Chapter 183: The Fuse Ignites Itself
The darkness before dawn was the quietest time in the East District of the bastion.
Most residents were still immersed in their dreams. The streets saw only the occasional footsteps of patrolling military police, and the lights of the distant academy had not yet turned on. However, the research institute and the garrison command center remained brightly lit all night, with everyone staring at the endless stream of anchor point fluctuation data.
After a night of strict control, the condition of the seventeen sleepers in the isolation pods had temporarily stabilized. Sedatives were continuously released, and the restlessness in their Seas of Consciousness slowly subsided. Everyone breathed a slight sigh of relief, subconsciously assuming that the round of signal testing from last night had ended there.
No one expected the explosion point to fall in a blind spot of the screening.
In an old alley of the East District, there was a street-facing grocery store. The owner was a man in his early forties who had purchased some groundwater near a pipe gallery node a few days ago. The spores had silently attached to him and taken root. The screening squad had only reached this alley yesterday evening and had not yet arrived at his door. The anchor point in his Sea of Consciousness had remained hidden outside the dormant list.
In the middle section of the underground rift, that ancient psychic flow lifted slightly upward.
It was merely an extremely tiny signal increment, far from enough to detonate all the sleepers in the city, but it just barely surpassed the tolerance threshold of this shop owner's anchor point.
The first anomaly appeared in his dream.
The darkness was filled with a low hum from deep within the rock strata. Countless tiny spiral patterns swirled in his mind, and a soundless intent repeatedly washed over his Sea of Consciousness: Open your eyes, clear the obstacles.
He suddenly sprang up from the bed, his eyes turbid and black, his pupils shrinking into tiny vertical slits. The anchor point was partially activated. It hadn't completely swallowed his sanity, but it had twisted his emotions and perceptions. The silhouettes of his surrounding neighbors all transformed into alien obstacles that needed to be eliminated.
Grabbing a short hatchet used for chopping firewood beside the counter, he smashed open the wooden door and rushed into the alley with a roaring scream.
"Alley C-17, East District, loss of control case! Non-isolated personnel! Partial anchor point activation! Requesting backup!"
The urgent call from the patrolling military police instantly pierced the communication channel.
The hatchet struck the wooden door and the iron trash can, emitting a piercing roar. Residents sleeping in their dreams were awakened, and screams and cries erupted one after another. The originally quiet old alley instantly descended into chaos. The shop owner possessed no high-tier strength, but his movements were frenzied. Driven by the brute force generated by the anchor point, the two military police trying to stop him couldn't subdue him quickly, nor did they dare to use lethal force directly.
The message reached the garrison command center in a second.
"Dispatch nearby mobile squads into the city to maintain order! Medical staff and Sea of Consciousness cultivators, proceed to the scene immediately! Seal off the entire alley; do not let the panic spread outward!"
Orders were issued rapidly. Multiple mobile squads that had been on standby at the outer defense line received the command, turned around, and sped toward the East District residential area.
This was exactly the result that the abyssal supreme ruler wanted to see.
At the rocky hill observation point on the wasteland, Lin Yan was focusing his perception toward the rift.
As the incessant city alarms echoed through the communicator, he watched the emergency vehicle lights flashing rapidly toward the bastion in the distance, realizing that a massive amount of garrison forces were being diverted into the city.
"It's fishing for our troops," Lin Yan said, his voice taut as he stared fixedly at the spectrum screen. "A small-scale anchor point self-ignition has a very low cost. Only one person loses control, yet it manages to pull the mobile units on standby outside the city back for reinforcement."
Old Zhou's expression was solemn as he immediately looked at the infrared and spectrum data toward the rift.
The pale purple psychic curve, which had previously been stably stuck in the middle of the channel, was now gently and continuously rising.
It wasn't a sudden eruption; it was an accumulation of power.
That vast, indifferent aura was gathering and compressing bit by bit, accumulating potential energy in the middle of the rift channel, like a bowstring being slowly drawn. It didn't immediately rush out. Taking advantage of the window when humanity's attention was drawn to the urban disturbances and the defense line's troop strength was depleted, it silently gathered its strength.
"The urban disturbance is a smokescreen," Old Zhou said, gripping the intercom tightly. "Using this single-point activation, it's testing the speed of our troop deployments while quietly accumulating power. If our massive mobile forces get bogged down in the city, it can launch a frontal assault at any time."
The maintenance operator's fingers slid rapidly across the screen, bringing up the troop icons at various points of the blockade array: "The mobile squads from the South and East Districts have already entered the city, and the reserve team at the northern gap of the defense line has also received notice to stand by for urban support. Right now, the emergency reserve team facing the front of the rift has less than half a squad left."
The risk was laid bare.
Humanity's defensive resources were limited. Some had to be allocated to screen for sleepers and guard the isolation pods; some had to be stationed at the city walls and the blockade array. Once an urban disturbance broke out, elite troops had to be diverted into the city to quell the chaos. The abyssal supreme ruler had seized upon this weakness, linking the inside and the outside, using sporadically失控 (out-of-control) sleepers to continuously tear at and dilute the defense line's forces.
"Report to the command center. Request to temporarily halt the diversion of the defense line's reserve team into the city! Alley C-17 is just a single-point loss of control; existing urban forces are sufficient to handle it. The defense line cannot be emptied any further!" Old Zhou immediately connected to the channel.
The command center was in chaos. On one side were the cries of residents and casualty reports from the alley; on the other were the warnings from the front lines that the rift's psychic flow was accumulating power. Pressure from both sides crashed down simultaneously.
Scholar Su's voice quickly suppressed the chaos: "Received. Notify the urban response squads to prioritize controlling and suppressing the out-of-control individuals; try not to continue pulling personnel from the front lines. All blockade array pillars are to maximize standby power. Gunners, take your positions. Load the oscillation cannons."
Within the bastion, the situation in Alley C-17 was still deteriorating.
The out-of-control shop owner was restrained by a low-intensity psychic shock released by the arriving Sea of Consciousness cultivator. The military police took the opportunity to tackle and lock him down, but the chaos had already spread. Many residents on both sides of the alley pushed open their windows to look out, and panic spread like ripples. Several residents living very close to the pipe gallery node, affected by the signal resonance of this anchor point activation, began to feel dizzy and experience tinnitus, muttering about whispers from underground. These were precursors that their anchor points were about to follow suit.
"It's not just one! Three neighboring households are showing secondary resonance reactions!" the cultivator reported loudly. "The anchor points are being driven by this loss of control, and their activity levels are rising synchronously!"
One fuse igniting itself set off a string of surrounding fuses.
The chain reaction came faster than expected.
On the wasteland side, the fissure in Lin Yan's Sea of Consciousness trembled continuously, and the will from the abyss became increasingly clear. He could feel that consciousness splitting into two tributaries: one continued to maintain the signal resonance of the city's spore network, amplifying the disturbance in the alley; the other continuously stacked psychic potential energy in the middle of the rift channel, hoarding it without releasing, quietly staring at the weak points of the blockade array.
It was weighing its options.
Observing whether humanity would continue to divert defense line troops, judging whether today was suitable to burst out of the rift and launch a frontal assault on the barrier.
"It's waiting for a critical point," Lin Yan said in a low voice to Old Zhou. "If we continue to divert frontline personnel into the city, it will most likely take the opportunity to launch an assault. If we hold the defense line steady, it might suppress this accumulated power, and then light the fuses one by one, slowly draining us."
It held two sets of plans, ready to switch at any time. The initiative had always been in its hands.
Time ticked by minute by minute.
Within the city, the reinforced healing cultivators arrived at Alley C-17, deploying a large-scale calming psychic field to suppress the restless spores in the surrounding residents. Medical staff took away the out-of-control shop owner, military police set up isolation barricades, and they went door-to-door to soothe and screen the residents. The disturbance was slowly brought under control.
The command center held the bottom line and did not divert the reserve team facing the front of the blockade array into the city.
In the middle of the rift channel, the continuously rising psychic curve slowly halted.
The power accumulation stopped.
The bowstring was drawn halfway, but not released.
It realized that humanity hadn't fallen for the trap again. The defense line still retained sufficient garrison forces, and the timing for a frontal assault was not yet mature. The pale purple spectrum curve remained at a high level, no longer rising, but not falling either. It just hung there, maintaining the pressure.
"It backed off. It's not charging for now," the maintenance operator exhaled a long breath, his back already soaked with cold sweat. "But the potential energy hasn't dissipated. It's still there, watching us."
Lin Yan looked toward the bastion.
The firelight and emergency lights in the city slowly extinguished, and the screams in the alley returned to peace. But everyone knew clearly that this disturbance was merely a rehearsal. Today, it was just one shop owner losing control and igniting a few surrounding households; next time, it could simultaneously ignite ten or a hundred anchor points, creating widespread chaos and forcing humanity to split its forces.
The supreme ruler in the rift outside the city was like a patient hunter, plucking the fuses within the city while watching for loopholes in the prey's defense line.
Old Zhou patted the communicator and said in a deep voice, "Notify everyone, double the shift rotations. Keep your eyes on the instruments at all times. Just because it didn't make a move today doesn't mean it won't in the next moment."
The wind on the wasteland swept over the rocky hill, carrying black sand.
The massive mouth of the rift lay quietly within the gray fog. That invisible will lurked deep in the channel, its potential energy suspended high like a sword hanging over everyone's heads. Countless sleepers within the city still hid in thousands of households, the anchor points in their Seas of Consciousness quietly awaiting the next pluck of the signal.
Lin Yan pressed against his brow, the dull ache of the fissure lingering for a long time.
In this game, it didn't fear a single failed attack. It had countless fuses. It could light them again and again, pulling at humanity's defense line again and again, until the day when humanity was stretched too thin, unable to contain the flames of war burning simultaneously from both inside and outside.
End of Chapter.
Most residents were still immersed in their dreams. The streets saw only the occasional footsteps of patrolling military police, and the lights of the distant academy had not yet turned on. However, the research institute and the garrison command center remained brightly lit all night, with everyone staring at the endless stream of anchor point fluctuation data.
After a night of strict control, the condition of the seventeen sleepers in the isolation pods had temporarily stabilized. Sedatives were continuously released, and the restlessness in their Seas of Consciousness slowly subsided. Everyone breathed a slight sigh of relief, subconsciously assuming that the round of signal testing from last night had ended there.
No one expected the explosion point to fall in a blind spot of the screening.
In an old alley of the East District, there was a street-facing grocery store. The owner was a man in his early forties who had purchased some groundwater near a pipe gallery node a few days ago. The spores had silently attached to him and taken root. The screening squad had only reached this alley yesterday evening and had not yet arrived at his door. The anchor point in his Sea of Consciousness had remained hidden outside the dormant list.
In the middle section of the underground rift, that ancient psychic flow lifted slightly upward.
It was merely an extremely tiny signal increment, far from enough to detonate all the sleepers in the city, but it just barely surpassed the tolerance threshold of this shop owner's anchor point.
The first anomaly appeared in his dream.
The darkness was filled with a low hum from deep within the rock strata. Countless tiny spiral patterns swirled in his mind, and a soundless intent repeatedly washed over his Sea of Consciousness: Open your eyes, clear the obstacles.
He suddenly sprang up from the bed, his eyes turbid and black, his pupils shrinking into tiny vertical slits. The anchor point was partially activated. It hadn't completely swallowed his sanity, but it had twisted his emotions and perceptions. The silhouettes of his surrounding neighbors all transformed into alien obstacles that needed to be eliminated.
Grabbing a short hatchet used for chopping firewood beside the counter, he smashed open the wooden door and rushed into the alley with a roaring scream.
"Alley C-17, East District, loss of control case! Non-isolated personnel! Partial anchor point activation! Requesting backup!"
The urgent call from the patrolling military police instantly pierced the communication channel.
The hatchet struck the wooden door and the iron trash can, emitting a piercing roar. Residents sleeping in their dreams were awakened, and screams and cries erupted one after another. The originally quiet old alley instantly descended into chaos. The shop owner possessed no high-tier strength, but his movements were frenzied. Driven by the brute force generated by the anchor point, the two military police trying to stop him couldn't subdue him quickly, nor did they dare to use lethal force directly.
The message reached the garrison command center in a second.
"Dispatch nearby mobile squads into the city to maintain order! Medical staff and Sea of Consciousness cultivators, proceed to the scene immediately! Seal off the entire alley; do not let the panic spread outward!"
Orders were issued rapidly. Multiple mobile squads that had been on standby at the outer defense line received the command, turned around, and sped toward the East District residential area.
This was exactly the result that the abyssal supreme ruler wanted to see.
At the rocky hill observation point on the wasteland, Lin Yan was focusing his perception toward the rift.
As the incessant city alarms echoed through the communicator, he watched the emergency vehicle lights flashing rapidly toward the bastion in the distance, realizing that a massive amount of garrison forces were being diverted into the city.
"It's fishing for our troops," Lin Yan said, his voice taut as he stared fixedly at the spectrum screen. "A small-scale anchor point self-ignition has a very low cost. Only one person loses control, yet it manages to pull the mobile units on standby outside the city back for reinforcement."
Old Zhou's expression was solemn as he immediately looked at the infrared and spectrum data toward the rift.
The pale purple psychic curve, which had previously been stably stuck in the middle of the channel, was now gently and continuously rising.
It wasn't a sudden eruption; it was an accumulation of power.
That vast, indifferent aura was gathering and compressing bit by bit, accumulating potential energy in the middle of the rift channel, like a bowstring being slowly drawn. It didn't immediately rush out. Taking advantage of the window when humanity's attention was drawn to the urban disturbances and the defense line's troop strength was depleted, it silently gathered its strength.
"The urban disturbance is a smokescreen," Old Zhou said, gripping the intercom tightly. "Using this single-point activation, it's testing the speed of our troop deployments while quietly accumulating power. If our massive mobile forces get bogged down in the city, it can launch a frontal assault at any time."
The maintenance operator's fingers slid rapidly across the screen, bringing up the troop icons at various points of the blockade array: "The mobile squads from the South and East Districts have already entered the city, and the reserve team at the northern gap of the defense line has also received notice to stand by for urban support. Right now, the emergency reserve team facing the front of the rift has less than half a squad left."
The risk was laid bare.
Humanity's defensive resources were limited. Some had to be allocated to screen for sleepers and guard the isolation pods; some had to be stationed at the city walls and the blockade array. Once an urban disturbance broke out, elite troops had to be diverted into the city to quell the chaos. The abyssal supreme ruler had seized upon this weakness, linking the inside and the outside, using sporadically失控 (out-of-control) sleepers to continuously tear at and dilute the defense line's forces.
"Report to the command center. Request to temporarily halt the diversion of the defense line's reserve team into the city! Alley C-17 is just a single-point loss of control; existing urban forces are sufficient to handle it. The defense line cannot be emptied any further!" Old Zhou immediately connected to the channel.
The command center was in chaos. On one side were the cries of residents and casualty reports from the alley; on the other were the warnings from the front lines that the rift's psychic flow was accumulating power. Pressure from both sides crashed down simultaneously.
Scholar Su's voice quickly suppressed the chaos: "Received. Notify the urban response squads to prioritize controlling and suppressing the out-of-control individuals; try not to continue pulling personnel from the front lines. All blockade array pillars are to maximize standby power. Gunners, take your positions. Load the oscillation cannons."
Within the bastion, the situation in Alley C-17 was still deteriorating.
The out-of-control shop owner was restrained by a low-intensity psychic shock released by the arriving Sea of Consciousness cultivator. The military police took the opportunity to tackle and lock him down, but the chaos had already spread. Many residents on both sides of the alley pushed open their windows to look out, and panic spread like ripples. Several residents living very close to the pipe gallery node, affected by the signal resonance of this anchor point activation, began to feel dizzy and experience tinnitus, muttering about whispers from underground. These were precursors that their anchor points were about to follow suit.
"It's not just one! Three neighboring households are showing secondary resonance reactions!" the cultivator reported loudly. "The anchor points are being driven by this loss of control, and their activity levels are rising synchronously!"
One fuse igniting itself set off a string of surrounding fuses.
The chain reaction came faster than expected.
On the wasteland side, the fissure in Lin Yan's Sea of Consciousness trembled continuously, and the will from the abyss became increasingly clear. He could feel that consciousness splitting into two tributaries: one continued to maintain the signal resonance of the city's spore network, amplifying the disturbance in the alley; the other continuously stacked psychic potential energy in the middle of the rift channel, hoarding it without releasing, quietly staring at the weak points of the blockade array.
It was weighing its options.
Observing whether humanity would continue to divert defense line troops, judging whether today was suitable to burst out of the rift and launch a frontal assault on the barrier.
"It's waiting for a critical point," Lin Yan said in a low voice to Old Zhou. "If we continue to divert frontline personnel into the city, it will most likely take the opportunity to launch an assault. If we hold the defense line steady, it might suppress this accumulated power, and then light the fuses one by one, slowly draining us."
It held two sets of plans, ready to switch at any time. The initiative had always been in its hands.
Time ticked by minute by minute.
Within the city, the reinforced healing cultivators arrived at Alley C-17, deploying a large-scale calming psychic field to suppress the restless spores in the surrounding residents. Medical staff took away the out-of-control shop owner, military police set up isolation barricades, and they went door-to-door to soothe and screen the residents. The disturbance was slowly brought under control.
The command center held the bottom line and did not divert the reserve team facing the front of the blockade array into the city.
In the middle of the rift channel, the continuously rising psychic curve slowly halted.
The power accumulation stopped.
The bowstring was drawn halfway, but not released.
It realized that humanity hadn't fallen for the trap again. The defense line still retained sufficient garrison forces, and the timing for a frontal assault was not yet mature. The pale purple spectrum curve remained at a high level, no longer rising, but not falling either. It just hung there, maintaining the pressure.
"It backed off. It's not charging for now," the maintenance operator exhaled a long breath, his back already soaked with cold sweat. "But the potential energy hasn't dissipated. It's still there, watching us."
Lin Yan looked toward the bastion.
The firelight and emergency lights in the city slowly extinguished, and the screams in the alley returned to peace. But everyone knew clearly that this disturbance was merely a rehearsal. Today, it was just one shop owner losing control and igniting a few surrounding households; next time, it could simultaneously ignite ten or a hundred anchor points, creating widespread chaos and forcing humanity to split its forces.
The supreme ruler in the rift outside the city was like a patient hunter, plucking the fuses within the city while watching for loopholes in the prey's defense line.
Old Zhou patted the communicator and said in a deep voice, "Notify everyone, double the shift rotations. Keep your eyes on the instruments at all times. Just because it didn't make a move today doesn't mean it won't in the next moment."
The wind on the wasteland swept over the rocky hill, carrying black sand.
The massive mouth of the rift lay quietly within the gray fog. That invisible will lurked deep in the channel, its potential energy suspended high like a sword hanging over everyone's heads. Countless sleepers within the city still hid in thousands of households, the anchor points in their Seas of Consciousness quietly awaiting the next pluck of the signal.
Lin Yan pressed against his brow, the dull ache of the fissure lingering for a long time.
In this game, it didn't fear a single failed attack. It had countless fuses. It could light them again and again, pulling at humanity's defense line again and again, until the day when humanity was stretched too thin, unable to contain the flames of war burning simultaneously from both inside and outside.
End of Chapter.