Chapter 243: S-Class Cleanup Mission
Chapter 243: S-Class Cleanup Mission
“Hoo…”
Lu Xin breathed a long exhale and rolled his neck around.
It emitted a distinct crack.
Then he looked up at the people before him. Facing their varied expressions, he smiled sincerely.
“I’ll take the mission.”
“…”
A brief silence fell around them, though whether it held concealed worry beneath it was uncertain.
Yet, whether it was Professor Bai, Mr. Su, Minister Shen, Chen Jing, Han Bing from the comms channel, or even the armed soldiers who clutched their guns tightly, bodies taut as they stood guard nearby attempting invisibility – each one felt a flicker of anticipation stir in their hearts.
“Now…”
Han Bing’s voice sounded over the channel, carrying a slight tremor.
Thump!
It sounded like she smacked her own chest to steady her voice. She continued, “Now transmitting the mission information:
Cleanup Mission: S-Class Ability User Spiritual Entity and Residual Influences from Maritime Nation
Mission Level: S-Class
Executor: Lone Soldier
Information Analysis Specialist: Han Bing
Support Personnel: Lone Soldier Squad Member, Doll…”
“…”
Only after finishing this did she pause, her voice lowering to ask, “Mr. Lone Soldier, are you ready?”
“Ready.”
Lu Xin replied softly and picked up the pair of glasses from the case.
At that moment, the gazes of everyone around instinctively shifted towards him – or rather, towards the glasses in his hand.
When Lu Xin’s finger made contact with the glasses, the sensation that it was a living thing intensified.
He could even feel the cold metal frame give a slight twitch, as if it too experienced a trace of nervousness. But Lu Xin didn’t hesitate. He simply fixed his gaze on it for a moment, and the glasses immediately became inert once more, like a lifeless object again.
Pretty sneaky, he thought.
Lu Xin gave it a slight smile and then put them on.
Fzzzt…
A line of blue light swept vertically downward over the left lens.
Instantly, a clear electronic voice sounded near his left ear: “Retinal information recorded.”
“Baseline emotional threshold recorded.”
“Initialisation initiated…”
“…”
While streams of indecipherable data flickered across the lenses, Lu Xin’s attention remained fixed primarily on the frame itself.
He could distinctly feel it – as the frame rested against his temples, faint, thread-like filaments seemed to slowly seep into his skin. It felt as if the frame was becoming an extension of his own body.
A sensation of slight heaviness crept over his consciousness.
It was like his entire being was plunging into an infinite dark abyss, falling endlessly downward.
Until, abruptly, he heard the intense thumping of his own heart. Deep within the boundless darkness, a pair of utterly detached eyes snapped wide open.
“Hoo…”
Lu Xin jolted back to alertness, only to realize nothing had actually changed.
The glasses were still sitting steadily and innocuously on his face, indistinguishable from any ordinary pair of spectacles.
He lifted his head and looked forward. The scene before his eyes began to shift subtly.
The view through the left lens could zoom closer or pull further away continuously as he focused his gaze. When he fixed his focus on a specific object or person, a red frame even appeared on the lens, locking onto the target. Accompanying it, a line of data would pop up, displaying the Psychic Radiation value of that person or thing. It was altogether like a miniature, transparent LCD screen attached to his eye.
However, this function was only present on the left lens. The right eye remained unchanged, looking through an ordinary flat lens.
It was an uncanny sensation, truly, like having a tiny television set balanced on his face.
“…Can you hear me?”
“Mr. Lone Soldier? Can you hear me?”
“…”
The voice sounded again, but this time it came from the left side of the glasses frame, not his earpiece.
When Lu Xin had donned the glasses, the comms signal in his left ear earpiece had vanished, as if scrambled by interference.
“So they double as earphones…”
Lu Xin murmured in surprise, then chuckled. “These glasses really are advanced…”
Professor Bai’s expression turned slightly peculiar as he nodded. “Yes, we’ve incorporated some technological elements.”
What remained unsaid, yet palpably implied, was that the glasses truly were cutting-edge.
But compared to the sheer amount of tech crammed into this tiny frame, the miniature receiver embedded in the temple…
…Nevermind. They belong to him now anyway.
……
“Alright then, I’ll handle the task first.”
Having agreed, Lu Xin gave a slight nod to the group, turned, and strode forward.
He hadn’t gone far before he abruptly glanced back, finding Doll floating silently just behind him, matching his steps.
“Wait for me here. I’ll be back soon.”
He said this, even offering her a smile.
Doll simply lowered her head and kept moving forward.
Lu Xin frowned. “Acting like you can’t hear me will only make me angry.”
Doll paused, halted, and lifted her head. A faint expression of hurt flickered across her face.
“Wait for me in the car,” Lu Xin instructed again, his tone softening as he pointed towards the vehicle. He then resumed his walk.
Witnessing this peculiar interaction, the others exchanged discreet glances and pretended not to see.
……
After turning away, Lu Xin’s pace steadily quickened.
Before him loomed the colossal Red-Cloak Spiritual Monster, standing over a hundred meters tall.
Its immense presence dwarfed everyone in the city, reducing them to the insignificance of ants beneath the eerie glow of the moon. Its robe, an unnaturally vivid red under the moonlight, billowed open to reveal sheer chasms plunging into unfathomable depths within. An unseen agitation pulsed from those dark recesses, a tangible malice cloaked in shadow, radiating pure Fear…
From various distant districts across the city, ripples of distorted Psychic Energy converged. One by one, escaped Psychic Entities crawled towards the Red-Cloak, inexorably drawn by its pull.
The path was littered with victims of Contamination.
A desperate father cradled his child, weeping helplessly. A terrified young man clung to the legs of a girl stumbling forward in a trance.
An old man whose limbs jut out at unnatural angles scuttled rapidly along the ground, head craned backwards, eyes gleaming with Aberration. Before him, a cluster of children panicked in an alley, shielded by a plump teacher who spread her arms wide in a futile barrier.
……
“Agggh!”
An electric arc sizzled as Lu Xin fired, instantly turning the distorted old man into a pile of charred remains wreathed in energy.
He didn’t break stride, continuing forward without pause.
“Can I really deal with something like this?”
His mind raced. “I don’t even understand what it truly is. It’s difficult, of course.”
“But… what if I really could act without any caution whatsoever?”
“……”
A subtle shift occurred in his thinking. The glasses on his face provided a semblance of security, a shield of sorts.
A spark of eager excitement, intense and unfamiliar, began to kindle within him…
“For the Sake of the Second Stage, the others hid themselves…”
“But now, the Second Stage is complete… Surely there’s no need for such overwhelming caution any longer?”
“……”
The thought was liberating. Lu Xin’s steps grew lighter, significantly faster.
He remained merely an ordinary man, deliberately avoiding any power borrowed from his Little Sister. Even running, his speed was relatively slow amidst the landscape of ruined buildings, Contaminated thralls, and wrecked vehicles; he seemed utterly insignificant. Yet, as he ran, a joyful giggle suddenly pierced the air from the facade of a building ahead.
“Big Brother…”
“Here I come!”
Lu Xin looked up. On the building ahead, a small shadow was rapidly descending the wall.
It was the Little Sister he hadn’t seen for days. Beneath her messy, dark hair, her eyes shone unnaturally bright and full of life.
Like a delicate spider navigating the ruins beneath the Crimson Moon, she shimmied down vertically, calling out to him.
Lu Xin pushed the glasses up his nose with a finger and beamed, stretching his other hand out towards her.
Still over ten meters above the ground, she leapt fearlessly, landing with arms wide open to cling onto his arm.
In that moment, an entirely different power surged into Lu Xin.
His form flickered subtly, his speed instantly multiplying. He leapt effortlessly over the abandoned vehicles strewn across the asphalt.
Near the roadside ahead stood a woman carrying a satchel. She turned a gentle gaze towards Lu Xin and nodded slowly, approval in her eyes.
“That pair of glasses suits you well,” Mother remarked, expressing a rare satisfaction with his aesthetics.
“Is it sufficient?” Lu Xin returned her smile, looking directly at her.
“Sufficiency isn’t the point,” Mother replied softly. “The essence is, since you’ve achieved this Second Stage, it’s crucial to start repairing the relationship with him. We are family, living together day after day. What sense does it make to constantly live in mutual suspicion?”
Lu Xin found the advice sound. “Alright,” he agreed easily, nodding once.
……
“Grrrr…”
The radiation of Psychic Energy intensified dramatically.
The closer Lu Xin got to the East Sea Grand Hotel, the heavier the Psychic Energy pollution became.
For the observers, a distinct visual distortion began to manifest around Lu Xin’s form—wavering like a heat mirage. As their eyes adjusted, the distortion resolved into clear shapes: two distinct figures, one big, one small, walked alongside him, engaged in apparent conversation, laughing as they moved together towards the monstrosity.
Minister Shen sucked in a sharp breath, his pupils contracting to pinpricks. His hair practically stood on end.
An immense fury visibly welled up within him before he whirled towards Professor Bai, his voice thick with accusation.
“You old con man!”
“Didn’t you insist his ‘family’ wasn’t real? Didn’t you promise they’d vanish as he mastered his powers and solidified the Second Stage? Explain this then! What… what in hell are they doing here? Those two women—one big, one small—explain that!”
He spat the words out, voice cracking, his anger terrifyingly genuine.
Even Mr. Su couldn’t hide his disapproval, giving Professor Bai a reproachful look. “This won’t do next time, Professor.”
Chen Jing needed a moment longer than the others to fully grasp Professor Bai’s pivotal role in crafting this narrative.
“How can you say I’m a con man?”
Professor Bai looked genuinely affronted. He spread his hands in a gesture of innocence.
“Everything I stated was merely rational deduction based on existing evidence. Hypotheses. That’s all! Of course, being conjectural theory, a slight deviation in detail is perfectly… normal, isn’t it?”