Nine Mysterious Figures and "Major Luo"

A thick, bizarre odor drifted up from below. Though strikingly fragrant, it disgusted Bai Zhou far more than any foul stench. The crisscrossing ventilation ducts emitted a persistent drone, sucking in the vapors and hurling large gusts of "fragrant wind" straight at Bai Zhou. The scent felt potent enough to pry open his skull. Pinching his snout shut and holding his breath, Bai Zhou simply gave up on breathing altogether. Even so, he worried that staying too long would leave him thoroughly pickled in the stench. *What is that...?* Peering past stacked cargo crates, Bai Zhou saw a group of people clad in gray work overalls sorting and crushing plants and minerals that shimmered with an eerie luster. Yet the smell did not originate from here. In this subterranean expanse that stood in stark contrast to the world above, this area was likely nothing more than the outermost perimeter. And so, soundlessly, Bai Zhou pressed forward. The black cat melded seamlessly into the shadows of the duct, moving without a whisper of sound. The black ribbon bow around his front paw swayed gently twice, Crow's voice transmitting directly into Bai Zhou's mind: "Now I understand why that encrypted ledger had a major budget allocation titled 'Park Development'..." Bai Zhou nodded. "It really is an industrial park." It was vast. The space below stretched beyond the horizon of his sight, a dense flow of workers shuttling and hauling goods back and forth while hawkish overseers patrolled all around, evoking the image of a bustling subterranean ant colony. Transformed into a black cat, Bai Zhou slipped through the ducts in silence for a long time, navigating the labyrinthine pipes coiling like pythons before finally emerging from that immense workshop. As he drew closer to the core area, the ducts branched out, different rooms corresponding to different junctions. Bai Zhou had no choice but to explore them one by one. Passing numerous empty offices, Bai Zhou observed for a while but refrained from dropping down, ultimately following that bizarre smell deeper inward and further underground. As the smell grew increasingly pungent, Bai Zhou indeed spotted a new subterranean level beneath the one he had just traversed. From afar, he also glimpsed multiple grand, imposing mechanical assembly lines. "...This is it!" Bai Zhou's eyes lit up. Rows of silver-white precision machinery, varying in function and ferocious in design, packed the multi-thousand-square-meter facility to the brim. Powders of every color were splattered across the floor as if pigment bottles had been overturned, yet they faintly sparkled, seemingly imbued with some kind of spirituality. It was a comprehensive, large-scale production chain—cold, efficient, and undoubtedly astronomical in cost. All of this was identical to the assembly lines for Human Material that Bai Zhou had witnessed through the last words! It was these very assembly lines that produced the Human Material the Major needed, supplying fodder to feed demons while constantly laying bricks for his so-called grand cause and generating filthy funding! Heaven knew how much hardship and effort Bai Zhou and Crow had poured into tracking down this location. To say nothing of Crow scouring the industrial park, Bai Zhou alone had journeyed to the real Yuanmeng Middle School before descending into the Reflected Ruin Realm just for this place. Recalling all the toil and trouble of the past days filled him with deep emotion. Beside the assembly lines were several empty secret chambers. —They were precisely the pitch-black secret rooms Bai Zhou had seen in those last words! "Only..." Bai Zhou quietly furrowed his brow. Unlike the bustling hive above, the assembly lines here had already ceased operation. Yet the heavy scent lingered unabated; that nauseatingly fragrant odor had been radiating from this very floor. Machinery hung idle, suspended in midair. Crates and boxes lay scattered across the floor. People in protective suits were clearing debris, while specialists in white coats dismantled machines and packed their components into various safe boxes. *Clatter—* Workers dragged discarded cardboard and plastic boxes away. *Rumble—* Others drove small carts, hauling away mountain-like piles of metal lockboxes. *Whirrr...* Still others cleaned up, scrubbing the pigments from the floor. "Quick! Pick up the pace, or we won't make it in time!" a supervisor urged. Tall squads of guards kept watch around the perimeter, glaring vigilantly at their surroundings, every one of them clad in security uniforms. Their right hands rested continuously on the mysterious bulges at their waists, hiding unknown equipment that intimidated every worker into diligence. All in all, it was a scene of disarray, the hushed atmosphere broken occasionally by the muffled thuds of cleaning. Holding his breath ten meters above within the crisscrossing ducts, Bai Zhou observed everything unfolding below, his mind swirling with questions. *What are they doing?* *The assembly line stopped? Why shut it down?* *Why is the supervisor rushing everyone... what are they worried about being unable to catch in time?* Bai Zhou's first instinct was to wonder whether they knew he had arrived. Yet he quickly dismissed the thought. If they knew, they would have made their move on him long ago. Furthermore, the arrival of one person hardly warranted scaring the Major into halting operations on the spot, let alone relocating. The Human Material supply chain had always been the Major's core enterprise, supporting many of his grand undertakings with its profits. Even when Bai Zhou fled with the encrypted ledger, the unflappable Major had never halted its operation. Could it be that the failure of the demon summoning meant the Major no longer needed Human Material to feed demons—and coupled with the authorities mobilizing in force over the demon incident, the heat was simply too high, prompting the Major to temporarily suspend operations? Yet pausing to lay low was one thing. Everything here was extraordinarily covert. Had Bai Zhou not used the last words to make the dead speak and confirmed something foul was afoot, he never could have traced his way here. And yet, looking at the Major's moves now... He seemed to be relocating? Relocating where...? Had the Major excavated yet another underground base? Bai Zhou was bewildered. A production chain of this magnitude meant that every idle day inflicted massive losses upon the Major, and constructing a new subterranean facility would cost an astronomical fortune. From what Bai Zhou knew of him, unless driven by an absolute necessity, that value-obsessed man surnamed Luo would never lightly shut down operations, let alone abandon a base to relocate. Abnormal circumstances signaled foul play! Had a new faction intervened, or did the Major have another scheme in mind...? Yet this happened to be a good thing for Bai Zhou. An underground factory operating smoothly was like a piece of precision machinery that tolerated no foreign object—impenetrable, leaving Bai Zhou no angle of entry. But a factory that had only recently halted operations and begun packing up? Everything lay before him in total chaos. And in chaos lay his chance to strike! Everything was still here, waiting to be investigated. His eyes glinting, Bai Zhou lingered a moment to commit every detail to memory before continuing along the ventilation ducts to search the perimeter. Much like the layout above, another row of offices sat behind the workshop floor. "B-Big brother, where is this?" The voice drifting up from below caused Bai Zhou to halt his steps, holding his breath to observe. Inside a quiet little office, a burly middle-aged man looked around uneasily. The office supervisor stood in front of him with his back turned, while two men flanked him, subtly blocking his exit. *It's that guy who came for the interview earlier...* Bai Zhou blinked, understanding immediately. Still, wasn't something wrong with this "office"? Steam and heat radiated through the room. In the corner burned a blazing stove, beside which the supervisor stood with his head down, occasionally prodding at something. "Congratulations, you passed our interview. Now you just need to complete a few onboarding procedures." "What?" The interviewee was no fool. Everything he had seen along the way had already made him want to back out. "I think I might need to consider this a bit more. Your company..." Before he could finish, the retreating man was slammed down by the two burly men behind him, his sleeves rolled up in the same motion. "There is no need to consider." Footsteps tapped rhythmically as the supervisor approached with a smile, holding a spider-shaped branding iron. "Deep breath. Pain is normal." The branding iron held aloft glowed crimson, hissing with heat. In the middle-aged interviewee's eyes, the supervisor's smile was indistinguishable from a demon's grin. "I'll be quick though. Bear with it—" "Aaaargh!" The interviewee's agonized screams erupted instantly, accompanied by the sharp, sizzling sound of searing flesh. Watching this, Bai Zhou couldn't help but shiver. *Is this how your company does tattoos?* *Straight with a branding iron? Is this a tattoo or a burn scar?* *Evidently, tattoos are hazardous; nothing beats clean, natural skin.* The ventilation shaft kept circulating air, continuously pumping the smell of charred meat up toward him. But Bai Zhou, usually fond of good food, felt not the slightest appetite, his expression one of pure speechless disgust. When the supervisor pulled the branding iron away, the shape of a spider was stamped upon the man's shoulder. The interviewee's face was deathly pale, yet his arm turned bright red. Vivid scarlet vitality surged outward of its own accord, coalescing onto the spider mark until the Red Spider design gleamed vibrant and wet. "So that's how the Red Spider mark is made..." Bai Zhou mused from the duct above as he took it all in. The man's screams gradually subsided. The terror in his eyes smoothed into calm, before finally shifting into a grateful, fanatical bow toward the supervisor. "Thank you for elevating me... I cannot wait to perform meritorious service for the group!" From the look of him, he seemed eager to carve the word "Loyalty" directly onto his face. "We all undergo this process." The supervisor flashed a satisfied smile. "Now, welcome aboard!" Just like that, the interviewee was transformed into a loyal lackey of the security group. The glowing branding iron in the supervisor's hand gradually cooled, its material evidently out of the ordinary. Bai Zhou shifted his gaze to the stove nearby, noticing that the fuel burning inside was no ordinary material either. *So those are the materials for the branding ritual... With something this simple, no wonder the minor totem is so shoddy.* Bai Zhou pondered, yet alarm bells began tolling in his heart. *Still, a ritual this cheap makes widespread replication possible—they can mass-produce legions of death-sworn foot soldiers at will.* Behind the Major stood a true expert after all! Just then, Crow's voice echoed in his mind, confirming his suspicions: "To simplify a ritual to this degree for mass production... whoever did this is at least a ranked ritualist." "Though I don't know what branch of rituals this ritualist specializes in, every ranked ritualist holds a status equal to—or even slightly above—a Level 6 Titled Extraordinary. You must never underestimate them!" A ranked ritualist! A bona fide master who had truly entered the higher halls. Though they might not excel in direct combat, their methods were endlessly diverse. Among Extraordinaries, they were like nobility, revered and courted. As Crow explained, such figures were far rarer than Titled Extraordinaries; in Tinghai, every one of them was an honored guest of major factions, treasured and pampered, treated with deference even by Extraordinaries beyond the Titled rank. Where had the Major unearthed such a prominent figure... and how had he convinced them to serve him? Yet... Even at a time like this, they hadn't stopped recruiting disposable death-sworn fodder? This realization stirred Bai Zhou's mind. He keenly sensed an anomaly. Bai Zhou didn't believe this was a coincidence—if interviews were still underway so late at night, there had to be far more during the day. What he had witnessed was merely one instance; how many had occurred out of sight? Halting operations, moving to a new location, mass-recruiting death-sworn cannon fodder... This didn't look like the Major lying low to avoid scrutiny. Rather, it looked like he had conceived a new plan and was preparing to make a massive move! "...Hm?" Yet as he continued onward through the ventilation duct, Bai Zhou was startled to discover that this immense subterranean facility didn't stop at two floors. There was an even deeper level! *A third floor?* This level was much narrower and far more secretive than the two above. Apart from the ventilation ducts, Bai Zhou couldn't see a single passageway leading down from the higher floors; it appeared completely sealed off on all sides. Yet everything here was also far more "unconcealed." Dim light hung over the area. Pitch-black metal cages were strewn across the floor, spattered with blood, holding all manner of bizarre creatures Bai Zhou had never seen before, lying on the brink of death. Calling them bizarre beasts was generous; they were deformed monsters. Beside the cages, machines processed streams of data, recorded in real time by white-coated personnel standing by. Empty containers and radioactive waste were piled haphazardly in the corners. Several whiteboards were densely scrawled with data and notes, chilling terms like "Feasibility of 35% Physical Enhancement," "Controllability of Mental Derangement," and "Disintegration Threshold." Mechanical assembly lines hummed as they ran. Several numbered black boxes were affixed to the head of the lines, where a wondrous, strange power bearing active spirituality flowed downward, siphoned off by writhing, densely packed crimson hoses attached to them. These scarlet hoses trailed along the assembly line, connecting to standing black humanoid creatures. Clad in tight black combat gear and wrapped tightly from head to toe, these humanoid creatures all had crimson eyes. They stood ramrod-straight atop the rolling assembly line as writhing scarlet hoses linked into them, seemingly infusing something. *Black Boxes! The Major's biological weapons!* Bai Zhou's gaze sharpened. He recognized them as the "Old Blacks" the Major had repeatedly sent to hunt him down. Yet these were distinctly different from all the Old Blacks Bai Zhou had encountered before! These Old Blacks were noticeably taller, each standing two meters high. They stood silently on the assembly line like oversized toys in production, yet emanated a bafflingly tyrannical oppression. *The Major's trump cards...?* Bai Zhou murmured internally. Aside from that, the most conspicuous feature on this floor was a cluster of incubation chambers in the very center, filled with green fluid. Yet there was nothing inside those tanks other than the liquid itself. A total of nine massive incubation chambers stood completely empty, their green liquid bubbling and churning continuously. *Thud, thud, thud, thud...* Heavy footsteps rang out. Eight men with extraordinarily distinct physical traits walked out from behind the incubation tanks. The eight were of similar build, all around 1.75 meters tall, and each wore a hideous half-face mask. Lined up from left to right, one had a head as big as a bushel basket; another had massive, thick arms; a third had legs tapered like awls; a fourth had a chest bulging high. One had protruding fan-like ears; another had pupil-less white eyes; another had bare feet broad as cattail-leaf fans; and yet another had a mouth that slit all the way back to his ears when he smiled, gaping like a bottomless black hole. The surrounding staff seemed to revere them immensely, saluting respectfully from afar upon seeing them. The eight were thoroughly accustomed to this, paying it no mind and not even sparing a glance. "Where's Fourth? Still not here?" The large-headed man swayed his colossal head, his grotesque appearance comical, yet not a single person nearby dared cast a glance his way. The wide-mouthed man let out an odd cackle. "I've waited so long the flowers are withering!" "Luo Jiu, don't get sarcastic with your fourth brother!" The one with feet like fan palms gave a cold snort and stomped his foot. The entire subterranean level trembled and shook twice, alarming everyone with terrifying might. "I'm here! Elder brothers, younger brothers, I'm late!" Someone laughed heartily, his voice arriving before his person. Next, an aperture in the ceiling opened automatically, and a suit-wearing man dropped down with a thud. This man wore no mask; his face was utterly ordinary as he smiled at the eight men. *Is that...?* Above in the ventilation duct, Bai Zhou's eyes widened sharply, his breath catching. He had never met this man in reality. Yet Bai Zhou had clearly seen him in the visions left behind in others' last words, and had spent the past few days searching for him every day, only to come up empty every time— It was that mysteriously elusive "Teacher Sun"! Why was he here? "Fourth, seeing us, and you're still wearing that face?" The man with the head like a bushel basket swayed his head once more. The man with the bulging chest patted his soft bosom, his voice booming and thick: "Luo Fourth, I don't like that skin either!" "Alright, don't rush me..." And so, under Bai Zhou's horrified gaze from above, this "Teacher Sun" chuckled, reached up, and pinched the flesh at the edge of his cheek. With a single tug— *Snap!* A layer of facial skin was peeled away. Revealing a sharply sculpted face beneath. —Indistinguishable from "Major Luo"!