Desperate people, accept the seed of my soul!

The Five Sacred Mountains Gathering.

Yan Tingyao sat at his desk, on which were two documents.

One document is a briefing on the operation where all members of Fang Li's extermination team have lost contact.

They set off in the early morning, did not return by noon, and communication was completely cut off; none of the six replied.

The other document was a copy of the on-site investigation report obtained through internal channels of the Chenxi City Public Security Bureau; the ink was still wet.

He first looked at the report from the public security department.

The report was written in a very official style: A fire broke out in a factory building in an abandoned industrial area. Multiple abnormal structural damages were found at the scene. Preliminary investigations have ruled out gas explosions and chemical accidents. The case has been transferred to the National Anomaly Management Bureau's station in the provincial capital for further handling.

The report appendix contained a table full of on-site photos.

The entire corridor floor collapsed into the first floor, the cement was shattered into powder, and there were no explosive residues.

A body was unearthed from the foundation of the factory building, sealed in cement with a density far exceeding that of normal concrete.

There are two spherical hard blocks, each one meter in diameter, in the ruins on the first floor. Their surfaces are smooth like polished granite, and there are traces of high-temperature burning inside.

The report concluded that "it is suspected that abnormal factors have been involved, and the case has been transferred to the superior authority in accordance with procedures."

Yan Tingyao laid the photos out one by one on the table, pointing to the words "abnormal factors": "The people in the Public Security Bureau aren't stupid; they know this isn't an ordinary fire."

He picked up the supplementary materials provided by the insider of the Five Mountains Society.

The insider note was brief: The General Administration has dispatched personnel to the scene. The on-site investigation was led by the General Administration's technical staff, and the preliminary assessment is that it is an "unregistered awakened person incident." A file has been created for tracking.

Yan Tingyao finished reading the two documents side by side and leaned back in his chair.

The assistant stood across from the desk, a thin layer of sweat already beading on his forehead.

He swallowed hard and asked, "Fang Li led six men, a standard mopping-up operation. How could they all be wiped out?"

"Good question." Yan Tingyao stared at the photo, remaining silent for a few seconds. "Six men chased a pharmaceutical company owner into his factory, and they all died. The factory was burned down to its frame, a layer of the ground collapsed, and the bodies were sealed in cement. How did they manage that?"

He raised the first finger.

"He had accomplices. Someone had hidden in the factory beforehand and set an ambush for Fang Li."

He then overturned this judgment himself.

"Our inside sources have confirmed that Shen Hanzhou escaped from Baishi Town alone. The police investigation at the scene also only found traces of a single person's actions—footprints, crawling marks on sewage pipes, and motorcycle tire tracks, all corresponding to one person. It's impossible for a second person not to leave traces. The ambush route is not feasible."

He raised his second finger.

"He has heavy weapons. Shen Hanzhou used to manage chemical warehouses for the Five Mountains Alliance. If he had previously hidden military explosives or incendiary bombs in the factory—"

He zoomed in on the photos of the scene, pointing his finger at the powder on the ground.

"The security department report clearly states that there were no explosive residues. The corridor cement was uniformly crushed, not blown apart. An explosion would leave radial cracks on the wall, but there are none here. Those two stone spheres have surfaces so smooth that even an industrial stamping machine couldn't achieve that. A demolition operation couldn't be this clean."

He raised his voice and pulled his second finger back as well.

The third finger is held upright.

"Other awakened beings were involved. It wasn't Shen Hanzhou who did it; it was someone else."

He flipped through the report on the unusual recent movements of the headquarters provided by his inside contact and glanced at it.

"The three known active Awakened in Lieyang Province—Liu Zhen, Meng Zhaowen, and Xu Suyuan—have formed an alliance. If one of them were to arrive at the abandoned industrial zone—"

Yan Tingyao interrupted himself.

"It's too late. Fang Li's operation was launched in the early morning, chasing them from Baishi Town to the abandoned industrial area, which only took a few hours. Shen Hanzhou doesn't have any means of communication. Even if he could contact the outside world, Liu Zhen and the others are in Guangyang City, which is more than 40 kilometers away. The timing doesn't match up."

He laid out the three photos from the scene side by side and pointed to each one in turn.

"There's something even more direct. Liu Zhen's ability is electricity, but there were no signs of electric arcs at the scene. Xu Suyuan's killing method is to attack at close range through walls without demolishing buildings. Meng Zhaowen manipulates plants, but there was no unusual vegetation around. None of the three people's ability characteristics match up at the scene."

All three fingers were retracted.

"Helpers, heavy weapons, other awakened beings—all ruled out. Only one explanation remains."

Yan Tingyao took out the photo of Fang Li's body separately and placed it face up on top.

"Fang Li and the other six were killed by Shen Hanzhou himself. The cement wasn't blown up; it was broken up by some kind of matter manipulation ability. The stone ball wasn't pressed by a machine; he shaped it by hand. Fang Li wasn't crushed to death by the collapse; he was sealed alive into the foundation."

The assistant's voice tightened: "This is a new ability."

"Yes." Yan Tingyao's tone turned cold, his words laced with suppressed anger. "It can dismantle cement, mold stone balls, and seal people inside foundations before burning them to the ground. I don't know the specific mechanism, but it's related to manipulating solid matter."

He flipped the photos over one by one and placed them face down on the table, his movements heavy.

"Shen Hanzhou spent six years in the Five Mountains Society. His file states that he was a pharmaceutical synthesis technician with above-average performance and a withdrawn personality. After Shen Yanhui's death, he was transferred to manage the warehouse, and nobody took him seriously. In the end, he awakened on the verge of despair."

Yan Tingyao stood up, placed his hands on the table, and leaned forward.

"We hadn't settled the score with Shen Yanhui yet, and then the score from the four-day, four-night chase piled up on top of that. The two scores combined pushed him to the brink. We gave him the final push."

He paused, lowering his voice even further: "It was my misjudgment. I treated him like an ordinary defector technician and sent Fang Li to deal with him. The price was six lives plus an out-of-control Awakened."

Sweat streamed down the assistant's forehead and temples.

Yan Tingyao stared at the photo face down on the table and continued, "But Shen Hanzhou sealing Fang Li in the foundation and burning Zhou Ting and Wang Zhaoping to ashes and molding them into stone balls wasn't about destroying evidence. He was demonstrating. He was saying, 'It's your turn now.'"

"What do we do now?" the assistant asked.

"He just awakened, his abilities are still unstable, and he must have expended a lot of energy. Find him before he recovers."

The assistant hesitated for a moment, then asked, "Should we report this to headquarters?"

Yan Tingyao gave a cold laugh.

"Report what? Report that I misjudged the situation, that Fang Li is dead, that Lieyang Province has gained another Awakened while we got nothing?"

He straightened up, placed his hands on the table, and his knuckles turned white.

"Song Mingzhang died at Yunyin Manor, and Zhong Heng died at Qingyun Horse Ranch. What is headquarters' attitude towards Lieyang Province now? It's one of observation. Whoever can stabilize the situation will be handed over to the Lieyang Province branch."

I traded Wang Hongyuan's assets—Chen Guohua's autopsy report and intelligence network—with Xiong Bei and Chi Ji for cooperation, barely managing to keep things afloat. Now, if I report an out-of-control Awakened, will headquarters praise me for doing a good job?

The assistant fell silent.

Yan Tingyao had another plan in mind that he didn't voice.

The National Bureau of Statistics has intervened, which means that Shen Hanzhou has been placed on a national-level surveillance list.

The Five Mountains Alliance must capture the person before the General Administration can.