76: Chapter 76 The ultimate answer lies within themselves?!

The older one was lean and slender with neatly groomed white hair; even while wearing a mask, he exuded an inescapable scholarly air.

The younger one...

stood only as tall as the old man's shoulder, wearing an oversized hoodie, the figure huddled inside the hood like a student who hadn't graduated yet.

People from Kindling!

Section Chief Han Zheng's mind raced.

"Lower your guns."

The old man's voice came from beneath the mask, hoarse yet exceptionally steady.

"We are not enemies."

Section Chief Han Zheng did not move.

His gun barrel remained steadily pointed at them.

"How can you prove that?"

The petite figure seemed to find this procedure troublesome and let out a soft sigh.

She pulled a bronze piece from her hoodie pocket, facing outward.

The two characters for "Kindling" shimmered with a dull, verdigris luster under the beams of the soldiers' headlamps.

Section Chief Han Zheng's gun barrel slowly lowered.

Seeing his gesture, the soldiers behind him, though filled with confusion, obeyed the order and lowered their guns, maintaining a defensive posture.

The guns were lowered, but Section Chief Han Zheng's thoughts tightened further.

They were dressed plainly, lacking the armor of the Paladins, which meant that the equipment of Kindling members was not standard issue, or it could be stored away at any time.

One old and one young, with a huge age gap, implying that supernatural awakening had nothing to do with age, ruling out speculations like "childhood cultivation."

The two had ventured deep into the ruins alone, so they must be supernaturals, and they had absolute confidence in their own strength.

They came here... they must have a purpose.

If their purpose wasn't to restart the ruins, perhaps there was some relic hidden here that was of great use to them!

A sharp light flashed in Section Chief Han Zheng's eyes.

But immediately after, the image of that man in the War Zone tearing the sky with two strikes of his blade flashed through his mind, and the thought he had just raised was instantly extinguished as if by a basin of ice water.

Don't even think about it.

The gap between humanity and such an existence could not be bridged by a few guns.

"Two... seniors."

Wang Hao opened his mouth, his voice dry.

He took a step forward, then stopped, not knowing what attitude to adopt.

He was a descendant of Kindling, and in front of him were active members of Kindling.

They might be connected by blood, but they were separated by a cold bronze mask and a chasm he could never cross.

Lin Xiaoman looked at him and sighed again.

Her voice was soft, but every word was clear, "Section Chief Han Zheng, I know you. We saw what you did in the War Zone."

She paused, as if recalling something that made her uncomfortable.

"You are a good person. So, I don't want to fight you."

Her gaze swept across the dead giant tree in the center of the altar.

"If you want to investigate, go ahead. We just need to take one thing away."

Section Chief Han Zheng suppressed the complex emotions surging in his heart, stepped forward, stood in front of Wang Hao, and spoke solemnly,

"On behalf of China, I thank Kindling for your assistance in the War Zone. Regarding the human faction... I will make no comment. But China sincerely wishes to cooperate with Kindling to face the great disaster three years from now."

"Section Chief Han."

Henry interrupted him.

The old man's voice carried a weight and exhaustion that could only come from having experienced the ruins of the tin sheds and the death of Isaac.

"Kindling belongs only to humanity, only to civilization."

He looked at Section Chief Han Zheng, his blue-gray eyes behind the mask as calm as a frozen lake.

"No picking sides, no cooperation. This is the ironclad rule that Kindling has passed down for thousands of years. It has always been this way, throughout history."

"Why?!"

In the corner, Zhao Xiaohe, who hadn't spoken until now, couldn't hold back, her voice rising with agitation,

"Isn't cooperation a good thing? Wouldn't it be better to gather all of humanity's strength to face the disaster together?!"

After she finished speaking, she fell silent herself.

The image of the boy in the European War Zone drawing houses in the mud flashed through her mind, along with the image of soldiers from both sides, even after the sky split, subconsciously aiming their guns at each other.

Humanity couldn't even stop its own wars, so how could they expect an organization that protected humanity to trust any single "country"?

Henry looked at her, at this young researcher whose face still held a student-like air, and the corners of his mouth beneath the mask seemed to move.

"Child, some things can only be understood by thinking them through yourself."

The entire altar plaza fell into a dead silence.

Professor Zhou lowered his head, his graying hair appearing even paler under the headlamp.

He had spent his whole life searching for history in piles of old papers, and today, living history stood before him, telling him a cruel truth he could not refute.

Section Chief Han Zheng forcibly suppressed his surging emotions.

He knew that dwelling on the topic of "cooperation" was meaningless.

"Fine."

He nodded, indicating his acceptance of this premise.

"Then, could you answer a few questions? In exchange, you can take that thing, and we will not interfere."

This was the greatest concession he could make.

Henry glanced at Lin Xiaoman beside him, and seeing her nod slightly, he replied, "Very well."

"Can the ruins here be reactivated?"

Section Chief Han Zheng went straight to the core.

Lin Xiaoman looked up at the gray, cracked, dead tree in the center of the altar, her voice lowering by half a degree,

"The ancient tree is dead, so the base cannot be restarted."

She paused for a moment, as if recalling something.

"As for why the ancient tree died... what the predecessors from over two thousand years ago actually faced, I don't know. But the ancient tree is the core that maintains the ruins' space; that is what the President told us."

Section Chief Han Zheng's gaze lingered on the dead tree for a second, and something sank deep into his eyes.

The President... as expected, that mysterious man was highly likely their supreme leader.

"One last question."

Section Chief Han Zheng looked at the two of them and asked the ultimate question that had plagued him and the entire upper echelons.

"How... does one become a supernatural?"

As his voice fell, everyone's breathing stopped.

Professor Zhou, Wang Hao, Chen Yiming, Zhao Xiaohe, and even the five fully armed soldiers all subconsciously leaned forward by half a step.

This is the answer.

It is the only answer for whether human civilization could grasp a glimmer of hope in the next three years.

Henry looked at Section Chief Han Zheng, at the undisguised longing and weight in his eyes.

The blue-gray eyes behind the mask were calm and profound.

He did not answer directly.

Instead, he turned his head, his gaze crossing the distance of a few meters to land on the pocket on Wang Hao's chest—the location of that bronze piece.

"You asked the wrong person."

Henry's voice was very soft, yet it made everyone present's heart skip a beat.

"The answer is not with us."

His gaze lingered meaningfully on Wang Hao for two seconds.

"It is within yourselves."

Having said this, he did not linger, turned around, and walked toward the shadows behind the altar.

Lin Xiaoman followed immediately, her petite figure quickly melting into the darkness.

Section Chief Han Zheng stared in the direction they had vanished, his brain still rapidly analyzing the meaning of those words.

"Within ourselves?"

Did it mean bloodline? Did it mean willpower? Or did it mean... some potential rooted in human genes that they had yet to discover?

Just then, on the stone wall behind the altar—the area they had never noticed before, shrouded by the shadow of the dead tree—

a tightly shut stone door lit up silently.

The runes on the stone door lit up stroke by stroke, as if injected with molten gold.