"How come you moved the Colonel to one side again?" Mr. Shaw asked loudly as soon as he entered the shop.
An Zhe had just sat up on the bed. Rubbing his eyes, he said in a small voice, "I can't sleep well with him next to me."
"You're so finicky." Mr. Shaw walked over and gave him a hard knock on his head. "Several days ago, you weren’t even capable of sleeping while hugging a human head, right?”
An Zhe wordlessly buried his head beneath the quilt once more.
A human head was a human head, and Lu Feng was Lu Feng. As a xenogenic who the Arbiter had repeatedly nitpicked, he didn't need a reason to be afraid of that person.
"I'm deducting your wages."
Left with no other choice, An Zhe could only get back out from under the quilt and slowly put on his coat.
The tone of Mr. Shaw's voice turned facetious again. "I think you better not go out to seduce mercenaries. Just work hard with me instead."
"How come?" An Zhe asked.
Mr. Shaw wasn’t saying that yesterday.
"With your small appearance, tsk, it's no good," Mr. Shaw said. "Those mercenary ruffians, they'll bully you."
"Why would they bully me?"
"For fun, probably."
Done talking, he knocked An Zhe on the head once more.
An Zhe frowned. He felt that Mr. Shaw was bullying him already with his actions just now.
However, he had no choice. He was currently just like a parasite, dependent on the pay from Mr. Shaw—so he could only obediently get out of bed and wash up, then throw himself into the day's work.
Today was the thirtieth day since he had started making mannequins. In other words, they had to completely finish the mannequin and then deliver the goods to the customer’s doorstep by tonight at the very latest.
Mr. Shaw had finished the torso and limbs ten days ago—though it was mainly An Zhe who made them under his guidance. After doing those things, he picked out a prop gun from the ones being sold in the shop and put it together with the mannequin. Finally, through the black market, they obtained a near-identical black uniform and dressed the mannequin in it. Now the mannequin of the Arbiter had a perfect body and only needed a head.
At present, An Zhe was holding the mannequin head and checking to see whether the alignment of the hairs he had personally implanted were pleasing to the eye. In the meantime, Mr. Shaw had fired up a melting furnace nearby and was stirring transparent adhesive in a small white ceramic pot with one hand while adding green dye one drop at a time with the other hand. The dye initially formed a dark green blob in the pot, but after a short while, countless tiny tendrils stretched from it and dispersed outwards. With the stirring, it was evenly distributed, and the adhesive became a light green that then gradually darkened. An Zhe had nothing to do after he finished examining the hair, so he stared at the color, recalling Lu Feng's eye color as he watched.
In the light, they were a green like that of leaves frosted over with ice. Often, when that pair of eyes looked at An Zhe, he would start feeling cold.
And in the dim lighting of the night, Lu Feng's eyes would appear to be a deep, dark green like a fathomless lake in the night that was hiding many unknown things.
As he was thinking, he paid attention to the substance's color. Once it matched the eyes in his memories, he said, "This is good."
With a smile, Mr. Shaw extinguished the melting furnace and said, "You have good eyes."
An Zhe handed the mold to Mr. Shaw without a word. The translucent material was poured into the spherical mold and allowed to cool and set. Then, once they were embedded into the eye whites, the eyes were completed.
Right away, these eyeballs were installed in the mannequin's eye sockets. The mannequin's eyelashes were also An Zhe’s handiwork, implanted one by one. Now, the black eyelashes gently covered the green eyes, and even the most minute subtleties of the cold expression were visible. It was truly too similar to the real person. Feeling anxious, An Zhe picked up the black service cap and put it on the mannequin.
The next tasks were to tune the joints and polish the facial details. When they were completely finished, it was seven o'clock in the evening. An Zhe silently looked at the mannequin, and the mannequin silently looked back at him. He felt that it looked utterly like the Colonel himself.
They folded up the mannequin that looked utterly like the Colonel himself at the joints and placed it in a rolling suitcase. Mr. Shaw clapped his hands and said, "It can be delivered now. I'll get Jensen to deliver it. He's cheap."
Jensen was the black-clad youth who sold cell phones and handed over the Arbiter's data to Mr. Shaw.
But although Mr. Shaw dialed repeatedly on his communicator, nobody answered.
Mr. Shaw frowned. "What's going on?"
"Did he get discovered?" He dialed Hubbard's communicator instead, but a voice immediately came from the receiver. "The party you have dialed has left the base. Please leave a message."
Mr. Shaw turned to look at the tablet computer on the workbench, tapped on it, and deleted all of the photos with a few quick motions. He said to An Zhe, "Something’s not quite right. Let's hurry up and get rid of the goods. There's nothing else to do tonight, so come deliver it with me."
Thus, An Zhe came to District 6, where he hadn't set foot for a month already.
Unit 4, Room 312 in District 6's Building 13 was their commissioner’s location. The suitcase was very heavy, so An Zhe and Mr. Shaw took turns carrying it up the stairs to the third floor. Unlike Building 117, where An Zhe lived before, Building 13’s residents were all women, and along the way, An Zhe ran into a good number of them. Most of them had short hair, tall statures, and distinctive and strong facial features. As he looked at them, An Zhe couldn't help but think of Doussay again.
Doussay was a very special woman. She was tall but slenderer than all the other women An Zhe had seen. At the same time, her bosom was fuller than other people's—because of this slender fullness, her body seemed strangely soft, and this softness was very rarely seen even on the third underground floor.
At the same time, he saw that Mr. Shaw was also casting unrestrained looks at the women passing by. In the end, Mr. Shaw said, "There's no second Doussay."
Without saying anything, An Zhe gently tapped on the door to No. 12. "Hello, we've come to make a delivery."
Nobody opened the door.
An Zhe's knocking became a little louder. "Hello, we're here to make a delivery."
Still nobody opened the door.
Mr. Shaw took a step forward and pounded the door a few times with his fist. "Is anyone there? It's a delivery from the third underground floor."
Silence.
Amidst the silence, footsteps came from behind them. An Zhe turned his head and saw a middle-aged woman dressed in gray. He said, "Hello, are you the resident of No. 12?"
The woman shook her head and looked at the door. "You two are looking for her?"
"Mm-hm," An Zhe said. "She ordered something, and we've come to deliver it."
There was no expression on the woman's face as her gaze shifted to the suitcase Mr. Shaw was pulling. "What goods?"
"Premium goods. Anything else, we can't say," Mr. Shaw said. "Is she not in? When will she return?"
The woman looked at him, the corners of her lips drawn taut. For a short while, she didn't say anything.
Unable to bear it any longer, Mr. Shaw said, "Is she—"
Just as the words left his mouth, the woman said, "She's dead. You guys didn't know?"
There was a brief silence.
"Dead?" After a brief silence, Mr. Shaw raised his voice. "Then who's going to give me the rest of my payment?"
The corners of the woman's mouth twitched. With an expression that held a shadow of a smile, she replied, "The Arbiter killed her. Go get him to pay."
Mr. Shaw, looking like a duck whose neck was being squeezed, said nothing for a while.
But An Zhe was suddenly stunned.
As he looked at the woman, he asked, "What was she called?"
As though the woman did not hear his words, she turned, lifted her hand, swiped open the room door on the opposite side with her ID card, and walked in. The moment before the door closed from the inside, two simple syllables came from within.
"Doussay."
An Zhe once again thought back to the expression Doussay showed to Lu Feng before she died and momentarily didn't know what he should say. Mr. Shaw was also silent. After a long time, he let out a sigh and said with a smile, "Do you know how much money this order was?"
"I don't," An Zhe said.
"Even more than Hubbard's order." Mr. Shaw looked at the rolling suitcase on the ground, his eyes half-closed, and said slowly, "She played with so many men, I didn't think that she'd also have genuine feelings."
An Zhe said, "Doussay said that the Arbiter saved her before."
"Fool." Mr. Shaw sighed and shook his head. "The kind of person that the Arbiter is… even if he did save her, it was because he wanted to kill xenogenics. She had scraped a living off of men since she was young. She wasn’t a little girl anymore, so how could she not understand this? It's not worth it."
An Zhe didn't say anything.
He didn't understand why Doussay liked Lu Feng either. However—compared to other people, Lu Feng was indeed different. What those differences were, though, he couldn't say.
After a long time, Mr. Shaw said, "She's gone, so what should we do with the goods? It can't be tossed. If it's discovered, the Trial Court will definitely come looking for me."
An Zhe said, "Then bring it back to the shop?"
"Absolutely not." Mr. Shaw shook his head. "I can't get in touch with Jensen all of a sudden, so I'm afraid something's happened."
As he spoke, he looked at An Zhe and seemed to suddenly think of something. "I remember that your home is also in District 6?"
He jiggled the suitcase. "And you don't live over there, so there's no fear of being seen. Let's do this. For tonight, bring the goods back to your place. After a few days, if nobody checks, we'll find someone to buy it."
"What about you?" An Zhe asked.
Mr. Shaw looked down at his watch and frowned. "I have to go back first, it's the last train."
An Zhe thought for a while and felt that it was feasible. He didn't live at home, so it was fine to temporarily stash the mannequin up in there.
Mr. Shaw patted his shoulder. "You can do it."
Then he swiftly left to catch the train.
But it turned out that An Zhe couldn't do it.
District 6 was a circular area, so Building 13 and Building 117 weren't far apart. This was also the reason why Mr. Shaw felt at ease about having him take the goods home. But the mannequin was solid and really couldn't be considered light. With practically turtle-like speed, he dragged the massive suitcase along the road. By the time he reached the foot of Building 117, the sky had already darkened completely.
Indistinct black shadows were everywhere, and the outline of the building was visible only by way of the aurora's glow. As An Zhe stood in front of the unit and thought about how he still needed to climb up to the fifth floor with the suitcase, he felt despair, for it really was very heavy.
The despairing An Zhe turned around on the spot so that he no longer faced the pitch-black staircase entrance. He planned to stop and rest a while first.
The sound of burning breaths suddenly came from behind him, and he was wrapped up in an abrupt hug.
"An Ze!"
It was Josh's voice.
"I saw you from the window, so I immediately came down." Josh held him tightly. "Where have you been? How come you've only come back now? Why didn't you tell me? I've been looking for you all this time."
He took a breath, then continued. "You aren't allowed to leave again. Where have you been?"
Mr. Shaw's words were correct. Josh thought of An Ze as his personal belonging.
Thus, An Zhe calmly said, "Please let go."
Not only did Josh not let go, he tightened his grip instead.
"Are you angry at me?" Josh asked.
Before An Zhe said anything, he spoke up again in a low voice. "I was wrong, I'll apologize to you. Whatever way you want me to apologize is fine. An Ze, I love you."
An Zhe was speechless.
Mr. Shaw's words seemed to be correct again. He really did want to bed An Ze.
"Thank you," An Zhe said, "but I have someone."
"You're truly angry?" Josh smiled. "You always did like to deliberately make me mad when you were angry."
An Zhe really was very annoyed with this human. He struggled to free himself, but Josh forcibly turned him around. "Look at me, An Ze."
"Bang!"
A gunshot ran out.
Josh gave a start and reflexively let go of An Zhe, then looked around.
An Zhe also looked in the direction where the sound had come from and saw that beneath the shadow of the black building, a person was standing there. The person had just fired into the air and was putting the gun away while walking over. Slim and tall, it was a figure he was extremely familiar with.
Only military people could legally bear arms within the city.
And within the military's various branches, only one kind of person could fire at will.
An Zhe thought that he seemed to have stumbled into the path of the Arbiter's city patrol again—what a coincidence.
Before he could carefully think about it, he heard Lu Feng's familiar cold voice. "What is he to you?"
"A neighbor," An Zhe said.
Lu Feng walked up to him.
From such a small distance, anyone could recognize that this was the Arbiter.
An Zhe felt Josh abruptly stiffen next to him.
"AD4117. My communicator number." Lu Feng's voice sounded nonchalant. "Next time this kind of thing happens, if you are willing to contact me, he'll be arrested for indecency."
An Zhe lifted his head to look at Lu Feng, his reaction temporarily delayed somewhat. But since this man was the military's Colonel, it seemed that he really did have the duty of maintaining law and order within the city.
He said, "Okay."
He felt Josh, who was behind him, get even more stiff.
But An Zhe couldn't be bothered to care about Josh at all.
Because Lu Feng's hand was gently resting on the handle of the rolling suitcase.
He asked, "Shall I help you bring it up?"
An Zhe and Lu Feng looked at each other.
The expression in Lu Feng's eyes was one of slight indifference, his gaze calm. He was being serious.
An Zhe stuttered, not even able to speak clearly. "There's... there's no need."
Stolen novel; please report.
If it had been something else in the suitcase and the Arbiter had suddenly wanted to help for some strange reason, although he didn't want to interact with this man more than necessary, he wouldn't have gone so far as to refuse.
However, what this box contained right now was nothing good.
An Zhe put his hand on the handle as well and tried to take it out of Lu Feng's grip. "I can do it myself."
"Can you?" As Lu Feng looked at him, his long brows slightly furrowed. "You live on the first floor?"
"... I live on the fifth floor. But I can still do it."
"Oh."
His hand pressed down on An Zhe's fingers, and then An Zhe's hand was somehow instantly removed from the handle.
With a click, the handle slid neatly back into the suitcase. Lu Feng grasped the handle on the suitcase’s side, then effortlessly lifted the entire thing.
An Zhe gave a start.
He said, "There's really no need."
"The fifth floor?"
Fine.
An Zhe realized that he himself had given away the floor earlier.
But without waiting for An Zhe to react, Lu Feng already started walking to the unit's entrance, so he could only follow. Before entering the building, An Zhe even turned his head back to glance at Josh and saw that he was watching them, disconcerted, and hadn't moved a single step. Mr. Shaw had said that if An Zhe seduced a powerful mercenary, Josh would definitely take the long way around upon seeing him. By the looks of things now, that statement may have really been correct, even though the one at his side was the Arbiter rather than some mercenary and even though he actually had no relationship with Lu Feng whatsoever.
However, in the brief span of this distraction, An Zhe had already fallen several steps behind Lu Feng. The Colonel's legs were longer than his, so he could only increase his pace to catch up before entering the building together with Lu Feng.
To conserve power, only the corridor's tiny emergency lights were giving off a faint glow. The place was very dark and very cramped. In the silence, the sounds of the Colonel's combat boots treading on the floor was particularly distinct, every single sound seeming to knock on An Zhe's heart. Based on his understanding of Lu Feng, the man was about to ask, "What's in the box?"
But in a strange stroke of fortune, on the entire way to the fifth floor, Lu Feng didn't say anything at all.
An Zhe stood at the entrance to No. 14, took out his ID card, and swiped it to open the door. The room's curtains hadn't been drawn shut, so as soon as he opened the door, the aurora's glow came in through the window. The aurora’s bright luster covered the greater part of the pitch-black sky. It was mainly green, with orange and purple at the edges. An Zhe entered and turned on the little light in the room. Based on the courtesy that the human community should have, he looked at the Colonel, who was standing next to the door, and said, "Please come in."
Lu Feng readily walked in and put the rolling suitcase next to the wall. Observing his expression, An Zhe felt that he was actually in a good mood and also seemed like he didn't want to leave.
He asked tentatively, "Are you going to continue patrolling?"
Lu Feng leaned against the wall with his arms crossed and said, "No need."
With those green eyes watching him, An Zhe felt that the Arbiter did not completely believe that he was human even now and that he was still fastidiously searching for any possible slip-up.
An Zhe asked in a small voice, "Then what will you be doing later?"
"Head back to the City Defense Agency to rest," Lu Feng said.
An Zhe strove to converse with him in the manner of humans. "You aren't going back to the Trial Court?"
"It's too far."
"... Oh."
He felt that under the current circumstances, he ought to invite the Colonel in to sit for a while, but he wanted very badly for the other man to leave because although there appeared to only be one Colonel in the room, there were actually two.
He asked, "When are you going?"
Lu Feng looked at him.
An Zhe cast his gaze down and pursed his lips.
"Go get me a glass of water," Lu Feng said.
The tone was completely unlike that of a discussion or suggestion. No matter what this person said, it sounded like he was issuing orders.
"Okay," An Zhe replied.
He picked up the water cup on the table and opened the door. From here, it was very far to the communal water room in the corridor on this floor. He walked over and, facing the red and blue buttons, guessed as to whether Lu Feng liked to drink warm water or cold water.
Very quickly, he pressed the blue button that represented cold water. There was no ice water here, otherwise he definitely would've gotten it for Lu Feng.
Afterwards, as he held the water cup and thought about how he had to continue facing Lu Feng, he walked back to his room with a heavy heart.
The Arbiter helping him carry the suitcase upstairs late at night was just so he could come over and drink a glass of water. Could it have been that he was thirsty after being out on patrol all night?
Once he told Mr. Shaw about this experience tomorrow, based on the fact that Mr. Shaw's head only contained one thing, he would definitely say, "He wants to bed you."
Wrong.
An Zhe stopped dead in his tracks.
He suddenly recalled why Mr. Shaw had left the box with him.
Because Jensen had clearly always been selling cell phones in the black market without causing any trouble, but he suddenly couldn't be reached. Mr. Shaw felt that something was fishy, so they couldn't take the mannequin of the Arbiter back to the shop.
Frowning, he began to think back on Lu Feng's every action.
The Trial Court's patrols were all conducted in groups, just like that time at the entrance to the black market when Lu Feng had led three people. Why was he by himself now? And right downstairs from his home?
Furthermore, this Lu Feng person seemed to have the ability to read minds. Previously, whatever abnormalities he had were all discovered, so how come he didn't ask at all about the suitcase’s contents this time?
An Zhe's hand, which had just landed on the door handle, froze.
He thought that the Arbiter, perhaps, had come to capture him.
He yanked his hand back, took out his communicator, and dialed AE77243, Mr. Shaw's number.
Four words appeared on the communicator's black-and-white electronic screen: "unable to accept call".
The alarm bells in An Zhe's heart went off.
But right at that moment, an authoritative and cold voice came from the other side of the closed door. "Come in."
An Zhe's heart thumped wildly. He took a deep breath, then opened the room door.
He saw Lu Feng standing in the same spot as before, head slightly bowed with the rolling suitcase upright at his side. An Zhe didn't know what he was thinking.
An Zhe took two steps and held out the cup. "Colonel, your water."
Lu Feng didn't move a muscle.
Something suddenly occurred to An Zhe.
He slowly, slowly turned his head to look at the other side of the room.
Then he met the gaze of the real Lu Feng.
Lu Feng was sitting at his desk with legs crossed, his sitting posture lofty. In his hand was a sheet of paper, and his head was tilted up to look at An Zhe.
An Zhe now knew true despair.
But at that very moment, all he could do was slowly take two steps forward and put the cup on the desk. "Your water."
Lu Feng picked up the water cup, put it to his mouth, and took a light sip, then frowned slightly. "Cold water?"
An Zhe didn't want to speak. He seemed to have done something wrong again.
He saw Lu Feng put the water cup onto the desk again, put the paper back on the table as well, and looked at him.
An Zhe swiftly admitted his mistake. "I was wrong."
Lu Feng didn't say anything. A full ten seconds went by before he asked, "What offense did you commit?"
"I didn't get warm water for you."
"Cold water is also fine."
An Zhe looked at the propaganda paper upon which "OPPOSE THE ARBITER'S TYRANNY" was written in bloody red, and his heart grew a bit colder again. He said, "I participated in an illegal demonstration."
"That's not it."
He was done for. There remained only one offense that he possibly could have committed.
What charge would cover the making a mannequin of the Arbiter?
As An Zhe felt self-loathing for not carefully looking at the base's laws before, he strove to find the correct words. Mannequin, a mannequin used for that kind of bad purpose—
The words Lu Feng said to Josh when they were downstairs popped up in his mind. In despair, An Zhe said, "... Indecency?"
He saw a shadow of a smile appear in Lu Feng's eyes. "Have you looked at the base's laws before?"
"I haven't."
Lu Feng said, "Come here."
An Zhe took a step forward.
"Hold out your hand."
An Zhe obediently held out his hand.
Lu Feng's words were still clipped. In the same commanding tone, he said, "Put it up here."
"Where?"
"On me."
An Zhe hesitated for a moment, then slowly placed his hand on the left side of Lu Feng's chest. The uniform's silver buttons and the badge pinned to his chest were all cold and had lines decorating their surfaces. He didn't know why Lu Feng wanted him to do this.
Click.
The icy silver handcuff was clipped onto An Zhe's wrist once more.
Lu Feng was expressionless. "For indecency."
An Zhe did not understand.
Immediately afterwards, he saw Lu Feng lift up his communicator.
"Capture complete. One item of contraband seized," he said. "Come provide backup."
----------------------------------------
The City Defense Agency's corridor was even darker and colder than the one in the residential building.
An Zhe was taken to the first underground floor. In the dim lighting, there were iron doors all around, and he realized that this may be the humans' prison.
He was locked up behind one of them.
"You'll be tried tomorrow," Lu Feng said as he locked the iron door. "You have ten hours to prepare a defense."
An Zhe said, "... I don't have a defense."
"That's what I thought," Lu Feng replied.
With those words, he turned around and departed without even looking back, leaving behind only one sentence. "Rest well."
Clutching at the iron door, An Zhe watched Lu Feng's figure disappear in the corridor.
Whispers came from the opposite side.
"Like I was saying, they won’t skip over even one."
"If Hubbard hadn't gone out into the wilderness, he'd be eating prison meals too. He had me take the photographs in secret. You two really trapped me. After we get out, pay me."
"Go to Doussay. She placed the order, and the bill hasn't even been paid yet."
"Then take me with you."
Those were Mr. Shaw and Jensen’s voices.
An Zhe looked in the direction of the sound and strove to identify the two people who'd been locked up across from him in the dim lighting. "You two are also here?"
"Obviously," Jensen said. "I was happily selling cell phones when people from the Trial Court took me away."
Mr. Shaw sighed. "After I separated from you, I hadn't even entered the train station when I got caught."
Jensen asked, "What about you? How did you get caught?"
An Zhe didn't answer.
"Master," he said.
"What is it?"
"Do I really make people want to bully me a lot?"
"You only just realized?" Mr. Shaw said lazily. "Why do you ask?"
An Zhe didn't answer that either. He asked, "What offenses did you guys commit?"
"Does it still need to be said?" Mr. Shaw asked. "The crime of illegally stealing the Arbiter's information."
"Is that so?" An Zhe said.
"What?" Mr. Shaw asked. "Was that not the case for you?"
"It was," An Zhe said.
Mr. Shaw let out a long laugh. "Your tone has even changed. What, did someone bully you?"
An Zhe said indifferently, "No."
In the quiet space, Jensen yawned. "The prison beds are actually pretty soft."
An Zhe looked around his own space. In the cramped prison cell, there was a soft plastic board measuring one meter by two meters placed in a corner with a folded white blanket at its foot—this was probably the so-called bed.
He went over there and sat down cross-legged, then wrapped himself up in the thin blanket and leaned back against the wall.
Footsteps came from the end of the corridor, and eye-watering light brightened the corridor. Three City Defense Agency soldiers were making the rounds with flashlights in hand. When the soldiers passed by them, the one on the left said, "There's three more now. Who brought them in?"
"The Arbiter, I guess. Colonel Lu's powerful. Let’s be honest, the City Defense Agency is just the Trial Court's logistics team now."
"The Trial Court wants to completely take control of the City Defense Agency, but the director is still holding out."
The soldiers ran the flashlight beams over their faces and didn't say much else as they walked on. After examining them all one by one, they left through another corridor entrance.
After the sounds of their movements disappeared, the entire underground space became utterly silent except for the prisoners' breathing. An Zhe could sense that there were very few people. From the distance came the sound of water dripping onto plastic board, and Mr. Shaw muttered, "So this is how the City Defense Agency wastes water resources."
But the sound of the dripping water still continued, ceaseless and extremely consistent. Jensen said, "It's a watch."
Listening hard, An Zhe realized that the sound was coming from next door to him and sounding once every brief interval of time. It wasn't dripping water, but rather the sound of an old mechanical watch’s movements.
In the dark, the second hand went around at a constant pace, and time stretched out endlessly.
At last, Jensen said, "Mr. Shaw, you have a lot of experience. How long will we be locked up for?"
"Not too long, probably," Mr. Shaw said. "For illegally stealing the Arbiter's information, it'll depend on its usage. It's fine so long as it doesn't bring harm to the Arbiter."
"I’m not sure that’s right. You used it to make a profit," Jensen said. "Even if we aren't locked up for too long, we'll have to pay fines, won't we?"
"Then I'd rather be locked up for a few additional years," Mr. Shaw said.
Jensen said with a sigh, "The Arbiter is the Arbiter. Even taking pictures will get you detained. In the future, I'll just stick to quietly selling cell phones. I had just taken a photo when people from the Trial Court pulled me away. At the time, I even thought I'd become a xenogenic at some point without knowing and got scared to death."
Mr. Shaw didn't say anything. From An Zhe's neighboring cell, however, came the clear voice of a young man. "I've seen the crime of illegally stealing the Arbiter's information before."
Mr. Shaw asked, "How long were they locked up for?"
"The shortest was three days, the longest was three years, and one was executed. He wanted to assassinate the Arbiter."
Mr. Shaw tentatively asked, "... Did he succeed?"
"He didn't."
"And he was still executed?"
"That's just how the Arbiter's Code is." The voice's tone was calm. "Without the Arbiter's absolute safety, there would be no Arbiter's absolute authority."
Mr. Shaw said, "Then... we didn't have any intention to harm him, so how long will we be locked up for?"
"Depends on the Arbiter's mood, really," the voice replied.
An Zhe's fingers curled around the blanket. He felt that the Arbiter was in a good mood.
He heard Jensen ask curiously, "Buddy, what did you do?"
The voice said, "They brought me up on charges of incitement and spreading fear."
Jensen seemed perplexed. "Huh?"
"I wrote contributions for the Cultural Affairs Administration, and the City Defense Agency arrested me," the person next door said. "The Cultural Affairs Administration closed down afterwards, yet I wasn't let out."
So he was An Ze's colleague, An Zhe thought.
Then he heard Jensen say, "How long have you been locked up for?"
"Lifetime imprisonment."
Jensen clearly went silent for a moment. "You're messing with me on this one."
The person let out a laugh but didn't reply.
An Zhe thought for a while. Based on An Ze's memories, the job he had performed was a very safe one.
He asked the neighbor, "What did you write?"
That person said, "Summaries of the base's history. My pen name is Poet. Have you read them before?"
"I haven't," An Zhe replied.
Poet said, "Then do you want to listen? Your voice sounds very nice. "
"Your voice sounds very nice too." An Zhe felt that he seemed to really want to talk, so he said, "I want to listen."
"Stop." Mr. Shaw spoke up. "The crime you committed was incitement. Don't think about inciting our kid too."
"Just listening is fine, you don't need to be afraid of being arrested." There was a laugh in Poet's voice. "Since you guys have already been arrested, and all."
His words were very reasonable.
"Ever since I've been locked up here, I've had very few opportunities to talk about the things I spent a very long time sorting out," Poet said. "But you guys also roughly know those things."
An Zhe said, "I don't know them."
"Oh?" Poet said. "Then I'll go into a bit more detail."
"Let me think about where to start talking from..." His words gradually slowed. "I'll start from the Desert Era, I suppose."
"Before the Desert Era, was the 'Era of Great Prosperity'. The world had seven billion people altogether, and in flatland regions, you could drive for an hour and be able to come across a village or city. The cities were full of people. At the edges of the cities were croplands, livestock farms, and factories that provided manufacturing materials for the cities. There were wars during that period, but they were all wars between countries. Animals and plants were not the opponents of human weapons."
At that point, he paused, seemingly organizing his train of thought. A while passed before he said, "That was the year 2020. It's something from over a hundred years ago now."
"When I was a mercenary, I went to the ruins of a research institute in the nation's capital city. There, I dug out some information, which was a geomagnetism research report starting from 2020."
Nobody in the vicinity said anything. He continued, "Starting from that year, they detected that Earth's magnetic field was rapidly weakening—do you guys know about magnetic fields?"
Jensen said, "No need to ask me, buddy. I'm uneducated."
Mr. Shaw didn't say anything.
"The base doesn't teach these things," Poet said. "Anyhow, in 2030, the geomagnetic field disappeared."
Jensen bluntly asked, "So what exactly did the geomagnetic field do?"
"Earth was a massive magnet, with the South and North Poles as its positive and negative poles. The geomagnetic field was everything," Poet said. "After the geomagnetic field disappeared, compasses stopped working, biospheres all over the world were thrown into chaos, and human industries were all stopped, for there was no way to generate and use power. But those were the lightest consequences of the geomagnetic field's disappearance.
"The geomagnetic field... Its most important role was to protect Earth. Earth is suspended in the cosmos, and there’s cosmic radiation in all directions along with solar winds, but after these things encountered the geomagnetic field, they were deflected in other directions and didn't harm organisms on Earth's surface. So in 2030, after the geomagnetic field disappeared, the entire planet directly faced the assault of solar storms and cosmic radiation. The external radiation was so strong that most of the land was directly blown away by the storms, the water disappeared, and the atmosphere thinned. Droughts, skin diseases, cancers... Half of the people on Earth died. That was the 'Desert Era'."
"Shit," Jensen said.
"However, the Desert Era ended very quickly." Poet let out a laugh, then continued. "From when the geomagnetic field’s changes were discovered in 2020, humans had already put forth countermeasures divided into Plan A and Plan B. I flipped through so much information in the city ruins before finding out."
Jensen's tone of voice had become respectful. "Do tell."
"Plan A was to construct massive magnetic field generators at two special locations on the continents of Asia and North America. One was called the 'East Pole' and the other was called the 'West Pole'. By replacing Earth's North and South Poles with the two magnetic field generators in the East and West and producing resonance with the charged particles in the solar winds, a new magnetic field would be produced and cover the entire world."
Jensen clapped his hands a few times. "Amazing."
"Plan B was to construct large underground cities and shift the heart of human existence from the planet's surface to the underground to be free from the assaults of radiation and solar winds."
Jensen continued clapping. "Nice."
"In 2040, Plan B succeeded, and the underground cities became available to live in.
"In 2043, Plan A succeeded, and a weak magnetic field covered the entire world. The atmosphere no longer deteriorated, and living organisms no longer died because of the cosmic radiation. Human technology began to recover, and this period of time between 2040 and 2043 was called the 'Dawn Age'."
At this point, Poet sighed softly. "But humankind's most difficult times had only just begun."
An Zhe opened his eyes wide.
"I know," Jensen said from the opposite side. "The Era of Calamity came."
"Mm-hm," Poet said. "The cosmic radiation brought about unknown genetic mutations, resulting in very frightening things.
"Initially it was superbacteria, fungi, and viruses. They propagated in the human cities, indiscriminately infecting all people and leaving corpses everywhere in the cities. Those who have been to the ruins in the wilderness all know about this."
An Zhe asked, "How did they survive?"
"Surviving was a matter of luck," Poet said. "Within your genes, if you had immunity to these germs, you'd be able to survive, but otherwise you'd die. The people remaining were all immune. In the end, of the three billion people on Earth who survived the Desert Era, only one hundred million or so remained. But this wasn't humankind's most difficult time either."
"And afterwards?" An Zhe asked.
"What happened afterwards, you all know. You could say that it was the unknown evolution brought about by cosmic radiation or some kind of virus we couldn't detect. Overall mutation of creatures occurred, and the entire world was occupied by these things. There must be something special on their bodies. As soon as humans come into contact, they'll be infected, gradually lose their human attributes, and be assimilated. They like to attack humans, and human genes are very tasty to them—and so the war began. This was the greatest war in human history."
After taking a soft breath, Poet continued. "The scattered humans had no way of withstanding the monsters' attacks, so humans began to combine their remaining resources and establish human bases. Our ID numbers begin with 3, which represents how this place is humankind's third base. The Underground City Base, Virginia Base, Northern Base, and Southeastern Base. The coalition of these four bases was the community of common destiny for mankind. After the bases were formed, humans could have a brief respite. Hence, you all can live like this now."
With this sentence, the atmosphere in the prison seemed to relax, but then with the next sentence, it dropped anew to the freezing point.
"Unfortunately, the bases weren't necessarily safe." Poet coughed a few times, and his voice gradually lowered.
"In 2061, there was an outbreak of rodent mutants, and the Southeastern Base fell.
"In 2073, marine xenogenics sneaked in, and the Virginia Base fell."
"Fuck." Jensen suddenly interrupted him. "Now I know why you'd commit crimes of incitement and maliciously spreading panic. The City Defense Agency ought to seal your mouth."
"But I didn't do anything wrong," Poet said with a smile. "I was only bumbling along in my boyfriend's mercenary team, collecting information everywhere from human ruins, and then organizing and publishing them when I was sentenced to life imprisonment."
Jensen said, "Your tongue ought to be cut out for good. You even had a boyfriend."
Poet laughed. "It's so boring inside the base. Why can't I have a boyfriend?"
No longer paying attention to Jensen, he said, "So now only the Northern Base and Underground City Base are still in operation. These two bases protect the magnetic field generators, so the auroras over the bases are brighter than in other places. The auroras are the flows of particles within the solar winds."
At that point, Poet sighed. "I don't know if there is still any communication between the two bases. There's the entire Pacific Ocean between them, after all. I said earlier that humankind's most difficult time wasn't the Desert Era, nor was it the Era of Calamity, because the most difficult time is right now. Who knows what will happen next?"
Just as he finished speaking, the earth shook violently
Dust fell from the prison's ceiling and landed on An Zhe's head and body, making him cough, but then stronger vibrations started up.
Jensen sprang to his feet and called out, "Earthquake?"
"It's not an earthquake." An Zhe heard the sounds of Poet climbing to his feet next door, and the well-informed man rambled on about some things he couldn't understand. "Earthquakes have transverse and longitudinal waves. Right now, it's random vibrations with a very shallow hypocenter—"
"—There's something underground!"
An Zhe understood that sentence.
"Boom!"
In the span of a moment, a loud sound came from the depths of the corridor, accompanied by the clanging of iron doors falling onto the ground.
"Boom!" The sound came again.
A vibration a hundred times stronger than the previous one rippled through, and An Zhe clutched the bars of the iron door to steady himself.
He could tell what the sound was now.
There was something—a massive living creature—fiercely slamming into the floor from below.