49 Apocalypse Rules

At the Central Earthquake Monitoring Bureau, all employees were glued to the seismograph reading screens.

Ever since the eleventh Apocalypse Rule was announced, this once small department had been flooded with new personnel.

Their mission was simple: work in 24-hour shifts to ensure that the moment an earthquake occurred, they could pinpoint its epicenter and report it up the chain of command.

At 6:20 PM, the five staff members on duty suddenly noticed an abnormal reading on the instruments, immediately followed by an automated alert.

"An earthquake is occurring!"

"It’s a micro-quake. It must be a level 1 earthquake from the rules. Report the epicenter’s location, now!"

The on-duty staff immediately reported the situation. Less than ten seconds later, the phone on Gao Liangwei’s desk rang.

Based on the epicenter’s location, he immediately contacted the Commander of the nearest local armed forces unit, ordering them to proceed to the position directly above the seismic focus—the epicenter—without delay.

He also demanded that the personnel dispatched to the area find the "Earth Vein Pillar" and attempt to make contact with it before the earthquake ended.

The earthquakes caused by the rules only lasted for five minutes, posing a tremendous challenge to their deployment capabilities.

Without adequate deployment capabilities, even if a group of Ascenders were willing to sacrifice themselves by touching the Earth Vein Pillar, they might not reach the epicenter in time.

Therefore, at Gao Liangwei’s suggestion, the higher-ups agreed to establish rapid deployment points in various locations, equipped with the fastest helicopters available. This would ensure that as long as an epicenter was near a human settlement, they could reach it at top speed.

Upon receiving the order, the armed forces unit near the epicenter deployed immediately, arriving at the target coordinates in less than two minutes.

It was an open-air soccer field in the city. Having been abandoned for over a year, it was already in a state of disrepair.

From the helicopter, the soldiers spotted the black cylinder standing in the center of the field at a glance.

It was the Earth Vein Pillar!

The soldiers immediately fast-roped to the ground. Since this was a level 1 micro-quake, they could barely feel the ground shaking after landing.

Two and a half minutes had already passed. The Commander immediately ordered, "Everyone, approach the Earth Vein Pillar, remove your gloves, and make contact!"

"Yes, sir!"

The soldiers rushed forward. The Earth Vein Pillar was a pure black cylinder, devoid of any patterns or designs. It was so thick that it would take three to five people to encircle it, and it was at least five meters tall.

Upon reaching it, the soldiers placed their palms on the black pillar without hesitation. As professional soldiers, they had made commitments and received protection in return; if a time came that required dedication and sacrifice, they were willing to step up.

For a soldier, obeying orders is their duty, and the Commander was no exception. He was the first to press his palm against it.

When their many hands touched the black pillar, everyone immediately felt the same sensation.

"The pillar is vibrating!" a soldier blurted out.

That’s right. Everyone touching the black pillar could feel it vibrating. But it was impossible to tell just by looking; the sensation was only present on contact, as if the vibration was originating from within the pillar itself.

At the same time, some soldiers noticed their Psychic Power caps were decreasing.

"Report! My Psychic Power cap is decaying!"

"Mine too!"

The Commander glanced at his Terminal Panel. After less than ten seconds of contact, his Psychic Power cap had already decayed by a full 20 points! That was an average of 2 points per second—an astonishing rate.

He gritted his teeth. "Do not remove your hands, even if it drops to zero! This is our mission!"

"Yes, sir!"

Time ticked by. In less than a minute, some soldiers could no longer hold on. Their faces went pale, and they slumped to the ground.

"Report... My Psychic Power cap is depleted. My personal terminal has shut down..."

Soon, the other soldiers followed suit.

Only the Commander held out to the end, but his Psychic Power cap wasn’t enough to last until the earthquake finished. Soon, his hand also dropped limply.

Just then, several CRACK sounds echoed out. Everyone looked up to see large pieces of the pillar’s outer shell cracking and falling away, revealing a flowing, dark brown liquid within that resembled liquefied earth.

A soldier murmured, "Commander, is... is that what we got for draining all our Psychic Power?"

The squad had a total of twelve members, and every one of them had depleted their Psychic Power cap to the point their personal terminals shut down. All they had to show for it was a few cracks in the "Earth Vein Pillar’s" shell.

The Commander was silent for a moment before reporting the situation.

Meanwhile, the Earthquake Monitoring Bureau also reported the real-time data changes from their earthquake detection.

Upon receiving the various sets of data, analysts in the Strategy Research Room immediately began their analysis, building models and using AI assistance for comparison.

At the same time, level 1 earthquakes also occurred in other member nations of the Human Federation.

However, not every country had the same deployment and operational efficiency as North Star. Nearly half the nations failed to dispatch personnel to the epicenter to make contact with the Earth Vein Pillar within the five-minute window. Of the remaining half, some only made contact for a mere ten-odd seconds.

In the end, only seven or eight sets of high-value data were collected. In accordance with their agreement, the nations made their data public for each other to use in their respective model analyses.

At 8 PM that night, the analysis report was on the conference table in the Strategy Research Room.

An analyst explained, "We’ve built a model by combining the data provided by all the nations. According to the model’s analysis, when an Ascender touches the Earth Vein Pillar, their Psychic Power cap will decay at a rate of 1 to 3 points per second."

"Additionally, based on the monitored tremor amplitude, energy decay, and waveband changes from the Earthquake Bureau, we can make a basic judgment: the ratio of Psychic Power cap loss to the reduction in earthquake destructive force is approximately 1000:1. In other words, sacrificing 1,000 points of Psychic Power cap can reduce an earthquake’s destructive force by 1%."

The result announced by the analyst stunned everyone in the conference room.

"1,000 points only reduces it by 1%? That’s way too little..."

"If this model is correct, then to weaken a level 10 mega-quake to a manageable level, how much Psychic Power would we need? How many Ascenders would it take?!"

"The current average Psychic Power cap for Ascenders is about 90 points, so let’s round it up to 100. To reduce the destructive force by 50%, you would need to completely drain five hundred Ascenders. That might not seem like a huge number, but emergency deployment of five hundred people is not that simple."

"And since the epicenter’s location can’t be determined in advance, we would need to have multiple groups of ’500 people’ on standby in every region, which would also be very troublesome."

"I have a suggestion," an expert said. "We should form a team composed of High Spirit Users. Because their Psychic Power caps are much higher than average, the number of people required would be greatly reduced."

"Then we can gather all the nation’s teleportation-type items and give them to this team. Once the epicenter is confirmed, they can use the items to teleport there en masse and quickly make contact with the Earth Vein Pillar, thereby weakening the earthquake’s power."

After he finished, everyone couldn’t help but frown.

"High Spirit Users are precious assets, the future pillars of our society. Isn’t it a waste to send them to their sacrifice?"

"I think so too... Every High Spirit User is an exceptional individual who has survived all the previous rules. It seems a bit cruel to send them."

"Is it not cruel to send the relatively weaker ones? And don’t forget, the environment at the epicenter of a major earthquake will be extremely dangerous. What if we send weaker individuals and they perish before they even reach the Earth Vein Pillar? We can’t afford the consequences of mission failure!"

"The method for personnel selection hasn’t even been decided yet. Isn’t it too early to be arguing about this?"

"I imagine the person in charge already has some ideas, or he wouldn’t have invited the academy’s dean to the afternoon meeting," someone mentioned.

Everyone turned to look at Gao Liangwei, thinking that was indeed the case.

In the meeting earlier that afternoon, Gao Liangwei had specifically summoned the academy’s dean, Zhou Qinfeng. It was impossible that he wasn’t entertaining the idea of "sending academy students to participate in the operation."

After all, the academy was affiliated with the government, and its graduates were all destined for official positions. These students were all exceptional individuals with Psychic Power over 80 when they enrolled; their current average Psychic Power was now over 100 points, placing them firmly in the category of the strong.

Facing everyone’s gaze, Gao Liangwei said slowly, "Regarding personnel selection, I am still considering it. We won’t make a decision in this meeting. Besides, a single test is not enough to perfect the model. We need to experience at least a few more earthquakes of increasing levels to verify the model’s accuracy."

...

That evening, Guan Tong sat in front of his computer, looking at a dozen or so images on a forum.

The subject of all these pictures was a big, dumb, black, and thick cylinder.

’This is the Earth Vein Pillar?’

He couldn’t see anything special about any of them. It was probably because seeing a picture was different from seeing it with his own eyes.

These images had all been released by various nations. They showed the Earth Vein Pillars discovered at the epicenters, and some user had collected and compiled them into a forum post.

According to the information publicly released by the Human Federation, when an Ascender touches an Earth Vein Pillar, they feel an internal tremor, and their Psychic Power cap decays at a rate of 1 to 3 points per second.

If an ordinary person whose personal terminal has already shut down touches it, they feel nothing at all.

After absorbing a certain amount of Psychic Power, the Earth Vein Pillar’s outer shell will crack, revealing a flowing brown liquid inside that resembles liquefied earth.

As for how deep these Earth Vein Pillars go, there is currently no relevant data.

Some speculated that the Earth Vein Pillar itself caused the earthquakes, its roots deep underground triggering them through the vibration of its internal liquid. This would also explain why breaking its outer shell and letting the liquid flow out would reduce the earthquake’s destructive power.

Some Human Federation member nations had tried attacking the pillars with various weapons—bombing, burning, physical strikes, chemical corrosion... they had urgently tried every destructive method available, but all were ineffective. They could not damage its outer shell.

Others had tried attacking with Psychic Power Bombs, but they also failed to cause any damage. It was unknown whether the bombs weren’t powerful enough or if the Earth Vein Pillar’s shell was immune to attacks.

If the only way to break its shell was to have it drain Psychic Power caps, then a large number of people were destined to make a sacrifice.

This sacrifice wasn’t just about Psychic Power, but potentially their lives as well. In the extremely dangerous epicenter zone, even if one successfully touched the Earth Vein Pillar, what then? Without any Psychic Power to support them, how would they evacuate afterward?

Guan Tong believed the government would surely provide for the future of those who sacrificed their Psychic Power caps, but the prerequisite was that they had to make it back alive.

And as for himself in this new rule...

For the first time, Guan Tong felt like there was nothing he could do.

Even if he were to selflessly sacrifice himself, his three hundred-plus points of Psychic Power would be a mere drop in the bucket compared to what was needed for a significant reduction. It wouldn’t solve the fundamental problem.

’Based on the content of the hidden rules, the path to survival designed by the Fire Thief is for one group of people to sacrifice themselves in exchange for the survival of others... This method of sacrificing a portion of the population is also the Fire Thief’s usual tactic for provoking internal conflict among humans. But besides that, isn’t there any other way?’

Guan Tong’s fingers mechanically clicked the mouse, refreshing his computer desktop, but his thoughts had already drifted far away, pondering other issues.

He had told himself long ago, back during the Blood Plague rule, that when faced with a rule, he had to try to think outside the box. If he just mechanically followed the path laid out by the Fire Thief, his thinking would only become more and more rigid.

’Just like when I solved the Mind Lock problem before. If it weren’t for...’

’Wait, Mind Lock?’

A thought struck Guan Tong. He took out the [Wordless Book] and flipped to the fifth page.

The character for "Open" that he had written on it back then to solve the Mind Lock problem suddenly made him think of the pictures of the Earth Vein Pillar’s cracked shell. A bold, out-of-the-box idea popped into his head.

’If this "Open"... took on the meaning of "Crack Open," could it have an effect on the Earth Vein Pillar’s shell?’