Chapter 82: Rescue
The heavily armored Sabertooth slammed on its brakes, sliding to a halt in the canyon with a harsh screech of rubber that kicked up a thick cloud of dust.
Prone on the vehicle’s reinforced roof, Dragon Emerging from the Sea kept his sniper rifle braced against his shoulder. His cold crosshairs remained locked onto the three survivors before him—focusing primarily on Chen Feng.
The cab doors burst open, and two squad members leaped out into the sand. Taking up defensive positions on either flank of the truck, they raised their weapons, eyeing Master Cloud Cliff and Old Demon of Xiangxi with intense caution.
The air in the canyon stretched as tight as a drawn bowstring.
Dragon Emerging from the Sea had no idea who these strange figures were. Seeing that the Daoist priest and the smoking hermit made no move to attack, he issued crisp, decisive commands:
“Sister Cai, finish off the man on the ground!”
“Old Wang, get to the boss’s hearse and take the coffin!”
Because a living person was now resting inside the casket, the system rules prevented it from entering the Space Jade Bangle. It had to be hauled on the roof of the armored hearse.
Old Wang gave Old Demon of Xiangxi a wide, wary berth. Seeing that the smoker didn’t even twitch, he sprinted toward Lin Huai’s idle vehicle parked nearby.
Lin Huai’s hearse was equipped with an autonomous navigation system, but activating it required voice authorization from its owner. Unable to engage the autopilot, Old Wang climbed straight into the driver’s cab, gripped the wheel, and started the engine manually.
Down in the dust, Chen Feng looked up to see a fierce, heavily muscled woman charging straight toward him with a steel spear. Panic seized his chest. Scrambling across the ground on his ruined knee, he dragged himself to Master Cloud Cliff’s boots, grabbing the hem of the Daoist robe with bloodstained hands.
“Master, save me! Please, save my life!” he begged, his voice trembling with terror. “I know… I know where the young man you’ve been searching for is! I swear on my life! If you save me, I’ll tell you everything!”
Master Cloud Cliff looked down at him, his expression completely flat. “Are you certain? If you dare play me for a fool again, I will end your life with my own hands.”
Chen Feng nodded desperately, his voice cracking: “I’m certain! I swear it!”
Just then, Sister Cai’s long spear arrived. The steel point whistled through the air, aimed straight at Chen Feng’s throat!
Master Cloud Cliff gave his horsetail whisk a casual flick. The supple white hairs appeared as light as silk, yet they carried the weight of a falling mountain. With a soft chime, the whisk effortlessly parried the spear tip, halting the thrust in mid-air.
Sister Cai’s pupils narrowed in pure shock. This unassuming Daoist possessed strength far beyond anything she had imagined!
Snapping the spear back to a defensive guard, she glared at him and shouted, “You stubborn old priest! Out of my way!”
Right then, Old Wang floored the accelerator, steering the massive hearse across the rocks with a low roar. High above, the green jade coffin seemed to sense the vehicle’s presence, drifting through the air to hover steadily over its roof.
Seeing the hearse in position, Dragon Emerging from the Sea shouted from the roof of the Sabertooth: “Sister Cai, fall back! Our priority is getting the boss out of here—do not get bogged down!”
If You’re Bad, Practice More ground her teeth in frustration, but she knew Lin Huai’s life hung by a thread, and dozens of hostiles were closing in from outside the valley.
Glaring daggers at Master Cloud Cliff, she banished her spear into her inventory, spun on her heel, and vaulted into the passenger seat of the Sabertooth.
Without a second of delay, the two vehicles reversed and tore out of the canyon.
Sprawled in the sand, Chen Feng let out a ragged breath, his brush with death giving way to pure, venomous rage. He opened his squad comms, his raspy voice dripping with malice across the open channel:
“All units, listen to me! Intercept the survivors from Zone 444 at all costs! Shoot to kill! Leave none of them breathing!”
Outside the canyon mouth, the plains were already engulfed in chaos. Seeing the tactical lights of the Sabertooth flashing through the dust, the Three Knight Brothers executed a textbook flanking maneuver. Their vehicle-mounted turrets opened fire simultaneously, carving a smoking corridor through the enemy lines for the Sabertooth and the hearse.
Peace and Violence’s mobile communications van, Jiangzhehu Inheritor’s luxury RV, Milk Tea Seven Parts Sugar’s ambulance, and Cute and Sparkling’s food truck were idling behind a cluster of boulders just outside the combat zone.
As for Old Wang’s heavy flatbed truck and Sister Cai’s modified off-road vehicle, both had been safely stored inside the Space Jade Bangle earlier to keep the convoy nimble.
The moment the vanguard broke through the choke point, the support vehicles fired their engines and fell into tight escort formation.
Behind them, however, the desert erupted. Having received Chen Feng’s kill order, dozens of drivers from Sector 888 swarmed across the dunes like starving wolves, roaring engines filling the air as they gave relentless chase.
Against such overwhelming numbers, the Three Knight Brothers alone couldn’t hold the line.
Checking his rearview mirror, Dragon Emerging from the Sea watched the pursuing pack close the distance. He tapped his headset, his tone calm and steady:
“Lawyer He, broadcast a distress call across the sector. Rally every driver from Zone 444 to form a defensive line and cover the boss’s extraction!”
In addition to monitoring regional chatter, Peace and Violence’s communications van was built for wide-band transmissions. Even though the instance lacked a public chat lobby, his onboard equipment could bypass the limitation to broadcast across encrypted channels.
It was this very feature that had allowed him to locate Dragon Emerging from the Sea, Miss Jiang, and the delivery brothers in the first place.
At Dragon Emerging from the Sea’s command, Lawyer He quickly brought up his console.
The heavy transmitter mounted atop his van hummed to life. While it produced no audible sound in the desert, it operated like high-powered radar, pulsing a wide-area emergency broadcast across every vehicle frequency linked to their home district:
“All Zone 444 drivers, attention. All Zone 444 drivers, attention. This is Peace and Violence. Any survivor receiving this signal, please move immediately to the southwestern valley to provide covering fire and intercept hostile pursuers from Sector 888!”
“Repeating: all Zone 444 drivers, attention. Move to the southwestern valley to support our vanguard and block Sector 888!”
The message repeated across the airwaves. Within minutes, scattered vehicles across the desert dunes turned their wheels, accelerating toward the signal’s source!
Hostile fire was still pelting the convoy’s rear armor when the first wave of Zone 444 drivers slammed into the battlefield. Recognizing the familiar lights of the Sabertooth and the distinctive hearse, the local drivers engaged without hesitation, crashing into Sector 888’s flank to cut off the pursuit.
A massive, chaotic skirmish erupted across the open flats. With friendly forces arriving to balance the field, Dragon Emerging from the Sea ordered the convoy to pull over in a sheltered gully.
The core squad gathered anxiously around the hearse, staring up at the hovering jade coffin.
Dragon Emerging from the Sea’s face was dark with worry. “Milk Tea, do you have any medicine stronger than a Guiyuan pill? The boss is critically injured.”
Milk Tea Seven Parts Sugar nodded frantically, tears welling in her eyes. Reaching into her bag, she pulled out a dark, fragrant sphere with trembling hands. “A Nine Revolutions Soul Returning Pill… As long as someone has a single breath left, it brings them back to full health instantly! This is the only one I have—hurry, give it to Sister Bone Ash!”
Old Wang leaned out of the hearse’s passenger window, scratching his head in sheer frustration. “The boss’s console is far too complicated! I can’t figure out which switch controls this thing. How do we get the casket down to reach her?”
Dragon Emerging from the Sea thought back to how the casket had broken free from the spatial bangle on its own, flying leagues across the desert to rescue its master. Taking a slow, steady breath, he stepped directly beneath the floating artifact and called out in a respectful, earnest voice:
“We are Bone Ash’s teammates. We’re here to treat her wounds. Please… come down and open up.”
Standing nearby, Peace and Violence pushed his glasses up his nose, his legal mind analyzing the situation logically: “As remarkable as the boss’s coffin is, it’s still a magical object. It can’t possibly understand human speech, can it? That would be a bit too—”
Before the words could leave his mouth, the heavy green jade casket slowly descended through the air, settling gently into the bed of the hearse.
With a soft scraping sound, the massive lid slid aside on its own, revealing Lin Huai lying motionless within, her face as pale as winter snow.
Sister Cai let out a sharp breath, her jaw dropping in sheer disbelief. “No way… It actually understood you?!”
