He wasn’t breathing, and his heart had stopped. 

Hu Bugui heard the rescue workers’ voices, and it was as though he didn’t understand Chinese. Then his gaze slowly moved to Su Qing’s face—when he had been speaking to him, he had only been coughing, he had only been coughing…

“I thought that…” 

Only three words came out of Hu Bugui’s mouth, then he came to a sudden halt. He didn’t know himself what he was going to say. Countless words caught in his chest and tangled together, circling in place. In the end they turned into one thought—Su Qing…was dead. 

He had thought that after breaking through the blue seal base, since Su Qing could be counted as having rendered meritorious service, the government would undertake all his medical and living expenses. It would only need time for his injuries to body and mind to be treated. They had Lu Qingbai, the best doctor, and the most advanced medical technology. And Su Qing was such a tenacious person. 

He had thought that Su Qing would surely be all right. He would take him home, make up for the torment he had suffered because of Hu Bugui’s own negligence… Perhaps he had also had some enchanting notions; after all, the circumstances of their first meeting had been both particular and awkward. Hu Bugui couldn’t resist remembering Su Qing’s disdainful expression and thinking that he was a bit like his little cat, who clearly liked being near people but had to put on a pretense of unwillingness. 

He had thought…

If his attention hadn’t been distracted midway by another person’s cries for help. If his views about Su Qing hadn’t been so optimistic. 

“Captain Hu! Captain Hu!” 

Hu Bugui woodenly pressed down on his earpiece. His vision was blurred. He reached up and felt that there were tears in his eyes. He didn’t dare to close his eyes, afraid that the tears would fall. He only opened his eyes wide and tilted his head back, making the tears recede. 

“What is it?” 

“Captain Hu, we suddenly lost contact with Chen Lin, and the blue seals have disappeared. And then there are the armed personnel in ‘Utopia’ uniforms that we captured. There are microchips of unknown origin in them. Just now, all the prisoners simultaneously fell, twitching all over, like an epileptic fit…” 

“Assemble the technical and medical personnel to inspect the prisoners’ conditions, and take people to search the whole base.” Hu Bugui gave orders relying on instinct. “Seal the perimeter, intercept anyone escaping. Turn on the energy detector and keep watch for any unusual circumstances.” 

“Yes, sir!” Qin Luo responded. She paused, then couldn’t resist asking, “Captain Hu, how…how is he?” 

Hu Bugui’s throat bobbed. The flesh of his cheeks tensed, but he didn’t say a word. Then he silently turned off the communicator and went over a step at a time. Next to Su Qing, a rescue worker was shaking his head. 

Hu Bugui silently squatted down and put his rough hand to Su Qing’s face, almost tenderly wiping the blood from it. He seemed to be able to feel his body temperature cooling. 

Just then, a person threw himself over in a scramble and pushed Hu Bugui aside. 

Cheng Weizhi was the most fortunate of them. He practically hadn’t been injured at all. He had only received a slight concussion. He had passed out at the start. When he had been saved by the rescue workers just now, on first waking up, he had seen Su Qing. 

He wanted to pick Su Qing up, but his extended hand paused in midair and didn’t fall. Su Qing had so many broken bones. Cheng Weizhi had lived to his present great age without ever having seen someone this badly injured. He carefully checked under Su Qing’s nose for breath, and his heart went cold—he couldn’t feel a trace of movement there. 

A rescue worker attempted to pull him away. “Sir, please lie back down. We need to thoroughly inspect your condition.” 

Cheng Weizhi didn’t move. He stared blankly at Su Qing along with Hu Bugui. 

The rescue worker sighed. “Sir, I’m very sorry that there was nothing we could do for your friend…” 

Cheng Weizhi seemed not to have heard. He stared blankly for a moment. Suddenly, he gave a fierce start and at last came around. He pulled Su Qing’s shirt away from his shoulder. 

The color of the flowing grey seal on Su Qing’s half-exposed shoulder was very dim. Everyone present knew that this was because the energy crystal was also slowly dying. 

Cheng Weizhi gazed at his grey seal with rapt attention. After a while, he suddenly shouted, “His…his grey seal is still flowing, really, look, there’s still a bit of movement!” 

The rescue worker sighed. “But he doesn’t show any signs of life. The grey seal is likely moving because his body temperature hasn’t dropped yet, he…” 

Cheng Weizhi cut him off. “No! It’s not like that, you don’t understand. The grey seal is projected on the skin by the energy crystal. If it’s still flowing, it shows that the energy crystal is still active. Even a grey seal isn’t entirely like an ordinary person. I have a way… I’ve thought of a way!” 

The old professor found the strength somewhere to grab Hu Bugui by the collar. “Make them take him to the blue seal activator, hurry!” 

Hu Bugui stood in the direction of Cheng Weizhi’s tug. “The blue seal activator? We couldn’t have the blue seal activator. It’s one of Utopia’s core research products, they would have…” 

“If you don’t have it, then we can try the auxiliary blue seal activator…the grey seal activator, that is. Don’t tell me it’s also been blown up!” 

Hu Bugui’s throat bobbed with difficulty. Cheng Weizhi seemed to have been stricken by frost. He took two steps back in disappointment. 

But after a moment, he raised his head once again. “I remember, there’s a discarded one in the basement. Everything in the grey house is worthless scrap. Lift him, come with me!” 

The rescue workers looked at each other, thinking that the old man had gone mad. 

But unexpectedly, their Captain Hu had gone mad along with the old man. He ordered: “Lift him. Listen to the man.” 

The advance personnel efficiently cleared the way for them. Cheng Weizhi’s grey hair was covered in earth and dust. He could have gone right into a beggars’ union. His cheeks were ashen, and he was panting from running. In a moment of inattention, he even nearly went sprawling. Without another word, Hu Bugui simply put the old man on his back and dashed to the basement. 

Machines always have a limited period of usefulness, but a machine tossed into the grey house wouldn’t be discarded because it had passed its normal use-by date. It would be completely irreparable and unusable. 

When Hu Bugui saw the grey house’s so-called basement, the light in his eyes immediately faded. 

Total squalor—rats had even taken up residence here. They weren’t afraid of people. Squeaking, they lined up to run past the rescue workers. The so-called “machine” was an antique that had stood there for an unknown length of time, mottled with rust and covered in spiderwebs. 

Cheng Weizhi took a deep breath. “It’s worse than I imagined.” 

Hu Bugui followed him in silence. Cheng Weizhi turned back to look at him, then went around the RZ Unit’s captain to look at Su Qing lying lifelessly on the stretcher. He took a deep breath. “I’ll fix it—don’t worry, I’m sure to be able to fix it. You, sir… I know you must have something like an energy detector on you with an energy core in it. If you don’t object, give me one.” 

Hu Bugui looked at him, not quite catching up. Just then, headquarters suddenly forced in a communications signal. Xu Ruchong’s voice exploded in Hu Bugui’s ear: “Captain Hu! Give it to him! Give him anything he wants! That person is Professor Cheng! He’s Professor Cheng!” 

Hu Bugui stared. 

Xu Ruchong was about to cry. “Those blue seal sons of bitches! Professor Cheng was my academic advisor in university! “ 

…What a small world it was. 

Before he finished speaking, Hu Bugui immediately took off the RZ Unit’s multipurpose watch and gave it to Cheng Weizhi and looked at him a little eagerly. “Will this do?” 

Cheng Weizhi took it. Pointing to a small box next to the dilapidated activator, he said, “Open that for me. That should be the instrument’s toolkit.” 

Hu Bugui simply took Xu Ruchong’s place as Cheng Weizhi’s student. He stepped up without another word, lifted his machine gun, and brought it crashing down with a bang. The lid of the box broke at once. Cheng Weizhi surged up and began to rummage through the toolkit. 

Hu Bugui couldn’t understand what he was doing at all, and there was nothing he could do to help. He could only stand there nervously, wringing his hands, from time to time checking the grey seal on Su Qing’s shoulder, afraid that the grey seal would stop flowing in the blink of an eye. 

Cheng Weizhi opened up Hu Bugui’s watch and produced a dazzling thread from somewhere in the scrapped instrument. 

Xu Ruchong watched Cheng Weizhi work without blinking. He quietly said, “The activator’s energy core is broken. He’s using the energy core from the multipurpose watch to set up a one-time link. Only he could do this in such an urgent situation…” 

Though Lu Qingbai didn’t especially understand, he still couldn’t resist butting in: “Do the watch and the activator have the same energy core? That can’t be right.” 

“No…look, he’s shorted out thread number four and turned it into something like a capacitor…” Xu Ruchong provided commentary as though no one was around. Sadly, no one was in the mood to listen, and they didn’t understand, either. 

Three minutes later, Cheng Weizhi raised his head and said to Hu Bugui, “He only has one chance, and this is only a conception of mine, I can’t guarantee…” 

The old professor’s words paused. Then he clenched his teeth. “There’s no other way now. Put him on it.” 

Su Qing was placed on the rusted platform. Cheng Weizhi looked down at him, took a deep breath, and picked up two electrical leads. Now he at last became nervous, shaking so hard he couldn’t aim. Hu Bugui silently extended his hand and took the electrical leads from him. “Tell me what to do.” 

“Connect…connect the two leads. Your hands can’t shake. Look at the five indicators on his head. When the last indicator lights up, break the connection at once. Can…can you do it?” 

“And then what?” Hu Bugui asked. 

“Then…either he’ll live, or…” 

Hu Bugui nodded and closed his eyes. Extremely steady, his hands connected the two electrical leads. The activator began to buzz. Sparks flew from the place where it was connected to Hu Bugui’s watch. Hu Bugui kept his eyes tightly fixed on the five lights lighting up in succession. The moment the last one lit up, he pulled the two electrical leads apart once more. The activator made an enormous sound, and the place where the watch was connected burst into flame. 

Cheng Weizhi and Hu Bugui simultaneously dashed to Su Qing’s side. Just then, Hu Bugui saw the seal on his shoulder change. 

His seal was still grey, though the color was a little lighter—then it turned from a half-moon into a full circle. The stagnating flow sped up—