On the Sky Dome train, Chen Sixuan, who had been dozing for a few hours, suddenly woke from a dream. She glanced at the brand-new, spacious living cabin and slowly sat up, her gaze sweeping the room. Now she lived alone;

she no longer shared the space with Lin Xian. Her activity area had grown noticeably larger. Chen Sixuan rubbed her face, feeling an inexplicable unease in her heart.

She rose and reached into the nano-charging compartment. Silver nanomaterials quickly coated her fingers and began crawling up her arms. In no time they wrapped her body, perfectly outlining her curvaceous figure. Bright striped patterns floated to the surface of the nano-suit, making it look like a full-body tight undergarment.

In reality, these nano-components could instantly reconstruct into an Executor X0 battle suit with high-energy combat systems and flight capability. Its protection could not match Daluo’s Black Dragon Armor or Ning Jing’s Executor X1, but it made up for that with lightness, high agility, and maneuverability. Its everyday defensive performance was also far from weak. Except when bathing or sleeping, Chen Sixuan had grown used to wearing this nano-suit like clothing—fitting her increasingly cautious nature.

She left the room and saw that the living cabin opposite, Lin Xian’s, had its lights off. She headed up to the bridge, where only Viola’s figure was visible at the moment.

“Where’s Lin Xian?” Chen Sixuan asked.

....

At the Vegas amusement park, night wind howled through the gaps of the decaying, rotten rides. The once-bright mascots and painted surfaces gave off a chilling, eerie feeling in the dark—exactly the impression Hua Xiaoling now gave Lin Xian by appearing here.

Lin Xian’s first reaction was that some object on him might be causing him to be tracked. A bolder guess was that Hua Xiaoling had come here carrying the dark civilization’s intent.

He took a step and calmly trod on a precisely delivered drone, then descended to the ground. He sized up the woman who made him feel so mysterious.

Meeting Hua Xiaoling a second time, he felt an unfamiliar sensation from this woman that was hard to put into words. Hua Xiaoling’s looks were not especially beautiful—fairly ordinary—except for a pair of deep eyes that seemed to glimmer with faint light. There was nothing else remarkable, yet Lin Xian knew this woman and the Foundation behind her to be extremely enigmatic—perhaps entities with decisive influence over humanity’s survival.

Click.

Lin Xian took another step and they stood apart in the dark amusement park clearing, gazing at each other across the space. The night sky’s light was thin and hazy, casting a layer of silvery veil over them both.

“I know you’re curious.” Hua Xiaoling broke the silence first. As when they had first met, she offered Lin Xian a friendly smile. “Curious why I appeared here, whether I planted a tracker on you, curious whether I’ll attack you and your team and cause a firefight here. If you’re worried about that, I can tell you—nothing will happen tonight. I bear you no hostility.”

“Is this your master’s will?” Lin Xian countered.

Hua Xiaoling’s gaze swept Lin Xian’s face, then she smiled faintly. “Do you remember what I told you the first time we met about the SIID Foundation’s mission?”

Lin Xian looked at her. “What do you want to say?”

“I want to say you don’t need to be on guard against me. Our mission is to save humanity,” Hua Xiaoling added. “Using human strength to save humanity.”

After saying that, she nodded slightly toward Lin Xian, then turned and began walking in one direction, speaking as she moved.

“The Crimson World was indeed created and supported by us;

the same goes for the Sanctum Organization and Sacred Revelation. But human thought diversity means people have varied understandings of apocalypse and revelation. Such ideological arrogance is also one of the impediments to social development. Of course, survival instinct in the face of life-and-death is a human consensus. That is why the Phoenix Society was able to quickly consolidate people’s hearts and lead the last human survivors in a global migration.”

Lin Xian followed ahead of her and said, “Are you trying to claim that the Crimson World and the Sanctum Organization’s actions were the Foundation’s original intention, or that you want to clear up the relationship?”

“They shouldn’t believe that.” Chen Sixuan, walking behind, spoke in a grave tone. “Those words were only used as a pretext to communicate with him.”

“And then?”

“Did he want to learn about the dark civilization’s secrets?” Chen Sixuan stopped and glanced back at Lin Xian, then continued walking.

Lin Xian’s expression tightened. At that moment he covertly sent messages to Viola and the Sky Dome train. Watching Chen Sixuan’s back, he took a breath and followed.

Chen Sixuan did not speak further;

she just walked through the bleached amusement park. Her steps crunched dried leaves underfoot. No zombies or abnormal entities appeared along the way. The two walked in single file for about two minutes and then entered a more open area.

At that point Lin Xian’s eyes narrowed. The open space looked like a performance area behind the amusement park, but to his surprise a brand-new tactical tent stood there on the bare ground, its exterior lights bright and several voices noisy within.

Chen Sixuan pulled aside the tent curtain and beckoned Chen over with a sideways motion. “Come sit.”

Lin Xian’s Mechanical Heart scanned the tent and only detected some holographic equipment and lighting power infrastructure. Apart from a simple table and chairs, there were no weapons or similar items inside.

“You came all this way just to invite me for tea?” Lin Xian asked.

Hua Xiaoling said, “Chen Yanxiu’s team was responsible for the last round of orders to hunt you, but they failed. Within our organization, some truly regarded you as an enemy of civilization’s evolution. I warned them those methods wouldn’t threaten you too much.”

She looked at Lin Xian. “Or perhaps killing you wasn’t the Master’s true intention.”

Hua Xiaoling continued, “You must be curious about the logic behind the offshore island’s geothermal base—whether it’s surveillance, guidance, or some form of research. Your escape from there was, I have to say, a miracle. From humanity’s perspective it was a small victory in the biological species contest. Now I can tell you the geothermal base’s real purpose: to use Uniga-1 at Haiyan Island to exterminate abnormal entities transmitted from Area 13 Star Abyss and Area 8 Star Abyss toward the continental shelf, thereby reducing the impact on the Dragon Kingdom’s coastal zones.”

“Ah?” Lin Xian frowned.

Hua Xiaoling’s words stunned Lin Xian;

he thought he’d misheard.

“Have you never wondered why huge, high-level abnormal entities—oceanic-based A-level special-level creatures—spread outward from various Star Abysses, yet Yongcheng Port did not take a severe hit from the sea?” Hua Xiaoling said with a smile. “During the Dawn City Great Battle, you were attacked from three sides, but only the eastern Yongcheng Port side was quiet. Doesn’t that say something?”

Lin Xian fell silent. He and the Phoenix Society had thought about this;

Ye Lan had even prepared contingencies. Hearing Hua Xiaoling’s explanation sent a jolt through him. His instinct told him not to trust this woman, but what she said sounded plausible.

Those massive abnormal entities—the Oceanic Titan-level creatures—were hunted and eliminated around Haiyan Island, so the coastal impact was reduced. After all, Lin Xian had seen those monsters under the sea, marching across the seabed on a terrifying scale.

“I can also tell you that the black gear you obtained is an ultra-A-class Forbidden Artifact, two containment tiers higher than your Radio 1542 and Flickering Bullet,” Hua Xiaoling said. “It is one of Chen Yanxiu’s most important treasures in Sacred Revelation. Containment methods require deaths, and the artifact’s property allows its carrier to perform dimensional travel within the Star Abyss—meaning you can, to an extent, see higher-dimensional worlds while inside a Star Abyss. But the artifact’s logic is that the four-dimensional dark world anchors as a singularity in the three-dimensional world, so it releases higher-dimensional properties. This Forbidden Artifact mirrors the time you travel, and when the countdown ends it will re-manifest the dimensional time you traversed. Simply put: time from the four-dimensional world is released into the three-dimensional world, producing an eruption-like appearance of the Star Abyss’s inner world. Do you understand?”

Lin Xian frowned, struggling to process it.

Hua Xiaoling looked at him without speaking, then turned and walked into the tent.

Lin Xian hesitated for a moment;

curious about her earlier words, he followed.

He lifted the tent flap. Inside was a brightly lit space. A clean, flat carpet held a redwood tea table and two tea chairs—one host, one guest. The only other object was a floating spherical projection drone-type holographic device. There was nothing else.

“So it is tea.” Lin Xian checked the time. “Is this really appropriate at this hour?”

Hua Xiaoling was already seated by the tea table. She silently drew out a blackwood tea tray from below the table with a gesture as light as brushing dust. As her fingertips passed over the tea set, two pale bluish-white jade cups had already settled in place—thin and translucent like newly frozen ice. The kettle was a plain purple-sand pear-shaped vessel.

She moved like a practiced tea master and began brewing tea without a sound, speaking as she worked.

“It won’t take long. You don’t have to bring your team;

one, we won’t resort to force between us, and two, I don’t want to disturb your peace. Of course, I didn’t come to reminisce—we have little past to continue. I will state my purpose, but I need you to let go of some suspicions—about those drones, and the woman who had a sniper aimed here.”

Lin Xian shrugged, walked over, and sat across from Hua Xiaoling. He watched the steam-shrouded woman and said, “You know it wasn’t easy for us to survive. It’s natural we’re cautious toward you.”

Hua Xiaoling smiled and said nothing more.

“You said containing the black gear required deaths, but that doesn’t seem right,” Lin Xian said. “When I faced Chen Yanxiu, I had things under control—no one died, right?”

Hua Xiaoling lifted the fairness cup;

her wrist hovered three inches above the tea cup. Tea flowed like streams into the jade cup with arcing light, the level precise and not a drop clinging to the rim. When she finished, she pushed a cup of hot tea toward Lin Xian and said calmly, “Before that, did you never kill anyone?”

Lin Xian’s expression faltered;

something flashed through his memory.

In the monitoring hall above the deepwater port, they had indeed killed a humanoid test subject.

“The silver pocket watch…” Lin Xian frowned. “No wonder—he was deliberately waiting for me.”

A chill surged through Lin Xian’s heart. He had stepped into a huge trap. That Chen fellow was not simple. A black gear had almost cost him everything;

the Southern Celestial Gate was nearly lost. If he hadn’t kept his cool at the last moment, he would have been transported to the Southern Celestial Gate and faced the erupting dark tide, turning into wreckage along with the gate.

With that realization, Lin Xian fixed his gaze on Hua Xiaoling. “So you coming to see me means the Foundation wants to open communication with the Phoenix Society?”

“You can put it that way.”

Lin Xian frowned. “I don’t understand. You worship that dark civilization as Master while also helping humanity?”

He shot a glance at the tea cup, his eyes cold. “Don’t tell me this is some Mission: Impossible-style game.”

Hua Xiaoling met Lin Xian’s eyes and smiled. “Captain Lin, perhaps you should acknowledge that the world’s operating logic isn’t simply black or white, enemy or friend, good or evil. The survival of human civilization isn’t limited to crude binaries like abandoning Blue Star or desperately opposing the dark civilization.”

Lin Xian frowned. “You mean unification through arrival and fusion?”

He had heard this from Chen Yanxiu before, and echoes of it existed in Gu Zheng’s consciousness as well.

Hua Xiaoling’s expression changed calmly;

she didn’t try to explain. Instead she turned toward the hovering holographic device beside them and spoke softly, “You wanted to know what the dark civilization and the Star Abyss truly are. Tonight you may gain a brand-new understanding.”

Lin Xian tensed and glanced at the device.

The spherical holographic projector looked like a flying drone, but its projected hollow depths were startling. It hovered silently. Lin Xian’s scan labeled it as a mechanical projection device, yet he felt an odd prickling along his skin as if sensing something profound.

As Hua Xiaoling’s voice fell, the projector’s center flashed with blue arcs. A holographic light began to unfold, expanding and instantly enveloping the tent. The light curtain, which should have been blue lines, turned multicolored, as if projecting a highly detailed world.

A dazzling flash passed before Lin Xian’s eyes. He instinctively closed them. When he opened them again, his pupils contracted.

He was still seated in his chair, but the table, chairs, and tea set were gone. Hua Xiaoling had shifted from sitting to standing and now faced away from him.

Most strangely, Hua Xiaoling was completely naked and smooth as if she had been that way from the beginning, then slowly turned to face him in Lin Xian’s astonished view.

A cold sweat broke out over Lin Xian’s body;

his hairs stood on end.

Hua Xiaoling wore a smile, but when Lin Xian looked at that once-familiar face, an absurd thought sprang up unbidden.

The Hua Xiaoling in the light display was not really her.

It was another kind of being.

An entity from the dark.

Staring straight at him!