All she could hear was the roar of the wind and the deafening sound of the dam crumbling.
The dam's spine heaved like a wild sea, tossing beneath her feet—Pei Ran staggered as she ran, barely keeping upright, leaping over one gaping crack after another.
The dam was massive, making her look like a tiny black speck swallowed up by the surging waves. But she was fast—blisteringly fast. Not a single second wasted.
She had never run so fast in her life. Her heart pounded as if trying to break out of her chest, and her mouth was filled with the metallic tang of blood.
Finally, she reached the concrete humanoid.
It was enormous—at least five or six stories tall. She had to crane her neck to see its face.
Its entire body was made of concrete, yet its facial features were eerily well-defined. You could even make out the weave of its clothing, the shape of pockets and buttons.
Like a giant statue—except this one was alive.
From the waist down, its form flared outward like a skirt, fused directly with the dam's upper platform.
The whole body tilted forward, its neck straining, desperately trying to reach toward the riverbank. But the dam—heavy and immovable—held it back like an anchor, refusing to let go.
W spoke in her ear: "Judging by the uniform, it looks like it was a worker at the Tangu Dam."
A worker fused with the dam. A crazed hybrid, twisted and unrecognizable.
As Pei Ran had sprinted toward it, she'd already been trying to summon the green light in her brain.
Green Light One had just eaten and promptly dozed off, apparently satisfied with tearing down a wall earlier and in no mood for overtime.
Green Light Two was at least awake—but Pei Ran knew her own drawing skills. By the time she sketched this concrete behemoth, the moment would have passed.
She looked up at the thing and tried calling on Yulianka's green light. Nothing happened. His power had no effect on these deranged fusions.
She'd have to rely on herself.
Pei Ran charged up the sloping "skirt" of the concrete man.
The incline was steep, and the whole structure trembled violently. She barely made it a few steps before the giant jerked, sending her tumbling, skidding all the way down.
The top of the dam had been warped by the creature's movements. On either side, the platform sloped downward—and beyond that, only the churning reservoir below.
Pei Ran spun head over heels, the world tilting, until she managed to grab onto a jagged crack in the surface.
She stopped herself, took a breath, and checked her waist.
Thankfully, the metal orb was still strapped on tightly.
A series of sharp snapping sounds echoed—the dam was still collapsing.
Without a word, Pei Ran scrambled to her feet and began climbing again.
The shaking grew worse. But now there were more fissures in the concrete skirt. Pei Ran used them as handholds, jamming her mechanical arm into every gap to anchor herself.
The higher she climbed, the steeper it became.
By the time she reached the creature's waist, she was practically dangling by her mechanical limb.
Then the concrete giant twisted its torso—and the force was too great.
Pei Ran flew through the air like a rag doll.
She arced toward the turbulent reservoir below.
But just before she fell, both her mechanical arm and the metal sphere deployed their grappling arms, latching onto the edge of the dam.
W grabbed the edge with one claw and Pei Ran's arm with the other. Pei Ran secured her mechanical hand, then added her human hand to the grip.
Together, the two of them hauled her back up.
The dam was still trembling.
Pei Ran made another charge upward.
Failure had taught her well. This time, she climbed faster, regaining the height she'd just lost.
There were fewer cracks here, so she used her mechanical hand to gouge footholds into the concrete, anchoring herself with each step.
W suddenly said, "Pei Ran, its part on the riverbank is moving again."
Pei Ran turned to look.
From this high vantage, the riverbank lay fully visible. One of the dam's tendril-like extensions was slithering across the open plains—sweeping up clouds of dust as it snaked toward the lights of Night Sea No. 7.
That transport ship sat parked at the edge of the reservoir, upstream. Even if the dam collapsed, it should've been safe.
Not anymore.
Then came the metallic banging.
Dong—
Dong—
Dong—
Much faster than before.
Night Sea No. 7 finally roared to life, its headlights swallowed by dust. It moved forward, away from the oncoming tendril.
W's voice, as calm as always, spoke into her ear: "If Night Sea No. 7 leaves, what do we do?"
Pei Ran carved a new pit with her mechanical hand and hauled herself up another notch. "Then we walk to Heijing."
Only about 1,400 kilometers.
Not impossible.
More likely, they'd be swept into the reservoir—dragged with the floodwaters, God knows where.
Pei Ran couldn't swim. But with a flood this size, it probably didn't matter.
She kept climbing.
At last, she reached her target—a spot that corresponded to the chest cavity in human anatomy.
Pei Ran carved a deep foothold, deeper than any before, anchoring her limbs firmly before she began cutting.
One strike at a time.
Concrete dust and rubble rained down like a storm. The pit grew wider.
W tried to help, but his claws weren't as effective. He scanned the area above and suddenly said, "Pei Ran, what's that on its neck?"
Pei Ran glanced up amid her frantic digging.
Just beneath the chin, she saw it—a darkened patch on the concrete, water-stained and distinct.
"A birthmark?" she guessed.
W paused. Then: "Yes. A birthmark."
"I found someone in the Tangu Dam employee roster. A guy with a mark in that exact spot. His name's Li Min. Twenty-four. Graduated from Xipu University, water engineering. Got hired by the dam right after."
"I looked into it. The dam's about to lay off a bunch of people. Everyone's scrambling. I found Li Min's application to a federal government department. Competitive. Low acceptance rate. But stable. That's what people want."
W added quietly, "I understand now why he's straining so hard toward the shore. You humans call passing those exams 'going ashore.'"
Pei Ran: "…"
Not quite what he meant, Li Min.
Like all other crazed hybrids, his obsession became his only instinct—he'd fixated on "making it." Even with the dam weighing him down, his entire being fought to reach land.
But knowing his name didn't help. Pei Ran couldn't use Shige Ye's notebook right now.
She dug deeper.
Finally, something organic peeked out beneath the concrete—a hint of living tissue.
Pei Ran's eyes lit up. Her strikes came faster.
Soft biological mass mixed with the concrete—easier to tear through. Her progress sped up.
She broke into the chest cavity, revealing a bizarre, labyrinthine interior.
As expected, the hybrid had organs.
Pei Ran widened the opening.
The concrete giant finally noticed. Its body shuddered—and with a series of sharp cracks, part of it broke free.
A new "arm."
It unfurled from its shoulder, filled with rebar, and whipped straight toward its own exposed chest.
The speed was terrifying—like a battering ram through the air.
Boom.
The world rocked.
But just before it struck, Pei Ran slipped inside, gripping a pipe-like organ and swinging into the opening.
1,400 kilometers away.
Heijing. Command center.
On the massive virtual screen, the camera jolted as it followed someone sprinting across the dam.
Toward the concrete titan.
Leaping cracks. Climbing, falling, climbing again. Everyone watching held their breath.
They knew who the probe was tracking—Agent W's companion. Subject 1593.
Her face briefly appeared in the footage, mouth sealed with black tape. Silent. Unrelenting.
She hacked into the concrete shell by hand. And at the last second—slipped inside.
The feed flickered. Then went black.
W's voice crackled: "Signal's unstable. Please wait."
Tangu Dam.
Pei Ran clung to an artery-like pipe, swinging into the belly of the beast.
Without a word, W turned on his internal lights.
They lit up everything.
It was a grotesque space—steel rebar and blood vessels tangled above her, organs fused with concrete in a twisted mess. Below, no tissue—just a yawning black abyss, probably linked to the dam's core.
Pei Ran hauled herself upward, climbing onto a patch of spongy, ambiguous tissue. It gave her footing.
She looked up.
There, at the chest cavity's peak, a massive heart hung suspended like a chandelier—entwined in violet and green-blue arteries, beating slowly, rhythmically.
The entire structure shuddered like a living quake. Steel and sinew trembled. Pei Ran lunged upward—scrambling over warped steel and half-organic flesh.
She finally reached the monstrous heart.
Pei Ran stepped onto the rebar, leaned forward, and grabbed one of the thick, bluish veins wrapped around the heart—then yanked with everything she had.
The heart spasmed violently, convulsing as if in pain. The entire abdominal cavity began to quake, lurching so hard she could barely stay upright.
Planting her feet firmly, Pei Ran ripped through several blood vessels, pushing past them until her hands reached the raw flesh beneath. She plunged her hand into the heart—and began tearing downward, fistful by fistful.
Finally, she tore a gaping wound open in the heart.
A torrent of blood erupted, cascading like a crimson waterfall into the pitch-black abyss below.
The heartbeat stopped.
For one breathless moment, everything around her seemed to freeze.
Then the entire cavity began collapsing inward.
She couldn't go down with it.
Just beyond the heart, now sagging and crumbling, Pei Ran saw it—that same green light she'd seen before in the dam's tendrils.
It was larger and brighter than the others, clearly risen from somewhere deep within the dam's core.
Pei Ran scrambled upward as fast as she could, stretching her arm toward the glow until her fingertips finally brushed it.
The green light flowed steadily into her body.
W's voice rang out: "Pei Ran, move!"
She didn't need the warning—she already knew.
The place was collapsing.
Her goal achieved, Pei Ran shot downward like a rabbit bolting for cover. As she reached the level of the opening, she caught hold of a hanging pipe, swung out, and launched herself toward the exit torn into the abdominal wall.
She tumbled out.
The concrete titan was coming apart.
But this time, she didn't fall far. When she finally caught herself—her mechanical hand latching onto a crack in the surface—she realized she was back on top of the dam.
Pei Ran turned her head.
The massive concrete man was almost entirely buried now, only its upper torso still protruding from the dam's surface.
It was frozen in the middle of its struggle, as if casting one last desperate gaze toward the distant shore—before collapsing with a thunderous crash.
Within moments, it was gone.
In its place, a wide circular pit had opened in the earth. Like a funnel, it gaped downward—dark, endless.
The night wind blew gently.
The roar of shattering concrete had gone quiet.
The Tangu Dam fusion had died.
The dam itself remained motionless—frozen across the Yara River, still holding back the 15 billion tons of water stored in the Tangu Reservoir.
Dong—
Dong—
Dong—
The air was crisp. The night wind carried a metallic ringing across the darkness—clear and echoing. Three chimes, as always.
Pei Ran turned her head.
Across the reservoir, on the vast expanse of the Xipu Plains, a soft yellow glow shone from the transport vehicle—Night Sea No. 7. It had emerged from the cloud of dust and now stood quietly, waiting.
Aisha and the others were still there, waiting for her.
Heijing.
Inside the command center.
Everyone's nerves were stretched to the limit. Every pair of eyes was locked on the main display, which had just gone dark.
But only for a moment.
The screen flickered back to life.
The feed resumed.
The camera followed Subject 1593—the Silent One—as she burst from the opening and tumbled downward.
The spinning footage made some people dizzy. Her black mechanical hand slammed into the ground, stopping her fall.
She had landed safely.
The inspection drone's camera swung back toward the dam.
The towering concrete giant had collapsed—sinking into the earth, swallowed by the pit. The entire dam froze—completely still.
The command center went silent.
Marshal Veina finally spoke. "It… died?"
"Yes," W replied.
Someone asked cautiously, "So… does that mean the Tangu Dam is…"
W answered, calm and certain, "It's no longer moving. Still in place on the Yara River."
A beat of silence passed—then the entire hall erupted into thunderous cheers.