"A murder took place at Coal Mine Field No. 13 in the Barrier Field District. Two foremen and the site manager were killed, and everything of value was looted."
The division head, who was carefully examining a master-crafted pocket watch from the West District, looked up impatiently at the secretary who had interrupted his midday break.
"If this is all, you can start preparing to hand over your work to Personnel."
The secretary lowered her head uneasily.
"According to the security staff over there, the culprit was most likely Miss Feng, who escaped, along with an experimental subject from the No. 7 Test Site."
"So what? Did the site security catch them?"
"No, but they suspect Miss Feng may have fled with the experimental subject to the territory of those failures."
At that, the division head's irritation eased somewhat. He set down the precious pocket watch.
"That Inspector Tian has closer ties to those failures. He'll have thought of this already. We pay so much in taxes to support those officers. It's about time they did some work."
"Following your instructions, we also requested access to the tracking devices from the manager."
The division head immediately sat up straight. His expression turned serious, and his back instinctively stiffened.
"What did the manager say?"
"Here is his approval notice."
The secretary quickly stepped forward and handed the division head an envelope.
He opened it and read the notice. His expression turned somewhat sour, then somewhat relieved. In the end, he took a deep breath and said in a low voice,
"Get Bai Qiulin over here."
Soon, a thin young man in a wrinkled shirt and slacks, with a disheveled, languid air about him, entered the division head's private lounge.
The division head made no effort to hide his dislike as he looked at the young man. With a stony expression, he slapped another sheet of paper from the envelope onto his desk.
"This is the manager's transfer order. From now on, you're entirely responsible for the matter of Feng Zi's escape."
Bai Qiulin scratched his messy hair, picked up the transfer order carelessly, and slipped it into his pocket without even glancing at it.
"Red shirt with white socks? Your taste is a little questionable, Division Head."
"Shut up! You're only a commissioner! Watch how you speak to your superior!"
"Sorry, sorry, esteemed Division Head. I sincerely recommend that you work on your sense of style."
He gave a whistle and left without looking back, leaving the division head red-faced and furious, with nowhere to vent his anger. He pounded the desk twice.
The secretary tactfully poured a cup of tea and set it in front of the division head.
"Is the manager still not planning to formally take over the branch's affairs?" the secretary asked quietly.
The division head picked up his tea. His anger had come and gone quickly—or rather, he had been putting on a show for that commissioner.
"The Sunlight Council has had an empty seat among its senior members for a long time. The Council plans to fill it officially on the day of this year's Festival of Radiance. The seat was originally meant for Feng Zi once she arrived, but that girl had to go and pick a fight with the entire city, completely unaware of her own limits."
"Since she's both stupid and crippled, the Council has plenty of other options. The manager is also very interested in the seat. Otherwise, why would he have avoided the company ever since he came to Sun City, instead spending so much time with those councilors and factory owners?"
The secretary hesitated, but still asked,
"If the manager becomes a senior councilor, then what about Commissioner Bai, who came with him—"
The division head narrowed his eyes and took hold of the secretary's fair fingers. With the same intense focus he had used when examining the pocket watch, he began toying with them.
The secretary obediently knelt beside him, letting him toy with the hand that had once danced across black and white piano keys.
"Don't worry. I had people at headquarters look into this Bai fellow long ago. Before he was assigned to the branch, he was an unknown researcher with no connections or background. After the manager brought him to Sun City, he left him alone at the company and never paid him any mind, let alone assigned him any specific duties."
"Now he's deliberately handed him that experimental subject case, giving him such a thankless task. It's obvious he's very displeased with him."
The division head slowly lowered the secretary's slender, fair hand to his lap. His foot, clad in the white sock that had been mocked, came to rest on her head.
The thrill of looking down on her and humiliating her without restraint lifted his spirits.
He sneered.
"Let him handle it. Let him handle all of it. I want to see what he does with such a thorny mess, one big enough to bring the whole sky down!"
In the shabby clinic, Li Wei sat on a little stool, bored out of his mind, listening to the priest he had met that morning explain the Church's doctrines. The priest wore a black robe and a Starlight Cross pendant around his neck.
"Twilight isn't a specific god. In this age, when everyone relies on science just to survive underground, even the most foolish wouldn't entrust their hopes to something so illusory."
"Natural laws have fallen into disorder. Humanity paid a terrible price to flee the surface and build a system underground that seems much like the one we had before, just so we could survive. But this clearly can't last."
"No one knows how much longer we can endure in this nature maintained by human effort. So, in Year 1 of the New Era, the great authority on neuroscience and psychiatry, Mr. Chen Pingyi, founded the Twilight Church and became its first pope."
"Twilight—the last ray of sunlight at dusk. The first pope founded the Church to keep despair and pessimism from taking hold in the underground city. He advocated preserving some of a person's brain nerves after death, using biological principles to maintain their most basic biological activity."
"Once the neural networks had grown large enough, they could create a world within consciousness. When the real world reached its final destruction and living beings were plunged into darkness, Twilight would be activated, and people's minds would be reborn in another form."
"In that world, there would be no poverty, hunger, or inequality. Everyone would have resources to spare. Their consciousness would enter Eden, while in reality, the neural thoughts of living beings would also continue."
"That is Twilight."
The white-haired priest spoke earnestly, but he didn't neglect the patient in front of him, whose arm had been scalded.
Li Wei glanced out the window at the clouds gradually darkening and casually asked,
"What positive effect does your faith have on the present world? If everyone's counting on humanity's eventual extinction and entering an illusory Eden, who would still want to live? They might as well go on a spree of killing and looting, then die and keep enjoying themselves somewhere else without consequences."
"What people do in the present world affects their lives in Twilight."
The priest finished treating the patient's burn, then looked at Li Wei and pointed to his own head.
"Good and evil, right and wrong—these things might fool anyone else, but they can never fool you. The moment a person's nerves are preserved, their memories have already formed a general judgment of their life. Twilight will use that to determine their form and circumstances in the spiritual world. Good people and bad people will have different appearances, jobs, and families. The most wicked will even be reduced to beasts."
As he spoke, he took a small card from his pocket and handed it to Li Wei.
"We don't seek to grow our congregation. But if you're interested in the Twilight that awaits us, you can come to the Church anytime to sign the Death Burial Treaty. Twilight won't interfere with your life, but we're willing to preserve your body and nerves properly."
"I've chatted with you this long because you have a good voice and a good look. The Church is preparing for the Festival of Radiance and putting together a choir. You could give it a try. If you're chosen, you can accompany the Bishop into the White Tower on the day of the festival and spread the word about Twilight to those important people. It's a rare opportunity many people dream of."
After handing over the card and treating his last patient of the day, the priest ushered Li Wei out, closed up the clinic, and headed straight out of the Border Market.
The residents of the Border Market clearly respected him. Even the children who had returned home after school would crowd around him.
Li Wei glanced at the card in his hand. It bore only one address.
[No. 18, Twilight Church, Labor District 2, Afterglow District]
He shrugged. Pinning the card with a finger, he flicked it lightly, and it spun away into the distance.
Not only could he not die, but even if he could, he had no interest in a church like this.
Its doctrine did encourage people to be good, but it would also turn more people into cattle who didn't know how to resist or question.
Li Wei had no ill will toward the Church and no interest in it. He had only wanted to see if he could trigger some kind of quest by interacting with the strange priest.
But clearly, he'd gotten nothing out of it.
Just as he was about to turn around and find a snack shop to grab a bite, Feng Zi found him, her expression downcast.
"We have to leave as soon as possible."
Before you continue