Act 11: Stone Cold Killer

[Part 1: Psychic Surge]

"We've already taken down over a hundred White Shark Association henchmen without a word leaking out. But that Manager Todd hasn't shown up yet, let alone George Joshua." Bailu was getting impatient as she repaired a 9527 gun in her key-cutting workshop.

Her mind was in turmoil; she felt only terror and unease.

--So many people have died, yet the White Shark Association hasn't made a single move. It's as if these high-ranking thugs are just disposable.

Brother Zhao Youde has been telling stories in the streets and alleys, spreading news about the nameless people, but so far no one of high value has stepped forward to stand up for the Zhan Gang. The harassment of Wulong Fortress is like a violent debt collection text message, all bark and no bite—it's just making people anxious and frustrated.

There were only two of them. Thumb Brother's combat skills were basically zero. 9527 had thought this beforehand. Xuanfeng Hu was already dead in Wulong Fortress. The truth couldn't be hidden forever. Rather than waiting for George Joshua to send people to investigate round by round, it would be better to directly raid his lair, blow up his vault, and force him to show himself.

However, Bailu couldn't get on the second cruise ship, and Thumb didn't have a referral letter or VIP card, so getting direct access to the White Shark Association's high-end clubhouse was extremely difficult.

These ships were impregnable, surrounded by reconnaissance yachts, and most importantly, the arms exhibition ship was surrounded by mines. It is likely that George Joshua was afraid of being exposed. As long as the Nameless Alliance carried out a large-scale cleanup, this resilient Immortals could leave by ship and hide in the complex network of waterways.

"Sister-in-law, do you think I should still go to Cruise Ship Two? If I'm not in the stronghold, how long can you hold out? The White Shark Association will definitely send out even more powerful psionicists next." Bailu said this, cleaning the mud and sand off the P320. Seeing the crooked sleeve, she began to feel irritated. "This is troublesome. My brother forged this thing from armor steel. If we want to plate it for correction—it needs to be annealed, but annealing won't make it hard enough."

9527 mumbled, "Go ahead and try, I'm fine."

The fierce battle with Lisa Krausa left her physically and mentally exhausted. Her spirit was not as resilient as her husband's. There were many delicate operations and weight-bearing lifting movements. The repeated heavy loads made her mentally fatigued and increasingly insane.

While she was sleeping, red marks Vita Imprint began to appear on her skin. When Bailu first saw this red demon, she was so frightened that she quickly fed her sister-in-law medicine, but Xiao Qi didn't take it seriously.

Bai Ziqing's Madness Index has remained at A+ for many years. She is used to the periodic outbreaks of Vita Imprint symptoms. These severe allergic reactions do not actually cause illness, but the large patches of erythematous papules make her weak and uncomfortable for a long time.

"I can't fix this thing," Bailu felt utterly useless. "Sister-in-law, I can't fix it. Why don't you take my secondary weapon and use it for now?"

9527 rolled over, half-asleep, and pulled a thick blanket over himself, muttering, "No need, I can use any gun. You just like the Type 92, I'm not changing it anymore—if it can't be fixed, I'll call Thumb to come out with you, hurry up."

"My husband will be able to fix this little toy when I wake up."

"Don't worry. I can handle things in the stronghold."

Without saying a word, Bailu changed into her Flash Butterfly Armor, picked up her gun and club, and prepared to set off, completely covered from head to toe.

In 9527, half-awake and half-asleep, she saw her children and husband playing on a basketball court in the mortal world. She sat quietly by the court, listening to the clanging of metal being hammered.

She slept terribly that night. When she woke up, her back ached, and she felt like she had a minor health problem. She also had a splitting headache that made her feel almost delirious. Her eyes were hard to focus, and her arms were always under her face. Just over an hour later, when Bailu was about to approach the vicinity of the No. 2 cruise ship to gather information, the alarm clock woke Xiao Qi.

She quickly got up, preparing to deal with the upcoming changes. She needed to maintain a state of combat readiness and ensure the safety of the civilians in Wulong Fortress. If Bailu successfully broke through, she needed to immediately contact the generals of the battle group to pinpoint George Joshua's exact location.

Just as she ran to the key-cutting counter to quickly wash her face at the sink—

--An unbelievable scene unfolded.

She looked at herself in the mirror and had never felt so tired. A face that was both strange and familiar appeared in the mirror.

"What's going on?"

There were still red marks from her palms on her face, but her skin looked supple and elastic, and the fine crow's feet at the corners of her eyes had disappeared. Her previously somewhat sagging chin had also become firmer.

She tilted her head slightly and saw that the hair around her ears had become black and shiny. She clearly remembered that the ends of her hair were still a bit rough and yellow, but now it looked like a head of shiny hair that had been nourished by eating black sesame seeds for many years.

She looked several years younger! No! A full ten years younger!

She quickly opened her phone and looked at the selfie she had taken while singing on the rooftop, comparing it to her face in the mirror.

"What's going on?! What's going on?! What's going on?!"

She was terrified and suddenly came to her senses. This was something she couldn't understand, and even found somewhat frightening.

Becoming young again isn't a bad thing, but this sudden change made her uneasy; everything felt so unfamiliar.

--Is this an enemy's Soul Might attack?

Is it a curse? What is its origin? Is it magic?

Is it Lisa Krauser's blood that seeped into my body?

Various speculations made Bai Ziqing's heart tremble. She bit her finger hard until it bled, then searched her backpack for the Spirit Calamity Probe. The contamination index of the Vita Imprint was not increasing. This relieved her. Fortunately, she hadn't become a puppet of the Holy Blood like Xiao Ju, nor had she become a source of infection for the Vita Imprint.

However, the other indicator, the concentration of Spirit Calamity, reached around 70%.

This made 9527's heart, which had just settled down, jump again. This wasn't normal.

--Only when psychic energy is at work, or under special spiritual pressure, will the Spirit Calamity index reach over 50%. If a dozen or so ancient ghosts are having a party and singing rock music in a confined space, the Spirit Calamity index can soar to 100%.

"What the hell?"

Xiao Qi looked at the sofa and noticed something strange.

She had just slept here, and the parts of the sofa that came into contact with her skin were made of soft leather, but now those parts had become rock hard.

Specifically, it becomes brittle and whitish after weathering, and crumbling into small pieces when pinched.

--9527 stared intently, comparing the clothes on her body to confirm that the weathered and aged areas were her neck, arms, and the places where her feet touched.

Two pale, bluish footprints were left on the armrest of the sofa. She poked them with her finger, and a large hole immediately appeared. The fragile leather had turned to powder, completely losing its oil and moisture, and would be blown away by the wind.

WTF

At that very moment, the Spirit Calamity probe emitted a beeping alarm, and the meter suddenly jumped to 100%!

A loud crash followed, and a strange noise came from the sink.

--9527 rushed over to check and found that the plastic cups on the table were intact, but there was shrinkage, and the handles of the cups had finger-shaped indentations.

The soft rubber on the toothbrush turned into yellowish sludge, and two handprints appeared on the sink, with brown rust spots constantly emerging!

Could it be...?

Looking in the mirror again, she saw she looked even younger, as if she were 9527 again! Her features were more defined; she couldn't forget this face—

--This is the smug, proud, and confident look of a young girl, with upturned eyebrows and delicate features. Her two front teeth, which haven't been fixed by the dentist, protrude slightly forward.

"My psychic energy is out of control? Is this... is this my soul power?!"

"No, no, no, no! No, no, no, you have to listen to me!"

Although its spirit is extremely weak and cannot yet break free of its body, seemingly struggling within its cocoon, it is already showing faint signs of breaking free and becoming a butterfly.

Unable to control the domineering spiritual energy within her body, Xiao Qi wiped the blood from her fingertips onto the mirror, intending to use the simplest spiritual medium tools to enhance her Inspiration and clearly see the appearance of the spirit.

In a layer of dark red mist, beneath the hazy mirror, she saw a pair of familiar beastly eyes—

--Her vertical pupils were hidden in her eyes, and they were exactly the same as her husband's "big, bright eyes"!

This part of her essence doesn't belong to her! That's not right! How can this be explained?!

Why did the spirit of Ming De transform into the spiritual characteristics of 9527!?

If a meteor were present at that moment, it could certainly explain this problem.

--This was mentioned before when introducing the basics of spirit communication, the ecology of the Flash Butterfly, and the Chimera bloodline of the calamity beasts.

Both the apostles and the Flash Butterfly possess some characteristics of amniotes. When they give birth to new life and transform Homo sapiens into monsters, they receive a portion of the "child's" essence.

The same applies to mothers; when giving birth to children, they coexist with them for a period of time. Although this period is very, very short, it is the time during which the mother and children become a chimera of flesh and blood.

Therefore, after giving birth, young mothers often feel full of energy and show signs of secondary development, as if they have been reborn. Part of the spiritual essence of 9527 comes from Ming De, which is the essence left behind when the children and Xiao Qi were a blood-and-flesh chimera. Jiang Zheng was born with the eye color and sharp teeth of a feline, which is the most obvious bloodline characteristic.

For the spirit of 9527, after years of recuperation, it had reached perfection in its metamorphosis. The fierce battle with Lisa Krauser awakened Bai Ziqing's spirit's self-protection mechanism, and the languid morpho butterfly was about to emerge from its cocoon. It had slept for far too long, and coupled with the violent psychic energy of this part of the BOSS, it showed signs of losing control.

[Sweet Dreams· Fragrant Dream] has never understood Jiang Xueming's feelings since birth; it has always been out of control.

Xiao Qi's spirit body is the same; this pale pink psionic avatar has a very peculiar structure, unlike the transformation paths of other psionicists.

--People in the pupal stage can use spirit silk. During the cocoon stage, the spirit silk takes the form of a ball of silk threads. During the metamorphosis stage, one can directly see the extended arms and limbs.

However, 9527 can manipulate these three forms of spirits simultaneously. The stages of metamorphosis are a joke to it, and it seems to be able to rejuvenate.

"Rejuvenation?"

9527 initially thought it was his own Madness Index that caused this regression in his psionic stage.

--She had always believed that a volatile temper would affect the spirit, and that she might, like Jason Megan, frequently experience a decline in her strength, especially after giving birth. She felt she had aged several years and that becoming weaker was natural, but she didn't take it to heart.

The special abilities expressed by her currently out-of-control psychic energy might be the answer—it's not that her periodic madness causes her spirit to change shape, but rather that whatever form she desires, the little sprite within her body immediately responds to her wishes!

"Oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no! Now I can't even hold the gun!" Bai Ziqing had just touched the grip of the P320X5.

The engineering plastic parts that her husband had cast by hand immediately became soft, like plastic clay that had been branded with a hot iron. This strange and inexplicable spiritual energy absorbed a portion of its "life force" or "time"!

In just over ten seconds, it had dented several dark dents in Xiao Qi's fingers, making them brittle and hard.

Xiao Qi instinctively reached for the deformed sleeve, and copper-colored rust visibly seeped from the armor steel.

"What am I going to do now! Will everything I touch with these hands age? Will they all die quickly?"

When Xiao Qi looked in the mirror again, she had returned to the age of fifteen or sixteen.

--It seemed that the time stolen from these objects had returned to her.

"My spirit! Listen to me! Don't cause trouble in a place like this! How am I supposed to hold my child after this?!"

[Part ②: I'm really not a Fu Rui fan]

She finally came to her senses and looked at her cuffs.

The clothing around the wrists seemed unaffected, a characteristic Wood Plark mentioned in his theory of psionic energy. The chiral nature of the soul power is released from the palms of the hands in a state of spiritual-physical unity. Releasing psionic energy through the physical hands is often the most powerful and violent.

The method to dispel psychic powers is universal and very simple--

--If you encounter a situation where psychic energy goes out of control, try to balance your own magnetic storm to stop the psychic disturbance. You can try putting your hands together in prayer position. This is like a short circuit, similar to the cathode and anode in a circuit readjusting their potential to make the psychic energy disappear.

I learned this basic knowledge of psionic theory while I was working as a laborer at Xiao Qi front-line base, studying and taking exams at the same time.

She didn't take it to heart at the time, after all, the power of the soul was too far away for passengers. Usually, only one in a million VIP would encounter the terrible situation of the spiritual energy going out of control. However, she also had to thank Professor Wood Plark for his universal teaching materials. Xiao Qi followed this method and put her palms together.

She felt extremely strained, as if an invisible and intangible mischievous child was fighting against her.

She gritted her teeth and tried to clasp her hands together, as if a demon was hiding within her, preventing this devout believer from praying.

At that moment, a commotion arose in the key-cutting workshop. The lights began to flicker and dim. Gusts of evil wind blew in from outside the window, messing up the workshop manager's ledgers. Suddenly, the mirror shattered, and the bloodstains left on the mirror by 9527 became the catalyst for amplifying spiritual energy.

As an extension of a spirit, the mirror's glass began to age, expanding, contracting, and cracking, while Xiao Qi's body grew smaller and smaller.

--If this continues, I'll die! I'll turn into a baby!

Xiao Qi's bitten finger has completely healed, and a layer of fair and delicate skin has grown back. She doesn't know what she has become, she only knows that her vision is getting lower and lower, her body is getting smaller and smaller, and the Madness Index in her mind is also rising rapidly.

"Oh no, no, no! This won't do! If this continues, my husband will go to jail!"

"I don't want my kids to ask a four- or five-year-old for pocket money!"

"Enough! Enough! Enough! Enough! Let me change back!"

With a "smack!"

The faint lightning in her palm finally merged into one, and her body, like wild grass seeing the spring sunshine, sprang up more than fifty centimeters, growing from an eight or nine-year-old child to a thirty-year-old adult in an instant.

The loose-fitting clothes clung tightly to her again; her skin couldn't keep up with her muscle growth, leaving bright red marks on her arms, thighs, and back, like patches of stretch marks.

Xiao Qi was panting heavily, covered in cold sweat, and only one step away from death.

If it had been just a few minutes later, if it had been even a little later, this eerie psychic energy would have killed her.

--She will become a baby, back to the form she was in the womb. The moment her respiratory system returns to the amniotic fluid circulation, she will suffocate and die. Even if none of these things can kill her, without her mother's protection, bacteria and viruses can kill her the moment her immune system collapses.

The pistol slide on the workbench suddenly broke in two. The rusty P320 slide exploded, seemingly caused by the internal stress and heat generated by the reduction reaction. In the instant the rust retreated back into the slide, as if time had reversed, the basic structure of the steel was destroyed.

The same goes for the washbasin and the mirror; even the dander that fell from the sofa became soft and shiny again.

Everything associated with "rejuvenation" is an object whose time has been stolen, as if it has been struck by knives, axes, or guns, either cracking or shattering, never to return to its original state.

It was a long time before 9527 dared to separate her hands. Her fingernails were "half-dead." These keratin proteins had died from birth. They grew out and immediately fell off, all ending up in the washbasin. Apart from some remaining on Xiao Qi's fingers, there were more than twenty fingernails in the basin, each three or four centimeters long.

Her hair was the same; in order to fight to the death against the powerful enemy of the White Shark Association, she had cut off a portion of her hair before arriving at Lieyang Fort, so at this moment, the hair on her head was in sections.

It turns black and shiny at times, then becomes softer in the next segment. The part near the hair follicle almost becomes the fine hair of infancy. Finally, when it returns to its normal shape, some dark yellowish-brown hairs grow back, almost reaching the floor.

Panting heavily, Xiao Qi cut off the excess hair with a single stroke. She became even weaker, as if her body needed energy. So she took her phone and went to the food stall on the first floor of the walled city to rest for a while.

Right now, at this very moment--

--The Brown Bear also sensed the powerful psionic tide.

He sat outside the wonton shop at a small table, called the owner over for questioning, and tried to find out the basic situation of Wulong Fortress.

On 9527, as he walked through the food stalls and alleys, he spotted the cannibal among the vast number of customers.

Her eyes suddenly turned into vertical pupils, like those of a wild beast, just like Jiang Xueming's.

Almost without hesitation, she subconsciously uttered Hunwei's true name.

"[Stone Cold Killer]!"

A seductive catwoman with a curvaceous figure emerged from 9527's body.

Its long tail circled around Xiao Qi's arm again and again, its soft paw pads resting on Xiao Qi's waist, its entire spirit body leaning forward as if it were about to pounce at any moment.

It was wrapped in a black leather coat, its bright green eyes hidden behind a thin veil, and its ears perked up, listening to the conversations of the diners passing by, twitching from time to time.

Its lips and teeth were slightly parted, and there was a bit of lipstick that looked like blood in the middle of the cat's split mouth. Its lips were slightly upturned, and you could see the barbs on its tongue.

Its arms are gloved with long gloves, also made of tight-fitting leather, and there are heart-shaped Fool's Gold decorations on the palms and backs of its hands.

Over the leather jacket, he wore a motorcycle jacket with an anonymous titanium-plated logo, like a graffiti mark in hip-hop culture. His ample bust, almost bursting out, was covered by a clump of darker pink hair, revealing only his unfathomable ambition.

It hunched over slightly, with a pair of spiked high-heeled boots hanging from its arms—it didn't want to wear shoes when stepping on its main body, afraid of hurting Xiao Qi.

SCK ([Stone Cold Killer]) spoke--

--The voice was high-pitched, as bright as a nightingale's, with an affected vibrato.

"I see you!~ There's a bad smell!"

I want to eat fish!