Chapter 163: More Explosions and Mission Successful

BOOM!A flash of light lit up the night and a cloud of smoke filled the entire van and spilled to the outside.

The guards who were unlucky enough to inhale it quickly fell to the ground one after the other.

Madam Xu turned to the entrance after hearing the sound, a frown on her face.

"Was that an explosion?" The avatar asked, sarcasm dripping from his tone, "I hope your guards are okay."

"You think this is a game?" Madam Xu asked, her anger evident on her face.

"Well, if it is," the avatar leaned forward, its blue eyes glowing a bit, "I’m winning."

Zhao Ming and the few guards that were sent to the basement came back, his face pale as he reported, "M-Madam... she’s gone."

Madam Xu slowly turned to him, her expression completely cold and unreadable. "What did you just say?"

Zhao swallowed hard, forcing the words out. "They used the eastern stairwell to get into the basement. The guards stationed there are unconscious, and the woman... she’s gone." Fresh chapters posted on N0veI.Fiɾe.net

Madam Xu’s jaw tightened, her fingers curling into fists. "...Find her," she said finally, her voice dangerously low.

"But Ma’am, you’ll be—"

"I said FIND HER!" she snapped, interrupting his words. "They couldn’t have gone far. The entire estate is sealed. Lock every gate, search every inch of this property. Now!"

Zhao nodded quickly and rushed out, barking orders in Mandarin to the remaining men.

"Oh please try and find them," the avatar on the screen said with a chuckle, "but all that search will end up being useless."

"So what now?" Jian Long who had been silently looking at the screen suddenly spoke up, "you think after saving her, that’s the end."

"I’m pretty sure it is," the avatar replied.

"Well, you’re mistaken," Jian Long said with a smile of his own, "you seem to forget that this is China, in other words, my turf."

"You might’ve gotten Lillian safely out of our hands, but how will you get her to yours?" He continued, "after all, every cop, new stations and major corps here is directly or indirectly under my fingertips, you saving her is just a minor inconvenience which will be fixed within a day or two."

"Hmm," the avatar placed a hand under his chin, seemingly thinking about it before coming to a conclusion, "you’re right, she really can’t leave without you getting notified."

His words caused the smile on Jian’s face to widen, but the next words immediately wiped that smile off his face.

"Then I’ll just have to get you out of the equation right?" There was a terrifying look in the eyes of the avatar as it looked directly at Jian.

The the silence that followed afterwards was pretty loud, as both madam Xu and Jian looked at the avatar, they wanted to laugh off the threat, but for some reason, they couldn’t.

Although Jian was the one called the reaper, he felt as if the literal reaper had his scythe on his neck right now.

"Alright then, I’ll see you two soon," The avatar hopped off his cube before pausing, "oh and, I left a gift for you two, hope you enjoy."

With that, the screen went black, leaving the two just standing there.

***

Zhao and the guards walked to the courtyard, only to be faced with a scooter parked there, a delivery bag strapped to it.

One of the guards moved forward with caution and slowly opened the bag. The moment it was fully open, the sound of a kid was heard within.

"Oh you want a fried noodle?"

The accent was cartoonishly overdone. It was high-pitched, nasal, and almost mocking.

Everyone froze.

The voice continued, cheerful and extremely, "Or maybe... extra spicy?"

Zhao’s eyes widened in horror. "Get back!" he shouted, but it was already too late.

The delivery bag let out two beeps,

Beep. Beep.

And then,

BOOOOOOM!

***

"Hehehe," Zero let out a cheeky chuckle as the van continued moving forward, away from the Mansion.

Bypass and Silk sat at the driver’s and Passenger’s seats respectively not a single word being exchanged but there was an undeniable smile of satisfaction on their faces.

In the back of the van, Zero was having fun transforming to most of his team members, thanks to the Mimic Nico had lent him, as she had promised.

One moment, he was Tag, the next he was Bypass and so on.

He continued for a minute or two before the thing glitched and switched off, causing him to sulk and move towards Nico who was silently sitting on one of the chairs in the van.

Juno, had immediately gone to sleep the moment his head touched the van’s seat and there was barely anything that would wake him up at this point.

Though, there was no need for him to wake up since the mission had been completed.

And finally, laying on another seat, deeply asleep was the target of their mission... Lillian Hayes.

She had gone to sleep still in captive and despite all the noise caused, she had calmly slept through it all.

Well, that was mostly because of the knock out gas Juno and Zero had used to deal with the guards stationed in the basement...after all, engaging them would just delay and give the others time to catch up.

And it’d also delay Juno’s time to return to sleep, something he had no intention of doing.

So they had pumped the room full of gas, knocked out the guards and successfully got her out.

Tag leaned back on his chair, relief washing over him, he had ditched his trench coat after realizing exactly how cringe he looked in it.

He now wore a simple black leather jacket, with matching pants.

Tag, looked through the cameras as his team left behind the Mansion. He was glad that everything had gone smoothly, else OmniTech would’ve had their heads.

He was still terrified of the man, even moreso when he learnt his identity, especially given how young he was.

"Good job team." He muttered with a sigh.

All that remained right now was to get Lillian to their boss.