Qin Jingzhou and Ling Jing hadn’t had a single moment of rest these days. Together, they’d made all sorts of “little gadgets,” most of which were things Ling Jing had dreamed of since childhood.
Ling Jing wasn’t the type to just talk big and let others do all the work, either. The moment she watched her boyfriend turn her dreams into reality one by one, she didn’t hesitate—she offered to handle all the “grunt work” herself. As an outstanding rune cultivator, she hand-crafted fifty thousand graphene processors in just a few days.
The job itself wasn’t difficult. It was just repetitive, mechanical labor that could be dreadfully tedious.
Qin Jingzhou didn’t comment on this openly, but inwardly he figured he’d use this opportunity to both strike at the enemy and give their group a little publicity. He hoped to attract more geniuses to join them. Once they'd received their basic introductory education, these new disciples could take on the hard work themselves.
While riding in the car, Qin Jingzhou hinted, “A little more experience won’t hurt anyone.”
He had installed compact offense-and-defense devices on both his daughter and her childhood friend, so he was perfectly clear on how the two kids were doing.
Ling Jing agreed as well. “Xiaoxiao is going to take over your mantle one day,” she said, usurping her brother to become the new Fate’s Son. “In the future, she'll have to weather countless storms. Even if she’s only seventeen, she shouldn’t keep living in a greenhouse.”
The driver that Chief Wang had assigned, as well as the chief coordinator in the passenger seat, understood—Professor Mi and his wife clearly meant these words for them and their superiors.
The driver reflected on the message.
The coordinator, meanwhile, immediately sent a report upstairs.
And the superior in question was none other than Chief Wang.
Speaking of Chief Wang, he’d just received a report. After learning that Mi Xiaoxiao and Gu Zhiyuan had been kidnapped on their way to school, he had mobilized his teams according to the original plan and then promptly took a rescue pill himself.
Previously, Professor Mi had mentioned that his daughter didn't like making a big fuss everywhere she went, so after consulting with his superiors, a pair of bodyguards were assigned to Mi Xiaoxiao—one in the open, one in the dark.
These two bodyguards, like those tasked with protecting Professor Mi himself, were top-tier elites from the most prestigious code-name units, specially equipped thanks to “private” subsidies from Professor Mi. Facing ten to one odds was nothing to them.
Under these conditions, the fact that both bodyguards were still defeated showed just how aggressive and ambitious the attackers were.
Not long ago, Professor Mi had released the structural diagrams for the neural interface chip and even allowed them to take the chip apart—so the experts from the Academy of Sciences and the Academy of Engineering successfully reverse-engineered... a complete graphene processor.
Now, over ninety percent of the key patents relating to graphene processors were held by Hua Country. Yet the graphene processor embedded in Professor Mi’s neural interface chip used none of the known patented technologies. Instead, through an exquisite crafting technique, he had built a three-dimensional graphene processor.
In an instant, Professor Mi’s importance rose dramatically in the eyes of the top brass.
Thinking about all this, Chief Wang couldn’t help but give a bitter smile. Even if the elders and high-level officials wanted to cherish Professor Mi, “The tallest tree in the forest is the one that gets felled by the wind.”
There was an eighty percent chance the enemy was from abroad, but if there was no mole on the inside... even he didn’t believe that.
After a moment’s thought, he was about to contact Professor Mi, when his secretary rushed in after knocking, reporting, “Professor Mi has just sent in the real location of his daughter and Gu Zhiyuan. He and Gu Xin, along with the entire security team, are already on their way over.”
Chief Wang became anxious. “How could you just let the professor run wild!”
Silently, the secretary handed over a phone. “They just filmed a short video,” he said, then slid a printed screenshot of the coordinator’s message onto Chief Wang’s desk.
Chief Wang finished watching the video and instantly leapt to his feet. “Get the car ready, bring plenty of camera equipment. We’re heading over now!”
Mr. Zhang and Elizabeth had teamed up to place an order on the darknet, bringing in a professional team that easily swept up Mi Xiaoxiao, Gu Zhiyuan, and both assigned bodyguards all at once.
The bodyguard who had always been by Mi Xiaoxiao’s side was critically wounded and unconscious.
The specialist team, made up of elite mercenaries and armed with heavy weapons, couldn’t care less about the life or death of the bodyguards. Their only directive was to keep Mi Xiaoxiao safe. As for Gu Zhiyuan, they had orders to avoid injuring him if possible, simply so he could be used as leverage against Mi Xiaoxiao.
The seemingly unremarkable squad captain even smiled as he reassured Mi Xiaoxiao, “We won’t hurt you, as long as your father hands over the schematics like we agreed.”
His Mandarin was surprisingly fluent, with only a slight accent.
Mi Xiaoxiao had been restrained. Her trusted “Pusher” self-defense device had also been confiscated—though the Pusher constantly required fingerprint and retinal verification to operate, and the kidnappers were never able to crack it after several failed attempts, so they simply gave up.
But her mouth hadn’t been gagged. She snorted. “All you want are the schematics?”
The captain replied openly, “What we want most is your father. As long as he’s willing, we’ll stop at nothing... to acquire him. This time we just want to get his attention, and take you and your little boyfriend with us.”
Mi Xiaoxiao snorted coldly, striving hard to appear calm as she glanced at her boyfriend bundled up like a silkworm chrysalis at her feet, and the unconscious bodyguard lying not far away. Inside, however, she was anxious: just as the captain said, she wasn’t especially worried about her own safety, but if no one came soon to save the young bodyguard... he might really die.
She’d rather let them take her away than have the young man die! Even if they hadn’t known each other long, he had made a deep impression on her—he was that sweet-smiling big brother.
What else did she have to offer? She struggled to think, hoping to persuade them to spare the young man’s life, even though she sensed they were doing this on purpose...
But before she could say another word, the captain’s expression shifted. He pressed his earpiece and said in English, “Mi Jingzhou is here.”
He immediately ordered the deputy commander and a few underlings to keep an eye on Mi Xiaoxiao while he took the rest of his men to check things out.
Mi Xiaoxiao watched as they left, becoming even more uneasy, her thoughts spiraling. She was sure her father would come fully armed and the authorities would do everything possible to rescue them, but these people were all trained desperadoes. Before, she’d wondered what people meant when they described someone as “radiating murderous intent” in novels, but now she saw it herself... and it was real.
If negotiations with her father broke down—and of course they would—these people would just use her as a bargaining chip. She should have brought more bodyguards, but then again, what good would bringing a dozen or more have done? The enemy could simply send more attackers after sizing up her security.
Suddenly, she felt it was fate—no matter what she did, this ordeal was inevitable.
Resigned, Mi Xiaoxiao looked at the so-called deputy commander, who was sitting there squinting at her. She thought of Mr. Zhang’s disgusting gaze and realized that with his involvement, if she really got taken away, there was a good chance her childhood friend would end up dead, even if the bodyguards’ fate was uncertain.
Her heart began to pound wildly. The deputy commander met her eyes and deliberately got up, moving toward her—when suddenly, there was an enormous crash. A huge hole was blasted in the ceiling, and as she looked up, she could see a few points of light. Then, a roaring noise filled her ears. Maybe it wasn’t all that loud objectively, but in her mind, it was thunderous...
In the well-soundproofed room where they were holding her, the deputy commander and several of his men went down instantly—five of them dropped on the spot. The only two left who could still move barely had time to draw their weapons before the second volley took them out.
Then, special forces soldiers with the Hua Country insignia on their shoulders and chests came pouring in through the hole above.
Mi Xiaoxiao’s eyes stung with tears, and though she tried to hold back, she couldn’t stop a few from falling.
The young man who rushed over first to cut her ropes was barely able to hide his joy, saying a long sentence to her, “Professor Mi... just wait until you see outside, it’s nuts, no wait, sorry... this is literally sci-fi come to life!”
Mi Xiaoxiao blurted out, “No way—my dad built another miracle device? And I didn’t even know?”