- Zhengzhou · A Peddler's Ravings
Qian Yiyan's carriage stopped before the Zhengzhou courier station as the sun slanted westward.
The clerk sent by the prefect, a gaunt man named Wang, wore an expression of anxious hesitation. He ushered her into the secondary hall, dismissed the attendants, and only then bowed low, lowering his voice.
"Astronomer Qian, the case files on the ghost ships you wished to investigate are here. However... your subordinate presumes to bring another strange matter to your attention."
"Speak."
"Recently, several cases of delirium have appeared in the city." Clerk Wang wiped sweat from his brow. "All the afflicted had come into contact with a batch of peculiar stones known in the black market as 'dream stones.' Afterwards, they began speaking nonsense, their words and actions inverted."
"Inverted how?"
"One peddler pointed at an official porcelain bowl and called it a transparent Lijie (referring to glass) cup. He shouted at an oil lamp, demanding to know why the electric light wouldn't turn on. He grabbed a constable's black uniform and insisted it was a police uniform from some future age." Wang's fear was genuine. "Another was worse—he crouched all day in a corner, muttering at the bricks, saying they contained moving pictures and devices that could transmit sound across a thousand li. The medical officer said it was evil wind invading the brain. But your subordinate thinks... it didn't sound like madness. It sounded like... like they'd truly seen something they shouldn't have."
Qian Yiyan's fingertip tapped lightly on the table.
Cognitive disorientation. And specifically, cognitive disorientation marked by clear temporal displacement. She knew this symptom all too well—mild, controllable rule contamination.
"Where are the afflicted now?"
"The worst case, the peddler, is being held in the rear compound." Clerk Wang hurriedly replied. "Would the Astronomer like to interrogate him personally?"
"Lead the way."
The rear chamber was thick with the smell of medicine. The peddler, a man in his thirties, was bound to the couch with cloth strips. His eyes were fixed on the ceiling rafters, muttering incessantly.
"...Iron birds... buzzing... so huge, emerging from the clouds... glowing boxes, one in every hand, with little people inside singing opera..."
Qian Yiyan approached. The peddler suddenly turned his head toward her. His gaze was unfocused, but then he grinned.
"Lady official... that hairpin in your bun, it's plastic, isn't it? The craftsmanship is amazing..."
Plastic? What was that?
Qian Yiyan's expression did not change. Her eyes swept over him, finally stopping at his sleeve—where a trace of greyish-white fine powder clung, faintly shimmering with a rainbow iridescence in the light.
She pinched a bit between two fingers and rubbed. The texture was smooth, with an extremely faint cold resonance, like a fragment of a star chart.
Anomalous stone powder.
"Where did he get these dream stones?" she asked Clerk Wang.
"His wife said he bought them cheap as rare gems from a familiar foreign merchant. The merchant's name is Ashina Zhi; he has a warehouse in the western part of the city."
Qian Yiyan straightened.
"Keep him under watch. Also, my mission here is to investigate the ghost ships on the canal. I need to visit the riverside granaries and docks." She looked at Clerk Wang, her tone flat. "This matter need not be publicized."
Clerk Wang nodded repeatedly, visibly relieved.
As she left the rear compound, dusk had begun to settle. Qian Yiyan returned to her room at the courier station, closed the door, and Take out the fragment of her father's star chart from her travel bag.
The fragment was warm and smooth; its lines flowed slowly in her palm.
She sprinkled the trace of anomalous stone powder from her sleeve onto the fragment's edge.
The instant the powder touched the fragment, Huummm—
A resonance, extremely faint yet penetrating straight to the skull.
The lines on the fragment flared briefly, twisted, and re-formed into an extremely simple pattern: several intersecting lines, a single point, and beside it, a symbol she had never seen before—Ψ.
Then a brief, sharp dizziness struck her. Before her eyes, images flickered: not the walls of the courier station, but rows upon rows of cold, glowing metal cabinets, countless tiny points of light flowing across their surfaces...
The vision lasted less than a breath.
Qian Yiyan gripped the table edge, closed her eyes, and breathed deeply.
Her father's notes had mentioned that when high-concentration rule-carriers approached each other, they could trigger brief informational Turbulence, allowing one to glimpse fragments of Corresponding time-space.
Those metal cabinets—were they a scene from Lu Baoyi's side?
She clenched the fragment. Its cold touch quickly restored her calm.
Ashina Zhi's warehouse.
- Night Reconnaissance at the Warehouse
At midnight, Zhengzhou city sank into slumber.
Qian Yiyan changed into a dark blue close-fitting outfit, tucked the Starlight Thorn securely against her body, and slipped out of the courier station like a shadow, merging into the night. The western warehouse district, bustling by day, was now reduced to scattered lamps and expanses of darkness. Ashina Zhi's warehouse had high walls and a thick gate, but scaling them was no difficulty for her.
She crouched on the rooftop across the street, observing for half an incense stick's time.
The guards were more numerous than at an ordinary merchant's, and their positioning was systematic—two each at front and back gates, plus roving sentries within the courtyard. Their backs were straight; when their eyes swept the area, they carried a soldier's alertness, utterly unlike common security men.
What drew her attention more was a detached warehouse in the northwest corner. Through the cracks in its windows, the light seeping out was not candlelight, but a steady, cool, pale white glow.
That quality of light—she had seen it before, on that future-style Scavenger in the West Water Gate ruins.
Qian Yiyan slid silently down from the rooftop. Using the shadows of stacked cargo boxes, she approached that warehouse. She didn't go for the door, but circled to the side and rear. Concentrating an almost imperceptible thread of astral force at her fingertip, she Erosion a tiny hole in the thick window paper.
She peered through.
The warehouse was not used for storage. In the center stood a large wooden table, upon which was spread a map of the Yellow River, marked heavily with cinnabar and ink. Three people stood by the table.
Two had foreign features—deep-set eyes, high noses—and wore Song clothing, but their bearing was lean and hard. The third, his back to the window, was of modest stature and wore ordinary grey short attire, yet his posture made Qian Yiyan's pupils contract—his Center of gravity was stable, his shoulders relaxed but not slack. That was the physique of one who had undergone long, rigorous training.
The grey-clad man was pointing at a spot on the map, speaking in a low but clear voice. He spoke neither a foreign tongue nor the official Bianjing dialect, but a language with a peculiar intonation and clipped, short syllables.
Qian Yiyan couldn't understand it, but she memorized a few sounds.
When the grey-clad man finished, the two foreigners nodded and dragged out two wooden boxes from under the table. They opened them. The boxes were lined with straw; amidst the straw lay several greyish-white stones, their surfaces naturally etched with twisted patterns—unmistakably anomalous stones.
One of them picked up a stone and walked to a strange Device by the wall. It resembled a bronze basin stand, but mounted on it was a smooth, polished black stone slab. He placed the anomalous stone on the slab and pressed a catch beside it.
Zzzzt...
A faint electrical sound. The black slab actually lit up, displaying several lines of twisted, flickering symbols. Qian Yiyan recognized those symbols—from the most confidential pages of her father's notes, where they were called The Other Side's base script.
The grey-clad man stepped forward to examine the symbols, nodded, and then withdrew a palm-sized iron box from his breast. He opened it; inside were even smaller, neatly arranged fragments of anomalous stones. He selected one and replaced the stone on the slab with it.
The symbols on the slab changed.
Seemingly satisfied, the grey-clad man gestured. The foreigners re-packed the anomalous stones into their boxes and carried them toward another door in the warehouse.
Qian Yiyan knew she couldn't wait any longer. She needed that map, or any written records on the table.
Like a falling leaf, she drifted silently into the shadow of the warehouse's rear door. The door was barred from inside, but the gap was wide. She extended a hair-thin thread of astral force from her fingertip; it slithered like a living thing through the gap and gently lifted the bar.
She pushed the door open a crack and slipped inside.
The interior was the main storage area, packed with cargo boxes. The air smelled of spices, hides, and a faint metallic tang of rust. Using the dim light filtering through high windows, she quickly scanned her surroundings. The map table was in the adjacent room, but here there should be ledgers or the like.
Just as she approached what seemed to be a partitioned office, from the shadow of a pile of goods behind her came the faintest click of a mechanism!
Without thinking, Qian Yiyan's back bent sharply, her entire body tilting backward.
Swish! Swish! Swish!
Three short crossbow bolts flew past, grazing the tip of her nose and her chest, embedding themselves deep in the wooden box opposite, their fletching trembling violently.
Not arrows—mechanically fired short bolts, their force and precision far exceeding ordinary hand crossbows.
From the shadows, two figures lunged out. They wore clothing similar to the guards, but their movements were far more swift. No shouts, no warnings. They attacked in tandem, one left, one right, fists and feet driving wind straight at her vital points.
Qian Yiyan pushed off with her toes and slid backward, the Starlight Thorn already sliding into her palm. The short blade traced a Deep blue arc in the darkness, parrying a fist from the left. Fist and blade met with a clang of metal—the man's knuckles were reinforced with iron.
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The right man's leg was already swinging toward her waist, heavy and powerful. Qian Yiyan didn't dodge. Her left hand formed a blade, fingers together, and she thrust, concentrating astral force at her fingertips, at the acupoint on the side of his knee. He grunted; the force of his kick faltered.
But the first man was upon her again, now wielding a short foot-long knife. His technique was Concise and ruthless, a straight thrust at her heart. Qian Yiyan spun, pressing the Starlight Thorn against his blade, guiding it, using the subtle leverage of four ounces to move a thousand pounds. But she felt his strength was solid, his stance extremely stable—he wasn't thrown off.
In a flash, three or four exchanges passed. With each exchange, Qian Yiyan's alarm grew.
These two had no flourishes—all their techniques were killing moves aimed directly at vital points. Their coordination was flawless: when one attacked, the other inevitably cut off her retreat. Moreover, their breathing patterns, their rhythm of exertion, were unlike any school of martial arts she knew in the Central Plains. More efficient. More... cold.
More like something from a military. But not from the Song army.
She recalled scattered bits of knowledge about modern combat that Lu Baoyi had transmitted through the jade fragment. Not specific techniques—just a feeling: a pursuit of the shortest path, maximum damage, absolute obedience to orders.
These two gave her that exact feeling.
She couldn't afford a prolonged fight. Alerting the adjacent room would mean trouble.
Qian Yiyan feigned an attack to the left, but as the man parried, she slid like a fish past him and ducked behind a stack of boxes. She reversed her grip on the Starlight Thorn, inserting it into a crevice between boxes and levering.
Crash—
Several boxes toppled toward her pursuers, propelled by her skilled leverage. Their lids flew open, and what spilled out was not goods, but a cloud of greyish-white powder!
Anomalous stone powder!
The powder filled the air. The two men instinctively closed their eyes and covered their noses, their movements faltering.
That was the moment Qian Yiyan had waited for. Like the wind, she darted through the gaps in the powder cloud, straight toward the partitioned office. A quick glance at the table confirmed several ledgers lay there. She grabbed the top one, its ink the freshest, and also spotted a rolled leather tube on a standing cabinet in the corner. She snatched it as well.
She turned. The two guards had already dispersed the powder and were lunging again, murder in their eyes.
Qian Yiyan had no intention of fighting further. Pushing off lightly with her toes, she bounded over the stacked boxes in a few leaps and reached the back door. She burst through it and vanished into the night.
Behind her came a short whistle, but no pursuit. They dared not raise too great an alarm.
Qian Yiyan threaded through the alleyways. Only when she was certain of her safety did she stop at a abandoned temple to the Earth God. Her shoulder burned with pain—a glancing blow from a blade had sliced through her clothes, leaving a shallow cut.
Ignoring the wound, she opened the ledger by the faint moonlight.
The writing within made her brow furrow.
It wasn't Chinese, nor any foreign script. It was a kind of twisted phonetic writing, interspersed with strange symbols. She could just manage make out a few simple words resembling quantities, dates, code names, but overall it was like a book written in heaven's language.
However, at the end of several pages of records, she saw familiar Chinese characters written in various hands:
Goods received. Cao Fu steward, Cao Ping.
Arranged with Captain Wang of the frontier garrison.
Inspected by Liu, Adjutant of Hebei.
Each name was like an icy needle stabbing into her eyes.
The Cao family. Frontier military officers.
The flow of anomalous stones, just as Zhao Yunbi had hinted and Cao Yan had warned, led directly to the empire's most sensitive military nerve.
She then unrolled the leather tube. It contained an even more detailed local map of the Yellow River, with several points marked in red and annotations in that strange script beside them. Beside one point, a small boat symbol was drawn, and next to the symbol were two words she could guess the meaning of:
Test zone. Bait.
Test. Bait.
Qian Yiyan leaned against the cold temple wall and slowly exhaled.
This wasn't smuggling.
This was a setup.
- Data Quagmire
At the same moment, the Yellow River forward command post blazed with light.
Lu Baoyi stared at the three floating screens before him, his eyes dry and aching. On the left was the Hetu's final navigation data and sonar scans. In the center was the Amber intelligence decryption interface Lin Wan had just同步. On the right was real-time feedback from the dozen or so unmanned boats and sensors monitoring the lost contact zone.
The command post was a spacious semi-underground space, filled with the low murmur of conversation, the clatter of keyboards, and the hum of equipment. The air reeked of coffee and sweat.
"Engineer Lu," a young technician with headphones called out, turning his head. "Anomalous echo in Sector D. Signature doesn't match known fish schools or geological formations. Movement pattern... very strange."
Lu Baoyi pulled up that screen and enlarged the waveform. The echo signal was intermittent, sometimes strong, sometimes weak, and its position on the 3D chart showed illogical jumps.
"Not a natural object." He rubbed his brow. "Mark as Unknown Target One. Have catfish drones Three and Five maintain distance and track. Don't alert it."
"Copy that."
Lin Wan slid her chair over from her workstation, a cup of pitch-black coffee in her hand. "Boss, Amber's second decryption is complete. The core of the inscriptions on those stone carvings is an encryption protocol. They're temporarily calling it the Yuan-Yan Protocol."
She projected the decrypted text onto the shared screen. Amidst dense formulas and symbol streams were interspersed some readable descriptions:
Protocol Function: Inject Targeting cognitive noise into a localized spacetime field, inducing calculable deviations between the receptor's perceptual system and the established reality model.
Carrier: Resonant minerals (codename: Dust) or specific information structures.
Associated Experiment: Sowing Plan sub-item, Reality Resilience Test...
"In plain language, Technician Lin," a middle-aged officer in naval uniform frowned.
Lin Wan glanced at Lu Baoyi. Lu Baoyi took over, his tone as casual as possible: "It means those stones are USB drives containing a virus program. The virus doesn't damage the hardware; it attacks the operating system—that is, your perception of the world. It makes you see a bowl as a cup, a lamp as something else."
The officer's face changed: "That's... impossible?"
"Before I got stuck with this mess, I thought so too." The corner of Lu Baoyi's mouth twitched as he pointed to another passage. "Look here: Reality Resilience Test. This thing might have been released not to harm people, but to... test."
"Test what?"
"Test how ordinary people react when exposed to this kind of cognitive virus. Test whether the medical system can handle it. Test..." Lu Baoyi paused. "Test whether specialized agencies like ours can detect, analyze, and contain it in time."
The command post fell silent for an instant.
"Are you saying the Hetu deliberately took this thing to the Yellow River to run scans?" The officer's voice deepened.
"The scanning might have been research, but the loss of contact..." Lu Baoyi pulled up the sensor data from the last thirty seconds before the Hetu lost contact. "Look at this energy reading. At the moment of loss of contact, a brief, high-intensity feedback loop formed between the ship's resonance scanning equipment and the stone carvings. This wasn't an accident. It's like triggering some... protection mechanism, or switch."
He enlarged a detail of the waveform. "See this harmonic decay pattern? Doesn't it look like a standardized response confirmation signal?"
Lin Wan sucked in a sharp breath: "Someone is using this to confirm the protocol has been activated?"
Before she finished speaking, a red alert box suddenly exploded on the command post's main screen!
【WARNING: NETWORK INTRUSION DETECTED】
【Source: Multi-hop Anonymous Node】
【Type: Data Infiltration and Live Stream Hijacking】
All operators' screens flickered simultaneously, then were forcibly switched to a dim interface dense with code streams. An exaggerated virtual face wearing a V for Vendetta mask appeared in the center, its电子合成 voice ringing through the command post with mockery:
"Good evening, busy little bees! Welcome to a special edition of Metis Channel—Strange Tales of the Yellow River: What the Hell Are You Fishing For?"
Beside the masked face, a blurry, shaking video began playing. It looked like footage from some submersible—dark underwater, with the vague, rusted hull of the Hetu visible. A line of constantly jumping subtitles was superimposed on the video:
Guess what surprises are in the cargo hold besides stones? Hint: they move~
"It's Metis!" a technician shouted. "They're trying to Diversification our attention!"
"No shit." Lu Baoyi had already switched to the countermeasures terminal, his fingers flying across the virtual keyboard faster than the eye could follow. "Firewall team, Hold the line against the frontal penetration! Wrestle that live stream back!"
The command room instantly entered combat mode. Keyboards clattered like torrential rain.
Lu Baoyi shouted into the comm channel even as he typed code: "Sonar team! Report Unknown Target One's movements! Those bastards underwater might try to make a move in the chaos!"
"Target One is accelerating toward the Hetu's suspected position! Signature Match... it's a Barracuda-class Miniature submersible, not our standard equipment!"
"Fucking cleaners indeed." Lu Baoyi cursed, splitting his screen to bring up the drone control interface. "Catfish formation, change pattern. Three and Five move forward and jam—emit active sonar pulses! Don't let them get too close!"
On the screen, the green dots representing the drones began maneuvering. The invisible battle underwater had already begun.
Meanwhile, on the main screen, the Metis hacker was still blathering: "Wow, pretty tight defense! But it seems your attention is a bit stretched? Let me help you out by adding some more spice——"
The live Picture suddenly changed to a satellite map of the Yellow River basin. Several red dots flickered on it, with annotations that made blood pressure spike:
Suspected rule-disturbance residue sites (data generously provided by concerned citizens of the Ark of the Covenant)
Current Gate activity prediction (Chiyou faction model error margin: roughly ± one civilization-ending event)
Oh, and don't you have a special agent currently on business in the Northern Song? Say hi for me!
This last sentence, paired with a Comical smiley face emoji, made Lu Baoyi's pupils contract.
They knew about Qian Yiyan. At least, they knew a key historical variable was active in the Northern Song.
"Lin Wan!" he shouted without turning.
"On it!" Lin Wan's voice was taut. " The live-streaming data packets contained a Trojan virus. I'm conducting reverse tracking on the backdoor.... need time!"
"There is no time!" the drone operator yelled. "The Barracuda submersible has released multiple small Separation units... looks like they're going to Forcefully dock with the Hetu!"
Lu Baoyi stared at the chaotic screen, his brain working at Overclocking. Hacker harassment, underwater grab, satellite Peeping... this was a coordinated three-front attack. The goal? Just to grab the stones?
No.
His gaze fell back on that Gate activity prediction map Metis had released. Despite the mocking annotations, the Foundation data underlying the model... seemed vaguely familiar.
He pulled up data from the anomalous stone cases Qian Yiyan had transmitted via the jade pendant—the fluctuation frequencies that had caused the cognitive disorientation—and quickly ran a comparison.
The core resonance peaks overlapped.
A chilling conjecture surfaced.
The hacker attack, the underwater grab, even the Hetu's loss of contact itself... might all be smokescreens. The true purpose was observation. Observing their response patterns under multi-front pressure, their resource allocation priorities, their intelligence analysis speed...
And observing whether a Beyond Time and Space coordination existed between him and Qian Yiyan.
This was an examination. And there was more than one examiner.
He and Qian Yiyan were the two most conspicuous examinees in the room.
At that moment, his left wrist suddenly erupted with a sharp burning pain! Not his old wound—the jade pendant was blazing hot. Simultaneously, an extremely chaotic information stream, packed with unfamiliar symbols, slammed brutally into his consciousness, accompanied by intense dizziness and a metallic, coppery taste in his throat!
It was Qian Yiyan. She was forcibly transmitting information, at enormous cost.
Lu Baoyi grunted, his face paling, but his hands didn't stop. Instead, fueled by the clarity that came with the sharp pain, he typed the final line of code on the countermeasures terminal.
Then he cut off part of the command post's control over the main screen and connected his own terminal.
Metis's Live broadcast footage suddenly froze, then was completely flooded by countless At high speed scrolling, meaningless junk data streams and an endless loop of meme-worthy cat pictures with panda heads!
"Holy shit..." someone in the command post couldn't help but laugh.
The Virtual masked face seemed to hesitate for a moment; even the Electron voice wavered: "......What the fuck?!"
Lu Baoyi's voice, hoarse from pain but forcing a casual tone, sounded on the Public channel:
"Hey, livestreaming bro over there, does Metis's KPI include Live streaming room activity? If you're going to Brush that many fake shots, why not come learn to cook from me? Or I could send you a data packet of Five Years of College Entrance Exams, Three Years of Simulation to help you up your game?"
The masked face was silent for two seconds, then flickered and disappeared. The intrusion Alarm ceased.
The command post erupted in a cacophony of relieved noise.
But Lu Baoyi had no time for that. Clutching his still-throbbing forehead, he quickly fed the unfamiliar symbols and patterns Qian Yiyan had transmitted into the analysis program, cross-referencing them with the decrypted fragments of the Yuan-Yan Protocol.
Lin Wan leaned in, watching the matching results Rolling rapidly on the screen, her eyes widening.
"Boss... this, this is..."
"A ledger. Transport records." Lu Baoyi's voice was low. "Encrypted with a hybrid cipher. Deciphered."
On the screen, a clear list presented itself:
【Goods: Resonant Mineral (Dust) - Grade B】
【Quantity: Three Boxes】
【Sender: Codename 'Pearl of the Eastern Sea'】
【Route: Canal / Private Line】
【Recipient: Cao (Fu) - Ping; Frontier - Wang; Frontier - Liu...】
【Remarks: Testing Phase - Deployment Observation. Bait已 placed at River Section S-7.】
The final item automatically triggered a simple diagram: a stretch of the Yellow River, marked with a red dot and two glaring characters beside it:
Ghost Ship.
At that moment, all the pieces clicked into place with an audible snap.
The anomalous stones were testing tools.
The ghost ships were testing grounds.
The Hetu was another testing ground.
And all of them were lab rats under observation.
Lu Baoyi leaned back in his chair, feeling a wave of profound exhaustion—and an even deeper chill.
He looked down at the A pale red burn mark on his wrist, and through the jade pendant, he perceived the weightiness and isolation. emotions coming from Qian Yiyan's side.
He pressed the comm key to connect to Director Li's secure channel.
"Director Li, request permission to synchronize Northern Song line intelligence. Also..." He paused, then spoke the conclusion.
We might have been drawn into a across time and space, systematic rule-contamination response test. And the examiners are grading us.
On the other end of the channel, a long silence.
Only outside the command post window, the night wind over the Yellow River sobbed like a lament.