Otherworldly Affairs Office-Chapter 88: Old Friends Meeting as Strangers

"Oh, even without the support of Elder Zuo and Elder Lin’s abilities, your thoughts can still remain here. You must really miss me!" Mu Fanchen looked at the soft clay trying hard to form a human shape yet failing repeatedly, reached out and let a dot of blue light float over it, enveloping it.

"You’ve always been like this, obviously not a spiritual ability user, what are you doing being so stubborn here? If you were here in person, it might’ve made me think a little." As he said this, his fingers slightly lifted, the blue light retracted into his body, and a completely black figure condensed into shape with his help.

Looking at his hands formed from condensation, Gu Shenghui sat up from the ground and rubbed his neck, "Is it merely thinking a little? Seems I’ve been underestimated!"

"How could that be? I’ve always rated you highly. It’s just that after all these years, as the goody two-shoes you won’t understand the changes I’ve been through?" Mu Fanchen withdrew his right hand and went back to rifling through Pei Yan’s memories without looking back as he spoke.

"Changed? Why don’t I feel it? That same smug, reckless look is just like before. Is growing complacent because of local advantages really worth your pride?"

"I admit if it was a frontal battle against such a lineup, it might really make me flee, but victory is victory. You chose the battlefield. Also, don’t forget you’re only able to stand here and talk with me because I want you to remain here."

Gu Shenghui clapped his hands, stood up from the ground, and walked over to Mu Fanchen’s side, helplessly saying, "Yes, yes! The victor is always right!"

"Oh, your temper has toned down quite a bit compared to before. I thought you’d keep yelling at me like you did when we first met." As Gu Shenghui’s thought form approached him, Mu Fanchen unbothered and teasingly remarked in a relaxed tone.

Gu Shenghui resigned himself to lower his head and sighed, "You have to bow when under another’s roof, I understand. So, can I ask what you plan to do with him?"

"Probing his memory. You’d love to know how he gained this power, wouldn’t you? You can stay and watch with me, consider it a New Year’s gift from me."

Gu Shenghui stared intensely at the memories of Pei Yan displayed in front of him, his hands gradually clenched as he said in a deep voice, "You should know doing this will cause him immense mental pain."

"Put away those clenched fists. Young men have to endure some hardships to grow. It’s because of all those rules and regulations that the Bureau’s efficiency is so low. You should have taken this action the moment you caught him, or you wouldn’t be in such a passive position now." Mu Fanchen glared at his once close friend with a sidelong glance, unceremoniously mocking.

"We have our principles!"

"Hmph! Principles!" Mu Fanchen snorted coldly, shaking his head disdainfully, "They are just the fetters hindering our progress. You, me! No! Even those brainless fools in the office reading reports up there understand what’s happening in this world! Yet they still choose silence, desperately trying to patch things up, maintaining what they believe to be world peace. Is that your principles, responsibility, honor?"

"Wake up! The big change will come sooner or later, and is it really the best choice to shield the public like a huge infant in a cradle?"

"This world isn’t as simple as you think!"

"This world can sometimes be just that simple!"

Their eyes locked in an unyielding stare, Mu Fanchen raised his hand in the air, shouting sternly, "Being so cautious all the time, afraid of the wolves in the front and tigers at the back—worrying over extradimensional invasions, while also worrying about not being able to control emerging ability users, such indecisiveness will only let you miss the opportunities for battle! We’ve suffered more than once already; haven’t you woken up yet? Hoping that our enemies will hold back on their invasions for fear of their own demise is nothing but a colossal joke. You should understand better than anyone that in any plane, there is never a lack of madmen who gamble everything!"

"And then? Just because of that, are you willing to abandon your bottom line? Do you think I don’t know what you’re doing? The bureau doesn’t know? Those are people! Living, innocent people! What you’re doing is no different from those detestable Immortals!" Gu Shenghui responded assertively, not yielding an inch.

"Innocent? There are no innocent people! Haven’t you been conducting similar experiments?"

"Don’t twist words before me, those people were already sentenced to death!"

"Ha!" Mu Fanchen let out a cold laugh, spreading open his right arm mockingly, "Then we really should thank these condemned prisoners; they’ve saved the world! Save it! Gu Shenghui! What we’re doing is no different, you and those people are just finding an excuse to give yourselves some psychological comfort. If you really wanted to be humane, you should’ve given them a swift end, rather than torturing them like dogs."

Seeing Gu Shenghui fall silent, Mu Fanchen adjusted his emotion and softly said, "Every major leap of humankind comes accompanied by mountains of corpses and seas of blood, treading on the bones of their kind. As the weak, they should feel proud to contribute to the survival of this world."

"So, is Director Ren also one of those weak whom you’d sacrifice?"

"That’s uncalled for. Striking at someone’s heart just because you can’t win the argument!" Hearing this, Mu Fanchen pointed his finger at the ink-black shadow before him, eventually sighing and shaking his head, turning back to his prior task.

After a long while.

"How is he now?" Mu Fanchen murmured in a voice barely audible.

"Mad!"

"Mad, how could he be mad!"

Facing Mu Fanchen’s abrupt, overwhelming aura, Gu Shenghui calmly said, "Undergoing such an ordeal, it’s normal for him not to bear it mentally. I’m curious, isn’t your Divine Authority supposed to be vast? Haven’t you heard any news about him all these years, or perhaps you dare not know?"

"Don’t try to provoke me with such words. Since the day I decided, there was no intention of regretting it. You know what I said was right and I’ll keep going, whereas you’re just propping yourself up with hatred against me." Hearing Gu Shenghui’s taunt, Mu Fanchen instead calmed down and rebutted.

"My not rebutting doesn’t mean I agree with your absurd theory. Fairness has never existed absolutely in this world, but ironically, the order you despise is exactly what ensures the relative fairness for most people! Without it, the world would have gone into chaos!"

At this point, Gu Shenghui paused, revealing the empty left sleeve of Mu Fanchen’s thought form, continuing, "Just because you suffered a little injustice, you think you’ve seen through this world? Rejecting repeatedly reviewed and cautiously proven plans, risking millions of lives on a gamble. Are you so sure the path you chose is correct! Get off it! Mu Haoran! It’s not me propped up by hatred, it’s you!"

"The weak should die? Should they become sacrifices to your bloated power and desires? Don’t forget, before your abilities awakened, you were also a weakling—someone who was too afraid to make a sound when a few thugs robbed him in an alley! It was him! He saved you! And now that person has been driven mad by you!"

"Bearing responsibility, sacrificing oneself, carrying burdens, do not equate your dirty deeds with those true heroes who sacrifice their lives to genuinely uphold peace!" At the end of his words, Gu Shenghui stared contemptuously into Mu Fanchen’s eyes, forcefully flinging the empty sleeve back at him.

"The slogan on the wall of heroes? Forget it, we walk different paths. In truth, I understood from the day I joined the team that you and I were never the same kind of person."

"Ah, yes, never the same kind of person!"

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