Commander’s Weakness Time

As night​​​‌‌⁠‌​​‌​‍⁠​​‌‌‌‍‍‍‌‍⁠ fell, the city plunged into darkness once more.

A few hundred meters north of the container was the filthy city canal. In the bridge tunnel, An Yu sat on the ground and wolfed down the bread.

This was already his sixth loaf; continuous fighting had completely drained him, and he had never felt so hungry.

His terminal displayed a survival value of 90%.

As the grapevines retracted from An Yu’s body, Zhu Tao exhaled deeply, “I’ve done my best. The remaining physical depletion is from fatigue. We can only pray the mission ends soon so we can go back and sleep for at least 12 hours.”

“Thank you.” An Yu chewed while examining the nearly healed external wounds on his body, planning to sleep for a month once he got back.

Billy finished broadcasting to the entire city and sighed, “I didn’t expect it to be this difficult before we came out.”

“The High Peak wants us to abandon the city,” Zhu Tao said, fiddling with a grape leaf he had pulled from himself. “Fortunately, Law refused. Otherwise, I don’t know how we’d remember this mission in the future.”

Hearing this, An Yu looked inside.

Qin Zhilu sat deep in the tunnel, one leg bent and the other stretched out, his black clothes blending into the darkness.

Since entering the bridge tunnel, he went inside alone.

The Commander seems somewhat downcast, An Yu thought. Although he wasn’t very good at perceiving other people’s emotions, but—

He opened the footage captured by the recorder.

The Commander was indeed acting strangely.

Not long ago, there had been a bloody standoff outside the container.

Because the aberrant tide was so large, they should have retreated quickly and waited for reinforcements to arrive before acting. But in the footage, Qin Zhilu stood tall on the broken stone wall, his pistol loaded with thermal bullets specialized for killing aberrants, shooting row after row of the surging aberrants.

An Yu disposed of those who were left, charging into the aberrant tide to finish the job.

An Yu was afraid of shooting, so his way of finishing them off was smashing their dirty heads with the heavy sniper rifle, a pure physical labor.

Zhu Tao shouted several times to withdraw, but Qin Zhilu turned a deaf ear each time. Those pair of black eyes were terrifyingly deep. An Yu had been exhausted long ago, but each time he looked back, he dared not speak.

He kept going until Qin Zhilu’s spare ammunition was finally exhausted.

After returning, he went alone deep into the tunnel.

An Yu grabbed Zhu Tao, who was leaning over to pick up bread, and asked softly, “Was it because of the order to abandon the city?”

Zhu Tao glanced inside and smiled, “Probably not.”

He didn’t know how to handle with the coarse bread loaf that was as long as his forearms, so he broke off half and gave it to An Yu, “Back in District 95, one request killed 2.8 million people. Law has a deep heart.”

An Yu hugged his knees and thought for a moment, “The Commander is a kind person.”

“Hmm?” Zhu Tao blinked, “Others were scared to death when they first heard this, but he’s the devil who pressed that button.”

“Ling Qiu said, to judge a person’s kindness, you have to see how much they’re willing to take responsibility for others,” An Yu whispered, “2.8 million people, that button is a very heavy responsibility.”

Zhu Tao suddenly looked at him differently.

An Yu calmly asked, “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” Zhu Tao shook his head. He recalled the Brain’s evaluation of An Yu as emotionally indifferent, like a small beast. Yet such a small beast could see through people’s hearts at a glance.

“Law has always undertaken the responsibility, bearing it for everyone,” Zhu Tao said, “Order is his bottom line, far above emotions.”

After chewing on the coarse grain for a long time before it softened in his mouth, Zhu Tao’s cheeks began to ache. He found it difficult to understand An Yu’s obsession with this stuff.

He mumbled with the bread in his mouth, “Law just had a moment of weakness.”

An Yu was puzzled, “The Commander has a weakness?”

“Law’s ability is indeed unreasonably powerful, but it’s also very limited. Taking in abnormal genes too frequently will make him fall into bloodlust and negative emotions, and his brain will evaluate it as a kind of self-loathing.” Zhu Tao murmured. “But he can take care of himself, after all, everyone relies on him. Just let him be quiet for a while.”

“Oh…” An Yu nodded.

Zhu Tao lowered his voice, “But if his condition worsens severely and he completely shuts himself off, don’t go near him.”

An Yu was startled, “What would happen if I did?”

Zhu Tao looked unusually serious, “No one who is still alive knows what happens.”

There was a brief silence in the tunnel. An Yu nodded and took a hard bite of his bread.

Suddenly, Zhu Tao chuckled, “So what’s your ability exactly? Is it similar to Rabbit An?”

“….”

An Yu’s expression darkened instantly.

Zhu Tao continued teasing him, “Did the Black Tower send you that cartoon show? Is it good?”

An Yu felt even more depressed, “It’s okay.”

Not long after entering the tunnel, he received a clip of the cartoon show “Super Aberrant Kindergarten” from the Black Tower. The protagonist was Rabbit An—a cartoon character with a rabbit head and human clothing, always jumping around.

It was only six years old, with two long ears and a small, snowy-white round tail behind its butt that shaked when it walked.

Because it looked innocent and gentle, humans adopted it into the Super Aberrant Kindergarten, unaware that at night it would sneak into residential areas to eat people. When it was chased by the police, it stared at them with a pair of blood-red eyes and ran so fast that even a car couldn’t catch up—but it definitely, definitely could not be called “teleportation”.

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The adorable round tail was the bomb—pluck it off, throw it out and bang! Another one would appear in its butt, endless and almost unbelievable to see.

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After watching it, An Yu sank into depression for a good half hour, and even lost his appetite for bread.

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He had never watched cartoons, let alone browsed social media—low-income households didn’t even have a phone. His first experience with an electronic device was with this terminal.

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Rabbit An was fictional, so what was he?

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“An Yu,” Qin Zhilu’s voice suddenly came from the tunnel. “Come here.”

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Billy and Zhu Tao’s laughter faded into the background, until all that remained was the sound of dripping water. Standing before Qin Zhilu, he uneasily said, “Sir.”

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He waited for Qin Zhilu to interrogate him, but Qin Zhilu simply stared at him quietly, his gaze as inscrutable as ever.

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An Yu thought he might not be mistaken; the Commander did indeed seem depressed.

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This might be a good opportunity to please him.

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“Oh,” An Yu was puzzled. When had he been wandering off? Nonetheless, he cautiously sat down beside Qin Zhilu, watching as he silently ate.

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The Commander seemed to… like to hug him very much.

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“You’ve become a human being again,” An Yu struggled to articulate, attempting this highly challenging social interaction named ‘comfort’. “As long as you want to, you can be human again. Don’t hate yourself.”

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After hesitating for a moment, he repeated his trick, “Sir, my whole body hurts.”

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Even if Zhu Tao healed his wounds, the accumulated inflammation kept him feverish.

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A trace of warmth slowly appeared in Qin Zhilu’s cold and lonely eyes. If Zhu Tao were here, he would surely be surprised at how quickly Qin Zhilu had emerged from his depression.

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An Yu was particularly anxious when he mentioned this, “But he can only help me recover to 90%.”

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An Yu warily covered his waist, “Why?”

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“That’s my personal blade, temporarily lent to you, not given…” Qin Zhilu hesitated briefly. “Forget it. Keep it.”

He stood up to leave. “But you mustn’t harm yourself. No matter how sad you are.”

An Yu nodded in confusion, unable to grasp his full meaning.

Qin Zhilu returned with Billy’s medicine box, pulling out a round, white little jar from the corner and softly saying, “This one doesn’t hurt.”

An Yu noticed how adeptly Qin Zhilu searched through Billy’s medicine box, much like how Ling Qiu knew exactly where all the food was stored in their home, as if he had done this countless times in the past.

Qin Zhilu sat back beside him, paused, and removed his gloves. 

In the darkness, his hands appeared even more slender, and he scooped out some ointment, gently applying it to the scars on An Yu’s waist.

A bit itchy, An Yu thought. He realized that, after removing his gloves, the Commander’s fingers were surprisingly gentle.

After applying the medicine, Qin Zhilu and he went out together. Qin Zhilu tossed the medical kit into Billy’s arms and asked, “How soon until the reinforcements arrive?”

“Any moment now,” Billy peeked out from the bridge tunnel, “It’s getting quite bright—”

His words abruptly halted.

Zhu Tao asked, “What’s wrong?”

“Why does it seem like someone turned on the light…” Billy muttered.

One of the eight [Frog Tongues] fell, and the power supply restriction was invalid.

“No way!” Zhu Tao stood up abruptly, “Don’t turn on the lights, don’t turn them on! The broadcast warned them so many times—”

An Yu’s heart suddenly tightened. “What did you just broadcast?”

Billy stuttered under his sudden sharpness, “J-just… survival tips… and the previous messages, plus your new findings, Level 3 mutations will result in human body resurrection, mantis consciousness merging with human memories…”

He suddenly stopped and jerked his head to look outside.

After the first light was lit in the distance, the light spots came one after another, gradually connecting from points to lines, extending from the other side of the bridge, and the number even exceeded the 10% survival rate estimated by Qin Zhilu.

After learning about the outcome of the mantis mutation, the survivors in District 53, without hesitation, abandoned the defense lines they had stubbornly held, turning towards the abyss.

“What on earth are these lunatics thinking?” Billy shivered, “Did the calamity drive them insane? They actually want to become aberrants?!”

Outside, the scattered lights gradually spread like a prairie fire. An Yu stared at the glow of lights and his hand by his side curled up briefly as if about to clench, then relaxed.

“The only thing that can drive people mad is people themselves.”

Suppressing the inexplicable surge of emotion from just now, he muttered to himself, “The people of Bait City, perhaps they don’t care at all whether they exist as humans or aberrants. Once they find out that after the distortion, they won’t die, won’t lose their memories, and instead will have the opportunity to rewrite the rules because of the aberrant consciousness, how else can we suppress them?”

Billy looked utterly bewildered, his tongue tied, “But… isn’t it natural for humans to be noble and protect human dignity?”

Before he could finish, An Yu suddenly grabbed his collar, “What does nobility and dignity have to do with District 53? Tell me, for District 53, what is so terrible about the occupation of aberrant consciousness, and what reason do they have to resist?”

It’s hard to find stars in the gloomy night.

District 53 had once been fortunate to have one, but it had just fallen.

After Ling Qiu’s fall, this Bait City no longer had any light.

Billy, pale as a dead pigeon, stammered, “I spoke out of turn, I’m sorry… I didn’t know you would think so… deeply.”

“Sorry.”

An Yu released his grip, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath, trying hard to suppress the restless stirrings hiding deep in his consciousness.

“Let’s go,” Qin Zhilu suddenly stepped forward, standing at the entrance of the bridge tunnel, then turned to look back at An Yu.

His towering figure blocked out the heartbreaking lights.

An Yu hesitated for a moment. “Where are we going?”

“To do what your neighbor didn’t finish. Didn’t you promise him?”

Qin Zhilu’s expression was very indifferent, but his tone was firm.

“We’re going to break through this miasma for him.”

M1zushi: I was tling this while listening to Made in Abyss’ ost and it makes me so sad kfsdklfksd

btw I take the extra effort to put those spaces between paragraphs bcs I feel like it helps to set the mood(spaces from the raw txt that get deleted when you convert it to docx), but cg makes it a huuuuge space, so do you think I should keep putting the spaces or does it bother you in the reading?