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Chapter 324 - The Truth!
At this time, in another room, Ling Lan and Li Lanfeng who had already finished registering were currently laid out on their beds, resting.
Not too long after, Ling Lan received a text message. She flicked open her communicator to look and was instantly immensely excited. In the very next second, she had extremely impolitely kicked at Li Lanfeng on the upper bunk.
Feeling the force coming from his mattress, Li Lanfeng sat up in puzzlement. Before he could ask Ling Lan on the bunk below what had happened, Ling Lan said, "There's news of #2 and the others. Clean up quickly and let's go look for them."
Li Lanfeng's eyes lit up. He put on a jacket and then leapt off the bed to follow Ling Lan heading towards where Qi Long was staying.
The reason Ling Lan received this news so quickly was not because of Little Four's abilities. Of course, if Qi Long and the others' information were to be registered, Little Four, who was already lurking in the network of the Swift Dragon base, would definitely be able to obtain the news at soonest notice. However, in order to let everything seem natural and above-board, when she had registered herself, Ling Lan had generously bribed the support staff of the Swift Dragon base. Of course, she had also let Li Lanfeng utilise that natural ability of his to gain favour with others and intensify the other side's good impression of them, thus successfully securing the other's agreement to help them.
In reality, right when Qi Long and the others' information had been registered, Ling Lan had already been notified by Little Four. However, Ling Lan had kept calm and continued to lay on her bed as if she knew nothing. Only when she received the notification from that support staff did she pretend to be excited and take action.
Of course, the other was not breaking any rules of the base by helping them. After all, Ling Lan and Li Lanfeng were just trying to find their comrades who had gotten split up from them — it's not like they were trying to inquire about the secrets of the base. Moreover, right now within the Swift Dragon base, Ling Lan was not the only person who was doing this. Many other soldiers who had been separated from their original teammates for various reasons had similarly put forward such requests. Ling Lan had only included an additional minor reward when she had made her request.
This reward was very simple — it was just a bottle of high proof liquor Ling Lan had on her for first-aid purposes. Under Little Four's assistance, Ling Lan had found out that this person's hobby was to drink.
As for why Ling Lan would have such high proof liquor on her ... ahem, ahem, this was actually a remnant habit Ling Lan had brought over from her last life lying on her sickbed. Having gotten used to the idea that alcohol should be used on wounds to sterilize them, she really could not adapt to this world where no prep work was done, with healing agents being directly sprayed or applied onto open wounds and leaving it at that.
Mentally, Ling Lan had always had some fear with regards to this sort of treatment method. What if, by any chance, there was tetanus or something similar about? Wasn't this just asking for trouble? Therefore, she habitually carried several bottles of high-proof liquor with her in her backpack. If she was injured accidentally, she would open one of the bottles to use the alcohol in it to disinfect the wound before spraying healing agents on it ...
With regards to this habit of Ling Lan's, although Qi Long and the others were puzzled by it, they would never question her. They only speculated secretly whether this was because their boss liked alcohol but was forbidden by his parents to drink ... could this be why he had sought out such an unreasonable reason?
It could only be said that some things were already ingrained habits of Ling Lan's. It was impossible for her to change them in a short period of time. Thus, without her knowledge, Ling Lan had become someone who liked to drink in her team members' eyes 1 .
Back when Ling Lan had brought out the liquor and handed it over as an incentive for the support staff, even Li Lanfeng could not help but sweatdrop silently and wonder if Ling Lan was an alcohol-loving rabbit — why else would he think of using alcohol as a bribe?
Still, for whatever reason, overall, Ling Lan's reward had pleased that support staff greatly. Consequently, the other was extremely cooperative, almost notifying them at first notice. This led Li Lanfeng to once again be in awe — the seemingly random and reckless actions of the rabbit always seemed to end up being extremely effective.
The two of them very quickly found the resting spot of Qi Long and the others and knocked on the door.
The one who opened the door was again Yang Yilong — who asked him to be the one sleeping on the bed closest to the door? Opening the door, he saw two strangers, so he asked, "Who are you looking for?"
"Is Luo Ying and company here?" asked Ling Lan coldly. That icy gaze of hers made Yang Yilong feel a chill invade his heart — he quickly ducked back into the room and shouted, "Captain Luo, someone's looking for you."
Hearing this, Qi Long's eyes lit up and he leapt off his top bunk to rush over with wide steps to the door. Seeing his boss's familiar face, he was instantly overwhelmed with emotion, "Leader, you've finally come!"
Qi Long's cry of leader made the other members inside the room leap up in excitement, all of them running over as well.
Yang Yilong was astonished at the sight, but thinking of the impression that person at the doorway had given him, he understood why these mecha team members would be so worked up. Only someone like that could gain the allegiance of proud mecha warriors. With just one glance, Yang Yilong could tell that that team leader was most definitely a formidable warrior. This was because he had felt a similar pressure from the team leader of the Leiguang Battle Clan.
Seeing his other two companions peeking out from their beds, nonverbally asking who the visitor was, Yang Yilong silently indicated for them to remain silent and continue to sleep and not disturb the group.
A mecha team leader was an existence high, high above them mecha support staff — he did not want to incur the displeasure of that team leader.
Qi Long and the others hugged Ling Lan excitedly in succession, and only then did they see the familiar smiling face standing by Ling Lan's side. Other than [No Mecha Unrepaired], all the others could not help but be taken aback, especially Li Shiyu, whose face actually stiffened noticeably for a brief moment.
Seeing this, Li Lanfeng smiled wryly and said, "#8, for previously planning to try and snatch your position in the team from you out of envy, I'm sorry. The crisis this time has let me understand that status, levels, and whatever are all not important. What's most important is my companions. I hope you can forgive me."
Li Shiyu only huffed at those words and turned his head aside without speaking. He knew his own expression had been slightly off — if some surveillance device had just happened to record it, a flaw might have already been discovered. Li Lanfeng was undoubtedly trying to help him hide his slip in composure, but he was just unused to acting and really did not know how to handle the situation.
Seeing this, Xie Yi tugged on Li Shiyu's arm and said, "All of us being able to survive is already a blessing. Why bother with things of the past? Don't you agree, #8?"
Li Shiyu saw everyone looking at him with smiles on their faces and could only reply grudgingly, "Forget it. Let's not talk about past matters anymore."
Only then did Li Lanfeng sigh in relief. He stepped forward to pull Li Shiyu into a strong hug and said, "Thank you, brother, for your tolerance and understanding ..." Only Li Lanfeng knew that he was not just putting on an act when he said this ... he truly hoped that, one day in the future, Li Shiyu could say these same words back to him. However, Li Lanfeng also knew that this was probably an impossible dream.
Seeing this, Ling Lan clapped her hands together forcefully and said, "It's great that you two have buried the hatchet. In future, we must be united. We shouldn't fight amongst ourselves anymore." Ling Lan's words marked the end of the matter, and the group happily welcomed Ling Lan and Li Lanfeng into their room.
Meanwhile, Li Lanfeng latched onto Li Shiyu and the two of them moved to sit on Li Shiyu's bed, where they began whispering to one another. It looked like they had truly buried the hatchet.
Only Li Lanfeng himself knew that despite his seeming composure, he was actually greatly shocked. When he had first seen Li Shiyu, as good as he was at deception, he had almost slipped up and reacted. That bloody Ling Lan had not given him a heads up that his family's Li Shiyu had also joined the battle clan.
Seeing Li Shiyu's face filled with innocence, Li Lanfeng could not help but sigh internally. What in the world did their Li family owe Ling Lan? Not only had he joined, even Li Shiyu who should not have been able to join had joined ... still, he could not help but become smug deep inside. As expected of his rabbit — able to do what others could not.
If he had the rabbit's help in the future, would he too be able to escape his so-called fate ...? Li Lanfeng's gaze flickered but very quickly settled as he tossed aside this idiotic notion of his. He absolutely could not harm the rabbit. To go against the heavens and change his fate, a terrible price would have to be paid. Grandfather Zhuge had already stated this very clearly from the start. And this price, could very well be his life.
Although Li Lanfeng was physically speaking with Li Shiyu, his mind was distracted in recalling when he and Ling Lan had first seen each other's true faces in this virtual world not too long ago.
When they had arrived at the Swift Dragon base, Ling Lan and Li Lanfeng naturally had to leave their mecha. Of course, they had it much easier than Qi Long and the others because in the virtual world, both Ling Lan and Li Lanfeng were miraculous beings. Because she had Little Four, Ling Lan could easily change her original civilian mecha suit into an official military mecha suit. Meanwhile, Li Lanfeng was a spectre, and though he could not directly change the fixed settings of the virtual world, he could apply a disguise to himself. Thus, when the two had come out from their mecha, their appearance was flawless, no different at all from the other mecha operators.
However, when Ling Lan and Li Lanfeng had met face-to-face for the first time after getting out from their mecha, Li Lanfeng had almost stumbled and revealed his true feelings. If not for the fact that his spectre abilities also hid his expression, his flabbergasted expression would certainly have aroused suspicion in those around him.
In contrast, Ling Lan's ice mask had long been formed, so it did not collapse even when she had seen Li Lanfeng.
"Boss ...!" Li Lanfeng bit back on the 'Lan' that had been about to come out, stopping his outburst at only 'boss', making it seem like he was just greeting his own team leader.
"#9, keep up." Ling Lan's glacial gaze had contained a hidden warning. Although others may not be able to see Li Lanfeng's true expression, perhaps because she was way too familiar with the leopard, Ling Lan had still sensed Li Lanfeng's loss of composure.
This gaze made Li Lanfeng's initially shocked and restless heart cool down instantly. He bowed his head and cuffed his own forehead lightly, chiding himself for his slip. They had both not known about the other, but Ling Lan had still been able to keep calm. In terms of mentality, he had completely lost to the rabbit who was younger than him by three years. This made him feel somewhat embarrassed.
Right then, Li Lanfeng was not at all surprised at why Ling Lan could have logged onto Mecha World at just 10 years old back then. As someone who was able to create a similar disguise as him now, Ling Lan was undoubtedly a spectre just like him. And for spectres in the virtual world, all those so-called restrictions and limits were all inapplicable. None of it could prevent them from moving about as they wished. Thus, for Ling Lan to be able to enter Mecha World at just 10 years old was completely believable.
That said, Li Lanfeng could not help but sigh to himself. At 10 years old, Ling Lan's spectre abilities had actually been strong enough that he had not noticed a thing. No wonder they had had such affinity back then — even if he had entered the mecha training hall first, the rabbit had still always been able to come unerringly to the training hall he had chosen. Now, thinking back, Ling Lan must have used his own spectre abilities to find where he was.
Was this proof that the rabbit had held him with just as much esteem as he had back then? Which was why the other had used spectre abilities to look for his position and stage a coincidental meeting?
Li Lanfeng felt a surge of warmth in his heart. It looked like his friendship had not been one-sided back then. If he had only told Ling Lan bravely about his real identity back then, perhaps they would be bosom friends now and he would not be ranked behind the other companions of the rabbit.
Right then, a trace of regret rose up uncontrollably in Li Lanfeng's heart. However, it was quickly throttled by him, because he did not think it was too late to change things.
In this manner, although Li Lanfeng's heart had struggled a little, he still accepted Ling Lan. After all, Ling Lan was younger than him by 3 years, while the rabbit had always been a formidable existence in his heart, a strong person he admired. As such, it was exceedingly normal for him to flounder a little to reconcile the difference between the two impressions. Still, these were all minor blips. Li Lanfeng would never bear to give up the rabbit he had missed for so long and had spent 7 years to find.
Meanwhile, when Ling Lan found out the true identity of the leopard, her first thought was — sure enough, the leopard was very dangerous. Her second thought was — the leopard was truly not a good person!
Still, Ling Lan did not mind. As long as the leopard treated her with sincerity and did not harm her companions, she would not care what terrible things the leopard would do in the future. She would still be willing to save a spot for the leopard in her battle clan.
Of course, at present, this was all the weight Li Lanfeng had in Ling Lan's heart. In contrast, if Qi Long and the others planned to do something bad, Ling Lan would definitely roll up her sleeves and pitch in to come up with strategies to help them.
Fine, our queen Ling Lan indeed did not have any so-called true sense of justice in her. She only wanted to take good care of these little followers who trusted her and were willing to follow her, as well as cultivate them to become strong people capable of holding their own in their respective fields.
1. T/C: Oh, the irony. Y'all remember what a lightweight Ling Lan is, right?
Chapter 325 - The Mantis Stalking the Cicada!
The survivors of the mainship obtained the chance to rest at the Swift Dragon base. Given that the Jinglong mainship had no way to travel long distances, they could only wait for the Federation army to send a new military vessel to pick them up.
After resting peacefully for three days and two nights, when the new mainship members heard that a new military vessel was about to arrive for them in two days, they were ecstatic. Even though they had been treated pretty well overall in the Swift Dragon base, they had still felt significantly restrained. The mainship members had been restricted to a small living area; for many other places on the base, they simply could not even get close. This made the fleet soldiers who were accustomed to being able to freely move around to feel extremely inconvenienced.
On this night, in a highly-defended area within the Swift Dragon base, several figures appeared silently not too far from the entrance. They lurked at the blind spot in the distance ...
"You're sure this is the spot?" Someone who appeared to be the commanding officer gestured as he asked the person beside him.
This group of people were wearing advanced induction combat clothing of the Federation military, which could buffer the human body from the outside air and perfectly camouflage the soldiers according to their surrounding environment. Once the soldiers laid down and stopped moving, it would be nigh impossible for even the most advanced radar detectors, thermal monitors, and the human eye to discover them.
The only reason we say 'nigh' is because there is nothing which can be guaranteed to be foolproof — there would always be the possibility of what if.
"Only this spot is most closely defended." The person beside the apparent commander returned a confident hand gesture.
"Have all the surveillance devices been blocked?" The commander turned to look towards another side, his gaze indicating that he wanted to confirm whether his men had completed the most critical step.
There were actually three people on his other side. One of them, who seemed to be their head, saw the question in the commander's eyes and nodded, signalling that it had been done.
It could be seen from their faces that it had not been easy to complete this step. Other than the one who had nodded, whose condition still seemed fine, the other two people had faint tracks of sweat on their foreheads and their faces were extremely grim. It looked like the two of them had already put forth all their energy to completely block off all the surveillance equipment and create false images.
"How long can it last?" After seeing the other's response, the commander then asked in a low voice.
"At most for only one hour and a quarter more. If possible, please try to come out within an hour," said the head grimly. He had not expected the defences of the Swift Dragon base to be so tight — in particular, there was an abnormal number of all kinds of advanced surveillance equipment. This had exceeded their estimation. If they had known earlier, they would have brought along the other two members of their team as well.
"One hour, is it? There should be enough time." The commander mused a little and felt that it was not a huge problem. Honestly, even if the problem was huge, he still had to go inside and investigate. Hadn't they already spent so much effort all for the sake of finding out what the hell was happening in the Swift Dragon base?
"Hollow Ground, I'll leave this to you," said the commander decisively to one of the others. His attitude was obviously much gentler than before with the others. In the virtual world, he truly did not dare to offend this Hollow Ground.
This man was outwardly different from others. His entire figure was enveloped in shadow, while his face was a complete fog of grey, his facial features forever indistinct. This was the appearance spectres held in the virtual world. They would never reveal their true face because as spectres, everyone who was an enemy would be out to kill them. This was because almost two-thirds of one's life was spent in the virtual world in this present world, and spectres were the terrifying group of people who were the only ones to hold the ability to decide true life and death in the virtual world.
Mind you, even the mainframes of the various great empires that maintained the entire virtual world were incapable of doing this.
Therefore, all the nations both loved and hated spectres — they wished to control the spectres in their borders, while they were extremely worried and jealous about the spectres of other nations. Besides spectres, equally feared by the enemy nations were those prodigiously gifted aberrant geniuses. These people, as long as their real identity was found out, if they were opponents, they would be prioritised for assassination, just like how Ling Lan had been attacked back when she had been younger ...
"Don't worry, no one can hurt them while I'm around." Hollow Ground's reply was brimming with confidence in himself. As one of the top elites in the central military spectre department, he had this confidence as well as his personal pride.
The commander frowned at those words. He knew spectres were, as a group, all strange and abnormal people. Known as death gods in the virtual world, they always had a sense of superiority as they looked down with contempt on the masses. However, since they were all Federation soldiers here, the commander did not take it to heart. He waved a hand at the men behind him, and two figures dashed out, using various areas of cover to hide themselves as they silently snuck over to an area not too far from the entrance.
At the entrance were two sentry soldiers facing outwards. Their eyes were alertly scanning everything before them — the two men who had snuck over just happened to position themselves in those sentries' blind spots, thus avoiding detection.
When they were only about ten meters away from the sentries, the two lurking men pulled out their weapons, which appeared similar to pistols, and aimed them at the two men on guard. Aware versus unaware — two muffled shots rang out as a cold light flashed at the muzzle of each pistol, and the two men on duty were hit accurately.
The two sentries had no chance to react at all, instantly falling over. It turned out that the men who had snuck over were using the highest level Federation silent tranquillizer gun. Even a relatively stronger C-class demonbeast in this universe would topple over from the anaesthetic in three seconds after being shot by this gun, not to mention these on-duty soldiers who were completely incomparable to a C-class demonbeast. As long as their skin had been scratched, they would be instantly down for the count.
Seeing that they had succeeded, the two men silently dashed over to the opponents' sides and held them up, and then swiftly gripped their heads and twisted forcefully. There was a crack, and the necks of those sentries were broken with no fuss at all. The two men then carefully laid their two victims down on the ground, and without making any noise, they turned their head to signal behind them with a wave.
The commander nodded at Hollow Ground and the other two men with him, then led the others to move stealthily over. Meanwhile, the one who had answered the commander earlier, the head of the three men, followed the commander as well.
To enter, they had to go through an electronic door. This had to be cracked by a hacker, which was why the head had followed. That person's skill level was very high; he only took a few seconds to crack the electronic door. The door opened silently — the inside was extremely dark, but these people all had night vision goggles so their eyesight was not affected much by it.
A warehouse came into sight. Inside it were stacks of military supplies. It looked like the other countless warehouses on the base, extremely normal. However, these people would not be discouraged just because of this surface appearance. They had specifically chosen this place because neither hackers nor spectres could see this area clearly, unlike other places where things could be taken in with one glance.
The commander made a hand gesture beckoning his men in and they all entered in succession. Everyone began to search the warehouse, hoping to find anything suspicious.
About five minutes later, one of their members suddenly waved to the others. It looked like he had found something. The commander immediately led the hacker with them over to the man and began to carefully examine what the other had discovered.
The hacker touched the spot, closed his eyes, and began to examine it with his senses. Very soon, he opened his eyes and nodded to the commander, confirming that this was the right spot.
The commander waved his hand and everyone took cover, hiding in a circle around the hacker. Seeing that everyone had taken cover, the hacker took three brisk steps back, took in a deep breath, and closed his eyes as his hands made various different gestures. He murmured, and then a soft click could be heard — the ground silently opened up, exposing a dark hole only capable of letting one person through at a time.
The commander looked at the hacker, and the hacker shook his head firmly, indicating that there was no perceptible movement below. Only then did the commander signal for his subordinates to scout the way.
After the first man went down the hole, the hacker's face became serious. Three minutes later, he nodded to the commander. This was to tell him that there was no problem below.
The commander motioned for everyone to go down. Once the last person went down, the ground once again returned to normal. It was as if the black hole did not exist, while the electronic door they had initially entered through closed again.
In the meantime, of the three men left at the doorway, two of them had simulated the uniforms of those officers on duty and taken up the sentries' spots at the door. It was just as if nothing major had happened here. And as the one protecting this area, Hollow Ground suddenly merged with the darkness, as if he had never been there at all.
********
Right then, in a secret room in the control centre of the Swift Dragon base, eight black-robed people had their eyes closed. D1 and D9 who had appeared at the start were among them, while the remaining six people appeared almost no different from them.
"These tiny ants finally could not resist taking action." D9 suddenly opened his eyes and smiled sinisterly. He cracked his fingers, rather eager to indulge in a grand fight. After waiting for two days, this group of investigators sent by the Federation mainframe had finally shown themselves.
In fact, the moment the command mainship had arrived at the Swift Dragon base, they had already been monitoring everyone from that ship and set aside a few key suspects. For this purpose, they had not hesitated to transfer several top-class spectres over from their own country. They had to be sure they could keep these people here.
They definitely could not allow the Federation to reclaim this sole foothold in the Federation which had taken them so much trouble to obtain. Moreover, their Project T was at its most critical period now — they could not afford the slightest bit of carelessness.
As long as Project T succeeded, the Huaxia Federation would descend into chaos, and they would then be able to take advantage to take over the most central and resource-rich supreme nation in their galaxy. In order to achieve this objective, their empire had spent countless generations worth of sweat and blood to only complete the early stage preparations of Project T ...
"Who'd have expected the other side to send so many people too. Tsk tsk tsk, three top hackers plus a top-class spectre ... we've managed to bait some big fish here." D1 was looking at those people sneaking up to that basement room where they had set up a trap. Right then, those people were slowly approaching — although they were extremely cautious, they had no idea that their every move was already being captured by comprehensive surveillance.
"Keep a close eye on those other suspects." Seeing everyone becoming excited, D1 could not help but warn coldly. He did not wish for them to succeed here only to result in their most essential secret base being discovered, thus causing them to fall short of success at this final stage.
Chapter 326 - The Oriole Comes From Behind!
"Rest assured. D1, D2, and D3 are stationed there. If anything happens, they will inform us," a black-robed person by D1's side calmly replied, "Moreover, two of our empire's top spectres are there looking out. Even if someone really reaches that area, the spectres can also eliminate them directly."
"We've already fished out the biggest fish, and I'm sure the others don't have the ability to get there," another black-robed man added.
"Yes, D1, don't worry too much. You had better think about how we can handle these big fish instead. Say, it's been a long time since we hunted and killed any spectres of the Huaxia Federation," said another black-robed man with a dark smile.
"D10 speaks truly. D1, let's show them some of our methods. Together, we can definitely toy with those few hackers until their heads spin." A black-robed man began to cackle coldly in a corner. He was very interested in the prospect of messing with those top-class hackers of the Huaxia Federation.
********
Meanwhile on the other side, Qi Long and the others, who had already fallen asleep, suddenly felt their communicators begin to vibrate. They leapt up and quickly put on their pre-prepared night combat clothing. Not long after, they could see the doors of their living quarters swing open automatically. Ling Lan and Li Lanfeng were standing outside the door, fully armed.
"Boss, we are ready," said Qi Long in a low voice.
"They wouldn't wake up suddenly, right?" [No Mecha Unrepaired], a.k.a. Chang Xinyuan, pointed at the three NPC soldiers sleeping soundly inside the room and asked worriedly.
"No, I've already arranged it so that no one in this room will wake up until dawn. Even if they wake up, they will still think you all are sleeping in the room." Seeing Chang Xinyuan's concern, Ling Lan patiently explained. With the heaven-defying god of the virtual world Little Four around, Ling Lan truly wasn't at all worried that these NPCs would discover any flaws.
Ling Lan carefully scanned her team members and then said softly, "The operation this time is very dangerous and there may even be a risk to your life. It's not too late to back out now." Li Shiyu and Chang Xinyuan were members who had joined the clan partway through after all — Ling Lan did not want to force them to brave danger against their will with the rest of her team.
When she mentioned the risk to their lives, everyone was startled, but Qi Long and the others of the original team quickly regained their composure. They had been braving life and death with Ling Lan since they were small, so they were not at all afraid of this. In contrast, a trace of confusion crossed Li Shiyu's and Chang Xinyuan's eyes. They did not know what Ling Lan meant when she spoke of this risk to their lives, because in the virtual world, even if they died, they would not really die. At most, their current avatar would just have to start anew and some of their time would be wasted.
Only Li Lanfeng's countenance shifted subtly at these words. He had thought of something, and the gaze he directed at Ling Lan grew even more shadowed and firm.
Everyone was silent. Although Li Shiyu was obsessed with military medical research, as intelligent as he was, he knew that these words of Ling Lan had actually been directed at him and Chang Xinyuan. Thus, he replied firmly, "Since I have decided to join the Lingtian Battle Clan, that means I am willing to brave life and death together with the Lingtian Battle Clan, both now and in the future."
This response of Li Shiyu's had a double meaning — Ling Lan raised a brow in astonishment, pleasant surprise flashing through her eyes. The other implication of Li Shiyu's words was that, even in the real world, he would still make the same choice.
Chang Xinyuan nodded fiercely at Li Shiyu's response, indicating that he too felt the same way. Those who liked to tinker with mechanical research did not have such convoluted ways of thinking — he was not aware of the double meaning of Li Shiyu's words. He only felt that, since he had already come to do this mission, of course he would follow it through till the end. Besides, he also was not someone who would run away when the going got tough, otherwise he would not have stubbornly resisted against the Thunder King for as long as three years.
"In that case, let's move." Seeing this, Ling Lan turned decisively and was the first to step into the heavy darkness of the night.
Seeing this, the team members all silently followed suit and stepped out with determination. At this moment, they did not know that this step would bring them into a reign of carnage and bloodshed 1 as they followed their team leader through life and death situations, all the way till the very day their lives ended.
As soon as they left the room, the door closed quietly behind them. Meanwhile, the three NPCs remained fast asleep ...
Ling Lan was making her way towards the west corner of the base. In the daytime, this was where the large canteen the soldiers ate at was located. Whenever it was time for a meal, that area would become filled with human cacophony, but when night came, other than the warehouse area, it was the quietest spot in the base. No one would go there typically. No one knew that beneath the large canteen, there was actually a small secret base.
No one was on duty to patrol the canteen, but Ling Lan had been alerted by Little Four that there were at least three top-class hackers controlling countless surveillance devices, both openly and covertly, to blanket-scan 1 the surrounding area. In other words, even if an ant were to crawl by, those hackers would be able to spot it clearly.
This way of doing things meant that almost no one would be able to slip by under their watch. Only if a top-class hacker came and ripped the control of the surveillance devices here from their hands would anyone be able to enter the area successfully. But that way, they would definitely be discovered instantly. This was one of the reasons why D1 believed that their control of the area was foolproof.
However, they could never imagine that there would be such a magical existence as Little Four in the world. He somehow managed to successfully manipulate things right under the noses of these three top-class hackers, making it so that false images were sent to these hackers, tricking them into believing that everything in the area was normal.
Ling Lan came to the large canteen and patiently waited for Little Four to respond. One minute later, Little Four raised a 'V' hand gesture high up into the air, butt wriggling wildly in exhilaration, and Ling Lan knew that Little Four had succeeded.
In her mindspace, Ling Lan instantly sent the smug Little Four flying with a flick of her finger. In order to prevent Little Four from making unnecessary mistakes out of pride, Ling Lan ruthlessly decided to crack down on such behaviour so that Little Four would never learn to be complacent.
Ling Lan signalled for her team members behind her to keep up as she strode up the doors of the large canteen without any sort of concealment. The rest could not help but take fright — was it really okay to just strut up like that directly?
Li Lanfeng looked at the unusually slender figure before him who walked with such sure steps and felt a complex mix of emotions stir in his heart. Compared to the others who knew very little about hacker abilities, Li Lanfeng was well aware that Ling Lan could be so bold because she had already taken control of all the surveillance devices here. Able to accomplish this in such a short amount of time, Ling Lan's hacker abilities were definitely no lower than imperial level.
He thought of the rumoured imperial level hacker involved in that Tianji Mecha Clan Headquarters explosion incident ... that had most likely been Ling Lan himself. The stronger the rabbit was, the happier he should be, but there was a sense of danger in his heart that was growing thicker and thicker. It was as if the person he was chasing so desperately was getting further and further away from him.
He definitely could not let the rabbit leave him behind! Li Lanfeng secretly gritted his teeth. In the past, he had been concerned over his body's condition, so he had always restrained himself somewhat while training his mecha control skills. Despite being pressured greatly by the Thunder King, he still had not changed his ways to recklessly increase his practice load.
Li Lanfeng had always known what he should do; he would not easily change his plan. But now, he had the urgent desire to become stronger. He felt that if he continued to dither around like this, there would eventually be a day when he would not be able to keep up with the rabbit's pace. The rabbit was very likely to get further and further away from him, and in the end, he would only be able to regretfully become a passing guest in the rabbit's life.
He, Li Lanfeng, absolutely would not accept becoming such a passing guest. No matter how important a passing guest he would be, he was disdainful of the very idea. This was because he wanted to have a long-lasting friendship with the rabbit, until both their heads were grey with old age. He hoped that at that time, they would still be able to drink wine together and reminisce, laughing together at the ups and downs they had shared up till then.
This was a deep desire that had been born from the regrets of Li Lanfeng's heartache when he had lost touch with the rabbit back when he had been 13 years old. Now, seven years later, God had given him the opportunity to re-establish this friendship, and he did not want to lose it again.
The door was soon opened, and Ling Lan led her team members straight into the canteen. The entrance to the secret base was in the canteen's kitchenette. The kitchenette only served the highest commander of the base; even the chef was a close confidante of the commander. In order to ensure the safety of the commander's food and drink, unauthorised people were not allowed to enter the kitchenette. This also worked well to protect the secrecy and security of the secret base.
Ling Lan moved towards the kitchenette like she was extremely familiar with the area. With regards to this, Qi Long and the others were already as used to it as they could be — they believed that all of this was merely due to Ling Lan's hacker abilities. Only Li Lanfeng lifted a curious brow. This was because he knew that hackers did not have the ability to locate an entrance instantaneously, nor did they have the ability to sense secrets remotely. Spectres too had some limits to their abilities — they could only use them at close range.
Li Lanfeng did not know about the existence of Little Four. As an intelligence entity, Little Four was not bound by these restrictions of hackers and spectres, which led to Little Four's status as a one of a kind existence within the virtual world. Just imagine if all the hackers and spectres had the abilities Little Four did. If that was the case, this virtual world would truly be an utter mess.
They had just entered the kitchenette when the position of the head chef's station opened up to reveal an opening. Ling Lan jumped in without delay, for Little Four had already displayed the situation below into Ling Lan's mind in 3D.
The opening and the ground below was about 20 metres apart. Ling Lan had no problems jumping this small bit of distance. With their boss as an exemplar, Qi Long and the others leapt in without any hesitation. Li Shiyu thought about it then jumped in resolutely, while Chang Xinyuan hesitated briefly before jumping in. Meanwhile, Li Lanfeng was last in line because as a spectre, he needed to constantly monitor the situation behind the group to ensure the safety of their rear end and see to it that they were not being followed.
Although this action of Li Lanfeng was rather superfluous as Little Four already had everything in the several kilometres around them under his control. If anything stirred, Little Four would know immediately. Still, Ling Lan would not reveal this truth. For one, she needed to give Li Lanfeng a chance to perform so that he could integrate himself quicker into the team. On the other hand, there were some things that still needed to be covered up. After all, the existence of Little Four was just too bizarre — even if she were to admit it honestly, she still would not be able to properly explain the existence of Little Four. Therefore, she might as well tacitly accept this behaviour of Li Lanfeng, as well as let Qi Long and others be glad for the addition of Li Lanfeng to their team. With an additional hacker in the team, their safety would be much better guaranteed.
Without knowing it, Li Lanfeng was slowly being integrated into Ling Lan's team. Qi Long and the others were more or less beginning to realise the importance of having Li Lanfeng in the team. They no longer solely took Li Lanfeng as a temporary fighter (a temporary fighter's position was the lowest in a clan, because they were replaceable at any time) but considered him as a true member of the clan now.
1. 腥风血雨: Literally 'rancid wind and bloody rain'. Quite poetic imagery in its own right.
2. i.e. to do a full-scale comprehensive scan
Chapter 327 - Spiritual Share!
After walking for about a minute, Ling Lan suddenly stopped and motioned to indicate that there was someone ahead of them. The others who had become somewhat relaxed due to the daring behaviour of Ling Lan were immediately cautious and alert.
After some thought, Ling Lan decided to expose her abilities a little. Thus, she let out her spiritual power, spreading them out into eight feelers, and began to connect them to the spiritual power of Qi Long and the others.
The spiritual power of those who had already awakened their innate talents was higher than those who had yet to awaken their innate talents, and Qi Long and the others of her original team already had some of Ling Lan's spiritual power in their minds, so her spiritual power connected with theirs very easily. Meanwhile, [No Mecha Unrepaired] and Li Shiyu had awakened support innate talents and so did not have much attack power. Hence, even though Ling Lan had to spend a little more time, she still managed to connect with their spiritual power in the end.
Only when she made contact with Li Lanfeng, her spiritual power was instantly consumed by the spectre power Li Lanfeng had placed around him earlier on as defence. Luckily, Ling Lan's spiritual power level was extremely high and she had deep reserves, so she had not been harmed much even though some of her spiritual power was consumed. That said, suddenly lacking a corner in her initially brimming spiritual power still made Ling Lan feel some discomfort. She frowned slightly, then swiftly circulated her spiritual power to instantly refill the spiritual power that had been consumed.
Ling Lan may not have been bothered much by the incident, but Li Lanfeng was instantly pale with shock and fear. He was well aware what his own power was — it was not typical hacker abilities like he had told Ling Lan but horrifying spectre power. The intrinsic nature of spectre powers was to consume and obliterate — if Ling Lan were to receive any long-lasting damage from this incident, Li Lanfeng would truly regret it for life.
Li Lanfeng's heart was filled with overwhelming regret. Perhaps he should have been honest from the start about what his true abilities were. That way, Ling Lan would not have rashly reached out and tried to connect with his spiritual power.
"Rabbit, are you all right?" In his worry, Li Lanfeng forgot the warning from Ling Lan and called her by his usual address for her.
Rabbit? This unusual address made the ears of all the others perk up high. Qi Long and the others shared a quick knowing glance. As expected, their boss was that rabbit mecha which had caused such a sensation back in the newbie area.
In contrast, Li Shiyu and Chang Xinyuan were extremely confused. They really could not relate such a cute and harmless creature like a rabbit with Ling Lan.
"I'm fine!" Ling Lan, who had been at the head of the team, was instantly right at the back with Li Lanfeng. She pressed her index finger to Li Lanfeng's lips, her gaze sharp and cold in warning to Li Lanfeng to keep quiet. There were soldiers guarding the exit ahead and she was unsure whether they were NPCs or real people. If they were NPCs, Little Four could cover up everything that was happening here, but if they were real people, there was no way to guarantee 100% safety, so Ling Lan did not dare to be careless.
Feeling the warmth of Ling Lan's finger on his lips, Li Lanfeng seemed to be shocked stiff. He could only stare dumbly at the cold face that had suddenly appeared in front of him and remain motionless.
"Release your defence and make it easier for me to connect with your spiritual power." Ling Lan's voice rang out by Li Lanfeng's ear. The warmth of her breath caused Li Lanfeng's ears to slowly turn red, until it was actually bright crimson in the end.
After alerting Li Lanfeng, Ling Lan extended a new cord of spiritual power once more to attempt to connect with Li Lanfeng's spiritual power. Meanwhile, pre-warned now, Li Lanfeng tried his best to restrain his active spectre power, which finally allowed Ling Lan to connect successfully to his spiritual power.
Soon, the situation behind the tunnel was faithfully reflected in the minds of everyone on the team. This was the exclusive special move of the Divine Command sect —— Spiritual Share! Ling Xiao's battle clan had been able to able to prevail for so long largely because Ling Xiao had this ability too.
After successfully connecting to Li Lanfeng's spiritual power, Ling Lan used her spiritual power to command, "Qi Long, Luo Lang, both of you move."
Receiving their orders, Qi Long and Luo Lang immediately split from the group. Due to the Spiritual Share, they knew there were only two sentry guards beyond the tunnel and were also aware of the guards' every move. They controlled their steps to not make a sound and swiftly moved to the front of the tunnel to lay down in ambush. They would wait to attack at the most appropriate time.
Everyone's attention was on Qi Long and Luo Lang, so they did not notice Li Lanfeng at the rear silently holding his chest, as if trying to calm something.
At the moment that Ling Lan had been close to him, Li Lanfeng, who had seen Ling Lan's face at close-range, suddenly noticed that the rabbit was actually very good-looking ... heaven knows whether it was out of fright or due to surprise, but Li Lanfeng's heart had actually pounded violently during that short moment, and his entire body temperature had risen by several degrees ...
However, Li Lanfeng's self-control was excellent; he regained his composure after just a few seconds. Just then, Qi Long and Luo Lang, who had long saved up their strength, caught the instant the two soldiers took their eyes off the mouth of the tunnel and charged out. Like two cheetahs that had been waiting to pounce, they abruptly launched their attacks at their prey.
The two of them used their left hands to press on their opponents' chests, and with their right hand, they plunged a miniature syringe at the necks of their opponents.
The miniature syringes had been prepared by Li Shiyu, and the high-effect anaesthetic inside the syringes was also courtesy of Li Shiyu. But the conversion of a common syringe into an attack, a potentially lethal weapon at that, was indeed at the orders of Ling Lan. Ever since Li Shiyu had joined the team, Ling Lan had never even considered just letting Li Shiyu simply be a medical doctor. Instead, she made full use of Li Shiyu's medical knowledge and tasked Li Shiyu to develop all kinds of medical weapons that could increase the combat power of the team. For example, this miniature tranquillizer syringe which was simple to use and carry around.
At the moment these two soldiers were pierced in the neck, their final outcome was already decided. The anaesthetic that Li Shiyu specially developed was even stronger than those used in the tranquillizer guns of the military. Initially, Qi Long and Luo Lang had been fully prepared to cope with the opponents' desperate counterattacks — but unexpectedly, the moment the syringes pierced the opponents, the tense muscles of the other party suddenly slackened, and their opponents were unconscious right after that.
Qi Long and Luo Lang carefully placed the two men to one side of the door, while the rest of the team, who had seen them succeed via their mind-link, walked out from the tunnel. When Qi Long saw Li Shiyu come out, a greedy expression appeared on his face. Inside their shared mindspace, he requested, "Senior Shiyu, this miniature tranquillizer syringe you've created is really too useful! Prepare a few more for us next time, okay?"
Powerfully potent, able to take the enemy down instantly, and small enough to carry around in large quantities — these syringes would also be effective as hidden weapons. Qi Long was naturally greedy for this type of useful weapon that could be used from the shadows. Sadly, the anaesthetic in the miniature syringes could only be used once. To use them again, they would need to be refilled with anaesthetic. Moreover, Li Shiyu was rather reluctant to make these things, so each member of the team only had three miniature syringes. After those three were used up, they would have to see when Li Shiyu's mood was good enough that he would be willing to help refill them ... the soporific was controlled by Li Shiyu, so if he did not want to do it, no one could do anything about it.
At Qi Long's request, Li Shiyu's fair face turned dark. D*mmit, he was a military doctor, a life-saving angel — not a devil who specialized in making these sorts of harmful weapons ...
"Yes, Senior Shiyu, with your tranquillizer weapons, we won't need to kill others." Ling Lan lightly kicked the two unconscious soldiers lying on the ground. "You've allowed us to avoid staining ourselves with this sin. I really don't know how we should thank you." Ling Lan was spouting these words of gratitude, but the gaze she directed at Li Shiyu was endlessly cold. It seemed to tell Li Shiyu that it was fine even if he did not want to make more — at most, these youths in their team would just have to commit sin much earlier and stain their hands with blood.
Li Shiyu bit on his lip and looked at this bunch of innocent youths before him with hope shining from their eyes. His heart softened once more and he replied, "Understood. When I have time, I'll make more for you all. You can just come find me to refill them when you run out."
Alright, Ling Lan had completely grasped the weakness of Li Shiyu's heart. Li Shiyu truly did not have the heart to let these junior brothers who had just joined the first grade to be exposed so early to killing and sin. This would place great mental and spiritual guilt and pressure on them, which may lead them to become terrified and suffer from sleepless nights.
Li Shiyu would never forget those few cases he had seen in the Military Medical Research Centre. Those cases had all been newbies freshly back from a battlefield. Unable to shake off the guilt they felt after their first kill, they had fallen into severe depression and some even displayed suicidal tendencies ...
If only Li Shiyu had known that these first-year youths that were so pure and innocent in his eyes had already participated in a civilian expedition team and been exposed to killing long before joining the academy, he would certainly regret his decision. These youths had already been stained with blood, and their hearts had already become exceedingly strong and ruthless from their experience. It should be said that Li Shiyu was like a pure and kind-hearted rabbit. For the sakes of what appeared to be a group of rabbits in his eyes but who were actually wolves in rabbits' skins, he was altering his baseline again and again, repeatedly subverting his original three outlooks. Unconsciously, he was going down the path of evolving into a black rabbit ...
Li Lanfeng saw that Li Shiyu had once again chosen to concede, and he knew that this cute and pure younger cousin of his was almost gone. He had mixed feelings about this realisation, unsure what he should say. In the end, he could only sigh ...
Li Shiyu's reply made Qi Long and the others yell out in excitement within their mindspace. Li Shiyu, who had initially felt a bit down for compromising his principles, found his gloomy mood lifting at the sight of his happy juniors.
With her back to them, Ling Lan, who seemed to be studying the door before them, found the corners of her lips quirking up subtly. How is this Dux Li so easy to deceive? As someone from the same Li family, the leopard was obviously much more black-bellied ...
Little Four did not open the door, merely transmitting the situation behind the door faithfully into Ling Lan's mind. Of course, Ling Lan shared this information as soon as she could with the rest of her teammates, and the initially excited group instantly became sombre again, knowing that this would be a difficult hurdle. Because behind the door were another two soldiers staring intently at the door from about 10 metres away. The moment they opened the door, they would be discovered. And the distance of 10 metres was enough for the soldiers to react and sound the alarm before the quickest attack of the team could reach them.
"Boss, what should we do?" Everyone looked towards Ling Lan and waited for her instructions.
If this were the real world, Ling Lan could have used a spiritual attack to knock down the opponents. But here in the virtual world, this killer move of hers is restricted. Just as Ling Lan was pondering how she could handle this perfectly, Li Lanfeng proposed, "Boss Lan and I are both hackers so we can apply some disguises." He pointed to the two soldiers who were lying unconscious and continued to say, "Two people from the team can pretend to be the guard soldiers standing at the door, while Boss Lan and I impersonate people from the base and go in. I think they will not doubt us right away, and as long as we can get close to them, Boss Lan and I will have the opportunity to take them out before they sound the alarm."
Chapter 328 - Spectre!
Li Lanfeng's suggestion put a shine in the eyes of everyone on the team. Han Jijyun cast a searching look at Li Lanfeng, once again feeling that invisible pressure the other gave him.
Ling Lan immediately gave her stamp of approval to Li Lanfeng's method. Qi Long and Xie Yi were the two brawniest people on the team and thus had the most soldier-like builds. The two of them quickly changed into the uniforms of the two soldiers and separated to stand on both sides of the gate. Other than Ling Lan and Li Lanfeng, the others all ducked into the tunnel again to hide with the two comatose soldiers.
Under everyone's gaze, Ling Lan and Li Lanfeng's initially black combat uniforms slowly changed to look like the uniform of the soldiers on the base, exactly like the uniforms Qi Long and Xie Yi had put on. The only difference was their epaulettes — Ling Lan's choice was a major's epaulette, while Li Lanfeng wisely chose to be a senior captain. He stood respectfully half a step behind Ling Lan.
This move made Ling Lan's team's impression of Li Lanfeng rise once more. It should be said that Li Lanfeng was consistently building on his favourability rating among Ling Lan's team members, and he was achieving his goal handily.
When everything was ready, Ling Lan instructed Little Four to open the door. After the doors opened, Ling Lan proudly strutted through the doorway, while Li Lanfeng followed behind her solemnly and respectfully.
Meanwhile, Qi Long and Xie Yi were standing straight on both sides of the door with their backs to it. They both executed an exemplary military salute at the same time, only putting their hands down again after Ling Lan and Li Lanfeng had passed by. All of it looked exceedingly normal.
The two soldiers on the other side of the door were taken aback by the sudden opening of the door and the two officers who had randomly walked through. They shared a doubtful glance because they had not received any news from above that someone would enter the secret base at this time.
However, the salutes and respectful behaviour of the two sentry guards at the door made these two soldiers afraid to judge rashly. Perhaps there had been some emergency so those above had not had time to inform them. Still, carrying out their duty as guards, one of the men yelled out, "Password!"
Li Lanfeng had already walked through the doors with Ling Lan at this time. When he heard the soldiers ask for a password, his heart skipped a beat and his steps slowed involuntarily. Only Ling Lan's pace remained steady. As if not at all affected by the other side asking for a password, she continued to walk forwards confidently, even raising her head to look at the two men before her with an extremely cold gaze.
"Hn, well done," Ling Lan finally spoke up, praising the two soldiers lightly. This made the two men frown, and as Ling Lan took one more step forward, the faces of the two men were about to change drastically when she continued to say, "The password ..."
Hearing the mention of the password, the tense expressions of the two men eased for a moment, and it was at this precise moment that Ling Lan pounced forwards like a cheetah with her entire body, instantly coming right up to the two men.
She opened her hands wide and flicked them forcefully. Two gleams of cold light flashed through the air, and then with a shake and a clench of both her arms, two almost invisible thin ropes flew out from her wrists to instantly loop around the hands of the two soldiers. With a forceful tug, the men were dragged away from their initial position.
Ling Lan's attack had seemed complicated, but it had been completed in an instant. The attack had come too suddenly — those two men did not have any time to react and were pulled right into the air. Ling Lan's hands pulled downwards, and the two men who had been about to collide with one another in the air abruptly changed directions to fall towards the ground. With a quick dash, Ling Lan was below them, and she caught the two men securely.
By this time, the two men were already long unconscious. Ling Lan quietly set them down on the floor.
Only then did Li Lanfeng reach Ling Lan's side. Seeing how much Ling Lan's speed and mobility surpassed his, Li Lanfeng felt a deep sense of frustration. Whether it be in terms of mecha controls or physical skills, he was considerably worse than the rabbit. It looked like, for him to achieve his dream of fighting by the rabbit's side, he would need to work much harder.
"Just now you had obviously already hit them with the tranquillizer needles. Why did you still pull them out of their positions?" Even though Li Lanfeng's speed was no match for Ling Lan's, his vision was excellent. He had managed to see all of Ling Lan's moves in their entirety during that instant.
Ling Lan did not reply, only motioning for Li Lanfeng to go check out the area where the two men had been standing. Li Lanfeng walked over suspiciously, but when he bent down to take a closer look, his expression changed. It turned out that the alarm activation device was right where the two men had been standing.
Though the two men had seemed to be standing firmly at their posts, in fact, they had each only been standing with one foot flat on the ground. The ankle of their other foot was in the air. In other words, their weight was only on the first half of their foot, while their ankle was held off the ground. The moment they noticed anything odd, they need only step down fully and their ankle would trigger the alarm instantly.
This kind of setup was extremely covert and not easily discovered. It could even guarantee that even if the sentry guards did not react in time and were killed, without the conscious thought to keep their ankles up, the guards' feet would certainly step down as their bodies lost balance. The alarm would still be successfully triggered.
Seeing Li Lanfeng return with a face full of belated fear, Ling Lan silently swiped the cold sweat from her forehead. Frankly, she too had not known the alarm was set up in such a way beforehand. If Little Four had not discovered it and alerted her in time right before she attacked, Ling Lan would definitely have fallen for the trap. Even if she managed to kill these two people, they still would not have been able to avoid triggering the alarm. In the end, they would have been forced to run away and return empty-handed.
Seeing that Ling Lan had successfully defeated the two guards inside, Qi Long and the others hurried over. When they saw how the alarm here was set up to be triggered, they too were struck with sympathetic fear, exclaiming that this setup was truly too insane. On the other hand, Chang Xinyuan was extremely interested in the setup. He laid right down on the ground to examine it closely, muttering to himself, as if calculating something.
They did not linger for long. Despite Chang Xinyuan's reluctant gaze, Ling Lan led her team to continue moving deeper into the base. This particular hurdle had indeed been rather challenging, but after that, things became much easier. Perhaps the senior officer of the secret base placed a lot of trust in this alarm setup of theirs, for the following few checkpoints were not as crazy and complicated. Ling Lan's team smoothly made their way to the centre of the base.
Ling Lan led her team members to this area and then stopped moving, because if they moved any further, they would enter the range of the spectres' monitoring. Little Four had long reported to Ling Lan that there were two spectres overseeing the area. The moment they entered within the spectres' range of detection, they would be ruthlessly attacked and obliterated. Moreover, at this time, Ling Lan had no idea how she could explain to her team members how she had known there were spectres here.
Only spectres could sense another spectre — as for who sensed who first, that would depend on whose spectre abilities were stronger. Furthermore, hacker abilities and spectre abilities were two diametrically opposite abilities 1 , which made it almost impossible for both to awaken in the same person at the same time. Even if there was an accident and someone managed to awaken these two abilities that could not coexist, they would still be unable to make those two kinds of abilities strong together.
Because the more powerful the abilities grew, the greater the friction between the two powers would become. The Federation had conducted an experiment once where they had made someone who had awakened both these talents to train them both up equally. In the end, the final outcome was that the bearer of the abilities was unable to withstand the build-up of friction between the two powers. His brain had been crushed under the explosive force caused by the clashing of the two powers, and he was reduced to a vegetable, never waking up ever again.
From then on, the Federation set the restriction so that even if someone awakened both these abilities, they could only choose just one to develop 1 . This information had been carefully conveyed to the students by the instructors of the scout academy around the time their innate talents began to awaken. As such, Qi Long and the others would be well aware of this fact, so she had no way of explaining why she could possess such powerful hacker abilities and spectre abilities at the same time. It could only be said that Little Four's existence was just too formidable beyond comprehension. Ling Lan could not find a reasonable explanation even if she wanted to.
Right then at that moment, Li Lanfeng, who had been rather subdued due to his shock at the extent of Ling Lan's skills, suddenly became focused and his expression turned rather grim. As if sensing something, he immediately cut off his spiritual connection to Ling Lan. Under everyone's stunned gaze and Ling Lan's quiet realisation, an extremely dangerous aura silently seeped out from his body and began to slowly spread.
Everyone felt this aura that made them uncomfortable and sensed their own spiritual power beginning to shudder violently. At the point where they felt as if their spiritual power were about to be consumed by this aura, Ling Lan's spiritual power abruptly surged up and spread out to swiftly wrap around the spiritual power of the seven others in the team.
Ling Lan's protection greatly stabilised the spiritual power of the seven people. Everyone was still unsettled by the experience; only Han Jijyun stared grimly at Li Lanfeng, as if thinking of something.
At this moment, Li Lanfeng had no mind to consider the situation of his companions. He had sensed two dangerous presences ahead, similar to his spectre powers, though they seemed slightly weaker than him since they had yet to notice his presence.
Still, Li Lanfeng's brow remained locked tight. The other side had two people, so Li Lanfeng could not be certain whether he could go up against both of them and keep everyone in the team safe. Afraid that the other side would discover his presence, he swiftly tamped down on his spectre power. With a grave expression, he turned to look at Ling Lan and said softly, "Rabbit, there are two spectres inside. They are very strong. The moment we enter their surveillance range, we will be attacked. Our lives are likely to be threatened."
Against just one, Li Lanfeng had the confidence to defeat the other with just a bit of luck. But with two, Li Lanfeng could not be too sure. After all, the spectres inside were just slightly weaker than him. If the two of them had good rapport and worked together, even if he wanted to protect everyone in Ling Lan's team, he was afraid he would miss something and expose a weakness to be caught by the enemy.
Initially, Li Lanfeng had suspected that Ling Lan too possessed very strong spectre abilities. However, as Ling Lan's hacker abilities had been showcased more and more, Li Lanfeng no longer had much hope for Ling Lan's spectre power. The things that Ling Lan and the others knew, Li Lanfeng knew as well. Although hacker power and spectre power could exist simultaneously, they could not grow strong together.
Perhaps Ling Lan had possessed both these abilities at the start, but he must have chosen to develop his hacker abilities rather than his spectre abilities. Li Lanfeng felt that this was a bit of a shame because almost all spectres were under the control of the Federation military. As the first heir of the Li family, Li Lanfeng naturally could not become a puppet of the military. Thus, when his grandfather had noticed how unique Li Lanfeng's spiritual power was, suspecting that he might be one of those rumoured spectres, his grandfather had completely sealed away all news of this. This was why Li Lanfeng had not been discovered by the military.
1. So... I went back to check when spectres were first introduced and talked about (chp 97 & 108), and the author explicitly stated that spectres were an off-shoot branch of hackers then. Now, with this, I guess the spectre mutation should technically kill off any pre-existing hacker mutation in a person. Antithesis in that sense.
2. T/C: I'm honestly surprised the Federation would even give these people the choice since spectres seem to be rarer and would be more useful to them.
Chapter 329 - Volunteering to Fight!
All these years, Li Lanfeng had not met any other of his kind in the virtual world. This had made him feel rather lonely, and this was also why he had taken an interest in Ling Lan even before he found out Ling Lan was the rabbit. Thinking that the other might have spectre abilities, he had been curious and wanted to find out more about him.
"You are not a hacker but a spectre, right?" Just as the other companions were astounded by what Li Lanfeng had said, Han Jijyun suddenly asked softly.
Han Jijyun's words surprised the rest of the team. They all knew what spectres represented in the virtual world. No wonder they had felt as if a great catastrophe was upon them just now. The dangerous aura they had sensed at that time was most likely spectre power.
Li Lanfeng nodded and said apologetically, "Yes, I'm a spectre. In order to hide my powers, I lied to you all. I'm sorry!"
"I knew this already. You all also know there are hardly any spectres in the civilian world. For the leopard's personal safety, I did not allow the leopard to speak of this," said Ling Lan suddenly, "I hope that this matter ends here. If anyone else finds out the leopard is a spectre, his life will be in danger."
Ling Lan's words caused everyone's heart to clench. Indeed, spectres had always been the primary targets of assassination by the enemy nations of the Federation. As long as a spectre's real identity was exposed, their enemies would kill the spectre at any cost. This was also why the Federation military had brought all the spectres in their borders under their control. The Federation needed to protect these spectres, though of course part of the reason was also that they were afraid the spectres not under their control would cause some horrific massacre in the virtual world.
In the virtual world, spectres were synonymous with death gods. With the exception of other spectres, no one else could stand up against spectres. Even the most powerful warrior in the real world or the most authoritative leaders and high-ranking officials were like powerless and defenceless babies before a spectre in the virtual world, helpless if the other intended to kill them.
Thus, the authorities in every nation both loved and feared spectres. They loved spectres because they could become weapons to threaten the enemy nations with, but they were also afraid the spectres would turn on them and harm them. This had also brought about the tragedy of spectres never ever having any freedom in their lives. No authority would be willing to let these frightening beings that could endanger their lives in the virtual world run around unchecked. For their own safety, they inevitably chose to control, or even ruthlessly obliterate these spectres!
"Yes, Boss!" Everyone on the team understood what Ling Lan was saying. Besides, Li Lanfeng had chosen to come clean, which was practically placing his life in their hands — this was the trust he had in his teammates. Qi Long and the others were extremely moved by this. It was from this point on that Qi Long and the others truly took Li Lanfeng as their own companion. He was no longer just a friend of the boss who had joined them halfway, as a member whose status was yet to be determined as temporary or permanent.
Han Jijyun threw a complex glance at Li Lanfeng. He mentally applauded Li Lanfeng's decisiveness in using all he could to obtain the acknowledgement of his companions, allowing him to integrate into the team at a very fast speed. At this time, he had a hunch that Li Lanfeng might be the strongest rival for his position in the team ...
Han Jijyun silently clenched his fists and told himself that he needed to work hard. He absolutely could not lose to Li Lanfeng, this member who had only joined them along the way. He, Han Jijyun, would not give up on the role of military strategist!
Hearing Ling Lan speak up in his defence, Li Lanfeng was extremely grateful. He knew very well that he had never told Ling Lan he was a spectre.
This should be what the books call a 'bosom friend' — at critical moments, the other would help him, accept him, and defend him. Li Lanfeng's heart pumped violently once again, a sort of indescribable warmth rippling within it.
Just as everyone was deciding whether or not to continue with the mission, Ling Lan asked Li Lanfeng with a serious expression, "Leopard, can you withstand the attacks of two spectres?" Only spectres could fight against another spectre's abilities — despite having the virtual god Little Four and so being not at all afraid of the spectres, Ling Lan still needed to ask Li Lanfeng this question. After all, on the surface, Li Lanfeng would be the one fending off the spectres.
Li Lanfeng considered the issue seriously and then replied, "In terms of pure defence, there should be no problem. It's just that there are quite a few members in the team. Once we spread out, I'm afraid I might slip up and the opponent might jump on that chance." The connotation was that resisting was not a problem, but their numbers were a little too many since his defence area was not very wide. Once anyone went out of this range of his, he would not be able to guarantee the safety of all the members of the team.
This was the statement Ling Lan was waiting for. She decided to let Qi Long and the others wait here while she and Li Lanfeng went ahead to check things out.
This decision received firm opposition from the rest of the team; they insisted that they wanted to follow Ling Lan in. They also promised that they would listen to orders and stick closely to Li Lanfeng without veering even one step away.
Li Lanfeng saw that none of the team members wanted to retreat and was instantly filled with pride. He spoke up to say, "Rabbit, I will do my best to protect them. Just let them come."
Ling Lan figured there should not be any big problems since there was still Little Four as backup, so she nodded and agreed.
Ling Lan led the way to the largest door. In fact, they all knew that they had been heading downwards all this while — who knows how deep they had travelled. But upon seeing this large door, every member of their group believed they were already at least 200 to 300 metres deep underground.
Ling Lan then used Spiritual Share to display the situation behind the door to all the team members. It was no longer just a few soldiers protecting this door but a medium-sized team of about 15 people.
On both sides of the door were two iron walls, each with three beam machine guns jutting out from shooting ports aimed at the doorway. And at the end of the iron walls, about 30 metres from the main door, six armed soldiers were each holding a heavy firearm and staring vigilantly at the door. There were also three more people hiding in blind corners of the iron walls. They really did not need to worry about those three men though — as long as they did not reveal themselves, they would not be able to attack the group anyway.
Moreover, Ling Lan and the others were not afraid that they would activate some alarm device either, because once they entered, the spectres would notice them anyway. Thus, they would be exposed regardless of whether the alarm was sounded.
That aside, other than the spectres, they now also had to make preparations to handle an unforeseen enemy — mecha warriors. From the image transmitted via Ling Lan's Spiritual Share, they could see that the area behind the door was vast. There was a space of about 50 metres from ground to ceiling. This proved that not only would ground infantry be present; there might also be mecha operators.
The group set aside those potential enemies for now as they began to analyse how they should deal with the current situation. The six beam machine guns were definitely for Boss Lan to deal with — only Ling Lan had the skill to shoot a hidden weapon accurately into the shooting ports to finish off the six shooters inside.
Meanwhile, Li Lanfeng had to deal with the two spectres. Once they entered, he would have to put all his strength into that, so he would not be able to spare a hand to help with the physical fighting. Therefore, the others would have to deal with the six soldiers with heavy firearms at the front on their own.
Qi Long and the other four of the original group were naturally alright with this. Having grown up under Ling Lan's tough love, even the weakest Han Jijyun was not weaker than the others by much. The key was what they would do for the sixth soldier. After all, each of them could only handle one person — that final additional person would be left out, giving him a chance to fire at them.
Qi Long gave it some serious thought and felt there was still a pretty good chance of success. He was just about to say that he would also handle that last person when Li Shiyu, who had been quietly observing from the side, suddenly volunteered, "That sixth person, leave him to me."
This was the first time Li Shiyu had taken the initiative to do something. This surprised everyone, causing them to all turn to look in Li Shiyu's direction. The intent gazes of the team members disconcerted Li Shiyu, whose fair face was instantly painted with a flush.
"Senior Shiyu is from the military medical research specialization. Won't your combat ability be a little weak? If there's an injury or an accident, the loss to the team will be significant. I don't think it's a good idea." Xie Yi was the first to object. If they were injured, they still had Li Shiyu to help patch them up, but if Li Shiyu was injured, they would be helpless to do anything about it if it were serious.
Xie Yi's words made everyone nod silently in agreement, believing that letting Li Shiyu handle the final sixth soldier was not very appropriate. Chang Xinyuan's mouth twitched, about to volunteer himself when Li Shiyu retorted coldly, "Although I'm a military doctor, my combat skills are not at all weak."
Li Shiyu's typically calm eyes were currently blazing with the flames of anger — Xie Yi's words had made him feel insulted. His expression was proud and confident as he retorted. This expression was very familiar — when Li Yingjie was displaying his proud and haughty side, this was the expression he wore. This caused Qi Long and the others to turn their heads away, unable to look straight at Li Shiyu. As expected of a member of the Li family — that pride and arrogance were in their very bones.
"Ahem ahem, actually, Young Master Shiyu's combat ability is very good. Our Li family puts great focus on cultivating its inheritors' combat skills from young. Based on what I know, Young Master Shiyu's combat ability is significantly stronger than Young Master Yingjie's," Li Lanfeng suddenly interrupted to say with a smile. Though his expression seemed endlessly sincere, as if trying to explain on the behalf of Li Shiyu, for some reason Ling Lan felt a dissonance in his bearing and could not help but feel goosebumps rising all over her body.
"Since we're all from the same team, just call me Shiyu in future," said Li Shiyu earnestly to Li Lanfeng, casting a grateful glance at the other. Li Shiyu frankly loathed the address of 'young master'. However, previously in the military academy, he could not reject the title directly because this was after all tied to the pride and status of his identity as a direct descendant of the Li family. But now, since they had become battle clan comrades, Li Shiyu felt that this address was no longer necessary nor appropriate.
Li Lanfeng smiled widely in response and said with a nod, "Alright then, Shiyu."
When he said this, Ling Lan keenly picked up on Li Lanfeng's buoyant mood.
Seeing Li Shiyu's eagerness to fight and with Li Lanfeng speaking up in support, Qi Long and the others could not find a good way to refuse. So they all turned to look towards Ling Lan, waiting for their boss to give the final word.
Ling Lan nodded and said, "Since Senior Shiyu is sure, then it's decided." Her expression turned stern and she added, "Qi Long, Luo Lang, Xie Yi, Han Jijyun, Lin Zhong-qing, Li Shiyu. The six people at the front are up to you all. You must complete your duty."
"Yes, Boss!" "Yes, Leader!" Even though they all responded slightly differently, the timing of their responses was synchronous. Li Shiyu was currently still unable to call Ling Lan 'Boss' like Qi Long and the others.