Xue Xiaolu suddenly let out a shriek. Qin Luo was all right, but Lu Qingbai wasn’t a field agent to begin with. His psychological quality wasn’t up to the mark. He was so startled by her shriek that he nearly fired accidentally. Then he followed Xue Xiaolu’s gaze, and his face turned white—a body on a dissection table was swayingly standing up. Its skin was dull grey. 

Then Lu Qingbai’s gun really did go off accidentally. A bullet hit the edge of the dissection table with a bang. Sparks flew in all directions. 

Qin Luo’s hand was much steadier than his. She raised her hand, and a bullet entered the center of the standing corpse’s forehead. 

Then this dear friend, with its belly that still hadn’t been sewn up, fell straight down, the back of its head knocking against the dissection table with a loud and clear sound. 

Xue Xiaolu, her eyes open wide, shakily said after a long time, “What…what the hell is that? Dr. Lu, are you sure he’s dead?” 

Lu Qingbai’s hand holding the gun wasn’t calm, but his brain was very calm. He turned and beckoned to the other two. “Headquarters is unsafe. Let’s get out of here.” 

He hesitated, then picked up a box of scalpels. With both hands on his gun, he walked in front, with Xue Xiaolu in the center and Qin Luo with her back to the two of them bringing up the rear. Incomparably nervous, the three of them left the treatment center. The moment they stepped out, Qin Luo thought that she clearly heard a low roar that definitely didn’t belong to a human. She gave a start and glanced at Xue Xiaolu and Lu Qingbai in front of her out of the corner of her eye. She thought that the two of them were already nervous enough and didn’t dare to say anything. 

Their footsteps echoed emptily in the corridor. This passage seemed to be boundless. Each time they passed a fork in the road, the surveillance system camera over their heads would slowly turn as though it were alive, “watching” them walk by. 

Dim cold light flashed over the mechanical screens. 

The three of them were all very familiar with the headquarters. They went right downstairs, cautiously passing the lobby, heading for the main doors. Suddenly, Lu Qingbai stopped. Xue Xiaolu’s attention was concentrated on either side of her. Seeing him suddenly stop, she couldn’t resist turning slightly, too, and looking past Lu Qingbai. With just one look, she felt a chill go up her spine—the place where the main doors should have been had become a blank wall. All the doors and windows were tightly sealed. A clownish face hung where the doors should have been, malicious light flashing in its eyes. With her own eyes, she saw the corners of the bizarre clown’s mouth slowly turn up. 

Typical amusement park music suddenly sounded all around. There was even a sound of gusting wind mixed in, just as if there really was a merry-go-round next to them. 

Then, as the smile of the clown on the wall became wider and wider, the music became slower and slower. The tempo stuck. Like a funeral dirge, each beat was heavier than the one before, and there was a faint strangeness in it. 

The three of them stood together back to back. Footsteps sounded all around. Qin Luo turned her head and saw countless “people” swaying towards them. Each one had ashen skin. She saw the one in the lead clearly. It was sporting a bullet hole in its forehead! 

Gunshots sounded. The front ranks of the zombies fell, only to be replaced by stronger waves coming towards them. 

They shot and shot, and Lu Qingbai felt that there was something off. He felt a chill at his back and quickly turned his head. He found that Qin Luo and Xue Xiaolu were both gone—no, it wasn’t that they were gone, it was that they had suddenly multiplied. At some point, all the zombies in the room had turned into countless Xue Xiaolus, countless Qin Luos, even…countless versions of himself. 

Each of them had a gun and faced the others with a blank expression. 

Lu Qingbai had never been so horrified in his life. 

Then daylight came at last, the white smoke slowly dissipated from before their eyes, and each person woke as if from a marrow-chilling dream, either life-or-death peril, or being abandoned for years in an endless maze, or dodging and gunning down themselves and their teammates. They were mentally and physically exhausted. 

Chang Dou suddenly began to cry, breaking all the clear morning stillness. He said, “Where am I? Where is this?” 

The enforced sleep device had been turned off, and the tightly sealed windows had been opened. Sunlight was pouring in. The others listened silently to Chang Dou’s crying. They felt as though a lifetime had passed, or perhaps…a lifetime had passed. 

There was a reveille outside—it had been many years since any of them had heard such an ancient thing. They all stared. The reveille was extremely penetrating. It was like a signal, digging them out from the trap of previous incarnations and present lives. 

Hu Bugui only then found that he was still in the posture of holding Su Qing entirely in his arms. Fortunately, everyone was currently absent-minded, and no one noticed. He lowered his head just in time to meet Su Qing’s eyes. After a moment, the two of them simultaneously averted their eyes, and each got out of bed. 

Hu Bugui efficiently said, “Chang Dou, don’t cry. Everyone, get cleaned up and out of bed. This is the first day of training. Don’t be late.” 

It had clearly only been one night, but they seemed to have gone through a whole lifetime. Fang Xiu silently touched his face, then glanced at the embarrassing Chang Dou next to him. He picked up Chang Dou’s coat and dropped it onto his face. He whispered, “Keep bawling and I’ll sell you.” Then he got out of bed. 

The officer who had received them the night before quickly appeared. This middle-aged man’s attitude was excellent. Under seven gazes that wanted to peel off his skin and rip out his tendons, he still gave a calm and composed salute, then turned to lead the way. “Please come this way with me to have breakfast.” 

Just as if he wasn’t worried that someone behind him would pick up a brick and brain him with it. 

The officer took them to a big dining hall, one of the old style dining halls with a serving hatch and a big, uneven wooden table in the middle with a ring of benches next to it. Each bench could seat two people. There were seven place settings on the table with mantou, pastries, and youtiao next to them, as well as a big pot with oil floating on the surface. 

The people who had just escaped from an “impassable forest,” a “grey maze,” and a “zombie battle” exchanged looks and found that this time they had traveled to a scene of city intellectuals having an enforced agricultural experience. 

Lu Qingbai laughed grimly and poked a mantou on the table with chopsticks. He looked up and asked, “Comrade, there aren’t hallucinogens in these, are there?” 

The officer gave a friendly smile. “The training course’s circumstances are very limited. It’s all homely fare. Please don’t take offense. You’ve had a tiring night, so you should eat a little more.” 

Lu Qingbai’s temper rose, and he was about to pursue the question doggedly. Su Qing held him back, putting on a careless smile. “It’s very hard on you to have to get up first thing in the morning, and there’s so much food here. It would be a waste not to finish all of it. Why don’t you eat with us?” 

—Now this was hiding a dagger behind a smile. 

The officer glanced at them and understood what the problem was. The ST Training Course had a tradition of employing potent drugs on the first night, so all kinds of things could happen the next morning. He looked at Su Qing and knew that if he didn’t sit down, not one of this group would move a single chopstick. So he went to the serving hatch, got a set of tableware, and sat down with them. He served himself a big bowl of noodles and ate it in big mouthfuls. 

Only then did Hu Bugui lower his eyes and make a gesture towards the others. They picked up their chopsticks one after another. Only Su Qing wasn’t in a hurry. He had a nutritional injection in his pocket and didn’t need to worry about eating. As he used his chopsticks to toy with some noodles, he sized up the officer sitting across from him and began to question him: “What should we call you, comrade?” 

“My surname is Zhong. Zhong Shiliang.”  

“Oh…so is it all right if I call you Zhong-da-ge?” 

Zhong Shiliang looked at him and smiled. “You can also call me Lao Zhong.” 

Su Qing curved his eyes in a smile and poked his own wrist a few times with his chopsticks. “We’re taking part in this training on arrangement from above. Reasonably speaking, whatever the organization tells us to do, we ought to do it, and we shouldn’t ask too many questions. You think so, sir, don’t you?” 

Hu Bugui didn’t hold him back, allowing this imperial diplomat to act for himself. He heard him sigh as though it were the real thing. “But, you see, sir, our unit is newly organized. Under normal circumstances, we’re still just starting to learn all over again how to get along when we’re at headquarters and going out on missions. There are a lot of things we can’t coordinate well over. So I have a concern—what happens if we disappoint the organization?” 

Zhong Shiliang put down his bowl and looked calmly at Su Qing. He thought, This little comrade may be young, but he’s a true disciple in the tradition of General Xiong. He said, “There’s no need to be concerned about that. Our training center will exert our greatest efforts to assist you all in successfully completing this training.” 

“Yes, yes, we’ll have to ask you to take the trouble, sir.” Su Qing casually served Zhong Shiliang a piece of meat, putting it into his bowl. Sadly, they were restricted by discipline, and there was no alcohol on the table, or else he probably would have stood up to propose a toast. “I’m very worried. Ah, I don’t mind telling you, I personally haven’t undergone regular military training, so I always feel like I’m missing something. It makes me very apprehensive. Yes, I feel rather lacking in self-confidence.” 

Fang Xiu nearly choked on a mouthful of noodle broth. Hu Bugui picked up his bowl to cover up a trace of a smile at the corners of his mouth. 

There was silence at the table. The others were responsible for stuffing themselves, while Su Qing was responsible for trying to get chummy with Zhong Shiliang. At the end of this meal, anyone who didn’t know better would have thought that Su Qing had known Zhong Shiliang for a very long time, and that they were old friends and comrades-in-arms. 

They talked and talked, and the subject turned back. Su Qing, with sincere anxiety on his face, said, “I was already uncertain, and now that I’m taking part in a training course with such high standards, I feel scared witless.” 

Zhong Shiliang asked him, “What are you uncertain about?” 

“I don’t even know the contents of the training. Look, Lao Zhong, I’ve been passing physical education exams based on sympathy since I was little. If it comes to running five kilometers cross-country carrying weights, I’ll go straight to see Karl Marx,” Su Qing said, lying through his teeth. “Also, I heard that the army has psychological training as well. My psychological quality…well, don’t mention it!” 

As he spoke, he took a cigarette from his pocket out of habit and familiarly offered another one to Zhong Shiliang. After Zhong Shiliang waved a hand and refused, he narrowed his eyes and felt around for a lighter to light it with. Before he could shake the crappy lighter that had given out last night into lighting up, Hu Bugui reached out a hand from beside him and snatched his cigarette away. “It’s first thing in the morning. No smoking.” 

Su Qing turned his head to look at him, pursed his lips, then, unexpectedly, for once didn’t voice any objection. He obediently put the pack of cigarettes back in his pocket. He turned his head and continued speaking to Zhong Shiliang. “You know, sir, I also have trouble sleeping in a bed that isn’t my own. Last night I didn’t sleep well and had a dream. In my dream, I saw lots of trees coming to life and chasing after me for all they were worth. I was scared enough to piss my pants. My legs are still weak.” 

Zhong Shiliang looked at him and smiled. “You weren’t dreaming last night. You entered the training course’s Multi-Frequency Dimension-Changing Space.”