The metal cover over the ventilation shaft was still raised, and cold air rushed upward. Ye Mo crouched beside it, feeling along the wall inch by inch, faint vibrations traveling through his fingertips.
He did not rush inside. Instead, he closed his eyes and activated Thermal Vision. In his vision, one area in the overhead cavity was colder, as though it had been deliberately cooled. Its outline was small, just large enough to hold a compact mechanical device.
Just as I thought, he said to himself.
Emma Frost leaned against the corner of the corridor, breathing softly. She said nothing, but her mind was already ready to receive instructions.
Ye Mo sent a message through Telepathy: Three o'clock, in the ceiling cavity. Not a living person-an automated sentry. Its signal frequency matches the tracker fragments from earlier.
Their new ally took an EMP interference grenade from behind his waist and lowered his voice. "Hit the receiver?"
Ye Mo nodded. "Keep the angle below fifteen degrees. Don't touch the main control line. It might have a self-destruct."
Their new ally crouched, fitted the interference grenade into the launcher, and gently chambered it. The click was very faint, like a fingernail scraping a plastic casing.
Ye Mo raised his hand, three fingers suspended in the air. Three seconds later, he sharply chopped downward.
The interference grenade shot out, skimming along the base of the wall before suddenly bursting into blue light near the cavity's entrance. There was no loud explosion, only a brief "beep"-like a digital watch's last sound before its battery died.
The device in the ceiling instantly lost its connection, and the corresponding red dot on the surveillance screen went dark.
"Clear." Their new ally put away the launcher. "But they'll definitely know we tampered with it."
"I never planned to hide it." Ye Mo stood. "They want a 'weakness.' We'll let them see all they want."
With that, he turned toward the electrical distribution box and opened its casing, deliberately making the ammeter needle jump violently twice before quickly lowering the power output to simulate a system reboot.
Emma Frost immediately understood his intent. She closed her eyes and extended her psychic power, projecting a blurry image into the middle of the corridor-Ye Mo bending over to inspect the wiring, his back to the ventilation shaft.
It was fake, but convincing enough.
Less than a minute later, a faint scraping came from a side duct. Three figures crawled out of the hidden passage, their movements perfectly coordinated. Their equipment matched the previous group's: anti-mutant pulsers, tactical goggles, and silent combat boots.
The leader raised his weapon and aimed at the illusion.
"Now," Ye Mo said quietly.
Emma Frost instantly cut off the illusion as their new ally pressed the remote button. The miniature electromagnetic mines planted at the passage junction detonated simultaneously. An invisible ripple swept outward, cutting off the enemy's communications link outright.
The three-person squad faltered, clearly losing the rhythm of their commands.
Ye Mo seized that fraction-of-a-second opening and activated Regenerative Phasing, passing straight through the wall at a blind spot and appearing behind the leader. Before the man could react, a knife-hand strike hit the side of his neck, and he crumpled on the spot.
The remaining two tried to fight back, but Emma Frost had already switched to Diamond Form and charged straight into the pulse waves. The blasts crackled against her body, but she did not retreat a single step. She slammed into one man, caught his throat, and flipped him to the ground. He hit hard and did not get up again.
The last man turned to flee, but their new ally was already waiting at the exit. He kicked the outside of the man's knee, and the instant the man dropped to his knees, he twisted his arm back and pinned him facedown against the floor.
"You..." The man struggled to raise his head. "You're not an ordinary mutant organization at all!"
"You're half right." Ye Mo walked over, crouched, and pulled off his tactical terminal. "We're not ordinary, but we're not what you think we are, either."
The terminal screen was still flashing, displaying connection requests from an encrypted channel. Ye Mo plugged in a decoder and pulled up their operational log a few seconds later.
"Just as I thought." He sneered. "Before every attack, they have to confirm whether the target is still alive. Like checking a corpse."
Emma Frost came over and glanced at the screen. "They're testing our response patterns."
"More than that." Ye Mo pointed to an entry. "Look at this timestamp. Every attack is seven minutes apart, with a margin of no more than three seconds. That's not tactical discipline. It's programmed control."
Their new ally leaned closer. "Meaning... an AI is coordinating things behind the scenes?"
"More or less." Ye Mo shut off the terminal. "They're using machines to command people and evade Telepathy detection. The people are just execution units. The real brain is operating remotely."
Emma Frost frowned. "Then what we just fought were actually puppets controlled by robots?"
"Flesh-and-blood puppets," Ye Mo corrected. "Their minds are still their own, but signals suppress their behavior, turning them into marionettes."
He stood and tossed the terminal to their new ally. "Take it apart and extract the signal source's characteristics. I want to know when they're coming next."
The three returned to the control area, and Ye Mo brought up all the combat data. Replays of the three encounters ran side by side on the screen: thermal trails, Telepathy residue, and EMP interference coverage.
He marked key points as he watched.
"The first time, they located us through fluctuations in the current." He pointed to the first clip. "The second time, they used a mechanical sentry for remote surveillance." He switched to the second clip. "The third time, they sent a human squad to test our reaction speed."
Emma Frost stared at the footage. "They're escalating every time."
"But they have one thing in common." Ye Mo enlarged the footage from 0.7 seconds before the third fight. "Before any of them attacks, their muscles contract for 0.3 seconds first. That's biological instinct. They can't avoid it."
Understanding dawned on their new ally. "So if we nail that rhythm, we can move half a beat ahead?"
"Right." Ye Mo drew a timeline on the tactical screen. "I call it the 'prediction window.' Every attack has a tell. Even with machine-controlled people, their physical reactions are slower than command transmission."
He turned to the two of them. "When you encounter troops like these in the future, remember three steps: first, use feints to make them reveal their rhythm; second, interrupt their attack chain the instant their muscles contract; third, use the chaos to strike their command node."
Emma Frost asked, "What if they switch to a faster signal?"
"Then we force them to make a mistake." Ye Mo sneered. "The faster the machine, the more it fears the unexpected. All we need is one unplanned variable, and the system will recalibrate. That's our opening."
Their new ally grinned. "Sounds like exploiting a bug in a game."
"That's exactly what it is." Ye Mo opened the training module. "In real combat, whoever controls the rhythm first wins."
He activated the simulation system and set the enemy to specialized troops mode. The three took their positions and waited for the ambush to begin.
The instant the alarm sounded, Emma Frost released an illusion, their new ally anticipated the EMP deployment trajectory, and Ye Mo watched the rhythm from the center.
The enemies appeared. The moment they began raising their guns, their new ally detonated the electromagnetic mines. Emma Frost simultaneously surged forward to block psychic interference, while Ye Mo phased through the wall, circled behind, and subdued the leader.
The entire process took two seconds, with zero errors.
"We did it." Their new ally laughed breathlessly. "This time, we didn't even get stuck on cooldown."
"Because you stopped waiting for orders." Ye Mo deactivated his ability. "You learned to anticipate instead."
He walked to the main console and brought up the global signal map. The old Hellfire frequency band was still flashing, but its activity had decreased.
"They've realized we saw through their routine." Emma Frost stood beside him. "They'll change tactics next."
"Of course." Ye Mo tapped his fingers on the desk in a steady rhythm. "But as long as they keep using people, there'll always be an opening."
Their new ally leaned by the door, checking his exoskeleton's status. "I'm starting to think fighting battles like this is a lot more interesting than fighting one-on-one."
"Because you finally don't have to shoulder everything alone." Ye Mo glanced at him.
The communicator suddenly beeped twice.
It was data sent back from the terminal being dismantled. A line appeared on the screen: Peak signal delay: 0.3 seconds. Source points to an abandoned radar station on the East Coast.
Ye Mo stared at the line without moving.
Emma Frost asked softly, "Are we going?"
He shook his head. "No. Let them think we're preparing to leave."
He switched on the spoofed-signal generator, entered a set of false coordinates, and set it to activate automatically eight hours later.
Their new ally understood. "Keep up the act?"
"Until they throw themselves into disarray." Ye Mo sat back in his chair, his fingers still tapping the desk.
Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap.
Seven taps, exactly matching the earlier electrical pulses.
Emma Frost looked at him. "You still remember every rhythm."
"I don't memorize rhythms." Ye Mo stared at the screen. "I just wait for them to make a mistake."
The main console suddenly vibrated.
The latest thermal scan showed a slight depression in the ground fifty meters outside the ventilation shaft, as though someone had just withdrawn.
Ye Mo slowly stood and grabbed his coat.
"They've sent someone to collect the bodies."