Chapter 199: Consciousness
About five minutes later, Feng Chengyu withdrew his Mental Power. His expression was relatively relaxed. “Marshal, his condition seems to have improved somewhat. He’s no longer as critical as when he first arrived.”
This was good news. After all, as long as Nan Yu was all right, there was no telling how many people he would be able to save in the legion in the future.
That was why Feng Chengyu also thought very highly of someone like Nan Yu and hoped he would recover. Before this, he had even felt it was a pity, believing there was a very real possibility that Nan Yu could no longer be saved.
But unexpectedly, Nan Yu was actually recovering little by little. It seemed no one had been helping him during this period, which meant that Nan Yu’s recovery depended entirely on his own self-healing ability. This was the first time Feng Chengyu had ever heard of a Mental Power User possessing such an astonishingly powerful self-healing ability!
Still, this was a good thing. And because this person was Nan Yu, he would not dig too deeply into it, overthink it, or run his mouth and tell others about it.
Yu Lanfeng said, “Then calculate it. At this rate, how long will it take him to regain consciousness?”
Feng Chengyu calculated for a moment before saying, “If he continues recovering at his current rate, it will probably take more than a year before he can barely meet the conditions for waking up. But his condition may change along the way, so I can’t say for certain whether it will take less than a year or more than a year.”
Yu Lanfeng already considered this good news. Before this, he had been wondering whether it might take two or three years. One year was already quite good...
However, he still had not found a way to keep Nan Yu from contacting the Nan family for an entire year. For now, he could only stall for as long as possible and deal with it when he could no longer hide the truth.
Perhaps Nan Yu would happen to wake up by then?
Feng Chengyu stood where he was and awkwardly stole a glance at Yu Lanfeng. So... was he supposed to keep waiting here? Was he supposed to examine Nan Yu every day?
Fortunately, after Yu Lanfeng came back to his senses, he immediately dismissed him. Feng Chengyu carefully left, and the moment he escaped the range of Yu Lanfeng’s perception, he ran toward his residence like a mad dog.
He would never tell anyone what had happened today even if they beat him to death. In short, absolutely nothing had happened today. He had merely gone out for a casual walk. Yu Lanfeng had not summoned him, and he had not done anything whatsoever.
After sending him away, Yu Lanfeng lay back down on the bed and continued watching Nan Yu. The matters at the military base could actually all be resolved within a short period of time.
It was just that after everything that had happened this time, Yu Lanfeng had thought of another possibility. Aside from spies who infiltrated from outside, there was actually another kind of infiltrator, and they were the most troublesome and most detestable of all—betrayers. Traitors!
No matter how thoroughly their identities were investigated, everything would be genuine. They were citizens of the Empire, and there would not be any problems whatsoever with their identity information. But so many external infiltrators had been uncovered across so many military bases. Those infiltrators must have managed to brainwash at least one or two people each. On average, every base should have around a dozen traitors. However, Yu Lanfeng had no intention of finding them right now.
These people originally had connections with some of the nearby gathering points. After all, infiltrators could not possibly hand over the contact information of the superior they directly reported to just because someone had supposedly been brainwashed by them. What if that person was only pretending?
Therefore, the traitors at each military base certainly had no way to contact anyone on the other side right now. All they could do was temporarily lie low and wait for another opportunity. Trying to uncover all of them now would be extremely troublesome, so Yu Lanfeng simply decided to leave them alone for the time being.
They would expose themselves sooner or later anyway. Besides, Yu Lanfeng had no attention to spare for so many things right now. What worried him most was when Nan Yu would finally wake up.
Several more days passed, until Zhou Changwu finally finished dealing with the spies and came to report to Yu Lanfeng.
“Marshal, everyone on the list has been dealt with.”
Yu Lanfeng said, “You didn’t leave a single one alive, did you?”
Zhou Changwu replied, “Yes, Marshal. Not a single one was left. It’s just that one of them was particularly cowardly. The moment he was caught, he immediately spilled a great many secrets without us even having to ask. Some of them concern things we hadn’t previously found any leads on...”
Yu Lanfeng immediately said, “Send me the information. Arrest everyone who needs to be arrested first. It’s not like we haven’t caught people like this before. Handle it as you see fit.”
Zhou Changwu understood what he meant. “Understood. Then I’ll take my leave first. I’ll come back and report to you once everything has been dealt with.”
Yu Lanfeng nodded and watched him leave.
However, less than three minutes after Zhou Changwu left, a fireball suddenly flew in from beyond the floor-to-ceiling windows leading to the balcony. It passed straight through the open doors and shot into the room.
Yu Lanfeng simply stood there quietly, watching the fireball rush toward him.
As it flew toward him, the curtains beside the balcony doors were blown upward by the heat wave and then ignited, burning to ashes in an instant.
Only drifting black ash remained suspended in the air.
Yu Lanfeng watched the fireball close in until it was right in front of him, then casually waved his hand.
The fireball vanished just like that.
He immediately walked out onto the balcony, but there was no one outside. It was as though the attack just now had merely been some kind of joke. Once the joke was over, the person responsible had simply left.
Yu Lanfeng found it very strange.
If someone really had been playing a joke on him, then it actually made some sense. After all, how many people in the entire Empire did not know that Yu Lanfeng’s ability was fire? And it was currently the most powerful fire-type ability in existence. Yet someone had actually used the very fire-type ability he specialized in to attack him. If that was not a joke, then what was it?
But because he could not find the person responsible, Yu Lanfeng still had no choice but to take this seemingly ordinary incident a little more seriously.
Standing on the balcony, he suddenly froze slightly as though something had occurred to him. He turned and went back into the room, then breathed a sigh of relief.
No matter who it was, no one could take Nan Yu away right from under his nose.
However, they definitely could not continue staying in this room. They needed to move to another one.
Zhou Changwu, who had only left a few minutes earlier, was called back again. When he learned what had happened, he frowned deeply and gritted his teeth.
“This should have something to do with Zhou Teng. He brainwashed a great many people before. News that he’s been imprisoned must have spread, so these people came here to cause trouble, hoping to pressure us into backing down and releasing Zhou Teng.”
Yu Lanfeng said, “They certainly have guts. But I don’t care whether they were brainwashed or not. Arrest every last one of them. If Zhou Teng being arrested is enough to make them do something like this inside a military base, then they are no longer fit to be soldiers. They’re far too emotional, refuse to obey discipline and orders, and act according to their own feelings. Add destruction of a military base and assaulting a marshal on top of that, and those charges are enough to put them away for many years. Hopefully, they’ll come to their senses by then.”
After giving these instructions, Yu Lanfeng had Zhou Changwu arrange another room for them. It was nearby, and the layout was exactly the same, so at first glance it almost looked as though they had not changed rooms at all.
Yu Lanfeng planned to wait a little longer and leave only after Zhou Teng’s matter had been completely resolved.
Now there was one more thing to deal with: the people who had attacked him earlier had to be caught first.
If someone attacked a marshal inside the legion, they could actually send them directly to court, or deal with them internally and send them to serve their sentences at another military base. But if they chose the latter, the court process would be omitted. It would become an internal matter of their own legion, and if anything went wrong, they would have to bear the consequences themselves.
Yu Lanfeng soon saw the two people who had attacked him earlier.
Zhou Changwu also found it somewhat strange. Something was not right. Since they had done something like this, shouldn’t they have hidden themselves properly? How had they been found the moment an investigation began?
Of course, it was possible someone else had deliberately leaked information about them so that they would be arrested as quickly as possible, but Zhou Changwu still felt something was wrong.
Still, there was definitely no mistake about these two being the attackers.
Yu Lanfeng looked at them a few times before losing interest.
“Why did you attack me? Speak.”
Unexpectedly, neither of them said a word.
Perhaps if they refused to speak, they thought the incident could simply be treated as though it had never happened. Unfortunately, there were no such things as “ifs” when it came to something like this.
Seeing that they still refused to say anything, Yu Lanfeng waved his hand and handed them over to Zhou Changwu to deal with himself.
This time, while he remained at this military base, he absolutely would not leave Nan Yu’s side to handle official business.
This incident was very likely intended to lure him away. After all, if he remained here the entire time, staying beside Nan Yu, certain people would have no way to carry out their plans.
It was not that acting would become difficult.
They would be completely unable to act.
Because as long as Yu Lanfeng was here, they had absolutely no chance of winning.
But this attempt to create a diversion had apparently failed.
At first, Yu Lanfeng had thought this military base was much better than the previous ones. Now, however, it seemed that the situation here was actually even more serious than at several of the military bases that had previously seemed much worse.
There was no telling what else might happen afterward.
Yu Lanfeng swore that during this period, he would remain here one hundred percent of the time!
If something happened to Nan Yu, he might really go insane.
Zhou Changwu said, “In that case, I’ll take them away first.”
Yu Lanfeng said, “Handle everything according to the rules. If you want to save some time, deal with them internally according to the requirements of the law. If that won’t work, send them directly to court. The evidence is sufficient anyway. There’s no need to gather anything else.”
Zhou Changwu quickly and secretly dealt with the two of them.
Because Zhou Changwu had already dealt with the spies earlier, the military base now seemed to have lost scattered groups of people here and there.
This time, it was merely another two people disappearing. To the people at the military base, it was hardly worth noticing anymore. Besides, the Ability Beasts were currently in the middle of a period of unrest. With fewer personnel, everyone who remained became busier, and no one had the time to think too deeply about it.
Yu Lanfeng checked the time and decided he would remain here for another ten days at most.
After dealing with the two men, Zhou Changwu assigned people to regularly pass by the area near Yu Lanfeng and Nan Yu’s current room to prevent anything similar from happening again.
But apparently the other side’s courage only went this far. Even their sneak attack had used the most direct method possible to test the waters. Now that they had discovered it would not work, they naturally would not send anyone else.
So Border Region Eleven should be relatively peaceful from now on.
Nan Yu felt as though his mind was trapped in a constant haze.
He wanted to move, but could not. He wanted to speak, but could not. He could not even blink, nor could he consciously adjust his breathing. It was as though his consciousness and soul had been separated from his physical body into two completely different parts.
His body maintained only the most basic automatic functions, such as breathing, while his consciousness was extraordinarily active, as though he had endless things to say.
Unfortunately, there was no one around for him to talk to.
The entire space was pitch-black.
Nan Yu’s vision went dark, but he realized that he had not actually lost consciousness. Once the darkness passed, what appeared before him was a plant.
It looked like the Nianshen Grass.
But wasn’t the Nianshen Grass still inside his spatial button?
Why was it here?
What had happened?
Wait.
Or rather, where exactly was this place?
Nan Yu struggled to remember. At last, he recalled that he seemed to have found a device inside that enormous laboratory that contained an immense amount of Mental Power, filled to its absolute limit.
While investigating it, he seemed to have accidentally activated it, and then...
Did what happened next even need to be said?
Of course, all that Mental Power had instantly knocked him unconscious.
So right now, he should be inside his own Mental Power world.
As for why he had absolutely no control over his physical body, it was surely because his Mental Sea had been completely occupied by all that Mental Power. He could not draw out any additional Mental Power to regain control over his Mental Sea, and therefore could not control his body.
Still, this state actually seemed rather interesting.
It was quite novel.
He floated around this place and experienced an incredible sense of freedom. He could drift wherever he wanted, however he wanted.
But he quickly realized that he could not waste time like this.
“I don’t even know how long I’ve been unconscious. Bro must be incredibly worried and blaming himself. And I don’t know whether he told Dad, Eldest Brother, and Second Brother about this. I really hope Bro didn’t tell them, otherwise...”
Otherwise, considering just how much his father and brothers doted on him, they might simply charge straight into the legion to find him!
Nan Yu took a deep breath and began searching for a way to help himself wake up as quickly as possible.
He explored every place he could reach while floating around and finally found his Mental Sea.
Honestly, if this sphere before him that looked like the sun truly was his Mental Sea, then Nan Yu really did feel a sense of accomplishment.
Unfortunately, not all the Mental Power inside belonged to him.
At the edge of his Mental Sea, he saw two extended Mental Power circulation pathways, one leading inward and the other outward. They looked extremely familiar.
Combined with the familiar-looking Nianshen Grass he had seen earlier, Nan Yu could now be certain.
Bro must have taken the Nianshen Grass out of his spatial button and placed it beside him.
He had cultivated together with the Nianshen Grass countless times. Unexpectedly, they were now able to automatically connect with each other, allowing the Nianshen Grass to control this Mental Power circulation on its own.
But Nan Yu could tell at a glance that the Mental Power circulation controlled by the Nianshen Grass was both slow and weak.
At this rate, who knew how long it would take him to recover!
Although he could not control his body right now, he could still control some of his Mental Power.
And so control over the Mental Power circulation passed from the Nianshen Grass to Nan Yu himself.
Nan Yu approached his Mental Sea and gently placed both hands against the barrier surrounding it.
He quickly discovered that he could not enter.
The reason was simple.
It was already completely full inside.
But that did not matter. It was fine if he could not enter. As long as he could control the Mental Power inside that belonged to him, it was enough.
His task now was to gradually strengthen the Mental Power circulation.
But this task was not so simple.
He had to gradually control the amount being released. As the amount increased, more Mental Power would be sent into the Nianshen Grass. The time the Nianshen Grass required to process that Mental Power would also change accordingly.
Obviously, it was impossible to force a machine originally operating at low power to suddenly start working at maximum intensity.
So he could only increase the amount of Mental Power little by little, allowing the Nianshen Grass to gradually increase and accelerate the rate at which it absorbed and converted Mental Power.
Once it adapted to that speed, he could slowly increase the amount of Mental Power again.
In this way, he could gradually accelerate the entire process. Later, even without deliberately controlling it himself, the circulation would be able to maintain that high speed.
He had no idea how much earlier he would be able to wake up because of this.
Nan Yu first increased the amount by half of its current intensity.
When this amount of Mental Power flowed into the Nianshen Grass, the plant really did pause for a moment, but it quickly adapted to the increased intensity.
Clearly, this level posed no problem for it.
After allowing the circulation to run at this intensity several times and confirming that the Nianshen Grass was fine, Nan Yu began increasing the amount of Mental Power again.
By the time he had increased it to ten times the original amount, the Nianshen Grass’s rate of consumption and conversion began to slow somewhat.
Nan Yu did not rush.
Instead, he stopped increasing the amount of Mental Power in the circulation and quietly observed the Nianshen Grass’s condition.
After the circulation ran at ten times the original amount for roughly fifty cycles, the Nianshen Grass’s processing and absorption speed gradually began returning to its previous rate.
However, judging from its current condition, this seemed to be its limit.
Nan Yu felt somewhat regretful, but he could more or less guess the reason.
This Nianshen Grass was simply too young. It was still very small, only a juvenile plant. Being able to achieve this much was already extremely impressive.
Besides, the current circulation speed was already ten times faster than before.
That meant he could wake up ten times sooner.
Hopefully, it would be soon.
Once Nan Yu relaxed, waves of exhaustion swept over him.
He must have used too much of his own Mental Power just now, which was why he was becoming sleepy. Otherwise, how could a body formed entirely from Mental Power even feel drowsy?
Nan Yu let out a long sigh.
Once he woke up, he absolutely had to make it up to Bro properly.
Bro must be worried sick because of him.
Muttering to himself, Nan Yu sank into the darkness and fell asleep.
Yu Lanfeng looked outside and saw that the sky had already grown dark.
He returned to the bed, and while pulling the blanket over Nan Yu, he suddenly realized that Nan Yu’s face was no longer pale.
Color was gradually returning to his cheeks.
Even his lips were no longer as pale and purplish as before. Instead, they were becoming rosy.
What did this mean?
It meant Nan Yu’s condition had improved tremendously!
Yu Lanfeng could hardly believe it.
He lifted the blanket and looked at the Nianshen Grass clutched in Nan Yu’s hand.
Sure enough, the Mental Power circulation had completely changed.
If the original circulation had been as thin as a single strand of hair, now it was as thick as a sturdy hemp rope!
Of course, Mental Power could not normally be seen at all. Yu Lanfeng was only able to observe it briefly with his Mental Power because of his relatively unusual constitution.
Even then, there was a limit to how long he could observe Mental Power. After a short while, he could no longer see it.
He slowly lay down beside Nan Yu and gently rested Nan Yu’s head against his shoulder.
“Xiaoyu, Xiaoyu... you’ve already regained consciousness, haven’t you?”
“You just can’t move right now, can you? It’s all right. You must have regained consciousness. Otherwise, there’s no way the Mental Power circulation could have changed this much...”
“Xiaoyu, when will you wake up? Xiaoyu, Xiaoyu...”
Nan Yu vaguely regained a trace of awareness.
He seemed to hear someone calling him Xiaoyu.
But when he tried to listen carefully, he could not hear anything at all.
As expected, Mental Power did not have a sense of hearing.
He simply rolled around twice before sinking back into sleep.
What he needed most right now was proper rest. If he could not rest well, then over the next several days, the Mental Power circulation definitely would not be able to proceed smoothly.
As Nan Yu’s condition improved, Yu Lanfeng’s expression was no longer as grim every single day as it had been before. Now he would even voluntarily show the others a better expression.
Zhou Changwu said, “Marshal, all the spies have been dealt with, and the follow-up matters have also been handled. As for Zhou Teng, we’ve identified the person from the Bai family he was in contact with. It was a woman named Bai Shanzhou. Apparently, she promised to marry him once everything was done.”
Zhou Teng naturally knew about the Bai family on the Capital Star.
And so, after being blinded by beauty, power, and wealth, Zhou Teng began carrying out his plan.
His plan was very simple.
He would use every possible means to drag this older relative of his down from the position of general.
As for exactly how the plan was supposed to be carried out, the ideas had actually come from Bai Shanzhou.
That was right.
The methods Zhou Teng had supposedly devised before had actually been suggested by Bai Shanzhou.
The objective was to remove Zhou Changwu from the position of general, after which Zhou Teng would specifically support another person in taking his place.
Zhou Changwu naturally knew who that person was.
In fact, if Zhou Changwu were no longer there, the position of general would very likely have gone to this man.
Yu Lanfeng asked, “Who is it? What’s his name?”
Zhou Changwu replied, “My adjutant, Jiang Zhan. He was extremely capable. I thought very highly of him and entrusted him with important responsibilities. But a few days ago, he led a squad to the front lines, and because the situation was too dangerous, he unfortunately died in action yesterday morning.”
Only one day after his death, they discovered that the now-deceased Jiang Zhan had connections to the Bai family.
So had his death truly been an accident on the battlefield caused by the overwhelming number of Ability Beasts?
Or had it been a man-made “accident” because someone no longer wanted him alive?
No one could say.
Everyone who had been fighting alongside him at the time claimed it had been an accident, but they instinctively felt that things could not possibly be that simple.
Yet questioning them again yielded nothing.
The trail ended there.
When they tried to investigate further afterward, they discovered that all the chat records and other communications between Zhou Teng and the Bai family that could have served as evidence had completely disappeared.
Obviously, someone on the Bai family’s side must have discovered that they were secretly investigating the contents of their private conversations.
So they had simply erased everything in one go.
From now on, no one would ever know what had been there.