May 21, 6:23 AM.
Jiang He spat out the mouthwash and fixed his hairstyle in front of the mirror.
The sound of a door closing ca from outside. He walked out of the bathroom and saw “Jiang He” entering the living room, placing pan-fried buns and hot pepper soup on the table.
“Co have breakfast.”
Jiang He sat on the sofa, snapped apart a pair of chopsticks, and casually asked, “No one noticed anything unusual, right?”
“Don’t worry, it’s already been dealt with,” White Crane said.
Jiang He’s movent paused as he looked up at White Crane smiling in front of him.
He should be joking… right?
Jiang He stared at White Crane for a few seconds, feeling a bit tired.
Ever since his real identity was revealed, White Crane seed to have taken off a mask, prodding at his nerves at every chance.
And the worst part was—he couldn’t completely ignore him. White Crane truly dared to act.
Therefore, Jiang He could only stay as vigilant as possible, keeping a closer eye on him.
Perhaps that was exactly White Crane’s goal?
After finishing breakfast, Jiang He changed his clothes and picked up his phone from the table.
There was still no news about Teacher Wei’s scholarship, but the greeting he had sent to Chi Zhilei last night had received a reply—a simple “Thank you.”
Jiang He knew her father’s condition was not optimistic. He shook his head slightly and opened another chat window.
He thought for a mont before typing and sending a ssage.
【Jiang He: I’m heading out.】
【Du Lingwei: Received.】
Jiang He put away his phone, left ho, and jogged toward the Fire Departnt.
A little past six in the morning, many breakfast vendors and drowsy office workers were already on the streets, adding so liveliness to the city.
From this scene alone, it was hard to tell that the city had just been attacked yesterday, let alone sothing like the so-called 【City of Sin】.
That was, until he crossed the street and arrived at the central district.
The sight before his eyes made his steps halt—
Jiang He rembered that in the center of Central State City there used to be a small plaza. Inside, there were fountains and other decorations, along with a large sculpture of humanity’s very first S-rank Transcendent, the first Speaker of the Transcendent Council, 【The Prophet】.
Around the plaza stood large shopping malls and a landmark 【Tower】.
But now, the tower, the plaza, the buildings… everything had been erased.
In their place stood clusters of semi-transparent crystal-like material, each towering hundreds of ters high, refracting the morning light and casting reflections.
Clearly, this was the aftermath of a great battle.
Had these things fallen on Central State First High School at the ti, likely not a single soul would have survived.
Beyond these crystal remnants, the surrounding buildings were also heavily damaged.
At the mont, the entire area was cordoned off, with figures moving about inside, working to clear the aftermath.
Jiang He did not go inside. Instead, he circled around the battleground of the central district, ran down a few more streets, and finally reached the Central State City Fire Departnt.
Du Lingwei was already waiting outside ahead of ti. She greeted Jiang He and led him inside the Fire Departnt—
In the Transcendent Era, various unexpected incidents often involved the Transcendent, making firefighting both far more important and far more dangerous.
All firefighters were Transcendents, with many C-ranks among them, and even so B-ranks.
For that reason, the Fire Departnt had been built into a large Transcendent facility, equipped with all kinds of facilities for firefighters to train and use daily.
“Other than lacking rare facilities like the 【ditation Room】, everything else here is complete.”
“Before school starts, we’ll train here.”
As Du Lingwei spoke, she led Jiang He through the corridor and into the building.
Before their eyes was a spacious training field. Across from it stood several buildings, with many people in firefighting uniforms going in and out.
While Jiang He was curiously observing, three n and won in firefighting uniforms walked out of a building. Spotting them, they stepped over.
“Captain Du, you’re here so early?”
“We’re about to head out on a mission, to clear the wreckage downtown. Captain Du, joining us?”
Du Lingwei shook her head. “I’ve got sothing else. You all go ahead.”
“Sothing else?” The three firefighters noticed Jiang He beside her and asked curiously, “And this is…?”
“This is Jiang He, sa as , he transferred into Fire Control. Teacher Zhong has too much on her plate, so she asked him to follow first.” Du Lingwei explained, “Since school’s suspended, I brought him here for training.”
“Fire Controller!”
“A genius!”
Clearly, the three firefighters understood well what that profession ant.
They imdiately beca enthusiastic. The ponytailed female firefighter said, “Hello Jiang He, I’m He Xue. I also went to Central State First High School, so I’m your senior!”
The short-haired male firefighter added, “I’m Chen Zhengyi, also a graduate of Central State First High. Your senior as well.”
“Yeah, yeah, you’re all connected. And , a graduate from Second High, is just lesser, huh?” the bespectacled male firefighter complained. “Jiang He, I’m Long Tao. You can treat as a senior… or even a senior sister if you like.”
Chen Zhengyi gave him a shove. “What nonsense, don’t scare the kid.”
Jiang He nodded sowhat awkwardly.
“Hello, seniors.”
“Hello, junior~” He Xue laughed. “We’ve got a mission, little junior. You just go train with Captain Du. We’ll talk later!”
With that, she dragged the other two away. “Co on, we’re late, Captain Zhang will be mad…”
“See you, junior!” Long Tao turned back to wave before being pulled away by the other two.
Watching their backs vanish into the corridor’s depths, Jiang He let out a breath of relief.
He really wasn’t good at dealing with overly enthusiastic people.
Du Lingwei noticed his unease and said, “Jiang He, you don’t need to be so tense. Although their personalities are a bit odd, they’re actually easy to get along with.”
Jiang He nodded. Thinking of what the three had just called her, he asked curiously, “They just called you Captain Du?”
“I work part-ti here,” Du Lingwei said. “I’m the vice-captain of Squad Seven.”
Already a vice-captain, yet she still called it a part-ti job?
Jiang He grumbled inwardly—when suddenly, he felt sothing rub against his calf.
Instinctively, he stepped back half a step and looked down, only to see a chubby calico cat nudging its head against his leg.
This cat… looked just like the one in Du Lingwei’s profile picture?
As Jiang He stared in surprise, Du Lingwei’s eyes lit up. She quickly squatted down, reaching out to grab the calico cat.
“Xiao Mi! When did you co over here?”
The calico cat was scooped up by Du Lingwei. It struggled a few tis but couldn’t escape her embrace, so it could only extend its pudgy paw toward Jiang He: “ow…”
Jiang He felt like the cat was calling him for help and hesitated.
“This cat is…?”
“This is a little kitten I rescued from a fire last year. Everyone liked it, so we raised it here.” Du Lingwei rubbed her cheek against the calico, her face glowing with happiness.
“I nad it Xiao Mi. It really likes , always clinging to .”
Jiang He: “……”
It didn’t look happy at all.
Jiang He watched the calico’s expressions shift from struggling, to pleading for help, to despair. In the end, it gave up and its eyes turned dull.
Only when Du Lingwei had thoroughly played with it and set it back down did it spring back to life, darting away like an arrow and vanishing into the grass.
Its movent was so fast that even Jiang He barely caught it.
Wasn’t its escape speed… a bit too fast?
With flushed cheeks, Du Lingwei said, “Let’s go train.”
Jiang He glanced at the grass and nodded. “Alright.”
……
In the grass, the calico cat lay on the ground, licking itself vigorously.
Outside its vision, White Crane stood beside it like a ghost, his brows furrowed.
“A beast…”
If he rembered correctly, Xiao Mi had only been an ordinary calico cat.
And yet now, it had suddenly beco a newly born 「Beast」, even possessing an ability similar to a Talent, appearing silently by Jiang He’s leg…
In just two and a half days, how could the tiline have changed so drastically?
This was clearly not sothing the butterfly effect could explain.
“『Possibility』…”
White Crane recalled Jiang He’s Talent, deep in thought.
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