In the general public's impression, those called professors are usually cultured and slender scholars, or those with white and speckled hair, wearing glasses, exuding an air of bookishness, and so on...
However, these traits would hardly be discernible on top of a mass of flesh standing over two meters tall.
The aforementioned mass of flesh now flashed a warm smile at Ai Qing, his face shining brightly with grease, blinding like the sun. His hands kept moving, skillfully manipulating those excessively delicate instruments for his thick fingers.
"Coffee or tea?"
"Coffee," said Ai Qing, "without sugar."
Soon, a steaming cup of coffee was served in a fine cup, placed on the saucer before Ai Qing.
The professor swiveled in his enormous, comically large chair, opened the refrigerator beside him, and began taking out all kinds of exquisite cakes, puddings, chocolates, macarons, fruits from Yingzhou, a thousand-layer pastry from Rome...
"It's just about time for dinner. Let's eat together."
He chuckled as he tied a napkin around his neck and picked up a knife and fork: "I'm on a diet recently, so I'm not eating meat in the evenings."
As Ai Qing looked at the table full of calories, a rare look of temptation appeared, but she soon shook her head in regret: "You're going to die of high cholesterol if you keep this up."
"If it's a brain thrombosis, I've had that several times already,"
The professor chuckled, lifting a finger to tap the scar from surgery on his forehead: "Thanks to the Astronomical Society, the medical technology of the Existence Institute always allows me to continue with my hobbies."
"Even if you're flattering me, it's no use. No matter what, I'm just a newcomer who's recently been promoted," Ai Qing lifted her coffee to take a sip, nodding in satisfaction.
Though she was reluctant to admit it, the professor's coffee was indeed the best in all of Xinhai, and despite having plenty of rare coffee powders at home, her own skills couldn't match his.
"Promoted at this critical moment? You must be having a hard time—"
A slight frown formed on the professor's brow: "Will the war in the Dragon Triangle affect Xinhai?"
"There'll be some impact, I guess,"
Ai Qing tapped on the table, sighing.
This was a perfect example of 'when the city gates catch fire, the fish in the moat suffer too.'
As the colossus at the forefront of the world, the power of the Astronomical Society was indisputably grand. It was, in essence, the shadowy counterpart of the United Nations.
Ninety years ago, to deal with threats beyond the Border, under the advocacy of the Guide Association, the International Astronomical Association was established with joint participation from the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council: Dongxia, Rome, Russian Federation, America Community, and the first dynasty of Egypt.
And now the ruling body of the Astronomical Society, which replaced Utopia's 'Jurisdiction Bureau,' consisted of politicians and major monopolies.
That's why the First World War came to be known as the war that ended all wars—
Since then, there were no global wars anymore, true, but that didn't mean war had vanished. It had merely shifted to places beyond ordinary sight. How many proxy wars had there been in these years among nations struggling for a voice in the Jurisdiction Bureau?
Otherwise, how would Bagdad have turned into ruins?
Dozens of Borders have been sunk by the fighting Natural Enemies, plummeting into the depths of Hell, and the repercussions are yet to subside.
Although nations and corporations maintain the Astronomical Society due to the pressure from beyond the Border, internal strife was ever-present...
Just like this time with the Border war in the Dragon Triangle.
Over the years, it's been an unspoken agreement that the country and organizations where the Border domain is located have the leading development rights of that Border—but Borders are called Borders not only because they lie at the periphery of Current Circumstances but also because they are akin to areas of weak sovereignty.
Especially under unusual circumstances, they can move...
In recent years, the internal battle within Yingzhou for the Border relic known as the 'Dragon Triangle,' between the Tianjin System's aristocracy and the Wu Family representing the national faction, had been incessant. They weren't in their first bout of bloodshed, and the transfer of Border sovereignty was happening at a pace more exaggerated than the replacement of a prime minister. The fight went back and forth until they managed to break the boundary wedge...
They actually broke the boundary wedge!
Friends, you're doing this on purpose, right?
Anyway, according to the calculations of the Astronomical Society, the Dragon Triangle has begun to drift, first heading toward the Australian archipelago for a stretch, then suddenly turning northwest...
That's right, heading towards Dongxia.
Dongxia could hardly contain its excitement; the Border development group, Tai Qing Heavy Industries, was already rubbing its hands together in anticipation, waiting for this piece of meat to fall into the pot.
Then Yingzhou started getting displeased. But by then, the Dragon Triangle had already drifted over the Open Ocean, so what could Yingzhou do about it? It's what the people want that truly matters.
Moreover, with such a big thing drifting over, if you keep it hidden and not allow others to intervene, what if there are dangerous items inside?
Dongxia clamored: Let me have a look!
It's not certain if it's growing properly, but the situation is definitely going to get more tense.
And what troubles Ai Qing now is that, if Dongxia does intend to do something about the Dragon Triangle, Xinhai City will soon become one of the most convenient ports for setting out.
That means more and more Sublimators seeking to make money, treasure hunt, grab a quick fortune, and cause trouble will come here.
What worries Ai Qing is not just the inevitable rise in Sublimator crime but also the mutual attraction between Borders—
What if the Xiematai Border relic inside the Dragon Triangle crashes into the coast of Dongxia and collides with another Border?
That would be like a comet hitting Earth!
Of course, she's not the only one concerned, but when the time comes, her name will definitely be on the list of those who take the blame. Becoming a formal Inspector of the Astronomical Society now was hardly good timing.
On the contrary, if she wanted to stay out of trouble, she would need to start planning a transfer within half a year.
The drift of the Border was not fast, but with the current momentum, it was feared that within a year at most, a major chaos would erupt from the peripheries of Xinhai.
"Have you found a place to go?"
The Professor asked casually, "The connections behind you, certainly can't even handle this, right?"
Ai Qing glanced at him and said nothing.
"Just curious, purely curious."
The Professor chuckled amiably, and after devouring the desserts on the table like a whirlwind, he had eaten more than half, and the coffee, sweet enough to almost turn into paste, had also gone down his throat.
He had eaten only a half-satisfying dinner.
He wiped his mouth and pulled out a thick file from under the table, placing it in front of Ai Qing.
"This is the investigation you asked for, all the records and messages about the Savior Association so far," the Professor said. "According to your request, I've only done basic integration, deleting some useless redundancies. However, I added no subjective arguments, and I trust such documentation won't trouble you."
Ai Qing was quite confident in her document reading abilities—if she had to guess, she wouldn't need someone else to make blind guesses and insert their subjective views for her.
Her ability to become an Inspector out of a thousand other candidates was not just due to her near-perfect test scores but also her 'intuition,' a talent considered rare even among the Astronomical Society.
Yes, that's right, intuition.
If she were to guess arbitrarily at heads or tails, her chances of being right or wrong were probably fifty-fifty, and she might not be as good as those professional mathematicians in a game of dice.
But it was only when faced with a complex chaos that her intuition truly revealed its worth.
If we were to talk probability, the chance of being right was about sixty-five percent.
This accuracy, more than fifteen percent above that of ordinary people, made her stand out from the complex tests, and she was rated as a top-class A+ talent.
Such a talent was an absolute fit for a predictive type of Stigma; even without soul sublimation, it was enough to inspire hope.
The Astronomical Society didn't care about the thirty-five percent failure rate; in fact, they had ample ability to pay the price for it. If it hadn't been for Ai Qing's refusal to join the strategy room, opting instead for a local post, the Astronomical Society might have already started their targeted training for her, right?
That's why she was laughed at by her fellow trainees as a classic example of someone who didn't know how to appreciate opportunities—
As an intelligence broker, the Professor knew everything about his collaborator, all records and details, but he was more curious about the things that had never been recorded on paper.
Ai Qing kept mum about it and had never revealed a trace to anyone.
In the silence, she flipped through the heavy pages with focus, while the Professor didn't speak anymore to disturb her, simply turning his chair and browsing through the obscure professional books on the table.
If one were to talk about Ai Qing's reading impressions, the Savior Association's waters turned out to be deeper than anticipated.
Although they seemed like a group of swindlers, the doubts within were too numerous to count. Whether it was the strange provenance of the Border Relic or those Sublimators who had secretly interacted with them…
The Wang Hai, as confessed by his accomplices, was merely a temporary leader; before him when the Savior Association was not yet named, there were even traces of other leaders.
They were indeed developing low-key in places like Old Pond Town, but the facade they showed to the world, including the many companies such as Love Charity, had broad contacts with other places.
Not just Xinhai, but traces extending to other places, could well be said to cover all sorts of people. If it hadn't been for the Red Gloves' forceful move, it may have taken who knows how long to notice these things that were growing in the rural and secluded urban lower classes.
Now, it looked more like a front and a vest of a massive organization.
But whose hand was it that extended this far?
There were so many suspicious directions.
The Black Sky Cult from India? The Paradise of Bliss from the Border? The Science God Spirit Association from the United State of America? Or the myriad ghosts and deities from Yingzhou?
It was just a shame that Wang Hai and the Nightjar, the only two who knew the details, were already dead; otherwise, Ai Qing wouldn't have had to start investigating again from scratch, like looking for a needle at the bottom of the sea.
She wasn't worried about what the Red Gloves, killed by Huai Shi, and the largest terrorist organization of the Border, the Green Day, were up to.
The power of the Border was ultimately that of the Border, and to make a move in the Current Circumstances, they couldn't circumvent the Astronomical Society that loomed over all humanity.
What worried her was what those lunatics from the Savior Association, who scavenged the Source Substance from the elderly, really wanted to do. Had they succeeded? Were they in the process? What was their plan?
In the mix of it all, who else was in on it with them?
She truly didn't believe that a waste like Wang Hai, who only knew how to scam money, could infiltrate the upper-middle class of Xinhai through Love Charity.
Just by looking at the files, she knew that guy was always just about scamming retirement funds.
So, who was behind it all, stirring the pot?
Before long, her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of a phone ringing.
After she finished the call, she completely lost the mood to continue thinking.
"Let's just end the preliminary report here," she said as she gathered the files from the table. "I will transfer the rest of the money to you, but please continue the investigation on the Savior Association. Let me know if there's any new development."
"Don't worry, I will."
The Professor drank tea, observing her expression: "Did another incident involving Erosion material and Sublimator crimes occur?"
"No, worse than that."
Ai Qing, expressionless, tapped the armrest of her wheelchair, remembering the description of Huai Shi in the phone call, and couldn't help wanting to sigh,
"—Far worse than that."