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He didn't even have time to scream. His body simply lurched violently as he clutched the skeletal half of his face and fell heavily backward to the floor.

"!!!" The other high-level officials gasped in horror at the gruesome sight.

The official on the ground finally regained his senses, letting out a muffled, indistinct cry. "Help! Someone, help!"

But his voice seemed to be dragged into a thick mire, its speed slowing several times over and its volume becoming incredibly faint. He was like someone pinned to the spot by nails, unable to move a muscle.

The panic in the meeting room lasted only a fleeting moment. The people sitting here had all weathered great storms, and they quickly forced themselves to calm down.

The Minister took a deep drag of his cigarette, exhaled slowly, and looked calmly at the intruder. "Ms. Tang, I hope you have been well. You still enjoy your little jokes as much as ever."

Tang Zhuhe, still in the likeness of the guard, laughed and countered easily, "I'm not here to joke this time."

Acting like an old friend, she found a seat and sat down, directly facing the Minister.

Under everyone's wary and tense gaze, Tang Zhuhe spoke leisurely. "Tell me, what new schemes have you been cooking up against me lately? Say it out loud so I can have a good laugh, and maybe I'll even give you some pointers."

"It's all a misunderstanding. Why would the Bureau headquarters target you?" the Minister said, using a forceful tone to deliver rather cowardly words.

"Oh?" Tang Zhuhe's smile remained unchanged. "The headquarters specifically sent a few ignorant children to Amber City to stir up trouble. Was that not a probe? Probing to see if I had died in the Mysterious Garden?"

"That was merely a standard operational procedure for a mission," the Minister replied without batting an eye. Inwardly, however, he was cursing. This woman really hadn't changed at all; her persecution complex was only getting worse.

Tang Zhuhe nodded as if accepting the explanation. "It's better if that's the case. However, what you think doesn't matter; what matters is what I think. So... don't do things that are so easily misunderstood."

"Daring to probe me suggests the headquarters has confidence. Confidence implies the ability to pose a threat to me. I hate potential threats; it's always better to nip them in the bud."

"I'll let it slide this time. I won't hold it against you. After all, I've always been a person of mercy and tolerance."

The Minister forced down the urge to roll his eyes and asked, "Then may I ask what has brought Ms. Tang here in person?"

"Two things," Tang Zhuhe stated bluntly.

"First, the ruler of the Mysterious Garden—the 'Tree of Truth'—has been unusually restless lately. Although its main body cannot leave the forbidden zone, its branches and the countless supernatural creatures within the garden are constantly attempting to invade reality. In fact, they have succeeded several times already. The headquarters doesn't plan to keep playing deaf and mute, dumping all the pressure of guarding the forbidden zone on me alone, do they?"

The Minister squeezed out a smile. "The Black Guanyin has many incarnations, worth ten thousand soldiers. How could you be alone? Besides..."

The Minister's tone turned a bit more serious. "Aren't you the branch director for more than a dozen major cities in the southeast region? Those cities have long since formed their own systems, independent of headquarters' control. You could easily mobilize the elite forces of those cities to assist in defending the Mysterious Garden. I've heard... you've gathered quite a few experts under your wing."

"That won't do," Tang Zhuhe refused on the spot, her tone matter-of-fact. "Those are all promising young talents I've carefully selected. Every one of them has the potential to reach Rank 5. They are the hope of the future. How could I bear to let them take such risks?"

The Minister's mouth twitched violently. So, Tang Zhuhe's people were precious treasures who couldn't be risked, while the headquarters' people were just consumables meant to fill the gaps?

Tang Zhuhe didn't give the Minister a chance to argue and moved directly to the second matter. "About that so-called 'Otherworld'—what exactly is going on with that?"

The Minister fell silent for a moment. This was something the headquarters had desperately wanted to hide from Tang Zhuhe. But since she already knew a fragment of the truth, with her abilities and methods, digging up the whole story was only a matter of time.

Rather than letting her find out on her own, it was better for the headquarters to control the rhythm and content of the information revealed.

In an instant, the Minister made the most advantageous choice.

He waved his hand and said to the others in the room, "The rest of you, leave."

The other high-level officials felt as if they had been granted a grand amnesty. With great tact and even smiles on their faces, they quickly retreated from the meeting room.

The moment the door closed, the smiles vanished from their faces, replaced by expressions of extreme gravity.

The guards in the hallway continued their patrol as usual, completely unaware of the intrusion that had just occurred right under their noses.

"My face! My face! The Medical Department! Someone call the Medical Department!" The official whose face had been half-turned into a skull could finally speak normally again. He wailed in pain as he was supported by others and stumbled away.

Inside the meeting room, only Tang Zhuhe and the Minister remained.

At this moment, the atmosphere between them seemed a bit more harmonious.

The Minister leaned back in his chair, relaxing. He stopped beating around the bush and asked directly, "You should be familiar with the organization known as the 'Glory Association', right?"

Tang Zhuhe nodded.

The Minister continued, "On the surface, the Glory Association is a charitable organization. In reality, it is led by the Su family and jointly controlled by several transcendent families. They've done plenty of dirty work in the shadows. The news about the 'Otherworld' originally came from the Glory Association. To be precise, it leaked from within the Su family."

"According to intelligence intercepted by headquarters, the Su family somehow discovered the existence of an 'Otherworld' and became desperate to reach it."

"Over the years, they have been secretly and frantically hunting down transcendents and supernatural creatures with spatial abilities. They used a technology or ritual we don't fully understand to... smelt these spatial ability users. The final product was a 'Key' that is said to be able to open the spatial barriers leading to that Otherworld."

"But the Su family is closely tied to several other families through marriage and intertwined interests. Such a massive undertaking couldn't be kept entirely secret. The other families eventually learned of the Key's existence. When the Key was finally created, these families each had their own schemes, all wanting to claim it for themselves."

"Although the Key's effectiveness has yet to be verified, and we don't know if it can truly open the door to the Otherworld, even if it can't, it is still a god-tier supernatural object that can easily manipulate space."

"The Key was stolen a long time ago. That armored transport vehicle passing through the outskirts of Amber City was hijacked by an unknown force—likely a case of thieves falling out. After one faction successfully stole it, they were ambushed by another during the secret transfer."

Hearing this, Tang Zhuhe's eyebrows arched slightly. No wonder the security level of the exploded transport vehicle hadn't been very high, with only five people escorting it.

The protection level and personnel allocation didn't match the importance of the item because they themselves were just a group of thieves, hurried to move their stolen goods after a successful heist.