Chapter 579: Humanity Utterly Defeated

Only two kinds of people remained in the square.

On one side were the two thousand who had not been infected.

On the other side were more than three thousand people, all wearing the same expression.

They stood in neat rows.

Nobody cried, nobody shouted, and nobody went to look for their loved ones on the ground.

Thirteen corpses still lay sideways at Lu Dou's feet.

A child's hand protruded from his father's embrace, soaked in blood.

Lu Dou lowered his head and stared for a few seconds.

He did not step around it.

His white shoes stepped over the blood's edge and halted in the middle of the human wall.

"Quiet."

More than three thousand people shut their mouths simultaneously.

The square was so quiet it felt oppressive.

Lu Dou scanned the surroundings.

His gaze swept over the infected's pupils, over the clasped hands, over those who had been assimilated yet still bore their original physical traits.

The janitor's hand wound was still there.

The delivery person's knee injury was still there.

The special police sister's sleeve was soaked in blood.

Yet they did not lower their heads to look at their wounds.

They surrendered their pain, fear, and grief over lost loved ones entirely to the collective.

Lu Dou raised his hand and gently brushed aside the old man's disheveled forehead hair.

The old man smiled at him.

"Are you comfortable?"

"Comfortable."

"Are you still afraid?"

"No."

Lu Dou nodded.

"Very good."

L's projection hung in midair, a string of data scrolling across the screen.

"Infected brainwave synchronization rate: 99.8%."

"Rejection reaction: below 0.3%."

"Damage-sharing mechanism stable."

She paused for half a second.

"Mortality rate statistics completed."

"Below 1%."

Liang Wen leaned against a half‑broken wall, his windcoat torn away in large parts, his fingerless gloves also ripped.

He glanced at the blood‑soaked ground, then at the laughing crowd.

"This data sounds pretty good."

"But the more I hear, the more I want to build him a mental asylum."

Nobody paid him any attention.

Su Ming raised his hand to wipe the blood from his lips, staring at the numbers on the projection.

In a contamination event involving five thousand people, less than one percent died.

Compared to any incident after the Weird's advent, this is an absurdly low loss.

Lu Dou pulled it off.

He transformed the reckless laughter's indiscriminate slaughter into a stable consciousness rewrite.

The contagiousness of the spread obviously decreased.

Killing decreased.

But the cost was three thousand people, who from now on can only exist as a single entity.

Su Ming's hand dropped.

This is harder to handle than simple killing.

Killing can be stopped.

How do you stop people from being turned into beings who willingly walk toward the Abyss?

Lu Dou raised his head, looking toward Jiang Yuan.

"Your technical staff are excellent."

"She should be able to see it clearly."

"I did not create a massacre."

Jiang Yuan did not respond.

He stood in place, the card bag pressed against his waist.

Of the three black cards, two remained.

But his hand did not reach for them.

Lu Dou's damage-sharing rule is placed there.

He plays another card, and more corpses appear on the ground.

That is not a battle.

That is Lu Dou having chosen his method of killing for him, then handing the knife back to him.

Lu Dou looks at him.

"Captain of Jiang Team, you just asked me if I had asked them."

"Now you can ask yourself."

He steps half a step to the side.

The janitor walks out.

She looks at Jiang Yuan, still gripping the blood-stained old towel in her hand.

"Captain of Jiang Team."

"Stop trying to save 'us'."

Jiang Yuan's Adam's apple moved.

The janitor lowers his head to look at his cracked hands.

"We used to get up at five every morning, sweep floors, clean toilets, and call our son after returning home at night."

"We were afraid he wouldn't eat well alone in a foreign place."

"Later he died."

"They told us to mourn."

She lifted her head, her face still wearing that smile.

"We can't mourn."

"Now we can."

"We no longer need to think about his last phone call, or wonder if he resented me."

"We feel at ease."

Jiang Yuan looks at her.

Her words contain no plea for help.

This is the most painful part.

Lu Dou did not force them to kneel.

He let them say it themselves, that they do not want to turn back.

Tang Guo'an stands at the rear, his speech manuscript already trampled.

He stares at the janitor, saying nothing for a long time.

Lu Dou spoke for him.

"Mr. Tang, this woman's son died in the Weird Domain."

"She has received compensation and also gotten psychological aid."

"She still lives each day in pain."

"The order you gave her couldn't save her."

Tang Guo'an lifts his head.

"That's not for you to make her like this."

"Why not?"

Lu Dou asks.

"Because you are not worthy."

Tang Guo'an stares at him.

"If people are living poorly, it is our dereliction of duty."

"What needs to be changed is the system, and those who hold power but do not do human things."

"It is not about washing clean the brains of the suffering and then telling them life is easy."

Lu Dou falls silent for a moment.

"Do you still believe in repair?"

"I don't believe."

Tang Guo'an says.

"But I have to do it."

"Because I stand here, not to prove I am smarter than anyone."

"It is to give them a chance to curse me, and a chance to replace me."

Lu Dou gently shakes his head.

"You will always leave hope for the next generation."

"But many cannot wait that long."

Having said that, he lifts the umbrella handle.

The weird tales around the square stop moving.

The old man whose mouth is full of mouths lies on the ground, the smiling face in his mouth closing.

The faceless weird tale is pressed down by Qin Zhixia, its limbs also ceasing to struggle.

One after another, the weird tales retreat into the Gray Mist.

They did not lunge at the Night Watcher.

No further infection.

Jiang Yuan's pupils constricted.

Lu Dou is going to leave.

He had already obtained the result he wanted.

This attack wasn't about killing a certain number of people.

He needed a batch of sufficiently stable samples to verify whether a single-consciousness society could function in a large population.

Three thousand people—enough.

Moreover, these three thousand people are all living propagation sources.

Jiang Yuan took a step forward.

Shadow spread from under his feet.

Su Ming's hand pressed onto his shoulder.

He pressed down heavily.

"Don't move."

Jiang Yuan tilted his head.

Su Ming's eyes were bloodshot, and blood continued to seep from the split on the back of his hand.

"If you act now, you'll be personally executing those three thousand civilians."

"He's going to run."

"I saw that."

"Let him go out—what about the people outside?"

"That also can't be exchanged for these three thousand people."

The shadow on Jiang Yuan's shoulder surged, and dozens of black hands drilled out from the cracks in the ground.

They reached toward Lu Dou's position, then stopped behind the infected.

Jiang Yuan's breathing was ragged.

He had thought many times about what he would do once he became stronger.

Kill the fierce ghost.

Block in front of the civilians.

Drag out those hiding within the rules.

But Lu Dou stood among the three thousand civilians.

These people are not shields.

They are people.

Precisely because they are people, they are harder to get past than any shield.

Liang Wen leaned against the wall and stood upright.

"Flying Cards."

Jiang Yuan didn't turn back.

Liang Wen looked at Lu Dou; the pattern on his glove had already faded.

"Don't be foolish."

"I may usually talk trash, but that doesn't mean I can't settle scores."

"If we force a charge this round, the battle report will have to be censored."

Qin Zhixia dragged the faceless strange tale back to the safe house.

Her white hair was stained with blood, and the muzzle of her mechanical prosthetic arm still pointed at the infected.

She very much wanted to fire.

Qin Zhixia moved the muzzle away.

"Everyone, contract the defensive line."

The policewoman froze.

"Qin Team?"

"Protect the uninfected."

"What about Lu Dou?"

"Let him go first."

As these words left her mouth, Qin Zhixia's arm twitched.

She didn't explain further.

Explanation is useless.

They all understood.

What should be done now is not to rush out and fight desperately.

It is to protect those not yet drawn into the collective.

Otherwise, before Lu Dou leaves, five thousand people will all become the same face.

Jiang Yuan stood still, unmoving.

Su Ming did not loosen his grip.

"Jiang Yuan."

"You are the captain."

"Don't let him count you in as well."

These words made Jiang Yuan quiet.

Lu Dou most wants to see them lose control.

As long as Jiang Yuan makes a move, Lu Dou can stake three thousand lives on the Investigation Bureau.

By then, people outside the Square will ask.

Why not save?

Why kill?

Why do the so‑called Night Watchers ultimately have no difference from monsters?

Lu Dou is not only contaminating people.

He also wants to drag order into the mud.

Jiang Yuan closed his eyes.

When he opened them again, the shadow fell back to his feet.

"All units, listen to orders."

His throat was hoarse.

"Uninfected persons enter the safe house."

"Infected remain in place; no one may make contact."

"Medical Team handles the wounded."

"Sniper unit withdraws high‑explosive ammo, replaces it with binding nets."

No one answered over the channel.

Everyone was looking at Lu Dou.

Jiang Yuan raised his voice.

"Execute!"

"Received!"

The female officer was the first to respond.

The SWAT officers gritted their teeth, holstered their guns, and instead escorted the still‑crying people out.

Someone refused to leave, shouting their mother's name desperately.

Someone tried to rush into the Infected crowd, but was tightly held by two policemen.

"My wife is inside!"

"She's still alive!"

"If she's alive, let me through!"

The policeman, eyes reddened, dragged the person away.

"If you go through, there'll be one more."

Lu Dou did not stop.

He held the umbrella, stood in the center of the crowd, waiting for them to set up the quarantine.

That composure made one's teeth ache.

Only after the last uninfected child was taken into the safe house did Lu Dou raise his hand.

The three thousand Infected were divided.

The orderly crowd moved to both sides.

A path was left empty in the middle.

At the road's end stood the sealed heavy‑metal gate at the Square's Exit.

Beyond the gate lay six layers of blockade.

Alloy partitions, anti‑rule coating, suppressive artillery platform, electronic jamming net.

This is the cage the Investigation Bureau prepared for an S Ji target.

Lu Dou walked to the door.

He stopped.

The White Umbrella turned gently.

Gray Mist adhered to the gate.

Then the heavy metal cracked open in the middle.

It was not an explosion.

There was no fire, nor smoke.

The door body split to both sides, its edges curling back, revealing the street outside.

The soldiers behind the Blockade Line raised their guns.

Yet no one dared to pull the trigger.

Behind Lu Dou stood three thousand Infected.

Whoever opens fire will first kill those three thousand.

A young soldier's hand trembled badly.

He looked toward the command vehicle.

"Report."

"Target is about to breach the blockade."

There was no reply in the Communicator.

Wei Gong was at the Zongbu Zhihui Zhongxin.

The grayish-white hair was a little messy.

He gripped the communicator, his fingertip pressing the talk button.

As long as he said a word, the artillery outside would cover the exit.

Lu Dou might not die.

But three thousand infected would die.

Lord Wei watched the orderly people on the monitor.

After a few seconds, he put down the communicator.

"Pull back."

The soldiers froze.

"Chief?"

"Clear the passage."

Lord Wei repeated it.

"Move the isolation zone to the secondary line."

"Let him go out."

The order was transmitted.

The blockade line slowly retreated.

Lu Dou stepped over the cracked metal door.

He did not look back.

After walking a few steps, he turned his face and looked toward Jiang Yuan in the square.

"Next time."

"I will let the whole city bathe in the same happiness."

The white umbrella fell.

The gray mist rolled over the street corner.

By the time the night watchers rushed out, only a sliced gate and an empty isolation passage remained outside.

Jiang Yuan stood in place, motionless for a long time.

Three thousand infected were still in the square.

They, separated by the restraint net, gazed in the same direction.

Every face bore the same smile.

Liang Wen walked up to Jiang Yuan and opened his mouth.

In the end, he said nothing.

Su Ming released Jiang Yuan's shoulder.

His palm was covered in blood.

Jiang Yuan raised his fist and smashed it into the ruined wall beside him.

The wall surface cracked.

Blood flowed down the back of his hand.

On the communication channel, no one spoke.

After a long time, Jiang Yuan's hoarse, low voice rang out.

"...... We suffered a crushing defeat."