Identity

This character's Exclusive Cultivation System was—"Social Superstar System."

The core rule of the "Social Superstar System" was: whenever you formed cooperative relationships with more superhuman individuals, you could obtain rewards through the "Exclusive Cultivation System."

Current progress—Cultivation Mission One: Form a friendly cooperative relationship with one Esper, regardless of whether they were on the side of justice or evil. Reward: 1 Attribute Point.

Ji Minghuan quickly scanned the text on the panel, his eyes lighting up. As he processed the new information, he thought, Isn't this perfect?

This mechanism suited him perfectly. If he could not use the Welfare Home clue to break through the current situation and find traces left behind by Instructor and the others, then he would have to get closer to those Espers and see whether he could pry information about that laboratory out of them. At that point, his actions would complement the Character Development System.

It was getting late, so he pressed the power button and turned on his phone.

At the Welfare Home, he had only eaten cafeteria food. He had never ordered takeout before, nor had he been entitled to. After carefully browsing the app, he finally ordered an Italian Dinner—spaghetti for the main course and Cream of Potato Soup to drink.

After confirming that the restaurant had accepted the order, he glanced at the clock on the wall. It was 8:20 p.m.

He thought, If there's a way to confirm the real-time local time in the laboratory's time zone, I might be able to use the time difference to determine its approximate location on the map.

Unfortunately... Ji Minghuan had lived a life without daylight in the laboratory. He could not even see the sky, much less use the light outside to judge the local time. Even more despairing was the fact that there had not been any clock-like devices in the Imprisonment Room.

During the first half month, Ji Minghuan had asked Instructor to hang a pendulum clock on the wall of the Imprisonment Room. He said that would let him know the time and sleep at regular hours, ensuring that his schedule would not fall into chaos. The reason he had wanted a pendulum clock instead of an ordinary clock was that he found the Imprisonment Room too quiet. If the swinging pendulum could make some noise, he would not feel quite so depressed.

It was difficult not to develop depressive feelings after spending a long time in an environment as silent as a vacuum. At times like that, even a little noise was an immense luxury to him.

Unfortunately, Instructor had not agreed to his request. After that, he had never made another futile attempt.

If the researchers in the laboratory had required him to eat three full meals at fixed times every day, he could at least have judged whether it was morning or night from when others brought him food. But reality was cruel. Nearly every day, when he woke up and opened his eyes, he would find an extra set of bowls, chopsticks, and food in the Imprisonment Room.

As a result, he could not determine morning, noon, or night from the times the experimenters stuffed food into his room either.

While lying in bed and waiting for his takeout to arrive, Ji Minghuan rested both hands behind his head and stared blankly at the ceiling. Then he suddenly thought of the accident that had happened to Gu Wenyu's mother.

He opened a video app on his phone to learn about the only publicly known member of the Esper organization, Rainbow Wing.

"Fan Dongqing." He was currently the only Rainbow Wing member whose identity had been revealed to the world.

The reason he could be an exception within such an organization was that his ability was far too flamboyant. Every appearance he made came with an extraordinarily grand spectacle. There was no way to hide it, so revealing his identity had been unavoidable.

Fan Dongqing had first appeared before the world when a meteor from outer space had been about to strike Li Capital.

Back then, he had used his ability, "Azure Wrath Boat," to intercept the meteor in midair, saving the city from disaster.

Ji Minghuan searched keywords such as "meteor" and "Rainbow Wing," then opened a video recording footage from that time.

A sudden sonic boom rang through the Night Sky. Trailing a streak of fire, the meteor tore through the Sky Curtain and plunged toward the city. The heat generated by its rapid descent had turned it into a gigantic fireball. As people stared at the meteor that was about to crash into the city, hoarse cries rose one after another, drowning out all sound in Li Jing Square.

Just then, a gigantic dragon boat appeared in one corner of the Night Sky, floating slowly beneath the pitch-black Sky Curtain.

The reporter zoomed in on the dragon boat. Lanterns and clappers hung from it, while burly men in ancient robes rowed from front to back. Their oars twisted through the air with sharp, violent cracks, while the lanterns radiated a thick Blood Red glow, casting down like a shadow that blotted out the sky.

As the oars churned through the air, the clappers attached to the dragon boat's surface opened and shut, crackling loudly. The lanterns swayed with a rushing hum, the burly men's oars split the air, and the clappers beat out a cheerful, rhythmic cadence. A string of chaotic sounds blended together with uncanny harmony, gathering into a majestic symphony that resounded above the capital and spread in every direction.

After that, perhaps because the scene had become too intense, the recording equipment suffered electromagnetic interference and lost its signal. The video showed nothing but flickering black-and-white static, with hoarse bursts of noise emerging from time to time.

No matter what, from that day onward, Fan Dongqing became the first Rainbow Wing member in the world to publicly reveal both his identity and ability. However, the remaining eleven members still remained behind the scenes—perhaps only the highest-ranking figures in the United Nations had the right to know who they were.

After watching the video, Ji Minghuan silently turned off his phone.

He thought, If I want to know who killed Gu Wenyu's mother, I'll have to find a way into Rainbow Wing and become one of them. Or I could take another route and become a top politician—but that path is far too unrealistic. No need to consider it.

With nothing better to do, Ji Minghuan followed his memories and found the "mask" Gu Wenyu had hidden in a corner of the room, along with a black long trench coat.

According to the Game Character setting, Gu Wenyu was an out-and-out Chūnibyō. He had all the thoughts an adolescent boy should have, but hid them deeply from others. In fact, even before awakening his ability, he had spent several years meticulously designing his own "Battle Suit" and mask.

Yet in the month after awakening his ability, perhaps because he still had not fully mastered it, Gu Wenyu had never gotten the chance to appear in those clothes.

"The workmanship is so crude. I could do better." Ji Minghuan clicked his tongue as he looked at the pitch-black mask in his hand. The eye sockets were Blood Red, while everything else was so dark he could barely make out anything. He put the mask and trench coat away at the bottom of the wardrobe. "I'll keep them for now... They might come in handy someday."

Before he knew it, the clock's hour hand had moved to ten at night. After eating dinner, Ji Minghuan casually took out the trash bags from both the room and the Living Room, then showered and lay down on the bed.

Gu Qiye had said he had something to do tonight and would not be coming back to cook, but Ji Minghuan had not expected him to still be out this late.

Since he had nothing else to do, Ji Minghuan picked up the remote, turned on the television in his room, and switched to a news channel.

The host was reporting a news story. An Esper criminal codenamed "Ghost Bell" had appeared in Li Jing City and publicly announced his criminal manifesto through the media. Using a deep metallic voice altered by a Voice Changer, he laid out his plan and boasted that if the Esper Association had any guts, they should send Rainbow Wing to deal with him.

But provoking them was one thing. The problem was, when would Rainbow Wing have the time? Rainbow Wing was the world's universally recognized strongest Esper organization. They only appeared in moments of existential crisis and would never waste their time on a lone Esper criminal.

Unless that criminal was powerful enough to massacre an entire city by himself, he would not even be worthy of their attention.

Ji Minghuan drank hot water as he watched television, and drowsiness gradually overtook him.

Thinking about how his consciousness would return to that Imprisonment Room the moment he fell asleep gave him a headache.

But when he remembered Instructor's promise that he would see Kong Youling tomorrow, he suddenly felt much more at ease and obediently lay down on the bed.

However, he had barely closed his eyes when a faint rustling sound suddenly came from the first floor of the house.

Someone had opened the door, and they were moving urgently. An Esper's hearing was far sharper than an ordinary person's, and Ji Minghuan could tell.

He slowly sat up in bed. Without turning on the light, he extended the Restraint Band into the darkness and laid it against the floor.

He had already tested the skill "Restraint Belt Senses" earlier and confirmed that the senses generated by the skill could indeed pass through barriers to observe what lay beyond them. Naturally, the floor counted as a barrier too.

Thus, as the Restraint Band touched the floor, it gradually replaced Ji Minghuan's own senses. His hearing and vision seeped through the wooden floor like water, flowing downward.

Then, he clearly saw the scene on the first floor.

In the darkness, a man wearing a blue-and-cyan metallic uniform sat leaning against the wall. He removed his helmet, revealing a pale face, then set the helmet on the ground and raised a hand to cover the deep gash in his neck. Blood flowed down like a curtain, faintly staining his shoulder armor red.

Through the Restraint Belt Senses, Ji Minghuan quietly observed the man's face. Then he raised an eyebrow with interest.

So it's you... he thought.

There was no doubt that the young man before him was Gu Qiye. Otherwise, there was no explanation for why he had a key to the house.

The crucial point now was the metallic uniform he wore, along with the helmet on the ground.

They were exactly identical to the appearance of someone Ji Minghuan had seen on television today.

And that Esper's codename...

—was "Blue Arc."

The very Esper Ji Minghuan had seen on television during the day, whose ability was to control lightning.