Routine Disinfection

Thunder rumbled in rolling waves. Amidst the echoing roars, an immense sea of spiritus circulated and billowed across the vault of heaven, shifting in tandem with the quicksilver to refract radiant iridescent light, as if transforming a rainbow into silk ribbons. Fluttering in the wind, it was gorgeous and splendid beyond compare. Likewise, to mindless bugs stripped of everything save the instinct to spread and propagate, it proved a fatal temptation. Shrill chirps and buzzing rose in wave upon wave. From deep within the marshland shaded by dense foliage, amidst countless rotting carcasses of snakes, vermin, rats, and ants, fluttering moths suddenly trembled their wings and took flight. Countless plumes of ash seemed to rise into the sky, gathering beam by beam into a savage, turbid river that writhed wildly across the heavens. To the piercing drone of flapping wings, the wildly thrashing gray torrent swept forward. Yet in the very next instant, it halted dead in midair. As though frozen. At that moment, the curtain of rain—spun from thousands of threads—rippled almost imperceptibly. Like a casual wave of a hand. And so, the spiritus moths stiffened in midair ruptured and annihilated one after another, leaving not even ash behind. It was as if an invisible palm swept across the dome of the sky, erasing every speck of grime and dust, wiping the gray river clean from the mortal world from head to tail, leaving behind only the endless, overlapping crackle of tiny ruptures spreading into the distance. In that briefest fraction of a second, Isis's observations had already locked onto every single moth dancing within that gray river. Immediately afterward, countless threads of quicksilver tore through the air. Interlacing lines so miniscule they were virtually invisible to the naked eye impaled each moth from head to tail with living precision, weaving an intricate, dense web across the firmament. There was no need to waste effort crushing them one by one. The threads of quicksilver—so delicate they seemed ready to snap in the breeze—merely trembled slightly upon piercing their targets. Then, the Solid Alchemy sequences inscribed within the quicksilver activated, drinking in all ambient spiritus to instantly harden into razor-sharp crystals that rapidly expanded, piercing through the moths' bodies. They drank until every drop of spiritus was devoured. All that remained were innumerable crystals plummeting from the sky, which then merged back into the endless quicksilver rain, rising once more toward the heavens to await final purification and processing! In the snap of a finger, the boundless swarm of moths vanished without a trace. Meanwhile, the colossal shadow of the Crown of Isis continued its slow advance, skimming inch by inch across the land. Wherever it passed, every flying insect and trace of spiritus met total annihilation, erased without a trace! Under the pull and recycling of Solid Alchemy, all that was left behind was a "vacuum" in the wilderness completely devoid of spiritus. Had a certain craftsman surnamed Lou witnessed this spectacle with his own eyes, he would have doubted his sight. Had some cosmic mix-up occurred? Why did this look so much like his signature technique... the Spirit-Extinguishing Domain?! Unfortunately, resemblance proved nothing. The Spirit-Extinguishing Domain relied on the Lou clan's abilities to generate an immense spiritus inert field, forcibly plunging all spiritus into dormancy, and could even interfere with an opponent's spiritus and creations. What Ji Jue was doing was far simpler and more brutal. He just drained every last drop of spiritus dry! With the terrifying mass of the Crown of Isis paired with the pinpoint precision of the Hand of Isis, backed by the material resources of all Haian Industries and the processing power of a supercomputing center, anywhere covered by the storm was turned into an environment approaching an absolute spiritus vacuum! What followed was the spontaneous surge of spiritus from spiritus-rich regions toward spiritus-depleted zones—as natural and inevitable as atmospheric pressure equalizing. Yet no matter how subtle a single current might be, once amplified to such an astonishing scale, it formed an apocalyptic meteorological phenomenon! As the Crown of Isis operated and forged ahead, the situation escalated violently! What began as a subtle shift like a gentle breeze gradually widened, turned savage, and coalesced into a colossal vortex around the torrential rain. Like a raging typhoon, it swept forward with several times its own mass of spiritus. Every impure strand of spiritus drawn in vanished into the expanding storm as though plunging into a bottomless abyss. It became easier and easier. Excited by the surging currents of spiritus, the moths did not even realize something was wrong before being carried along into the clouds, essentially diving headfirst into a meat grinder! At this moment, heaven and earth were gripped by a scene of chilling calamity. Storms woven from fleeting neon flickers circled silver clouds that hung like an iron curtain. Trailing violent winds and torrential rain, they rampaged across Haizhou, roaming and spreading across the landscape. Wherever they passed, streams of spiritus flared up from the earth like flames, flickering before extinguishing into darkness. Only the rain, standing like an iron wall, pushed silently forward, advancing inch by inch. No matter how slow it might have appeared, its sheer scale made its progress unimaginably swift. There was no room to flee. "What... what is that...?" Amidst blaring alarms at the settlement's highest vantage point, the observer atop the watchtower was drenched in cold sweat, his face ghastly pale. Chaos gripped the settlement below, filled with wails, shrieks, hysterical screams, and weeping. "Run for your lives!" "Xinquan is attacking!!!" "Why the fuck are they doing this?!" The settlement leader slumped in his chair, tears streaming down his cheeks. "Has that bastard Ji lost his mind?! I only delayed paying the remaining balance by a few months! Is that any reason to do this?! Is it?!! All of you are to blame! I told you we couldn't delay paying Xinquan, but did you listen? Look at us now! All our money got swallowed up by that damn blockchain and crypto scam, and now we're going to die without even a grave!" "Come on, Boss, it won't come to that..." A subordinate beside him tried to comfort him. "Look on the bright side. If Xinquan wanted us dead, they'd just send a few armored vehicles. Or fire a few missiles to level us. Why go through all this trouble? Who uses an anti-aircraft gun to swat a mosquito?" "R-Really?" The leader's tear-filled eyes flickered with a faint glimmer of hope. Just as the subordinate was about to reply, someone else chimed in with a sullen face: "Who knows? Maybe they just want to make an example out of us." The words had barely left his mouth when the leader gave a loud wail, his eyes rolled back, and he passed out cold. Throughout the chaotic settlement, some scrambled to pack their valuables and flee by car, while others realized there was nowhere to run and dragged their families and belongings into storm cellars. Some scurried aimlessly like headless flies, while others grew so frantic they dug out weapons to fire guns and grenade launchers at the approaching storm... Still others, plunged into utter despair, found a comfortable spot to lie down in their final moments. Waiting for death. Yet whether they resisted, begged, or surrendered, none of it mattered. The silver storm continued its inexorable advance. Amidst howling gales, boundless silver radiance engulfed the entire settlement—only to veer off indifferently toward its next destination. Behind, in the subsiding winds, it left behind bewildered faces, stunned and incredulous. What on earth just happened? Wait... they were completely intact! Nothing was missing! Even the gold bars clutched so tightly in their arms that sweat dripped off them were untouched. At most, plunged into a spiritus-depleted zone, they felt an instinctive bout of dizziness and shortness of breath. Wait, what was the point of all that?! What the hell did you come here for, man?! The deluge said nothing. It merely pushed silently forward, tearing across Haizhou's wasteland from one settlement to the next. After brutally piercing through every line of defense, it mercilessly smothered every corner, only to depart without a backward glance. It left shaken "survivors" staring at one another in disbelief, who, once they came to their senses, broke into endless curses or tearful cheers. In just a few hours, the Crown of Isis had expanded to several times its original size. Had Isis not deliberately restrained its growth to prevent material properties from overloading and spinning out of control, it would have been even more monstrous. As the vortex took shape and the silver storm expanded, more and more moths were swallowed and ground to dust. Bizarre hues began to bleed through the silvery white, threading sinister crimson veins into the storm. A veritable natural disaster! Faced with the annihilation wrought by the Crown of Isis, the countless spiritus moths seemed thrown into disarray. Unfortunately, escape was impossible; driven by the instincts of the desires that formed them, they sought only to retaliate. When sheer numbers failed, hordes of rotting, infected birds threw themselves in droves toward the storm. Yet before they could even draw close, hardened droplets of quicksilver shredded them into a mist of blood. At last, the rising shrieks converged into a single roar. Within the stinking mire, mud and foul water abruptly boiled. Rotting giant trees and mounds of sludge surged upward, bulging higher and higher. As if a colossal behemoth beneath was rapidly ascending. Vines groaned and snapped one after another. Amidst the storm, the mire erupted, splattering sludge everywhere as rotten tentacles as thick as pillars reached toward the heavens, swelling rapidly. Countless suckers and mouthparts opened wide, hungrily latching onto the cloud cover. A calamity beast!!! Deep in the marsh muck, a half-rotted behemoth was writhing. Moss and two saplings grew from its giant squid-like head. The blessings of Vortex and Huangxu had allowed its body to develop to this magnitude, and it could even temporarily swell to a far more grotesque size. Unfortunately, they had not protected its consciousness. Having devoured too many flying insects and infected creatures, it had long since been infested and parasitized by Dreamloss Syndrome. Now, countless moths squirmed within its massive eye sockets. Though dead, the Vortex blessing kept its flesh biologically active, endlessly regenerating the rotting tissue amidst the parasitic insects. Yet it was unsustainable: caught in an endless cycle of growth and decay, extraneous limbs and tumors covered its entire body. Now, with tens of thousands of moths gathered within that hollow shell, fed by boundless desires, it was spurred once again by hunger to hunt! Iron-gray arms and tentacles rose toward the sky, shrugging off the cleaving quicksilver rain and deflecting every impact. Tentacles shooting out like bullets tangled into the storm clouds, sucking down huge gulps of spiritus in an attempt to tear the storm asunder. Until Isis, puzzled, slowly lowered her gaze. She noticed the foul stench and rotten flesh tainting her silvery-white clouds. *Ah. My new clothes got dirty...* The instant that thought surfaced in her soul, the brilliant starlight revolving within the clouds turned crimson with wrath. Behind layers of mist, a hazy face slowly opened its eyes. Looking down upon everything with cold indifference. Instantly, the world froze. Countless raindrops suspended in midair grew rapidly, gleaming with razor-sharp light. Under the alternating application of Fluid Alchemy and Solid Alchemy, a boundless tide of blood-red energy surged forth, turning the rain that blanketed the earth into pure crimson. With just a single glance. *BOOM!* As if a colossal cannon had fired from thin air, a gaping, bloody crater burst through the dead calamity beast's body, piercing straight through! In a flash, deep within the Crown of Isis, a massive volume of quicksilver collapsed into blades and shot forth. Like crushing dry weeds and smashing rotten wood, they severed tentacles, sank into the body, ripped through rotting flesh, and detonated violently. Then came a second, a third, a fourth... Amidst instinctive shrieks of agony, the calamity beast's body convulsed violently. Crater after bloody crater exploded across its frame in rapid succession. Severed tentacles fell away, only to be ground into flying mulch. The cruel devastation seemed endless, the explosions deafening. Not until the massive calamity beast was blasted into pieces did the countless moths scatter, attempting to flee in every direction. Only then did they realize that the bloody rain was contracting and closing in. As the blood-colored water grew and hardened, it sealed off all directions, cutting off the inside from the outside world. Innumerable slender pillars of quicksilver descended slowly from the clouds, linking heaven and earth. Then, countless blades sprouted from them... And began to spin! Within the sealed perimeter, a spine-chilling hum rose from the storm, drone without end. Bones shattered, blood evaporated, and flesh was obliterated. Every trace of remaining tissue was shredded into indistinguishable mist, to say nothing of the moths. And when the blood-colored rain surged forward once more, all that remained in its wake was a winding river of stone dust, sawdust, and pulverized meat that scarred the earth with a chilling trench as the storm marched on. "Hm?" Ji Jue raised his eyebrows in pleasant surprise. "It actually mimics the structure of Pan Ying?" Using the Crown of Isis as a vessel, she plundered vast amounts of spiritus via quicksilver, then imitated the spiritus composition of the worm to create a crucible-like construct. Using the vast spiritus gathered through Harboring Resentment as fuel, she applied Fluid Alchemy to cast quicksilver into disposable weapons modeled after Pan Ying. After enhancing their power via blood sacrifice, she catalyzed the spiritus completely using Consuming Lust to trigger massive explosions. He had never created such a design himself, yet Isis had naturally optimized and produced it on her own. Looks like she learned quite a lot! Ji Jue showed not the slightest concern over any potential risks, nor did he worry about what kind of monster he had created. He beamed with delight, clapping in praise. Worry about what? Isn't it a good thing when a child loves learning! Still, the process was somewhat cumbersome and redundant. In the end, she was constrained by her underlying composition and foundation, unable to utilize that power and accumulation with complete flexibility. Once Ji Jue completed his Regeneration form, he could set about propagating Matrix: Non-Offensive and creating a matrix relic. By then, with the ability to perform barehanded alchemy based on spiritus, she would no longer be so limited. Though, in that case, the vessel would require some extra thought... At the very least, he'd need top-quality materials, right? Ji Jue pulled out a pen and began sketching and scribbling on paper, contemplating combinations of various materials and their specific requirements, filled with anticipation. Once again, he lost himself in his work. Meanwhile, the storm continued to rampage across Haizhou. In just half a day, it had swept over nearly half the province, sparking chaos wherever it went. Such an overwhelming display and alarming scale was nothing short of a disaster! Unfortunately, whether from settlements, small towns, or the central city, countless callers rang the Security Bureau's phones off the hook, yet received not a single reply. Every report submitted vanished like a stone dropped into the sea. After a while, as if realizing things couldn't be left unaddressed, a public notice stamped with Warden Lyu's seal and signature was finally released. The gist of it was that late autumn pestilence was spreading through the wasteland. In the interest of public health and regional stability, and to prevent widespread damage, routine disinfection was being conducted. Citizens were advised to stay calm, as the situation would resolve shortly, and so forth... In short: standard procedure, don't panic, don't make a fuss. Reading the flimsy notice placed before them, countless people didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Look at the tempest tearing across the horizon, folks! Look at that sky-blotting silver brilliance! And look at that calamity beast that just got thrown into a blender and pureed into paste with a loud *bzzzt*! You're telling us this is a routine disinfection?! Why don't you just call it the Federation's Purge?! Even if I were blind, I wouldn't confuse disinfectant spray with a gas chamber... Where is the Heavenly Overseer?! With a commotion this big and a scale this terrifying, it's practically a man-made natural disaster! Heavenly Overseer, save us! Alas, the Heavenly Overseer showed zero reaction. Completely slacking off. As if turning a blind eye. No—more accurately, a glance had been cast... For a single fleeting moment, Ji Jue had felt a suppressive weight from Tianyuan through the Crown of Isis, like a gaze cast down from the highest vault of heaven. Just one glance. Yet immediately after, that gaze dissolved into nothingness, paying it no mind at all. In fact, it had subtly lifted certain restrictions, fanning the flames... If the Law of Heavenly Overseer still held absolute control over the Federation, how could such a massive spiritus tide have been whipped up so easily? And so, the reckless grand cleanup commenced. Except... "How fascinating." In the dead silence, a chuckle like an auditory hallucination rang out without warning. From right behind Ji Jue. Ji Jue's furious scribbling stopped dead. Setting down his pen, he looked back coldly. The girl in the white dress, who had appeared in the workshop without anyone noticing, stood with her hands clasped behind her back. She looked around with curious eyes before her gaze finally settled on him—seemingly curious, her smile turning faintly mocking: "To think someone like you actually exists in this world..."