"I-I’m not!" Zhou Chen retorted. "It’s definitely because my injuries haven’t healed yet. That’s why I feel cold and weak."

"Is that so?"

"It definitely is," Zhou Chen said with conviction.

"Then you’d better rest up properly."

Li Xiye pinched his cheek. "Wait here. I’ll go get Erin."

With that, she pushed the door open and left.

Zhou Chen was stunned. ’She’s... just leaving like that?’

Before he could think any more about it, the conference room door was pushed open carefully, and Erin walked in, looking like she had calmed down.

But when she saw Zhou Chen, she suddenly gasped, covering her mouth.

Following her gaze, Zhou Chen looked down at his collar.

There was a fresh lipstick mark on it.

’When did—!’

Zhou Chen’s eyes widened. He hadn’t noticed at all!

"You two... aren’t you like brothers?" Erin asked in surprise.

"Well, it’s a bit complicated..." Zhou Chen fumbled, folding his collar to hide the mark. "Ahem, she did that on purpose to embarrass me. Don’t worry about it...

How’s your recovery? Are there any aftereffects?"

"The doctors said I’ve recovered very well, with no aftereffects. My Soul is free from the Curse, and I can use my Extraordinary Abilities now. I’m a Healing Type, you know."

A relieved smile touched Erin’s lips. "From now on, I’m free."

She would no longer be plagued by the Curse, no longer have to worry about death claiming her life. She could live freely and without a care in the world, just like everyone else.

"Congratulations," Zhou Chen said, genuinely happy for Erin.

"It’s all thanks to you." Erin stepped forward and gently hugged Zhou Chen, pressing her face against his chest as if to draw an unprecedented sense of peace from him. She knew this was very unladylike, but on this matter, she was willing to break the rules she lived by.

"Thank you..." she murmured.

Zhou Chen ruffled her hair and asked, "What are your plans now?"

"I plan to go home first, and then... I’ll have to trouble you again."

Erin’s voice trailed off, the tips of her ears turning red. "I want to stay in Jinzhu for a while longer. Could you be my guide?"

"I’d be happy to. But I might not have a lot of free time. I’ve been skipping work a lot lately. If I ditch again, Jiang Che will definitely kill me."

"That’s okay. As long as you can be my guide, that’s enough for me," Erin said, a hint of delight in her voice.

·

"Finished chatting?"

Back in Jiang Che’s office, Li Xiye was sitting on the sofa stroking Xiao Ju. She glanced at Zhou Chen and said flatly, "By the way, there’s something I need to tell you."

"Huh? What is it?"

"I’m planning to stay at your place for a while to prepare for my Advancement, and to catch up with an old friend."

She looked at Erin behind Zhou Chen and smiled faintly. "I’ll be in your care, Miss Erin."

The world went dark for Zhou Chen as he envisioned the tragic future that was about to unfold.

·

·

Far across the ocean, in a country called the North Carolina Republic.

The North Carolina Republic was a nation designated as a Restricted Area, code [041], which was unsealed in year 185 of the New Calendar. While not large in land area, it was rich in Ore resources, possessed fertile soil, and had vast forests. These assets allowed it to become a small nation with one of the World’s top economies.

The country’s class structure was extremely distorted. Only the cities near the national Capital could be considered large cities or wealthy districts. Once one left the Capital region, they would find themselves in impoverished slums.

According to statistics, ninety-seven percent of North Carolina’s total wealth was concentrated in the hands of the top elite. The rest of the poor had an average income of less than five hundred a month, suffering from constant hunger and cold. The wealthy elite and even the country’s high-level officials did not see them as "human," and ruthlessly exploited them for every last bit of profit.

The slums they lived in were filthy, cramped, dark, and damp—perfect breeding grounds for bacteria and viruses. The country had suffered several plagues throughout its history. Although they were eventually resolved, each one resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands of civilians.

Now, a brand-new plague was spreading throughout the North Carolina Republic.

—Crystal Disease.

It was an extremely bizarre illness with an incubation period of up to a month. By the time this strange disease was first discovered, it was destined to have already spread rampantly. The crowded slums were the perfect environment for rapid transmission.

People who contracted Crystal Disease would first experience unbearably itchy skin. Most would scratch constantly until they broke the skin.

Less than three hours after the skin was broken, the wound would begin to show signs of crystallization. Within twelve hours, it would spread rapidly throughout the body, crystallizing bones and meridians. During this process, the patient would experience indescribable agony. Over seventy percent of patients died from the pain during crystallization, while the remaining thirty percent would face even more painful torment.

Their organs would begin to crystallize one by one. If it was the lungs, they would struggle to breathe until they suffocated. If it was the stomach and intestines, they would suffer from relentless diarrhea, leading to death by starvation or dehydration. If it was the brain, it was actually better; the death was relatively painless...

In just three days, the medical system in North Carolina’s slums was completely overwhelmed. The wealthy districts, however, had long been isolated from the slums and thus avoided a large-scale outbreak of Crystal Disease. The few isolated cases there could be treated with advanced medical care.

But the poor received no help. Contracting Crystal Disease meant nothing but waiting for death. Even those who weren’t infected couldn’t escape; they too were just waiting to die.

Unwilling to die so passively, the poor started to riot. Within a few short days, all cities outside the wealthy districts descended into chaos. Gangs ran rampant, and madness, violence, and confusion filled the streets as all of society’s ugliness and darkness erupted.

It was like Hell in the apocalypse.

「Nameless Clinic.」

The female doctor, wearing a gas mask, numbly covered a patient with a twisted face with a white sheet.

This was the twenty-seventh person to die today.

In this period, this small, unlicensed clinic alone had taken in over two hundred patients who died from Crystal Disease. They were even running out of white sheets.

Even her assistant, a young man she had trained who dreamed of becoming a doctor to save his people, had been infected with Crystal Disease five days ago.

"—Sister Ka, I’m so, so scared. I’ve seen what the infected look like, the way they scream in agony... that look... I’m so scared... Rather than... rather than die in excruciating pain, just let me die comfortably. Sister Ka, I’m begging you, please give me a quick death..."

At that time, the young man had knelt on the floor, the wound on his arm already beginning to crystallize, begging her through his tears to give him a quick end.

Calia, of course, knew the horrors of Crystal Disease. Many people now chose to commit suicide immediately upon learning they were infected, just to avoid the prolonged suffering.

She had no choice but to suppress her grief and personally send off the apprentice she had known for years.

"Damned Crystal Disease..."

Calia cursed, put the fresh corpse into a simple body bag, and tossed it onto a pushcart piled high with other bodies. She then pushed the cart out of the clinic, found a large, pre-dug pit in the street, and dumped the body in.

The crematoriums had long been overwhelmed. Now, bodies could only be burned in pits dug in the streets. In a few more days, they wouldn’t just be out of white sheets; they’d be out of plastic body bags too.

Back in the clinic, Calia looked at the patient lying on the bed and sighed deeply.

’Fortunately, this disease doesn’t infect Ascenders. I still have enough time to research it.’

’Based on my current research, this is an Extraordinary plague. The crystals actually contain Essence, which is completely unheard of.’

’An Extraordinary plague doesn’t just break out for no reason. It’s either deliberate or caused by some unknown contamination... To find a cure, I have to find the source. Heh, what’s the difference between that and dreaming...’

Calia mocked herself weakly.

Then, she looked at the System Panel that existed in her vision.

[Wish Value: 3 points.]

’Only the Extraordinary can deal with the Extraordinary...’

She murmured one of the truths of the Extraordinary World and decided to try something. 𝐟𝕣𝗲𝕖𝕨𝗲𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝗲𝚕.𝗰𝚘𝐦

Calia stood up, walked over to a little girl with milder symptoms, and made a wish in her heart:

"—I wish to cure her of Crystal Disease."