[HOST INTEGRITY: 23%]
[LOCATION: SECTOR 9 - THE STREETS]
[TIME: 11:00 PM]
The Alchemist Consortium did not send an army. They sent the dark.
High above Sector 9, the massive spatial gates—the glowing, rotating rings that connected the slums to the Upper Layer—ground to a halt. The deep, mechanical hum that had vibrated in the teeth of every citizen for a century died.
Then, the power grid was cut.
It happened in a wave. The massive neon billboards advertising expensive Spirit Pills shattered into darkness. The streetlights flickered and popped. The automated water purifiers in the Undermarket stopped pumping.
Within five minutes, the temperature in the slums dropped twenty degrees.
Without the ambient spiritual electricity leaking from the grid, the low-tier ghosts felt the cold immediately. The Hunger, a gnawing, physical ache in the center of their translucent chests, flared up.
Usually, a blackout meant blood. It meant the Vermin class dragging each other into alleyways to tear at each other for scrap ectoplasm. It meant riots, screaming, and shattered glass.
Tonight, there were no riots.
In the pitch-black streets, small lights began to appear. Not flashlights. Not torches.
Eyes.
Thousands of pairs of solid gold eyes ignited in the dark.
The citizens of Sector 9 stepped out of their rotting apartments. They didn't speak. They didn't push or shove. They formed massive, silent columns in the streets. Footsteps slapped against the wet asphalt in a slow, synchronized rhythm.
They were walking toward the only place in the Sector that still had power. The Last Stop Factory, running on Dr. Zhu's independent scrap-metal grid, glowed in the distance like a lighthouse in a dead ocean.
They carried things in their hands. A broken pocket watch. A rusted copper coin. A piece of clean cloth. Worthless trash, salvaged from the gutters.
They carried them with absolute, terrifying reverence.
The Wall of Iron
[LOCATION: THE LAST STOP FACTORY - COURTYARD]
"Stand to!" Ye Lingshan barked.
She stood at the shattered remains of the front gates. The Nine Pillars of Punishment were offline, cooling in the acidic rain. Behind her, the 500 Iron-Husked Myrmidons formed a solid black wall, their heavy boots planted in the mud.
Lingshan held Winter's Edge in a two-handed grip. Her breath plumed in the freezing air.
"The grid is dead," Lingshan warned the Myrmidons. "The slums will riot. They will come here for the factory's power core. If they cross the property line, break their knees."
She heard them before she saw them.
The shuffling of fifty thousand pairs of feet.
The mob emerged from the green smog. Lingshan tightened her grip on her sword, channeling her icy Qi. She prepared for the screaming, the desperation, the frantic charge of starving spirits.
It didn't happen.
The massive crowd of golden-eyed ghosts reached the edge of the courtyard. They stopped exactly one inch from the Myrmidons' iron boots.
No one spoke. The silence was heavier than the crushing pressure of the Nine Pillars.
Then, the ghost in the very front—a skinny man in a rotting grey sweater—dropped to his knees. The wet concrete slapped against his kneecaps.
He bowed his head. He held up a tarnished silver spoon in both hands.
Behind him, fifty thousand ghosts collapsed to their knees in unison. The sound of thousands of bodies hitting the pavement echoed off the rusted factory walls. They bowed their heads. They held up their rusted coins, their broken watches, their clean rags.
Lingshan stared. The icy Qi faded from her blade.
She slowly lowered her sword. Her heart hammered against her ribs. She looked at the kneeling sea of gold and grey, stretching out into the dark as far as her eyes could see.
She realized she wasn't guarding a factory anymore.
She was guarding a temple.
The Internal Shift
[LOCATION: REN'S OFFICE]
"We are dead. We are completely, mathematically dead."
Jian paced behind his desk. The office was pitch black, illuminated only by the harsh red glow of his laptop battery warning.
"Ren, the main grid is severed," Jian panicked, running a hand through his hair. "The spatial gates are locked. That means no supply lines. No food. No raw materials. Dr. Zhu's backup battery will run the factory lights for maybe two days. Then we go dark. They don't even have to fight us. They are just going to lock the door and let us starve!"
Ren Wu sat in his leather chair.
His eyes were closed. His breathing was shallow. A thick line of black blood leaked from his nose, dripping off his chin and staining his white shirt.
His Integrity was locked at 23%. His ribs ached. His organs felt like crushed glass. Pushing the Voice of the Sovereign through the city's infrastructure had fractured his internal architecture.
"Ren? Are you listening to me?" Jian grabbed a flashlight, shining it at the floor. "We have an army of iron tanks, but they can't punch a hole in a spatial quarantine!"
Ren didn't answer.
Deep inside his mind, the massive, golden Ledger of the Ministry opened.
Normally, the Ledger recorded transactions. Karma was an exchange. I give you Dragon-Tooth Ash, you give me your obedience. It was a business deal, bound by the rigid laws of the Ninth Era.
But right now, the Ledger was doing something else.
The ink on the pages wasn't black. It was burning gold. The numbers were spinning out of control.
[SYSTEM ALERT] [TRANSACTION ERROR] [NO GOODS EXCHANGED. TRIBUTE RECEIVED.]
Ren felt a strange sensation in his chest. It wasn't the cold weight of Karma. It was heat.
[ANALYZING INPUT...] [FAITH DETECTED. BYPASSING LEDGER.]
Karma required a contract. Faith was a one-way street. It was raw, unfiltered, irrational submission.
Ren opened his eyes.
"They didn't come to riot, Jian," Ren whispered. The grinding fatigue in his voice was gone.
He stood up. He walked past the panicked boy and pushed the office door open.
Ren stepped out onto the rusted metal catwalk overlooking the courtyard.
Below him, the Iron Legion stood like statues. Beyond them, fifty thousand ghosts kneeled in the freezing rain, offering up their trash.
When Ren stepped into view, fifty thousand golden eyes looked up.
THUMP.
The impact hit Ren physically. Golden threads of raw energy rose from the kneeling crowd. They floated up through the rain, defying gravity, and slammed directly into Ren's chest.
Fifty thousand souls pinned him to the earth with the sheer gravity of their belief.
The heat inside him flared into a supernova.
The fractured architecture of his soul welded itself shut. The cold numbness in his veins burned away, replaced by rushing liquid fire. He felt his crushed ribs snap back into perfect alignment. The black blood on his face vaporized into steam.
[HOST INTEGRITY: 23% -> 28% -> 35%] [CRITICAL DAMAGE REPAIRED] [VESSEL CAPACITY EXPANDED]
Ren didn't just look healthy. He radiated a faint, oppressive golden halo. The acidic rain hissed and turned to vapor a full foot above his head.
He breathed in. He smelled wet concrete, rust, and absolute devotion.
The Repossession
Jian crept out onto the catwalk, staying near the door. He looked down at the silent, kneeling masses. He shivered.
"Ren," Jian whispered, his voice trembling. "What are they doing?"
"They are paying their rent," Ren said calmly.
He looked down at his hands. The pale skin was flushed with vitality. The vessel had stabilized. He was no longer a dying ghost clinging to a broken body.
"But we are still trapped," Jian pointed a shaking finger at the sky, toward the massive, dead rings of the spatial gates. "They cut the power. Sector 9 is a cage."
Ren looked up at the dark sky.
The bureaucratic coldness returned to his golden eyes. It wasn't the look of a trapped animal. It was the look of a landlord who just found out his tenant damaged the plumbing.
"They cut off our power, Jian. That is a breach of contract."
Ren turned around. He looked at the heavy toolbox sitting near Jian's desk.
"Get your tools."
"My tools?" Jian blinked. "For what? I can't fix a city-wide blackout with a screwdriver!"
Ren walked past him, heading for the stairs.
"We are going to dig up the Ley Lines."
Ren's voice echoed over the silent, kneeling thousands.
"If the Consortium refuses to supply electricity... we will repossess the entire grid."
[AUTHOR NOTE]
[SYSTEM NOTIFICATION]
Consortium: "We cut the power! They will starve in the dark!" Sector 9: Ignites fifty thousand pairs of glowing eyes. "What dark?" Ren Wu: "Time to steal the city's batteries."
Next Chapter: The Blockade Breaker. The counter-attack begins. Ren Wu doesn't need to punch the gates open. He is going to rip the spiritual roots of Sector 9 out of the ground.
The Faith is real! Drop a Power Stone to offer your tribute to the Minister! 🛐🔥
[END OF CHAPTER 71]