Once an earthquake occurs, every country needs to locate the epicenter and conduct data asurent and collection.
However, unlike other countries, due to the incident during the Level 2 earthquake, Beixing implented deploynt changes within just two short days.
When the earthquake struck, the monitoring bureau received the instrunt signals and, as usual, reported via telephone.
This ti, however, they didn't directly report the latitude and longitude coordinates. Instead, they reported out a string of code.
The Shadow, lurking in the darkness and wiretapping, synchronized the audio to Guan Tong. Upon hearing it, Guan Tong imdiately realized—the authorities were already on guard against him.
After the last incident, on one hand, the authorities wanted to find him. On the other hand, they would certainly also wonder: how did the person who dealt with the Geomantic Pillar know the epicenter location?
Just as Guan Tong could figure out the information source lay with the Earthquake Bureau, there was no reason the authorities' personnel couldn't think of that.
Consequently, if the authorities suspected an internal leak from the Earthquake Bureau, they would naturally strengthen confidentiality. Currently, abandoning "plaintext passwords" and using coded ciphertext to represent latitude and longitude coordinates was one thod of handling it.
It must be said this thod was quite effective. Without the decryption key corresponding to the code, Guan Tong had no idea what that string of code ant, thus he couldn't obtain the earthquake epicenter location.
"This is troubleso now."
Guan Tong had originally wanted to conduct tests during this earthquake. He hadn't expected the authorities to act so swiftly, directly sealing off his channel for obtaining information.
"In that case, I can only wait for the official data," Guan Tong thought. "The authorities have data from the first earthquake. Comparing it with this third earthquake's data should yield a result. If they publicize the result, I should be able to make a corresponding judgnt."
Without the epicenter location information, even if Guan Tong spread his shadow lines across the entire country, he wouldn't know which one to use Body Swap with.
Helplessly, he could only wait.
anwhile, based on the encrypted epicenter coordinates, the authorities had already dispatched a data collection team to the location, arriving within two minutes.
Seeing the Geomantic Pillar, the collection team captain imdiately reported to his superiors: "Geomantic Pillar located. No suspicious personnel in the vicinity. We will proceed with contact data collection imdiately."
The superiors also relayed the ssage to the Counterasures Research Office. Everyone here, upon hearing it, unanimously felt they had found the reason.
"It seems the information did indeed leak from the monitoring bureau."
"But we already questioned all the staff on duty last ti. They even passed inspections by professionals with 'lie detection' abilities, confirming no breach of secrecy occurred. How is this possible?"
"Possibly, personnel had miniature listening devices planted on them. Possibly, there's so item capable of remote eavesdropping... The abilities and items of Ascendants are bizarre and varied. Nothing is impossible."
"Correct. The important thing is that after encrypting the coordinate location this ti, the mysterious individual hasn't reappeared. Otherwise, if the authorities failed to collect data yet again, it would undoubtedly affect the model's precision."
The people in the conference room spoke while watching the real-ti footage transmitted from the scene on screens.
The data collection team mbers quickly approached the Geomantic Pillar, placing their palms against it. Vast amounts of Mind Power Upper Limit were absorbed. In return, the shell cracking could only be described with the word "slow." It took over ten seconds for a palm-sized piece to shatter.
The more everyone watched, the uglier their expressions beca.
"The efficiency is far worse than the first ti."
"This many collectors' Mind Power can only cause this level of damage to the shell?"
"Truly don't understand how the Geomantic Pillar from the Level 2 earthquake completely disintegrated..."
"It seems this data will be very pessimistic."
The absorption lasting over two minutes soon ended. The Mind Power Upper Limits of more than forty data collectors were drained dry, and the terminal panel closed.
Yet, all it bought was minor damage to the Geomantic Pillar's shell. Roughly, this implied that completely disintegrating it would likely require thousands of ordinary Ascendants. It was truly an exaggerated figure.
That sa morning, countries of the Human Consortium uniformly uploaded the collected data to the large model for intelligent analysis and prediction by AI.
During this period, another incident sparked discussion within the Human Consortium.
That was the "Great Chaos at Liloan Central Plaza" that occurred in the Republic of Fahe in the early morning hours.
This great chaos resulted in thousands of casualties. The trigger was official ard soldiers opening fire on a civilian crowd.
Since Fahe, like the Suroma Empire, is a country that doesn't ban guns, civilians can own guns as long as they obtain a gun license. Therefore, when the official forces opened fire, civilians within the protesting crowd drew their guns and returned fire.
This caused the situation to instantly descend into chaos. Those with guns all opened fire. Those without also used Mind Power abilities and items to attack. The entire large central plaza instantly transford into a massive brawl arena.
Such a situation would absolutely not have occurred before the Doomsday Rules. But after over a year under the rules, everyone's psychology was too suppressed. Many people harbored an impulse to "destroy everything" in their hearts.
Stimulated by gunpowder and the scent of blood, this impulse turned into reality, leading to massive casualties not caused by the rules. That night, casualties in the entire district exceeded three thousand. In the end, the Fahe authorities had to deploy a large number of armored vehicles to finally complete the suppression.
The Human Consortium paid close attention to this matter because thousands of non-rule casualties were no small issue. Since they joined the consortium, representative committee mbers from other countries had the right to inquire.
The Suroma female committee mber, Mary, opened with an accusatory tone: "The authorities ordered soldiers to fire on civilians. Does Fahe think it has too many people?"
Since almost all countries stopped reproduction after the Doomsday Rules descended, expecting no population replenishnt for the years the rules exist, population resources have beco the most precious asset now. It's truly a case of one less with each death, no joking matter.
The Fahe committee mber wore a pained expression: "We certainly didn't want this, it's because... sigh!"
Seeing the Fahe committee mber's distressed look, Gao Liangwei spoke up: "Whatever difficulties you have, please speak plainly. Don't forget, the Human Consortium was established precisely for unity and mutual assistance."
The Fahe committee mber gave Gao Liangwei a grateful glance: "Thank you, Chairman Gao. Based on our overnight investigation, preliminary judgnt indicates a very cunning, despicable, and heinously evil Ascendant is lurking within our country. This individual most likely possesses so kind of 'mind control' type ability, capable of controlling others' actions."
"This person used their ability, through 'mind control,' to turn a large number of originally ordinary civilians into cultists, obstructing official data collection of the Geomantic Pillar. They themselves hid in the shadows, far from official sight... Although reluctant to admit, it's possible so within our official ranks were also subjected to this 'mind control,' leading to the leak of the epicenter location intelligence."
Upon hearing this, the expressions of all committee mbers present turned extrely grave.
A mind control ability capable of controlling multiple people?
Undoubtedly, this was a very terrifying ability. If it fell into the hands of soone with an evil nature, it would cause horrific consequences like those seen now.
Imagine soone hiding in the shadows, manipulating others to do things they themselves dare not or find inconvenient. If this person has a negative character, what imnse harm could they inflict on the collective?
Furthermore, what's even more frightening is that even so within the Fahe official ranks fell victim. This was sowhat horrifying to hear.
One committee mber asked, puzzled: "How could high-level officials be mind-controlled? Weren't they equipped with defensive items against Mind Power intrusion?"
It's an unspoken understanding among nations that key national figures are equipped with Mind Power defense items. Because the bizarre and varied abilities are too nurous to guard against completely, but the source of these abilities or items is Mind Power. So, as long as one can defend against Mind Power, they can defend against these things.
"They were equipped, but it still failed," the Fahe committee mber said. "Possibly, the other party's Mind Power Upper Limit is very high, breaking through the protection of ordinary items."
"..."
"However, everyone need not worry. Currently, we have already isolated and reviewed all personnel suspected of being mind-controlled. But the troubleso part is that mind-controlled individuals lose mory of the period when they were controlled. This makes it very difficult to root out that evil Ascendant."
"This matter cannot be taken lightly. I think all our countries must remain vigilant," a committee mber from a small nation said anxiously. "If this person infiltrates and controls high-level decision-makers, wouldn't the entire country face major problems?"
"Indeed. You must handle this carefully. If you need assistance, we can send people to help investigate."
"That won't be necessary," the Fahe committee mber shook his head. "We in Fahe still have our own pride. We can handle this problem independently."
The committee mbers exchanged glances. The Republic of Fahe was indeed very powerful in the past, with comprehensive national strength ranking in the world's top five. But now was not the past.
"Let's look at the earthquake data instead," Gao Liangwei said, having just received the analysis results from the AI model analysis departnt. He displayed them on the large screen.
The results were poor.
"Based on calculations from data provided by various countries, the weakening requirent for the Geomantic Pillar is positively correlated with the increase in earthquake magnitude, and the increase is massive."
"During the Level 1 earthquake, the ratio of Mind Power Upper Limit to earthquake destructive power reduction was 1000:1%. But now, for the Level 3 earthquake, the ratio has expanded to 4000:1%, a fourfold increase. This ans, even if we gather a group of elites averaging 200 points of Mind Power Upper Limit, we would need a thousand people to reduce the destructive power below 50%."
"But Level 3 earthquake is only considered minor, right?! What about Level 8 or 9? How many people would that require!"
"This is currently very difficult to estimate," Gao Liangwei's expression was also very grim. Judging from this data, by the ti the greatest catastrophe, the Level 10 earthquake, occurs at the end of the month, even gathering tens of thousands of Ascendants might only slightly weaken a small portion of the destructive power.
"Could it be that the path of weakening destructiveness is impassable?" the committee mber from Sakura Prayer Country said sowhat despairingly. "Can humanity only endure head-on, seeing how many ultimately survive?"
"Could there be other hidden information not disclosed! Can't we find out who that mysterious Administrator is!"
"... Currently, it seems that Administrator has no reason to conceal crucial information. If most of humanity perishes, it wouldn't benefit that Administrator either, right?"
Soone said with a bitter laugh: "Should we start preparing for destruction now?"
"No," Gao Liangwei firmly denied with a resolute attitude. "Humanity still has ti. We will definitely find a way. I deeply believe this."
"Chairman Gao's reasoning? Is it rely optimism, believing humanity will surely triumph?"
"Yes," Gao Liangwei did not deny it at all. "I believe humanity will triumph. Moreover, I also believe the Fire Thief is absolutely not so 'intelligent robot' that only periodically announces rules. It must be an existence with emotions and thoughts. I firmly believe this set of rules is its deliberate strike against us humans for establishing the Human Consortium. As long as we endure, humanity's future will definitely be bright!"
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