Welcome to Ability Store-Chapter 57 - 56: Public Declaration

Chen Xuan figured it out—this branch store can open as long as there’s a storefront, and the location of this storefront isn’t important.

In other words, it can open in this world or in the worlds of other customers.

Once there’s a branch store, it’s equivalent to opening a wormhole between here and the main store, allowing travel back and forth, which is a very convenient feature. Even if he doesn’t sell abilities, it’s perfect for sending cross-ocean deliveries.

The premise is you need a large sum of money to prepare.

Now, he has a stable cash flow channel and it’s not hard to accumulate some extra money, the only issue is that the rental contract must be legal and compliant, so the location for the store is quite important; you can’t just put up a house by the roadside as a branch store.

Besides, even if he doesn’t open a branch store, there’s no loss, so he doesn’t have to rush to test this feature.

Ding-ding-dong~

The wind chimes at the door curtain rang, and more customers entered the store.

"Welcome." Chen Xuan put down the manual and looked toward the entrance, finding that it was the elder who buys cigarettes, and behind him were several people, adults and children alike. Without introduction, it’s easy to see that this is his family.

"Young man, I heard you also went to the pedestrian plaza today?" The old man routinely picked up a pack of Furong Wang.

Another woman pretended to look at the shelves, but the corner of her eye was always glancing toward the bar counter.

Isn’t that the old man’s daughter?

Chen Xuan was slightly surprised; he had covered his face carefully following the dinosaur, yet she noticed him? But he quickly realized that the association probably wasn’t appearance, but voice. The store has dozens to hundreds of customers visiting every day; she might have run errands for the old man before and exchanged a few sentences with him.

"Who said that? I was napping at home this afternoon."

He cleared his throat and replied with a smile.

Sound is something easily changed; slightly tightening the throat can produce a different pitch.

"Oh, Old Zhang next door said so; he might have been mistaken." The old man nailed the performance, "I also felt you wouldn’t go, judging by your disposition before, as you’re not one to enjoy crowded places. But you definitely missed out this time! The scene was so lively; it was more exciting than any gala I’ve ever seen!"

"Dinosaurs, right? I watched it on TV, felt a bit unreal."

Chen Xuan noticed his daughter had withdrawn her gaze and was no longer focused here.

"Well, who wouldn’t think so, but the thing is, it’s real!" The old man said with relish, "That one with the especially long neck..."

"Aunt said that’s called Thunder Dragon!" his young boy shouted loudly.

"Alright, alright, Thunder Dragon. When it stretched its neck across the railing to eat the trees at the edge of the Botanical Garden, everyone at the scene saw it; that was definitely the real deal, drooling from its mouth!"

Chen Xuan deliberately reacted with surprise, "That’s incredible. Did you stay and watch ’til now?"

"How could we? Traffic was jammed, all four of the cross-river bridges were blocked, probably everyone went just to watch the spectacle. You wouldn’t believe it, the vehicles on the street lined up bumper to bumper, nowhere to see the end."

During their chit-chat, after settling the bill, the old man’s family was planning to leave when an unusual scene suddenly played on the wall-mounted TV.

"Next, we interrupt for an emergency news broadcast!"

"Our station received notice that an organization calling itself ’Dimensional Limit Mechanism’ is broadcasting globally and will make a public statement in three minutes."

The screen then displayed a three-minute countdown.

The customers in the store couldn’t help but glance at each other; it was their first time seeing such a situation.

It was the same for Chen Xuan; in the past twenty-six years, he’d never seen the TV station interrupt all programs to waste precious three minutes on a colorful countdown frame. This grid-filled, multi-colored standby screen he’d seen online before, but that belonged to planned program intermissions, not like this where existing programs got cut off specifically to await an upcoming news release.

"What’s going on?"

"No idea, wait and see."

These short three minutes felt interminable, like thirty minutes.

Not only did the old man’s family stay, but more and more neighborhood residents squeezed into the store, gathering in front of the TV, discussing the implications behind this emergency news.

Lin Qing also walked down from the second floor.

She exchanged a glance with Chen Xuan and silently looked at the television.

At the moment the countdown ended, a new image appeared. Judging by the background, it seemed to be some sort of legitimate auditorium, with a podium, a screen, seats, and it was surrounded by many reporters.

A man stood on the podium.

He appeared to be in his forties, wearing glasses with an elegant demeanor. Despite the formal occasion, he was not in a suit and tie but a white lab coat, as if he had just stepped out of a research lab.

"Why is it him?" the old man’s daughter exclaimed in surprise.

"Who is he?"

"Do you know this person?" Neighbors immediately asked.

"His name is Jiang Yiheng, a prominent figure in several academic fields," she explained, "Anyone slightly interested in cutting-edge technology today knows who he is. He graduated from the top university in the country, studied for his PhD at a top university in the United States, and later became a Changjiang Scholar with research projects in many countries. Specifically, in nuclear physics, superconducting physics, bioelectronics, and bionic mechanics research, the labs he leads are world-leading."

Hearing this, Chen Xuan faintly recalled.

While working at a big company, he had heard colleagues talk about such an extraordinary individual, but as a programmer, he didn’t pay much attention as these fields had little in common.

"Hello everyone, I am Jiang Yiheng, the current head of the Dimensional Limit Mechanism." The man on the stage adjusted his glasses and spoke in a cheerful tone, "I apologize for taking up your evening time, I only found out about the incident at Jiang City’s Botanical Garden an hour ago."

"Liar."

Chen Xuan heard Lin Qing mutter softly.

"Given the circumstances, I can no longer beat around the bush, yes, those so-called ’abilities’ online do indeed exist, and they could potentially appear in anyone among you."

As soon as he said this, the flashlights below the stage began flashing non-stop!

The customers in the shop also burst into chaos!

Jiang Yiheng continued, "But I don’t like to collectively refer to it as an ability. In my view, it resembles more of a curse, something that provides short-term gratification but, over time, becomes a poisonous affliction. It’s an erosion from other worlds, or one might say gravitational pulling, the specific cause is still unknown, but the intuitive feeling is that our world is becoming riddled with holes."

He pressed the remote in his hand, and a video appeared on the large screen behind him.

"Isn’t that the Botanical Garden in our city?" Someone immediately recognized it.

"The large forest showcase, I was there last month."

From the video, a space that was completely out of place appeared among the trees cultivated to simulate a tropical rainforest. Its edges were constantly twisting like a saw, and inside, it showed a dim dark green. This green intermingled with the surrounding forest, permeating each other, like a painting ruined by water.

"This is erosion," Jiang Yiheng spoke again, "As you can see, our world’s space is diminishing, being invaded. Even with strict control measures, medium or higher-level intrusion points are hard to eliminate in a short time, possibly lasting five, ten years... or even longer. Here, I must strongly condemn those thugs who activated and enlarged the intrusion point in Jiang City’s Botanical Garden! They deliberately lured large numbers of residents to that location, trying to create a dramatic effect, essentially putting thousands of ordinary people in extreme danger!"

"Not considering the strong radiation and gravitational distortion generated when two worlds overlap, there exist countless dangers on the other side of the intrusion point, such as unknown bacteria and viruses, harmful species, etc. It also makes the general public more susceptible to mutations... Such blatant disregard for life is no different from terrorists, the only difference is they not only kill but also bring severe chaos and damage to social order! What’s even more hateful is, they are well aware of these side effects!"

"The Dimensional Limit Mechanism has always chosen to hide related information due to this concern. It’s already terrifying enough for everyone to have guns, let alone abilities that are impossible to guard against? According to our statistics, with every infiltration incident occurring, the crime rate in that area rises by 2 percentage points. I can now assert that in the next three years, Jiang City will see a significant increase in criminal activity, and a considerable part of it will be related to ability crimes!"

Upon hearing that crime would increase, everyone became somewhat restless, "Really? Can the police catch those using abilities to commit crimes?"

"You’re overthinking it, what else can they do besides muddling through?"

"If they could, those causing trouble in the Botanical Garden would have already been caught."

Chen Xuan coughed twice, "Lower your voice, the TV isn’t finished yet."

Jiang Yiheng raised his hand, similarly signaling the reporters to quiet down, "Moreover, I must emphasize that the agency has never persecuted or controlled Ability Users, but has always maintained good cooperation with them. A simple fact is that some members of the agency itself are people with abilities, how could they persecute themselves? This is an obvious slander from the enemy, sadly, many uninformed individuals believe it."

"Therefore, starting today, the Dimensional Limit Mechanism has decided to change its original route to openly demonstrate to everyone the necessity and legitimacy of our work. We welcome governments from all nations to collaborate with the agency to jointly combat intrusion and increase prevention and crackdown on ability-related crimes. The agency also wishes to share the research findings on abilities achieved in the past, transforming it from a curse into something that can truly benefit humanity."

"Similarly, in order to avoid the misuse and blind use of abilities, we plan to open recruitment to the public. Anyone who suspects they may possess abilities, or those who already have abilities but don’t know how to use them, can come to recruitment points for testing, consultation, and even joining the Dimensional Limit Mechanism family, contributing together to the stability of the world!"

His final words were resounding.

Applause thundered from the audience!