Chapter 91: Charles’ Fury

Chapter 91: Charles' Fury

Ji An immersed his psychic energy into Bi Xue's ability, sensing the spatial energy within her powers.

Since Spatial Slash utilized the power of spatial dislocation, he could directly employ this force.

Just as the first missile was just 0.01 millimeters away from the passenger plane, Ji An, controlling Bi Xue's body, successfully released spatial energy.

Time seemed to freeze in that second, everything coming to a standstill.

Ji An felt like a god looking down upon the mortal world, able to clearly see the frozen space. It felt as though a single flick of his finger could alter the battle and change everyone's fate.

By manipulating Bi Xue's spatial ability, Ji An effortlessly severed the plane from its original space.

He intended to transport the plane directly to Luo City Base, but as he attempted it, he encountered powerful spatial resistance, preventing him from relocating the aircraft.

At the same time, he could distinctly feel Bi Xue's spatial ability rapidly depleting. If he forced it further, her abilities might be permanently damaged from overuse.

Ji An looked at the suspended stealth fighters and considered shifting their positions to make the missiles strike them instead. However, the moment he tried, he sensed Bi Xue's spatial energy draining dangerously fast.

He immediately stopped, not daring to proceed. Bi Xue's spatial ability was still too low-level—its energy insufficient. While escaping was possible, relocating other fighters was beyond her current capability.

Employing spatial dislocation to move their own plane was already the limit of what Bi Xue could endure.

Thus, Ji An could only relocate the detached plane within the range Bi Xue's ability allowed.

With a snap of his fingers, the passenger plane reappeared 500 meters away.

The stealth fighters had been moving at about 1,000 meters per hour. Catching up would take at least half an hour—more than enough time for Ji An and the others to escape.

For those on board, the experience was one of violent spatial distortion and compression. For a brief moment, they felt as though they had been compressed into two-dimensional shapes, their breath stolen away, even the air in their lungs squeezed out. The sensation was unbearable—worse than airsickness—with an overwhelming nausea that couldn't be suppressed.

Then, in an instant, the scenery around them blurred, as if everything had flashed by in less than a second. The intense dizziness and bodily distortion faded.

Ji An watched as the shifting surroundings finally resolved into an unfamiliar vista. He smiled—success.

His gaze met Gu Jinsheng's, who was staring back at him with eyes filled with adoration and wonder.

Ji An himself felt nothing unusual, and Gu Jinsheng seemed fine too. But many enhanced individuals in the cabin had severe physical reactions. Before their minds could process what had happened, their bodies rebelled violently. With a simultaneous heaving, many vomited.

The entire space was filled with a putrid smell—including Bi Xue.

Once the spatial transfer was complete, Ji An withdrew his mental control from Bi Xue's mind. Still dazed, she barely had time to react before the overwhelming nausea hit, and she joined the others in vomiting.

Kong Zhongcheng pointed at her accusingly. "This is your doing, and you're throwing up too?"

Between heaves, Bi Xue managed, "Divine Ji mind-controlled me! I didn’t know anything!"

Before they could finish arguing, cheers erupted around them. Rushing to the windows, they saw an entirely new landscape outside—as if they had been transported to another place in an instant.

"Teleportation?" Bi Xue exclaimed in shock.

Kong Zhongcheng frowned at her. "You don’t even know your own ability?"

"Of course not!" Bi Xue replied defensively. "I had no idea! If not for the big boss, I wouldn’t have known my spatial ability had any function beyond storage. Even Spatial Blade and Spatial Slash were discovered by him. Why else would I call Researcher Ji 'big boss'? He’s incredible—any ability in his hands becomes useful! Us ordinary enhanced folks just can’t compare!"

"Never mind that—what matters is we’re saved!!!" Bi Xue cheered, jumping and dancing with the others, too elated to care about the revolting stench around them. "Ahhh!!! We’re saved! All hail Boss Ji! All hail Divine Ji!!!"

In the cockpit, the Captain—a veteran pilot with decades of experience, including years flying fighter jets—had kept his cool even in the face of the missile attack. He hadn’t succumbed to despair, instead widening his eyes, determined to find a way out of the crisis.

So he was probably one of the few who saw it most clearly—he watched as the missile vanished the instant it was about to hit their passenger plane.

Then an intense wave of dizziness and reality warping struck.

The crushing pressure and vertigo made the Captain feel violently nauseous, but his years of high-altitude flight experience and self-control allowed him to suppress the sensation.

The Captain soon realized it wasn’t the missile that had disappeared—it was as if they had teleported. They were now in a completely different sky, with entirely unfamiliar surroundings, and even the coordinates on the dashboard showed they were 500 meters away from their previous position.

Suddenly, the dashboard began spinning wildly, alarms blaring one after another. The Captain recognized each warning, knowing exactly which part of the plane was malfunctioning.

"Reporting to Commander Gu, the aircraft is experiencing system failures and is no longer flightworthy—there’s an imminent risk of crashing!" Before the Captain could even process the exhilaration of escaping the missiles and superpowered hunters from R Nation, another crisis struck.

Ji An said, "It’s likely the plane couldn’t withstand the force of teleportation. We need to abandon ship!"

Gu Jinsheng nodded.

Ji An immediately alerted the still-celebrating supers in the cabin, "Bail out!"

With a surge of superpower, Ji An shattered the window in front of him. The explosive sound of shattering glass snapped the jubilant supers back to reality as he shouted, "Bail out now!"

Leading by example, Ji An leaped out first. Following him, Gu Jinsheng commanded, "Bail out immediately!" and jumped after him.

"Bail out, bail out—follow the boss now!" Kong Zhongcheng was the first to react, roaring at the still-celebrating supers.

The sound of glass shattering echoed continuously as holes burst open across the cabin, and supers poured out like lemmings.

Before jumping, Kong Zhongcheng noticed He Tao zoned out, eyes shut, as if sleepwalking. Without time to explain, Kong Zhongcheng kicked him out and followed immediately.

He Tao struggled to open his eyes amid the howling wind, only to realize he was plummeting through the sky. Around him, others were jumping out one after another, like hailstones.

He hurriedly pulled the parachute cord they had been instructed to prepare earlier when the crisis first struck, letting the wind guide his descent.

It was then that He Tao noticed the missiles and superpowers had all vanished. The sky was unnervingly calm, as if no battle had ever taken place.

He glanced around in confusion before his eyes widened in shock—this… this was truly not the same sky they had been in before.

He Tao couldn’t pinpoint the exact difference, but their previous location had been over mountains, which they had even used for cover. Here, there were no mountains—only the sea below. It was an entirely different place!

Just as bewildered was Kobashi Ichiro, who had been watching the live footage from R Nation’s stealth fighters, eagerly awaiting the moment Gu Jinsheng and Ji An would be blown to bloody pieces.

Humming a tune, Kobashi Ichiro raised his wine glass toward Dewitt on the screen in a sarcastic toast. "Mr. Dewitt, you are about to witness how the so-called 'god-like' Commander-in-Chief from the Jing City Base—overhyped by China’s backwater idiots—gets blown to bloody pulp, leaving no remains!"

Dewitt ignored Kobashi Ichiro, instead raising his glass to Charles on another screen. "Commander Charles, congratulations on achieving your wish."

Charles laughed heartily and ordered his subordinates, "Bring that woman from China here. Doesn’t she also have a grudge against Ji An and Gu Jinsheng? Since I’m in a good mood today, I’ll be generous—let her watch how her enemies die without even leaving a scrap of flesh behind! Hahaha!"

Tang Tang was soon dragged in. Though she had only been at the HSD Base for just over a month, she looked decades older than when she had arrived.

When she first came, Tang Tang had appeared aged, but only superficially. Now, most of her hair had turned white, her eyes hollowed out, numb, her entire being emptied, like a shell.

Shoved violently into the room, Tang Tang collapsed to the floor. No one helped her up, and she didn’t even try, curling into a tight ball and clutching herself.

Her short time at HSD had left her physically and mentally broken. Every day, she endured endless mental assaults, her psyche battered relentlessly.

They denied her sleep, keeping her in a state of exhaustion and vulnerability.

But Tang Tang’s weakened mental state was useless—the mental compulsion implanted deep in her mind remained unshaken. The telepaths at HSD Base couldn’t breach the mental defenses in her brain.

The more this happened, the worse the vicious cycle became. SHD’s psychic superpowered operatives intensified their mental torment to break the mental conditioning embedded in Tang Tang's mind.

By now, Tang Tang couldn’t remember how long it had been since she last slept. Perhaps she had even forgotten these things entirely.

Tang Tang curled up on the ground, hugging herself, her eyes glazed over. She murmured, "No more, please don’t torture me anymore. I beg you, go find Ji An, go after him. Just let me sleep, even for a little while—ten minutes is enough."

With a wave of his hand, Charles summoned a hulking superpowered enforcer, who grabbed Tang Tang by the hair and roughly shoved her face toward the screen. Charles’ voice was soft, almost like a lover’s whisper, but it only made Tang Tang tremble in terror.

"Don’t be afraid. Look, your enemy Ji An and his partner Gu Jinsheng are on this passenger plane. Soon, they’ll be blown to smithereens—*boom*—and nothing will remain!" Charles’ eyes flared with manic glee as he yanked Tang Tang’s hair, pressing her face against the screen. "Don’t you hate him? Don’t you want to watch him die? Then open your eyes and see how horribly he dies!"

"Ji An… die!" Tang Tang’s haze-addled mind latched onto the keyword, and her dull eyes suddenly widened. She stared at the plane on the screen, knowing Ji An was aboard.

Now, that plane was surrounded by missiles and superpowers, with the nearest missile about to strike. At such close range, survival was impossible.

Tang Tang cackled hysterically, pointing at the screen and shouting, "Die! Ji An, die!"

"Yes, well said! Hahaha!" Charles laughed. "Now, let’s count down to the demise of this so-called genius scientist: 3… 2… 1… *boom*!"

Charles mimicked an explosion, sipping his wine with closed eyes, savoring the thrill of lives ending by his command. On the screen, a series of earsplitting explosions followed.

"The… the plane is gone…" Tang Tang muttered in disbelief, her sunken eyes frantically scanning the screen. "Where’s the plane? How did it disappear? Did it fly off-screen?"

Charles ignored her ramblings, knowing her shattered mind was beyond reason. No one subjected to constant mental invasion could stay sane!

He even humored her with a cheerful explanation: "The plane was blown up, of course it’s gone—"

"Commander Charles…" Dewitt’s trembling voice cut in. "The plane… the one carrying Gu Jinsheng and Ji An… it’s gone…"

"Are you as mad as this lunatic? The plane was destroyed—of course it’s gone!"

"No, no, Commander Charles," Dewitt swallowed nervously. "Their plane vanished suddenly, as if it had teleported through space!"

"Impossible! A goddamn space jump? Do you think this is a movie? That’s science-fiction bullshit!" Charles roared, lunging at the footage. But just as Dewitt described, the passenger plane carrying Gu Jinsheng and Ji An had indeed vanished in an instant.

"How?! How is this possible?!" Charles stared at the screen in disbelief before unleashing a barrage of superpowers, shattering every monitor in the room. Then, he turned his fury on the superpowered soldiers present.

Caught off guard, many were cut down before they could blink. Those who fought back tried to flee, but Charles, a top-tier superpowered, overpowered them effortlessly, picking them off one by one until none remained.

Only after the massacre did Charles return, his footsteps measured, predatory like a reaper wielding a scythe.

Tang Tang scrambled backward, pressing herself into the corner, barely daring to breathe—yet Charles dragged her out mercilessly.

"Tell me," he demanded, his gaping eye socket dripping blood, his remaining eye alight with insanity, "what kind of monster is Ji An? How does he keep escaping? How does he keep inventing things that defy the laws of our era?!"

"Ahhh!!!" Tang Tang shrieked like a cornered animal.

Dewitt watched the snow-blank screen, knowing full well how enraged Charles must be. The thought of Charles’ hair-trigger rage sent a shiver down his spine.

Fear and fury warred within Dewitt—fear of Charles’ impending wrath, and fury at Kobashi Ichiro, that damn R-national bastard!

He hurled his wine glass at Kobashi Ichiro’s face on the screen, bellowing, "Is this what you showed me?! Where are Gu Jinsheng and Ji An? Where’s their plane?!"

Kobashi Ichiro looked dumbfounded. "I—I don’t know! They were just there! The missiles were about to hit!"

"I don’t want excuses," Dewitt hissed. "Save them for Commander Charles. You know his temper. You screwed up something this important—he’ll never let you live!"

The mere thought of that unhinged tyrant sent Kobashi Ichiro into a full-body shudder. "No, Commander Dewitt, you know this isn’t my fault! I don’t know anything! I swear!"

But Dewitt, fighting for his own survival, had no fucks left to give. He slammed the comms shut without another word.

Shaking with fear and rage, Kobashi Ichiro could only contact the Captain of the stealth jet that had survived the explosion and remained at the scene.

"What the hell happened? Why did they just disappear into thin air?" Kobashi Ichiro demanded.

"We don’t know either. Their passenger plane just disappeared," the Captain stammered. "It was like they suddenly warped through space-time, just like in a sci-fi movie!"

"Then why didn’t the missile disappear with them? It was about to hit their plane!"

"I—I don’t know, Commander Kobashi Ichiro. That’s beyond my understanding!"

"You're useless!" Kobashi Ichiro cursed, forgetting his rank. "Search for them now! A thorough, grid search! You must find them—they can’t have gone far. It’s all Ji An’s trickery!"

"Yes, sir!" The stealth jet Captain didn’t believe vanishing into thin air was mere trickery, but he dared not argue with the furious Kobashi Ichiro.

"If you don’t find Ji An, consider yourselves dead!" Kobashi Ichiro roared before ending the call.

He never imagined he'd spoken prophecy.

After Gu Jinsheng followed Ji An and jumped from the plane, he maneuvered his parachute and body to get closer to Ji An—skills he had mastered from strict military training as a child.

But even though Gu Jinsheng was a professional, Ji An wasn’t. Gu Jinsheng could only watch helplessly as Ji An kept flailing, drifting further away.

Frustrated but powerless, Gu Jinsheng couldn’t even shout for Ji An to stop moving—his voice would be lost in the wind.

Suddenly, Thunder Dragon materialized from Gu Jinsheng’s consciousness, smirking slyly. "You can’t reach Ji An, but I can!"

With a flick of its tail, Thunder Dragon streaked across the sky, reaching Ji An in an instant.

Ji An blinked, and suddenly found himself seated on Thunder Dragon’s back. The dragon turned its massive red eyes toward him, its tail lashing proudly, clearly seeking praise.

Ji An quickly patted its head. "Good job, Thunder Dragon!"

Thrilled, Thunder Dragon banked and rolled through the air.

From its back, Ji An scanned the sky, but everyone was too far away—just tiny specks, impossible to distinguish.

The wind howled in his ears, so Ji An cupped his hands and shouted near Thunder Dragon’s ear, "Thunder Dragon, where’s Gu Jinsheng?"

As the manifestation of Gu Jinsheng’s super-power, Thunder Dragon could always sense him, even if no one else could.

Blinking innocently, Thunder Dragon lied, "The wind's roaring, An-An! I can’t hear you! Let’s go for a ride!"

With a dive, it shot upward, carrying Ji An in dizzying barrel rolls.

Though Ji An couldn’t make out the distant figures, they could all see Thunder Dragon—its full sixty-meter length wreathed in lightning, impossible to miss.

As Gu Jinsheng’s super-power, Thunder Dragon’s actions were still linked to him. Even if it acted independently, Gu Jinsheng could perceive everything it experienced.

So he naturally overheard Thunder Dragon’s conversation with Ji An—including its attempt to shake him off and keep Ji An to itself.

Since Thunder Dragon was his super-power, Gu Jinsheng could still control it. He subtly commanded it to return.

Feeling the pull, Thunder Dragon struggled but couldn’t resist, grumbling angrily.

Yet it lied to Ji An again. "Hold on, An-An! I’ll take you to that scheming Gu Jinsheng!"

Ji An defended him. "Jinsheng is upstanding. Don’t say that."

Thunder Dragon snorted. "All power players are underhanded and crafty."

"That’s not the right phrase," Ji An corrected. "It’s called being strategic."

Muttering darkly—inaudible over the wind—Thunder Dragon clearly had more complaints about Gu Jinsheng.

When it reached Gu Jinsheng, Thunder Dragon only wanted to flaunt Ji An, not carry him. But as its master, Gu Jinsheng’s will was absolute. With great reluctance, it permitted him aboard.

"We need to regroup quickly. The others are scattered, and the R-nation’s goddamn stealth jets might catch up," Gu Jinsheng said, both to Ji An and as an order to Thunder Dragon. Thunder Dragon immediately bellowed. "Absolutely not! I won’t let anyone but An-An ride me! Allowing you on is my absolute limit!"