“Good morning, Mr. Zicang.”

“Good morning, Sister Lili.”

Upon entering the office, Yang Zicang first saw the screen shelf on the right side of his workstation.

“What are you looking at?” Jiaoma, dressed in an elegant white dress with yellow dots and carrying a small cloth bag diagonally, walked briskly into the office.

“I…” Yang Zicang glanced at the girl with pure eyes. “I had a very realistic dream.”

“Huh? So someone can be sentimental too.”

Yang Zicang pointed to the sturdy wooden shelf next to the workstation that held the screen.

“There used to be a desk here, with someone named…”

After thinking for a moment, Yang Zicang quickly grabbed a pencil from his desk and, under Jiaoma’s gaze as she stretched her head to look, wrote the three words “Wei Zhenguo” on the back of the paper.

“Is that a surname? How strange.”

“Isn’t your name also strange?”

“But my name was given by my father before he left. He first gave me my real name, and this one is a pseudonym. He said it can prevent curses to some extent.”

Yang Zicang smiled. “So, do you know your real name?”

He had long heard that although this young girl wasn’t old, she was a living veteran who had followed her father into the company life since she was three or four years old.

Upon hearing Yang Zicang’s question, Jiaoma pursed her lips, slyly glancing left and right. Seeing that aside from two middle-aged women in the distance, no one else had entered the office, she whispered to the contemplative Yang Zicang:

“Are you still thinking about resigning?”

“Huh? I…”

“This place is countless times safer than Hub Town. Many people crave to enter it. And here, as our positions rise, we can also become powerful in the future.”

Of course, Yang Zicang knew this, but he had reasons not to stay for long.

Jiaoma lifted her small face, her gaze carrying a natural touch of innate charm yet still looking at Yang Zicang with over seventy percent innocence:

“We’ll all have long lives, even with colleagues around. But here…”

Suddenly, her ears turned very red as she lowered her head to fiddle with her skirt hem, “I… actually, I’ve been wanting to ask you…”

“This…” Yang Zicang’s heart thumped violently a few times.

“I, I… if you’re willing to come with me to the Archives Department, we could actually spend more time together in the future. I live alone, and my psychic field is pretty large,” she suddenly covered her face with her hands, whispering in a muffled voice, “What am I even saying.”

Yang Zicang nervously glanced at the two colleagues in the distance who were desperately burying their heads in their work. He felt everything was a bit strange; Jiaoma’s state seemed far too impulsive, as if she was proactively trying to make up for some regret.

Come to think of it, didn’t that person in last night’s dream say something about wanting to drink wedding wine for him and Jiaoma?

Hmm… could this be a hint?

Yang Zicang scratched the back of his head, his face also feeling a bit warm.

“G-Group Leader, there are partners in the city who would risk their lives for me. I’m destined to… sigh.”

Yang Zicang suddenly calmed down, “I’m destined to leave. And you, Group Leader, you probably don’t like people who abandon others to enjoy themselves alone, right?”

“Phew–” Jiaoma let go, exhaled a breath, her eyelashes fluttering. With a hum, she clenched her little fists and quickly walked away.

After she left, the door to the office slowly creaked open a crack. Lao Xing, who appeared to be in his fifties, poked his head in, glanced at the girl quietly sitting at her seat, and tiptoed in.

As he passed by Yang Zicang, he whispered, “Jiao Jiao is at the Group Leader level, with a genuine private Mental Realm covering ten square kilometers. Are you sure you don’t want to reconsider?”

In the distance, the young girl whirled around instantly, shooting a murderous glare at this man.

“Ahem. Good morning, Zicang.” The man immediately straightened up, solemnly adjusting his collar as he walked toward his seat under the young girl’s slow, tracking gaze. “I’ll be working with vigor today, Group Leader.”

……

In the afternoon, Yang Zicang walked along the corridor paved with dark cyan and white tiles, gazing at the decorative statues around him.

As he was about to turn onto the path leading to the training ground, he stopped in his tracks, looking at an iron statue carved almost to human height.

The beast’s head, inlaid with ruby-like eyes, was vividly sculpted, though a layer of dust had settled over it, dulling its luster slightly.

Yang Zicang hesitated for a moment, then spoke uncertainly to it: “Are you… all… imbued with Psychic Bodies? Is this your other form?”

The corridor was silent, with no response.

Yang Zicang lowered his head.

“What exactly is this ring? Why do we all have to possess it? Why must we fight each other? Can’t we live in peace like people on Earth?”

No sooner had the words left his mouth than they faded into nothingness.

It remained quiet here. Yang Zicang glanced at the figures passing by at the corner of the hallway.

“I had a dream. It felt incredibly real. In the dream, it told me that some of these statues have psychic bodies attached to them. You guys… forget it.”

Yang Zicang turned around and nearly bumped into a figure with his next step.

“Hey there!” The young man stepped back, looking at the beast-faced person before him, who had a three-petal mouth and a pair of ruby-like eyes staring right at him.

{Anything else you want to ask?}

“You scared me to death.” Yang Zicang let out a breath, glanced at the glowing ring on his chest, and said, “I still want to know… never mind. Excuse me, can you keep watching this place at all times?”

{That’s not really what you wanted to ask, is it? You’re worried that if you guessed right, you won’t be able to leave the company?}

The beast-faced person in front of him seemed to read his mind and let out a chuckle.

{Don’t worry. Guesses you deduce on your own aren’t bound by the confidentiality agreement, as long as you don’t spread them publicly. As for keeping an eye on things all the time, hah, we’re not that bored.}

Somehow, it felt a bit familiar.

Yang Zicang took a closer look at the man who had suddenly appeared before him. He wore neat black trousers and a fashionable scarf-like cloth folded over his shoulders. With ruby-red eyes that shone brightly, the man pulled out a psychic pocket watch from his bosom and glanced at it. The hands were about to point to 5:30.

{At dawn and dusk in the latter part of each month, this happens to be my patrol period. If there’s nothing else, go collect your reward.}

With that, this seemingly tangible psychic projection turned around and prepared to leave.

Yang Zicang quickly said, “Sir, what was that dream of mine all about? To some extent, it has already come true twice today.”

{Two possibilities. The stronger one’s mental power, the more likely they are to be influenced by elemental force, the etheric field, and other psychic spaces, gaining some inspirations. As for the second, you’ll know once you reach the full moon stage.}

“Full moon?”

The beast-faced man turned his head with a light chuckle and continued:

{That is, awakening to the fifth ring. Hmm, while enhanced mental power brings inspirations, it also comes with dangers. Some bloodline abilities gain insights beyond reality by resonating with the free-floating information of the universe. That’s a form of spiritual resonance. If you don’t have that bloodline ability, don’t actively attempt it.}

Yang Zicang’s brow furrowed.

The beast-faced man toyed with his pocket watch, chuckling softly:

{For instance, the ‘Base Cognition Pattern’ you wish to obtain acts like an anchor, helping those whose mental power resonates with deep energy for the first time to pin their consciousness in a safe frequency zone.}

With that, the man took two steps forward and vanished from the corridor.

— “Here comes the Block Stacking Master!”

— “Young lad, you’re really something, standing still, not fast, yet you challenge the hidden level, showing off your style for the slow and clumsy~”

Pushing open the door, Yang Zicang saw more “people” had awakened today.

— “The last day of the hidden level challenge. There’s no suspense anymore. When the holiday comes, my boss will also come to give it a try.”

[The Barking Dog Gate tells me that today there is…]

[I, the Great Quadrilateral, inform the Barking Dog Gate: you may dispense with your barking.]

Taking the Psi-kat Cassette from the hands of a newly rotated “keeper,” Yang Zicang stepped into the trial ground. The scorching air began to lick his skin, but with two days of prior experience, the third wave of heat was no longer as unbearable as before.

After completing the challenge, Yang Zicang felt he could have persisted for a few more minutes even at that point.

Thud, thud, thud, thud!

The heavy, dull sounds of boxes hitting the ground grew more frequent. As the last few boxes were guided by the model into the wooden gaps in the square, the wind spirit warrior with a blurry face clapped as he approached.

{Astonishing prowess among warriors, my friend—truly achieving SUPER ratings three rounds in a row—you are indeed a talent of great caliber.}

Yang Zicang modestly dug at his ear.

He strongly suspected that this wind spirit warrior might be some foreigner being toyed with by an entity of abilities similar to Boboli’s.

The blurry-faced wind spirit warrior appeared before him, and from his palm emerged two distinct Celtic knots.

{My friend, which imprint do you wish to choose? Alternatively, you may opt to accumulate points.}

“I’ll pick this one.”

His finger, turned crystalline by the infused psychic energy, pointed to the bluish-green “Wood Song’s Soothing” imprint.

Yang Zicang had already decided which one to choose from the very first day. As his finger made contact, the solidified “Psychic Energy Circuitry Pattern” rapidly retracted into the youth’s body through his fingertip.

A grand sound like a sea breeze rustling through treetops echoed within his consciousness.

[I’ve implanted the ‘Psychic Energy Circuitry Pattern, Wood Song’s Soothing’.]

In that instant, Yang Zicang felt as if he were amidst a vast forest—the sound of heavy snow crunching pine needles, a clear spring caressing moss, sunlight striking billions of rustling leaves, withered foliage falling with a swish—all merging into a sensation that washed over him…

Vast, distant, expansive, yet silent.

He couldn’t help but take a deep breath. Suddenly, Yang Zicang felt the pathways of “Crystal Perception” within him activate of their own accord. His eyelids, weary from the earlier challenge, snapped open swiftly.

“So comfortable… Is this the ‘Psychic Energy Circuitry Pattern’?”

The mark was now gone, or rather, the lingering illusion of being perpetually surrounded by the forest was the mark itself.

[Barking Dog Gate tells me this mark can last until around the third ring, fourth tier.]

The Wind Spirit warrior ahead waited silently, as three “Psychic Alchemy” constructs, which he had commissioned, floated before him.

How should he choose among these three? They all seemed useful, yet none appeared immediately necessary.

“These…”

Yang Zicang furrowed his brow, pondering his choice.