Chapter 421: Xu Jiali and His 'Psi-Energy Attendant'
Xuan Che controlled his expression, not letting any anomaly show.
He quickly condensed his divine sense, carefully sweeping through the entire city lord's manor once more, and "looked around" the entire room.
There really were only the two of them, him and Mo Ran, and there was no third-party mind lurking here—nor any external technique creating an illusion.
Mo Ran's expression was also completely normal, her breath steady, and her mental state showed no abnormalities.
But she clearly believed she had brought that "Elder Daoheng" here, and that Elder Daoheng was now standing beside her.
Xuan Che nodded lightly with an unchanged expression, not stopping Mo Ran from leaving. She, without any suspicion, simply bowed and withdrew from the room.
The room fell silent.
Xuan Che stood quietly by the window, maintaining his outward divine sense, confronting the silence, but his mind was not as calm as his face appeared.
He thought rapidly. For a moment, he even felt a ridiculous self-doubt—doubting that Elder Daoheng really was standing in the room, but that there was something wrong with his own perception, making him unable to see the other.
But he immediately shook his head, shaking off this thread of inexplicable self-doubt, and inwardly heightened his vigilance against heart demons. He then unobtrusively took out the Lingxi Mirror and began contacting various parties...
***
On the surface of Garrison-3, Engineer Sun's construction team was digging through thick layers of soil under Yu Sheng's guidance. The large equipment temporarily transferred from the Black Forest was highly efficient, quickly doubling the size of the hole Hu Li had made when she fell, and then they began digging downward.
And near this "main excavation pit," there were several smaller "collection points."
These were a few crystal cluster eruption points that Engineer Sun's team had found more suitable for sampling—branches that had lost their vitality now sat lifelessly wedged in the crevices of soil and rock, fortunate to have escaped being completely crushed into powder by the impact of Hu Li's fall. The shallow crystal material beneath the fissures was intact and uncontaminated.
The civil engineering veterans in heavy yellow engineering power armor carefully used small excavation arms to enlarge the fissures around the crystal branches, then peeled off the underlying crystals as intact as possible, sending them to a temporary stacking platform at the edge of the excavation area. Around the stacking platform were recovery teams just summoned from the Special Operations Bureau.
These "hazardous materials experts" specializing in handling anomalous substances wore white protective armor marked with the prominent insignia of the Special Operations Bureau. They worked in groups of three: two handling the samples while the third observed the mental state of the operators. A "team leader" with red markings on their armor stood by to command and simultaneously monitored the behavior of all three-person teams for any abnormalities.
And near these recovery teams stood several "Deep Divers" in heavy combat armor—each fully armed, with their walking tactical robots behind them, all tense as if facing a great enemy.
Among the Deep Divers was a familiar face.
Xu Jiali opened the outer metal armor of his helmet, revealing his large, stubbly face under the transparent visor. Among all the Deep Divers, he seemed the most relaxed—he even ran out of formation to chat with Yu Sheng, without any sense of urgency from leading a team to deal with "suspected Angel matter."
"They're all rookies. The moment they heard that the samples to be recovered might be related to the Dim Angels, they got nervous as hell," Xu Jiali said, glancing back at the Deep Divers he had brought, then turned to Yu Sheng. "But you... haven't seen you for a while, and the moment we meet, you're stirring up something big?"
"It's not like I did it on purpose," Yu Sheng spread his hands. "How was I supposed to know something like that would suddenly pop out of the ground..."
Xu Jiali twitched his mouth, turned to look at the devastated "battlefield," and couldn't help sighing. "If you hadn't told me, I wouldn't have believed it—that this was caused by that Miss Fox. It looks like it got hit by an 'Atlas' Nova Cannon... Good thing she's on our side."
"She told me she had a big move, but I didn't expect it to be this big," Yu Sheng said with a wry smile. Then his gaze involuntarily fell behind Xu Jiali. "...What's that girl who's been following you doing?"
He was pointing to an inconspicuous figure behind Xu Jiali—a petite girl, barely over one meter fifty, who looked like a child compared to the two-meter-tall Xu Jiali. Although she wore a protective suit similar to power armor, it was noticeably thinner than the Deep Divers' gear by several times. She carried no weapons, only holding a strange sphere in her hands with mechanical patterns and blue crystal lattices on its surface, its purpose unknown.
Wherever Xu Jiali went, this unfamiliar petite girl followed.
And Yu Sheng also noticed that every Deep Diver on the scene had such a figure following them—some male, some female, some tall, some short. Their commonality was that light armor that looked very thin, not even like combat equipment, and the "mechanical spheres" they held in their hands.
Wherever the Deep Divers went, these figures carrying mechanical spheres followed.
"Oh, this is my Psi-Energy Attendant. I forgot to introduce her," Xu Jiali slapped his helmet, then pointed at the petite figure behind him and introduced her to Yu Sheng. "Her name is Lingdang."
He paused there, then added, "Remember I told you before? Every Deep Diver's 'full complement' during field operations includes a fire support shuttle, two walking tactical robots, several light drones, and a Psi-Energy Attendant. So strictly speaking, every Deep Diver out in the field is a fully equipped tactical squad. What you're seeing now is our 'expeditionary mode'... Of course, because the situation was sudden, we didn't bring the shuttle this time..."
Yu Sheng listened to Xu Jiali's explanation, stunned, and took a few seconds to recall that there was indeed such a thing. Then his gaze fell on the girl named Lingdang, who looked up at him and suddenly spoke: "You're friends with the boss?"
"We're friends," Xu Jiali said cheerfully beside them. "His name is Yu Sheng. He's an 'Angel Counter-Expert' from the Borderlands. He's a big shot."
"Oh, hello." Lingdang nodded, still holding the mechanical sphere with one hand, and extended the other hand to Yu Sheng.
Yu Sheng reached out and shook hands with this "Psi-Energy Attendant," then suddenly noticed something odd about her eyes—her pupils were vertical, like... a cat's.
Probably noticing the curiosity on Yu Sheng's face, Xu Jiali took the initiative to explain before he could ask: "Lingdang is a Jipulo—most Psi-Energy Attendants are Jipulo. The Special Operations Bureau has a long-term cooperation agreement with this alien race. They provide us with their most gifted psychics, and we supply them with the strongest catnip in the universe."
Yu Sheng's expression suddenly became bewildered: "...Ah?"
Then he noticed that the two pointed structures standing upright on Lingdang's helmet didn't seem to be decorations...
"The Jipulo are a Terra race. You've heard of Terra, right? The 'Academy' is there, and it's also the homeworld of the Senjin," Xu Jiali continued cheerfully. "The Jipulo have some feline characteristics. They're very sharp—especially in terms of psychic ability.
"We Deep Divers are good at combat, but not at magical stuff. Psi-Energy Attendants can make up for our shortcomings in that area. And if we encounter attacks specifically targeting the mind, Psi-Energy Attendants are our first mental barrier. Of course, that's for 'expeditionary operations' out here. When performing 'diving' missions into alien domains in the Borderlands, it's a different procedure. The 'umbilical cord' can replace the role of Psi-Energy Attendants to some extent..."
Yu Sheng listened to Xu Jiali's explanations with a mix of curiosity and seriousness—these were "pieces of knowledge" he had heard a bit about before but never deeply understood.
During this process, the Psi-Energy Attendant named Lingdang stood quietly behind Xu Jiali, not speaking, only occasionally fiddling with the mechanical sphere in her hands, seeming uninterested in what was happening around her.
Just as Yu Sheng and Xu Jiali were chatting while waiting for Engineer Sun's excavation progress, a phone ring suddenly interrupted their conversation.
Yu Sheng took out his phone and saw on the screen a fox head with squinting eyes and a big smile showing white teeth.
He answered the call, and Hu Li's happy voice came from the other end: "Benefactor! I'm full~ Open the door, I want to go back~~"
***
, Special Operations Bureau Building.
Li Lin, who had just ended his mission leave and returned to the bureau for his first day of work, stood at the entrance of Cafeteria No. 2 holding his meal card, his expression somewhat dazed.
The cafeteria doors were locked, and an electronic screen at the entrance scrolled a line of text:
"Due to special circumstances, Cafeteria No. 2 will not be open today. Employees in need are requested to dine at the main cafeteria on the third floor."
Li Lin blinked. In all his time working at the Special Operations Bureau, this was the first time he had seen such a situation.
He curiously peered through the glass window on the door, but found nothing unusual inside—just clean and empty.
A few Special Operations Bureau agents passed through the corridor behind him, and their voices faintly reached Li Lin's ears:
"What's going on? Why did it suddenly close?"
"I don't know. It was still open when I came in the morning."
"I heard a fox caused trouble..."
"...Ah?"
"They say it's a fox from the 'Inn'—I don't know what that means."
Li Lin listened silently, looked down at his meal card, looked up at the cafeteria, and felt like crying but had no tears.
"...Then who's going to make up for the missing discounted chicken legs?"