"Hmm? Surrendering so soon?"
Ji Jue raised an eyebrow, offering earnest advice. "On a matter of such gravity, shouldn't you give it some more thought? Why not try your luck? Maybe this thing is all bark and no bite, just a hollow facade."
"No, no, absolutely not!"
Yue Ting lay flat on the ground, terrified to make even the slightest twitch, and offered an obsequious grin. "My account books are all on my phone, the data is all on the cloud drive, and the bearer account at Everlasting Bank has the password four zeros and two ones…"
"Tsk."
Ji Jue's face fell at once.
Yet another useless fool who wasted an opportunity.
With a flick of Ji Jue's hand, Little Niuma's other massive mechanical arm raised. Its muzzle locked on. In a thunderous blast, an empty shell casing tumbled through the air as quicksilver sprayed forth, transforming midair into slender ribbons. After Yue Ting was wrapped up from head to toe, Ji Jue fished a filthy rag of indeterminate vintage out of the sewer, shoved it into Yue Ting's mouth, and tossed him into the rear cargo bed.
Inside the open bed, another Celestial Chosen—still squirming in futile struggle while muffled groans escaped him—subconsciously looked up and saw another comrade being hurled in.
Their gazes met, mingling a hint of shock, a flicker of pleasant surprise, and a wave of desolation, witnessed by no one else.
Ten minutes later, after confirming that no one else was fleeing from this direction, Ji Jue folded up his chair, drove the vehicle through the main gates and into the warehouse, and took in the scene of complete devastation and dying outlaws strewn everywhere.
Mm, progress!
At least a few were still breathing!
It seemed his instruction had borne fruitful results after all!
"Brother Ji Jue, thanks for your hard work!"
Xiao An, who had been waiting where he was, waved with a smile.
"Small matter. Where's the haul?"
Ji Jue poked his head forward.
Xiao An pointed a finger. In a cage rested a juvenile calamity beast with only its upper torso intact, its eyes tightly shut as it trembled, playing dead.
"Whew, these smugglers are getting more and more brazen."
After casting an eye over the low-value juvenile calamity beast, Ji Jue glanced across the massive crates and walked straight to the center. He rapped his knuckles against one, producing an empty, hollow echo.
It was even hooked up to electrical cables.
Prying open the hatch, a blast of frigid air rushed out to greet him.
Preserved inside the refrigerated vault, limbs and internal organs lay neatly packed in foam containers. Without a change in expression, Ji Jue reached in and lifted an arm to examine it, immediately piecing things together.
"Artificial organs and limbs?"
Ji Jue remarked, "Fitted with illegal internal augmentations, no less… Looks like there's a Vortex-lineage cloning farm behind this."
"I—I don't know anything!"
Yue Ting, who had just been hauled out of the cargo bed by Little Niuma, finally spat out the filthy rag and wailed incessantly to plead his innocence. "It's a misunderstanding! All a misunderstanding! I'm only the transporter, getting paid to move cargo! These goods are all for medical use, purely medical!"
Upon realizing his captors were not rival gangsters staging a shakedown but operatives from the Security Bureau, he somehow regained his nerve, daring to talk back and claim wrongful arrest.
"Medical use, with metallized bones? Muscle density substantially increased too." Ji Jue sneered, lifting the limb by its wrist. "This even bears the mark of the Military Department. Tell me, whose medical treatment is this for?"
"T-this… We only do transport, just transport." Yue Ting squeezed out a strained smile. "It's a bit… unconventional, legally speaking, but…"
"Then what about that?"
Ji Jue swung the artificial arm, pointing it straight at the juvenile calamity beast that was still feigning death in its cage.
"An—an ornamental pet! A client's special request, purely an ornamental beast!" Once Yue Ting found his rhythm, his words flowed smoother and smoother, tears and snot pouring forth in grief. "We possess a special transport permit, Officer! It's a misunderstanding, all a misunderstanding… I'm a Yacheng native too! I've rendered meritorious service to Haizhou, I've shed blood for Yacheng! I demand to see Customs! I want—"
Catching sight of Ji Jue's placid, unruffled smile, his voice abruptly ground to a halt.
He swallowed hard, prudently swallowing the name of his backer along with it.
"Big brothers, the rules—I understand, I get it all!"
He wriggled forward on his belly, forcing a fawning grin. "We were blind to have dirtied the sacred ground of Beishan District! I'll pay! I'll pay every cent! We accept the fine…"
Seeing how compliant the man was, Ji Jue's smile warmed slightly. He patted Yue Ting's head like an obedient dog's and consoled him, "Don't worry, you'll certainly pay. We'll follow standard protocol. Don't be afraid—Haizhou is just and honorable. How could we let an innocent victim shed both blood and tears, right?"
"Ah, right, right, right! Yes, exactly, absolutely!"
Yue Ting's eyes went wide as he hollered in agreement, swallowing a gutful of curses while playing along with Ji Jue's routine. But immediately after, he noticed Ji Jue's hand resting on the metal crate nearby.
He gave it a light pat.
Amidst the hollow reverberation, Ji Jue remarked in a leisurely tone, "Still, this crate looks rather out of the ordinary to me…"
In that single instant, Yue Ting's expression changed violently.
He turned deathly pale.
"Generally speaking, an aluminum alloy crate of this size shouldn't weigh this much."
Ji Jue's fingertips tapped a steady rhythm along the edge of the crate. As the crisp sounds rippled out, Yue Ting's face grew progressively paler. "The resonance is too airy, the vibration too tight. The sound, the texture, the density, the mass—none of them add up."
He paused, his voice turning completely flat as he asked:
"—What you're really smuggling is Shoushan copper, isn't it?"
Mountain copper and Shoushan copper.
A single word of difference, yet they were two entirely distinct metallic materials.
Mountain copper was merely a spiritus conductor whose toughness and strength were multiplied through intricate smelting. Though costly, it remained widely available across the market and was hardly rare.
Shoushan copper was a different beast altogether.
Owing to its peerless properties, every territory within the Federation capable of producing Shoushan copper was subject to Midtown's strictest control. Haizhou's sole ore vein sat directly adjacent to the main garrison base of the Haizhou military forces.
Security clearance was so exacting that they practically pried open your buttocks for an inspection before letting you pass.
Beyond performance that vastly surpassed conventional materials, it could perfectly accommodate almost every Sovereign Virtue blessing. Furthermore, it could endure repeated processing by an artisan more than nine times while retaining the special properties imparted during every single refinement.
Precisely for this reason, it was utilized in forging the reaction chambers and precision components of top-tier power armors. Any model incorporating it was without exception a true weapon capable of turning the tide amidst tens of thousands of troops on the front lines.
An unequivocal strategic resource.
And the sort of contraband where a single speck leaking out meant every link along the chain would have their entire families exterminated.
"I mean, honestly, such laughable smelting… You must have hired an apprentice. Mmm, no, wait—it was deliberately made this way, wasn't it?"
Ji Jue rapped his knuckles on the metal skin, offering a contemptuous critique.
Had the smelting technique been any better, Ji Jue wouldn't have sensed something was off through a mere coat of paint. Yet it was precisely this incomplete smelting that prevented the Shoushan copper from reacting with the other metals.
The temperature had been controlled with meticulous precision, halted right at the threshold of reaction to preserve its inherent properties.
Unfortunately, their skill remained mediocre at best, serving only to mask the smelter's lack of proficiency in Transmutation.
Evident enough, the recipient's skill was just as subpar.
Otherwise, even if alloyed through a completed reaction, it could still have been extracted later through other displacement methods.
Given the mass of these two crates, the weight alone sufficed for this fellow to commit a swift, gruesome suicide in prison to wipe the slate clean.
Just how deep did the waters behind this run…
Things were growing rather troublesome.
He had only dropped by to handle a stray errand, so why did a mountain of trouble crop up every single time?
After a moment's thought, Ji Jue ignored Yue Ting's frantic muffled groans, pointed a finger to wrap a few more layers of quicksilver binding over the man's mouth, and stepped out of the warehouse to make a phone call.
Half an hour later, two trucks came roaring up to the scene.
They pulled to a halt right before the entrance.
Once identities were verified, several burly men set to work without uttering a single word, loading every trace of cargo into the trucks. As for the outlaws who deserved whatever fate awaited them, they weren't even granted a chance to speak before being dispatched on their way ahead of time.
Meanwhile, all records of this arrest operation in Beishan District were thoroughly purged from the archives of the Yacheng Security Bureau.
"Aiya, well done this time, Little Ji!"
Lao Zhang, who had arrived with the vehicles, clapped Ji Jue on the shoulder, his face beaming. "Good thing you were here. Otherwise, if we brought this pile of garbage back, we'd probably be working overtime and taking the fall for it all month."
Upon learning the full story, even Lao Zhang, who loved nothing more than slacking off on the branch sofa, had received a massive fright. How could routine checks on a few petty smugglers turn up so many hidden landmines?!
He had genuinely developed a phobia.
Not of a mere handful of smugglers, but of the assorted freaks and monsters that had been springing up like mushrooms across Yacheng over the past few days. When it came to smuggling, this haul paled in comparison to the lunatic who had tried hauling out multiple ship loads of corrupted pollutants last time!
The eventful autumn was over, but winter offered no respite either.
Drawing on his decades of experience in coasting and slacking off, he could only offer one piece of wisdom: don't panic yet; this is just the prelude. The real disaster is almost certainly still to come!
"The winds have been blowing the wrong way lately. Keep your guard up too."
Lao Zhang sighed, shaking his head helplessly as he watched the two crates being loaded onto the truck.
Ji Jue nodded with a smile.
Then… he shoved the Shoushan copper ingot he had casually extracted with Non-Offensive a little deeper into his pocket.
As the saying went, never let a wild goose pass without plucking a feather. When rare materials landed right on his doorstep, how could he possibly watch them slip away?
If I don't take it, and you don't take it, how is Commissioner Tong supposed to take it?
And if Commissioner Tong doesn't take it, how are the rest of us supposed to get ahead?
Besides, Tong the Vegetable had already dropped clear hints over the phone: there was no operation, no smuggling, no crates, and certainly no Shoushan copper.
Even if hauled back, it would be slated for destruction. To ensure current stability, not a single hair of these two crates could be permitted to linger in this world.
Even if a bomb was bound to go off, it couldn't detonate on Yacheng's home turf.
Let it blow up wherever else it pleased!
"So you're basically doing work for the Tong family now?" Lao Zhang mused during their idle chatter.
"We're friends, just doing each other favors. It hardly amounts to that."
Ji Jue shook his head nonchalantly. "Besides, I'm just an apprentice without so much as an artisan's license. What business do I have getting tangled up in that mess?"
Lao Zhang's smile grew increasingly gratified.
A lad worth teaching.
Make money when you can, and tell trouble to shove off—that was the true art of living.
So what if the Tong family was filthy rich?
The further away the headache, the better.
"Ah, right, almost slipped my mind."
He slapped his bald pate. "Congratulations on the new place! Happy housewarming!"
"Don't mock me."
Ji Jue sighed. "My old basement was just too packed, leaving no room to work. I had to set up a little auxiliary workshop, and I only just moved in. Nothing's been organized yet.
"Once everything's sorted out, drinks are on me to celebrate."
"Then you'd better make it soon. Little Wen has been off the bottle for nearly a week now; looks to me like she's about to crack."
Both men burst into laughter.
After thoroughly inspecting the site to ensure nothing had been missed, Lao Zhang gave Ji Jue a quick physical checkup before parting.
Satisfied that he was mostly recovered without lingering complications, he offered a couple of perfunctory reminders to get plenty of rest—which even he knew were useless—and ambled off.
Before taking his leave, he added that once Ji Jue's workshop relocation was officially complete, the Beishan District crew had a gift lined up for him.
The remark left Ji Jue itching with curiosity.
Unfortunately, Xiao An's lips were tightly sealed this time. No matter how much Ji Jue prodded, the boy gave nothing away, his eyes darting evasively whenever pressed.
"Seriously? Why so mysterious?"
Ji Jue scratched his head.
He had honestly developed a bit of a trauma.
He still hadn't fully recovered from the last time someone shoved a surprise gift into his hands…
Xiao An blinked, looking pitiful. "Sister Wen told me not to say."
"Fine, fine."
Ji Jue sighed. He stepped on the brakes, dropped the boy off at the entrance of an arcade, and watched him walk away before turning the vehicle around and heading all the way out toward the periphery of Beishan District.
Another warehouse district bordering the sea.
Merely a few hundred meters from Professor Ye's workshop stood an aged two-story building.
Property values in Yacheng had suffered a total collapse ever since the Flame Tide Calamity ten years ago. What was once an exorbitantly priced coastal villa had sat neglected for years without a single prospective buyer.
Upon returning to Yacheng, the back pay, allowances, and assorted subsidies disbursed by Tong the Vegetable had totaled enough to purchase ten such aging buildings with luxury renovations included. Flush with cash for once, Ji Jue had waved his hand generously… and haggled with the original owner for two straight hours, ultimately securing it in full cash at a thirty percent discount on an already pathetic sum.
Following four or five days of renovations, the interior was now crammed with an assortment of unsorted clutter in chaotic disarray.
Scrap foraged from Quancheng, reclaimed materials, several lathes and milling machines that had passed through countless hands, and odds and ends hauled from his former basement.
Everything sat jumbled inside crates, completely untouched.
Hoisting his pack, Ji Jue shut the door behind him. After confirming the outer spiritus seal was intact and no one had entered during his absence, he headed straight for the basement.
Compared to the floor above, the basement was strikingly vast. In it already sat an alchemical crucible he had dug out of the Quancheng Ruins.
If one overlooked the near-total lack of supporting equipment, one could pinch one's nose and stubbornly call this place a workshop.
Regrettably, apart from a scrapped furnace, there was virtually nothing else.
It possessed the tragic aesthetic of a startup teetering on the brink of collapse.
"Broke… still broke…"
Surveying the destitute expanse before him, Ji Jue sighed softly, reached out, and slowly pulled the door shut behind him.
Click.
A crisp latch.
Immediately following, accompanied by the clear ticking of a second hand, scorching, soot-black scorch marks spread outward from the handle in all directions. In an instant, they devoured every inch of the basement.
In a flash, everything changed entirely.
Amidst the dead silence, the vaulted ceiling rose while the ground sank away. The somewhat barren basement expanded further, transforming into a dilapidated train platform. As if emerging through parting mist, an ancient train covered in fractures materialized silently upon the tracks like a phantom.
A gentle, warm light ignited within the carriages, illuminating Ji Jue's face.
With a crisp metallic scrape, the train doors slid slowly open.
Waiting in silent deference.
Hoisting the Shoushan copper ingot from his pack onto his shoulder, Ji Jue waved cheerfully:
"Hey, hey, hey! Folks, I begged up another meal!"
Chapter 247