The Swift Black Dot

Three enormous virtual screens hung before them. The second and third were black.

The first virtual screen displayed surveillance footage from a few minutes earlier at United Association headquarters.

The footage showed a bird's-eye view.

The guards at the entrance were chatting with each other.

Along the road outside the gate, flowerbeds laden with blooms stretched on either side, their plants swaying in the breeze.

For the first few seconds of the footage, everything was quiet and peaceful. Nothing happened.

The time displayed in the lower-right corner ticked along normally.

Then, in an instant, everything changed.

Minister Jiang was the first to notice that something was wrong with the footage.

He saw the image freeze, as if the screen had gotten stuck.

The guards at the entrance were like robots that had lost power. They abruptly froze in their previous poses, mouths open mid-conversation, without making another move.

The flowers and plants swaying in the breeze on either side of the road also stopped moving, frozen in place as the wind bent them.

Even the time ticking in the lower-right corner suddenly stopped.

"What... happened?"

"The footage froze!"

"How is that possible? We're at United Association headquarters. The signal can't be this bad!"

Just as the three of them were puzzling over it...

Everything suddenly changed!

First came the sound.

Thud!

Thud!

Thud-thud-thud-thud-thud-thud!!

A rapid series of heavy footfalls thundered through the surveillance footage, almost blending into a single sound.

The continuous bursts of sound seemed to press together, creating a strangely grating noise.

Then came...

BOOM!!

While everything else in the footage remained frozen, someone slammed through the gate of United Association headquarters!

As the metal gate flew away, a Black Shadow shot across the surveillance screen and vanished in an instant, like a perfectly straight black line racing