Chapter 88: Driving Away the Threat -2

Captain Jia chuckled.
He had heard too many stories of people spouting crazy nonsense like this before, driven mad by the news that they were being kicked out.
He was about to mock these ridiculous fools when, in an instant, his mind was struck, as if he were faced with an inviolable and overwhelming presence of authority.
Yang Zicang turned his cold eyes to the big guy beside him, Lyu Zhi. “Don’t say anymore.”
Then those eyes suddenly swept across the space.
The dozen or so people around Captain Jia felt enveloped by a deep, distant, and oppressive aura. An unspeakable sense of insignificance quelled any thought of resistance within them.
It was as if they were standing before a superior being that had existed for an age of time.
“Leave. The business here is more or less finished.”
Hearing Yang Zicang’s decision, the six people beside him didn’t even dare to breathe.
Captain Jia stood there dumbfounded, not knowing what to say, as the man before him calmly made his way toward the main gate. Wang Chong, who had been inseparable from his weapon all morning, followed closely at Yang Zicang’s side.
“Brother Jiazi, wait for us! We need to pack our things.”
“Don’t leave us behind; without you, we’re done for.”
The remaining five were utterly panicked, momentarily fumbling and unsure which way to go.
“Don’t bother packing. Whatever you need, I’ll give it to you.”
The words were bold, but the few people beside Captain Jia curled their lips, thinking, “Just as I suspected—a spy from the greenhouse district here to scrape up leftovers.”
The five exchanged glances, then all looked together at Yang Zicang ahead, and nodded firmly.
Captain Jia and his people snapped back to reality, annoyed that they had been intimidated by a single glance from this man.
“Damn it! Mark my words, this punk’s going to get himself killed sooner or later.”
Suddenly, a commotion broke out from deep within the tent area.
It wasn’t about Zhang Yuanxin successfully building a boiler that might catch the interest of Hub Town, but something far more serious.
That woman inside Ning Yang’s stone house was wailing at the doorway, “The Anchor Core Engine is gone! What’s in the box is a fake!”
“What!”
This instantly triggered an uproar.
“No way, how is that possible?”
A bunch of people squeezed their way, jostling and shoving, into the tent leader’s stone house, picking up the transparent engine that Aya had taken out of the box from the table.
It was about ninety percent similar to what everyone had seen yesterday, but the illusion inside was clearly carved on its surface, and it didn’t emit the cool, lucid spiritual feeling—this wasn’t the real Mind-Loss Engine!
It wasn’t even an engine at all.
It was just a piece of glass!
“It’s been switched.”
“Who did it?”
The crowd panicked. Someone grabbed the woman by the collar and roared angrily, “Who touched it? Did you hide it?”
“Don’t bully Aya.”
Squad Leader Jia, who had just arrived, was stunned.
“Boss, that guest from Room Sixty, he left just a little too nonchalantly, didn’t he?”
In the midst of the noisy crowd, a thin member of the security team whispered in his ear, “Could it be that the one from Room Sixty stole it?”
Those words were a wake-up call!
“Whether or not it’s him, stop that bastard, call him back for a search—now!”
Six or seven men turned and chased after him. Squad Leader Jia ordered them to put Aya down. He grabbed the arm of this woman who had been sold here, dragging her to toss into the bedroom a few steps away.
After sliding the door shut, he casually pointed at two people and said, “You two keep an eye on her. The rest of you, follow me to round that bastard up!”
Squad Leader Jia strode out swiftly, a fierce expression on his face.
“That scumbag from Room Sixty!” he growled fiercely.
No matter how many sides the opponent’s model had, no matter how skilled he was, he had to keep the Mind-Loss Engine here!
The crowd surged outside after the security leader, who seemed to have a target in mind.
“Who is it?”
“Has Squad Leader Jia found which bastard did it?”
The commotion finally found an outlet. Led by Captain Jia, the once aimless, headless-fly-like crowd chased out of the tattered shantytown.
“You bastards! No matter how high your time sequence is, I’ll smash you dead with one punch each and bury you like grandsons!”
Captain Jia charged ahead into the wasteland, with a tide of ragged, stick-wielding people following close behind.
“Stop right there!”
“You few, get back here!”
The complainants had barely walked a few hundred meters when a crowd from the settlement behind began to chase after them, growing larger by the moment, nearly a hundred people.
“Get back here!”
Yang Zicang frowned and turned around.
“You coward who dares not name yourself—hand over what you stole!”
“Jiazi Time! Give back the Ephemeral Sustenance Engine!”
The crowd surged in like a swarm, encircling the seven.
Fan Xiuyun stepped back and said, “Did you guys drink urea? Burned your hearts out?”
“Return the stolen well, or it’s death!” The crowd brandished clubs and shouted.
Seeing this, Wang Chong quickly gripped his sword tightly, while Xu Xiuchuan, Qian Zhongsheng, and the others clasped their hands together and then pulled apart, conjuring several force fields.
They stared nervously at the ever-increasing number of people rushing in, piecing together the gist of the matter from the chaotic noise.
“Bullshit! That well was a gift from us masters to you turtlenecks! Move aside, or I’ll drag someone down with me even if I die!”
These six couldn’t stomach such humiliation. Now, even surrounded, Lv Zhi, the big guy, couldn’t contain his rage any longer and burst out cursing.
Qin Meng beside him was burning with rage, holding back several times from activating his model.
“We made that water well’s Inert-Mind Engine ourselves. Screw you, we need to steal? Steal your ancestors’ coffin boards to make toilet bowls?”
“What did you say? Say that again if you dare!”
The crowd glared angrily at Fan Xiuyun and the big man.
Xu Xiuchuan, both worried and furious, said, “Brother Jiazi, I told you these people aren’t worth pitying. We should have taken the engine long ago and set up our own shed area.”
“Oh ho, look, they’ve admitted it themselves!” someone pointed at Xu Xiuchuan.
“They’ve had their eyes on the well all along!”
“Kill them, make an example of them!”
Chests lit up like flashbulbs in the crowd, and several people, without waiting for Captain Jia to order, rushed forward with ethereal, silvery glows, some even with golden hues cast from their hands.
Facing several incoming fists, Wang Chong, unskilled with weapons, instinctively shut his eyes.
[Silent Night!]
The air suddenly grew still.
Everyone felt a suffocating oppression.
Oxygen, moisture, the ground, the sky—the whole world itself—seemed to resist them, to reject the fragile lives that could only survive through their dependence on them.
They seemed to hear an ethereal, unreal chant, as if an ancient sovereign had abandoned them to heaven and earth, casting them into a dark night that would never see the dawn.
As Silent Night was activated, these people, already battered by life, had no spirit left to resist. Many of them clutched their throats, gasping for breath, and fell to the ground rolling around in chaos. Their combat effectiveness was instantly halved nearly.
Those who remained standing could only barely hold on; their spirits were tormented by an unbearable sensation as if they stood on the edge of an abyss, despite being on solid ground.
“Everyone, don’t, be scared, this is… mental, magic.”
A person let out a loud roar, raised a broad wooden staff that shimmered with golden light, and charged at YangZicang.
Bang!
Before he could even get close, he was knocked back by a wave of air, heavily slamming onto the ground dozens of meters away.
The wooden staff in his hand was flung by an eerie force into the sky at the moment he was sent flying, its sudden acceleration reducing it to just a black speck.
Captain Jia’s pupils trembled as he gazed at the horizon. This was too extreme!
This wasn’t human strength, but… this place had never been a human world after all.
YangZicang took slow steps, covering a distance of over ten meters in just two or three strides, and appeared before Captain Jia.
He pulled off a button from this security captain’s clothing.
“Go back. I’ll let it slide this time.”
YangZicang flicked his fingertip, sending the button whistling high into the sky, colliding with the falling wooden staff.
The staff burst into countless tiny fragments.
Fragments rained down like falling rain, yet most of them were taken over by an invisible force above the crowd, flickering abruptly like ink washes, whistling through the air as they carved paths, trailing dazzling golden and silver phantom shadows!
It was like a shimmering rosy cloud of golden strands and silver scales!
Everyone who saw the golden cloud was terrified—those were hundreds of shattered wooden slivers, each radiating brilliance! How much temporal energy must that be!
“H-Help, help!”
The stifling pressure suddenly ceased, receding like a tidal wave.
Whizz, whizz, whizz, thud, thud, thud, thud!
Yang Zicang turned and walked forward. The rotating mass of fragments circling ever lower above the crowd scattered with a swoosh, landing firmly like nails around everyone’s feet—three of them resting near each person.
The crowd was paralyzed with fear.
None dared move an inch, terrified that the slightest motion might cause the wood chips to accidentally pierce their bodies.
……
Only when the seven figures had vanished beyond the horizon did the oppressive silence lift, and some finally dared to collapse onto the ground.
“G-Goddamn, is this a demon or what?” one person whimpered.
Only then did some in the crowd realize that, unnoticed, a wet sensation had spread in their crotches.
“He really could’ve wiped us all out! Damn it, what kind of twisted world is this!”
That ultimate mental intimidation, those radiant wood chips that had hovered mere inches from their bodies, was undoubtedly the sickle of death dancing at their throats.
“Captain Jia, the well, we…”
“The well… Master Zuo can still, uh, produce and craft it.” After a long while, Captain Jia finally caught his breath, patting his chest while finding an excuse for himself.
“Right, right, as long as Master Zuo is here, everything’s fine.” The others finally came to their senses.
Once the danger had completely disappeared, Captain Jia plopped down onto the ground, still struggling with how to explain this to Ning Yang.
Should he say that the entire camp area had been threatened by that man?
He’d believe it, right? After all, there were so many witnesses. Everyone could tell him, “You, Camp Chief Ning Yang, are lucky you didn’t have to witness this firsthand.”
“Let’s… go back.”
“It’s a tough break for Master Zuo.”
No one dared utter a single word of complaint. They all understood that this camp area had truly brushed past the gates of hell.