153: Chapter 153 The Judge's Visit

By the time Gu Xingzhou arrived at the Safe House with his team, it was already pitch black outside.

Beside him was a man in his thirties wearing a dark grey jacket. His complexion was poor, as if he had just been dragged out of a meeting that hadn't woken him up yet.

The man didn't look at Zhao Ye first, nor did he stare at Shen Qinghe's Fire Seal; instead, he placed the document case in his hand onto the table.

The case was very old, and the clasp still bore the reference number of an old court archive room.

"Who is he?" Zhao Ye asked.

Gu Xingzhou's introduction was brief: "A special liaison, codenamed The Arbiter."

Zhao Ye raised an eyebrow.

The man spoke for himself: "Don't misunderstand, I didn't choose the codename. I used to handle accident archiving, responsibility reviews, and confidentiality audits. The people below me thought my words were harsh, so they called me that."

"I can tell," Zhao Ye said.

Gu Xingzhou acted as if he hadn't heard.

The Arbiter opened the document case, revealing a stack of photocopied files. The one on top was the accident record for Chen Fu.

It was written in great detail.

The time, location, warehouse structure, the extent of the shelving collapse, and even a blurry screenshot of Chen Fu driving the forklift were all included.

Yet, the conclusion was only one line.

[Violation of operating procedures led to the escalation of the accident; the relevant consequences are to be borne by the party involved.]

Tang Zhiwei's expression turned cold the moment she saw that sentence.

The Arbiter pulled out a second document. Han Yue.

[Unauthorized departure from the protected area and entry into a high-risk zone, resulting in the depletion of subsequent rescue resources.]

The third one. Lu Chengzhi.

[Unauthorized deviation from the established route, vehicle loss of control, rescue targets forced to be relocated.]

None of these sentences were fabricated out of thin air.

Chen Fu did indeed drive the forklift. Han Yue did indeed leave the Safe House. Lu Chengzhi did indeed change the navigation route.

But the page had completely erased who they had saved, what they had protected, and why they had made those choices.

All that remained were the errors.

"Some copies have already appeared in the official System," Gu Xingzhou said. "I've suppressed the main database, but this kind of stuff spreads too fast. Someone is using real details to piece together false conclusions."

The Arbiter looked up, his gaze falling on Lu Chen.

"Who can prove that the Torch sacrifice list is real?"

The room went silent.

Zhao Ye took a half-step forward, his voice lowered: "What do you mean?"

"Exactly what it sounds like." The Arbiter did not back down. "Your records state that Chen Fu guarded the warehouse door, Han Yue left the coordinates, and Lu Chengzhi escorted four people to the Safe House. Who can prove these things?"

Tang Zhiwei's hand pressed against the edge of the table, her knuckles turning white.

"I can prove it."

The Arbiter looked at her: "You are the party involved."

"So what?"

"A statement from a party involved can serve as testimony, but it cannot stand alone as fact."

Zhao Ye finally couldn't help himself: "Did you come here just to pick faults with the dead?"

"I'm not here to pick faults with the dead." The Arbiter looked up at Zhao Ye. "Someone has already written them down as those responsible for the accident. You can't hold them up now just by saying 'he was a good person.' To keep them, you have to break down every single event—who saw it, who recorded it, and who signed off on it—it all has to be brought out."

No one in the room liked that statement.

Yet, Tang Zhiwei did not immediately refute it.

Lu Chen had remained silent. He looked at the files and suddenly asked, "Where is the original copy you brought?"

The Arbiter took a thin, black booklet from the bottom of the document case.

The cover had no unit name and no reference number.

As soon as he placed the booklet on the table, the pages flipped open on their own.

Everyone saw a line of text slowly seeping onto the last page.

[The Arbiter, testimony is false.]

For the first time, The Arbiter's expression changed.

The next second, an extremely fine pen tip extended from the black booklet, as if someone were holding a pen from behind the paper, ready to continue writing after his name.

The inside of Shen Qinghe's wrist suddenly burned hot.

The Fate-Illuminating Bronze Bell vibrated in her palm.

The first toll of the bell made no sound, yet the papers on the table all stopped moving at once.

The pen tip froze in mid-air.

Shen Qinghe's face turned pale as she stared at the booklet.

"It's not an ordinary file."

"It's looking for witnesses."

Bai Ya had already reduced the Grey Net permissions to the minimum to prevent the black booklet from replicating itself through the network. Watching the repeating entries popping up on the screen, he whispered:

"It's not looking for witnesses."

"It's looking for whoever has a guilty conscience."

The Arbiter did not change his tune just because Zhao Ye's expression was ugly.

He spread the files out page by page, pointing out the most terrifying parts within them.

In Chen Fu's record, the time of the shelving collapse was true, the forklift position was true, and the fact that the warehouse door was blocked was also true. But the file had deleted the evacuation list and changed "ensured seventy-three people left the Safe House" to "delayed subsequent rescue."

In Han Yue's record, the violation of candidate protocols was true, and leaving the Safe House was true. But the sentence "left behind the coordinates for the Liuxia entrance" had been completely cut, leaving only the conclusion that he "trespassed into a high-risk area."

"It doesn't need to fabricate everything," The Arbiter said. "It only needs to take away half the facts; the remaining half is enough to nail someone to the cross."

Tang Zhiwei's breathing hitched.

She knew this tactic all too well. If ten minutes were missing from a schedule, a route would change from "temporary detour" to "unauthorized deviation"; if four people were missing from a list, Lu Chengzhi would change from a rescuer to the person responsible for the accident.

Gu Xingzhou looked at the files, his expression darkening: "Once this kind of thing enters the main System, the consequences won't just be internal archiving."

The Arbiter nodded: "Families won't receive compensation, rescue personnel will face disciplinary action, and old cases will be reclassified. In the end, even those who come later will believe that they were never meant to be remembered in the first place."

Zhao Ye was silent for a moment, then took a half-step back.

It was an admission that this matter could not be solved by fists first.

"How do you intend to investigate?" he asked.

The Arbiter looked at Lu Chen.

"First, find the place where it writes."

The black booklet flipped to the last page right at that moment, as if in response.

The Arbiter then took out a voice recorder and pressed the play button.

Inside was a phone recording of a grassroots staff member in Qinghe. The person's voice was trembling, asking him over and over: If this name isn't in the System, how does the compensation work? What can the family use to prove it?

The Arbiter did not turn off the recording, letting the sound play until the end.

"This is what it truly wants," he said. "It's not about cursing someone for being responsible. It wants everyone to start doubting: whether there should never have been a place for these people in the first place."

Gu Xingzhou looked down at the document case, and only after a long while did he say, "Then don't let it enter the main System for now."

"How long can you suppress the main System?" The Arbiter asked.

"As long as I can," Gu Xingzhou looked up. "We can't just wait for it to finish writing."

Neither of their tones was good.

But this time, no one felt they were fighting for power.

The black booklet snapped shut.

The wind outside suddenly stopped.

The lights in the Safe House flickered twice, and everyone's phones simultaneously received a text message from an unknown number.

[Qinghe Old Archives, the trial begins.]

Gu Xingzhou instinctively checked the time.

On the screen, the date field was becoming blank.

Gu Xingzhou watched the date field on his phone slowly empty out, the back of his hand tensing until it turned white.

This thing didn't intend to stop at the Archives. It wanted to teach everyone to say one phrase: No such person found.