50: Chapter 50 The First Knock

Gu Xingzhou did not look for Shen Qinghe directly, nor did he go to intercept Zhao Ye or Bai Ya.

He was very clear that if so-called contact began with arrests, tailing, or interrogation, there would be no second sentence. The other side had already demonstrated capabilities in information masking, anomaly containment, and rapid response; rashly treating them like an ordinary non-governmental organization would only turn the door into a wall.

Therefore, he chose a more restrained approach.

In a small, abandoned building in the south of the city where low-level Anomaly traces had once appeared and were later contained by Torch, peace had returned to the scene, leaving only a scorched mark in the corner from the firelight. Gu Xingzhou placed a sealed file bag there, without arranging any arrests or setting up snipers, leaving only ordinary surveillance and an extraction team in the distance.

There were three sets of Materials in the file bag.

Jiangbei Paper Sedan Chair incident report.

Summary of life status anomalies in overseas laboratories.

Comparative analysis of recent Anomaly disposals in Qinghe.

On the last page, Gu Xingzhou had handwritten a few lines.

"We know someone in Qinghe is handling these matters."

"We do not want to push ordinary people in front of Anomalies."

"If you are willing to talk, please leave a signal."

He did not write Gray Fire Organization, nor did he write Xinhuo Council. The former was just an official temporary code name, and the latter had not been confirmed by them. He only added one sentence at the end: "We have heard the word 'Torch', but we do not know what it represents."

Eleven minutes after the file bag was placed, the Grey Net captured it.

Lu Chen sat in his rental apartment, and the Xin Huo Interface automatically projected the scene. Zero unfolded the contents of the file bag page by page—the Jiangbei Paper Sedan Chair, the overseas laboratories, the Qinghe comparison—each set of data was incomplete, yet it was clear that the authorities had begun to piece the fragments together.

"They have knocked on the door," Lu Chen said.

Zero asked: "Shall I destroy it?"

"No need."

If it had been a probe left by the Longevity Society, he would have directly burned the clues away with Purifying Flame. But the authorities were not the Old Object black market, nor were they an Anomaly organization. The order of reality still needed to be maintained by them, and ordinary people could not rely entirely on the Xinhuo Council. In the future, if Anomalies continued to spread, the authorities and Torch would sooner or later have to draw a boundary.

The only problem was that this boundary could not be written unilaterally by the authorities.

After reading what Gu Xingzhou had left behind, Lu Chen was silent for a moment, then asked Zero to pull up the comparison map of Qinghe and Jiangbei. The Paper Sedan Chair traces in Jiangbei were still spreading, like a thin red line crawling outward along the Old Object Chain. The Anomaly points in Qinghe, however, were suppressed by the Grey Net and Torch markers, and their spread was significantly slower.

Spark allowed Qinghe to have rapid response, Purifying Flame allowed Anomalies to be contained, and the Xin Huo Interface allowed members to receive tasks in real-time. But these things could not be made public for official research, nor could they be handed over to become their tools.

Lu Chen raised his hand and left a trail of fire beside the file bag.

It was not a large-scale Purifying Flame, nor was it a falling Spark, but just a stable and clear Torch marker. In the surveillance footage, that spot of firelight seemed to emerge from the air, briefly illuminating the seal of the file bag.

Subsequently, a line of text slowly appeared on the paper.

"Anomalies belong to Torch for containment."

"Ordinary people belong to you for protection."

"Do not put Anomalies among the crowd."

"Those who cross the boundary, bear the consequences."

When Gu Xingzhou received the surveillance playback, no one in the office spoke.

His colleague looked at those words, their Adam's apple moving.

"Is this a response?"

Gu Xingzhou looked at it for a long time, then nodded.

"It is a response, and it is also a boundary."

"Can they talk?"

"Yes," Gu Xingzhou froze the image on that trail of fire, "but they do not accept orders, nor do they accept being co-opted."

The colleague whispered: "The higher-ups may not like this."

Gu Xingzhou smiled bitterly: "Whether the higher-ups like it or not, the Jiangbei Paper Sedan Chair is still carrying people away."

This sentence made the office quiet again.

On the other side, in Xinhuo Hall, Lu Chen did not relax because of this response. The first knock was just the beginning. The authorities would be cautious, and they would probe; they would want to cooperate, and they would want to know where Torch came from. The Longevity Society would exploit these gaps, and the black market would turn rumors into prices.

He opened the backend and added new items to the subsequent rules.

"[Official contact principle: Limited communication.]"

"[Do not expose the Core of the Torch.]"

"[Do not hand over contained objects.]"

"[Do not accept investigation of member identities.]"

"[Anomaly intelligence can be exchanged, protection of ordinary people can be collaborated on.]"

Zero finished recording.

Deep in the Grey Net, the traces of the Jiangbei Paper Sedan Chair were still flickering. It had not entered Qinghe, but it was like a line, reminding Lu Chen that Anomalies would not stay outside one city forever.

The Spark of official members could cover the entire city of Qinghe.

After reaching a high rank, it could cover the province.

Further away, currently only Lu Chen could reach.

He looked at that line and suddenly understood that the Xinhuo Council would sooner or later walk out of Qinghe. Not to expand power, but because Anomalies were already expanding. If the fire did not extend outward, the darkness would flow in by itself.

The first official signal had been left.

The first Spark had also fallen into reality.

Outside Qinghe, someone was waiting for a response.

Lu Chen turned off the Xin Huo Interface, leaving only the Grey Net map quietly glowing in the darkness.

The fire had not yet left the city.

But the road had already been lit up.

This response was short, but clearer than a long negotiation.

Gu Xingzhou made a paper copy of it and placed it on the top layer of the special task force's files. He did not immediately declare "contact successful" to his superiors, because this could not yet be counted as a success. Torch had only acknowledged that communication was possible, while drawing a very hard boundary. Anomalies belonged to them for containment, and ordinary people belonged to the authorities for protection. The two sentences sounded like a division of labor, but in reality, they also sounded like a warning: Do not stick your hands into the containment system, and do not try to use ordinary people to probe Anomalies.

He understood this toughness.

If all low-casualty incidents in Qinghe stemmed from this organization, then they indeed had the qualifications to be tough. The real question was whether the authorities could accept an order-maintaining force that was not under their control, but was clearly more effective in the field of Anomalies.

The answer would not be pleasant for the time being.

But at least, this door had not been shut tight.

Gu Xingzhou watched that trail of fire disappear, and in his heart, he was instead more certain of one thing. The other side had not evaded the official gaze, nor were they in a hurry to show their power. They simply placed the rules there, letting the authorities choose for themselves whether to abide by them. This attitude was more like that of a true order-maintaining organization than any threat.

He closed the playback and sealed the file bag again. The next time they knocked on the door, what the authorities brought out could not just be questions; it would also need to have sufficient sincerity and boundaries. Otherwise, that door, which had just revealed a crack, would close again.