Turnstiles were always meant to look like this—square, clean, and minimal. Pei Ran had merely restored them to normal.
In this mad, chaotic world, normal had become a luxury.
The moment the turnstile clamped down on someone, the middle-aged woman had snapped out of her daze and started struggling in panic. Now that it suddenly released her, she froze in place.
She looked ahead, then back, her feet rooted to the ground like they'd been nailed there.
A girl in a red wool hat saw what happened and rushed over, grabbing the woman's arm and dragging her out from the gate.
She was right to do so.
Because Pei Ran had also noticed—the turnstile only stayed normal for a few seconds before it began to squirm again.
The first to move was the leftmost metal unit.
Bubbles began to swell up from the smooth metal casing—bigger and bigger, until the entire box warped and twisted like something alive was thrashing inside.
One massive bubble bulged from the top—not a neat circle, but the shape of a human head.
A face. Complete with eyes, nose, and mouth.
It twisted, craned its neck unnaturally, baring a double row of teeth in a silent scream—then sank back into the box.
The grotesque sight sent the college students and middle-aged woman stumbling backward in horror.
Immediately afterward, the rest of the turnstile units followed suit. Like before, they began extruding bubbles of mixed metal and flesh—half biological, half machine.
Just like the deranged pipeline workers, it recovered faster than any human. It had only been under the black notebook's control for seconds before springing back to life.
A building behind them suddenly exploded. A fireball burst through the windows, trailing searing heat. Shards of glass rained down onto the street like a hailstorm.
The night sea was turning into a sea of flames. Time was running out.
Pei Ran clicked her pen shut, tucked the black notebook away, and stepped out from the building's corner.
"What are you planning to do?" W asked.
Pei Ran peeled off her leather gloves and flexed her mechanical fingers. "I plan to dismantle it. Violently."
W: "…"
Pei Ran gave instructions: "You have a job. If I start looking off—like I'm sleepwalking—trip me. Claw my leg. Knock me down. I don't care how, just stop me and wake me up."
Those who had flung themselves at the gate earlier had been out of it—hypnotized, almost. Luckily the trance wasn't deep. A slap was enough to snap them out of it.
W's folding arms had been repaired. They were agile and strong—plenty capable of tripping or smacking someone if needed.
W agreed calmly: "Understood."
As they walked, Pei Ran scanned the crowd near the turnstiles.
It probably hadn't been the deranged fused machine that had hypnotized the college students and the woman.
Their zombie-like charge at the gate felt more like they were... clearing a path for someone.
Especially the middle-aged woman—who had been controlled into picking up a Night Sea No. 7 employee card from the ground and swiping it at the gate. The attempt failed. The gate didn't recognize it.
Someone out there didn't know how to get past the turnstiles—and was using human lives to run their experiments.
That kind of hypnosis resembled a special ability of an Order-class fusion entity.
If there really was such a hypnotist hiding among the crowd, they were likely across the street—near the last turnstile unit.
That's where the employee card had been tossed, mixed among a pile of scattered papers. Barely noticeable.
From this side of the street, it was too far to see clearly—unless you had an eyeball with telescopic magnification like the metal spheres.
Assuming the hypnotist didn't also have super-vision, the college students on this side could probably be ruled out. At least their suspicion was low.
Near the last turnstile, there were around twenty people: a family of three with a child; an elderly couple supporting each other; a few lone young adults keeping their distance from each other; and four or five tall men standing in a group. One of them wore a doctor's white coat—quite conspicuous.
Pei Ran glanced at them, then headed straight for the first turnstile unit.
It was the one most warped. It had been the first to produce that human head bubble, and the rest had followed. It might be central.
She stopped a step or two away from it, took off her backpack, set it on the ground, and placed a metal orb on top.
The others were stunned.
Especially the college students who had just watched their peer get sliced in half. Two of them had drifted toward the gate in a trance. Now, another person was walking straight up.
But this one was different.
Her eyes were clear. Her movements crisp. There was no sign of being possessed—yet she approached the gate all the same.
Two thousand kilometers away.
The underground facility of Blackwell.
Fifty-one hours into lockdown.
Crisis management at Blackwell was running 24/7. More personnel, equipment, and manufacturing lines were arriving by the hour.
But humans still had biological clocks. Many chose to rest during the night, and now—during the day—the command hall was fuller than usual.
Only Agent W never needed sleep. Always alert, tirelessly processing affairs both inside and outside the base.
The Federal Chief Executive—Bathaway—was also present.
Bathaway was in his forties, well-built with broad shoulders and long legs. Elegant, charismatic. Even in a fallout shelter like Blackwell, his suit was flawless.
People across the Federation often said Bathaway had immense personal charm—especially in speeches and debates. During the election, once the livestream started, his poll numbers soared.
Now, he sat in a high-backed chair, spine straight, frown precise.
"As Chief Executive," he said, "what concerns me more than military equipment is the admission process for ordinary Federation citizens. Agent W, what's the status of that?"
W agreed on that point.
"According to my calculations," W replied, "Blackwell is now ready to accept civilian refugees. Our supplies are sufficient to last until production ramps up. A large influx won't exceed capacity."
Someone asked, "But Blackwell is limited. How do we decide who gets in, and who doesn't?"
Marshal Veina spoke up: "The Council is meeting this afternoon to discuss exactly that."
W interjected, "Let's hope they don't take too long. People are dying by the thousands out there. If we wait much longer…"
A dry note of sarcasm crept into W's otherwise even voice, "…there won't be many living people left to choose from."
General Delsa glanced at the large screen, puzzled.
He muttered, "That didn't sound like an AI at all…"
W had already returned to its calm tone. "I'll draft several refugee-screening protocols immediately, based on various ethical and logistical models, and send them to the Council."
Marshal Veina nodded.
Moments like this always reminded her—W could instantly provide a range of precise plans, ready for decision-makers to pick the most appropriate one. Having this AI reduced a great deal of pressure.
Once their discussion ended, the Minister of Culture finally asked, "W, about the Federal Digital Archives you mentioned last time—any update?"
W answered, "The data has reached Night Sea."
The screen switched.
The camera angle was low—likely from ground level. Looking up, the skyscrapers of Night Sea burned like torches. Black smoke curled into the sky. In the streets, people fled with families in tow.
Silence filled the room.
The camera panned. A row of turnstiles came into view. Number 1593—the Dormant, Pei Ran—was walking toward them. Above her, half an ad sign burned, its frame showing the image of a vintage train.
"Night Sea Station Seven," someone recognized it.
W confirmed: "Yes. We're trying to board from its terminal to escape Night Sea and head to Blackwell. Unfortunately, the station entrance is guarded by a deranged fusion entity."
They didn't need W to say it.
The screen showed bodies on the ground—sliced open as if by blades. Blood everywhere.
"Did… did it cut someone in half?"
"Clean through. One inside, one out."
A turnstile that could bisect a human made everyone shudder.
And yet, the girl on screen didn't hesitate. She stepped between the two metal pillars.
The turnstile reacted instantly—swelling, its metal surface becoming semi-transparent. Underneath, vein-like tissues writhed grotesquely.
Chief Executive Bathaway had just barely held his composure at the earlier corpses. Now, seeing this new horror, he couldn't suppress a sharp intake of breath.
"Fusion entities have gotten this far?"
W replied, "This is a deranged state fusion. Likely triggered by an increase in Rift-5's energy output. More are appearing—and mutating."
On screen, the two metal boxes bloated to over human height in under a second, forming two giant metal blisters that threatened to crush Pei Ran in between.
She didn't flinch.
She waited for the moment when their surface stretched taut—veins bulging.
She rolled up her right sleeve.
And punched.
Pop.
The metal-flesh surface, stretched like a balloon, ruptured from the blow. Underneath, a grotesque mess was revealed.
The turnstile's internal structure was a chaotic blend of human organs and mechanical components. Red veins tangled with bright wires. The whole thing pulsed wildly—no separation between man and machine.
The turnstile spasmed, retracting.
But its transparent flaps snapped open.
They buzzed like insect wings—then elongated, curved to the side, and sliced laterally toward Pei Ran's waist.
But they weren't faster than her mechanical hand.
She was ready.
She grabbed the blade mid-swing, snapped it off.
The other flap came at her—snap—also broken.
Pei Ran, expressionless, reached into the hole she'd made.
With swift, practiced motions, she tore open the machine's casing.
Her hand plunged deep.
One by one, she yanked out parts—tangled in flesh and blood—unrecognizable, and tossed them aside.
She was gutting it.
In the command center, everyone had the same thought: she was like a wolf, clawing open its prey and ripping out the insides.
She seemed to be looking for something.
Finally, she found it.
She pulled her hand out, gripping a grotesque object—
A heart.
Roughly human in shape, but far too large. Greenish veins and circuit-like wires still connected, pulsing frantically in her hand.
Her black mechanical fingers clenched.
Dark blood splattered.
The heart burst.
The moment it did, the entire row of turnstiles convulsed.
And then stopped moving.
It was dead.
W cut the feed.
Silence blanketed the room.
It took Chief Executive Bathaway a while to collect himself. "Her… uh, mechanical arm—is that even legal?"
W replied coolly, "Yes. Entirely legal. She was a participant in a Warin Group experimental program developing prosthetics for the Department of National Defense when she was a child. The project was shut down due to legal violations—they recruited infants as volunteers—and Warin Group was investigated some years ago. Because this specialized prosthesis cannot be replaced by standard ones, the volunteers were issued special federal amnesty. Would you like me to retrieve the exemption record?"
"…No, that won't be necessary," Bathaway said.
Nightsea City.
Pei Ran stood in front of the gate.
As she expected, the gate was a humanoid fusion construct, just like those three crazed pipe workers, with a mutated, alien heart at its core.
Once the heart stopped beating, the insane fusion construct died.
Also as she predicted, she remained fully conscious throughout the encounter—no abnormalities whatsoever.
The gate hadn't activated any hypnosis protocols even when attacked. That meant it wasn't the one doing the hypnotizing—it was just a mechanical executioner.
Whoever was hiding in the crowd, using hypnosis to control others and send them through the gate to test it, had no reason to interfere when Pei Ran stepped forward to destroy the thing. On the contrary, they probably hoped she would deal with it for them and clear the way.
Who that person was—she still didn't know.
Inside the fusion gate, she noticed a small cluster of green light near the heart, tucked deep within a metal compartment, just past the mouth of a thick, coiled pipe—close, but just out of reach.
Suddenly, a hand reached over from beside her.
The cuff was neatly pressed. The fingers long, nails clean and well-trimmed. A pack of tissues was held out to her.
Pei Ran turned her head.
It was the man in the white lab coat she had noticed earlier.
He looked under thirty, very tall, wearing a pale blue medical mask. His hair was a soft shade of ash-brown. His eyes—visible above the mask—were a clear blue tinged with smoky grey, gentle and calm.
His coat was spotless, pristine white—even in this city on fire, he stood out as something extraordinary.
Pei Ran thought: The Silence has lasted three days already, and he's still in his hospital clothes. Is he still working? Then again, even in a disaster, you couldn't just abandon patients.
A few companions stood behind him. They were all dressed in civilian clothes.
The doctor nudged the tissues toward her again, his gaze falling on the bloodstained mechanical arm. He didn't say anything, but the look in his eyes was easy to read.
They said: Whatever this creature bleeds, it probably isn't clean. Better wipe it off.
Pei Ran accepted the tissues and casually wiped her fingers. She also cleaned the blood splattered on the front of her coat.
The doctor's wristband vibrated. A small virtual window popped up in the air before him, displaying a newly received image—a thumbnail.
Pei Ran's eyes were sharp; she caught a glimpse. The sender's avatar was a man with curly black hair. The picture was a rough sketch of a street map. Judging by the layout, it was a nearby area. A red dot marked a particular street corner.
The doctor turned, looked in that direction, nodded briefly to Pei Ran, and quickly jogged away.
The gate had gone still again. Others in the crowd were starting to cautiously test it now. With so many people around—and someone in their midst capable of using mind control—it was definitely not the time to grab that green light.
Pei Ran turned back, picked up her large bag and the metal sphere.
The fusion gate was dead. Time to find Nightsea Station No. 7.
Pei Ran stepped through the gate and entered the tunnel leading to the underground transit hub.
"No green light followed me, right?" she asked.
W's eyes shifted slightly. "No."
The tunnel had probably been built decades ago. It looked like an old metro station. The main power was out, but emergency backup lighting was still on. A small lamp glowed every few meters. Not bright, but not pitch dark either.
The tunnel sloped gently downward with an escalator that had long since stopped working. Pei Ran walked down the unmoving steps.
W suddenly said, "Yulianka."
Pei Ran blinked. "What?"
"That man who smiled at you just now," W explained. "I scanned his eyes and found his citizen record. His name is Yulianka."
Pei Ran replied, "He had a mask on. Covered half his face. I didn't even notice if he smiled."
"I did," W insisted. "Based on the shape of his eyes, the creases at the corners, and the subtle changes in the mask's fabric, I was able to infer the movements of the muscles beneath. He smiled."
Pei Ran: "Oh."
Pei Ran: "Is that… important?"
W didn't answer the question directly. Instead, he continued: "Yulianka. Twenty-eight years old. An unsuccessful veterinarian here in Nightsea."
So he wasn't a doctor for people—he was a vet.
Pei Ran: "…"
Pei Ran: "Unsuccessful? Why do you have to judge the guy like that?"