Xia Lan: From Meeting a Martial Arts Girl

Chapter 50 The Feast

He should have known.

Zhang Lei and Liu Chuang appeared in the corridor and blocked his way. Their mission was to buy him time, trap him there, and make him focus all his attention on them.

Meanwhile, Lao Zhao used this time to move the cage to another location using some kind of Xia Lan technique that he didn't know about.

The art of detection.

He closed his eyes, and his primordial energy spread out from his body, covering a spherical space with a radius of fifty meters centered on him.

He found it.

At the very top of the banquet hall, Old Zhao was there, and so was the cage.

Lu Siye opened his eyes and looked up at the ceiling.

He withdrew his gaze and turned to walk towards the banquet hall.

The banquet hall has been reduced to ruins.

As Lu Siye walked into the banquet hall from the corridor, three tyrants turned around.

The primordial energy is almost gone.

The moment those three Tyrant Zeros attacked, a shell blasted them into dust.

Several soldiers stood at the entrance of the banquet hall, dressed in Siamese army uniforms, holding guns with smoke still rising from their muzzles.

When they saw Lu Siye, they hesitated for a moment.

Lu Siye didn't give them time to hesitate.

He sheathed his dagger at his waist, walked toward them, and raised his hands above his head to indicate, "I have no weapon, I am not the enemy."

He walked up to a soldier who looked like a captain, pointed to the assault rifle that had fallen from the hands of a dead soldier on the ground, and then pointed to himself.

The captain glanced at him, his gaze lingering on his face for a second, before nodding.

Lu Siye squatted down and picked up the rifle.

It was heavier than he had expected.

He checked the magazine; it was full, thirty rounds.

Pull the bolt, load the bullet, and release the safety.

He rested the butt of the rifle on his shoulder, muzzle pointing downwards, and his finger resting on the outside of the trigger guard.

He had never used a gun.

But some things don't need to be learned.

Pulling the trigger, aiming, and shooting—the basic logic of these actions is so simple that any person of normal intelligence can master them in a few minutes.

The difficulty isn't pulling the trigger, but pulling it without hesitation, without feeling sad, and without realizing you're doing something wrong.

Lu Siye, holding a gun, walked out of the banquet hall.

There were also some Ba Lings in the corridor, wandering around like ghosts in twos and threes.

These Tyrants are half human, which means they have very low resistance.

Bullets can penetrate their bodies, but not their ability to move, unless they hit specific nerve centers.

Zero hidden.

Destroying Zero will kill them.

It took Lu Siye a lot of effort to deal with them all.

The remaining few...

The bodies of the Four Symbols Heroes have been strengthened by Yuan Qi, making them impervious to ordinary bullets.

But if they don't activate their shields, a few bullets could kill them.

The gun is not Xia Lan's weapon, but it is the best weapon.

He suppressed these thoughts and continued walking forward with his gun in hand.

He encountered more guards.

They weren't barbarians; they were living people, palace guards, dressed in military uniforms, holding guns, standing at every corner of the stairwell.

Like the guests in the banquet hall, they were transformed into this thing by some force the instant the lights went out.

Lu Siye did not hesitate.

His movements, from clumsy to fluid, and from fluid to instinctive, became natural.

He met the first person who hadn't become a Zero on the fifth floor of the stairwell.

A young soldier, probably in his early twenties, was wearing an ill-fitting uniform, his hat was askew, and there were tear stains on his face. He was holding an assault rifle just like his, and the muzzle was trembling.

He almost pulled the trigger when he saw Lu Siye rushing up the stairs.

Lu Siye saw his index finger tighten on the trigger, the muscles bulging slightly beneath the skin of his finger.

"Don't shoot!" Lu Siye shouted.

The soldier's hand trembled, and his index finger slipped off the trigger.

He looked at Lu Siye, his eyes filled with fear.

"They...they turned into..." His voice was broken.

"I know," Lu Siyue said, slowing his speech, "Is there anyone else up there?"

The soldier shook his head. "They're all...dead...they've all turned into...that thing..."

His gaze fell on the gun in Lu Siye's hand, then moved away, as if confirming something, or perhaps avoiding something.

"You...you've come to rescue us?"

Lu Siye looked at him and remained silent for a second.

"No," he said, "I'm here to look for something."

He didn't wait for the soldier's reply, walked past him, and continued running uphill.

roof.

At the end of the stairs was an iron door, half-open, through which purple light peeked in.

Lu Siye stopped in front of the door and then kicked it open with his foot.

The roof is large and spacious.

The cage is in the center of the roof.

It was covered with black canvas, and the four corners were secured to the base of the cage with ropes, tied very tightly.

The canvas didn't move, the cage didn't move, and there was no one around.

Lu Siye's detection technique told him that Old Zhao was here, nearby, within his perception range, but he couldn't see him.

Old Zhao's primordial energy was too strong, so strong that it completely disrupted the accuracy of his detection technique.

He carried the gun and walked step by step toward the cage.

The gun barrel swept from left to right, and from right to left, passing through every corner where someone might be hiding.

He walked to the cage, squatted down, and placed his left hand on the canvas.

His fingers tightened.

Just as he was about to lift the canvas, he heard a voice.

"Si Ye"

His body stiffened.

"Siye, you've arrived."

The sound came from behind him, about five or six meters away.

Lu Siye did not move.

His hand was still on the canvas.

His mind went blank for a second.

This sound is wrong; it's too clear.

This is an illusion.

This is a trap.

But it was just that one second.

He sensed it.

A needle pierced the back of his neck.

The instant the needle pierces the skin.

His vital energy stopped flowing.

His hand slipped off the canvas.

A hand reached out from his chest.

From behind.

It went in through his back, came out through his chest, and pierced through his body.

Lu Siye lowered his head and looked at his chest.

There is a hole there.

He tried to stand up, but his legs wouldn't move.

He tried to shout, but his throat wouldn't move.

His consciousness became very light in that instant.

His consciousness went dark.

He stood in the darkness for a long time.

It might be a second, or it might be a year.

Then he saw the light.

The light spread out from beneath my feet, flowing in all directions and illuminating more of the ground and more of the space.

He saw a figure standing on the other side of the light, far away from him, so far that he couldn't see the face clearly, only the outline.

The person's silhouette looked familiar.

Xiang Dingkun.

Yi Songjin.

Su Nian.

Xiaoman (Grain Buds)

steamed stuffed bun.

Wen Ranran.

Liara.

They appeared one after another, looking at him one after another.

Lu Siye stood there, watching them disappear one by one.

The last one is Tang Yuan.

She stood on the other side of the light.

Lu Siye watched as her face gradually turned into golden specks of light.

He felt as if he had grasped something.

Some things he had never seriously thought about, or thought about but dared not admit.

What is Tang Yuan to him?

Family, friends, obsessions, habits, dependencies, or all of these combined, or something unique that he couldn't find the right words to name, something that belonged only to him.

The Xia Lan should protect the world.

But if you can't even protect your own family, what's the point of protecting the world?

The world is so vast that his vital energy is like a drop of water falling into the ocean, unable to even make a splash.

But Tang Yuan was very small, small enough to be held in his arms, small enough to be covered by his hands, small enough to be hidden in his heart, in that deepest, softest, and most untouched corner.

The light shattered.

"So annoying."

The sound fell from the white sky.

The voice was strange; it wasn't a man's voice, nor a woman's voice, but a mixture of both.

"Just like that red-haired brat, I always have to save the day."

Lu Siye opened his eyes.

He squinted for a moment, and only slowly opened his eyes after his pupils had adjusted to the light.

He lay on the ground, face up, and could see the sky.

There was no hole in his chest.

When you touch it with your fingers, the skin feels intact.

But there was a hole in his clothes, right in the center of his chest, the edges of which were soaked with blood. The area around the hole was covered in blood, and his clothes were wet and sticky against his skin, which was very uncomfortable.

He sat up.

The primordial energy flowed in the dantian, and it recovered, flowing more smoothly than before.

The mark of sin on the palm of his right hand was glowing.

He stared at the mark of sin for two seconds, then looked up.

Old Zhao was lying half-reclined five meters in front of him, his head tilted to one side, and there was blood at the corner of his mouth.

The canvas of the cage was lifted, and it was empty.

The creature disappeared.

Lu Siye stood up and walked towards Old Zhao.

Old Zhao looked at him, and the corner of his mouth twitched slightly.

"You..." Old Zhao's voice was very soft, "You are right."

Lu Siye looked at him without saying a word.

Lu Siye reached out and placed his palm on Old Zhao's forehead.

Old Zhao smiled.

That smile was awful.

The sound of a helicopter came from afar, growing closer and closer.

Not just one, but many.

Lu Siye looked at Lao Zhao, and Lao Zhao looked at him.

Their eyes met briefly in the air.

Lu Siye closed his eyes.

His right hand was on Lao Zhao's forehead, and his left hand was on Lao Zhao's chest.

He mobilized zero force.

Zero Force emerged from his palm and burrowed into Old Zhao's forehead.

Old Zhao opened his mouth, but no sound came out.

Then his body began to dissipate.

Then his body exploded from the inside.

In that instant, his flesh and blood body turned into nothingness, and a golden energy surged out from Lao Zhao's body, flowing into Lu Siye's body through his palm.

He stood up and turned around.

The helicopter was already overhead.

The searchlight beam shone down from the sky, enveloping him in a circular halo.

The light was so bright that he couldn't open his eyes. He shielded his face with his arm, and through the gap in his arm, he saw ropes hanging down from the helicopter.

Black figures slid down the rope, one, two, three, four, five.

They were dressed in black combat uniforms and wore black helmets, holding guns with the muzzles pointed at him.