Chapter 506: Crystal Stone

Back in the Qiu Ce Yuan underground, the ultra‑secure lab.

Su Ming's fingertip stopped three centimeters from Lu Yu's chest cavity.

It's not fear. It's that the heart's beating frequency is off.

A normal heart beats regularly, like a metronome. The vibration emanating from Lu Yu's chest carries a subtle, irregular tremor, two frequency sets superimposed, like two unsynchronized engines forcibly welded onto the same chassis.

Similar to atrial fibrillation.

He turned his head and glanced at Liang Wen.

Liang Wen's voice was pressed low, "You saw it, right?"

"Hmm."

"That thing... isn't a structure a human heart should have."

Su Ming didn't reply. He twisted on his portable Tactical Flashlight, narrowed the beam to its thinnest, and sliced it into the narrowest slit of the fissure.

The moment the light entered, his pupils contracted.

Deep within the fissure, the Taotie Core's vortex had completely vanished. Yet directly beneath where the core had been, against the myocardium—

there was a crystal.

About the size of a fist, an irregular polyhedron, its hue between dark red and black‑red. Its surface was covered with spider‑web‑like fine vascular veins that swelled and contracted with each heartbeat; every pulse made the crystal flash briefly, as if a living thing were breathing.

It's not attachment.

It's clinging.

The crystal's base had penetrated deep into the myocardial tissue, its peripheral vascular veins having formed a bizarre Symbiosis network with Lu Yu's own coronary arteries. With each beat, faint golden specks of life force could be seen drawn from the myocardium, traveling along the veins into the crystal's interior.

Su Ming's flashlight beam flickered slightly.

He had seen many Weird parasitic human cases—grievance energy entering the body, ghostly entities possessing, Rules erosion... but those were all contaminations on the energy level. The scene before him was similar yet different.

What this crystal was doing was a physical‑level parasitism, a biological‑tissue‑level fusion. It formed a circuit directly with the host's heart, turning Lu Yu's very existence into its source of nourishment.

"Damn," Liang Wen squeezed a word from his teeth, his voice hoarse, "What the hell is this thing?"

Su Ming handed the flashlight to Liang Wen, then retrieved from a side pocket of his Tactical Backpack a silver device about the size of a cigarette pack. It was the Federation‑standard Anomalous Substance Detector, model RD‑7, capable of identifying all known Anomalous Radiation Spectrums above D‑grade.

He aimed the probe at the fissure and pressed the switch.

The instrument's screen lit up.

The readings began to fluctuate.

Three seconds later, Liang Wen heard an extremely faint "beep." It was the detector's alert for reaching its measurement ceiling.

He leaned in to look at the screen.

The value read 9.7.

Full scale is 10.

Liang Wen's mouth twitched. "Quasi‑S?"

"No," Su Ming shook his head, turning a knob on the device's side to switch to another detection mode. "I've never seen this radiation spectrum before."

The waveform on the screen began to surge violently. Two curves intertwined: a green line representing Lu Yu's own vital signs, and a red line for the unknown substance. The red line's amplitude was slowly but steadily suppressing the green, and with each beat the red peak rose a few tenths of a percent higher than before.

"It's siphoning," Su Ming said, staring at the waveform, his voice flat, "siphoning his life force and his spirit. The frequency is accelerating."

"Can it finish the siphon?"

"At this rate," Su Ming raised his hand to glance at his Tactical Wristwatch, "in about forty‑seven minutes Lu Yu's brain‑death indicator will cross the threshold. At that point the Taotie symbiote will no longer be suppressible."

Liang Wen was silent for two seconds.

"Lin Fan's strike."

"Hmm," Su Ming turned off the detector, stuffed the device back into his backpack, "he disrupted the crystal's energy circuit. Look at the fissure's edge; those charred marks are the remnants of the Blue Flame of the Nether's burn. About two‑thirds of the crystal's surface veins have been burnt away."

Liang Wen followed his gaze.

Sure enough. On the side of the crystal nearest the fissure, the surface vascular veins had carbonized into a brittle, charred shell, merging with the surrounding tissue scorched by Hellfire. The remaining one‑third, still linked to deep myocardial veins, continued to pulse, but at a noticeably slower rate.

"So Lin Fan..." Liang Wen's voice carried an indefinable tone, "he dismantled the deadly bomb."

Su Ming nodded:

"Exactly. This Crystal Stone's purpose is to weaken Lu Yu's stamina and will, to catalyze the Taotie's loss of control. If the Taotie runs completely wild, the entire Qiu Ce Yuan underground—and the surface structures above—should already have ceased to exist by now."

Liang Wen's mouth opened, but did not close.

He turned his head to look at Lu Yu on the wall.

The youth was still embedded at the center of the radiating fissure, eyes half‑closed, his complexion as gray and wilted as paper. The charred gaping wound in his chest oozed blood mingled with blue smoke, a scene of utmost misery. Yet as Liang Wen stared at that face, he felt a cold draft seeping out from the gaps of his own spine.

They were, by Lord Wei's command, protecting the "End of Days Fire Seed" at any cost.

It had nearly become a Timed Bomb buried deep within the Federation's heart.

And the one who removed the Detonator was Lin Fan.

The "Defector" they had constantly tried to capture, contain, even eliminate.

This realization made Liang Wen feel absurd. So absurd that he wanted to laugh.

He actually laughed—dry, two short bursts of breath from his throat. "What do you call this?"

Su Ming gave no answer. He walked to the edge of the corridor and pressed the encrypted channel button on his Communicator.

Three seconds later, Lord Wei's voice came through.

"Report."

Two words, devoid of emotional fluctuation, as calm as hearing a daily morning briefing.

Su Ming inhaled. "An unknown Weird parasitic entity was discovered within Lu Yu's thoracic cavity. At the biological tissue level it has formed a Symbiosis circuit with the host's heart, forcibly catalyzing the Taotie Core's loss of control. The parasitic process has been disrupted by Lin Fan, but residual structures remain threatening. Recommendation: transfer immediately to a Containment Unit Level 1, dispatch a Medical Team for a physical excision operation."

The communication channel fell silent for five seconds.

Lord Wei's voice sounded again, still calm.

"Source of the parasitic entity?"

"Unknown. The radiation spectrum is not in the Federation database, suspected to be a completely new type. But......" Su Ming paused, "I suspect its origin is related to the gods. Perhaps the gods have already come into contact with Lu Yu without our knowledge, planting this dangerous bomb right under our noses."

Another three seconds of silence.

"I understand."

Wei Gong said.

Then he added a sentence, his tone unchanged, as if saying tomorrow's weather would clear up.

"Seal the news. All physical evidence on site is to be sealed in place. Su Ming, you and Liang Wen are responsible for guarding; the Medical Team will arrive in ten minutes. Before the surgery is completed, any fluctuation in Lu Yu's vital signs must be reported immediately."

"Yes."

The communication was cut off.

Su Ming lowered his hand and turned around.

Liang Wen still leaned against the rubble pile, his gaze sweeping back and forth between Lu Yu and him. "What did Wei Gong say?"

"Seal, guard, wait for the Medical Team." Su Ming walked back, stood directly beneath Lu Yu, looked up at that ashen face, and said, "From now on, this place is upgraded to a top-secret isolation zone. All entry/exit records will be erased, surveillance footage overwritten, and physical traces purified."

"I understand." Liang Wen pushed himself up from the rubble, brushed off the dust on his body, and said, "Just pretend this never happened."

"Pretty much."

"What about Lin Fan over there?"

Su Ming looked up at him.

Liang Wen shrugged. "He chopped Lu Yu with a knife and disarmed the bomb that the Federation had almost detonated. Should we record this in the report?"

"What do you think?"

Liang Wen thought for a moment, then gave a wry smile. "Forget it, better not record it. Otherwise, how would we write the report? 'Thanks to defector Lin Fan's brave act of successfully defusing the bomb'? Wei Gong could twist my head off and kick it like a ball."

Su Ming didn't respond to the joke. He crouched down, took from his backpack a set of portable containment seal—a silver-gray metal frame with four extensible fixing arms, the tips bearing restraint rings that flashed blue light.

He unfolded the device and fixed it to the ground beneath Lu Yu.

The fixing arms extended, probing into the rubble crevices, firmly clamping Lu Yu's back and limbs.

The restraint rings were placed on his wrists, ankles, and neck; the blue light turned into a steady, pulsing flash.

Throughout the process, Lu Yu showed no reaction. Only the crystal in his chest continued to faintly beat; each beat dimmed the residual pulse a little.

Liang Wen, leaning nearby, suddenly spoke.

"Su Ming."

"Hmm."

"You said...... what is Wei Gong thinking now?"

Su Ming adjusted the parameters of the restraint rings without looking up. "I'm thinking about how to extract this bomb from Lu Yu's body without alerting the gods, then clean up any traces."

"I mean," Liang Wen paused, "does he know whether the gods might already have reached this close?"

Su Ming's hand paused for a moment.

After a few seconds, he continued adjusting, his tone as flat as if discussing what to have for dinner.

"Now I know."

Liang Wen whistled.

"Then there's a good show to watch next."

Su Ming didn't respond. After finishing adjusting the device, he stood up and stepped back two steps. The four fixing arms firmly locked Lu Yu against the wall; the blue light of the restraint rings flickered in the dim passage like some kind of ruthless heart monitor.

Footsteps echoed from the end of the passage. The Medical Team had arrived.

Su Ming went to meet them, briefly explaining the situation. Several medical staff in white isolation suits pushed a stretcher bed and a sealed containment box forward quickly; the metal wheels grated over the rubble, producing a harsh scraping sound.

Liang Wen didn't move. He remained leaning against the rubble pile, his gaze sweeping over the busy Medical Team, over Lu Yu on the wall, and finally settling on Su Ming's back.

He suddenly felt a bit cold.

It wasn't the cold of temperature. It was a chill that seeped from the gaps in his bones, carrying a metallic, rusty sensation.

The gods' fingers had already clamped around their throats.

They only noticed the existence of that finger a second before they were almost strangled to death.

What's more ironic, the person who saved them was another monster they had always wanted to strangle.

Liang Wen twitched his mouth, wanting to laugh but couldn't.

He lowered his head, looking at the dust and blood stains on his fingerless gloves, and slowly clenched his fists.

The lights on the third underground level flickered. The Medical Team bustled around Lu Yu, metal instruments clinking softly. Su Ming stood to the side supervising, his spine ramrod straight; only occasional tightening of his lips betrayed his emotion.

Liang Wen closed his eyes.

From his ears came the low-voiced conversation of medical staff, the hum of machines starting up, and a dull thud from somewhere far down the passage where something unknown shattered and fell.

It was noisy.

But it was better than silence.

At least it proved they were still alive.