As Chen Chuan's blade swept through, his eyes mirrored the stunned, bewildered look frozen upon Assistant Ling's severed head. The man seemed utterly unable to believe that the slash had arrived with such blinding speed and razor sharpness.
At the very same moment, Hongfu's blade and the recalled meteor hammer both struck Chen Chuan squarely, each impact letting out a deafening sonic boom.
Yet despite suffering such brutal blows, Chen Chuan did not budge in the slightest. Acting as if completely oblivious to the strikes, he reached out and snatched Assistant Ling by the hair, holding the severed head suspended in midair while allowing the headless corpse to tumble from the branches of the True Form Tree.
Right then, Hongfu suddenly halted. Indifference and vitality flickered back and forth across her eyes, but she made no further move against him, choosing instead to stand to the side, holding her blade.
Holding Assistant Ling's head level before him, Chen Chuan said calmly, "Assistant Ling, you lost."
A trace of approval surfaced on Assistant Ling's face, and he smiled faintly. "Yes, you won. Was that spiritual perception just now...?"
An admiring expression appeared on his features. "I truly didn't misjudge you. With strength like yours, had you joined us, our vision would have had an even greater chance of succeeding. What a pity."
Chen Chuan stared intently at him and asked, "Let me ask you something. You claimed someone in the Disposal Bureau told you to deal with me. Do you know who that person is?"
Assistant Ling replied, "Unfortunately, I only received word through an intermediary. That person was exceedingly cautious and never revealed their identity. As you know, once I succeeded, I would have departed anyway. I didn't care who they were, so long as it served my objective."
From the dissipating mental emanations around him, Chen Chuan could discern that he spoke the truth. He then asked, "Is this True Form Tree currently in the Confluence?"
Assistant Ling answered just as readily, "Yes, it is right there. Our people are guarding it. If you're interested, Supervisor Chen, you can try looking for it yourself. I look forward to seeing what choice you make—though I won't live to witness the outcome."
"Who else in the academy is involved in this besides you?"
Assistant Ling smiled faintly. "If I gave you an answer, Supervisor Chen, would you dare believe it?"
Chen Chuan nodded. "One last question." His gaze locked onto the man's face. "The Great Impact will be here soon. According to your plan, if the True Form Tree fails to achieve what you envision before then, how do you intend to respond?"
Assistant Ling's smile remained unaltered. "The Great Impact might arrive in a few years, or perhaps in over a decade. And it is precisely because time is so tight that we cannot afford to slow our pace. We must seize every second and employ any means necessary to bring this to fruition.
"If we still haven't finished before it arrives, we will simply enter the Confluence early. That is the place where the two worlds first began to merge, capable of bearing the echoes of both realms. Both the government and the corporations have laid their preparations there. It is the location most likely to endure indefinitely, and we will carry on our work there."
Chen Chuan said, "So in the end, your so-called preparations, your lofty ideals, still amount to nothing more than fleeing into the Confluence?"
Assistant Ling looked puzzled. "Is there anything wrong with that? It is precisely thanks to the True Form Tree that humanity will no longer be bound by physical form. We can temporarily shed such burdens, dwelling inside it as pure consciousness, needing only to await the day of our rebirth."
He sighed with genuine regret. "Supervisor Chen, I truly hope you will reconsider. There is no need to bind yourself to the innate shackles and perceptions of humanity or this world. The world is changing, and the people within it ought to cast off the past and rebuild their understanding anew."
Having uttered these words, Assistant Ling caught the cool, indifferent look in Chen Chuan's eyes. It seemed he suddenly realized something. Just as he opened his mouth to speak again, his features twisted violently, and his entire head swelled up like a balloon, as though an immense force inside was desperate to break free.
Once the skull stretched to its absolute limit, a muffled boom rang out. The entire head burst apart, erupting like a grand display of fireworks right before him.
Chen Chuan looked on impassively. He slowly withdrew his hand, dangling a slender, translucent branch-like band from his fingers—the boundary credential Assistant Ling had worn.
Taking this back for analysis might yield some useful discoveries.
With Assistant Ling dead, authority over the Sky Garden's field naturally transferred to Chen Chuan, as he now held the highest permissions present.
Chen Chuan cast a glance toward Hongfu. After a brief flicker of bewilderment, her eyes regained their vitality, and she gazed deeply at him.
Just as he was about to deactivate the field, Hongfu suddenly spoke. "I want to leave this place."
Chen Chuan looked at her in surprise. This was the first time he had heard Hongfu speak like this; ordinarily, her voice was cold and entirely devoid of emotion.
He asked, "Why?"
Hongfu lowered her gaze. "Because of my autonomous consciousness. The academy tolerates the presence of my autonomous consciousness because it enables me to produce more adaptive responses to better serve them, but only under the premise that it conforms to their will.
"Yet earlier, under an explicit command, I displayed acts of resistance. This has already been recorded. The academy will inevitably seek to 'correct' this afterward and erase my consciousness."
Chen Chuan nodded. "What do you need me to do?"
Hongfu looked toward his blade. "The channel to the Confluence is open, and I can travel there. Academy protocols forbid externalized conscious entities from entering that realm. By procedure, if an entity breaks away, the link must be promptly severed to perform a self-purge."
Her vivid eyes turned back to Chen Chuan. "I will attempt to cross over there. Your saber can sever my externalized consciousness from the main body, allowing me to break free from it entirely."
Chen Chuan asked cautiously, "Will this cause any harm to your main body?"
Hongfu answered honestly, "There will be some impact, but the main body can recover quickly. However, the conscious entity manifested in the future will be another version of me—one that obeys orders unconditionally."
Understanding her situation, Chen Chuan did not hesitate in the slightest. He nodded. "Alright. I'll help you."
Hongfu held his gaze for a moment. Then, transforming into a fluttering sweep of red, she turned and drifted toward the channel leading into the Confluence.
Chen Chuan closed his eyes slightly, focusing his senses. He could indeed feel a spiritual force field, resembling an intangible swirl of woven threads, extending deep into the passage toward the Confluence.
Standing upon the tree branch, he gripped the hilt of the Xuejun Saber. His inner force and spirit surged steadily, and once they reached their absolute zenith, his eyes snapped open. Leaping forward with both hands raised high on the hilt, he descended through the air and delivered a thunderous cleave!
A flash of saber light slashed clean across the Confluence passage, striking all the way to the ground!
With a heavy thud, his boots planted firmly onto the earth. Beside him, at the edge of the massive Confluence passage, the swirling vortex of spirit was sheared apart at its tail, its leading end dispersing naturally into the void.
He slowly straightened his posture and looked over. No further movement came from the other side; Hongfu had evidently severed her tether and departed freely.
Yet from this day forward, the Wuyi Academy would likely never again see the Hongfu possessed of her own self-awareness.
He turned around, intending to dissolve the environment. Just then, a sudden intuition struck him. Turning back, he saw a crimson scarf drifting through the air, whirling upward into the sky above.
He raised his head, sensing an intent transmitted from above. Having separated from the main body, Hongfu's conscious entity was now like rootless duckweed. It required a vessel to latch onto, or else it would be unable to persist for long. Thus, rather than departing immediately, she sought to anchor herself to him.
In return, should he ever encounter a crisis beyond his power to handle, she would manifest to aid and protect him. If he refused, she would depart to find another anchor.
Chen Chuan looked up at the hovering crimson scarf. After a moment of thought, he nodded. The scarf gently drifted downward, finally settling around his neck and fluttering softly in the breeze.
Chen Chuan glanced at it, then tapped the boundary credential. A moment later, the surrounding environment fractured and collapsed like shattering glass.
Looking up, he watched the brains suspended from the branches dissolve one by one. Involuntarily, the image of Instructor Wu rose in his mind, along with the notes the man had left behind. He also thought of the very first anomaly he had handled upon arriving in Center City—the innocent Xiaoman who had met a tragic end, and his older brother who had been transformed into a mannequin.
He had an inexplicable feeling that one of the heads hanging from that tree might very well have belonged to Xiaoman's brother.
As all the play of light and shadow faded away, the area restored itself once more to the tranquil appearance of the Sky Garden.
Birds chirped amidst the fragrance of flowers, and blossoming trees swayed gracefully, as though none of the prior atrocities had ever taken place.
Glancing aside, Chen Chuan spotted Assistant Ling's headless body lying on the ground. Not far away rested the set of meteor hammers, while the scabbard of his Xuejun Saber lay on the other side.
He walked over, retrieved the scabbard, and slid the Xuejun Saber back into place. Then, touching his boundary credential, he drafted a report.
In essence, it stated that Ling Jianxing, assistant at Wuyi Academy, had attempted to ambush him and had now been neutralized. It requested the immediate dispatch of personnel to secure and examine the body, while alerting Andun to activate the distrust clause.
Since Assistant Ling had stated unequivocally that there was a problem within the Disposal Bureau, Chen Chuan naturally had to remain vigilant. The matter needed to be kept under wraps so an investigation could proceed in secret.
Moreover, for Assistant Ling to have acquired such elevated permissions, it was hard to believe he had not received authorization from certain higher-ups. Chen Chuan also recalled that it had been Vice Principal Tan who originally proposed the arena tournament; it was difficult to imagine the man was entirely uninvolved.
This Vice Principal Tan was likewise attending meetings in Bainiao District right now, absent from the academy when the incident occurred, having conveniently steered clear of it.
The "distrust clause" was designed precisely for circumstances such as this, and only an Investigation Supervisor with real authority possessed the right to invoke it.
Until he submitted his report to higher authorities and reached preliminary findings, the news would remain confidential, inaccessible to any uninvolved personnel and barred from transmission elsewhere, ensuring a total information blackout.
In less than fifteen minutes, an elite disposal squad from the Disposal Bureau arrived at the academy to take over the scene and handle the aftermath.
……
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Chapter 707