Wu Jia had been sitting quietly the whole time, watching the show unfold. He sighed to himself. How far was this woman's influence going to reach?
He had expected something like this, to be fair. What he hadn't expected was that even in a place like this, she would still have an entire faction of fans.
"Grandmaster Bai... what do you say?"
The presenter could feel the weight of the room pressing down on him. Everyone knew better than to push the young woman directly, so they pushed the intermediary instead.
"I don't want to. If you need a leader, wouldn't Zhang Xianyuan be a better fit?" Bai Fanxian collected herself and refused outright. Given her personality, taking on something like this was just asking for trouble.
"I couldn't fill that role."
The meeting room door swung open. In walked the Marshal himself, covered in dust, his uniform torn and stained as though he'd come straight from a fight.
"What happened to you?"
Liu Yianfei's eyebrows went up. Zhang Xianyuan answered with a grimace. Instead of going back to his duties, he had spent the whole day holed up at that house. Anyone who didn't know him and his history with Lady Bai would have thought she had cast some kind of spell on him.
"I have something to show everyone."
Zhang Xianyuan shifted gears quickly. He walked up to the stage and exchanged a few words with the presenter. The screen changed to display footage and data.
"Apologies for being late. But I have a report."
"This morning, we received urgent word from the south. A demonic beast with Grandmaster-equivalent strength surfaced at the coast."
The atmosphere in the room shifted the moment he said it. Glances were exchanged all around. They had all seen enough by now to know what it meant when one of these things was left unchecked.
"What's the status?"
"Under control. Beyond two fishing boats, there were no other casualties."
"...What is that thing?" someone muttered as the image appeared on screen.
"A turtle?"
The shell that filled the screen was nearly five meters tall. Measured lengthwise, it stretched over ten meters.
It was covered in sharp red spikes that looked harder than forged metal. No one wanted to think about what would happen to a person if that thing came charging at them.
Murmurs spread through the room. Four or five of these creatures had appeared within two days. If this was the pace, there was no way they could contain them all before ordinary people got hurt.
"You already dealt with it?" Bai Fanxian had been watching the image and noticed something off.
"Worthy of the leader. Your eye for detail is remarkable," Zhang Xianyuan said with an exaggerated sigh.
He pretended not to notice Bai Fanxian's eye twitch at the new title and kept his expression carefully serious.
"When we pressed it, it retreated into its shell and wrapped itself in magical energy. Once it did that, the defensive power was something even I couldn't break through."
The Marshal gestured for the screen to zoom in. Around the turtle's shell, pale blue magical energy moved in sluggish, heavy currents.
"Even you, at peak Grandmaster, couldn't do anything?"
Bai Fanxian raised an eyebrow.
"That's right. So I had no choice but to come and trouble the leader, or one of your Sages." Zhang Xianyuan cleared his throat and avoided Bai Fanxian's gaze. He was also, quietly, making a point to anyone still uncertain — that the Sages, currently the country's highest combat power, all answered to the young woman sitting there.
And more to the point, so did she. People had gotten used to calling her "Grandmaster Bai," but that had always been their own mistake.
"...Don't tell me."
Bai Fanxian looked at the screen again. The background behind the giant turtle was nothing like the coastline he had described.
"...I couldn't leave it near the villagers. So I brought it back. It's locked in the highest-security area in the underground levels of this base."
.
.
.
Dozens of meters below ground, the military base spread out in a network of connected passages, branching like a web. Any building above could be reached from below without surfacing.
Down here, much was kept away from ordinary eyes. The military's most classified weapons laboratory. Ongoing projects — all of them now paused. Every researcher and technician had been reassigned to work on whatever could be learned from these creatures of unknown origin.
"Leader, just ahead is the lab where we're analyzing the crystals found in their hearts."
The presenter had quietly become a tour guide. He was leading Bai Fanxian's group and the assembled officials through corridors wide enough for two large trucks to pass side by side.
Through the glass walls of the first room, dozens of scientists could be seen working around the red crystal mass recovered from the bears the day before.
"And here we have the materials team, Leader. We've brought in skilled craftsmen to study the physical materials from the carcasses and see what equipment can be made from them."
The next room had a different feeling entirely. Blacksmiths, engineers, and researchers in lab coats stood around examining the materials with unfamiliar tools. They were visibly excited, and also visibly arguing.
"Mm."
Bai Fanxian gave a noncommittal nod. Did this man really think she hadn't noticed how he kept addressing her? She was about to say something when her eyes landed on the last room.
It was the size of a football field, with a ceiling far higher than anything else down here. Right now it was empty space enclosed by security walls that wouldn't scratch under a Grandmaster's full-force attack.
In the center of the room sat the shell. If no one told you, you'd have thought it was just an empty casing. The turtle inside looked as though it had sunk into deep hibernation.
"You actually brought it back..." she murmured. The other participants crowded toward the glass for a look.
"What does the leader think we should do?" The old man who had first nominated her came to stand beside her, beaming. The question irritated Bai Fanxian.
"I'm not—"
"Leader, I think we should observe its behavior for a while first."
A young woman, one of the Empress's fans, spoke up at exactly the right moment, cutting in before Bai Fanxian could finish. She gestured toward the shell sitting alone in the middle of the room.
"I said—"
"The longer we leave it, the more dangerous it becomes. We should deal with it now before something happens." A young man handed Bai Fanxian a rough printout of data.
"Its defensive capacity may already be at Sage-equivalent. If it wakes up fully, it'll be much harder to put down, Leader."
"..."
The conversation showed no sign of ending. Huang Zihuan, trailing quietly behind his lady, allowed himself a private smile.
Bai Fanxian was usually decisive in situations like this. But this one was different. The people pushing her toward the role were doing so with genuine good intentions and sincere hearts. It was well known among those close to her that she had a very difficult time refusing people like that. All of those pressing her here, however subtly, were her own fans. So Huang Zihuan found himself witnessing something rare.
On one side: people sincerely trying to lift up someone they cared about.
On the other: the person they cared about, fully aware of this, and unable to simply say no.
He had no idea how long this would go on. But watching his lady's expression shift this many times in a single day was already more than enough entertainment.
"Leader, shall we head down?" one man asked. The viewing window they were standing at was at the highest point of the wall. To enter the room itself, they would need to take the elevator down another level.
"I'll let the officers below know to— hm?"
The presenter had barely started when something stopped him. From this angle, he could see the door at the bottom of the room swing open. He hadn't given any such order.
"Is that... Li Xinmei?"
Someone with sharper eyes recognized her first. Li Xinmei. The special officer. The Police Commissioner's daughter.
"How did she get in there?!"
The shock spread through the group. Her chief, who almost never let his expression slip, looked stricken. They had separated because she said she needed to use the bathroom. He hadn't thought that the moment she was out of sight, she would do something like this.
Below, Li Xinmei strode across the security room toward the motionless beast without hesitation. It was asleep. What could it possibly do?
She moved around it, examining it with curiosity. Whatever pride and arrogance she carried told her that she could handle this, that she could probably even hurt it if she tried.
Cultivators weren't so special after all.
But before she could act on any of that, she felt it. A pair of eyes in the shadows, fixed on her.
Li Xinmei went still. She looked around slowly. There was nothing else in this room. Just the turtle—
Wait—
*HOOM!!*
The roar hit her like a wall. Her eardrums rang. She was close enough that the shockwave reached her before she could move. She was airborne, thrown several meters back by the force of it.
"This is bad!"
Everyone above pressed against the glass. The turtle was awake. And the only other living thing in the room was crumpled on the floor, too shaken to move.
"Get someone down there!"
No one was sure who said it, but the chaos spread fast. Even Li Xinmei's chief lost his composure. His expression went taut. He glanced at the elevator — the indicator showed it was at the lowest level — and his jaw tightened.
By the time it came up and descended again, it would be too late.
"Hmph."
He made his decision. He pressed one hand flat against the glass and stepped back. Before anyone could react, he swung his fist into the security glass with everything he had.
*BOOM!*
The impact rattled the wall. Everyone around him flinched. The force behind that punch was something no ordinary human could produce, enough to put a Grandmaster-level cultivator down!
But the glass didn't move.
Not a crack. Not a mark. He stood there staring at it, wide-eyed.
"...It's not just the walls. The glass is rated to the same standard." The presenter swallowed. He studied the man carefully. There had been no qi — none at all. Which meant every bit of that force had come from his body alone.
"...!"
The man's jaw tightened. Below, the turtle was turning. Its attention had found the only living thing left in the room — Li Xinmei.
"Please — someone help her—"
He turned toward Zhang Xianyuan, who was already issuing orders nearby, voice tight. But before he could finish the sentence, Bai Fanxian stepped forward and extended her hand toward the security glass that had just been proven unbreakable...
*CRACK!*
With one light flick from her. The glass that he had given his all but still couldn't crack shattered into pieces just like that!
He gulped. Then he pulled himself together, turned to Bai Fanxian, and bowed his head gratefully. Before jumping down, he didn't forget to leave words that made her eye twitch:
"...Thank you, Leader."