Chapter Five: The City of Wangjing

While Liang Zhi and his companion were still on their way, the doors of the Justice Office in Antai Town were pushed open, and five figures stepped inside.

They belonged to the Dazong Erasure Department, an organization established by Dazong to suppress ability users and traitors with force.

“Ugh, what is that thing? Can I skip this assignment?” A woman in a gray coat, her hair tinged with yellow, took a step back, her delicate features contorted in horror.

Pan Tu, a burly man with a pipe clamped between his teeth, spoke up: “Han Beinuan, calm down. That thing doesn’t eat people.”

“It’s not Little Nuan’s fault; I feel like I need to throw up too.” Niu Danong, his skin tinged with iron, spoke up for Han Beinuan, then his expression twisted in disgust.

Before them stood six soldiers fused together.

Their waists and thighs bloated and merged, six heads and six arms arranged in a grotesque haphazardness, twelve lower legs supporting the mass. The eyelids and mouths of the six were fused into a rough, fleshy conglomeration, like three distorted navels; their ears were sunken deep within their own ear canals, the heads writhing in confused turmoil.

Just the sight of this thing was enough to unhinge the mind.

“To turn people into this and keep them alive, you’d need the powers of both a Twisted Healer and a Flesh Warlock,” murmured a man in the group, average in appearance and exuding a gloom.

But his teammates hardly heard his analysis; they had already crossed the courtyard and entered the main hall of the Justice Office.

“Record, record, I must record everything!” At a desk to the left, a scribe rolled his eyes and drooled, his hand rhythmically pounding his own chest. There was no shirt on his chest, only the metallic keys of a typewriter, fused seamlessly with his flesh and blood, indistinguishable from one another.

Beneath the plaque that read “Justice Impartially Rendered” hung a corpulent, pitch-black figure: Chief Justice Fan Dai.

Everything about Fan Dai was black—his eyes, his teeth. If you were to cut him open, you would find his organs, blood, bones, and even brain matter all dyed the same inky hue.

The source of this darkness was a bucket of black ink on the desk.

That Fan Dai was still alive was itself a miracle, though perhaps not one he wished for.

But the most bizarre sight was not them.

In the very center of the hall, a dozen or more fleshy tentacles sprawled, each tipped with a different instrument of torture.

If you looked more closely, you would see that within these tentacles dwelled every human organ—eyes, ears, mouth, nose, tongue...

From the bodies of the tentacles emanated a chorus of whispers: “Heaven and earth, sea and wind... all things must ultimately connect. The formless greatness is born in the union of all things...”

“This... is truly horrifying. Ugh.” Han Beinuan leaned on a pillar, finally unable to hold back her nausea.

Niu Danong hurried over, patting Han Beinuan gently on the back, his gaze lingering uneasily on the grotesque congregation: “These people are alive, but suffering worse than death. Whoever did this must be extremely dangerous.”

The man who had remained outside the courtyard entered, observing the three “creatures” in the room, and again whispered his analysis.

“A psychologist, a sinister forger... The perpetrator has at least four abilities. He’s a master of the Connection Faction in the Wiles Sequence. Our little squad might not be able to take him down alone.”

Pan Tu picked up a wanted poster from the floor. “Wen Zhongxiang, you can stop analyzing. I think our culprit is this guy.”

...

Liang Zhi put on his glasses, his demeanor acquiring a scholarly air.

Immediately, he felt the power within the glasses at his disposal.

His facial muscles twisted subtly under the glasses’ manipulation—just a slight adjustment at the corners of his eyes and nose, and he looked like an entirely different person, though his handsomeness was undiminished.

Grandpa Crow looked over in surprise. “It’s been less than a day, and you’re already adept at using the Sinister Forger’s power.”

Liang Zhi was a little proud. Along the way, he’d meddled with all sorts of things. Even during his chats with Grandpa Crow, he’d been practicing, twisting two thin strands of straw into one thick one.

From Grandpa Crow, he’d learned that Dazong’s ability users were divided into four sequences: Wiles, Secrets, Physiques, and Arcana.

Each sequence had two factions, and each faction eight branches—sixty-four distinct abilities in all.

Liang Zhi’s body’s previous owner had been the apex of the Connection Faction in the Wiles Sequence. In theory, only the other seven apexes could have surpassed him.

By agreeing to fulfill the man’s dying wishes, Liang Zhi gained the Sinister Forger’s ability. Gaining any further powers would not be so easy.

The list of wishes was divided into eight chapters.

He needed to fulfill all the wishes in seven chapters to unlock a new Connection Faction ability.

When all eight abilities were unlocked, Liang Zhi would inherit the original owner’s entire legacy and become one of the most powerful beings in this world.

But the eighth chapter—the Chapter of Atrocities—was the most extensive and miscellaneous of all.

Fulfilling the first wish—agreeing to carry out the wishes—was only the beginning. The others...

[Bullying the Weak]: Do bad things to twenty children under the age of twelve—stealing, robbing, beating, cheating, or even killing.

[Disrespecting Elders]: Do bad things to forty people over the age of sixty—stealing, robbing, beating, cheating, or killing.

[Destroying Beauty]: ...

The Chapter of Atrocities consisted of a series of scattered misdeeds, but each one carried a reward—sometimes money, sometimes items, sometimes even living creatures...

“What kind of irredeemable villain could have such a twisted, depraved list of wishes?” Liang Zhi stared blankly into the azure sky.

He wasn’t keen on doing evil, but the rewards were simply too tempting.

“Well, since I’ve already taken on this task for the sake of my own life, I’ll just have to grit my teeth and carry on.

Back in my previous life, that woman lied to me and called it a white lie. So maybe I can do some ‘benevolent’ beatings, ‘benevolent’ thefts, ‘benevolent’ robberies, ‘benevolent’ murders...

Wait... How does one murder benevolently? ‘I’m killing you for your own good’?”

While Liang Zhi agonized over this, the straw cart had already arrived at the gates of Wangjing City.

He jumped off the cart, gazing up at the city gates—over forty meters high, like a small mountain—and the city walls, twenty meters tall and slanting slightly outward at the top. He was shaken to his core.

But it wasn’t the height of the walls that stunned him. It was that the lower ten meters of the city walls and gates were entirely clad in thick, coldly gleaming alloy plates!

Even in the highly developed industrial society of his previous life, no city had ever been so extravagant as to armor ten meters of wall in metal for defense.

Compared to these alloy plates, the massive searchlights and crossbow turrets atop the walls seemed almost unimpressive.

Grandpa Crow tilted his head at Liang Zhi and perched on his shoulder with a smile. “Caw, caw! Welcome to the capital of Dazong—the Backbone of the Nation, the Land of Miracles, the City of Steel: Wangjing!”

On the first of April, in the 3120th year of the current era, Liang Zhi arrived in the capital of Dazong.