150: Chapter 150 Beyond the Lighthouse

Three days after the third anchor point in Linhai stabilized, the Old Port District finally had a hint of human activity.

The blockade was still in place, and engineering vehicles were still coming and going; officially, they claimed it was a foundation accident and seawater backflow. However, there were no longer people constantly walking down into the hospital entrance, and the freight elevator on the B1 level of the shopping mall had been welded shut, with two iron gates added to the outside. Every night at nine, personnel from the Linhai Station Coordination Point would go to the Seventh Pier to inspect the Fire Beacon, confirming the Tide levels, lamp wicks, personnel, and all entry and exit records.

This was not a victory ritual.

It was something that had to be done every single day from now on.

Tide had passed the candidate review, but she wasn't in a hurry to exchange for an Ability Seed. She remained at the dispatch center, first organizing all the abnormal water levels in Linhai, the roads in the Old Port District, and the evacuation routes into a map that ordinary people could understand. Tang Zhiwei granted her logistics coordination access; for every new temporary Lamp-Keeping Zone on the map, Tide could see a light Fire Beacon.

"This is more useful than giving me a gun that sparks fire," she said.

Space Venerable became a Linhai structural coordinator. He still insisted that others call him Venerable, but ended up being called "Little Surveyor" to his face twice by Zhao Ye. He was so angry his face turned red, yet he still ran around the Old Port District every day with a ruler. If any wall, manhole cover, or load-bearing pillar near the third anchor changed, he would be the first to notice.

Jiaoyue accepted the medical coordination Fire Seal.

She did not receive a combat seed. What she exchanged for was the long-term permission for "Tempering Record": everyone she confirmed to be alive would leave a brief Fire Seal in the Lamp-Keeping Zone, preventing them from being easily erased from reality records by anomalies again. Xu Minglan teased her that this ability wasn't cool at all, and Jiaoyue replied, "The ER doesn't need to be cool; the ER needs people not to die."

Cao Gui cleared out a small room in the old Archives to specifically organize the list of missing persons in Linhai. He placed his brother Cao Zheng's file on top, not writing "Case Closed," but only "Related to Downward Station, pending continued observation by the Fire Beacon." After finishing, he went to the pier and bought two cans of soda, drinking one himself and placing the other next to the third anchor.

Wu still did not have an official identity.

His observation records had to be rewritten every day. Sometimes he remembered Tide, sometimes Jiaoyue, and sometimes only "Do not enter the elevator." Xu Minglan prepared a thick blank notebook for him, with only four characters written on the first page.

I am still here.

Wu would copy it out every night.

In Xinhuo Hall, Lu Chen pulled the three fire points of Qinghe, Jiangbei, and Linhai into a stable triangle. The Spark Post Road had not fully recovered, but the fire lines could already handle emergency transport. Zhao Ye's Suppression Domain, Shen Qinghe's Illumination Realm, and Bai Ya's Patrol Lamp were all recorded as second-stage permissions after the mission; it was not an upgrade without cost, nor was it something anyone could use whenever they wanted.

Zhao Ye's Fire Nail required a reality Fire Seal landing point; he couldn't just pin down a town out of thin air.

Every use of Shen Qinghe's Illumination Realm consumed the remaining law samples of the bronze bell; forcing it open continuously would leave her unable to hear reality sounds for days.

Bai Ya's Patrol Lamp could not function without the Grey Net and marked nodes; entering unknown areas would still result in a disconnection.

Power had grown stronger.

But someone had to stand in reality to catch every single one of them.

Gu Xingzhou came to the outside of the Linhai third anchor once. He did not apply to enter Xinhuo Hall, only bringing a cross-city data sharing agreement and a box of unopened mineral water. He stood outside the Fire Beacon for a while, finally saying only: "The authorities will send over the roads, vehicles, and people we can provide first. As for the rest, we will wait until you are willing to let us learn."

Lu Chen did not agree, nor did he refuse.

Torch was not anyone's subsidiary organization.

But the more roads there were, the more people could walk out alive.

On the fourth night after the third anchor was lit, the Grey Net received an encrypted report that had been relayed through multiple layers.

The sender's location was not within the country.

There were no long explanations in the report, only a screenshot of sea surface surveillance. In the image, a distant offshore lighthouse flickered repeatedly in a storm. There were no ships on the sea surface illuminated by the lighthouse, but a black return ticket was floating there.

The ticket had Chinese written on it.

[Next Stop: Liuxia Passenger Station]

A name was signed at the end of the report.

Rhine.

Bai Ya finished reading and whistled: "Are they starting to sell tickets overseas too?"

Lu Chen did not smile.

The Linhai lighthouse Fire Beacon shone in the distance, its light crossing the breakwater and shining all the way to the endless sea.

And on the edge of the Grey Net map, a grey line extending from Linhai crossed the national border for the first time.

That line was very far.

So far that the fire could not yet reach it.

After the third anchor in Linhai stabilized, a triangular Fire Map appeared in Xinhuo Hall for the first time.

Qinghe was on the inner side, Jiangbei on the north side, and Linhai sat by the sea. There were no real roads between the three anchor points, but there were confirmed fire lines. The Spark Post Road could not yet be opened on a large scale, but emergency Fire Seals, sealed artifacts, and a small number of official members could already perform short-distance leaps along the lines.

This meant that Torch was no longer just guarding a single city.

But Lu Chen did not treat it as a number worth celebrating. Every time a spot lit up on the Fire Map, it meant that someone there had been dragged into an anomaly, someone had died, and someone had to guard it day after day to prevent the door from opening again.

Zhao Ye's Suppression Domain permission was re-annotated. From now on, he could spread a sixty-meter Suppression Domain within the confirmed Fire Beacon range, capable of suppressing mid-tier routes, downward, and forced cross-line type rules. However, every forced activation required a reality landing point, and continuous use would harm his body.

Shen Qinghe's Illumination Realm was listed as rule analysis permission. She could illuminate the boundary borrowed by a high-risk anomaly and briefly cut off an incorrect "method of asking," but the law samples of the bronze bell required long-term replenishment.

Bai Ya obtained higher-level external permissions for the Patrol Lamp network, allowing twelve Patrol Lamps to collaborate simultaneously. However, he was also explicitly restricted: the Grey Net could trace recorded lines but could not guess unknown answers for others.

Every increase in strength came with a price.

Lu Chen did not intend to raise anyone into a weapon without a price.

Before Gu Xingzhou left with the cross-city agreement, he looked back at the Linhai Fire Map.

"The authorities don't understand your fire," he said, "but we understand one thing: hospitals, roads, ports, and settlement points must be guarded by someone."

"Then guard them well," Lu Chen said.

"We will."

Rhine's encrypted report came in only after this.

Bai Ya spent a long time decoding it before he could open the audio inside. The sea wind was strong, and someone said in not-very-fluent Chinese: "My name is Rhine. When you lit the Linhai lighthouse, something on the other side of the sea turned back."

Following the audio was a photo.

The distant offshore lighthouse in the storm, its light flickering. A black ticket floated on the sea surface; the edges of the ticket had been ruined by the waves, but the characters were still there.

[Next Stop: Liuxia Passenger Station]

Rhine continued: "There was originally no Chinese here. Now, in the pockets of all the missing persons, the same kind of ticket has started to appear."

Bai Ya was silent for a moment, then asked Lu Chen: "Should we connect the overseas line now?"

Lu Chen did not nod immediately.

Linhai had just stabilized, Jiangbei Passenger Station was still waiting in the interlayer, and Qinghe Safe House was far from safe. The fire lines could reach further, but that didn't mean Torch could treat every patch of darkness as a task it must solve immediately.

"Reply first," he said.

"Tell Rhine: don't take the ticket, and don't let anyone approach the lighthouse alone."

Bai Ya acknowledged.

Wu sat in the observation room, still copying that sentence.

I am still here.

When he wrote the last character, he suddenly looked up out the window. The fire of the Linhai third anchor shone from a great distance, like a nail on the edge of the Black Sea.

On the edge of the map, after the grey line crossed the national border, it did not stop.

It continued to extend further out to sea.

And everyone knew that where the lighthouse shone, sooner or later, something would look back along the light.