Laurina Departs

The catchment basin was just ahead. The moment Lu Yuan rushed in, his footsteps faltered.

At the small tunnel entrance on the right, the deep green vines had been resting quietly at the edges during their approach, blocked by the copper frame. Now, it was different. The vines had surged out.

They had bypassed the gaps in the copper frame, spreading outward along the brick walls of the catchment basin. They were not fast, but their writhing was visible to the naked eye. Every grey-green eyeball at the tip of each vine had opened. All of them were turned toward the group.

They had still been inside the tunnel entrance when they arrived. Less than half an hour had passed. Was it the noise that startled them? Or were they expanding all along? There was no time to think.

"Get through! Don't touch the walls!"

The six people, along with the two dragged greater ghouls, charged through the center of the catchment basin. A vine tip sprouted from a gap in the floor bricks, right by Bo Er's feet. Bo Er stomped it, snapping it in two. Grey-green fluid oozed from the severed end.

They burst out of the catchment basin and into the crawler zone. The grey-white figures on the walls all grew restless, their limbs quickly adjusting positions on the surface, creating a chorus of rustling sounds. But the light remained. The glow of the two sandworm oil lamps covered the team. The crawlers dared not descend. They clung to the ceiling, their grey-white mouths opening and closing, teeth gleaming with moisture under the reflection of the lamps.

Lu Yuan ran at the rear, looking back as he moved. Deep in the tunnel behind them, the darkness was writhing. This was not a metaphor. It was truly writhing.

Those vines had already extended from the direction of the catchment basin, advancing slowly along the walls and ceiling. And behind the vines, in the deeper darkness, the sound of claws and hissing grew closer.

The two dragged greater ghouls were still bleeding, their black blood leaving long trails across the copper floor. Lu Yuan reached for the mithril at his waist. The bottle shimmered with a pale, silver light. Without hesitation, he threw the mithril high into the tunnel behind them.

The glass bottle flipped in the air, landed in the standing water, and shattered. Boom.

Silver-white flames exploded instantly. This was not ordinary fire; it was alchemical fire that burned 'spirituality'. The silver inferno swallowed the tunnel for over ten meters, burning from the floor to the ceiling, covering every inch.

The vines clinging to the walls withered and curled instantly in the silver flames, their grey-green eyeballs bursting. A few face-hounds that had been chasing them the fastest charged into the range of the silver fire; without even a sound, their bodies disintegrated, turning to ash in three seconds. The two crawlers on the ceiling did not escape either.

But the duration of the mithril was very short. After about a minute, the silver flames began to recede. But this time was enough to create distance.

Light appeared ahead. Sunlight leaking down from the shaft opening. White, warm sunlight.

The six of them accelerated almost simultaneously.

"Hoist the cargo up first!" Lu Yuan shouted. Bo Er threw one end of the hemp rope up the shaft, and the young Nightwatcher caught it above, pulling with all his might. The first greater ghoul was cinched by the rope around its torso, bumping and scraping against the shaft as it rose, its severed limb stumps making harsh, grating sounds against the walls.

The veteran pushed from below, while the two above pulled. Bang, it slammed onto the ground above. The second one followed, just as quickly.

Then, the people. Bo Er went up first. Bolen and Kail followed closely. The veteran missing his pinky finger was second to last. Lu Yuan was the last.

He looked back one last time from the bottom of the shaft. The silver flames of the mithril had been completely extinguished. In the darkness at the end of the tunnel, something was regrouping. Many things. Several new vines were creeping forward again along the charred walls. The grey-green eyeballs at their tips slowly opened in the darkness.

Lu Yuan turned, his left hand gripping the ladder. As his right hand grabbed the iron rung, the split in the crook of his thumb tore open further, making him frown in pain. The moment the sunlight hit his face, Lu Yuan vaulted onto the surface and turned to slam the cast-iron cover back into place.

Clang.

Bo Er grabbed the copper powder canister and sprinkled a thick circle around the edges of the cover.

"That's enough," Lu Yuan said. He leaned against the wall, gasping for air. The sunlight was pleasant. The air on the surface, while not exactly clean, felt like a different world compared to the pipe network.

The two greater ghouls were dumped onto the copper floor. Without limbs or mandibles, only their grey-red torsos remained, writhing on the ground. Blood still seeped from the stumps, and the black liquid hissed as it touched the copper, thin wisps of smoke rising as the metal burned their bodies. Yet, they were still not dead. The core of their thick keratinous torsos remained intact, their vitality absurdly high.

Bo Er slumped to the side, panting, glancing at the two things, then at the empty scabbard at his waist. "Damn it," he muttered.

The veteran missing his pinky finger dragged the ghouls to a section without copper, while the young Nightwatcher walked to a corner and dry-heaved. Bolen remained the fastest, his eyes gleaming. But the first thing he did after coming up was to scribble something on a piece of paper, then carefully scrape the fungus layers off his cane with meticulous movements.

Lu Yuan sat at the base of the wall, looking down at his right hand. The veins on the back of his hand were still throbbing. He could not use his right hand for the time being.

Lu Yuan's gaze settled on the writhing torsos of the two greater ghouls. "Move them behind the Alchemy Workshop," he told Bo Er. "Find a place to lock them up and sprinkle copper powder in a circle around them. Don't let anyone else touch them."

Bo Er looked at him. "Are you going to...?"

"Dissect them." Lu Yuan's tone was flat. "I want to know what is inside their brains."

Inner City. Nightwatchers base.

Glock stood at the door of Kraus's office, took a deep breath, and pushed the door open. The office was small. The window was half-open, looking out over the streets of the Inner City, where the occasional sound of hammering could be heard as Inscriptionists rushed to repair runes.

Kraus sat behind the desk. A map of Bronze City was spread out before him, marked with over a dozen locations in red ink: collapse points, blockade lines, supply routes, and defensive positions. He did not look up. "Speak."

Glock recounted the situation. The copper plates had been tampered with. Between a few months to half a year ago. Yet the people at City Hall had no corresponding maintenance records. Furthermore, the internal corrosion of the pipes was worse than the exterior. The source of pollution was flowing through the pipes. Glock's speed of speech was steady and his points were clear.

After he finished, the office was silent for several seconds. Kraus's hand paused on the map. Then, he looked up. His expression was cold. "Some people want to die," he muttered.

Glock stood where he was, not responding. Kraus took his hand off the map and leaned back in his chair. He was silent for a few seconds. His gaze rested on a location on the map, lingered, and then shifted away.

"You go back first."

"...What are the instructions for the base?"

"The instruction is to go back first," Kraus's voice was very low. "I will arrange for someone to handle this matter."

Glock's lips moved, but he said nothing. Sometimes, knowing too much was truly not good news.

"What is the situation in the Inner City?" Glock changed the subject. Kraus tapped his fingers on the table twice.

"The Old Council Square is still surging. The numbers have dropped a bit compared to the last two days, but it hasn't stopped. The Holy Church's holy light barrier is under heavy strain; the nuns' rotation frequency has been reduced to one shift every three hours. The water supply has not been restored to this day."

He paused. "The collapse points throughout the Outer City can only fend for themselves for now. I have already told the Inscriptionists to speed up their progress; they will repair what they can. There will be no reinforcements in the short term."

Glock nodded. "Understood."

He turned to walk toward the door. As he reached it, Kraus's voice came from behind. "Glock."

"Yes?"

"If you discover similar... situations, remember to tell me first."

"Understood."

Glock opened the door and walked out. The door closed behind him. In the office, Kraus lowered his head again, looking at the map. His gaze rested on a spot in the Inner City. He tapped his finger on that spot twice. Then, he folded the map.

Afternoon. Glock's carriage arrived from the direction of the Inner City. When he jumped down, his expression was complex. Lu Yuan met him. The two went up to the second floor. Glock closed the door and briefly recounted what Kraus had said.

Lu Yuan nodded. He was not surprised. After all, the city was already rotting to the core. It was no surprise that strange things were happening.

"There are a few more things that happened after you left." Lu Yuan briefly described the grey-green backflow and the pipe network tracking from that morning. Then, he described the things they encountered in the pipes.

"The greater ghouls are deliberately creating Eerie entities."

Glock turned around, a rare expression appearing on his face. "Hm?"

"They use their own secretions to catalyze human mutation, creating four-legged hunting hounds. The face-hounds and greater ghouls act in coordination; there is a clear hierarchical relationship."

Lu Yuan's tone was flat. "The greater ghouls on the surface do not do this; they only know how to charge and bite. These two in the pipe network are different. They have strategy and division of labor."

Glock was silent for a few seconds. "You said 'these two'."

"I brought them back. Alive. They are locked up behind the Alchemy Workshop."

Glock looked at Lu Yuan. His gaze landed on his right hand. He did not ask how the two things had been captured.

"How do you intend to handle them?"

"Dissection," Lu Yuan continued. "Compare them to the ones on the surface and see what the difference is in their brain tissue and the pollution residue in their bodies."

Glock did not object, but his expression grew more complex. Glock stood by the window after listening, his back to Lu Yuan. He was quiet for a while.

"No wonder," his voice was strained. "How did Bronze City become like this?"

Lu Yuan did not answer. Glock turned around.

"There is one more thing." Lu Yuan picked up a letter from the table. "You brought this back."

It was Laurina's letter. The last one she wrote before being escorted to headquarters. It was folded twice and tucked into an unsealed kraft paper envelope. Lu Yuan walked to the window and opened it under the afternoon sun.

Laurina's handwriting remained the same. The first half contained the information Lu Yuan requested.

The Church's blockade line was centered on the Old Council Square, covering about four hundred meters. Outside the blockade, things were basically ignored at night, and while there were patrols during the day, they could not cover everything. Supplies relied on the Port West Warehouse; there was only one transport line, escorted by Nightwatchers, running twice a day only during the day. The city gates were still closed, with no external supplies. She estimated the warehouse would last two to three weeks. The nuns' rotation was reduced to three hours. The Archbishop had not made an appearance.

But she heard rumors at the branch that new reinforcements might be arriving soon. It was unclear exactly who they were.

The handwriting paused here.

"Something is wrong with the Polymath Tower."

"The procurement volume of alchemy materials has skyrocketed recently. Several batches of rare high-level materials were urgently transferred in, all through the Polymath Tower's own internal channels, bypassing the branch's approval process."

"I discovered this while doing inventory for the branch's pharmacy. The consumption rate of several materials did not match the branch's usage records. All the excess was flowing to the Polymath Tower."

Then came the most critical sentence.

"The Polymath Tower has sealed itself off."

Lu Yuan's gaze rested on those four words for two seconds.

"I am not sure exactly when they sealed it. But people who went to deliver materials toward the Polymath Tower these past two days were blocked outside, claiming it was for 'internal research needs,' and no non-Polymath Tower personnel were allowed to enter. Even people from the branch could not get in."

Sealed off.

At a time when Bronze City was facing the most severe ghoul crisis in its history.

When the city wall runes were fading and Eerie entities were constantly surging from collapse points.

When everyone was desperately defending the city.

The Polymath Tower chose to lock itself away.

Lu Yuan turned the letter over. The handwriting in the second half was more hurried.

"The escort team leaves tomorrow. This is the last letter."

"Regarding the matter I told you about earlier, the laboratory in the Third Tower—the item is left there. It is not convenient to write about it here; you need to go yourself."

"No one else can retrieve it."

The last line was written very small, almost at the bottom of the paper.

"Don't die."

Lu Yuan looked at those two words, his gaze lingering for a long time. Then he folded the letter and placed it in his inner pocket.

Evening. The sun began to slant westward. Lu Yuan stood at the second-floor window of the Alchemy Workshop, watching the street outside. His right hand rested on the window frame, the split in the crook of his thumb throbbing faintly.

The Polymath Tower. What was the Polymath Tower doing?

Lu Yuan's gaze crossed the street toward the Inner City. In the distance, the spires of the Polymath Tower gleamed with a dull copper luster in the sunset.

Outside the window, the last rays of sunlight landed on the runes of the city wall. The runes glowed faintly. Then, they dimmed.

The seventh night had begun.

Lu Yuan closed the window. He returned to the corner and sat down. He placed the revolver on his knees.

He would continue to guard tonight. Tomorrow, he would dissect those two things. And then—he would see what to do about the Polymath Tower.