Chapter 267: Phoenix Order

"Oh, I see."

Kiki flew over at this moment, used her telekinesis to pick up a reagent tube, and examined it carefully: "So, drinking this can enhance abilities. Finally, our blood essence has a use other than just being traded for things..."

"Then what is this?" She picked up the round, coin-shaped badge and placed it in her palm. She found it was not light in weight. Upon flipping it over, she discovered it even had a data port and some kind of information device on the back.

"This is a Phoenix Order."

Zhou Wuer took one out from his own person at this moment, but the one in his hand was slightly different; it was silver-black in color.

"It is a special badge issued by the Phoenix Society to cooperative teams, called the Crimson Phoenix Order. We internal staff have the Starry Sky Phoenix Order. It can receive and decode information packets transmitted by our regional radio stations or branches. We call this 'Fire Book.' It contains valid information from within the last 48 hours, as well as the latest research content on abilities, Star Abyss survival, and anomalous entities. At the same time, it can also send and receive distress signals on special frequencies, leaving behind one's own Fire Book."

"Simply put, the Phoenix Order can directly contact Phoenix Society organizations within a certain range using one-way signals. You can also leave specific information. For example, if you encounter danger, you can use full-band broadcasting to send out your 'Fire Book information packet.' This packet will use surrounding available information equipment, other survivors' broadcasting equipment, and Phoenix Society branch information towers for 【transient storage】. As long as there are other survivor teams passing by or broadcasting here, they can achieve information relay, allowing it to be received by more distant Phoenix Society branches..."

Zhou Wuer scratched his head as he spoke: "Am I making it sound too complicated? Of course, the biggest function is simply treating it as a form of identity verification. For teams with a Phoenix Order, Phoenix Society organizations everywhere will regard you as a trusted partner or even an equal-level unit."

"I understand," Lin Xian nodded and said.

Having just experienced the blizzard pursuit battle, Lin Xian's electronic beacon had used a relay mode to contact the *Infinity* one hundred kilometers away, and also contacted the rescue team's signal through automatic feedback.

This Phoenix Order, however, was more advanced. He remembered that Wei Kexue had once told him that there were certain 'ciphers' in the Phoenix Society's broadcasts, used as a means of communication to coordinate organizations in different regions. The cost of such communication was very high; Lin Xian had previously spent two first-level blood essences just to broadcast within a small area at Hengshan Pass. It was not hard to imagine how difficult a global broadcast would be.

To reduce this cost, every global broadcast from the Phoenix Society hid many 'ciphers' within it. Lin Xian guessed that, depending on decoding authorization, the content received by different departments, regions, or ranks might vary.

If he had had this thing when he was at Hengshan Pass, he might have been able to directly contact Phoenix Society members operating in the vicinity.

However, after listening to Zhou Wuer finish, Lin Xian was very interested in the 'Fire Book information packet.' Being able to obtain the latest research content from the Phoenix Society was equivalent to synchronizing information with the authorities—this was a very important resource!

Obtaining information was the key to survival. For this reason, some survivor teams even specifically appointed information personnel responsible for collecting regional and global Phoenix Society information 24 hours a day. On Lin Xian's side, Kiki, Ding Junyi, and Chen Laoshi were mainly responsible for this in rotation.

Even so, they could not guarantee complete information collection. For instance, under the current extreme cold vortex, they hadn't received any Phoenix Society radio information for several days.

"In short, this Crimson Phoenix Order is a mark of our external cooperative teams, and also a way to facilitate the organization and liaison of living forces in the future. With this, you are equivalent to an organization recognized by our Phoenix Society, which also represents a kind of goodwill. Of course, since you are only a cooperative team, we will not directly issue orders to you. It's just that when assistance is needed, the Phoenix Society will prioritize cooperation with trusted teams. Whether it is a commission or collaboration, we will provide compensation in the end. You can also provide your needs; as long as the operating personnel in the region can provide them, we will do our best to cooperate."

Lin Xian nodded. At this moment, Kiki tossed the Phoenix Order over. He caught it in his hand and said to Zhou Wuer: "This method of cooperation is very good. Regardless, thank you very much for your assistance."

"Let's talk about the second matter. Currently, our Nightwalker organization is conducting large-scale ability measurement and information collection in uncovered areas. It is mutually beneficial; we provide valuable information and evolutionary help to ability users, and we can also obtain information on many ability users and even conduct recruitment along the way. It's just that for you, we hope to be more detailed," Zhou Wuer said.

"Now?"

"No, in Xilan City. You shouldn't be leaving for a short time, right?" Zhou Wuer asked.

Lin Xian nodded and said: "It depends on the situation. We should be transferring with the main force, and we'll make plans after passing the No. 5 Star Abyss."

"By the way," Lin Xian brought up the main business: "Actually, we also have an important matter for which we are looking for the Phoenix Society."

After Lin Xian finished speaking, he looked at Ding Junyi. Since the other party was a member of the Phoenix Society, it would be perfect to hand over the research data on the Dark Mark to them, which would also save some trouble.

Ding Junyi nodded, took a miniature mobile hard drive out of her pocket, and handed it to Zhou Wuer: "This is a research document on the behavioral patterns of dark creatures attacking humans. Although it lacks some specific parameter verification, I believe the Phoenix Society should already have relatively in-depth research in this area. The content inside includes our practical data and has a certain reference value. I hope it is useful to you."

Regarding the research on the Dark Mark, there were some key issues that Ding Junyi could not conclude at present. The most important was the theory and capture method of cold dark fundamental particles; the *Infinity* did not have the equipment needed for particle-level measurement.

Precisely because of this, she could not perform comparative analysis on the changes in correlation effects with the Hell Black Chrysanthemum, so Ding Junyi mainly conducted comparative experiments using the Soul-Oscillation Value Measuring Instrument.

Zhou Wuer and Peng Peng were both surprised to hear this. They did not expect that a survivor train in the midst of fleeing would actually be conducting research on board.

Facing the mobile hard drive handed over by Ding Junyi, Zhou Wuer received it with great interest, nodded, and said: "Wow, you guys are truly amazing. You have to face zombie monsters and still research how to save humanity."

"Saving humanity is not quite the word," Lin Xian said bluntly: "It's just that we happened to discover this pattern, and it is precisely this pattern that has allowed us to survive until now, rather than running around blindly."

Zhou Wuer was quite curious: "Although I am not relevant personnel, would it be convenient to disclose it?"

Upon hearing this, Ding Junyi briefly explained the judgment regarding the Dark Mark to Zhou Wuer. Unexpectedly, Zhou Wuer became interested immediately after hearing it, took a cold breath, and said:

"Oh~ I know this. Our Nightwalker organization and the Phoenix Society's research department have also been studying this aspect. There is one item that is very similar to the Dark Mark you mentioned, but we call it... forgot, it means about the same as Dark Mark. This sounds more vivid. Now, quite a few people within the Phoenix Society have begun to support this judgment, it's just that there is a lack of more powerful evidence at present."

After he finished speaking, he looked at the mobile hard drive in his hand: "I didn't expect you to provide this. Good, I will submit this immediately. There is one of our research teams in Xilan City, and they should be very interested."

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief upon hearing this. Chen Sixuan asked: "Currently, many survivors mainly support the group hunting effect, which actually exacerbates survivors' refusal to unite and their tendency to take risks alone, increasing the risk of death. If your Phoenix Society confirms this theory, how long will it take to announce it on the global radio?"

"This..." Zhou Wuer smiled awkwardly and said: "That is not a scope that we postmen can involve ourselves in. However, you should know that the Phoenix Society is extremely cautious about any content officially announced, so the key issue is whether the research team can produce powerful evidence. Before it is fully confirmed, the authorities will not provide guidance. All they can do is try their best to save people."

"Hey, do you know that other evil organizations are already using the Dark Mark as bait bombs to harm people? You are the largest official organization of the Phoenix Society; how can your research progress be slower than those evil organizations?" Shasha became a little anxious upon hearing this: "Do you know how many survivors this information can help?"

"Evil organizations?"

"An organization called the SIID Foundation Laboratory. They are very advanced in many research aspects of the Dark Tide. We had contact with them at Hengshan Pass, but their research institute was already empty. From some experimental traces they left behind, their research on abilities and the Dark Tide is much more advanced than ours."

Ding Junyi was previously the person in charge of the Federal No. 9 Underground City Biological Laboratory, and her judgment had high reference value. As for the bait bomb dropped at the Hengshan Pass station, she also described it, but there was no evidence to indicate that the operation was related to the Foundation. However, the fact that the other party left behind the Phoenix Society logo still made Zhou Wuer frown deeply.

"Using the Phoenix Society logo..."

Zhou Wuer looked at Lin Xian at this moment, frowning, and said: "Where exactly is the location of that research institute?"

"About 3 kilometers north of Qingshui Town. It should have been submerged by now," Lin Xian replied.

Zhou Wuer nodded upon hearing this: "Good, this information is very critical. I will report it to headquarters. They should send people from the Polar Night Department to investigate. As far as I know, the largest Advent Sect organization is currently called the Deep Red World, which is a very big trouble in the Phoenix Society's global rescue operations. It seems that the previous crash of our Qingluan Sky City had a certain relationship with this organization..."

Zhou Wuer took a deep breath, put away the mobile hard drive in his hand, and said to Lin Xian: "Then our mission is complete, so we will leave first. If there is a chance, we will see each other again in Xilan City in these two days. At that time, if superiors or other brother departments need assistance, I hope Mr. Lin can support us."

"Good," Lin Xian nodded.

"Farewell."

Immediately, Zhou Wuer let Kiki open the top hatch of Carriage No. 2. That Peng Peng reached out and pressed onto Zhou Wuer's shoulder. The next instant, the special cloaks on the two of them suddenly wrapped around them and they soared into the air, whistling away above the train with a strong sound of breaking through the air.

"Flying ability users?" Seeing this scene, Shu Qin couldn't help but say.

"I've heard people mention it before. Postman groups are generally ability users with strong mobility. It shouldn't be surprising that they have flying abilities," Lin Xian said.

Chen Sixuan looked at the gradually closing top hatch and said with some worry: "I don't know why, but I always feel that this matter of the Dark Mark is not as simple as we thought."

"We can only do so much. Let their officials study the rest themselves."

Lin Xian rubbed his brow. He had already provided what he could. He couldn't possibly give away the Hell Black Chrysanthemum as well. This matter was considered settled in his heart. Now he was more concerned about the situation inside the train. "How are the injuries of Xiao Yuan and the others?"

"Nothing serious," Shu Qin said: "Fortunately, our armor is sturdy. We managed to carry through even in this situation."

"Sturdy..."

Lin Xian had a headache. Now the right armor plate of the entire *Infinity* was in ruins. Many grille plates had completely fallen off. The armor plates made of high-manganese steel and high-hardened tungsten steel were now scarred as if they had experienced a baptism of gunfire, and even the carriage plates were covered in wounds.

Originally, this armor was meant to deal with zombie tides, but the pressure of this Snow Demon tide was not on the same level as a zombie tide at all...

"We have cleaned up the interior almost enough. As for the external armor, let's slowly repair it after we arrive in Xilan City," Chen Sixuan walked over at this moment. She knew Lin Xian was very tired, so she said comfortingly.

"Right, Brother Lin, these things don't matter, we can still hold on," Dalou also said at this moment.

Lin Xian nodded, then walked over and picked up a cold dark reagent: "I forgot to ask him just now, do you drink this directly..."

Looking at the dark green liquid, Lin Xian couldn't help but frown deeply. He always had a not-so-good feeling.

"And what changes will drinking one bottle have? How much can it improve? He didn't say either."

Now he only knew it was worth 10 first-level blood essences. Here, 10 were given to the *Infinity*. Counting it up, it was worth at least 100 first-level blood essences, which could be considered quite valuable compared to the total supplies of a medium-sized fleet.

!

In fact, Lin Xian knew that the Phoenix Order in his hand was the real good stuff. This was equivalent to entering the Phoenix Society's whitelist in this ruleless apocalypse, being able to directly contact Phoenix Society people on regional radio waves, and even being able to trust and cooperate with each other. This gave the team more survival choices.

And he could also obtain the Fire Book information packet with time-sensitive information, which had full benefits for his subsequent route choices, understanding of abilities, and judgment of danger.

In short, compared to running around blindly and looking for Phoenix Society stations, this undoubtedly gave them the initiative.

"The Phoenix Society branch in Xilan City has an ability detector, which can detect ability levels by stimulating the peak of the soul-oscillation value."

Ding Junyi said at this moment: "They already told me just now. In addition, I know you must be very interested in the separation device for cold dark fundamental particles, but there is currently no formal civilian version. It might take some time. This reagent is mainly launched by the Phoenix Society. I heard that Dawn City also has a similar version, but the price is not cheap."

"Detector?" Lin Xian said upon hearing this: "Is it just to detect the level of ability users?"

"Yes, it belongs to a part of the extensive experiments of the Nightwalker organization. That Zhou Wuer also said just now that ability users need a clear understanding of their own abilities, and the Phoenix Society also needs more ability user data, so the Phoenix Society is sparing no effort to launch these pilot projects now, just to help ability users improve, and by the way, collect data and recruit talent."

"So now the Nightwalker organization has initially formulated the grading, positioning, and rarity of abilities, and even synchronized various effective means to help abilities grow, helping more ability users become strong and improving the survival rate of survivors."

Lin Xian picked up the Crimson Phoenix Order in his hand: "Then the Fire Book information packet inside should have these, right?"

"Oh right, I was just curious just now. Let's take a look and we'll know, right?" Kiki said with bright eyes at this moment.

Lin Xian nodded, so he handed the Phoenix Order to her. Immediately, Kiki picked it up and connected it to the information center's computer. Very quickly, a special key was automatically entered, and the Phoenix Order was activated and began to start.

"This thing really needs to be connected to a radio to be used," Kiki said after studying it.

"It should be a precision information device itself," Lin Xian looked at it and said.

After activation, the Phoenix Order quickly decoded a piece of information, but it was not from the current radio waves, because the *Infinity* was currently in the blizzard, and except for short-range communicators, it could not receive long-range signal bands at all, even if there were dark radio stations, they were not connected.

And this information was obtained from the 【transient frequency】 acquired from the radio station before the *Infinity* entered the blizzard a few days ago.

The content was not complicated; it was several activity directions of Phoenix Society organizations in the region, including schedules and special events in directions like Xilan City and the Wei River. In addition, there were some assistance requests, but because the time limit had passed, this information had lost its value and could only be used as a reference.

The main reason was because of the blizzard; otherwise, they should have been able to receive real-time information within the radio waves.

Besides that, there was the Fire Book information packet. What was different from what was announced on the radio was that this information packet was very detailed, while the radio could only contain short text information due to the limitations of the Dark Tide. This point was very critical. The Fire Book information packet was somewhat similar to a kind of 【Apocalypse Survival Guide】, mainly divided into three parts:

I. Map

It included the expansion rate changes of 13 Star Abysses globally observed within 48 hours, coverage areas, the distribution of natural disasters brought by the Star Abyss in various regions, and the latest survival map, marking many safe areas. These safe areas specifically noted that they were intelligence summaries of having 【safely passed the dark night】, which could provide some kind of reference under specific conditions.

II. Anomalous Entity Illustrated Guide

Here, the anomalous entities that had been observed and encountered were named and numbered. Most of those clearly observed would have pictures or hand-drawn diagrams, while a small portion were text descriptions. This Anomalous Entity Illustrated Guide divided various dark creatures into 5 levels according to threat level, namely C-level, B-level, A-level, Special-level, and S-level.

For example, the Atmospheric Mica they encountered in Yubei City before was numbered 10, but the abyss monster from that No. 9 Underground City was not found.

In addition, Lin Xian and the others saw another kind of existence for the first time in this illustrated guide, and its level was actually ranked above S-level, called:

World-class Disaster!

The Phoenix Society had another description for this: Dark Side Invader!

This kind of world-class disaster had actually already been discovered to have 4, numbered 01 to 04 respectively. In this, there was that floating giant corpse that Lin Xian and Kiki had once seen in Jiang City!

"Creature No. 2: Unknown Sky Giant Corpse, humanoid type, observed scale over 10,000 meters, floating altitude 3,000~4,000 meters, disaster capability unknown, current airspace Ping'a Lake to Congshan area..."

Kiki looked at the text on the screen and couldn't help but frown.

"My god, this thing is actually real, not a nightmare... and, this monster seems to be still moving!"

"What is this?" Lu Xingchen stood behind the crowd. At this moment, seeing the existence in the blurry picture, his face changed drastically: "This... the world actually still has such demons!?"

"10,000 meters, this is much bigger than that Atmospheric Mica..." Shu Qin also frowned deeply at this moment.

As humans, seeing this scene, a deep sense of powerlessness suddenly surged from their hearts.

Lin Xian, however, was astonished in his heart. He was surprised that the number of this sky giant corpse was exactly the same as what he heard in his dream, which made him feel a bit dazed.

What was going on? He originally thought it was a mental disorder caused by excessive use of abilities, but seeing this official illustrated guide from the Phoenix Society at this moment, he realized that his two dreams seemed very unusual.

"Creature No. 2, moving! Moving! Orientation East, Orientation East!"

He clearly remembered that woman saying this, as if she was observing the movements of this floating giant corpse.

The question was, who was that woman?

Why did Lin Xian dream of her?

Lin Xian's mind was filled with questions at this moment. After a long time, he suppressed his wild thoughts and focused his gaze on the current discussion again.

"This thing had been hiding in the huge cloud layer before, right in Jiang City. I always felt there was a problem at that time, but I just hadn't seen its true face," Lin Xian said and looked at Kiki. He had seen the face of this floating giant corpse for the first time in Kiki's consciousness.

Kiki's face was a bit dark at this moment, and she muttered in a low voice: "Anyway, it's very scary, even scarier than that Atmospheric Mica. I really don't know how humans should face this kind of thing."

"My god~" Shasha's eyes were wide open: "I'm scared to death just looking at it."

"And, this doesn't seem to be the biggest one..."

"Creature No. 1: Unknown Underground Biological Tissue, discovered in Siberia No. 1 Star Abyss, form is giant crustal parasitic creature, disk-shaped, first observed diameter 65 kilometers, has massive radiation reaction, disaster capability unknown."

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 268 =====