In recent years, Lei Wuye had kept a low profile, rarely appearing in public. Most of the time, he stayed in his seaside fishing estate, practically living in seclusion.

On the surface, he seemed calm and detached, like some reclusive master beyond worldly concerns. But in reality, his desire for power had not diminished in the slightest.

From that picturesque retreat, he still remotely controlled his vast network of industries through various means, issuing orders and making decisions. It was as if visible shackles had turned into invisible reins, tightening around the necks of everyone living in the shadows.

The last time he had appeared publicly was a few months ago at the inauguration ceremony of the new governor. Back then, Lei Wuye had shaken hands with the governor as the citizen representative, smiling warmly for the cameras as if they were old friends.

And yet, in such a short span of time, he had been admitted to the ICU. It was almost impossible to believe. Precisely because it was so bizarre, it also felt vaguely credible.

What made it even stranger was that such a critical piece of news had somehow spread like wildfire. Overnight, everyone knew that Lei Wuye was dying. The news threw the entire city into turmoil and chaos.

Logically speaking, so what if an old man died? What was the big deal? After all, Lei Wuye had spent decades entrenched in Cliff City’s underworld. To say he had done good deeds would be laughable. His hands were soaked in sin, so even if he was not utterly wicked, then at the very least, he had it coming.

After finishing her edamame, Wen Wen had already waved someone over to open champagne in celebration.

Hurrah! Even the governor cheers with joy! This is great news!

Even if he didn’t die, if one day Wen Wen really couldn’t take it anymore and quit in anger, she would have gone to his door just to squeeze him as if he was a bubble wrap to vent her frustration.

Unfortunately, he wouldn’t be the only one to die.

“When a whale falls, all things thrive” was a beautiful saying, truly. But very few could actually achieve such a legacy that benefitted generations. In the case of certain malignant tumors, all they did was spill pus and worms everywhere, leaving nothing but disgust once they burst.

And that was exactly why Division One had called Division Two.

The director was away. Within Division One, the department head, Tong Shan, and the deputy director were in charge. But the deputy had been frequently absent in recent years and was rarely seen, leaving all real authority in Tong Shan’s hands. The eldest son of the Tong family of Cliff City was now, in effect, the acting director of the entire Security Bureau.

After the call ended, starting tomorrow, Wen Wen would have to run errands. As usual, she would go around the entire Northern District and knock on the doors of every gang leader and fixer, reminding them to not push things too far. If any dirty business spilled onto the streets, nobody would look good when the time came.

Among the nineteen major cities of the Federation, each one had its own hierarchy, and the distribution of wealth and grease money varied accordingly. Cliff City, located at the southernmost tip of the Federation, did not have outstanding local industry, but its import-export trade alone was enough to feed who knew how many parasites.

Electronics, weapons, luxury goods, and even illicit drugs. Just imagine how much profit was hidden in the fishing villages and covert ports scattered along this coastline. It was practically a flowing river of gold. How many people could resist that temptation?

After Lei Wuye died, another Lei Wuye would step forward. So, people would start asking themselves, Why can’t the next Lei Wuye be me?

As an organization that spanned the world’s darkest underbelly, the Wasteland Assembly’s complexity and scale needed no further explanation. Twelve overlords stood at the top, like dragons commanding wind and rain, making countless lesser forces submit.

While becoming a dragon was something most people wouldn’t even dare to dream of, the position of a serpent was very real, wielding immense power and influence, enough to cloud one’s mind.

The local administrator of the Wasteland Assembly was, in truth, a genuine local tyrant. He was the person in charge of Cliff City’s underworld. In name, he was there to mediate and prevent both sides from escalating things too far. After all, the overlords couldn’t spend their days worrying about whether a certain street in Cliff City should have one more illegal betting shop.

Those who became overlords were peerless White Deer Celestial Beings, behind-the-scenes bosses who unified multiple regions or cities, or uncrowned kings who controlled maritime routes across thousands of islands and could bankrupt small nations with a word.

Before becoming an overlord, one fought and bled until exhaustion. After becoming one, they still had to work themselves to the bone. If that were the case, then what was the point of becoming an overlord at all?

Thus, local administrators emerged as necessary tools under these circumstances. They were essentially the Wasteland Assembly’s regional general managers. Within the Wasteland Assembly, they were beneath the overlords, but in Cliff City, they stood unquestionably above tens of thousands.

With the careful use of this authority and title, even an unarmed person could subdue fierce dragons and settle all underworld disputes with a single word. Not to mention, they had so much money that the amount had turned into mere numbers to them, and they had nearly limitless authority over their subordinates.

In general, for a position this critical, even if the main leader suffered an accident, there would usually be a successor in place. That old geezer Lei Wuye was different. Over the course of his life, he took in fourteen sworn sons and daughters, assigning each of them authority over different regions, and letting them check and balance one another so he could sit back and stay secure.

The White Deer Path was like this: loyal dogs were certainly plenty, but backstabbers were even more common. Once a subordinate gained too much power, killing the boss was practically a routine affair. No amount of second-in-command arrangements would change that.

He had played this system so smoothly that the moment he let go, no one could hold the whole thing together anymore. It turned into a scattered mess. Worse still, over years of conflict and the rifts it created, they had come to see each other as mortal enemies.

Lei Wuye wasn’t even dead yet. He had only just been admitted to the ICU, and the empire he had built was already starting to collapse, on the verge of tearing itself apart in internal slaughter. It was hard to say whether that old face beneath the oxygen mask was now filled with rage or panic.

If things went wrong, it was entirely possible that before he even stopped breathing, everything he cared about would no longer belong to him. By then, that expression of dying sprinkled with lingering resentment would probably just look ridiculous and tragic. Wen Wen pictured it and almost wanted to laugh.

But when she thought of the chaos this would bring and all the innocent people dragged into it, she could not help but want to march straight over and grind that old bastard’s bones to dust.

Just look at the mess you’ve made.

“When will I ever get to kill all these scumbags?” she muttered.

Tilting her head back, she downed the celebratory yet mournful liquor in one gulp.

With Lei Wuye’s fall from power, everyone tied to him would begin to scramble like mad. Or rather, that ravenous, never-satisfied, ferocious “deer” had already grown sick of Lei Wuye’s decay, and had begun searching among countless prey for its next sacrifice.

The dark side of Cliff City was about to descend into chaos.

“Looks like another brutal bloodbath is coming, huh.”

Wen Wen tilted her head toward the pitch-black sky. Among the rolling clouds, neither moon nor stars could be seen anymore.

***

“Damn it, what kind of bloodbath is this?”

The next morning, Ji Jue stared at the doubled homework load. With a wail of despair and agony, even the sun rising into the sky seemed dim and lifeless.

The world felt gloomy.

According to Professor Ye’s instructions, since he had taken the whole day off, he was supposed to find time on his own to make up for the progress he was missing out on.

Given Ji Jue’s sense of initiative, supervision and inspection weren’t necessary. But if he skipped studying for one day, he knew he’d skip for two days in a row, and Professor Ye would definitely notice. At that point, she could even tack on an extra spirit matter defense class at night.

Better to suffer the pain of studying than the pain of fists. What a ridiculous choice.

Ye Chun could only look on, already speechless about this bizarre teacher-student relationship. After all, this kind of wildly unrestrained way of managing and training an apprentice was practically a freak anomaly in the entire craftsman world.

In ordinary workshops, apprentices with no real advantages, no money at home, and average talent were basically no different from office workers. Clock in in the morning, clock out at night. If tuition was paid in full, they’d be assigned to assist the craftsman. If the craftsman was in a good mood, they could teach apprentices a couple of things. If not, they could even get slapped, and all they could do was go home and cry quietly.

Then there were the gifted ones, the brilliant ones, the favored students who always stayed by the teacher’s side, constantly listening to guidance and learning through relentless drilling, progressing from beginner to intermediate level. After graduating and becoming craftsmen themselves, they would go on to enjoy admiration, respect, and attention.

Ji Jue was neither.

If you said he was valued, he absolutely was. Professor Ye taught him everything without reservation. As long as she had time, she never ignored Ji Jue’s questions or confusion, not to mention the clues to Pacifier and the inheritance of Dissociation Technique.

But if you said he wasn’t valued, that was also true in a way. Because after teaching Ji Jue the basics and pointing out the direction, Professor Ye simply tossed him aside to deal with his own projects. She basically dumped him into warehouses and libraries and let him mess around on his own.

There was no tracking of progress nor concern for results. Even if he caused trouble outside or got locked onto by a sniper, she showed complete indifference. So even though he was technically an in-house apprentice, he somehow ended up with a distinctly independent upbringing.

Strangely enough, both of them were quite satisfied with this arrangement and didn’t care about anything else.

After reading Ji Jue’s study notes, Professor Ye slowly said, “The Elevation element foundation is already fine. The Purification part you’ve developed your own understanding through Fluid Alchemy, so that’s sufficient for now. You can make up the rest later. Next, the main direction you need to focus on is Transformation. This is your real weakness. Aside from practicing Dissociation Technique, spend the rest of your time studying this material.”

In modern alchemy, there were four fundamental elements: Ascension, Transformation, Purification, and Harmony.

Ascension referred to imbuing physical matter with spirit matter. For example, turning stone into gold, or elevating it toward a Supreme Benevolence quality so it could contain blessings.

Purification was the act of making the properties of matter more singular and pure, filtering out impurities and blocking interference, and allowing it to evolve infinitely toward an absolute purity.

Harmony was the integration of all components, fusing multiple spirit matter circuits, structures, and Supreme Benevolence blessings into a single unified whole.

Transformation, on the other hand, was when multiple materials and blessings interacted and catalyzed each other, undergoing a transformation into an entirely new state. In simple terms, in gamer slang, it was what they called “fusion.”

But putting two things together and calling it fusion was far from simple. When to fuse, how to fuse, the proportions, timing, altitude, position, even magnetic field strength or something as absurd as personal luck, all of these could produce drastically different outcomes.

Even though modern alchemy already had countless established formulas, and their number continued to grow every year through exploration, it was still far from enough.

At a certain point, rote memorization became useless. Every craftsman had to develop their own understanding and intuition through the process. Only through massive practice and experimentation could one accumulate experience until instinct and perception could tell you when and how to act.

And, without a doubt, this was also the most expensive part.