Chapter 469: Mutual Consensus

Lu Yu vomited.

It wasn't a dry heave, not that kind of cough that only picks up a few specks of blood.

It was mouthful after mouthful of black blood surging up from deep in his throat, carrying a rotting sweet taste that made one's tooth roots tingle, splashing dark‑red blossoms in the downpour.

His knees hit the ground first.

Then his palms.

Finally his whole body, face down, fell silently into the mud.

The body that had just been brutally beating the S Ji Weird now lay on the ground of broken stones and sludge, its spine heaving violently with each breath, the rib outlines clearly visible beneath the torn school uniform.

Su Ming was the first to move.

His left tibia might have cracked a seam, so he couldn't run; instead he resorted to the most primitive method—both hands braced on the ground, half‑dragging, half‑crawling, knees and elbows carving blood streaks on the broken bone shards, somehow scraping from behind a bunker ten‑plus meters away to Lu Yu's side.

"Lu Yu!"

He rolled over the boy's body, two fingers pressing on the carotid artery.

There was a pulse. Weak as a mosquito's buzz, yet there.

Su Ming exhaled. After releasing that breath, an indescribable feeling churned up from his stomach.

He stared at Lu Yu's face.

Rainwater washed the blood everywhere; the boy's features blurred between red and white, his lips turned bluish, eyelids shut, mud specks clung to his lashes. Thin, frail, vulnerably weak.

Just like that.

He had just crushed an S Ji heart with his bare hands.

Su Ming suddenly didn't know what expression to wear. Awe? Gratitude? Guilt? Or lingering fear? These emotions tangled, choking his chest.

"Step back."

A mud‑caked hand reached from the side, directly grasping Lu Yu's wrist.

Chen Shao.

The man's whole face was ashen, like it had just been dug from a grave; his back‑parted hair was disheveled, strands clinging to his temples, the suit jacket left only one sleeve hanging on. His right eye— that Demon Eye—was a scarlet that had faded to a dull pink, its glow as weak as a dying LED.

But his hand was steady.

Two fingers rested on Lu Yu's wrist artery, the posture as precise as an emergency‑room nurse.

"Pulse irregular, vital signs draining too fast, his Weird is backfiring," Chen Shao's voice was hoarse, a strand of froth spilling from his mouth, "The kid's body is devouring itself."

He looked up.

Su Ming met his gaze.

In the downpour, two bloodied men knelt on either side of the same boy's body, staring at each other's faces.

If this scene had been set three days ago, it would have been sheer fantasy.

Chen Shao was the first to look away; he twisted his head and shouted toward the still‑collapsing ruins behind him.

"Xu An!"

Twenty seconds later, the boy with his lips sewn shut emerged from the smoke. Barefoot, stepping over broken bones and mud, his expression forever the hollow one that sends a chill down one's spine.

"Send a message back," Chen Shao said at breakneck speed, "Tell the Ark to activate the A Ji medical contingency. I need Dr. Lin's healing squad, get them into the spatial rift within three minutes."

Xu An neither nodded nor shook his head; he turned and vanished into the rain.

Su Ming's complexion changed.

"What are you doing?"

"Saving a life."

"He can't be taken by you."

"I didn't say take him away," Chen Shao's Du Yan stared at Lu Yu's lips turning ever more blue, "I'm saving a life. Your Federation's emergency system takes at least eighteen minutes from contact to dispatch to arrival. Eighteen minutes, this kid is dead."

Su Ming bit his back molar.

He knew Chen Shao was speaking the truth. The Federation's system is efficient, but even that can't outrun layers of bureaucratic approval. Moreover, the recent battle had knocked out all communication signals within three kilometers, rendering conventional contact impossible.

But letting someone from Eden Garden touch Lu Yu?

Su Ming's mind completed a cost‑benefit analysis in a fraction of a second.

Then he pulled the Encrypted Terminal from his waist—this device has an independent satellite link, bypassing ground stations.

"Command center, Su Team calling," his voice was chopped by the downpour, "Authorization code—"

A sixteen‑character alphanumeric string was transmitted.

"Request a military medical helicopter, GPS coordinates synced, land within three minutes. I don't care where you pull it from; you can even seize one from the Air Force base."

The other end was silent for two seconds.

"Su Team, please confirm the code level—"

"I confirm," Su Ming gripped the terminal until his knuckles whitened, "Tell Lord Wei that this boy saved all our lives. He died; you handle the director yourself."

Click. The line cut.

Chen Shao turned his face aside and gave him a glance.

His mouth twitched, an expression that was hard to read as sarcasm or something else.

"Your Federation's procedure can approve in three minutes?"

"That's none of your business."

"My healer is already on the way."

"You can treat him, but if you try to take him for research, I'll dismantle your entire Ark Medical Department afterward."

"Oh? Just based on your current half‑dead state?"

"Not on me. On Lord Wei."

The two stared at each other across Lu Yu's body for three seconds.

The heavy rain slammed down among them.

From under the nearby ruins came Liang Wen's weak, breathless voice: "I... uh... you two big shots... could you please stop arguing... I'm about to run out of breath..."

Su Ming and Chen Shao lowered their heads at the same time.

Lu Yu's breathing visibly grew shallower; the rise and fall of his chest became smaller and smaller.

Su Ming cursed, tore off the half of his jacket that remained, and placed it under Lu Yu's head. Without a word, Chen Shao stripped off his still-intact suit sleeve and pressed it against the boy's chest wound to staunch the bleeding.

Their movements, almost as if guided by some unseen force, fell into a certain coordination.

Neither gave the other more than a glance.

They were both staring at the half-dead boy on the ground.

If an unaware passerby saw this scene, they would likely think two fathers were desperately trying to save their own child.

And the 'child' himself——

Lu Yu's consciousness had not actually been completely cut off.

More precisely, he held himself at a delicate threshold: weak enough for outsiders to judge his life hanging by a thread, yet not so much that he lost control of his body.

In his previous life, having survived many years in the apocalypse, he had long since maxed out the skill of playing dead.

He could feel two pairs of hands with different temperatures busying themselves on his body. The cold pair on the left was Chen Shao's; the slightly warm pair on the right was Su Ming's—probably because his palms had been scraped raw while crawling and were now inflamed.

He could still hear their argument.

Su Ming said, "He can't be taken away by you."

Chen Shao said, "I'm saving his life."

Su Ming called in a military helicopter.

Chen Shao summoned a healer.

The two forces... were fighting over him.

They were fighting to save his life.

On Lu Yu's face beneath the muddy water, the corner of his mouth twitched. The movement was minuscule, small enough to be completely covered by the mud mixed with rain and blood.

No one saw it.

Done.

This is what he wanted.

From the moment he lifted the court dome, from the moment he chose to reveal his power in the most ostentatious way, he had been gambling.

He gambled that the Federation and Eden Garden would both covet his power.

He gambled that Su Ming would feel guilty for 'being saved by a child.'

He gambled that Chen Shao would be inclined to recruit him because 'this kid can take on an S Ji.'

He gambled that neither side would leave him to die.

So after the fight he didn't prop himself up, nor did he pretend to be at ease.

He chose to collapse.

He chose the weakest, most pitiable, most protective-instinct-triggering way to fall.

Fourteen years old. School uniform. Frail. Vomiting blood. Muddy ground. Violent rain.

Together, these keywords pack a destructive power greater than any S Ji attack.

It strikes the heart.

Now both sides owe him a life. Both sides are vying to be his benefactor. Neither side can possibly act against him.

He successfully pinned himself at the exact center of the crossroads between 'the shared savior of both realms' and 'the Federation's future star.'

The safest position.

Whoever moves against him is simultaneously making an enemy of both sides.

Lu Yu let out a sigh in his heart.

Exhausted.

Truly exhausted.

It's not all an act. The backlash from prematurely using his trump card while still immature is indeed gnawing at his innards. It hurts so much he wants to curl up into a ball, but he can't show too many signs of being awake on his face.

Just endure a little longer.

Just wait for the helicopter to come.

He closed his eyes, letting the violent rain pour on his face, and waited quietly amid the two men's agitated breathing.

Thirty seconds later.

Su Ming and Chen Shao almost simultaneously stopped their movements.

It wasn't because a new threat had appeared.

It was because they finally noticed each other.

Not in the sense of 'opponents.' Amid this devastation-strewn ruin, after this absurd nightmare ended, for the first time they looked at each other as two middle-aged men who had both been beaten half to death.

Chen Shao knelt on the ground. His Demon Eye was about to fade. His whole person seemed as if he'd been put through a blender.

Su Ming half-squatted. His left leg was lame. He held the terminal in his hand, rainwater trickling between his fingers.

Outside the ruins, Liang Wen's half-body was still not fully crawled out. In the distance, Jiang Yuan and Qin Zhixia walked toward them, their steps also limping.

Blood covered the ground. Broken bones and severed limbs littered the earth.

These were the elite of both factions. Now they all looked like refugees dug out of the disaster zone.

And the one who truly ended this disaster...... was the child at their feet whose breathing was almost stopped.

Chen Shao's Adam's apple rolled once.

Su Ming's lips pressed into a thin line.

No one spoke again.

On the distant horizon, a sound grew louder.

It was a propeller.

The searchlight's white beam pierced the downpour's veil, slashing down between the clouds, lighting the charred battlefield a stark, blinding white.

A military medical helicopter.

Three minutes. Not even a second more.

Su Ming squinted, blocking the searchlight's glare. He pulled a combat jacket bearing the Federal Weird Investigation Bureau emblem—from somewhere beside him, not knowing which fallen operative had left it—and carefully placed it over Lu Yu.

Then he stood up.

His left leg ached, contorting his whole face, yet he still stood up.

He turned, facing Chen Shao directly.

The helicopter's airflow tossed both of their ragged hair into disarray. The searchlight cast intersecting shadows between them.

Su Ming spoke.

His voice was largely drowned by the propeller's roar, yet each word was crystal clear.

"We need to talk."

Chen Shao was silent for a long time.

The crimson Demon Eye, nearly extinguished, flashed once at last.

"...... Okay."