Vance undid his jacket and put it aside, then twisted open the water flask's cap and continued speaking. "The base is too densely populated. After xenogenics enter the base, they will go on a killing spree, and following that will be large-scale infection. The Trial Court's responsibility is to determine if every single person entering the city is human or xenogenic, and the determining process is called the 'Trial'."
"Then... what happens after they discover a xenogenic?" An Zhe asked.
"What else?" Vance raised his eyebrows. "They're shot on the spot."
Without saying anything, An Zhe bowed his head and took a bite of hardtack. He had just learned how to eat by human methods, but to him, human food was somewhat coarse. When he swallowed, his mouth and throat would get scratched. He ate very slowly, but his heart beat very quickly.
After a while, he asked, "Can they really identify all the xenogenics?"
Vance took a big gulp of water, leaned against the car wall, and closed his eyes. His voice carried a trace of despondency. "Who knows? The dead can't prove anything. Nobody knows whether the people killed were really xenogenics or not. That was the case with my younger brother."
An Zhe said nothing. Vance seemed to have answered a question he hadn’t asked, but he still listened quietly.
"That time... he came with me to Flatland 1, where the pollution level was lower than even Flatland 2’s. I kept an eye on him the entire time, and I could confirm that he hadn't been wounded." Vance smiled, but his voice was raspy. "When we returned to the entrance of the base, the one on duty that wasn't any ordinary Judge, but their boss. Everyone calls him 'the Arbiter'. Other Judges will give their justifications for killing someone, but he doesn't have to. He doesn't need justification to kill anyone, nor does he accept any pleas. Even if it's the base's top brass, if he killed them, then that's that. It was like that on that day. He so much as glanced at my brother before opening fire on him.
"I didn't believe it, but there was nothing I could do. This sort of thing happens often. He's killed many people, so there are many people in the base who despise him, myself included. For all I know, someday he’ll kill me too."
With those words, Vance looked at his own right hand in a daze for a while, then tossed the flask to one side. He lay down with his head pillowed upon his arm, but his eyes were still looking at the car ceiling. At last, he got back on track and answered the question An Zhe had asked at the very beginning. "They'd rather mistakenly kill someone than let them pass. If a xenogenic really made its way into the base, it would be discovered for sure. In the entirety of this year, there has been only one xenogenic attack."
An Zhe felt uneasy. To conceal this uneasiness, he closed his eyes and rubbed them with his left hand.
Vance said, "Go to sleep, kid."
An Zhe lay down next to him. No matter how tomorrow turned out, at least he was safe tonight. There were no monsters and there was no Hosen. There was only Vance, who treated him very well.
Before sleeping, he held the bullet shell in his hand and looked at the car door at the end of the aisle.
Supposing—supposing he secretly opened the car door right now, got out, and returned to the monster-infested wilds, he could still live. He would not face the Trial, and he would not be killed on the spot. He didn’t know how long he could live, but it would definitely be for longer than tomorrow.
But was the spore something more important than his own life?
It was.
To the creatures in the Abyss, death was the most trivial thing. And in this short day outside of the Abyss, he had witnessed Anthony's mutation and Hosen's death. Human lives were by no means precious either.
An Zhe closed his eyes. He knew he had to go to the Northern Base.
Early the next morning, they continued driving towards the base. Because only Vance was driving and he lacked energy, their rest times became irregular. They stopped to rest that afternoon and continued driving north at midnight on the third day. When the aurora began to dim and the sky was suffused with white, Vance said, "We're almost there."
An Zhe looked forward. In the morning's gray fog, a round city gradually appeared from the horizon.
City—he knew this word. Humans clustered in cities the same way mushrooms clustered in the rainy season.
The armored car continued moving forward, and bit by bit as the early morning fog gradually dissipated, more of the city's details appeared. The round city was enclosed by gray steel walls, their height like that of the tallest mushrooms. Even if twenty people stood atop one another, with each person's feet on someone else's shoulders, it still may not have been enough to climb over the wall. Steel tusks and spines protruded from the walls as well, their hues sharp and icy cold like rocks and soil in winter.
The city boundary was filled with surveillance equipment and laser devices, so anyone who sneaked in would be immediately discovered. The two city gates were the only ways of getting in and out of the city, and one was entry only while the other was exit only. The one they were at right now was the one that only allowed entry.
Then An Zhe saw many small teams similar to Vance's drive back from all directions. Some of them were traveling light, while others were wearing heavy gear and carrying weapons. There were four or five people per team, and they drove similar armored cars to designated areas before getting out of them and walking through the city gate. The cars and people were inspected separately.
Vance got out first, and An Zhe jumped down from the car while grabbing onto his arm. Feeling that Vance's arm was somewhat tense, he thought that perhaps this city gate evoked Vance's bad memories of his younger brother.
They walked towards the city gate, where a long line had formed. There was a slight disturbance at the head of the line, but they couldn't clearly see the situation. People were still entering in order.
An Zhe trailed after Vance, walking towards the line and looking around as he walked.
Soldiers clothed in black uniforms stood at both sides of the city gate, two guns at their waists. One was a thermal weapon, while the other was a laser gun. Behind them were colossal heavy weapons that directly faced the city gates. One could imagine that as soon as a monster tried to break in, it would be blown to pieces by these heavy weapons.
After looking around, his gaze was drawn to a black figure. At an open space beneath the distant city walls, that person, also clad in a black uniform, appeared to be a sloppy and undisciplined soldier who had abandoned his post. He wasn't standing guard in an orderly fashion like his colleagues, but rather leaning against the city wall and slowly wiping a black gun with his head lowered.
However, the silver-trimmed black uniform he wore seemed more beautiful and imposing than the others, perhaps because his physique was tall, slim, and well-proportioned.
Vance cast a glance in that direction and began walking much faster for some reason while pulling him straight forward. Just as they were about to join the end of the line—
An Zhe saw the man in the distance slowly raise his head.
A pair of ice-cold green eyes showed beneath the brim of the black uniform cap.
In an instant, An Zhe stopped dead in his tracks, feeling that the surroundings had turned as chilly as if they had frozen over.
Vance turned back and said, "What's the—"
His voice suddenly stopped.
A gunshot ran out.
Vance's tall body swayed on the spot, then toppled over with a thud. His eyes were wide open, his throat made gurgling noises, and blood gushed from his temple. After his body jerked a few times, there were no further movements.
But An Zhe could not even reach out to grab at the hem of his clothes, nor did he have any room whatsoever to think about what exactly had happened just then. He could only lift his head and meet the gaze of the uniformed soldier because, at that moment, the soldier was slowly turning the jet-black muzzle of the gun…
… towards him.