Since the sky was covered, the heavens began to show their holiness

"As expected of a city of progress, the technology here is indeed advanced."

Zhou Xian strolled through the progressive city of Rune Continent. The metal buildings glowed coldly in the sun, and the suspended trains dragged magical streams through the buildings. The automatic magic energy vending machine on the street corner was using a mechanical arm to hand out cold magic drinks. In the glass curtain wall of the laboratory in the distance, researchers in white coats were controlling the rune matrix suspended in the air, injecting the blue magic energy into the mechanical device that rotated the gears. He passed by a transportation hub that integrated magic and technology, and saw the intelligent golem guiding the flow of people in an orderly manner. The magic crystal embedded on its forehead flashed the glimmer of data operation. He couldn't help but sigh again at the city's ingenious idea of ​​weaving magic factors into the technological context.

Zhou Xian's eyes fell on the energy cabin of the suspended train at the corner of the street. There was a diamond-shaped crystal embedded there, and the dark blue halo flowing inside was resonating with the elements in the air. He reached out and touched the back of the automatic cleaning golem on the street. His fingertips touched the raised hexagonal core pattern. The magic energy was passing through the rune array on the surface of the crystal, converting wind energy into kinetic energy to drive the gears.

At the top of the towering lighthouse in the distance, the giant Hex core beat like a heart, and each pulse drew a golden trajectory of elemental flow in the sky, weaving the fire elements in the earth veins and the water elements in the clouds into an energy network for the city to operate. He suddenly realized that these cores of different sizes were like the magical heart of the city, allowing metal and runes to coexist here to create a technological pulse that transcends the mundane.

"Whoever invented this Hex Core is a genius."

Zhou Xian couldn't help but sigh.

"Yes, thanks to Senator Talis for inventing Hextech, otherwise our Piltover wouldn't be what it is today."

A passerby at the side puffed out his chest proudly, as if the Senator Talis he was talking about was him, and then looked at Zhou Xian, "You are not from our Piltover, are you?"

Zhou Xian nodded, his eyes cast towards the Parliament Building in the distance which was engraved with gears and rune emblems: "It is indeed my first time here. I heard that Piltover has advanced technology, and today I see that it is indeed worthy of its reputation."

Hearing this, the passerby showed a proud look, and his fingertips traced the rune border of the magic street lamp on the street: "That's right, our Piltover's technology is second to none in the entire Rune Continent. Now even those guys in Zaun are secretly using our improved micro cores to repair pipelines." He suddenly lowered his voice, "But I heard that the parliament is arguing about the decentralization of core technology recently, and Zaun is always clamoring for sharing."

Before he could finish his words, the hover bus on the corner of the street suddenly sounded an alarm. A fist-sized Hextech core fell off the chassis, bounced twice on the ground, and then floated up and automatically sucked back into the energy tank - as if every part of this city was engraved with a tribute to its creator.

"This was designed by the councillors to prevent the leakage of Hextech technology. Even if the people in the lower city covet Hextech technology, there is nothing we can do."

After saying that, the man glanced at Zhou Xian, as if warning him that he had better not have any ideas about Hextech.

Zhou Xian noticed the other party's vigilant eyes, chuckled and spread his palms: "Don't worry, I don't even understand the basic formula of the rune matrix." He pointed to the core that automatically returned to its original position, "But this self-stabilizing system is indeed ingenious. When the core fell off just now, I saw that the rune array automatically generated elemental anchor points."

The passerby's expression eased a little, but he was still staring at his cuffs. "The councillors embedded a resonance lock in the core. If a magical wave without Piltover certification approaches, the entire core will disintegrate into elemental turbulence on the spot. Last month, a Zaun thug stole a magic furnace, and the core exploded in his backpack, creating a frost vortex half a street away - enough for him to lie in the haze for three months to heal his lungs."

As soon as he finished speaking, the magical pendulum of the bell tower in the distance began to hum, and Zhou Xian saw that the runes on the surface of the bell were changing their arrangement with the flow of time. Every glimmer of light was like the anti-counterfeiting signature that Talis left in the blood of the city.

“You know a lot.”

Zhou Xian glanced meaningfully at the passerby who was talking, and the man puffed out his chest proudly upon hearing his words.

"Of course!" The passerby patted his chest and took out a fingernail-sized Hextech core fragment from his pocket. "See? This is a defective product I picked up at the scrap yard on Gear Street. It took me three months to figure out the first principle of the resonance lock!" He suddenly leaned closer and lowered his voice. "But seriously, Senator Talis has been going to Zaun a lot recently. I heard that he is working on some kind of 'equality plan'. Shhh——"

The voice was cut off by the sound of an alarm passing through the sky. Three suspended law enforcement devices dragged lightning across the rooftops, and the sound of glass shattering came from the alley below. The passerby immediately stuffed the shards back into his pocket and winked at Zhou Xian: "See? This is why the core must be locked - the Zaun gang has been seizing the core transport convoy recently, and last month they actually used a steampunk modified broken mecha to withstand the magic cannon!"

He dragged Zhou Xian into the safe zone covered by the magic shield, looked at the flickering elemental barrier in the distance, and suddenly straightened his chest: "But they can never steal the rune code in the core! Just like the gears in Piltover will always be more accurate than the steam clocks in Zaun - click, twelve o'clock!"

The newspaper vending golem on the street newsstand just happened to "click" out today's "Piltover Herald". In the front-page photo, Senator Talis was standing in the gray haze of Zaun, the hextech core in his hand slowly resonating with a rusty steam core.

“Our future is bright.”

The sonorous voice seemed to come through the newspaper. Zhou Xian stared at the yellowed lenses of Senator Talis in the newspaper, and suddenly noticed that the rune array on the surface of the core had a crack-like pattern compared to the runes on the streets of Piltover. The passerby followed his gaze and scratched his head: "I heard that the Senator found crystal dust that can neutralize magic repulsion in the Zaun mine, but the masters in the parliament said that this would turn the core into an 'elemental bomb'."

The magic lighthouse in the distance suddenly changed its halo, from the indigo blue representing stability to the orange-red of warning. The passerby's face changed, and he dragged Zhou Xian to the nearest shelter: "Oh no! The core resonance index is abnormal - it was like this when we tested the new core last month!"

The crowd was running under the magic shield, but Zhou Xian saw that the newsstand golem was still mechanically spitting out newspapers. The word "Light" in the front-page headline was illuminated blood red by the emergency light, as if foreshadowing some kind of burning future.

Zhou Xian's fingertips stroked the edge of the newspaper, his eyes passing through the gray haze reflection on Councillor Talis's glasses. The magic trash can on the corner of the street suddenly made a click of gears turning in reverse, and spit out half a crumpled page of experimental report, on which the words "arcane fusion critical value" were blurred by water stains. He looked up at the lighthouse that was changing red light, and found that the pulsation frequency of the top core actually produced a weak resonance with the rusty gear he brought back from Zaun in his pocket - that was given to him by a dusty teenager this morning, saying it was "the key to illuminate the truth."

Passersby grabbed his sleeves and urged him to walk faster, but Zhou Xian stared at the news projection suspended in the air: Senator Talis was giving a speech at the Parliament Building, and the Hextech core on the holographic screen behind him overlapped with the Zaun steam core, emitting dangerous purple arcs. "When gears dance with steam." The councilman's voice was vibrating like a magnetic storm. Zhou Xian noticed that he was wearing a gear-shaped ring on his left ring finger, and the pattern on the ring matched the gear in his pocket.

"Don't you think there's a bit of rust in this light?" He suddenly smiled at the passerby, and at the same time, he ran his thumb over the rust marks on the gears in his pocket, feeling a faint magical fluctuation. The unique sound of steampunk valves came from the alley in the distance. When a black shadow flashed around the corner, he saw that what was hanging on the other side's waist was not a weapon, but half of a Hextech core engraved with the emblem of Piltover.

"Piltover Law Enforcer?"

The familiar figure in the dark made Zhou Xian narrow his eyes slightly. In "League of Legends", the Piltover Enforcer refers to Wei.

Wei was once a saboteur on Zaun's black streets, with a quick temper and a hot temper. She grew up alone, which gave her a survival instinct and a venomous sense of humor.

Now, she works with the Piltover Guard to maintain peace in Piltover. She uses a giant pair of Hextech gloves that can break through both the iron wall and the psychological defense line. "Sir, please come with me and lie down."

Wei walked out of the darkness in the alley and looked at Zhou Xian without any doubt.

Zhou Xian raised his eyebrows, his fingertips unconsciously rubbing the cuff buttons, his eyes swept over the cold glowing Hextech gloves on Wei's waist. The neon lights at the alley entrance shattered into spots on his glasses, but his tone was somewhat nonchalant: "Does the law enforcement officer always use this kind of 'invitation' method?"

He took a half step back, his heels scraping against the peeling graffiti on the wall. "If I remember correctly, Article 17 of the Piltover Law requires that charging documents be produced before an arrest."

Wei's metal wristbands hummed with electricity, and she tapped her knuckles on her gloves: "I'm not in the mood to flip through the code when I don't have to." Several law enforcement officers suddenly jumped out of the shadows, and Wei smiled.

"You have two choices now - you go by yourself, or I help you 'go'."

"If you want me to go with you, then it depends on whether you in Piltover have the ability to do so."

Zhou Xian's mouth curled up slightly. Seeing this, Wei's Hextech punch suddenly smashed the wall. Amid the flying gravel, she raised her leg and kicked Zhou Xian in the back of the neck.

Zhou Xian raised his eyelids slightly, without even dodging. Seeing this, Wei secretly withdrew a lot of strength. Suddenly, a khaki earth wall rose from the ground. Wei's pupils shrank suddenly, and the arc of the Hex boxing gloves exploded into blue-purple sparks in front of the earth wall. Zhou Xian's fingertips gently touched the cracks on the wall, and the khaki magic penetrated into the bricks and stones through his fingers, and vine-like curse patterns bloomed on the earth wall.

"The mercy of the law enforcer?" He tilted his head and chuckled, and suddenly pressed his palm against the wall - the entire earth wall suddenly liquefied into quicksand, and a golem in the shape of a crab gathered at his feet, and its huge claws wrapped around the rubble and slashed towards Wei's face.

Wei spun around to avoid it, her gloves brushing past the golem's shell, but were entangled by the sticky curse the moment they came into contact. The moment she broke the arc, Zhou Xian had already stepped on the quicksand and jumped to the second-floor window sill. On the parchment scroll that was turned out from his sleeve, there was a holographic projection of the underground pipe network in Piltover. "Compared to force suppression..." He shook the scroll open, and his fingertips touched a sewage plant mark, "I am better at turning rules into weapons."

Suddenly, a sharp siren sounded at the entrance of the alley. Three Hex police cars braked to a stop, but the searchlights on the roofs all short-circuited when they swept across Zhou Xian.

"Mage?" Wei's eyes suddenly became serious, and her fingertips subconsciously rubbed the interface of the Hextech gloves, and the arcs in her pupils jumped into tiny silver chains. She kicked away the half-melted mechanical spider at her feet, and the gears made a crackling sound on the soles of her boots.

The magic power on Zhou Xian's fingertips moved between the gaps of the components like a living thing: "Mage? It would be more appropriate to call me a magician."

He raised his hand and waved it gently. The fire hydrant behind Wei suddenly burst, and the water column condensed into the shape of a raven with outstretched wings in the sunlight. "Control the laws of heaven and earth."

"Whether you are a magician or a wizard, hand over what the Wildfire Gang members gave you today. That thing is not something you can touch."

Wei's gloves suddenly unfolded into a giant shield, and arcs of electricity formed an electric grid around the edge of the shield: "That is a forbidden fusion of Hextech and Zaun alchemy. The Council has expressly forbidden it—"

"Council? That's the council of your Piltover." Zhou Xian chuckled. How could he give up something he had obtained? This was a treasure related to time and could allow him to come into contact with the mysterious time.

"Then you can only offend."

Wei's boxing gloves suddenly burst into a dazzling blue light, and the arc of electricity climbed up her neck along the wrist guard, forming a cold and hard edge of light behind her ears. She bent one knee slightly to lower her center of gravity, and the ground cracked under the pressure of Hextech energy, and the rubble floated around the boxing gloves and swirled into a storm.

"Elements?" Zhou Xian raised his lips slightly, and formed a twisted rune on his palm. "Why not try and see how many 'rules' your Hex can absorb?"

Before he finished his words, Wei had already leaped up on the rubble storm. Amid the screaming sound of his giant boxing gloves tearing through the air, Zhou Xian slapped the ground with his fingertip runes - the bricks and stones of the entire building suddenly softened like mud, and condensed into towering stone pillars under his feet, lifting him into the air.

"The weapons are good, but the people are not good enough."

Zhou Xian shook his head and flicked his fingertips, causing the ground to suddenly crack into a spider web-like curse. Just as Wei was about to jump out, obsidian-like rock spikes broke out of the ground and formed a prismatic cage around her.

Dark gold veins flowed on the surface of the rock spikes, which strangely resonated with the energy frequency of the Hextech gloves, causing her arms to go numb. "Hextech is a good piece of iron," he paced around the cage, runes floating in his palms and glowing, "It's a pity that it's locked in the furnace of rules and can't be forged into a sharp edge."

Wei swung her fist at the rock spikes, and the collision of blue light and dark gold produced a sharp scream. However, the cage produced more rock crystals during the vibration, which stuck the glove tightly.

"Miss Law Enforcement Officer, I advise you not to act so rashly in the future. Otherwise, I cannot guarantee that I will not take your life." Zhou Xian narrowed his eyes slightly, and a hint of coldness flashed in his eyes for an instant.

Hearing this, Wei's struggling movements suddenly stopped. He felt as if countless sinister evil spirits were staring at him, and a chill rose from the bottom of his heart.

"As punishment, I'm taking this thing away. Ask Jace to get you another one."

After Zhou Xian finished speaking, without saying anything else, he stretched out his hand and crushed the glove in Wei's hand, and took out the Hextech core from it with a quick and decisive movement.

(End of this chapter)