Chapter 248: A Golden Twenty Mile Climax!

Chapter 248: A Golden Twenty Mile Climax!

The MV Agusta Brutale 1000 RR tore through the mountain roads past North City, its engine roaring into the midnight air. We neared our destination around 1 AM after playing a tense game of hide-and-seek with Clark Lee and his goons through the twisting turns. The plan required us to draw as many of the SDF loyal to the Lee Traditionalists into our trap as possible.

Ling Ling and I were forced to listen to Lucy laughing in our earpieces for the last hour. She kept replaying the scene of Raymond breaking down after getting onto the highway to chase me. What made Lucy absolutely bust a gut was when Ling Ling explained the speedometer joke.

Setting the trick to eighty-eight miles per hour was a nod to a car time-traveling at that exact speed. Back To The Future wasn't a movie on Pangaea, so Lucy told me that after we got our revenge on the Lee, I had to produce that movie and star in it. Thinking about the trilogy, I found myself agreeing that it would make a pretty good retirement acting role for me. I immediately decided that the role of the girlfriend had to go to Ana for sure.

Soon, I had to stop my motorcycle at the entrance to a blocked-off mountain road that sported a prominent closure sign. I would have been surprised to see a female security guard guarding the pass entrance if I hadn't already known the plan. Ning'er had activated her Shadows to secure the whole mountain range for the impending trap.

The woman wore a crisp uniform, standing in a guard booth and waving a glow-stick to force us to a halt. Right beside her, the sign read... [Danger: No Trespassing]

When I brought the bike to a stop, the guard could easily see our faces. As superhumans, we had no need for helmets, leaving our expressions completely bare.

The woman addressed the pair of us, her voice crisp. "Sorry, the road is closed unless your name is Rick Tang. I assume you are him?"

I leaned slightly over the handlebars, looking her right in the eye. "I'm Rick Lee-Tang, hiding in the shadows."

The woman immediately bowed her head in respect, then pointed toward the dark, unlit road ahead. "Mr. Tang, we have surrounded the entire mountain region for over twenty miles and are only keeping others from entering the destroyed region. Not a single one of our people have gone in, as per your orders. What orders do you have for me to relay, sir?"

I pulled the motorcycle keys from the ignition and handed them directly to the woman. "Have someone drive my bike to this address at Club Di and fill the tank. I will have the manager take the keys from you and pick it up later. For the next twelve hours, no one but the two of us may leave the mountain range alive, and keep everyone out during that time except for the SDF forces, understood?"

Another woman emerged from the guard booth, stepping up to take the bike keys from my hand. "No problem, Mr. Tang. Leave this simple task to me."

The first woman turned her gaze to Ling Ling, acknowledgment gleaming in her eyes. "It is nice to meet the legendary Shadow who graduated with perfect marks, Miss Ling. I'm glad to see you at Mr. Tang's side for his mission, haha."

Ling Ling shifted behind me, wrapping her arms tightly around my waist as she leaned against my back. "I am just his fuck toy, fufu. We wanted to try our luck at camping and maybe find the Hidden Temple while we were at it."

I waved to the speechless guards, grabbed Ling's small hand, and pulled her straight into the pitch-black darkness of the mountain forest.

Once we were well out of sight of the guard post, Ling and I suddenly picked up our pace. We channeled our Chi to move at rapid speeds, knowing Adam did not know we had ditched our motorcycle. He would believe our rapid GPS movement was simply due to us being on the bike.

While both Ling and I ran at a dizzying sixty miles per hour through the dark forest in the deep mountains, Lucy's voice chimed in our earpieces.

[Rick and Ling Ling, you are both approaching the now destroyed Hidden Temple, but I saw your bike taken away. How are you guys moving so fast?! Also, Clark and his men have arrived at the checkpoint, and Adam authorized two Boeing AH-64 Apache attack helicopters to advance to your locations.]

When Ling and I arrived at the devastated land that had taken a large number of MOABs, it had taken the pair of us only ten minutes to run ten miles into the deep terrain.

We had to stop running to reply to Lucy, but before I could come up with a lie, Ling spoke up. "Lucy, Rick is already telling others he is the Yellow Emperor and shedding his disguise. So are you a hundred percent certain no one but you can hear what I am about to tell you, and are you sitting down?"

It took a moment of heavy silence before we heard her voice over the line again.

[Okay, I scrambled everything and even turned off Valentine. Go ahead.]

When Ling Ling looked at me, I gave her a firm nod, prompting her to speak into the transmitter. "Because I know Rick is your world, I will let you in on some world-altering news. First, do you know the name of the very first Yellow Emperor's wife, his first Empress?"

The line went completely quiet for a while, and I could easily imagine Lucy sitting there like a deer in headlights. Soon, her voice came through in a completely disbelieving tone. [Empress Ling Ling?!]

Ling Ling giggled, her chest pressing against my arm. "Fufu, you get a gold star for knowing my husband's history, yup. Now you know why our Rick loves me, right?"

Lucy sounded completely bewildered as she replied. [But... Ling Ling reincarnating never was recorded in thirty thousand years. How?]

Ling Ling shrugged her shoulders, her voice relaxed. "Hah? Easy, by keeping my mouth shut. Actually, this was the first time I finally met Rick since back then, as our lives and reincarnations always missed one another, sigh. Anyway, that is not important, but back to your question from before... Rick and I are superhuman, but I cannot go into details, not even with you. The truth would get Rick and I killed, do you understand?"

Lucy's tone softened into absolute compliance. [Understood, then I won't ask, but most of us had noticed our bodies changing since you and Rick got together. So it has something to do with you after all. Well, then I can forgive my Rick for being with you, fufu.]

I let out a heavy sigh and stepped in to clarify the situation. "Lucy, I don't remember my past with Ling Ling, but she did. As for our supernatural connection, she and I had in our past lives swapped a section of our actual souls with one another, called a Dao Companion, that followed us into other reincarnations and worlds. It is permanent until the universe ends, sigh. As for our powers, we are like superheroes and can even shrug off low-caliber bullets. I will tell you all about it some other time, but for now, we have to start."

Lucy didn't hesitate to get back to business. [Okay, but they have entered the area you designated, Rick. As for the other stuff, just decide it yourselves, I heard nothing.]

Ling took my hand and pulled me further into the sprawling ruins as she explained the technical reality to Lucy. "Rick and I are going to unleash our maximum power that doesn't belong in this world, so when all communication is cut, don't panic. It is a supernatural EMP burst that will permanently destroy technology, even those shielded, like Rick's super expensive phones, so we will go black for a time. I need you to block all satellites from seeing us for a while, okay?"

Lucy immediately confirmed the request. [Alright, I will disable all working satellites to see nothing. Those Boeing AH-64 Apache attack helicopters have an ETA of about fifteen minutes until they enter your ten-mile radius, by the way.]

I looked around and spotted a cave tucked away in the collapsed rubble. "Okay Lucy, we are going dark, see you at the hidden mansion in the morning."

Her voice cut through with fierce emotion right before we shut the devices off. [I love you more than this world, Rick. And Ling Ling, please keep him safe for us.]

Ling Ling smiled into the dark, offering one last playful remark. "Tonight Lucy, the sun will rise in the west, fufu."

After we removed all items, clothing, and electronic equipment, the two of us with just our naked bodies joined as one and meditated...

The midnight air over the northern peaks of Azure State was bone-chilling and pitch-black. At precisely 01:30 AM, the steady, rhythmic thrum of two Boeing AH-64 Apache attack helicopters cut through the silent mountain valleys.

Inside the lead chopper, the pilot scanned the monochrome world through his night-vision goggles. To the Self-Defense Force command, this was a routine seek-and-destroy mission. The briefing had been sparse, ordering them to locate and eliminate two high-priority targets holed up deep within the rugged terrain with no names or background provided beyond the raw coordinates.

The pilot keyed his radio, his voice flat and professional against the steady hum of the cabin. "Lead to Chalk Two, approaching the ridge. Keep it tight."

His wingman responded immediately through the static. "Chalk Two, copy. No thermal signatures yet."

They were exactly ten miles from the target zone when the horizon shattered.

A blinding explosion of golden light erupted from the dead center of the mountain range. The radiance did not merely flash; it expanded instantly, ballooning into a massive, twenty-mile-wide dome of brilliant energy. To the pilots, it looked like a violent, premature sun rising rapidly from the west, casting a terrifyingly beautiful dawn over the jagged peaks.

Then came the pulse.

The moment the edge of the golden wave washed over the Apaches, the cockpit displays flickered violently and died. The green glow of the night-vision goggles vanished, plunging the pilots into absolute darkness. The digital instruments went pitch black as the fly-by-wire controls stiffened into heavy, unresponsive metal.

Worst of all, the roar of the twin turboshaft engines instantly cut out. The rotors gave a final, futile whine as the mechanical gears ground to a permanent, seized halt. Total, suffocating silence filled the cabin, broken only by the rush of passing wind.

The golden glow faded as quickly as it had arrived, leaving behind an ink-black night. Without power, the multi-million-dollar warbirds became nothing more than heavy bricks of falling steel, dropping rapidly toward the jagged rocks below.

The pilot gripped the useless cyclic control stick, his muscles straining against a dead hydraulic system. He could not even shout a warning over the radio, as the comms had gone completely dead.

Beside him, his co-gunner became a mere shadow in the dark, frantically flipping switches that no longer had electricity to spark them. Through the reinforced glass of the canopy, the absolute silence of the mountain peak rushed upward to meet them like a giant, dark wall. There were no alarms to scream and no eject buttons to press, leaving only the whistle of the wind and the terrifying, final realization of their descent.

Clark Lee was leading a tactical team of ten men when he heard the rotors of helicopters cutting through the night. With his advanced military knowledge, he recognized them instantly as SDF Apache attack helicopters coming to sortie on a lethal mission.

One of his soldiers stepped up beside him, checking a device. "Captain Lee, sir, I just got word from command. Those are our birds heading to kill our targets. What are your orders?"

Clark knew that his Lee clan had already written Melody off as waste, and only Raymond wanted her saved. He had strict orders to kill Rick Lee, leaving little room for hesitation.

Clark adjusted his grip on his weapon, his eyes tracking the distant shadows. "We continue—" His words died in his throat as a blinding flash of golden light exploded from the exact GPS coordinates they were tracking. By the time their vision returned, the sheer shockwave hit them.

Twin explosions echoed through the valley, violent and loud. The pair of Apache attack helicopters crashed into a rock wall not far ahead of them, erupting into massive fireballs of flame and thick smoke.

A sudden darkness swallowed the squad as they realized their equipment had failed. Their flashlights, devices, and every piece of gear that once relied on electricity had gone completely lifeless, leaving them under pure starlight.

The woman behind Clark shifted uncomfortably, her voice trembling in the dark. "Sir, was that an EMP bomb, or one of those nuclear weapons?"

Clark's danger sense spiked violently, prompting him to snap an immediate order to his ten troops. "Two Apache attack helicopters were wiped out, and the mission parameters have changed. We are pulling back, this mission is a failure."

The eleven soldiers all froze in their tracks. A strange woman's voice cut through the darkness, completely detached from their group.

"Hey Rick, look, our clothing problem is fixed, just don't get blood on the clothing, fufu."

I didn't waste a single second, instantly rushing right into the center of their formation and catching Clark completely off guard. I reached out, grabbing the barrel of his assault rifle and bending the heavy metal like a soft pretzel.

I looked back at Ling Ling, offering a wry smile in the shadows. "Why did you open your mouth? I was sneaking up on my old friend Clark here, sigh. Sorry Clark, you were born in the wrong branch family. I wish you were one of my Conservatives."

That was the absolute last thing Clark heard before everything went black for him. In a fraction of a second, the sounds of his entire team echoed through the clearing as they went completely silent.

After Ling and I broke through our meditation, we had heard the two distant crashes. Thanks to our heightened super-senses and almost limitless Chi, we easily detected Clark's group even from two miles away because they wouldn't stop talking in the silence, so we immediately launched our attack.

The massive golden explosion from earlier had ripped our clothing to absolute shreds, leaving the two of us completely butt-naked in the wilderness.

We needed replacement clothes immediately.

Ling Ling walked among the fallen soldiers, curling her lips in deep disgust as she inspected the gear. "Damnit Rick, they all shit themselves, we can't wear this stuff. Now what?"

I pulled off a relatively clean jacket from one of the bodies, wrapping it securely around my waist. "Let us go find some Shadows for clothes, haha. Damnit Ling, that was a much bigger event than you said it would be. Now the military will swarm this place, right?"

Ling grabbed a jacket for herself and wrapped two more around her waist like an awkwardly improvised dress, nodding in agreement. "That is right. We want the SDF to spend all their time looking in the hills for nothing. We snapped their necks only, and the only thing they will find was an EMP bomb at most. The blinding sun will bring reporters and draw attention away from Star City and all the Lee's deaths."

With the tactical situation fully settled and no other enemy troops left in the area, we took off into the night. We ran at stupidly high speeds to leave the forest and mountains behind, intending to order the shadows to disperse early once we secured proper clothing. Side by side, Ling Ling and I headed straight back to Star City.