Chapter 19

Then you better actually have that ability.

Bai Mu Yun tugged at the corner of his mouth, clearly unimpressed with Ying Duo's Aberrant Arts display.

What else can you do? Or is your Aberrant Arts limited to this explosive art?

If that's all it is, any ordinary person, after studying the relevant knowledge for a few more years with sufficient materials, could easily do it.

Is this ability even worthy of being called Aberrant Arts?

If there are blueprints," Ying Duo's reply remained slow and concise, "I can do other things too.

Oh?

Bai Mu Yun seemed to have sparked a bit of interest, but he remained unenthused.

Just give you the blueprints and you can replicate it? Sounds like you'd be better suited thrown into the weapons R&D department's production line than coming to Tianmian City as an undercover agent.

He obviously didn't fully believe it, but he couldn't be bothered to investigate further.

After all, strictly speaking they aren't even from the same department—Ying Duo is from the Intelligence Department, he is from the Mutation Department—but since he holds the highest position among those here in Tianmian City, he uniformly manages them.

Bai Mu Yun casually grabbed what looked like the most standard Energy Pistol from the weapons rack beside him, checked the energy cell, then tossed it to Ying Duo.

Aim at that target over there, let me see your marksmanship—don't tell me you only know how to make explosives and can't use a gun.

He pointed to the end of the testing area, where a metallic humanoid target was slowly rising.

Ying Duo successfully caught the pistol he threw; when it landed in his hand, the pixel-art figure's hand sank slightly, the cold metallic feel couldn't be conveyed through the phone screen, but it should have some weight.

However, his next action caused Bai Mu Yun's eyes to suddenly narrow.

Seeing Ying Duo not do as he expected—placing the item on the table and immediately raising the gun to aim—but instead casually flipping his wrist downward, at the moment he turned his hand, that inconspicuous little iron box vanished from his palm out of thin air.

As if it had never appeared.

Bai Mu Yun narrowed his eyes; Ying Duo seemed unaware of his oddness, still carefully examining the pistol he had just received—the weapon stats provided here were far superior to those given by the school.

【Standard Energy Pistol】 (White)

Durability: 20/20

Energy Consumption: 15/shot

Trait: Bulky

Bai Mu Yun lowered his arms that were crossed, no longer leaning around like a weakling, he straightened up, his horizontal pupils stared at Ying Duo, dumbfounded for two seconds, then raised his gun and aimed at the target.

"Bang!" Hit the bullseye.

"......" Bai Mu Yun fell silent for a few seconds, his voice lowered slightly but with even greater pressure than before: "Where did you put the explosives?"

Ying Duo lifted his pair of hollow golden eyes to look at him, his tone flat and unchanging:

"This is also my Aberrant Arts."

——————————————

The cold white lights of the basement illuminated everything here without leaving anything hidden, yet they could not pierce the gloom in certain inhuman hearts.

Ying Duo had already left, carrying a large pile of materials he had scavenged from here; after a preliminary understanding of his Aberrant Arts, Bai Mu Yun generously gave him a copy of some of the weapon blueprints available here.

After learning of Ying Duo's needs, he even let him pack up and take away all the scrap parts here.

Although Bai Mu Yun's gaze at him was like looking at a trash collector, for Ying Duo this trip was a bountiful harvest.

Finally Bai Mu Yun couldn't bear to watch him scavenging any longer, and even let him take some extra normal parts before leaving.

The secret door silently closed again, once more separating inside and outside into two worlds.

Bai Mu Yun stood alone in the center of the room, his habitual weariness of the world slowly fading, becoming much more serious.

He slightly tilted his head, his gaze toward a tiny monitor in the corner of the room almost blended with the wall; that faint red light indicated it was active.

In the empty room, only the low hum of the equipment served as background noise.

Suddenly, a mechanically altered voice, clearly processed, sounded from a hidden speaker, breaking the silence.

"Observation complete, what are the assessment results?"

Bai Mu Yun didn't answer right away; he walked to the weapons rack, his fingertips unconsciously brushing over the little iron box that Ying Duo had 'taken' and then 'spat' out to leave him as a keepsake, and began to think about how to dispose of this dangerous item.

"As you can see." His voice revealed no emotion.

"I think he'd be better suited for logistics work; controllability... questionable, his thought pattern differs from ordinary people, he seems to have his own logic, currently speculated to be caused by Mutation."

He recalled the strange hair color and, when uttering the code word, the bizarre liquor name that Ying Duo inexplicably blurted from his mouth.

Although it's already quite absurd, but among those who come from that Dome place, who is mentally normal?

Everyone big has their own problems; no one should point fingers at anyone else.

The mechanical voice fell silent for a moment, then sounded again, actively shifting the topic—evidently Ying Duo's abnormality hasn't yet reached the point of demanding constant attention.

"There's no rush with this matter; I've recently captured some more interesting material, and have a new 'research subject'."

Bai Mu Yun's brow twitched imperceptibly, not knowing what madness the person on the other end of the communication was brewing.

He didn't respond, just listened quietly, being a qualified audience.

"Have you heard of... the 'Undead of the Old World'?" the mechanical voice asked slowly, as if savoring a novel term.

"Undead of the Old World?"

Bai Mu Yun repeated it, his tone clearly confused.

"What is that? A new classification of Aberrant Species? Or a new symptom of mental Mutation?"

He tried to find a corresponding item within his existing knowledge system.

"No, none of those."

The mechanical voice immediately denied it, seeming to find Bai Mu Yun's ignorance amusing: "This is a temporary internal designation we've given, referring to a group of... very special individuals."

That voice paused, as if organizing its words, or rather choosing a description that best captures its absurdity.

"They claim to come from a world completely different from ours; according to the description, they might originate from that world before it became a wasteland, but they did not arrive via spacetime travel, but rather... 'occupy'."

"Occupy?" Bai Mu Yun's brows furrowed even tighter.

Yes, according to what they themselves say, they received a beta test notice for some game, then 'entered' the bodies of living people in our era, replacing the original consciousness and becoming the new 'master' of this vessel.

Even though Bai Mu Yun considered himself well‑traveled and knowledgeable, hearing this utterly bizarre, almost Arabian‑ Nights‑like tale filled his golden eyes with disbelief.

That sounds even more absurd than the worst sci‑fi novel.

"...... You mean they played a game and then crossed over into our world?"

He tried to explain the principle—'consciousness overwriting? Or mass brainwashing? Are there many victims......'

"Many, and the Undead have been confirmed to truly exist—not an illusion produced by someone being deceived by the Consciousness Law."

A mechanical sound cut him off; even after being processed into a cold electronic tone, one could still hear the distorted excitement within it.

"They cannot be explained by any current theory, which often means a whole new field—or rather, their very existence is a challenge and mockery of the world's present rules."

"I am trying to find out...... the pattern of their appearance, and whether this process can be 'copied' or 'controlled'."