"Found anything?"
"Nothing at all, several types of item-finding items were all ineffective."
"Not even a trace of a body was found? This is troublesome now."
Within a thousand-mile radius of Xun'an Town, after a large-scale carpet search by many people, it ended with no results.
Even after deploying various advanced equipment and special items, they still couldn't find any trace of Jiang Lanying. It was as if she had completely evaporated from the face of the earth.
After the report was submitted, orders quickly came down to cease the search and withdraw all personnel.
At this moment, in a ward at the Countermeasures Research Office base, Dragon Soul lay on the bed, verbally recounting everything he witnessed at the scene.
"So, you also can't determine whether 'Shadow' intended to carry out vigilante justice on the target or help the target leave the country?" Li Meng, who was sitting by the bed taking notes, inquired.
"That's correct," Dragon Soul said. "I cannot be certain."
At the time, whether it was Jiang Lanying offering promises of payment or Dragon Soul asking Shadow if he intended to carry out vigilante justice, Shadow did not give a definitive answer.
Li Meng adjusted his glasses and speculated, "It seems it's because of the rules. Shadow didn't want you to know his true intentions."
Both Li Meng and Dragon Soul understood that, bound by Rule Thirteen, lying was not very realistic. Especially for an Ascendant of Shadow's level, no amount of benefit could make him pay the price of violating the rules.
Therefore, not directly answering any questions was the best way to prevent others from knowing his true thoughts.
"I understand the situation now," Li Meng patted Dragon Soul's shoulder. "You focus on recovering from your injuries. I'll take my leave first."
"Section Chief Li," Dragon Soul asked, "how will this matter be handled going forward?"
"That... I can't make the call on that either. But by doing this, Shadow is taking a huge risk for himself. You understand what I mean, right?"
Dragon Soul nodded.
"However," Li Meng's tone shifted, "in this era, there are simply too many things that defy common sense. The environment is changing, people are changing, the world is changing... Perhaps soon, what used to be major events will become minor, and minor events will become major."
After Li Meng finished speaking and left the ward, Dragon Soul pondered these words, vaguely sensing some of Li Meng's personal inclinations.
He closed his eyes, no longer dwelling on this matter, and instead began reviewing his battle with Lucifer. He contemplated what he could have done differently to win if given another chance. This was his usual method for self-improvement.
At the same time, inside the shelter at the bottom of the canyon.
Guan Tong stood at the entrance, gazing at the sky, and let out a long sigh.
"Over a year... it's finally over."
Starting from his involvement with the kidnapping case at the beginning of the Doomsday Rules, this old case, which had become deeply entangled with him, had finally concluded with the complete death of the mastermind behind it.
With her, the ringleader, gone, along with those trusted subordinates she had cultivated into something like Death Warriors, the entire evil chain should completely collapse. As for that Qingmei Society, which had long existed in name only, it had now completely become a part of history.
At this moment, Guan Tong felt as if a stone that had been weighing on his heart had finally been lifted and dropped, shattering into dust scattered by the wind.
As for the words Jiang Lanying spoke before her death, he didn't pay them any mind.
In the end, what she said was still that same mindset: "Even though nobles may have internal conflicts, if some lowly commoner dares to challenge them, they immediately abandon their infighting and unite to deal with the commoner first."
Considering her age, it wasn't surprising she believed in such things. Even if everything she said was true, and there really were people of similar status who would despise, hate, or even be unable to tolerate Guan Tong's actions, so what?
During the period of Rule Thirteen, Guan Tong didn't like to make definitive statements, fearing he might accidentally violate the rules. But in the end, he told Jiang Lanying, "I'll bite to death as many as come." That was his most genuine thought. He wasn't worried at all about saying it out loud violating the rules.
If anyone wanted to avenge her, he welcomed them at any time. The more such people exposed themselves, the more he could take them down. He believed doing so would actually increase his own luck—good deeds bring good rewards, after all.
Furthermore, aside from avenging evil people in this operation, he also discovered a major flaw in his Shadow Domain: it couldn't prevent those trapped from using teleportation items to forcibly escape.
"The ability to use teleportation items to leave the Shadow Domain is essentially because the Shadow Domain isn't a truly independent space."
Guan Tong pondered.
When you got down to it, the Shadow Domain was just spreading the Shadow out in layers upon layers. During this process, space wasn't affected, so those trapped wouldn't face any restrictions when using movement or teleportation-type items.
"To correct this flaw, unless... unless the Shadow Domain truly becomes a small space separated from the real world, becomes a genuine domain."
Guan Tong frowned. How could that be achieved?
He raised his palm, and the [Wordless Book] appeared in it.
Opening to the sixth page, the solitary, blood-red character "Domain" written there was quite lonely. He had written it with his own blood back then.
"Should I try by adding characters?"
This had been his usual method: adding characters to increase or even change the strength and nature of the materialized products from the book's pages.
But it had been a long time since he last added characters after the previous time, because the cost of writing on the later pages was greater. This applied not just to the first writing, but to subsequent additions as well.
Might as well try.
Guan Tong planned to add the two characters for "space." After just two strokes, his Mind Power was completely depleted.
He stopped writing then, with no intention of expending his reserve Mind Power to continue.
During this encounter with Lucifer, he quickly expended a large amount of his reserve Mind Power to use the Shadow Domain right after taking action, all for the sake of a quick resolution.
Otherwise, that Birdman Lucifer would have kept flying in the sky, and with his wings having become sharper than before, conventional attack methods wouldn't have been very effective.
Judging from the actual combat results, the effect was excellent. Lucifer's advantages had basically no room to play out in the face of the Shadow Domain and were thoroughly suppressed.
The only regret Guan Tong felt was that he hadn't managed to kill Lucifer this time. Next time they met, that guy might also develop some methods to deal with his Shadow Domain.
But every Ascendant was constantly improving. In this era, if you didn't progress, you'd be eliminated. Guan Tong wouldn't slack off. He also had to ensure that next time he encountered that Birdman, he would have more advantages. So, during this period, he wouldn't stop his steps in developing and growing stronger.
For a period of time after that, things were calm and peaceful.
Apart from teaching his daily classes, Guan Tong hardly spoke or published any text.
After classes ended, he would return to the shelter and continue his character additions.
What became increasingly silent wasn't just reality; online, as time passed, the number of people actively posting also became fewer and fewer.
Earlier, many people had failed their challenges because they accidentally lied online, mostly due to habitual sarcasm and trolling.
For example, phrases like "You're so awesome" or "Grateful [Heart]" might seem harmless, but in reality, the person posting the comment didn't think that way at all. The moment they posted, they failed the challenge for violating the rules.
Some people were even more unlucky. They merely posted some photoshopped pictures online and actually caused themselves to fail the challenge—it turned out that if you knew what you actually looked like, posting edited photos could also be counted as a "lie," something many people hadn't realized at all.
With these precedents, later izens became more cautious. They stopped trolling altogether, either falling silent or speaking with genuine feelings.
However, there were also some people who had already violated the rules and completely threw caution to the wind. They randomly fabricated outrageous rumors and even used the rules to back themselves up, saying things like "The rules are supreme, everything I say is true," and so on.
The consequence of doing this was that after some rumors fermented and spread, the instigators who thought they were fine were quickly found by the authorities. After some loving education, they obediently made public apologies to debunk the rumors.
By late October, near the end of the rules period, the world had almost entered a Great Silence era, where no one spoke anymore.
Because the closer it got to the end of the rules, the more careful people became.
No one wanted this situation: being careful for over twenty days, only to accidentally say the wrong thing in the final few days and have all their previous efforts go to waste.
Even those who had already violated the rules fell into silence. Because they discovered that no matter who they spoke to, the other person responded with silence.
This atmosphere of Great Silence brought an unusual psychological pressure to everyone.
Even Guan Tong, when going to teach his classes, felt extremely stifled seeing all the students coming and going without uttering a single word.
If someone had once imagined: a world where you cannot tell lies would be a beautiful world where everyone could live as their true selves.
Then the current reality told these people what the actual outcome is.
A world where you cannot lie will be a silent world.
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