastard Ji Jue not to break his furnace, he hadn't hesitated for a second when it was time to pull together in the same boat. Now, as the flames subsided and the residual heat dissipated, the entire underground chamber grew increasingly sweltering. Yet the teammates hardly cared. Instead, as if gathering to watch a spectacle, they crowded around the furnace, eagerly observing the live furnace-opening like viewers watching an online streamer open a kiln to sell teacups. Seeing that Ji Jue didn't care either, Lou Feng, who had been roped in as an assistant, couldn't be bothered to explain to the others how taboo this was. Let them watch if they wanted; he wanted to see it too… What in the world had Ji Jue drummed up after acting crazy all night? Amidst the faint scrape of metal against metal, there was no dazzling brilliance, no purple vapor rising from the east, and not even the slightest flash of light or sound. A wisp of silver light flowed silently from the furnace, landing squarely inside Ji Jue's toolbox. If one had to describe it, the surface of the quicksilver shimmered and rippled with dazzling splendor, tempting anyone to pull out their phone and snap a photo for social media. Yet in the next second, Lou Feng noticed something abnormal and instinctively leaned closer. He stared with wide eyes. In a resting state, given the mass of mercury itself, it should have retained a mirror-smooth surface. How could it be constantly rippling? Before he could process it, a hand clamped down on his shoulder. A tight grip. "Don't move—" Lou Feng instinctively moved to pull away, but right then, his pupils abruptly shrank. Amidst those tens of thousands of shimmering ripples, a faint strand seemed to drift out, gliding right in front of his eyes. Thin as spider silk. So light that even a breath could perturb it, yet so long that it soared through the shelter's warm air, dancing ceaselessly. Under Ji Jue's cautious control and gathering, it contracted, rewound, and vanished. And in that final instant, the tip of that silver thread lightly brushed past Lou Feng's eyes once more, entirely imperceptible. Gone without a trace. "That's it?" He looked sideways at Ji Jue. He had stayed up all night, wasted so many materials, and even poured in a blessing, only to produce a thing like this? Ji Jue didn't answer. He simply looked at him with a knowing smile. In the silence, Lou Feng's expression gradually shifted. Right across his forehead, a stray lock of hair hanging down severed silently right in the middle. Fluttering, it drifted to the floor.