Chapter 16 – Salvation

A figure in white suddenly zipped past Li Yiming and Ji Xiaoqin. In the midst of her jump, Qing Linglong closed her fists. Two daggers, each reminiscent of the crescent of a nascent moon, appeared in her hands. Glowing indigo markings were carved onto the short, rustic blades. These blades were her talent—Moonshadow Daggers. Every time Qing Linglong spun her body, and the daggers sliced through the air, crescent-shaped indigo glares would follow the blades where they traveled.

With Qing Linglong now joining the fray, the situation improved slightly, but the prospects were still grim. Xiang Liu’s body had become nearly transparent now. Suddenly, the violet flame around the camouflager’s body was extinguished, only to erupt ever stronger in the next instant. He suffered two strikes from Qing Linglong to his back and reached out for another two of Xiang Liu’s heads. Two more purple blossoms and the heads liquefied.

Now only five heads remained, and Xiang Liu itself was stripped of all of its ferociousness. Not only did its body seem more ethereal than ever, its size had shrunk down to barely three meters.

The camouflager dashed towards Xiang Liu, stopping Qing Linglong’s daggers once again with his left hand. A swift kick directed at Qing Linglong’s face forced her to retract her weapons and cross them together to block the blow.

Thud! Although Qing Linglong managed to protect her head, the momentum of the strike sent her flying until she crashed into the building on the opposite side of the street.

The camouflager glanced at Xiang Liu, who was no longer a threat, and strolled towards Li Yiming. The fierce fight that had barely concluded seemed to not have affected him at all.

One step... Two steps...

As the camouflager came closer and closer, Li Yiming wrapped his arms around Ji Xiaoqin tightly.

Tatatatatatat... The continuous firing of the L86A2 machine gun was heard—Wu Jie had taken the rifle and jumped out from behind the car.

"You’ve been enlisted by National Security..." Upon hearing this short sentence, Wu Jie knew that today would be unlike any other in his life. ’Speeding... Beauties... Heavy weapons... And this man who fell from the sky, then Vice-Commissioner Wang and that weird snake...’ Wu Jie was beyond excited. He realized that it was not just a different day for him, but a different world he had just stepped into. One that he had dreamt about ever since he was a child.

’National Security? To hell with that... These guys are the Dragon Team. The most mysterious and the strongest organization in the country!’ Wu Jie, who had since long been poisoned by the clichés of online novels, cried out inwardly. 1

With the L86A2’s rapid rate of fire, Wu Jie had emptied his bullets within thirty seconds. A clicking noise could be heard as he continued pushing the trigger down. However, the three hundred bullets he had fired resulted in nothing more than a rippling of the purple fire which surrounded the camouflager’s body. The latter swung his arm in contempt and Wu Jie, to his surprise, was blasted away by a bolt of lightning, falling limply down on the ground.

Bang! Another gun shot was heard. The camouflager jumped back, and a slowly expanding crater appeared where he had stood. He turned his head around and threw a cold look at a skyscraper in the distance; he recognized the gun which inflicted a wound upon him a while ago. The bullets, also Made in Secret Domain, were capable of breaking his self-protection spell. The light around him concentrated into another dark purple orb in his right palm, and he hurled it toward the skyscraper.

"Eyeglasses! Run!" Qing Qiaoqiao cried.

fraction of second later, the center of the skyscraper was obliterated. The projectile inflicted a similar damage on the several buildings behind its initial target and flew into the distance. Then, a deafening explosion could be heard.

Li Yiming was speechless as he looked at the gaping hole left in the middle of the skyscraper. The camouflager, by that time, however, had turned back and looked back at where Qing Linglong had crashed with severity. The clouds and winds above her were sucked down from the sky in a spiral and formed a shape reminiscent of Qing Linglong’s Moonshadow Daggers.

Grandma Wang, with visible traces of despair etched on her face, firmed her determination and performed another seal with her hands. After spitting out three mouthfuls of blood, Xiang Liu’s body convulsed and its five remaining heads disappeared one by one, until only one remained. Then, its form shrunk until it was no longer than two meters and suddenly snaked towards the camouflager, binding him in place. The latter realized the seriousness of the threat and once again discharged his flame around his body. However, despite the shrills of pain, Xiang Liu did not allow the camouflager to escape its restraint.

The huge blade that had materialized as a result of the confluence of clouds swung down on the camouflager at that precise instant. The latter met it with blazing eyes as black lightning bolts ran down the intensifying purple blaze that surrounded him. Right before the blade struck him, the snake that coiled around his body was cut to pieces by a sudden surge of black light. The camouflager joined his hands together and pushed upward, creating a shrieking noise as his palm met the billowing blade.

Qing Linglong clenched her teeth as the indigo light around her converged into her projected weapon. The flame around the camouflager danced as if it was boiling and onyx sparks accumulated in his palms. "Go!" With a mighty roar, his black garments were pulverized into smithereens and a ray of pure blackness rose into the sky, obliterating the cloudy dagger that had held it to the ground.

Qing Linglong had finally reached her limit. She fell down unconscious from where her summoned wind had lifted her. With a panting breath, the camouflager cast away his black lightning, and what little remained from the purple flame dwindled in the wind. Only his right palm remained tainted by a purple color. He threw a cold look in Li Yiming’s direction. Both Li Yiming and Ji Xiaoqin shuddered when they saw his unmasked face.

The camouflager’s appearance brought shock and fear to Li Yiming... Whereas Ji Xiaoqin threw at him a look full of guilt, as if she had known him for a long time. The camouflager looked just like Li Yiming. Even the wrinkles around his eyes and the unshaved chin were the same. The only difference was in the expressions they wore. One was full of naivety whereas the other was cruel and cold.

"Li Yiming-!" Qing Qiaoqiao’s shout came from the ruins of the emergency building. "Shoot him!"

’Shoot?’ Li Yiming instinctively reached for the Desert Eagle stuffed into his belt. He had taken the gun before he had entered the hospital. He shared the pair of pistols with Wu Jie. When the camouflager heard Qing Qiaoqiao’s shout, he raised his eyebrow mockingly and did not even bother to turn his head. His emotionally turmoiled gaze remained fixated upon Ji Xiaoqin

"Shoot! Now!" Qing Qiaoqiao aligned the index and middle finger on both of her hands and pointed at her temples. Her pupils suddenly shifted to a bright red color. To the camouflager’s shock, he found himself unable to move an inch. It was finally the turn for Qing Qiaoqiao’s talent: charm. Her attempt would not have succeeded under normal circumstances, but when the camouflager had also exhausted his strength, she was able to achieve a temporary paralysis.

"Quick!" Blood seeped out of Qing Qiaoqiao’s eyes, ears, nostrils, and mouth.

Li Yiming pulled out his pistol, aimed and shot.

"NOOOO!" Ji Xiaoqin, who had stayed in his arms until now, suddenly leaped toward the camouflager.

Bang! Li Yiming had already pressed the trigger.

The 8.8 mm bullet was catapulted from the barrel and heated up to an amber red streak as it cut through the air. It entered Ji Xiaoqin’s body through the back and emerged from the front; it even had enough power left to cause blood to spray from the camouflager’s chest. Ji Xiaoqin fell into the camouflager’s arms from the momentum of her leap.

"Yi... Ming... I’m... Sorry..." Ji Xiaoqin collapsed against the camouflager’s body. Her breathing gradually became strained and had to be forced out. Every now and then, she coughed up blood from her mouth. The camouflager completely ignored his wounds, and his attention remained solely focused on Ji Xiaoqin, visibly shocked by her actions.

"I... I regret it so much... I... Really... Really... Really regret it... Please... Forgive me..." Ji Xiaoqin’s voice waned. She lifted her hand with difficulty to caress the camouflager’s face as her pupils gradually dilated.

"Forg... Forgive me... Please... Okay..." Ji Xiaoqin’s arm fell down, limp, and became still after a few gentle swings.

The camouflager did not speak a single word, only nodding his head mechanically. He clung onto Ji Xiaoqin’s body as tightly as he could as tears dribbled down his cheeks. Li Yiming could not bear looking at the two. His pistol slid down and fell onto the ground. He forgot about everything else as he looked at the couple in front of him. For a moment, he felt the truest, most genuine kind of happiness.

The camouflager’s body started to fade away, and it was not long before he turned into thousands of light orbs that spread out in the oncoming wind. However, one of them, a purple orb, entered Li Yiming’s left palm after a barely noticeable change in its trajectory. The buildings, the people, everything that had surrounded Li Yiming suddenly distorted and vanished. The crumbling skyscraper, the craters on the ground—they all disappeared as if time itself had rewinded, replaced gradually by noisy crowds and hurrying pedestrians. The entrance to the hospital had finally regained its usual busy state.

Sitting on the stairs right in front of Li Yiming, a middle-aged woman, plainly dressed and carrying her medical records in a plastic bag, listened to a song which was being played on her cell phone with her eyes shut.

If love lives on sharing and chains you like fetters,

Then hate, more than anything, depends on freedom.

Love and hate coiling and twisting togetherTell me, what can I do to save you?

If love is spilt milk,Then who can protect whom?

For whom will my heart wait?Tell me, what can I do to save you?If passion is a fatal poison,

Then who can protect whom?How can I make this love immortal? 2

"Low level secret domain completed. Ten life marks awarded."

"Special secret domain completed. Twenty life marks awarded."

"Camouflager eliminated. One hundred life marks awarded."

"Self-will erased. Talent awarded: innate summon."

"Team award distributed, please distribute accordingly."

’It’s over...’ Li Yiming let out a heavy sigh. It was difficult to describe how he felt after all of it. He glanced at his watch: August 15th, 10:30 AM. Exactly the time he arrived at Pure Water Herb Hall...

"Hey, someone has fainted here." A sudden cry was heard, and members of the crowd ran toward the hospital, which fortunately happened to be nearby. A few paramedics quickly arrived to treat Qing Qiaoqiao, who had fallen unconscious right at the entrance of the emergency department.

"There’s another one over here!" Grandma Wang had also been found.

Li Yiming looked at where Ji Xiaoqin had been shot. Instead of her, he found two middle-aged man engaged in a relieved exchange about the results of their health check-ups. ’Everything really is over...’

Another team of paramedics rushed out of the hospital, pushing a wheeled stretcher and headed for the building on the opposite side of the street—Qing Linglong had also been found, and someone had called the emergency services.

"Are any of you still alive? Help..." Eyeglasses’ feeble voice came out of Li Yiming’s earphone.

"Eyeglasses?"

This concludes the first book. Please stay tuned for the double chapter release tomorrow! A new adventure awaits Li Yiming. Also a reminder that domains are fictional, so when people die (except for the guardians), they don’t die in reality, since it’s only the replicate that “died”. Therefore, don’t be surprised when you see Ji Xiaoqin and Guo Xiang alive!

Note: the “Dragon Team” is a commonly used name for what’s essentially the national superhero squad in other FreeWebNovels. I think the author is making a meme out of it. ↩ Taken from song by the artist Sun Nan, available on Youtube ↩