# 290
Chapter 290 – The Suppression Stele
“This prison is deeper than I thought.” Lin Qiye nodded.
“Under the effect of the Suppression Stele, every realm and Forbidden Ruins sequence becomes meaningless. No matter how high your sequence, it’s locked inside your body. Only a handful of physique-enhancing Forbidden Ruins still work, giving abnormal combat power—that’s how Boss Han rose to the top,” Fang Yanghui explained.
Wang Lu nodded in agreement. “Before he entered the Purification Chamber, he was just a Sea Realm user with a body-strengthening Forbidden Ruins. This place holds prisoners at Infinity and even Klein—any one of them could’ve crushed him outside. But in here… the power balance is completely reshuffled.”
“The Suppression Stele…” Lin Qiye murmured the name. “That’s the artifact suppressing everyone’s Forbidden Ruins?”
“Exactly,” Wang Lu said. “It’s carved from an extremely rare black stone that can crush any Forbidden Ruins. The bigger the slab, the stronger the suppression. A basketball-sized piece is enough to suppress anything below River Realm, but to lock down Klein-level powers you need a monolith eight or nine meters tall.”
Lin Qiye pictured the basketball-sized stele back at training camp—tiny compared to this place; otherwise it couldn’t have suppressed so many inmates at once.
“An eight- or nine-meter target? Aren’t they afraid something might happen to it?” he asked. “If the stele vanished, who could keep these prisoners in check?”
Wang Lu and Fang Yanghui exchanged grins.
“As if it were that easy. Do you even know where the stele is?” Wang Lu challenged.
Lin Qiye shook his head. “No idea.”
“Exactly. Apart from the warden, nobody does.” Wang Lu chuckled. “A black slab that huge should stick out like a sore thumb, yet even if you turned the Purification Chamber upside down you’d never find it. Can’t break what you can’t locate.”
Lin Qiye was speechless.
“And even if something did happen to it, not a single prisoner would make it out alive,” Fang Yanghui added.
“Why?”
“Do you know who the warden is?” Fang Yanghui asked mysteriously.
Lin Qiye shook his head.
“One of the five Human Apex—Master Chen.” Fang Yanghui’s lips curled. “Even without the stele, every inmate here combined couldn’t lay a finger on the old man. What could possibly go wrong?”
Lin Qiye: …
The image of the old man sipping tea with him resurfaced. He hadn’t realized Master Chen was not only a Human Apex but also the warden of the Purification Chamber. With him guarding the place, unless several gods descended, the prison was impregnable.
Lin Qiye exhaled. With Master Chen present, his escape plan had become exponentially harder. Even if his Forbidden Ruins were unlocked, slipping past a Human Apex was nigh impossible.
Was he really stuck here until his year was up?
“But Master Chen is a free spirit,” Fang Yanghui added. “Though he’s the warden, he doesn’t linger here. With the stele in place, his presence hardly matters.”
After lunch, Lin Qiye checked the time and headed to the exercise yard to train.
Yesterday’s session had been cut short by Brother A-Meng’s provocation. Today, Boss Han’s crew was mysteriously absent, giving him welcome peace.
Nine sets of pull-ups done, he picked up rocks, fashioned a weight vest, and began laps around the field.
The noon sun blazed overhead, the air so hot it scorched lungs. Few inmates were foolish enough to exercise now; most stayed in the canteen or reading room. The prison offered plenty of pastimes.
Only one boy in blue-and-white striped patient garb staggered beneath a makeshift weight, sweat streaming, yet stubbornly pushing forward.
Wang Lu and Fang Yanghui sat in a patch of shade, chewing grass stems, watching Lin Qiye with nostalgic eyes.
“Ah, youth—reminds me of training-camp days…”
Fang Yanghui shot him a skeptical glance. “You ever train that hard?”
“…” Wang Lu glanced at the empty yard and changed the subject. “Boss Han’s bunch didn’t bother Lin Qiye today—guess we worried for nothing.”
“They’re not uninterested; they’re busy,” Fang Yanghui shrugged. “One of Han’s men, One-Eye, has vanished. They’re searching.”
“Vanished? Killed in secret?”
“Could be.” Fang Yanghui’s gaze swept the yard. “This is the Purification Chamber. When a grown man disappears without trace, there’s only one explanation…”
“Someone capable of killing under Han’s nose—impressive. Didn’t know we had such a wolf among the inmates,” Wang Lu mused.
…
“Tools in the first-floor toilet were moved?” Boss Han frowned at Scarface’s report.
“Yes, and fresh blood on them—probably…” Scarface hesitated.
Han’s face darkened as he scanned the canteen, eyes glinting viciously. “Touching my man… courting death!”
He inhaled, forcing down rage. “One-Eye provoke anyone lately?”
“Not that I know,” Scarface mused. “But his neighbor said One-Eye had his eye on a new kid—pretty, fair-skinned.”
“A boy…” Han’s eyes narrowed.