Forty Millenniums of Cultivation, page 1032
"Well…" Li Yao thought quickly. "Based on your experience in the past, have the forces in Fish Dragon City, including all the desperadoes in the Dragon Snake Space Zone, ever attacked the Cultivators from Firefly, you know, for personal grudges or simply for your treasures?"
"How is that possible?" Tang Xiaoxing snorted. "Although we have been on the run for a thousand years, the overall quality of our Exos are magnitudes higher than the mobs in this place. Also, most of the people here make their living directly and indirectly through the trade deals between Firefly and the Star Glory Federation. They are incapable of attacking us, nor do they have the courage to!"
"Therefore," Li Yao concluded, "the marks of 'Firefly' have been clearly painted on the shell of the three shuttles of yours so that everybody else will know beyond any doubt that they are the shuttles that belong to the 'rightful government of the Star Ocean Republic', right?"
"Of course!" Tang Xiaoxing was confused. "It is very important to show your banner in such a place like Fish Dragon City. A lot of unnecessary trouble can be avoided. Is there a problem?"
"The problem is not a small one. Ask your men to change the route and return immediately!" Li Yao tapped the soundproof block between the passengers' side and the cockpit and said, "Tell the driver to get out of the seat. I'll take the wheel—"
Hardly had he concluded his sentence when Li Yao's ears, which had been filled with spiritual energy, picked up a feeble sound in the air. His pupils constricted violently, and he gave up the plan of crawling into the cockpit. Instead, he went back and lunged toward Tang Xiaoxing, opening his spiritual shield!
"Watch out!"
The moment he let out the warning, an ear-splitting explosion took place. They seemed to have been hit right in the face by a heavy shuttle that was running at a speed of more than eight hundred kilometers per hour when they were in a shuttle that was running at exactly the same speed. While the world was spinning, the shuttle was thrown away from the magnetic rail!
Explosive spiritual energy flooded into the narrow cart like surging tides.
BAM! BAM! BAM! BAM!
The airbags hidden in the shell of the shuttle all burst out, only to explode in the next second under the blast of the continuous spiritual energy from outside!
Even Li Yao's face was bleeding everywhere, his body almost deformed. His brain was humming, and there was even a moment when he could not summon his spiritual energy!
You—you've got to be kidding me. Even a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator has been so heavily wounded? What the f*ck is that?
From the outside, the luxury shuttle had turned into a cluster of garbage from which smoke was billowing. It was swirling in midair quickly before it was attracted by the man-made gravity and crashed to 'ground'.
Li Yao's telepathic thoughts spread out like soft smoke. He immediately sensed that two massive streams of spiritual energy came from a skyscraper in the northeast and a crystal train in the southwest and hit the two shuttles of bodyguards precisely.
Boom! Boom!
After two deafening noises, the two shuttles turned into two clusters of furiously burning fireballs. The elite Exos from Firefly inside had been vaporized into ash before they had a chance to scream. The blood red fireballs illuminated the bluish night sky!
Crack! Crack!
Because the magnetic rail that they were on had been blown up, dozens of shuttles that were attached to the rail immediately lost control. They flew randomly in midair like headless flies, crashing into brilliant fireworks.
Li Yao's pupils were constricted to the size of needles before they expanded and occupied his entire eyes.
Judging from the aftershock of the spiritual energy from the barrel, the attacks must've been made by the main guns installed on the small warships!
Are you kidding me? Dismantling the main gun, delivering it secretly to the downtown of Fish Dragon City, and attacking a single target with a cannonball that is designed to penetrate the shield and the plate armor of a hostile starship? No wonder even a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator's nose is bleeding!
This is too unbelievable. Who's putting on such a big show? Also, how exactly did they lock onto us? The shot was rather precise!
Chapter 1592: This Is an Expert! |
The information streams inside Li Yao's head surged crazily, allowing him to distinguish the differences between the three cannonballs in the two attacks.
The first cannonball that hit the luxury shuttle that he and Tang Xiaoxing were in should have been a 'stunning cannonball', which contained an overwhelming blast of spiritual energy that could seriously jam and block the spiritual energy circulation of a Cultivator. For the normal high-level Cultivators, such as Tang Xiaoxing, they would lose their entire combat ability and probably be cast into a coma, but the cannonball was not fatal.
The cannonballs that targeted the two shuttles of bodyguards, on the other hand, were truly deadly ones that boasted penetrating and explosive effects.
That was why the two of them were unharmed.
It was the cannon of a warship, designed to dig through strengthened armor that was several meters, if not dozens of meters, thick!
If Li Yao had been hit by such a cannon right in the face, even though he was in the Nascent Soul Stage, he would have suffered heavy wounds instead of an injury as minor as a nosebleed!
Of course, the Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators had a ten times keener sense of danger than the normal Cultivators did. If the enemy had locked onto him with the deadly cannonballs in the beginning, it would certainly have been perceived by Li Yao in advanced. So, he would not have been hit at all.
It was exactly because the enemy was using a stunning cannonball, which was not fatal, that Li Yao's senses had been sluggish for half a second, leading to this accident in Fish Dragon City despite his abundant experience in adventures.
Disrupting the nerves and even the entire brain of a Cultivator with a massive blast of spiritual energy so that they will completely lose the ability of resistance and even awareness, without harming their body or leaving any sequela, such a stunning cannonball is rather sophisticated from a technical point of view. Based on the intelligence I've gathered over the past couple of days, it is not something that can be made in the Dragon Snake Space Zone.
However, attacking a target blatantly with a warship cannon in the downtown area?
Even if the warship cannon can be dissected into parts, and the parts can be hidden in different Cosmos Rings and brought into the Dragon Snake Space Zone, it will still take quite a lot of time to assemble such a piece of complicated heavy magical equipment. To fix the cannons, whose recoil can be very powerful, on a skyscraper and a train, it also requires an enormous fixation and buffer pedestal. Unfolding all those things will certainly take more than ten minutes.
However slow the Chamber of Commerce that controls Fish Dragon City is, it can certainly detect such a piece of monolithic magical equipment in ten minutes.
Then, there is only one conclusion. The authorities of Fish Dragon City, namely the Four Sectors Chamber of Commerce, have participated in the assault targeting Tang Xiaoxing or at least permitted the operation.
Interesting…
The debris of the wasted shuttle was swirling quickly in midair, like a sparrow whose wings had been broken in a storm.
Despite the protection of Li Yao's spiritual shield, Tang Xiaoxing still passed out at the first second of attack, leaving Li Yao to think calmly alone in the quickly overturning world.
Boom!
The shuttle smashed into the ground brutally after falling for hundreds of meters. Many remnants of the magnetic tubes and shuttles that had accidents just now crashed near them one after another.
Li Yao sighed gloomily.
Such a man who likes to keep a low profile and dismisses fame and fortune like myself should be living in peace with other people. Why do you force me every time?
Spitting out a mouthful of saliva mixed with blood, he kicked open the door of the shuttle that had been seriously deformed before he crawled out of the vehicle like a cobra that was expanding because of fury.
The luxurious shuttle was divided into two cabins. Other than himself and Tang Xiaoxing, two Cultivators had been seated in the cockpit before. They were a chauffeur and a bodyguard.
It was a pity that they were both dead.
The passenger cabin that Li Yao and Tang Xiaoxing were in was fully enclosed. Not only did it adopt the most advanced strengthened iron plate and buffer level, almost a hundred protective rune arrays had also been deployed between them. In comparison, the protection for the cockpit was relatively weaker.
The attackers were obviously experts of such assaults and knew the features of Tang Xiaoxing's luxury shuttle very well. By adjusting the power of the stunning cannonball perfectly, they were able to knock out the passengers despite the strengthened iron plate, the buffer level, and the defense rune arrays.
However, since the defense rune arrays around the chauffeur and the bodyguard were relatively weaker, they had been directly killed in the explosion.
Looking at the faces of the two Cultivators, which were still in a daze, Li Yao's eyes flickered, but he did not have time to feel sorry for them. Narrowing his eyes, he glanced at the skyscrapers around and the interconnected magnetic rails in the sky.
Shua! Shua! Shua! Shua! Shua! Shua!
Inside his brain, the entire world was digitized into a series of colorful figures that were jumping, changing and calculating, allowing him to perceive the locations of the attackers, the bystanders, the watchers, and even the suspected commanders who were standing far away.
Triggering the map of this area in Fish Dragon City from his mini crystal processor, Li Yao analyzed and calculated the best route of escape quickly. He then grabbed Tang Xiaoxing by the neck and sent a stream of spiritual energy into the back of her head. In the end, he shook her slightly and woke her up from the coma.
"What happened?" Tang Xiaoxing's eyes were unfocused, and she was in such a daze that she did not know where she was at all, which was an effect of the stunning cannonball. Her Cultivation was not low, but she was a pure creation-type Cultivator. Naturally, her brain was not as tough as Li Yao's, and her mind was still in chaos.
"It's alright." Noticing that a low of shadows were coming close from all directions, Li Yao said, "Lie there and stay still. Let me touch you."
"Huh?"
"Make no mistake. I am not interested in you at all, nor will I do anything outrageous on you in such an environment. Please be absolutely assured. My life will be in danger if I do anything that crosses the line."
Before Tang Xiaoxing came back to herself from the trance, Li Yao sent another stream of spiritual energy into her limbs, stimulating her nerves and making her stretch out her arms and legs.
Li Yao's hands shone glamorously and drew colorful streaks of light in midair, turning into a rainbow swirl as he worked on Tang Xiaoxing!
A moment later, Li Yao sniffed and tore off a piece of membrane the size half a fingernail from the back of Tang Xiaoxing's left ear, which was the exact same color as Tang Xiaoxing's skin.
Nobody would be able to distinguish it if they were not searching carefully with a pair of highly sensitive hands.
Inside the membrane was a chip that was as thin as the wing of a cicada and could be bent freely.
"How delicate." Li Yao stuck the super tiny chip to his fingertip to observe it more carefully before he showed it to Tang Xiaoxing. "This must be some sort of mini chip both for localization and for aiming. Not only does it report your coordinates precisely, it can even navigate the aggressive magical equipment such as a warship cannon so that it will never miss the target. That explains how the enemy shot us so precisely!
"Also, such a chip can actually be put to sleep. When it is in the hibernation state and protected by the biochemical membrane outside, even someone with eyes all over their body wouldn't be able to discover the chip!"
"You—" Tang Xiaoxing was utterly dumbfounded. Her mind was in confusion. There was no telling whether it was because the unexpected assault, the fact that the chip had been stuck to her without her knowing at all, or Senior Lin's amazing hands!
What kind of refining art was that? Making a translucent ribbon of rainbow with hands? That was too incredible!
Right when she was lost for words, Li Yao found a second localization and navigation chip that was perfectly hidden on her ankle.
"It's beautiful." Unleashing part of his spiritual energy, Li Yao squinted and sensed the tiny rune arrays on the two super small chips, appreciating rarely-seen beauty. It was truly a work of art!
However…
The master who has produced such artwork installed two identical chips on the same target? Such an approach is rather monotonous!
Li Yao's eyes were like two sharp scalpels that were about to dissect Tang Xiaoxing so that he could study her every body part more carefully. Tang Xiaoxing's face went pale, not knowing what to do!
Suddenly, he snatched a hair from Tang Xiaoxing's head as quickly as lightning!
"Ah!" It was not very painful for Tang Xiaoxing, but she was truly taken surprise. Because of the aftermath of the stunning cannonball, her computational and thinking abilities had plummeted, and she was no better than an ordinary person. She had no idea what was going on at all.
Li Yao curled her hair in his fingers and then snapped out greenish flames, entirely burning the hair into ash. However, an extremely thin object that looked like a molecular mica thread remained at the tip of his fingers.
"Wow…" Li Yao widened his eyes in amazement. "Building a piece of tracing magical equipment into such a thin object, with such hardness and intensity, and implanting it into the head of the target as a hair. Like an antenna, it is powered by the energy of the target's head and sends out signals to the outside world incessantly.
"What a terrifying methodology and approach! This material is unheard of!"
Li Yao took out a gray piece of rubber from the Cosmos Ring and carefully embedded the 'localization thread' into it.
He then took out dozens of balls that were as fat and round as pearls. After sticking the two localization and navigation chips onto one of the balls and sending telepathic thoughts into them, Li Yao sprayed them on the ground. Before long, all the balls rolled into the gap of the cover of a drainage.
Although Fish Dragon City was a metropolis in space, for the comfort of the residents, artificial precipitation was occasionally arranged.
The drainage was not only responsible for dewatering but also served as important channels to accommodate wires and to support maintenance. They were spacious enough for two people to pass through if they crouched.
That was Li Yao's conclusion after searching the map just now.
"Let's go. Change your face first."
Li Yao touched the center of his eyebrow softly, putting on another random template face, which was as plain and unattractive as before.
It was not until this moment that Tang Xiaoxing finally recalled what had happened. The talents of a refiner gradually woke up in her blood. "We… explosion… Dear lord, we were hit by a warship cannon!"
"That's right." Li Yao frowned. "What's the problem? Let's go!"
"What's the problem?" Tang Xiaoxing almost collapsed. Rubbing her temples, she stared at Li Yao in disbelief, barely able to speak a whole sentence. "We—we were attacked by a warship cannon in the downtown area! Why are you still so calm, Senior Lin?"
"Why shouldn't I be calm?" Li Yao scratched his hair, which had been blown into a mess that looked like a bird nest, as he looked at the girl expressionlessly. "Isn't it the daily life for a Cultivator to be hit by the main gun of a warship every other day? What's there to be surprised by?"
Chapter 1593: Chilly Wind... |
Tang Xiaoxing was rendered speechless.
She had never seen such a Cultivator before, either on Firefly, in the Dragon Snake Space Zone, or from the diplomatic team that the Star Glory Federation had sent to Firefly.
Of course, there did not seem to be an equally… queer existence among the Immortal Cultivators whom she had encountered!
Li Yao picked up Tang Xiaoxing and sent another stream of spiritual energy into her body, making her manage to get rid of the influence of the stunning cannonball. The two of them ran crazily down the street.
In Fish Dragon City, while robbery and gang fights were anything but unusual, few of them were as huge as the one that was taking place at that moment. Even warship cannons had been used, and quite a few magnetic rails had been blown up. No wonder everybody was running crazily in panic on the street. The two of them were not very eye-catching in the middle of the crowd.
Also, the route that Li Yao had carefully calculated took every angle into consideration, allowing them to always reach the most appropriate location at the most appropriate timing. The enemy's sight was blocked perfectly.
The enemy, on the other hand, was mainly relying on the three pieces of localization magical equipment to determine Tang Xiaoxing's coordinates. Naked eyes were only ancillary tools.
Li Yao brought Tang Xiaoxing into a dilapidated alley.
They were safe for the time being.
He lowered his head to check the countdown displayed on the light beam, which was the estimated time that it would take for the attackers to enter the drainage under the navigation of the tracking chips.
Ten, nine, eight, seven…
Taping his mini crystal processor, Li Yao casually said, "Cover your ears."
"Huh?" Tang Xiaoxing was confused, unable to react immediately. The blast of the stunning cannonball was so intense that her brains were still shaking violently inside her skull to this moment, like the tofu on a bouncing van.
"Senior Lin, what did you say?" Tang Xiaoxing said in a daze. Hardly had she concluded her sentence when a series of ear-splitting explosions took place behind the two of them, as if an infuriated fire dragon had crawled out of the drain. The raging fire consumed half of the sky.
