Alien Hotel.

Chapter 667 Board of Directors

The center of Jiecheng.

The Council Tower stands tall and imposing in the center of this vast, almost boundless "City of Crossroads," its scale reaching into the clouds. Its rigid, gradually tapering lines evoke the shape of a monument. Yet, no one can say when or by whom this magnificent building was erected.

Every resident of Jiecheng seems to have been born accustomed to this towering giant tower, feeling that it should "naturally" stand in its proper place. People do not doubt its existence, nor are they curious about its construction process. Even as thousands of years have passed, and even as the shape of the tower has changed with the times in the eyes of generations of Jiecheng residents, people naturally incorporate these "changes" into their "normal understanding."

The people of Boundary City even extended this "taken-for-granted" perception to the five members of the council—everyone knew that the council members ruled the city, but it seemed that no one had ever thought about the origins and "unusual" nature of these five council members. Some of the council members never appeared in public, and people never became curious about it.

For thousands of years, the members of the Borderland Council have remained unchanged. Their existence is as ancient and "stable" as the tower in the city center, like a wedge firmly driven into the Borderland. No one in the city, including the countless ordinary people working in the Council Tower, has ever doubted this.

Footsteps broke the tranquility of the upper level of the Council Tower. As usual, Baili Qing walked expressionlessly through the connecting area leading to the central elevator. Occasionally, ordinary people working here would bow respectfully to her, and although her expression did not change, she would still nod in response.

She then walked through the connecting corridor—ahead was a small rest area with expansive floor-to-ceiling windows, from which she could directly gaze at the scenery outside the Council Tower. The vast city stretched out to the horizon outside the windows, and above the city was a clear and high sky.

There was no one in the rest area—or rather, no ordinary "humans".

An old computer sat on a table in the corner. Its yellowed, bulky monitor and creaking case seemed out of place with the surrounding art style. The slightly tinted CRT screen was running an ancient game from who-knows-when. When Baili Qing entered the rest area, the old computer slowly turned its head. The game screen flickered a few times before switching to a rudimentary human face, and a distorted voice came from the speakers: "Identification... Council member - Ms. Baili Qing. Welcome, the elevator is currently open."

Bai Liqing looked at the "old computer" in front of her expressionlessly: "...It's changed its design again? It looks stupid."

A screeching noise came from the old computer case, followed by a sudden "bang" as a thick plume of smoke billowed out. When the smoke cleared, a classic old-fashioned record player appeared in the corner, a vinyl record slowly spinning on the machine, and a somewhat shrill sound emanating from the speaker: "How about this?"

"...not as good as the microwave from last time."

Bai Liqing said casually and stepped into the elevator at the end of the rest area.

Behind her, the "classic record player" emitted a series of strange noises, then creaked and twisted a few times before transforming into a purple crystal ball floating on a velvet cushion. From within the crystal ball came a soliloquy: "Is retro fashion no longer in style these days...?"

The potted plant next to her spoke up: "She's sleepy and in a bad mood—it's time for hibernation, and she doesn't have time to sleep."

"...It's really unlucky to work 'outside'."

"Yeah, it's really unlucky to work 'outside'."

The crystal ball shook up and down: "Let's not talk about this anymore, let's continue. Where were we?"

"Speaking of the Dark Lord's army pressing in."

"Oh right, the Dark Lord's army was pressing in, a massive, dark mass that seemed to change the very color of the sky and reverse the flow of rivers. King Langdon III fled on the spot. As the kingdom's chief astrologer, I went up to the city wall, pointed down below, and shouted..."

“No, you just said you were Langdon III—I am the Kingdom’s chief astrologer.”

"...Then you be the chief astrologer, and I'll be the Dark Lord. My army will be pressing in, a vast, dark mass..."

Before the crystal ball could finish speaking, a terrifying face suddenly appeared on the ceiling of the lounge. The face, made of scorching ash, writhed and roared like thunder: "Shut up! I am the Dark Lord! I have been listening to you two idiots discussing these stupid topics for two centuries—can't you talk about something else?"

"Alright, I am the princess of the Fourth Dynasty of Selin Star, and the one on the ceiling—you are my mother."

"...Enough! What did I do wrong to deserve being trapped in this stupid time-space prison, with two idiots like you!"

The bonsai couldn't stand it anymore: "Can you only criticize the crystal ball? I'm just a plant, and all I do every day is quietly photosynthesize here—it's always the one that starts the conversation."

……

Baili Qing heard the sounds coming from behind her, and even as the elevator doors closed, her keen ears could still hear the chaotic conversation.

But she was used to it.

If the Secret Service headquarters is a spatial tangled mess, with a chaotic spatial structure permeating all its floors, then this massive Council Tower is a temporal well, its mysterious central structure concealing illusions of the old era. Moreover, these "temporal illusions" are not always stable; on many occasions, they tend to overflow.

This is because the entire Council Tower was built around a special "abnormality point," which is the remnant left over from the last "epochal shift" in the Borderlands. There is more than one such remnant; the "Pale Library" in the Secret Service headquarters building is another example. However, in terms of scale, all the existing "old generation remnants" in the Borderlands combined cannot compare with what is buried deep within the Council Tower.

Due to the change of eras, no one can understand the specific meaning of those echoes anymore. However, sometimes, those echoes will seep out from the layers of protective protocols and static barriers within the Council Tower. Although they are not very harmful, they will cause some strange phenomena in the real world—sometimes they are memories of the city-state era, sometimes they are phantoms that have fallen out of some fragment of time, and sometimes they are simply... "people".

The council devised a way to contain these things that could potentially have a huge impact on the real world within the core area of ​​the tower, using layers of protective measures to isolate them from the world of ordinary people. It also relied on the "collective cognition" of hundreds or thousands of ordinary people in the building to form an anchor point, maintaining a balance within the core area.

Bai Liqing pressed a few buttons on the control panel of the elevator.

The modern control panel and screen emitted a faint glow, but flickered erratically as she pressed the buttons, sometimes transforming into a stone slab engraved with mysterious runes, and sometimes into a magical illusion floating in the air. The walls of the elevator car gleamed with a silvery-white light, but as the brightness of the lights changed, the silvery-white alloy walls subtly revealed a beautiful, crystal-like light and shadow.

Text appeared on the control panel, and a slightly distorted voice of the Tower Spirit came from inside the elevator: "Elevator * Platform... Initiating, ascending * Council * Remnant * Parliament... Heading to the next era * Arriving safely at * Supreme Sanctuary... Welcome * Past Tense."

Bai Liqing was also used to this chaotic "car announcement".

Suddenly, a pair of eyes appeared in the air beside her. Baili Xue floated on the wall of the sedan chair, bobbing up and down slightly: "Ah, I don't like this place."

“I understand,” Baili Qing nodded calmly, “but now that they have accepted your presence, you don’t need to be overly nervous.”

"But they wanted to kill me!"

"That's because you almost killed me back then."

"..."

Baili Xue fell silent, her eyes drooping slightly, showing a somewhat disappointed expression.

Just then, the elevator doors opened.

A long hall appeared before Baili Qing.

This long hall has a style that is completely different from the modern style of the other floors of the Council Tower—it is paved with black marble floors, and there are towering gray-white stone pillars inlaid with gold patterns on both sides. The strong black and white contrast gives people a feeling of being torn apart yet solemn. There is no roof in the hall, only a kind of gray light that covers the ends of the stone pillars very evenly, illuminating the entire place.

In addition, the walls around the hall are lined with countless windows, which are narrow and tall, resembling classical architecture from a bygone era. The view outside the windows is of boundless clouds and mist, bathed in the orange glow of dusk.

Even though it was noon at the border.

Baili Qing walked straight to the center of the long hall.

There was a large round table there—several figures were already standing guard around it.

There was an old man wearing a gray robe, his hair and beard were completely white, and his face was covered with wrinkles. He was so old that it was impossible to judge his age from his appearance. He seemed to be so old that he could die at any moment, or as if he had aged for countless years and could continue to age in this way.

There was also a middle-aged man in a black coat, with an extraordinary appearance, but at this moment he looked exhausted, with a deep weariness in his eyes, as if he hadn't rested for a hundred years.

There was another black-haired girl with her eyes closed, her long hair almost hanging to the ground, her figure thin and slender, her skin pale as if she were dead, her sickly appearance carrying a strange... dangerous aura.

The last figure was an unusually simple and bizarre "robot"—its torso consisted of thin steel pipes and simple cranks, gears, and connecting rods; a bunch of ticking clocks were stuffed into an iron cage in its chest cavity to serve as its internal organs; a few crisscrossing wires that were actually not connected to anything were its blood vessels and nerves; and its head was just a large, seemingly fragile old-fashioned light bulb.

A faint light flickered within the bulb, its glow uncertain.

Bai Liqing walked over and sat down between them, next to the black-haired girl and the robot.

“Ah, the colorless dragon has arrived,” the white-haired old man raised his head and said tremblingly, “Then the meeting may begin.”

(End of this chapter)