Spring City was shaken by an earthquake. No, that wasn't quite right. The whole damn ground had flipped over!
With President Qiu Wanshan away, Vice President Mo Fang had his hands full. He and his team had already rushed to three sites, and the scenes were much the same: earth and stone had heaved upward, carving deep, long trenches. Sections of scorched or split tree roots often lay exposed, and other vegetation had been caught up in it too.
In the more fragile limestone-cave areas, entire caverns had collapsed, causing casualties.
The city proper hadn't fared too badly. Outside the city, things were reportedly much worse.
"Most likely an aberration phenomenon. Some rare aberrant plant has spread into the city. Or Parasitic Bacteria might be directing it, like what happened with the Hundred Peaks Monarch."
That was the preliminary assessment from the experts on-site.
Mo Fang gave no opinion. He turned to the subordinate compiling the reports. "Can we find where it started?"
"Not yet, but the incidents follow a clear sequence. The later ones are farther east."
"East?"
Mo Fang pulled up surveillance footage from the more open outskirts. Dust billowed, the ground split, and thick roots thrashed like startled pythons as they retreated swiftly eastward. Before long, they snapped and crumbled. Some even burned fiercely.
"Why are they burning?"
No one answered Mo Fang's latest question.
He shook his head. The temperature was strange today too. It was winter, and morning at that. Why was the sun so fierce? Even on a plateau, this was ridiculous!
He narrowed his eyes at the Sun Wheel slowly climbing the eastern sky, then heard another report from his subordinate: "The General Forum wants every city branch to submit a summary of the aberrant tree-root incidents."
"Aberrant tree roots? They've already classified