Volume Two: Setting Out to War! Chapter Eighty-Five: Chaos

As the plane drew near the skies above Nakamura Safe Zone, the fighting below caught Liu Cong’s eye. Countless mutated creatures surged like a tide, crashing again and again against the Japanese defensive line.

In the chaotic exchange of fire, roars and gunshots mingled into one. Smoke drifted thick through the air, and the severed limbs and bodies of mutated beasts lay scattered everywhere. It was plain this battle had raged for a long time.

Seeing that the line below was about to collapse, Liu Cong’s aura erupted. In a single breath he condensed hundreds of black feathers of slaughter and sent them shooting downward.

Only when these black feathers neared the ground did they seem to detect their targets, locking on with slight delay before striking.

So the killing feathers had only a limited range of perception. To hit enemies far away, they had to be thrown to work at all. Liu Cong witnessed the whole process and silently noted it to himself.

Hundreds of black feathers fell from the sky at once, instantly reversing the tide of battle. They flashed through the mutated horde like lightning, as though streaks of black light were binding those creatures together. When the black radiance faded, every beast it touched fell dead. Each corpse bore dozens of piercing wounds, a truly horrifying sight.

The vast, densely packed mass of black monsters was suddenly slain in an instant by those lightning-fast strikes, solving a major problem for the defenders. The soldiers all looked up at the sky and, seeing the transport planes flying in orderly formation, finally understood.

“It’s that Huaxia sword immortal who saved us!”

The good news from the front line soon reached Nakamura Masao’s ears. He hurried to the window, leaned out to look, and upon seeing the formation of transport planes above the safe zone, quickly made his way to the temporary airfield to welcome them.

“The planes are here! The planes are here!”

The residents, still lined up in long queues, cried out in excitement at the sight of the aircraft. After four hours of waiting, the planes had finally returned. During those four hours, no one had been willing to line up again; everyone wanted to board sooner, to leave this land sooner.

The ceaseless gunfire outside had also reached them. These Japanese residents, frightened for so long, finally saw the planes they had been waiting for and rushed forward in a frenzy, the lines breaking apart at once.

“Everyone, get back in line! One by one!”

By the time Nakamura Masao arrived, this was what he saw. Since most of the troops had been temporarily reassigned to defend the front line, only a little more than a dozen soldiers remained to keep order here. The surging crowd immediately scattered the barrier they had erected and swarmed toward the aircraft that had not yet landed inside the airfield.

A terrible stampede broke out once more. Nakamura Masao saw with his own eyes a little girl of about ten years old separated from her mother by the crowd, then swallowed by the press of bodies. Through the dense gaps, he could faintly make out fragments of the girl’s red dress. Before long, blood-red footprints began appearing on the ground.

The little girl’s mother was carried forward by the flow of people. She kept turning back, over and over, trying to find her daughter’s figure, yet before she was pushed into the airfield, she never found a chance to look back even once.

The crowd continued to press together, and scenes of tragedy kept unfolding. Nakamura Masao stood frozen in place, feeling strength drain from his limbs. On the ground, those filthy scraps of red cloth stabbed into his heart like a blade. He thought of his own daughter, who was about the same age. In his memory she was always wearing a red dress, always looking up at him with a sweet smile. Was she all right now?

“C-Chief, are you all right?”

Though the secretary was also heartbroken by the little girl’s fate, she quickly noticed the abnormal look on Nakamura Masao’s face. Tugging lightly at his sleeve, she asked in a low voice.

Nakamura Masao slowly turned his stiff neck to look at her. Her youthful, lovely face bore a slight resemblance to his late wife. “Sari, do you think this is Heaven trying to destroy our country? Why are there so many nations in the world, and yet it is we who must bear so much of this?”

The secretary let out a soft sigh. “I don’t know why this is happening, but I believe it will all pass.”

“Pass? I’m afraid the disaster hasn’t even passed before it’s already driven people mad. Look at these people who have lost their reason. They’re all insane!”

“......”

The immense chaos stirred up by over a hundred thousand people could not be stopped once it began. If Liu Cong had not timely halted the plane’s descent, those men shouting beneath the wheels would have been crushed into paste.

“These people are simply outrageous! If they all crowd here like this, how are we supposed to get anyone on board? I’m afraid the moment the cabin door opens, they’ll burst it apart,” Zhao Tian said, frowning.

Wang Na rubbed her forehead weakly. “I knew it. Even with a leg to lean on, this mission was bound to run into some nonsense.”

“What on earth are these people thinking? Do they imagine that by crowding here, they’ll all get on the plane? If it’s become this chaotic, how are we supposed to land? With people trampling one another, who knows how many will die.”

“Alas, let’s just see how Commander Liu handles it.”

Not only Zhao Tian and Wang Na, but even the Korean pilots found this situation deeply vexing.

Liu Cong took a deep breath and forced down the irritation churning within him. Moments earlier, he had even entertained the thought of finding Nakamura Masao, taking the documents, and leaving at once.

After calming himself, Liu Cong also realized that his temper had been growing increasingly irritable. Perhaps it was because so many people had always yielded to him and obeyed him without question; now that someone had gone against his will, his balance of mind had been upset. Or perhaps it was simply the effect of his growing power.

But with the crowd blocking things up below, there was no way forward. If he wanted to continue the mission, he had to calm them down first. Liu Cong took out his phone, only to find that too much of its charge had been wasted on G15; it was already powered off.

“Is there anyone who can speak Japanese? I need help,” Liu Cong said into the headset.

“I can!”

“I can!”

Two voices answered in quick succession, one male and one female. The male voice was unfamiliar, but the female voice Liu Cong recognized immediately: it was Kim Soo-ji.

Flying over to the transport plane where Kim Soo-ji was seated, Liu Cong opened the side door. Under Li Jun’s astonished gaze, he took Kim Soo-ji by the hand and led her out.

Led by Liu Cong, Kim Soo-ji stepped blankly to the hatch. Beyond it was a drop of dozens of meters, and she subconsciously stopped in place.

“Keep walking. Nothing will happen,” Liu Cong said with a smile.

Kim Soo-ji bit her lip and cautiously extended her left foot. The moment it reached outward, a black stairway suddenly appeared beneath it. When she stepped on it, a solid force returned underfoot.

No longer hesitating, she followed Liu Cong and strode out above the crowd. With every step they took, a black stair would appear in time beneath them, and after they passed, it would vanish.

Only when they reached the air above the crowd did Liu Cong speak again. “Listen carefully. You will translate for me, understand?”

Kim Soo-ji brushed back her hair, blown loose by the wind, and nodded softly.

“You know, your foolish behavior has angered me. I’ll give you two choices now: first, you can keep crowding here, and I will take the planes back to China, and I will no longer care whether you live or die.”

After Liu Cong finished, Kim Soo-ji translated it at once without the slightest hesitation. Her voice, carried by Liu Cong’s control, drifted to every corner of the square.

At these words, the already noisy crowd erupted again. The sword immortal is abandoning us! Liu Cong’s words were like a bomb, detonating the panic in the crowd, and voices rose everywhere pleading with him not to go.

“Second, go outside, line up properly, and board the planes one by one. Which do you choose?”

“Two! We choose two!”

The crowd frantically held up the gesture for two, terrified that this sword immortal might misunderstand something.

Liu Cong curled the corner of his mouth. “Very good. Now, on my command, exit slowly and in order through the entrance and form a line. Anyone who dares to run or push even once will not be allowed onto the plane.”

The unrest in the crowd immediately subsided. Under Liu Cong’s command, those closest to the outside went out first to line up. In this way, those who had pressed furthest forward would be forced to stand furthest back once they came out, and that was the punishment Liu Cong gave them.

Kim Soo-ji watched his profile. It was the first time she had seen this man, usually so gentle and ethereal, reveal such an overbearing side. He resolved such a chaotic situation in only a few words, and a stirring unease rose within her, quickening her breath slightly.

“What’s wrong? Did I scare you?” Liu Cong turned to look at her, his eyes puzzled.

Kim Soo-ji’s pretty face flushed red. She avoided his gaze, though her clasped hand had already tightened, her fingers interlacing as she held his hand in return.