Chapter 91: Space That Cannot Be Sealed
Bat walked ahead with one hand in his pocket. The researchers around them seemed deeply afraid of him and quickly moved aside to clear a path. Eventually, he arrived at a room, entered the password, and opened the door. Yu Xian followed him inside. The door suddenly closed on its own, startling him. Right then, the lights in the room flickered to life, revealing rows of corpses preserved in jars of formalin.
It was Yu Xian's first time seeing so many different kinds of bodies. He was so frightened that his hair nearly stood on end. Holy crap!
Just then, Bat turned around. Although Yu Xian could defeat Bat with a single punch, to him, Bat seemed incredibly terrifying at that moment. What kind of freak is this guy?
Bat extended his hand, and Yu Xian immediately grew wary. "What?"
Bat helplessly reminded him. "Zhong Wuliang's corpse."
Coming back to his senses, Yu Xian quickly took out the spatial ring and handed it to Bat. Bat took the ring and walked over to an operating table. After putting the ring on, he took Zhong Wuliang's corpse out.
Seeing a charred, twisted corpse, he sighed. He took a syringe from the workbench behind him, prepared a solution, and injected it into the corpse.
After that, he took out a yellow talisman and stuck it to the corpse's forehead. There was a button on the side of the operating table. When he pressed it, a transparent film instantly covered the corpse.
Curious, Yu Xian leaned forward. "What does that do?"
Bat said flatly, "I injected his corpse with a tiny amount of a corpse miasma mixture. Over the next twenty-four hours, the corpse will gradually turn into a zombie. During that process, his cells will automatically repair the damaged areas, especially the meridians filled with corpse miasma. Based on the concentration of corpse miasma, we can determine their strength, then use that to reverse-engineer his cultivation technique."
Yu Xian frowned. "Isn't that way too dangerous?"
Bat remained calm. "Experiments are never one hundred percent safe to begin with. Besides, this is the headquarters."
The headquarters was full of experts. A little zombie really would not be able to cause much of a stir here.
If Yu Xian took a sip of Zhong Wuliang's blood, he could easily obtain the Eight Treasures Elephant-Suppression Art from the man's memories. However, Zhong Wuliang had been blown up, and the corpse was simply too disgusting. Yu Xian could not bring himself to put his mouth on it. Besides, the Eight Treasures Elephant-Suppression Art was not that important to him anyway.
Most, most, most importantly, he really did not want to look through the memories of an old man who had spent years living alone in the wilderness. The Slashing Mantis's memories had been disgusting enough. Yu Xian felt that Zhong Wuliang's memories would be even worse. That was why he chose to give up drinking Zhong Wuliang's blood.
Bat took off the spatial ring and returned it to Yu Xian. "You came to Yanjing because you want to visit Jin Sheng, right?"
Yu Xian nodded. "Yeah, but it's too late at night now. I will visit the captain tomorrow morning."
Bat walked over to the sink. After washing his hands, he said, "Then should I see you out?"
Yu Xian refused. "No need. I would like to take a look around headquarters."
He planned to place some spatial bubbles around the headquarters and would leave only after he was done.
Bat hesitated for a moment and nodded. "Then... help yourself?"
Yu Xian also nodded. He turned and walked to the door. "All right. See you."
When the door opened automatically, he immediately bolted out. The room was too terrifying and oppressive. Staying there even one second longer would have been torture for his mind.
Outside, Yu Xian took a lap around the first floor, placing the spatial bubbles in suitable corners. Suddenly, a familiar voice rang out.
"Holy crap, Salted Fish!"
Yu Xian looked up and saw Ether turn around and try to run. A smile appeared on his face. He used Spatial Leap to chase after him, but the skill failed. Only then did he belatedly realize that Qilin's headquarters probably had some kind of formation or barrier that prohibited spatial teleportation.
Wait. Does that mean all the spatial bubbles I placed are useless?
Yu Xian immediately controlled one of the spatial bubbles and enlarged it. The moment he stepped into the bubble, he appeared behind the two-seat bench at the Thirty-Sixth Ring Road. He looked up at the dark sky and teleported back to headquarters.
It seems that the formation or barrier cannot stop my spatial bubbles!
However, when he teleported back to headquarters, Ether's huge face was pressed right up against the bubble. The way Ether looked at him was like he was staring at some kind of immortal.
Ether was solemn. "Salted Fish, how did you do that?"
Seeing how serious Ether looked, Yu Xian asked innocently, "How did I do what?"
Ether made an exaggerated expression. "That was spatial teleportation just now, right?"
When Yu Xian nodded, Ether immediately jumped up and down, completely worked up. "Do you have any idea how many layers of formations and barriers surround the headquarters? Forget about you—even a Dragon-rank big shot wouldn't be able to use spatial abilities here! Not even a divine artifact can teleport in or out of this place. You... you... you... This is bad!"
Ether shouted at the top of his lungs, and before long, all of Qilin's security personnel had surrounded them. Half an hour later, he and Yu Xian were sitting in the director's office. Yu Lie and other higher-ups were all gathered around Yu Xian, staring at him. Xiao Cheng even took the opportunity to rub Yu Xian's head, messing with his hair.
Yu Lie looked at Yu Xian. "Little Fish, teleport again and let us see."[1]
Yu Xian let out an innocent little "Oh," then created a spatial bubble. He instantly teleported through it back to his home in Silver City. There, he patted his chest. That was scary.
"I haven't been this stressed since... well, since the last time I was this stressed."[2]
After a while, his phone vibrated. Yu Lie had sent him a message, telling him to hurry back.
Yu Xian sighed. "Well, if it's a blessing, it won't turn into a disaster. If it's a disaster, there's no avoiding it."
He teleported back to Yu Lie's office with a bitter expression.
Yu Lie smiled. He patted Yu Xian on the shoulder, his face full of admiration. "Kiddo. This ability of yours... I don't even know what to say."
Xiao Cheng offered an explanation. "There's a high probability that the interior of Little Fish's spatial bubbles isn't affected by external space. They likely belong to a very high-tier self-contained dimension, which is why he can teleport freely inside them."
A bald man asked, "Then can we use this principle to develop a more stable teleportation formation?"
Everyone immediately discussed the matter all at once. At the same time, they talked about how to handle Yu Xian. After all, his ability was far too powerful. It was basically equivalent to letting him come and go freely from headquarters without being monitored.
In the end, Yu Lie made the final decision. "Little Fish, I will allow you to place bubbles inside headquarters, but I decide where they go. You are not allowed to place them secretly."
Yu Xian immediately straightened his back. "Yes, Sir!"
Xiao Cheng smacked the back of Yu Xian's head, amused. "Don't even think about playing tricks. I'm having security conduct daily inspections from now on. You can't hide your bubbles from them."
Yu Xian quickly assured him, a faint sweat breaking out on his cheeks. "I promise I won't place any bubbles without permission."
Although just now, there really had been one instant when he had considered secretly placing a few more bubbles.
1. In Chinese culture, attaching 小 (Xiǎo), Little in English, to someone's name is a common way to create a warm, familiar, or informal nickname. It is typically used by older individuals addressing younger people, or between close friends and colleagues of a similar age. ☜
2. This sentence is a nod to Chinese internet "Nonsense Literature" (废话文学)—a style of deadpan comedy that uses circular logic or states the glaringly obvious to express absolute exhaustion, stress, or speechlessness. Instead of comparing his current stress to a specific past event, the character uses a circular loop ("the last time was the last time") as a sarcastic way of showing his brain has completely short-circuited under the pressure. ☜