Chapter 32: Peach Blossom Calamity

Chapter 32: Peach Blossom Calamity

Shen Ji was silent for a good while before finally responding with a faint, "Oh."

Li Zhiyan was pretty disappointed. "I thought you would ask me why I dreamed of you."

Shen Ji: ...

This man truly has no sense of shame.

"Then, if I asked, would you tell me?"

Li Zhiyan shook his head confidently. "No, because I don’t know why either."

"Shen Ji, let’s just kill this weird guy and become the protagonists ourselves!"

Calm down, System! Do you remember analyzing that our chances of winning against him are only fifty percent? What if we both die and end up being shipped by future generations?!

"Mr. Li, you do know how to joke," Shen Ji said, topping off Li Zhiyan’s teacup. "So, it’s just an act, right? You pretend to be affected and confess to me, and I pretend to know nothing and agree to your confession to test the rules of this contamination."

Li Zhiyan was very satisfied. "Indeed, you’re clever. Both your outward show and your abilities meet my standards perfectly."

"I genuinely hope you can join my team."

"Let’s skip that topic," Shen Ji said, pushing the teacup toward him. "So, this really is a Peach Blossom Calamity?"

Li Zhiyan sighed regretfully. "Probably. There’s a giant peach tree, and it’s related to confession and dreams—fits perfectly. If it weren’t for the contamination event, it would be a great tourist attraction."

"The peach blossoms are quite beautiful. It’s late autumn, and everything else is bare, yet such a large patch of peach blossoms appeared—a real standout."

Shen Ji couldn’t help but sigh as well.

A contaminant that Li Zhiyan found so eye-catching... Would he end up preserving this peach tree after eliminating the contamination?

"However, I think this contamination might be related to a Nightmare," Li Zhiyan said, picking up his teacup. "Do you know about Nightmare contaminants?"

Of course, Shen Ji knew—after all, he had read the original novel.

In the original story, there was a very special type of contaminant called a Nightmare. Nightmare contamination was extremely subtle—it would enter people’s dreams at night and corrupt them within their dreams. Most people affected by Nightmare contamination would experience nightmares all night, leading to intense fear reactions. Eventually, they would become too afraid to sleep or even face any light.

This reaction would last for more than a week, and humans simply can't last a week without sleep.

Those contaminated would often go mad from sleep deprivation and eventually die by suicide, with no traces of contamination left at the scene.

Nightmares could only be caught the moment they attacked and invaded a person’s dreams.

"But there’s no precedent of a Nightmare being bound to a peach tree," Li Zhiyan mused. "It would be great if we had a suitable psychic mutant."

Shen Ji leaned back in his chair. "There’s always a way."

"The Guard Team was established to fight contamination. You are the frontline personnel in this apocalypse, the hope of everyone. You must never give up."

Admiration flickered in Li Zhiyan’s eyes. "Impressive. You can even say things like that."

Shen Ji: ...

He was starting to consider the System’s proposal to "kill this guy and become the protagonist."

Li Zhiyan finally took a sip of tea. The moment the water touched his mouth, he nearly choked. It was only his strong self-control and excellent sense of politeness that allowed him to force it down.

He quickly put the teacup back on the table.

Bitter, harsh, and sour... What is this taste?

"Huh? Doesn't it taste right?" Shen Ji feigned confusion. "Sorry, this is just my temporary place, so I didn’t prepare anything for guests. This was the only tea I could find."

Li Zhiyan frowned. "You might as well brew me the flowers from your windowsill."

"You like floral tea?"

"Compared to this cup, I definitely prefer floral tea." Li Zhiyan coughed twice, managed to reply.

This thing is different from poisonous mushrooms.

Poisonous mushrooms are toxic, but they’re delicious! If it tastes good and won't kill you, why not eat it?

This cup of tea isn’t poisonous, but it’s awful.

It's disgusting! I’d rather drink petal-infused water!

So Shen Ji stood up, walked over to the windowsill, plucked a petal from one of the flowers, came back, and dropped it into Li Zhiyan’s teacup. The pale blue petal swirled on the surface before slowly sinking to the bottom.

Shen Ji adjusted his glasses and said seriously, "Here’s your floral tea. See? There’s a flower, and there’s tea."

Li Zhiyan: ...

As an abstract individual, this was the first time in his life he’d been rendered speechless by someone.

After a few seconds of silence, Li Zhiyan nodded. "You’re right."

Shen Ji: ...

He actually admitted it.

"...I can’t even tell which of you has less shame anymore."

Anyway, after explaining the situation, Li Zhiyan put on his transparent raincoat, took that thin, small potted plant, and left.

Out in the rain, Li Zhiyan let out a sigh and finally pulled out his phone from his pocket—on silent, it had been ringing countless times without him noticing.

"Hello," Li Zhiyan said casually.

"Captain! Where did you go?! I turned around for one second and you were gone!" Jiang Ying was practically shouting. "Next time, could you please tell me before you leave?"

"I told you," Li Zhiyan said. "I said I was going to discuss with the person I dreamed about. You just didn’t hear me."

"If I didn’t hear you, you should’ve said it again instead of just walking off!"

"What a hassle," Li Zhiyan muttered, holding the flowerpot as he walked. "But Jiang Ying, you know what? He’s really special."

"How special?"

"He gave me expired tea to drink, dropped a petal in it, and claimed it was floral tea."

"Even if it was expired tea, there was a flower and tea—so it was technically floral tea."

Jiang Ying: ...

She took a few seconds to confirm that she had actually called Li Zhiyan, then a few more to convince herself that he’d really been fooled into drinking expired tea.

Finally, she hesitantly asked, "Captain, you don't actually think he's special because of that, do you? Are you a masochist?"

"No, I just think he's very free-spirited."

To Jiang Ying’s surprise, she detected a tone of ease in Li Zhiyan’s voice—unlike his usual self, his words were soft this time, with a hint of a laugh. It wasn’t another weird, abstract thing he was saying, but a genuine feeling.

Li Zhiyan liked free-spirited people and those who did their own thing, which was why all the members he recruited were real characters, forming such an unconventional Special Operations Team.

But even among those unique team members, none could compare to the way Shen Ji made him feel.

He was like a free bird, like a tourist just visiting. His expression was humble, yet his eyes were sharp. He could deliberately give him expired tea without batting an eye, completely indifferent to the fact that Li Zhiyan was, technically, his boss—the only S-Class Mutant in the entire City Q.

Li Zhiyan liked free-spirited people.

And among those he had met, Shen Ji was the most free-spirited of anyone.

And easy on the eyes too.

Jiang Ying chuckled. "So that’s why you didn’t make Doc Shen join up, Captain."

The Sixth Special Operations Team was the most unique unit in the Pollution Prevention Center. Li Zhiyan held special authority—he could select teammates from anywhere, no red tape. Both Jiang Ying and Zhou Ye were chosen this way: Jiang Ying had once been the head of the Pollution Harmless Treatment Center, while Zhou Ye was a minor member of the Far Wilderness Exploration Team.

Yet Li Zhiyan hadn’t forced Shen Ji to join them, even though he had been dying to get him on the team.

"I won’t give up," Li Zhiyan said with a yawn.

Then he suddenly remembered something. "Ah..."

"Now what, Captain?"

"I forgot to ask Shen Ji to take a photo for me. His photography skills are way better than yours. The pictures you take always look like crime scene photos."

Jiang Ying: ...

Sorry I can't take a decent picture!

/

Due to the incident involving the death of a confessing patient, Wen Jingyu took it very seriously. He required all medical staff to review patient surveillance footage to determine if any other patients had confessed their feelings and also polled everyone in the facility who'd had dreams, even recording the people they dreamed about.

It was through this compilation that they discovered a good number had dreamed of their lovers or secret crushes.

Compared to the isolated patients who couldn’t contact the outside world, medical staff could actually end up having their confessions accepted.

The Pollution Prevention Center announced that the number of deaths after successful confessions tonight was 35. Not everyone who confessed successfully died, but the number 35 was still terrifying. No one knew whether more people would die or when they might suddenly develop mental abnormalities and confess to others.

In the end, they could only warn themselves: if someone confesses to you, you must reject them.

After finishing work and returning to the dorm, Shen Ji sat down on the sofa and yawned. He didn’t go to sleep right away but instead opened his phone and clicked on that forum.

As expected, the forum was full of posts about the peach tree contamination incident.

"The Pollution Prevention Center has officially named this contamination incident 'Peach Blossom Calamity.'"

Main post: "Peach Blossom Calamity," an unidentified pollutant with an undetermined level. No significant contamination detected, but it affects a huge area. Those affected will randomly confess to others, but according to the security team, the confession targets of affected individuals are likely the people they dreamed about. Therefore, it’s best to contact the person you dreamed of in advance, and even if confessed to, you have to turn them down, no matter what.

1st comment: Peach Blossom Calamity? What kind of name is that? Who came up with it?

2nd comment: Your Captain Li.

3rd comment: Well, that’s fine then. The name is actually quite clever.

4th floor: Li Zhiyan always gets weirdly hung up on the smallest things. So, has anyone here been confessed to?

5th floor: Peach Blossom Calamity is a contamination incident, not a chance for you to test how charming you are.

6th floor: Don't make a joke out of a tragedy! Thirty-five people died in just one night!

7th floor: Die upon a successful confession—why is this contaminant so incapable of tolerating true love?

8th floor: I feel like we could find the source by looking into heartbroken couples. This kind of hatred is anything but innocent.

9th floor: Three people confessed to me, but I didn’t accept any of them. If I had, they might have died. If it’s true love, you can’t say yes, even if the other person pleads pitifully that they can’t live without you.

10th floor: Upstairs, you can’t even hide your desire to show off. What, if it weren’t for this contamination, were you planning to accept all three at once? What kind of person does that!

“……So it’s really named Peach Blossom Calamity? Did Li Zhiyan suggest that?”

“I’m more concerned about something else.” Shen Ji put down his phone. “This means whether the person who confesses lives or dies is now up to those being confessed to, right?”

“If the person being confessed to doesn’t like the other person or simply holds a grudge, all they need to do is accept the confession and later claim they had no idea. Then the person they hate could die directly in this contamination incident.”

“Theoretically, yes, but the guard team isn't just for show either. They’ll charge them with ‘premeditated murder’ and send them to jail.”

Shen Ji was surprised. “They still have *jails* in this day and age?”

“The Pollution Harmless Treatment Center is chronically understaffed. After all, handling contaminated corpses is quite dangerous, so those convicted of premeditated murder are now sent there to deal with contaminated bodies—life or death not guaranteed.”

“This method has indeed somewhat suppressed crime in the city.”

Shen Ji sighed. “You could spin this policy two completely different ways for a news story, tapping into hot-button issues like the Pollution Prevention Center, criminals, pollution handling, and more. I guarantee it would be a hit.”

“Too bad there’s no journalism industry anymore.”

“……”

Little reporter, do you have to be such a journalist about this?

Meanwhile, inside the containment facility, fine, glistening white hyphae were inching their way up, occasionally darting out playfully before rolling back upon discovery.

The containment facility was where Shen Ji was usually based, and they had long since claimed it as their territory, patrolling it every day.

This nest was big and fragrant, with endless snacks everywhere. The only downside was that their owner was always stopping them from pigging out, so they had to sneak out every night after he fell asleep to nibble a few bites.

Especially that doll—it had already been secretly gnawed to pieces, barely maintaining its C-level contamination.

They lingered outside the special processing lab, drooling as they waited for the people inside to leave so they could sneak in for a few more bites.

They weren't allowed to nibble if anyone was watching—the owner didn’t allow it, and they’d be punished. *Whimper.*

Just then, they noticed someone squatting in the restroom nearby, making a phone call.

“Mumu, yeah, I’m doing fine. How about you?”

“Why am I calling you out of the blue? I’m on solo duty and just got hit with this huge wave of missing you. I had to call.”

“……Mumu.”

“I really, really like you.”

The hyphae curiously drifted around this person.

Although the hyphae possessed a faint consciousness of their own due to the unique nature of the pollution, Shen Ji's thoughts still dominated them. Under his influence, they spontaneously paid attention to "confession incidents." Upon discovering someone on the phone expressing love, they even abandoned the doll pollution in the lab to focus intently on observing this person's movements.

Soon, the person laughed happily, kissing his phone with joy, surrounded by pink bubbles.

After this affectionate display, the person finished his shift.

He returned to his dorm as if completely unaware of being influenced, even greeting a colleague coming to take over his shift along the way.

The hyphae hesitated, glancing at the doll in the lab, but ultimately chased after this person in tears.

By the time the person returned home, it was very late. Exhausted, he tossed his jacket onto the sofa and collapsed onto the bed, immediately starting to snore loudly.

It was at that instant the hyphae detected a sudden burst of pollution aura.

They burrowed into this person's body at a speed invisible to the naked eye, capturing the pollution within a second.

Meanwhile, Shen Ji had just finished showering. Drying his hair, he was still discussing follow-up actions with the system.

The timeframe for the original story's internal corruption to be exposed was drawing closer. Although Shen Ji currently lacked the conditions for exposure and Chen Guo was no longer a Class A Pollutant, they were still worried about potential issues later. They wouldn't relax until this plot point had completely passed.

"So, was this Peach Blossom Calamity not in the original work either?"

"Not necessarily."

"What do you mean?"

"Pollutants have hierarchical classifications. The 'Decaying Organism' was unlucky; it was accidentally eliminated by the Class A Pollutant Chen Guo while attempting to cause secondary contamination of the shelter. After that, it was the battle between Li Zhiyan and the Class A Pollutant. At such times, any pollutant with a bit of brains would hide and not show itself."

"After all, stick your neck out, and it gets chopped off."

"In other words, the single event of Chen Guo not becoming a Class A Pollutant could trigger a chain of butterfly effects."

"That's just how reality is."

Just then, a plump mushroom cap fell from the ceiling and landed on Shen Ji's head. The mushroom rolled to the ground, spun in a circle, and quickly transformed into hyphae, wrapping around Shen Ji's waist. Having just showered, Shen Ji was dressed lightly, with little covering his waist, making him vulnerable to the hyphae's close-range sneak attack.

His exposed waist, paired with the ribbon-like hyphae, and Shen Ji's recent shower without his black-framed glasses—

A mix of rationality and restraint, exposure and concealment, all kinds of sensuality surged through him.

Shen Ji reached out and grabbed the mushroom. "What are you doing?"

The hyphae wrapped around his fingers. Shen Ji felt them exert some force, and before he could react, he suddenly found himself falling face down.

He instinctively steadied himself, and upon regaining his bearings, realized he had changed locations.

The sky was a hazy black, dotted with ominous purple clouds. In front of him stood a massive peach tree in full bloom, its flowers vibrant and intensely fragrant. The strong scent rushed into Shen Ji's nose; he covered it, but the smell didn't lessen.

It wasn't a scent he was smelling.

Shen Ji raised his hand; the hyphae were still struggling to pull him in a certain direction.

"System?" Shen Ji called out.

No voice answered him, as if the system had never existed.

After hesitating, Shen Ji followed the hyphae's pull forward. He circled the peach tree and soon spotted a smaller one.

Unlike the large peach tree, the smaller one had long since withered, surrounded by a rotting stench. Many human heads hung from its branches, their eyes closed in pain, their monstrous expressions making Shen Ji's heart skip a beat.

He circled the small peach tree and eventually spotted a familiar face among the heads.

It was the patient of Zhang Qingli, who had been found dead in the isolation room that morning.

The woman's wooden face was twisted in agony. She was impaled horizontally on the peach tree's branch, rotting peach petals falling onto her face, staining it crimson.

"Where is this?" Shen Ji asked the hyphae on his wrist.

"...A dream?"

Shen Ji frowned slightly. "What did you say?"

"You caught the 'tail of the nightmare' and dragged me into the dream along with you?"

Unexpectedly, before Li Zhiyan could find a way in, his hyphae had already brought him into this dream.

But speaking of nightmares, after entering, Shen Ji felt it wasn't quite like a nightmare pollutant anymore.

As mentioned before: nightmares are actually a special type of pollutant that causes the infected to have constant nightmares, experience fear, and even avoid sleep, ultimately leading to suicide from terror and insomnia.

But this scene, this nightmare... seemed to have a dreamer.

Shen Ji stepped forward. A sign was planted under the peach tree, seemingly with something written on it.

Upon closer inspection, Shen Ji found the words "scum" written in blood-red on the sign, crossed out with a large X, the force nearly splitting the wooden board.

"Scum Tree." Shen Ji looked up at the monstrous, terrifying human heads. "...Quite a unique name."

After waiting a few seconds without a sarcastic remark from the system, Shen Ji blinked, as if finally realizing something, and nodded.

"Oh, AIs can't dream. That actually fits natural law."

Just then, Shen Ji heard someone calling his name.

The voice was now near, now far, as if both in his ear and far away. Shen Ji turned toward the sound but opened his eyes.

Upon opening his eyes, Shen Ji found himself lying on the sofa. The ceiling light was unusually bright, his phone was ringing incessantly, and the system was shouting his name in his ear.

"Shen Ji!"

"You're finally awake! Did you pass out?! How did you suddenly fall asleep?!"

"I thought you'd suddenly died!"

Shen Ji:...

Maybe it's time to scrap this system.

Shen Ji sat up on the sofa, fishing his phone out of his pocket. As he put it to his ear, he realized he had pressed it against a mushroom.

He had to switch to speakerphone and take the phone to the bathroom to look in the mirror.

In the reflection, he saw a cluster of small mushrooms sprouting from his temple. They swayed slightly with his movements, reluctant to leave.

"Shen Ji?" Li Zhiyan's voice called for the third time over the phone. "Why aren't you saying anything?"

"Sorry, I just woke up and was still groggy. I thought I had responded." Shen Ji replied in a just-woken-up voice. "Mr. Li, what's with the early call?"

Li Zhiyan fell silent for two seconds. He glanced at the large sun in the sky, then at his watch—the hour and minute hands pointing to 10:30 a.m.

"Early in the morning?"

"It seems you're really out of it," Li Zhiyan said. "Perhaps you should take a vacation. If this continues, what if you drop dead one day?"

"If I drop dead, I'll turn into a pollutant. At that time, I’ll need you to go easy on me, Mr. Li."

"Please, don't even think about it. I couldn’t bring myself to do it."

Shen Ji: ...

He couldn't help but complain to the system, "...Wow, this protagonist, he sure knows how to lay it on thick too."

"Shen Ji, listen to me, we absolutely cannot be fooled by the protagonist's sweet talk! He talks out of both sides of his mouth!"

'I'm not stupid.'

Shen Ji mused, "Mr. Li, why are you calling so early in the morning?"

Li Zhiyan decided not to correct Shen Ji's use of "early in the morning." He walked over to the peach tree. The massive tree looked just as it had before, but unlike yesterday, a few faint, shadowy heads had begun to appear among its branches. They hung there like projections, impossible to scan or touch.

After Jiang Ying scanned and identified them, they were confirmed to be the deceased.

"Nine more people died last night," Li Zhiyan said. "There’s no point dragging this out. Let's go check out the dream."

"I'm planning to tell you how I feel. Do you like things to be formal? What kind of ritual are you hoping for?"

"Do you prefer flowers or honey? Money or a set of blockbuster movies? How about I get you on the guard’s payroll so you can collect a paycheck without doing any work?"

Shen Ji: ...

Is he still pushing his own agenda??