Fate's Choice: Livestream at the Start Summoning Billions of Ravens

The entire Tanyuan ship entered radio silence four minutes after the homing agreement was issued.

All external communication channels were shut down one by one, the satellite uplink was disconnected, and the shipborne radar switched to a purely passive receiving mode. Only a single red encrypted link directly connected to the headquarters of the Ninth Bureau was still transmitting a weak carrier signal.

Captain Lin Yuan of the Yan'an did not use an encrypted link.

He himself piloted the helicopter and landed on the deck of the Tanyuan. While the rotor was still slowing down, he bent down and crawled out of the cabin door, with a brown briefcase no more than one centimeter thick tucked under his arm.

Chen Jianguo was waiting for him on the deck.

The two met in the wind pressure zone of the helicopter's tail section, their hair blown into a mess, but neither of them paid any attention.

Lin Yuan handed over the document bag, his voice muffled by the whirring of the slowing propeller.

"Old Chen, you haven't seen this before."

Chen Jianguo took it and glanced at the cover.

It has a double red header, a joint serial number from the Central Military Commission and the National Security Commission, and two different steel stamps are affixed to the red wax seal at the closure.

He opened the document bag, pulled out three pages, and read them from beginning to end.

There are only three items in the content.

Article 1: A-001 must undergo its first formal inquiry by the Ninth Bureau headquarters within seventy-two hours.

Article 2: The inquiry location is an underground facility in the Western Hills of Beijing, and the confidentiality level has been raised to the highest level, Red Star.

Article 3: During the interrogation, the personal safety of A-001 shall be directly the responsibility of the Central Security Bureau, with the Ninth Bureau providing assistance.

Chen Jianguo turned the three pages back to the first page and looked again at the words "seventy-two hours" in the first item.

"Is this a suggestion or an order?"

Lin Yuan answered very directly.

"The joint resolution accepts no compromise."

Chen Jianguo stuffed the paper back into the document bag without immediately expressing his opinion.

His fingers traced the seal on the bag's opening twice, as if weighing a degree of discretion that only he himself understood.

"He just came from a depth of 10,000 meters at sea, and his physical condition has not been fully assessed. Give me at least 48 hours to do a basic physical examination and a mental health screening."

Lin Yuan shook his head.

"The additional instructions are at the bottom of the bag; please check them."

Chen Jianguo pulled out the last page of the attachment from the document bag; it was an A4 sheet of paper with only two paragraphs printed on it.

The first paragraph is a qualitative assessment: the top leadership has listed the "return of the dead from Tokyo Bay" as one of the most strategically valuable extraordinary events in the world today.

The second paragraph is the logic: any delay could lead to critical information being obtained or analyzed by foreign intelligence agencies first, and risk assessment does not allow for waiting.

"You know about the signal issue too?"

Lin Yuan's voice dropped another half tone.

"When he came up from the water, six conceptual weapons around the world synchronized pulse resonance, and the earthquake monitoring network recorded it all. This news could not be kept secret. Within 72 hours at most, the intelligence systems of various countries would be able to match the timestamp with the energy release in the Mariana Trench."

Chen Jianguo remained silent for five seconds.

"I see."

He folded the briefcase and put it in the inside pocket of his trench coat, without trying to persuade him further.

Lin Yuan patted his arm, turned around and walked towards the helicopter, then turned back after taking two steps.

"Old Chen, it's a good thing he's back."

"I know."

Chen Jianguo repeated the same three words, but in a softer tone than the first time.

Lin Yuan's helicopter took off again, and the airflow generated by the rotor blew the water on the deck into an arc-shaped curtain of water. Chen Jianguo stood at the edge of the curtain of water, looking through the splashing water droplets toward the stern of the ship.

Fu Ningna was still sitting on the mooring post, and Zhou Ruo was standing next to her. The two of them were talking, but the content was unclear.

Mirror One is no longer in that location.

Chen Jianguo walked a dozen steps toward the bridge and found him at the corner of the port side passage.

Mirror One leaned against the iron wall of the passage, holding a half-empty mineral water bottle in its right hand, its gaze fixed on the sea, its posture as relaxed as an ordinary young man waiting for a bus on the roadside.

But Chen Jianguo noticed the bird crouching in the shadow of the pipe at the top of the passage.

The Shadow Raven is smaller than a normal raven and is entirely black. If it weren't for the faint reddish-gold glint in its eyes, it would almost blend into the shadows of the pipes.

Chen Jianguo's gaze lingered on Shadow Raven for a second before returning to Mirror One's face.

Mirror One spoke first.

"Uncle Chen, you don't need to hide it from me."

His tone was flat, without probing or questioning, only stating facts.

"I'll go back to the capital with you, the sooner the better."

Chen Jianguo didn't ask him how he knew; it would be pointless anyway. The shadowy crows in the pipe's shadow had already explained everything.

"How much did you hear?"

"I heard every word Captain Lin Yuan said from the moment he landed until he took off."

Mirror One finished the last drop of water from the mineral water bottle, then crushed the empty bottle and held it tightly in its hand.

"A 72-hour window, Red Star level inquiry, Central Security Bureau responsible for security, and Ninth Bureau assisting."

He flipped the crushed bottle over and pressed his thumb into the dent in the bottle.

"The longer it drags on, the better it is for everyone. If you try to buy me some buffer time, you'll offend people. If I stay on the ship and refuse to leave, the people on board will think the worst about the situation."

Chen Jianguo took off his glasses and pinched the two red marks on the bridge of his nose left by the frames with his thumb and forefinger.

You've changed.

Mirror One tilted its head slightly, the angle and rhythm exactly the same as when it argued with Chen Jianguo in the safe house.

"Nothing has changed, except I died once."

His voice softened by half an octave.

"Before I died, I thought I could put everything off, since I'd still be alive tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow too."

He tossed the crushed empty bottle into a trash can by the deck, the sound of plastic hitting the metal wall bouncing twice in the passageway.

"You only realize after you die that tomorrow isn't a free gift, and it's best to do what you can now."

Chen Jianguo put his glasses back on, and the gaze behind the lenses lingered on his face for three seconds.

Are you sure?

"Sure."

Mirror One stood up straight, hands in the pockets of his trench coat.

"Ask whatever you need to ask, investigate whatever you need to investigate. There's nothing I can't say."

Chen Jianguo looked at him for five seconds, nodded, said nothing more, and turned to walk towards the bridge.

Mirror One remained in place.

The shadowy crows in the pipes above the passage silently dispersed into a black mist, disappearing into the gaps in the pipes.

Six thousand four hundred kilometers away.

Rome, luxury suite.

The curtains were drawn tightly shut, and only the light from the holographic panel reflected on the ceiling, turning the entire room into a deep blue hue.

Jiang Ming sat on the sofa, holding a half-glass of red wine in his right hand, while the fingertips of his left hand hovered over the edge of the panel, slowly scrolling through the data stream.

The panel displays Mirror One's complete set of real-time parameters: the soul fluctuation curve is stable, the output thresholds of all four main abilities are in the green range, and the thought process is clear and free of noise.

The mood counter in the upper right corner of the panel is constantly ticking.

The topic of "the resurrection of the Raven God" spread like wildfire across global social media, generating new threads of discussion every second, with the chain of reposts spreading from Tokyo to New York, and from London to Cairo.

Emotional value revenue has exceeded 1.27 million, and the growth rate is still climbing.

Jiang Ming took a sip of red wine, letting the liquid linger on his tongue for two seconds before swallowing.

"The stage has been erected all the way to the capital."

He spoke very softly to himself, so softly that even if there were a second person in the room, they might not be able to hear him clearly.

"Let's see how he performs next."

He placed the wine glass on the armrest, tapped the bottom of the panel twice with his fingers, and brought up the chart of the emotional value classification.

A line of text pops up at the bottom of the system panel.

[An abnormal concentration of sentiment values ​​has been detected globally. Source tags: Fear (34%), Awe (28%), Fanaticism (22%), Confusion (16%). The current total balance has exceeded 6 million.]

Jiang Ming's gaze lingered on the word "fear" for four seconds.

Thirty-four percent.

Beyond awe, beyond fanaticism, it is the most prevalent of all emotional labels.

He picked up the wine glass and put it down again, rubbing his fingertips along the inside of the glass.

"There are more people who fear me than who admire me."

He didn't laugh.