Chapter 133

133/Seven Flows

Lu Yan had grown accustomed to the neat, orderly interface that greeted him upon entering someone's mental space. To him, other people's minds were like homework waiting to be graded. He hadn't expected to plunge directly into a churning, violent sea this time.

Waves crashed over him in the dead of night. Clinging to a piece of drift ice, Lu Yan was battered by the saltwater, utterly disheveled.

"What is this?" he asked the system.

[07's current mental space.]

[His base parameters are also significantly higher than yours. In other words, you cannot manipulate his mind as you did the Sea God Cult followers.]

[07's consciousness is currently in chaos. Many memories are suppressed beneath the surface, sealed away like ice.]

Another massive wave surged, forcing Lu Yan under the dark water.

Below, enormous ice coffins drifted in the depths.

07—Zong Yan—lay inside a transparent block of ice, his eyes closed, his face a deathly pale. Countless identical ice blocks surrounded Lu Yan, each containing a version of Zong Yan, bobbing in the frigid water.

[Wake him,] the system's voice was grave.

Lu Yan's hand went to the short blade at his waist. He drove the blade deep into the ice before him.

Within the glacier, Zong Yan's eyes snapped open—a pair of burning crimson coals.

Darkness swallowed Lu Yan's vision. When it cleared, he was staring at an unfamiliar ceiling.

He quickly realized the abnormality: he couldn't move.

Or rather, he couldn't control this body.

He sat up, reached for a bottle of water by the bedside, and took a long drink.

In the mirror, Lu Yan saw the face of this body.

Zong Yan.

The sensation was surreal, like watching a movie in first-person perspective.

Zong Yan set the water down and tentatively snapped his fingers.

A vivid crimson flame ignited at his fingertip.

Lu Yan heard 07's muttered thought: "I could do a world magic tour with this."

[Remember the timeline when you entered Tang Xun'an's dream? This is the third day after the "Revelation Event."]

The First Research Institute was being rebuilt. Most of the damage was confined to the upper underground levels. Volunteers like Zong Yan lived on floors nine and ten, largely unaffected.

At 7 AM, Zong Yan arrived at the institute's cafeteria. The breakfast crowd was thin. Lu Yan, seeing through Zong Yan's eyes, spotted Gu Zheng in the hall immediately.

The cafeteria was free, serving a dim sum-style breakfast. Zong Yan piled seven or eight steamers onto his tray.

He sat down across from Gu Zheng. "Where are the others?"

"Yanbei took leave for an art exhibition. Yuanchen is with Professor Qiao reviewing experimental data. Zhan Yihan and the others were up until 3 AM gaming. They won't be getting up."

Zong Yan hesitated. "Speaking of which, that black dragon we saw a few days ago… the one living on the tenth floor?"

Gu Zheng nodded. "Mm. Tang Xun'an."

"Don't think I've seen him around much."

"He's undergone too many pollutant transplant surgeries. His condition is unstable. His contamination level was critically high before, so the rejection reactions are severe. He's… confined now. Not sure if he'll recover."

"What a pity," Zong Yan sighed. "What happens if the contamination level breaks 100?"

Gu Zheng answered without hesitation. "Euthanasia."

A heavy silence fell after his words.

"That's too cruel," Zong Yan said, discomfort plain in his voice. "His contamination spiked because he was saving people."

"Zong Yan." Gu Zheng set his bowl down, his expression serious. "Compared to ordinary people, we've faced pollutants directly. We should understand better than anyone that pollutants and humans are separate species. When an Awakener becomes a pollutant, no matter who they were before, they become our enemy."

"Pollutants possess power far beyond ordinary humans and harbor an innate craving for human life. In other words, they are all potential murderers. It's pathological. Irreversible."

"It sounds brutal, but it's an unavoidable choice to protect the majority. Moreover, even if some semblance of consciousness remains after becoming a pollutant, their thinking changes. The only link left to human society is memory. But how long can the warmth in those memories last? The moment they become a pollutant, the part of them that was human dies."

"Even if my contamination broke 100, I'd want you to treat me as an enemy, not an old friend."

Gu Zheng spoke at length.

Lu Yan was silent. So that's what 01 thought back then.

[If you treat evolution as a war, qualities detrimental to survival are weeded out. Clearly, when Gu Zheng became 01, he actively discarded his empathy, among other things.]

Zong Yan's appetite vanished, a knot of dread in his chest. "Understood. If my contamination ever nears 100, I'll find an ocean to jump into."

After breakfast, he began his training.

His gift was Karmic Flame. The researchers had devised a long-term training regimen based on its properties to help him master it.

Flames danced in his palm, flaring and shrinking. Some embers leaped onto the carpet but didn't catch fire, instead being drawn back to his hand like iron to a magnet.

His daily training was capped at two continuous hours. Any longer risked an unsafe spike in his contamination level.

By 10:30 AM, with a researcher's assistance, Zong Yan was done. The rest of the day was his.

He'd intended to go to the surface, but his feet turned of their own accord toward Qiao Yu's office.

He pushed the door open, hesitated for a moment, then said, "Professor Qiao, I'd like to see Tang Xun'an. Is that possible?"

Qiao Yu looked surprised. "He doesn't much care for visitors, but I can ask." He picked up the phone.

After a brief ringtone, the call connected.

"Tang Xun'an," Qiao Yu said gently.

A young voice replied from the other end. "Professor Qiao."

"Someone wishes to see you. A volunteer from the ninth floor."

"...Sorry." Tang Xun'an's voice was muffled; he was curled inside a wardrobe, picking at a loose black scale on his cheek. "I don't want to."

I'd scare them.

Zong Yan didn't press. From his perspective, Lu Yan watched the day pass in a blur.

When his eyes opened again, the calendar on the wall showed a month had passed.

Zong Yan rose, did his morning exercises on an empty stomach, then went to the medical bay for a blood draw.

The researcher withdrew the needle from his arm and said casually, "Zong Yan, the volunteer from underground level ten is leaving the institute today. Want to go see him off?"

Zong Yan was taken aback. "So soon?"

"Mm." The researcher nodded. "He's not like you all. He came to the institute for pollutant fusion surgery. The mortality rate is extremely high; it's only been tested on animals before. By all accounts, it was a success. The volunteer from room ten originally had one gift. Now he has three."

"Barring complications, he'll join the newly formed Special Operations Department. In recent months, Pollution Disease cases have spiked worldwide. Conventional weapons are starting to fail against pollutants. We have to send Awakeners now."

"If Tang Xun'an succeeds… it proves our experimental direction is correct…"

"You are the executors of the Spark Project. You are… our future hope."

The researcher's words trailed into a murmur.

Zong Yan's fist tightened subtly. "I understand."

---

The next time Lu Yan's awareness surfaced, his eyes instinctively scanned the wall calendar. The wall had changed from a light coffee color to a cold, metallic white.

Maybe it was his imagination, but the lighting seemed dimmer, gloomier.

[This is 31 years later. Three years ago, Professor Qiao, aged and frail, passed away in the hospital… After a series of power struggles, Gong Weibin is now the Director. Professor Qiao's former faction left and established the Third Research Institute.]

[The Third Institute applied to take the experimental subject, but it was denied. This year marks the first year of the Apotheosis Project.]

Zong Yan rose early, was led into an office, and attended a meeting.

"This is your new researcher, Ren Xuan." Gong Weibin's expression was mild. "Professor Shi is too old to continue overseeing your physical studies. Don't worry. Though young, Ren Xuan is my most outstanding student."

Lu Yan frowned. I've seen him before.

Back in P City, before departing for the Luo River Botanical Garden, he'd crossed paths with Ren Xuan.

Back then, Ren Xuan had already been Zong Yan's researcher for many years.

Later, Ren Xuan would jump from a high-rise in P City. Zong Yan's researcher would then become Wei Chengwu, who, unable to endure the whispers of his gift, would also leap to his death.

Ren Xuan wore a slightly bashful, excited expression. "Hello, Mr. Zong Yan. I've heard of you for a long time. I was also previously an assistant to Professor Shi. Rest assured, I will devise the most suitable modification plan for you."

Zong Yan was silent for a moment before extending his hand. "Hello."

All changes happen gradually. Not overnight.

At first, it was just longer training hours. Then, because some volunteers began showing obvious aberrant traits, their time outside was reduced.

Later, the first incident of an Awakener unconsciously harming others occurred, resulting in six researcher deaths. After that, the volunteers' free movement was restricted.

Ren Xuan's modification plan was relatively mild. Slowly, Zong Yan fell behind the progress of the others.

Zong Yan awoke from a brief, drug-induced stupor. One of his ribs had been replaced. It ached. Through the wall, he heard Gong Weibin's stern, chastising voice.

—"Do you have any idea how dangerous the situation outside is now?! Every day, the death toll from pollutants exceeds one hundred thousand!"

Gong Weibin’s voice was a whip-crack in the sterile air. "The other experimental groups have their subjects’ spiritual power thresholds at 5000! Your group is still at 3500! At this rate, when will the God-Making Project ever succeed?!"

"Subject 07 is a precious resource! I won't let you waste him! If you can't handle this, pack your things and get out!"

Ren Xuan’s reply was tight with tension. "I can't, Professor. Using your protocol… Zong Yan’s body won’t withstand it."

"They are not human," Gong Weibin snarled, hurling a stack of experiment logs into Ren Xuan’s face. "Stop judging them by human standards! My final warning—deliver results, or get out."

"Don’t waste my time."

With that, Gong Weibin stormed away, the door hissing shut behind him.

Ren Xuan knelt on the cold floor, gathering the scattered papers with trembling hands. His eyes were red-rimmed.

The door slid open again. Zong Yan stood there, one hand pressed to the fresh ache beneath his ribs, the other wrist encircled by the cold metal of a data-monitoring cuff. In silence, he helped collect the pages.

"It’s okay," Zong Yan said, his voice flat. "I’m fine."

That simple sentence broke something in Ren Xuan. He crumpled against the wall, face buried in his hands, shoulders shaking with silent, heaving sobs. "What do I do, Zong Yan? I have no choice. If I’m not your researcher… who will protect you then? Who will even listen…?"

Anyone who left the Institute did so with their memories scrubbed clean by the confidentiality protocols.

Zong Yan had watched Ren Xuan age. From a keen young man to this—mid-thirties, an age that should have been prime, yet streaked with premature grey, shoulders permanently bowed by a weight they were never meant to carry.

"...It’s okay," Zong Yan repeated softly. "Can I see Gu Zheng?"

Ren Xuan wiped his face, voice thick. "Gu Zheng is under the Professor’s direct supervision. I… I haven’t seen him in a long time either."

Zong Yan fell silent.

The next time they strapped him to the surgical table, the room was crowded with strangers in full containment suits. Their eyes were clinical, voices monotone as they recited data points.

"Bodily flame-conversion rate remains suboptimal."

"Spiritual power threshold requires aggressive enhancement."

"Initiate full blood replacement. Use the pollutant Jinwu specimen."

Ren Xuan grabbed one researcher’s arm, desperation bleeding into his plea. "Can we split the procedure into two sessions? Please."

"Ren Xuan." The man shook him off, irritation sharp. "This is the Professor’s final concession. I have Subject 03 to manage. I don’t have time to coddle your schedule. Make your choice."

Ren Xuan’s gaze swung to Zong Yan on the table. The young man’s eyes met his, calm and depthless, a still pool reflecting nothing. A silent it’s okay, even as restraints held him immobile, denying him even the turn of his head.

Tears welled as Ren Xuan accepted the scalpel from his senior.

Zong Yan remained conscious through it all.

Lu Yan witnessed the world through his eyes, a captive audience to a horror he could not share, could not alleviate. He could only watch.

"It took me a moment to place this scene," Lu Yan murmured to the void. "An autopsy."

In the frozen sea of Zong Yan’s mind, time leaped forward in jagged cuts. Each massive ice coffin Lu Yan shattered with his blade released another fragment of 07’s memory.

Years bled away.

Zong Yan’s face remained unlined by time, but the man who visited his cell had grown old.

Ren Xuan knocked, then entered only after confirming the absence of monitors and eavesdroppers. "07," he whispered, voice raspy. "Do you still want to get out?"

Zong Yan looked up. A faint spark, long dormant, flickered in his crimson eyes. "...Yes."

Ren Xuan sat heavily beside him. "It will require another surgery. I’ll have to remove a portion of your frontal lobe. You’ll lose the Karmic Flame talent. To keep you alive… I’ll have to transplant a different one in its place."

"Once you’re out," Ren Xuan leaned closer, the words barely audible, "don’t ever come back. Understand? I’ll take you out, to the Luo River Botanical Garden. The security detail coming with us… the Professor grafted canine genes into them. I don’t know who to trust anymore. So you… trust no one."

Zong Yan stared, processing slowly. The side effects of countless procedures had dulled his mind.

He nodded. "Okay."

What followed, Lu Yan already knew.

The Luo River Botanical Garden. The lost talent. The dead banyan tree.

Zong Yan escaped. He trusted no one.

But decades of isolation had left him a stranger to the world. They found him. Dragged him back, locking him away in the X City Pollution Disease Control Center.

He remembered Ren Xuan’s warning. Trust no one.

Anyone could be Gong Weibin’s dog.

A disobedient subject could be erased. The reason didn’t need to be complex: surgical failure, pollution index breakthrough past 100, euthanasia.

For the first time, Lu Yan saw himself through another’s eyes.

He looked… surprisingly gentle. "Was I really that soft with patients?" he wondered aloud.

The system snorted. Yes. You heart-arsonist.

He watched as his memory-self sat with 07, watched low-budget TV, spoke softly of the outside world. He saw 07 eventually rest his head on that memory-self’s knee, finding sleep.

[07 saw kindness in you. A gentleness he hadn’t felt in a long, long time. A human warmth, even if it was just pity from a higher place.]

Ren Xuan had told him to trust no one. Yet, in the end, Zong Yan’s hand had shot out, fingers closing around that doctor’s wrist in a desperate, bruising grip.

"Doctor. Save me."

And that doctor had not let him down.

……

……

The memories unfolded further—glimpses of the Prophet, of Shen Qingyang, of 01.

One by one, the ice coffins in the deep sea shattered. Lu Yan pushed through the layered currents, descending to the very bottom of this frigid ocean.

Here, the water was still, no longer turbulent, but cold enough to sear the soul.

Amidst a pale coral graveyard, a small red bird lay curled, feathers dull.

Back in the cafeteria, joking with Gu Zheng, Zong Yan had said if his index ever broke 100, he’d jump into the sea.

So here he was. Having thrown himself into the depths, unwilling to wake.

[This is 07’s core consciousness. You can wake him now.]

Lu Yan frowned. "But I haven’t really done anything…"

[You didn’t need to. These were things Zong Yan made himself forget. You walked the path with him again, unsealing the memories. There’s a saying, isn’t there? ‘If you knew me then, you’d understand me now.’]

Lu Yan moved forward. The deep-sea pressure was a visceral, crushing weight. His hand reached out, touching the ice-cold little bird.

A spark.

Then a conflagration.

The flames erupted, weaving and coalescing into a human form. Zong Yan lay on his side on the seabed, dark hair fanning out in the water, his red eyes fixed unblinkingly on Lu Yan.

"You saw everything."

"Yes."

"Will you forgive me, Doctor Lu?"

Lu Yan considered it. Then, just as he had in the Center’s quiet rooms, he reached out and gently smoothed the hair from Zong Yan’s forehead. "You’ve done more than enough. No one but you has the right to grant forgiveness."

Zong Yan closed his eyes. A faint, weary smile touched his lips.

"Okay."