Plague Doctor

Translator: Lonelytree

Night came eventually. A crescent moon and million stars decorated the dark sky. The constellations, which were hidden by smog in the city, were perfectly visible in the countryside. Rohini of the Tauri sat next to the crescent moon, glowing faintly in yellow. The team designated their mission at an outdoor experimental field outside the Spell Department. This place was originally a field used for experiment so it was situated quite a distance from the nearby base and hostel. The perimeter was set up with cameras and guard towers posted with snipers. Drones flew across the sky, ready to unload their bullets if necessary. The tanks, armored cars, and missile launchers were in place. Should anything bad happen, this piece of land would be levelled.

35 members of the team and the group of Action Department members had all drafted their wills. For the higher-ups, this mission was not only to save Gu Jun, it was also an experiment to open a channel to Dreamlands so they had to be ready to be faced with any possible enemy. At that moment, many people were gathered inside the headquarter’s surveillance room. “This mission will have a lasting influence.””Hopefully it’s a good one.”

Back inside the command central at the Spell Department, Elder Tong, Prof Shen, and Prof Jiang stood waiting. Researchers worked in the background while members from the Action Department stood guard.

“Elder Tong, did you feel something will go wrong?” Prof Shen asked seriously. That afternoon Elder Tong suddenly mobilized a lot more security, he did not give an explanation to even Prof Shen. Elder Tong gave the order directly to the Action Department. The security detail at Spell Department was increased and all members of the department who did not participate in the mission were required to stay in their rooms and a heavy guard detail was posted at the hostels.

“One cannot be too cautious.” Elder Tong answered. Zheng Jialiang was not given a weapon and the snipers as well as drones were targeted on him. There were pros and cons to allow him on the mission. If he was really the traitor, then he would be exposed during this mission. A live feed of the field was shown on the monitor in the command central. There were only a small number of people who were allowed to carry firearms. The ostentatious reason given was that no one could tell what would happen when they crossed over to the Dreamlands. However, the real reason was Elder Tong had no idea who might align themselves with the enemy, if even there was one.

In the middle of the empty land, the 35 members stood 3 metres away from each other and formed a spiral triangle facing Hostel Number 5. Their expressions caught by the drones were calm but some were quite worried, like Cai Zixuan. Wu Siyu stood among them, her dark eyes looked around her and she noticed that Zheng Jialiang still appeared as harmless as ever…

“Is everyone ready?” Even though Xue Ba was not the one with the most advanced training when it came to the Seven Cryptical Book of Hsan, his Special Mobile Force experience made him the leader of this team. He said seriously, “we might only have one chance. If it is really Gu Jun, we will definitely save him; If it is the enemy, we will apprehend them.” Gao Yi, Zhang Zuodong nodded. Wang Ruoxiang took a long meaningful look at Wu Siyu to her left and whispered, “Siyu, remember to keep calm no matter what.”

Due to Zheng Jialiang’s subtle wordplay and influence, everyone was brought to believe that Wu Siyu was too mentally frazzled to be standing there but everyone knew about her special mental bond with Gu Jun so she was given a special permission by Elder Tong. To everyone’s hidden relief, she was not allowed to carry firearms.

“Okay.” Wu Siyu nodded and ended the conversation.

“Then let us begin.” Xue Ba looked at his teammates. Lou Xiaoning and Yu Xiaoyong nodded in return. They had no idea what would happen, but they were sure this ritual would greatly drain their mental power, and time was necessary for one’s mental power to recover, so he was not speculating when he said they only had one chance that night.

Eventually, even the birds had quieted down, what was left was the buzzing of the drones. People everywhere were paying attention. The team standing in the spiral triangle focused at Hostel Number 5 as they thought back to the content of Seven Cryptical Book of Hsan and used their mental power to activate its power. They opened up their senses to their surroundings, made connection to the land and the night sky, to channel a mysterious force that appeared to derive from the stars…

Wu Siyu naturally took no part in this. She kept her eyes peeled, watching the changes to the others’ expression. Their faces took on a veil of shadow. ‘Not yet, it’s not yet the time… their mental power is still not exhausted enough…’ To her consternation, she noted that the eyes of Wang Ruoxiang, Cai Zixuan, Xue Ba and Zheng Jialiang had glassed over, or rather they were slipping into an illusion. A strange apprehension gripped her heart, she could feel a power of nothingness corrupting her mind, it appeared… to be the source of power behind the tome. Her senses became befuddled, this had happened to her for the first time.

The night breeze chilled her bones. She looked up into the sky and realized with shock the stars and moon had faded away, leaving behind the sole yellow Rohini. The star seemed to have grown larger and closer, its yellow glow was practically consuming the night sky.

‘Something is wrong, my mind is slipping away… Learn from Gu Jun! What would he do now?’ Wu Siyu pinched herself heavily on her waist and the pain jolted her awake. She could see that the people around her were being mentally corrupted, the higher their training, the more obvious the corruption. Wang Ruoxiang, Zhang Zuodong and Gao Yi’s bodies were radiating a yellow light. Their faces were twisted like they were seeing something horrible in their mind.

Wu Siyu was suddenly reminded of what Gu Jun said, the reason behind Seven Cryptical Books of Hsan training syndrome might not be that simple. ‘What is the tome’s source of power? Is this actually a ritual to corrupt their mind and transmute their personality? They are not traitors now, but after this ritual, they might become one. This ritual has to be stopped…’

Wu Siyu pressed on the alarm that was given to her by Elder Tong as she moved from her designated spot. She made an attempt to charge into Wang Ruoxiang to knock her down. She had to stop this ritual! But at that moment, a figure suddenly appeared to block her.

“Command central, we have spotted a dimensional distortion!”

“We have lost aim of the targets! Repeat, loss of vision, we cannot aim at the targets!”

A ripple appeared in the middle of the field. The snipers on the towers reported immediately. Due to the distortion, their scopes were rendered useless. Looking through the heat sensors, the shapes of the team members had melted into a glob with their surroundings. At the same moment, perhaps due to signal disturbance, several drones suddenly crashed to the ground. Back at the command central, as they listened to the live report and watched the scene unfold on the monitor, they were all nervous as hell. But no one made an order to stop the ritual because no one could tell for sure if this was not just an effect of the portal to Dreamlands being opened. According to Xue Ba’s description, when Gu Jun summoned the white ship, the dimension was disturbed as well. This appeared to mean that the mission of opening the portal was successful but the problem was they had no idea where the portal would lead…

“Elder Tong, should we do something?” Prof Shen asked anxiously.

Elder Tong though was suddenly assaulted by a headache, his mind too was affected by the corruption…

“Did you hear that? The singing?” Elder Tong’s hoarse question startled Prof Shen and the rest, but soon they understood what Elder Tong meant. There was a song that seemed to be coming from the field while at the same time echoing inside their heart. Was it the team members in the field who were singing?

But that could not be true because the song floated on the grace of a female voice, it flowed freely as a river and evoked the melancholy of loneliness. It rang through the night and slipped into everyone’s heart.

“Along the shore the cloud waves break,

The twin suns sink behind the lake,

The shadows lengthen

In Carcosa.”