The whole nation: You're put to survive on a desolate planet, you'll be running an alien b

"Everyone assemble. Imperial Mausoleum—enter ahead of schedule."

At a command over the earpiece, the previously suppressed breathing in the villa seemed to be released, and footsteps, the faint sounds of metal buckles and weapons being cocked quickly filled the corridor. Li Haotian stood in front of the safe house, the stinging sensation of the brass badge still lingering on his fingertips. Without lingering, he turned and left.

Several maps were spread out on the makeshift command table in the living room, with highways, auxiliary roads, service areas, and a few suspicious "blind spots" circled in red. Su Wan leaned against the table, her hair neatly tied up, her eyes not red from staying up all night, but with an almost calm calculation.

"I disagree with leaving the Silver Cocoon at a fixed point." She cut to the chase. "You might be able to hold it once or twice, but if you can't, they'll turn the entire city into an altar. The Nameless Cult's greatest strength isn't surprise attacks, it's making it impossible for you to know where the battlefield is."

Liu Hu said gruffly, "Then let's go to the imperial mausoleum, go straight into battle, and cut the Gordian knot."

Su Wan shook her head: "We can leave, but not as 'escorts'. We have to become a shadow they can't understand."

She slapped a conversion diagram on the table: a heavy truck chassis, a closed biological chamber, an isolation cabin, an emergency oxygen supply and negative pressure system, and an internal restraint frame, but the outer shell was a standard engineering vehicle body, and there were even painted "municipal emergency repair" and "tunnel reinforcement" signs.

"A mobile nest." Su Wan pointed to the blueprints. "Some of the aliens, equipment, and samples will be loaded into compartments. The main vehicle will only transport the core—the Silver Cocoon. The rest will be distributed to two auxiliary vehicles, forming 'multiple decoy targets.' The exterior will be disguised as an engineering convoy, traveling on the highway at night, hidden in the rain and fog. Once the lights are on, no one will give it a second glance."

Qin Yue entered through the door, her face expressionless, displaying only professional restraint: "Dragon Shield can provide a covert escort team. Standard procedure: for the cross-regional transfer of major engineering materials, temporary passes are required. We are responsible for leaving traces in the public sphere, making the enemy believe that everything is 'within the system'."

Liu Hu snorted: "Openly escorting us? Isn't that just telling people where we are?"

"Tell them a shell they think they can swallow," Qin Yue said calmly. "The real core is in your hands. My people are just a fig leaf, and also bait."

Su Wan continued, "Liu Hu, you're in charge of the armed escort, staying close but not exposed. The convoy will be organized as follows: one lead pickup truck for clearing obstacles, two disguised heavy-duty engineering trucks, and one repair van at the rear. The 'alien' vehicles will be divided into two layers: one group will be lurking inside the vehicles, and the other will be moving stealthily along the roadside. If we encounter road closures, interceptions, or inspections, we will handle them according to the emergency engineering procedures—if we can detour, we'll detour; if we can't detour, we'll 'repair' them."

Li Haotian remained silent. He stared at the main vehicle structure diagram, his gaze settling on the central compartment—the "core isolation compartment."

"Place the silver cocoon here." Su Wan pointed to the hull. "Three layers of isolation: an outer alloy layer, an inner electromagnetic mesh, and a gravity array anchor point at the bottom. You bring the token; you're responsible for mental suppression. We can only guarantee physical isolation; on the mental level... only you can suppress it."

Liu Hu looked at him: "Are you sure you want to keep an eye on things yourself?"

Li Haotian looked up, his voice low but instantly silencing the room: "It's learning a heartbeat. It's also learning other people's rhythms. If someone knocks on it on the street—I have to know immediately."

Su Wan didn't try to persuade her further, but added, "There's one more thing. The main carriage is pre-installed with anesthetic atomizers and high-frequency dispersants. If things really get out of control, we'd rather have the entire cabin fumigate to sleep than let it 'synchronize' with the outside."

Qin Yue nodded: "The departure window is set for 1:30 a.m. The rain belt has just arrived and can wash away some of the heat from the surveillance cameras. Route: First take the ring road, then switch to the highway, avoiding several locations in the city where the nameless cult is active."

Li Haotian put the token back into his palm, as if driving a heavy nail into his heart: "Do it this way. Load it into the car in ten minutes."

-

As soon as the garage door opened, the smell of cold rain mixed with diesel fuel rushed in. The heavy truck was parked in the darkness, like two crouching iron beasts. The exterior of the truck bed was sprayed with brand-new engineering paint, and reflective strips were hung on the sides. Even the mud spots were deliberately aged, as if it had just rolled out of a construction site.

The loading process was extremely fast and quiet. The aliens were introduced into the enclosure in batches, their claws scraping against the metal floor with a faint sound, which was swallowed up by the thick soundproofing layer. The equipment box, emergency power supply, and purification device were secured one by one, and the clicking sound of the fasteners locking was particularly clear in the rain.

When the main vehicle's isolation compartment opened, the air seemed to be sliced ​​open. The silver cocoon was slowly pushed into the compartment from the mobile containment rack in the safe house. The silver sheen on its surface was dazzlingly cold under the white lights of the vehicle, and its patterns seemed to writhe slowly like a living thing.

Li Haotian followed him inside, and before the cabin door closed, he glanced back at the rainy night outside.

"close."

The alloy door slid shut, the last ray of light disappeared, leaving only the soft, cold emergency lights inside the cabin. The silver cocoon trembled slightly, then stabilized at that familiar frequency—one beat after another.

It's like he's confirming that he's there.

Li Haotian pressed the token onto the fixed slot in the isolation chamber, and the gravity array activated with a soft hum, as if the space was being compressed slightly by an invisible hand. He closed his eyes, and his mental lines spread out, like an invisible net covering the silver cocoon.

"Stop fooling around," he whispered. "I'll hide it for you when we get there."

The silver cocoon pattern paused for half a second, then jumped again—even more steadily.

Liu Hu's voice came through the walkie-talkie outside: "The convoy is in position, lead vehicle clearing the way. Qin's visible vehicles are already waiting at the outer ring entrance."

"Let's go," Li Haotian replied.

-

On the highway at night, the rain and fog made the headlights look like broken white lines. The convoy maintained a 200-meter distance, and the searchlights of the lead car swept across the shoulder, the raindrops in the beams looking like shards of glass. The markings of the construction vehicle convoy meant that the tollbooth staff only glanced at the documents before letting it pass, without even letting the truck bed get close.

Qin Yue's escort vehicle was traveling in the outer lane, its two police lights flashing rhythmically rather than blindingly, as if telling all the cameras: this is "normal".

Liu Hu sat in the passenger seat of the middle heavy truck, holding a short shovel in his hand, his eyes fixed on a string of blurry taillights in the rearview mirror: "This road is too smooth, as if someone paved it for us."

Su Wan stared at the tablet in the repair cart, a simplified mental field monitoring curve flashing on the screen. She frowned. "Don't talk. Too much smoothness doesn't mean it's safe; they might just be waiting for us to enter."

Inside the isolation chamber, Li Haotian couldn't hear the rain, only the low-frequency vibrations of the engine transmitted through the metal, and the relentless "heartbeat" of the silver cocoon. He maintained his mental suppression at a controllable level, neither stimulating nor relaxing, like holding a snake that might bite at any moment.

Suddenly, Qin Yue's voice came through the earpiece, slightly distorted: "Two kilometers ahead, road closed due to an accident. Traffic police have temporarily diverted the route; please take the right-hand ramp."

Liu Hu cursed, "What kind of coincidence is this, an accident on the highway in the middle of the night?"

Su Wan lowered her voice: "Don't force your way in. It's reasonable for the construction convoy to change course. Let's follow them and see what they do next."

The convoy began to slow down. Flashing red and blue lights appeared in the rain and fog, and several vehicles were parked across the intersection, their reflective cones neatly arranged, like a standard procedure. There was even an overturned truck, smoke rising in the rain; the scene was so realistic it was impossible to find fault with it.

Just as the convoy was about to enter the ramp, a broadcast came from the loudspeaker in front—not a traffic police officer's command, but a noisy program like a radio crossover, interspersed with a deep male voice reciting indistinct words, yet with an eerie rhythm.

"...returning to obscurity...returning to—"

The driver's breathing suddenly became erratic. The man in the driver's seat had white fingers, unfocused eyes, and muttered, "There's something on the left...it'll stop if we hit it..."

The steering wheel jerked sharply to the side, and the front of the car veered towards the darkness beyond the guardrail.

"Brake!" Liu Hu yelled into his earpiece.

But the driver seemed not to hear him, instead pressing the accelerator harder and repeating, "Run it over... run it over..."

Li Haotian's eyes suddenly turned cold. The rhythm of the recitation pierced the mental field like needles, trying to find a point of resonance in the convoy—the heartbeat of the silver cocoon, people's fear, the low frequency of the night rain, all were used as drumbeats.

"A remote ritual of the Nameless Cult." His voice wasn't loud, but it cut through the fog like a knife. "They want to use the accident site as the focal point, the broadcast as the medium, to induce self-collision to produce blood offerings."

He ceased his gentle suppression, his mental energy suddenly plunging down like a boulder crashing into water. The air inside the isolation chamber stagnated, and the patterns on the surface of the silver cocoon abruptly contracted before being forced back to their original rhythm.

Li Haotian spread this "pressure" along the vehicle's structure, like an invisible hand gripping the back of everyone's neck—

"Awake."

As soon as the two words were spoken, the driver jolted violently, as if jolted awake from a dream, and instinctively slammed on the brakes. The truck's tires screeched on the wet road, the vehicle swayed twice, and it came to a stop just half a meter from the guardrail.

A rapid, panting voice came through the earpiece: "I...I just heard someone call my name."

"Don't listen," Li Haotian said coldly. "Turn off the car radio and disconnect all channels. Switch your headphones to the intranet."

Su Wan immediately gave the order: "All vehicles disconnect from external audio sources and switch to short-range encrypted audio. Liu Hu, lead vehicle, do not enter the ramp, move to the right and assume a 'repair' posture."

Liu Hu reacted quickly: "Understood. Lead troops in position, deploy for defense."

Even more bizarrely, the "traffic police" at the road closure didn't approach to check or wave to guide people; they just stood in the rain, like a row of mannequins illuminated by lights. The chanting still drifted intermittently from the loudspeaker, its rhythm trying to grab people's breath again.

Li Haotian narrowed his eyes: "It's not a physical interception, it's a test. To see if we have any mental protection, and to see if the Silver Cocoon will respond."

He pressed the intercom button: "Release two, sneak along the roadside, and check behind the roadblock."

Su Wan was taken aback: "Release it now? Won't that give us away?"

"Stealthily clear the obstacles." Li Haotian's tone left no room for doubt. "Since they dared to set up the array's key points, there must be a 'wire' connecting them. Find the wire and cut it."

A few seconds later, from the rain curtain on the right side of the convoy, two almost flat-bottomed black shadows silently slid out and moved along the shadow of the guardrail. Their claws were dry, as if they were stepping on another world.

Liu Hu stared at the group of "traffic police" through the scope and whispered, "If they were real people, I could turn them into sieves right now."

"Don't fire." Qin Yue's voice came from the escort vehicle in the open. "I can see their body cameras... no signal. It's like an empty shell."

Su Wan stared at the tablet, and a thin "traction" suddenly appeared on the curve of her mental field, extending from the road closure point towards the service area in the distance: "Found it. It's the route of the ceremony, not at the scene, but 300 meters behind, in the culvert under the bridge."

Li Haotian's eyes darkened further: "As expected. The array's core was just for show; the true 'source of the curse' is hidden in the shadows."

The next moment, the alien's transmitted image returned via low bandwidth: a circle of wet, black talisman paper lay in the culvert, several radio devices were strapped to a bracket, and there was a makeshift generator nearby. Further away, a thin wire connected to the emergency broadcast interface by the highway, glistening from the rain.

nobody.

Only a faint red light shone, like a blinking insect in the rain.

"Remote trading," Li Haotian whispered. "They don't dare get close; they only dare to probe our base."

He raised his hand, making a tucking motion across the heavy carriage. The stealthy alien pounced, its claws slicing through the talisman ring, ripping it apart, severing the microphone, flashing a spark from the generator, and extinguishing the red light.

The chanting on the highway came to an abrupt halt.

The group of "traffic police" standing in the rain also disappeared like a lost image within seconds, leaving only the overturned truck still smoking. But upon closer inspection, the outline of the overturned truck looked like a backdrop, and the edges began to soften and collapse as the rain washed over it.

"Illusions layered on top of reality." Su Wan took a breath. "They're using the most cost-effective method to force us to reveal our true colors."

Liu Hu gritted his teeth: "Then let them watch to their heart's content—let them see if we don't crash."

Qin Yue quickly took over: "The vehicle in the open should go to communicate with the 'site' and report the emergency detour according to procedure. We'll stall for ten minutes until they confirm the blockade is broken before we leave."

Li Haotian slowly withdrew his mental suppression, leaving only a thin layer of warning netting over the convoy. He looked at the silver cocoon; the patterns were still pulsating—once after once, like the moment before when he wanted to run to the rhythm of the broadcast, but he forcefully pushed it back onto the original track.

"Did you hear that?" he whispered to himself, pressed against the bulkhead. "They're calling you. Don't answer."

The silver cocoon trembled slightly, its lines tightening as if in restraint or excitement.

The convoy restarted, bypassing the "accident" section swallowed by rain and fog. In the distance, the highway lights seemed to fall backward one by one, like a string of broken beads.

Through the earpiece, Su Wan's voice was cold and hard: "The first probe is over. They already know we have mental suppression, mobile containment, and stealth units."

Liu Hu scoffed: "Then let them know more—we've been a tough nut to crack all along the way."

Qin Yue added in a deep voice, "A real interception wouldn't be this light. The real challenge will come later."

Li Haotian didn't reply, only twirling the token halfway through his palm. The coldness of the bronze token crept up his finger bones, as if reminding him: tonight they had only cut a thread, and the Nameless Cult's net was far longer than this highway.

The car headlights pierced the rain, the convoy moving like a snake with its body low to the ground, gliding towards the imperial tomb. Inside the isolation chamber, the sound of Silver Cocoon's heartbeat rang steadily—

one more time.

Instead of learning from the world, it seems to be waiting for the world to learn to be afraid first.