“This is bad. Jiang Qing must be striking a deal with Lou Ting—most likely asking him to remove the Scales of Judgment so they can reopen the Ice Age Realm!”
“Lou Ting will definitely agree. What do we do? We might not make it in time.”
Inside the main conference room of the Central Government Building, everyone stared intently at the massive display showing Lou Ting. Although they couldn’t hear the organization’s audio feed, lip-readers among them quickly decoded Lou Ting’s words, making the situation painfully clear.
Lou Ting was never someone to set aside personal desires for the greater good. Behind him, his own grandmother had fainted from sheer panic, yet he hadn’t cast a single backward glance.
Mobilizing and deploying the armed forces required precious time, to say nothing of the transit. The moment Lou Ting reached an agreement with Jiang Qing, removing the Scales of Judgment and allowing the organization to escape would take mere seconds. How could the military possibly catch up? A golden opportunity was slipping right through their fingers.
Anxiety began to grip the room.
“Wiping out the organization is important, but Qiu Fa and Long Jin are just as important,” Madam President stated calmly. “Either way, we gain something.”
“That’s true.”
“Notify the Atavist clans to prepare cold-weather gear. The second the portal to the Ice Age Realm opens, launch the rescue operation immediately.”
Orders moved through the state system with quiet efficiency.
“Still, having both would be ideal,” Madam President added, turning her gaze toward the Minister of Weapons Research. “That missile you mentioned last time—what’s its status?”
“It still needs field testing, ma’am,” the minister replied.
“Then the timing is perfect.”
“Understood!” A grin of eager anticipation spread across the minister’s face as he turned to issue the command.
“A missile? What special missile are we developing?” someone asked, confused.
Madam President offered a subtle smile. “Minister Xiao and I share that secret. You’ll see soon enough.”
With that, no one pressed further.
Watching the exchange, the Secretary-General felt a knot of dread tighten in her chest. At a time like this? Physical strikes can’t break a spatial bubble. Why launch a missile? Wait… could it be that one?
“Madam President, if we want to secure both objectives, shouldn’t we request aid from our neighboring country?” another official asked. “The organization is a global threat; countering them is a shared responsibility among all nations. Distant countries can’t arrive in time, but our neighbor is right beside us.”
“No. The Prime Minister of our neighbor suddenly detained Qiu Fa last night, which raises serious suspicions. Have they offered a valid explanation yet?”
“Well…” The sudden appearance of Lou Ting and the organization headquarters had thrown everyone’s schedule into chaos, leaving no time to press the neighboring Prime Minister for answers.
The Secretary-General spoke up without delay. “Madam President, I’ll contact them right away.”
She turned and left the room hastily, her hurried steps resembling an anxious newcomer rushing to fix a mistake.
The entire world kept its eyes glued to Lou Ting, every nation watching Hualan.
In the adjacent country, citizens and officials alike followed the broadcast intently. The cabinet members who had spent the morning demanding explanations for the Prime Minister’s sudden lockdown of land, sea, and air routes fell silent the moment Lou Ting made his dramatic entrance, their focus completely diverted.
This bought precious breathing room for the Prime Minister and his Secretary-General.
Yet before they could catch their breath, a far worse text message arrived on their phones:
Hualan discovered the organization headquarters. Military forces mobilizing for a full assault.
The Prime Minister and his Secretary-General stared at the screen, their faces draining of color. A scenario far worse than their exposure as double agents had come to pass. If their identities were compromised, the organization could cover their tracks or extract them. But if the organization collapsed, they would be dragged down with it.
Scrolling down, they saw the second half of the message contained an order, causing their complexions to turn a sickly pale.
The directive originated from a superior in their intelligence hierarchy. Even among sleeper agents, rank existed, and critical moments empowered high-level operatives to issue binding commands to subordinates.
Yet the contents of this order surpassed anything they had ever conceived.
“How… how are we supposed to pull this off?”
“This is absolute madness!”
Right on cue, a call incoming from Hualan’s central government handed them the exact leverage required to execute the wild scheme.
Moments later, the Prime Minister strode into his cabinet room alongside his Secretary-General, his face set in a grave expression. “Hualan has located the organization’s headquarters and is mobilizing a siege. They’ve requested our military assistance. I will head to the Arga Military Base immediately to rally our troops for deployment.”
Lou Ting had offered no immediate reply. Jiang Qing held his breath, waiting in tense silence as his heart hammered like a drum in his chest.
Government forces were already en route. Which military base was closest? How much time remained before their arrival? Twenty minutes? Ten?
Finally, Lou Ting’s voice cut through the air. “Open the entrance to that realm.”
Jiang Qing responded without hesitation. “Remove the Scales of Judgment first.”
“If you dare trick me, you know what follows,” Lou Ting warned, his voice icy cold. “I will pass judgment on this world city by city until every single one of your people is dead.”
A cold shiver ran down the spines of everyone in the room. Jiang Qing lowered his eyes. “Rest assured. At this stage, we won’t try anything stupid.”
Lifting the receiver, Jiang Qing contacted the Advanced Technology Building. “The moment the Scales of Judgment vanish, inform the operator at the nearest membrane-breaking machine to open the coordinates to the Ice Age Realm. Keep it open until further notice.”
After receiving confirmation, Jiang Qing hung up and looked at Lou Ting through the video feed. “Your turn.”
Lou Ting gave a cold snort, confident they wouldn’t dare play tricks. With a single thought, the massive Scales of Judgment hovering over the sea dissolved into golden light and vanished.
In that exact instant, the mobile spatial bubble shot forward like an arrow released from a bow, breaking free of its containment.
Cheers erupted across the organization facility. Mr. Fei and the senior leadership let out a collective sigh of relief. The government forces hadn’t arrived in time—they were safe!
Yet the second they moved, a specialized missile hit its mark, exploding across the ocean surface.
BOOM—!
The organization facility shuddered as if struck by an earthquake.
“What was that?”
The tremor was faint and stabilized almost immediately, leaving the crew bewildered.
“Did Hualan launch a missile? Are they insane? Do they really think they can destroy a spatial bubble from the outside?”
“Maybe they realized they couldn’t catch up and threw a wild punch in desperation?”
A spatial bubble could never be destroyed from the outside by physical weapons. Even a nuclear detonation on the exterior would leave it unscathed. It was a pocket dimension, guarded by a dimensional wall that no conventional force could breach like an ordinary wall.
Yet Jiang Qing felt another wave of unease wash over him. Unlike those fools, he knew the leadership of a major power wouldn’t waste ammunition on a hopeless gesture.
A phone rang frantically. Jiang Qing snatched up the receiver, hearing an operator’s panicked voice: “S-Sir, this is bad! The explosion near our headquarters was from a specialized tracking signal warhead! Our spatial bubble’s signature has been captured!”
Jiang Qing’s face turned pale.
The spatial bubble was invisible to the naked eye. Anything that passed through its space slipped right past it unless it found the entrance.
A signal tracking warhead, however, was designed specifically to detect dimensional signatures. When detonated within range, its pulse caused subtle ripples across the bubble’s outer boundary—like a gentle breeze disturbing a calm pond. Minute as the disturbance was, it sufficed for detection.
Each spatial bubble existed as a distinct pocket dimension, producing a unique electromagnetic signature that served as its digital identity. Once captured and logged, an unregistered bubble became fully tracked.
Spatial bubbles were usually thought to stay in one place, clinging like tiny drops to a larger sphere. So detection warheads had always been short-range devices. After all, something that couldn’t move didn’t need long-range tracking.
Yet Hualan had secretly engineered a long-range tracking missile capable of locking onto dimensional signatures—and hit their target on the very first try, pinpointing the organization’s mobile headquarters!
Inside the Central Government Building, Madam President received a call from the Minister of Weapons Research. Her expression remained serene. “Our hypothesis was correct. Their headquarters is concealed inside a mobile spatial bubble. My apologies, everyone—with organization sleeper agents embedded everywhere, I had to keep this development strictly confidential.”
The Secretary-General’s fingers twitched slightly.
“Madam President, we’ve locked onto their signature!” the Weapons Minister announced, unable to hide his excitement. “Unless they move at a crawl, any disturbance across their dimensional wall immediately reveals their location. Let them run—the faster they flee, the easier they are to track!”
Because the mobile bubble was traveling at high speed, its dimensional boundaries emitted constant signals, effectively broadcasting its position to Hualan every few seconds.
They were trapped in a dilemma: staying still meant destruction, but fleeing produced a trail directly to them.
The organization had failed to catch wind of this breakthrough, leaving them completely exposed.
“Hualan outmaneuvered us this time,” Jiang Qing muttered, closing his eyes as a wave of dizziness hit him. The crisis hadn’t passed; if anything, it had escalated.
Long Jin… was this your goal all along? To wipe out the entire organization in one stroke?
Meanwhile, inside the Advanced Technology Building, personnel sprang into action following Jiang Qing’s command the moment the Scales of Judgment dissolved.
“Activate the membrane-breaking machine hidden in Xiang Prefecture! Open the portal to the Ice Age Realm and leave it running until further orders!”
Tang Woxue, who had just stepped through the main entrance of the building, paused mid-stride. A subtle twitch touched his lips before he turned and blended smoothly back into the crowd of fleeing technicians.
Following at a distance, the Doctor blinked in confusion, his dark eyes narrowing. Instinct told him he wouldn’t gain anything useful today.
Upon hearing that the portal to the Ice Age Realm might reopen, Feng Yilian and his companions rushed to purchase high-tech thermal gear. They were determined not to stand by helplessly as the fissure sealed again.
“Qiu Fa is inside, and Xiao Jin might still be alive. We have to bring them back!”
“B-but isn’t that too risky? It’s another dimension entirely. If the portal closes after we go in…”
“If you’re afraid, go help the military fight the organization and keep quiet.”
“What is there to worry about? Lou Ting is standing guard outside. The organization won’t dare pull any tricks while he’s watching!”
Word soon spread that the entrance to the Ice Age Realm had reopened in neighboring Xiang Prefecture. Volunteers from various Atavist clans flooded toward the docks, boarding airships bound for Xiang Prefecture, while others joined forces with the Tribunal Division along the southern coast to intercept the cornered organization.
In Nevergone District, Chu Xusheng burned to rush to Xiang Prefecture, but he remained firmly at his post guarding Min Yue. He kept his master’s directive carved into his heart: protect Min Yue from harm until the final moment.
Still, the situation appeared promising. With the portal reopening, rescue teams would soon venture inside. It seemed they wouldn’t need to reach that mysterious “final moment,” though he still had no idea when that moment would actually arrive.
The organization fled at top speed, but its dimensional signature kept pulsing, allowing Hualan’s forces to follow without stopping.
Despair pressed heavy on Jiang Qing, leaving him virtually out of options, to say nothing of Mr. Fei.
Yet right at that breaking point, an extraordinary text message flashed across Jiang Qing’s phone. His eyes widened before he burst into a fit of wild, echoing laughter.
At that exact second, inside Hualan’s Central Government Building, an aide rushed into the room, reporting with a pale face:
“Madam President, we have an emergency! Our neighbor has just launched a nuclear warhead directly toward us!”
