Chapter 75: "Another Boundary City"

Not long after, two more people entered Bai Liqing’s office.

One was the burly Song Cheng, while the other had graying hair and looked to be in his fifties.

The latter wore a pair of narrow-rimmed glasses, was not very tall, and had a slightly stocky build, giving him the appearance of an ordinary mid-level office manager who was already coasting toward retirement.

Bai Liqing glanced at the two who had entered her office and gave a slight nod. “You came quickly.”

“You went to see that person called ‘Yu Sheng’?” Song Cheng spoke first. “From the look of it… did you find something?”

“I talked with him at length, and the process was far from what I expected. ‘Yu Sheng’ might be the most unusual ‘unnatural’ individual I’ve ever encountered. But before we go into detail, I want you to see something first.”

As she spoke, Bai Liqing turned her gaze to the graying man—the head of the Confidential Management Office: “Luo Zheng, close the door.”

Luo Zheng immediately nodded and turned to shut the office door.

The moment he closed it, an invisible pressure spread throughout the room, like a gentle breeze brushing past, and wherever it passed, even the floating dust in the air seemed to freeze.

Seeing this setup, Song Cheng’s heart tightened. He muttered “here we go” and mentally canceled any hope of leaving work on time this afternoon.

Meanwhile, Bai Liqing silently rose after the office was “sealed” and walked over to the floor-to-ceiling window.

The window was large, and outside it was always shrouded in a thin haze. Within that haze, the scenery constantly shifted—but it was clearly not scenery that belonged in the Boundary City. Sometimes it was rolling mountain ranges, sometimes an endless forest, but most of the time it was a calm lake surface with barely a ripple, and in the distance of the lake stood a small house, wrapped in mist, hazy like a dream.

As Bai Liqing approached the window, the flowing mist outside quickly stilled, and the ever-changing scenery slowly faded.

Song Cheng and Luo Zheng watched the mist with grave expressions. After a few seconds of stillness, something new began to appear in the mist.

Buildings, scattered rooftops, an unfamiliar city—and gradually spreading crimson glow.

“What is this?” Song Cheng asked instinctively.

“This is what ‘Yu Sheng’ showed me. He said it’s another ‘Boundary City’,” Bai Liqing said softly, her colorless eyes calmly fixed on the mist outside while the scenes stored in her memory manifested and recreated themselves in the haze. “He’s fixated on this place, and he’s seen it before.”

A flicker of shock crossed Luo Zheng’s eyes. He took off his narrow glasses, wiped them on his shirt, and stared at the shifting lights outside the window. “Another ‘Boundary City’?!”

“Yes, another one. And I vaguely sensed his emotions—he seems to think that this is what a Boundary City should look like. The ‘normal’ way.”

Both Song Cheng and Luo Zheng fell silent in astonishment. They looked at the so-called “normal” scenery outside the window with a hint of unease.

Pitch-black buildings, only their silhouettes visible, stood arrayed over the land. In the distance rose tall, strange spires, tracing a magnificent outline. Mist filled the air, and those rooftops and towers looked like rows of tombstones arranged in the haze. A crimson glow pierced through the mist, giving the entire sky a bizarre, dim texture. And the sunlight…

Blood-red “sunlight” flowed like water through the city, swirling between the buildings, mixing with the glow as it poured down from the rooftops, dripping and trickling along the eaves—drip, drip, pattering…

Bai Liqing’s voice reached Song Cheng and Luo Zheng, sounding somewhat ethereal: “He said it’s a peaceful seaside town, with a beautiful sunset, where red light spills like water across the sky and flows along the rooftops…”

“…That sounds like a poetic description,” Song Cheng said quietly.

“Yes, that’s what I thought when I first heard it,” Bai Liqing said, gently shaking her head. “Until I realized—it’s literal.”

“There’s no way this is an actual ‘location’ that exists in reality,” Luo Zheng said seriously. He had already shaken off the unease and tension caused by witnessing the anomaly and quickly regained his composure. “There might be many planets with strange landscapes in the universe, but this scene doesn’t look like a natural landscape no matter how you look at it. The light and shadows around those buildings, and the ‘sunlight’—their forms violate the laws of physics. They… look like they’re melting.”

“If I had to describe it, it’s like when a graphics driver crashes while playing a game, and the rendering goes haywire,” Song Cheng added, stroking his chin in thought. He then added, “I’ve seen that kind of thing when my daughter plays games.”

“This should be some kind of Otherworld,” Luo Zheng said cautiously. “By the look of it, it’s large-scale, but without more data or reference points, it’s hard to determine the classification—‘Wilderness’ or ‘Realm’? It’s definitely not a ‘Fortress’.”

“It could also be an ‘Anomaly’,” Bai Liqing said flatly.

“An ‘Anomaly’-type Otherworld?” Luo Zheng was surprised, frowning. “Like ‘Fairy Tale’ or ‘Heroic Epic’? But it looks like an actual, existing space…”

“Anomaly-type Otherworlds also form their own ‘actual existence’ in perception. I only saw the scene sketched out in Yu Sheng’s mind, so we can’t rule out that the essence of this scene is just a ‘memory’ or ‘story’,” Bai Liqing shook her head. “The key point now is that no matter what this ‘Otherworld’ is, Yu Sheng considers it another ‘Boundary City’.”

Both Song Cheng and Luo Zheng fell silent, and the atmosphere in the office grew exceptionally heavy.

There were countless Otherworlds in the world, and the ones that had established connections with the Borderlands—or even overlapped with them—were as numerous as stars. But no matter what, Otherworlds were just Otherworlds. Their overlap with the real world was extremely limited in scale. Since records began, no Otherworld had ever been able to point to—

Another Borderland.

Song Cheng stood in front of the floor-to-ceiling window, staring intently at the city outside being washed and soaked by the red flowing light.

To be fair, those pitch-black city silhouettes didn’t share many similarities with the “Boundary City” beneath his feet—at least, he couldn’t see any. He didn’t understand why that person called “Yu Sheng” would think this was another Boundary City, but there was one thing he did understand:

Different perspectives lead to different worlds.

To the Algredians, the starry sky was filled with magnificent, orderly lines and patterns. To the Bamosa, the world was simultaneously illuminated by “light” and “magnetic fields.” The Gipro could perceive the contours of electric fields. And the ancient Senjin people would embrace time in meditation, even briefly foretelling the future.

Humans were one of the most “narrow-sighted” races in this world. In the eyes of gifted species, humans were both deaf and blind. So vast was the world that less than one percent of all the information was “effective” to humans. Yet, at the same time, with the right equipment or methods, the human mind could process almost all “knowledge,” and their capacity to withstand and adapt to dangerous information beyond perception was astonishingly high.

That was why humans were universally recognized by all races as the “born investigator constitution.”

“The world in ‘his’ eyes is different from ours,” Song Cheng suddenly said.

“Yes,” Bai Liqing did not deny it, but added, “But ‘he’ can also survive in our world. Aside from feeling a little awkward, he adapts quite well.”

“Possessing both the human and… ‘non-human’ perspectives? Or rather, two ‘cognitive systems’?” Luo Zheng frowned, pondering. “You’ve met him. Do you think he is an ‘entity’ or a ‘human’?”

“More like human—at least that’s what he thinks for now,” Bai Liqing turned and lightly tapped the glass of the floor-to-ceiling window. As she spoke, the “scenery” outside abruptly collapsed and contracted, returning to its previous calm state of mist, mountains, and water alternating. “I think it’s best not to disrupt this ‘status quo’—until we can determine exactly what No. 66 Wutong Road and ‘Yu Sheng’ are.”

“I understand,” Song Cheng took a light breath and nodded very solemnly. “So next…”

“Next, the Second Brigade should allocate some manpower and focus specifically to matters related to No. 66 Wutong Road and ‘Yu Sheng’. The first thing is to help him with some registrations.”

“Registrations?”

“The two ‘people’ beside him need legal identities,” Bai Liqing said unhurriedly. “Secondly, he himself seems to intend to register as a… ‘Spectral Detective’.”

Song Cheng: “…Huh?”

“He said he wants to maintain order in the Borderlands and fight against Otherworlds and entities.”

Song Cheng: “…Huh?”

“I know what you’re ‘huh’ing about,” Bai Liqing raised her eyelids to glance at Song Cheng. “The Special Service Bureau always deals with absurd things. Go arrange it—pick a sharp and reliable person to handle this. I think the two mentioned in the last report are pretty good.”

Song Cheng’s expression turned subtle: “I just gave them three days off…”

Bai Liqing thought for a moment. “True, in this situation, they do need rest. You arrange it as you see fit—just don’t delay too long.”

(End of chapter)