Chapter 35 Secret Meeting
June 6th, night, Super Hero Association branch building.

Qing Ya walked out of the lounge and boarded the specialist elevator that was only used by members of the Round Table. He took out an ID card from his cloak and swiped it through the card slot. Then, the silver-white elevator slowly moved upwards with a hum.

Soon, the elevator stopped at the 99th floor, where the association's high-rise building was equipped with the most confidentiality and security conference room.

He left the elevator and walked for a while in a corridor that seemed to have no end. A door-shaped opening slowly opened on the metal wall on the right, and a cold light shone in his face.

Qing Ya walked into the conference room, sat down at the high-tech round table in front, and waited silently for the arrival of the guests.

According to the news, the three magical girls of the Alliance had already arrived at the 79th floor of the branch and were waiting for him downstairs. But the executive of the Abnormal Control Bureau said that he wanted to talk to him alone, so he waited alone in the conference room.

The official status of the Anomaly Control Bureau is slightly higher than that of the Superhero Association. Their work is different from that of the Superhero Association. The former is responsible for investigating some abnormal phenomena, while the latter directly deals with disasters and superhuman criminal incidents.

But this is only what is said on the surface. In fact, the fundamental purpose of the United Nations is to completely curb the possibility of riots in the Super Hero Association, so the "Anomaly Control Bureau" was created.

Experts in the Abnormal Control Bureau studied the abilities and characteristics of each superhero day and night, and formulated a large number of countermeasures against them. Once they showed a tendency to lose control, the Control Bureau would implicitly warn them, and if it was ineffective, they would directly intervene.

They spend most of their time dealing with "out-of-control superheroes" and "illegal superheroes". There are at least hundreds of superheroes who have died in their hands or have been detained in the Abnormal Control Bureau. However, to the outside world, these superheroes are either dead or missing.

So they will only take action in two situations: one is when there are major strange events that are difficult to explain, and the other is when there are superheroes who need to be warned or dealt with.

Ke Youqing hopes it is the former.

Because if it is the latter, then the fact that the "Black Judge", the executive officer of the Control Bureau, came to visit him in person this time means that the Control Bureau is not far from taking action against him.

But he also knew in his heart that as the "Green Crow", he had been fighting criminals by any means necessary for nearly decades, so it was not surprising that he was targeted by the Control Bureau.

At this moment, footsteps were slowly heard in the corridor outside the meeting room.

The closed eyes behind Qing Ya's mask slowly opened, and a door-shaped opening appeared on the wall where his gaze reached, and a tall and narrow figure slowly walked into the meeting room.

The other person was wearing a black swallowtail windbreaker and a sharp-edged mask on his face. In the middle of the mask was a conspicuous blood-red "V", and the rest was covered in black. Just from this unique and eye-catching V-shaped mask, Qing Ya was able to identify the other person's identity.

"Black Judge", a new monster in the Abnormal Control Bureau.

In just two years, his rating in the Control Bureau rose all the way from E-level to the highest level S-level, becoming a well-known figure in the Control Bureau, known to almost everyone.

The Black Judge approached the round metal table, unceremoniously pulled up a swivel chair and sat down, resting his elbows on the tabletop and crossing his fingers slightly under his chin.

His V-shaped mask was facing Qing Ya, and he said jokingly, "Wow, what an honor, I can actually meet the famous 'Qing Ya'. I thought the Chinese branch of the association would send 'Mo Xie Jia', 'Tai Ji Ke', 'Jiu Jian Feng' and other people with empty names to meet me."

"No, I came here only because you asked to see me." Qing Ya said slowly.

The voices of the two people in the conference room were modified using each other's masks. Qing Ya's voice was hoarse and gloomy, and Black Judge's voice was metallic and magnetic, like a machine.

"Yes, but I didn't expect to see you." The Black Judge smiled.

"Time is precious." Qing Ya stared at him with a sharp gaze, "Why did the executive of the Control Bureau come here specially?"

"You misunderstood. I'm not coming for you." The Black Judge tilted his head, and the blood-red V on his mask tilted. "Mr. Qing Ya, have you ever heard of the term 'player'?"

"Player?"

"That's right." The judge smiled. "Just yesterday morning, I was shopping at a chain supermarket in New York, and I happened to run into two armed robbers. I was in a bad mood, so I cut off their hands and feet, arrested them and tortured them. Guess what they confessed?"

The blue crow remained silent, staring quietly at the judge's mask.

The Black Judge sneered and raised his voice, "They actually think that this world is a game and that we are all NPCs, so we can do whatever we want without being bound by the law. So the first thing they did when they came here was to try armed robbery. That's ridiculous, isn't it?"

"Are they suffering from paranoia?"

"No, don't worry, you will understand."

Judge Black shook his head and smiled. "Originally this was just an ordinary robbery case. As you said, if it were someone else, they would probably regard their confession as the nonsense of schizophrenia or paranoia. But I was very interested in what they confessed, so I asked the people from the Control Bureau to use the latest brain imaging equipment to reproduce the world in their eyes into images. Guess what I found?"

"What did you find?" asked Qing Ya.

The Black Judge reached out and pressed a button on the table. Suddenly a groove opened, and a metal projector in the shape of a pen slowly rose from it.

He picked up the projector and slowly loaded a memory chip he carried with him into it, then continued:
"I found that in the perspectives of these two 'players', there is a row of icons similar to game functions, just like... uh, those cheesy online games. Not only that, they can touch these icons to open the game store and shop there, or open the task panel issued by the game system. As long as they complete the tasks on the panel, they will level up and get rewards. The ultimate goal they get from the system is..."

He paused for a moment, then continued in a calm tone, "Within a year, exterminate the parahumans."

"Are you kidding me?" Qing Ya was silent for a moment and then asked.

"No, I'm not kidding." The judge said calmly, "According to the information I got from those two players, there are currently a total of 100 players in the world. Whether the number will increase in the future is another matter. Excluding the two players I captured and the one who has died, there are still 97 players left on Earth. They are lurking all over the world. Players may appear anywhere, including the United States, the United Kingdom, China, and India."

After saying that, he pressed a button on the pen-shaped projector and projected a picture onto the wall in the conference room.

Qing Ya turned his head and stared at the image projected on the wall by Black Judge.

The screen shows a person's view from a first-person perspective. The person stares blankly at a blank ceiling, with seven tiny "icons" arranged vertically in the upper right corner of his field of vision.

Soon, a bright red warning panel popped up in front of his eyes. On it were written in big black letters: "Warning, please do not reveal any information about the 'player' to any superhuman. Your behavior will seriously affect the progress of other players' tasks and directly endanger their personal safety! Warning, you are violating the taboo treaty! You are violating the taboo treaty! You are violating the taboo treaty! The warning is invalid. In five seconds, your body and soul will be forced to die."

The next moment, all the panels and function icons in the player's field of vision disappeared, and a huge blood-red number "5" appeared, decreasing with each second. Accompanied by a burst of horrified roars and wails, the countdown number went from "5" to "4" and then to "3", and finally only "2" remained...

The lower the number, the more fierce his resistance became.

But when the number reached "1", the player completely stopped resisting, and his brain imaging screen gradually turned black.

The video ended here, and the Black Judge pressed a button on the projector, and the projection image on the wall disappeared.

The blue crow was silent.

The conference room was briefly shrouded in silence, and the two men remained silent as if they had reached a consensus.

"This is the brain image of that player." Black Judge was the first to speak and break the silence. He turned the projection pen with his index and middle fingers and said, "The technicians of the Abnormal Control Bureau have put a lot of effort into meeting my needs. They also used some neural decoding technology to barely realize this idea."

He spread his hands and said, "It's a pity. They were killed by the thing called 'system' before I could do anything. Otherwise, I would have tortured them again."

"When did they start to appear?" asked Qing Ya.

"Four days ago." Black Judge put down the projection pen. "Although they currently only have the combat power to rob a supermarket with guns, they are very dangerous. Based on my current guess about this system, it is likely that it can allow these players to achieve incredible combat power improvement in a short period of time. So even though they are still weak now, after a year, they may have become a completely different person, like... a human-shaped nuclear bomb."

"You told me this because you want me to assist the Bureau and help you find these 'players'?"

"Yes."

"To find ninety-seven people out of ten billion..." Qing Ya sarcastically said, "What a wild idea."

"Originally, this should have been a task for the Extra-Dimensional Control Bureau, but the 'players' are not traditional time travelers. Their souls move to this world and directly occupy the body of a resident of this world as a disguise. Therefore, the common methods of the Extra-Dimensional Control Bureau cannot work on them... So this matter fell on the shoulders of our Abnormal Control Bureau."

The judge paused and said, "But I think this matter is far more important than they imagined. That's why I came to seek your help."

"Then why should I help you? This is not my job."

"Because even you, Mr. Qing Ya, everyone around you may have been quietly replaced by players, but they disguised it very well and you never noticed it."

"Isn't it the same for you?" Qing Ya snorted coldly, "Worry about the people around you first."

"Of course, I don't deny it." The Black Judge smiled, "It is even possible that at this moment, you or I, who are sitting between us, have been replaced by the so-called 'player'."

Green Crow stared at the Black Judge's mask and was silent for a moment. He sneered and said, "You think our world is a game? How arrogant..."

The Black Judge rested his elbows on the armrests of the swivel chair with his fingers crossed, and a mechanical laugh came from behind the mask.

"It seems that we have reached a rare consensus."

After saying that, he slowly stood up from the swivel chair and said, "Then, please tell what you just said to the three magical girls next door. They should also know about this matter."

"Won't you meet them in person?"

"No, I'm not very good at dealing with these frivolous people." Black Judge said, "So I chose you as my meeting point. I respect you very much, Mr. Green Crow, you are a true hero, but you must know that the Abnormal Control Bureau has been keeping an eye on you in recent years. One day in the future, if you truly lose yourself and cross that line, then we will be on opposite sides."

As he spoke, he suddenly laughed: "Of course, I will be very excited if that happens, because I can finally tear off your mask with my own hands and see who you really are..."

"You are not worthy to be my opponent." Qing Ya looked at him and said coldly.

"Who would know if they hadn't tried it?"

"It's time for you to go."

"That's right. Goodbye then, Mr. Blue Crow."

After saying goodbye slowly, Black Judge turned and walked out of the meeting room. He walked along the corridor for a while and got on the elevator at the end.

Soon, he reached the 45th floor and entered the special guest room prepared for him by the Super Hero Association.

Black Judge first used the instrument on his wrist to confirm that there were no surveillance cameras in the room, then took off the V-shaped mask on his face and took a breath.

He stood by the window, drew back the curtains, and raised the slats of the blinds.

Looking towards this brightly lit city, the train rumbles past on the viaduct, and the traffic rushes on the road like an endless tide.

"Well, I'm almost tired of all the fighting and killing this year. I should go home and enjoy my vacation in a few days."

Ke Yinzhi raised his lips and murmured softly. He lowered his head and glanced at his phone.

The lock screen cover of the phone is a family photo. He still remembers that summer, his six younger brothers and sisters were crowded on the sofa, and he and his parents stood behind the sofa. With the sound of a click, a smile appeared on every child's face.

"I hope those maggots... don't grow in my house."

He muttered to himself, a deep light flowing in his pupils, and the smile on the corners of his mouth gradually faded.

(End of this chapter)