In the following period, Ye Bai underwent three identity transformations in the eyes of the people of Taida: from "a lunatic who came out of nowhere," to "a lunatic with some skills," and finally to "wait... maybe not a lunatic after all."
Using her mastery of psychic manipulation, Ye Bai extracted metals, electronic components, and sensors from the building, assembling them into nanoscale micro-drones entirely under her control—a basic technique in the Aether Lab of "Black Hole."
These micro-drones, infused with her psychic energy, became extensions of her will. Harnessing strong nuclear force, gravity, and magnetism, she began rapidly transforming the landmark building below—a venue typically reserved for joint meetings of the three major conglomerates.
"Any leads?"
In the Armed Forces Department, the head, Lance, pressed the intelligence officer for answers.
"Nothing," the officer replied, scratching his head. "This person's appearance bears resemblance to many, but no exact facial match has ever appeared in any surveillance footage. They might have undergone recent bio-modification—plastic surgery, or even a sex change."
"Did you cross-check the purchase records of the Nora Serum?" Lance frowned, pressing further.
To maintain basic societal stability, the conglomerates allowed every citizen to receive a free, low-grade Nora Serum upon registering as an adult. However, the odds of awakening psychic abilities from it were minuscule, and the lucky few who did were almost always under the control of the pharmaceutical companies.
To enhance their abilities, citizens had to purchase higher-grade serums, plunging most Taidans into crippling debt. Some newborns even inherited genetic serum debts from their parents or grandparents.
Given these stakes, hardly any Taidan would pass up their first free dose of Nora Serum.
The intelligence officer shook his head. "That’s the thing—we checked the Nora purchase records first. There’s nothing. I suspect... they never used Nora Serum at all."
"Never used Nora Serum..." Lance's expression darkened. "Are you saying this lunatic is a natural-born psychic? And at Celestial-tier strength?"
"Most likely," the officer confirmed.
While most Taidans relied on Nora Serum to unlock their psychic potential, genetic variation ensured the occasional prodigy—those born with innate abilities, like the founding ancestors of the conglomerates... or Lance himself.
Thanks to his Earth-tier psychic awakening at birth, Lance—a commoner—had his debts wiped clean. Nurtured by the conglomerate, he rose through the ranks over two decades to become a regional head of the Armed Forces Department, even marrying a scion of a conglomerate family.
"An unregistered natural-born Celestial-tier..." As Lance spiraled into theories about Ye Bai’s true identity, an urgent report cut in: "Sir, the advance team has been wiped out."
Lance took a sharp breath. "What happened?! That person never cut the live feed. Aside from Units 887 and 932, no one even got close to Taida Tower!"
"Correct. The team was eliminated before reaching the tower. It looked like E4 armaments—no, something even more advanced. Maybe E5? Whatever they were, the enemy took control and turned them against us."
"Impossible!"
Lance, given his clearance, knew some secrets about the E-series armaments—cutting-edge combat mechs developed by the Taida Armed Group, the shadowy entity overseeing all weapons, including nuclear arms, on Taida. These were their trump cards against rogue psychics.
E4 units required complex activation protocols, and the fifth-gen E-series was so classified that even Lance wasn’t sure if they existed.
Then the footage arrived. His face twisted in disbelief.
On-screen, rows of E5 units—sleeker, deadlier than E4—stood guard around Taida Tower like an army. High-energy laser beams carved out a kill zone, annihilating anything that crossed the boundary.
"How did they override the controls? There’s no way the Armed Group would let these fall into enemy hands!" If Lance had spare mental bandwidth earlier, it was gone now. He dialed a high-priority encrypted line—direct to the true master of the Armed Group.
"Bzzz—"
Dead silence. No connection.
A cold dread settled over Lance. Then another call came through—from his conglomerate-born spouse.
"AAAAHHH—!"
A bloodcurdling scream pierced the line, followed by a voice on the verge of collapse:
"They’re dead! Grandfather, Great-Uncle, Second Uncle, Dad, Thirteenth Uncle... all of them! That lunatic—that Doomsday Harbinger—killed them!"
Lance’s mind blanked. He stared at the ceiling, half-expecting it to crash down. Only when the screams and sobs continued did he snap back, rasping:
"The decoys? You alone have three I can’t even tell apart. Where were theirs?"
Silence. Then, weakly: "I... I don’t know. I don’t know how they were found. I didn’t even know their real locations..."
No conglomerate heir neglected personal security. Even with top-tier Nora Serum enhancing their psychic gifts, each had multiple indistinguishable body doubles—so many that Taidans dismissed assassination reports as fake news.
Even among themselves, heirs could never be sure who was real.
"I heard the voices calling for their deaths."
Simultaneously, the live feed split into multiple scenes—each showing a killing. The shadow rulers of Taida now lay as corpses.
Lance realized the truth: the heads of the Nora Group, the Energy Group, and the Armed Group hadn’t just been assassinated. They’d been hunted down—personally—by Ye Bai, who’d remotely hijacked E5 units to execute them.
What kind of hacking could do this? And if she could do this... what about the Armed Group’s nukes?
At this thought, Lance suddenly shuddered. He now sincerely hoped that whoever knew about that button was already dead. Otherwise, if the button were pressed, the final destination of the nuclear missile wouldn’t be decided by the one who pressed it—but by the person currently broadcasting live.
Lance instinctively looked up at the internal surveillance feed in the operations command center, where a red light flickered ominously. He suspected his current panic and helplessness were laid bare for the other side to see.
Meanwhile, the countdown clock behind the mysterious figure continued ticking steadily. Less than thirty minutes had passed since the timer began.
……
Lance’s worries were unnecessary. The locations of all nuclear weapons on this planet had ceased to be a secret the moment Ye Bai arrived. They had long been handed over to Lynn as the first batch of raw materials for the spacecraft.
Nuclear weapons crafted by a planetary-level civilization? In Lynn’s hands, they could be effortlessly dismantled and repurposed.
Of course, unbeknownst to the people of Taida, Ye Bai had done far more than that.
The Taida civilization remained at a planetary level, lagging far behind interstellar technology in both scientific advancement and psychic mastery. The gap between their era and the interstellar age was even wider than that between primitive tribes and the information age.
After returning from the divine realm, Ye Bai’s power had grown exponentially. Combined with advanced technology, the might of a high-level psychic was overwhelming compared to Taida’s current technological capabilities.
Without ever leaving Taida Tower, Ye Bai remotely seized control of the three major conglomerates’ stockpiled resources—arms, energy, and genetic reserves—accumulated since before the information age.
Vast quantities of resources and energy were funneled into a region absent from all digital records: Lynn’s automated spacecraft factory. A small fraction remained beneath the fully transformed Taida Tower.
Taida Tower and the headquarters of the three conglomerates had now become absolute no-go zones on the planet.
Yet, despite the collective demise of their shadow rulers, the three conglomerates didn’t collapse into chaos. High- and mid-level executives with psychic abilities took whatever personnel and resources they could carry. Lance was among them.
The resources too cumbersome to move—energy reserves and top-tier weaponry—were now under Ye Bai’s control. What these fleeing elites took were vials of Nora genetic serum and Taida’s monetary standard: chromium gold.
The fall of a system was never simple. With the old oligarchs gone, new ones—or perhaps future warlords—were eager to take their place.
"Relax, darling." Lance, the former arms minister, was the first to flee Taida Tower with his most trusted subordinates after careful consideration. Arm in arm with his seemingly fragile partner, he gazed at the neon-lit night, a newfound ambition stirring in his heart.
"At least we still have weapons. We still have money—more than we could spend in millennia! These are our tickets to doing whatever we please, anywhere on Taida."
That night, amid the planet-wide chaos, Lance slept more soundly than ever.
The next morning, he was jolted awake by his partner’s laughter—a mad, unrestrained cackling that tore him from his dreams.
Bewildered, Lance stared at their silhouette by the window. "What’s wrong?"
They turned with a cryptic smile and gestured for him to see for himself.
Heart pounding, Lance approached and followed their pointing finger—only to be met with a dazzling sea of blue and gold.
The Taida people adored towering skyscrapers, their neon-lit silhouettes a signature urban spectacle. But now, every steel pillar in the city, regardless of its original material, had transformed into chromium gold—Taida’s hard currency.
Yet from this moment on, describing chromium gold required a new qualifier: ‘formerly.’
The value of a precious metal lay in its scarcity. No civilization ever adopted ‘rock-backed’ or ‘dirt-backed’ currency.
Amidst the hollow laughter, Lance’s partner turned on the TV. Unsurprisingly, even this isolated safehouse’s offline display had been hijacked by the broadcast from Taida Tower.
Lance whirled around at the noise. On-screen, the enigmatic figure smiled. "Good morning, would-be oligarchs. Enjoy my gift? An endless supply of ‘money.’"
Lance’s ears rang. Dizziness washed over him—a shock surpassing even yesterday’s massacre of the ruling class. This wasn’t just fear.
The death of individuals was fleeting. What truly terrified Lance was the obliteration of a social order he’d believed as immutable as natural law.
…Perhaps the harbinger of doom had truly descended upon their world.
