Across the city, and even in the over 30 other cities watching this scene, everyone was drawn to the voice of the ultra-long-range Financing Model.
“Li Mi?”
“Who is that?”
People in some cities were puzzled to find that they heard the voice of the Financing Manifesto without being transferred through or accepting the “Super Financing of the Demonic Hero Hall.”
Could this Financing Manifesto actually transcend the boundaries between cities?
Lü Bu vaguely sensed that something was wrong.
“Fang Tian! Don’t keep building up the strongest reinforcement, attack directly!”
Yang Zicang on the platform quickly ducked back.
“Xiao Machao, don’t stop, keep running!”
{Wait, hold on.}
Yang Zicang thought he must have misheard; Xiao Machao rarely failed to follow his orders. His heart tightened as he wondered, could this Demonic Nightmare train be faltering at such a critical moment?
The train turned its body slightly, gazing into the distance at something that resembled a giant radio telescope.
{It seems…}
Xiao Machao murmured, his voice carrying a faint loneliness.
“It seems like what?”
Yang Zicang nervously observed its condition.
The train stared fixedly at the object propped up on the distant mountaintop, and at the sky above it.
{I’m so envious.}
“Envious?” Yang Zicang was slightly bewildered as he listened to the train’s voice.
Meanwhile, Lü Bu had already been shouting from the platform, calling out “Fang Tian” over and over again, but the swirling red cloud vortex in the sky didn’t show any sign of reacting to him.
“Could it be that Li Mi has some way to deal with Fang Tian?”
On the distant hilltop, the parabolic antenna, which seemed to have been abandoned for decades or even a century, was already tattered and broken, yet it miraculously managed to struggle open—this was nothing short of a miracle.
{Mr. Fang Tian, please look at me.}
Li Mi’s voice continued to come through.
{Do you see it, Fang Tian!}
Some sharp-eyed individuals, or those using tools, vaguely caught sight of something rising on the distant hilltop.
“What does he intend to do?” the people in the city wondered in confusion.
The massive “radio telescope,” carrying a strong wavelength, emitted a gentle remark—
{Mr. Fang Tian, I imagine you must feel quite lonely alone in space.}
“？”
The people in City 41, as well as all those from City 11 to City 35, Hub Town, and the Lost Frequencies, were all taken aback in unison.
Lonely in space?
The red cloud in the sky rippled as it spun, shuddering violently.
As if it had struck a nerve, the thundercloud within the red cloud, glowing with an orange light, seemed to thicken noticeably!
“Huh? No way!”
Countless people began to piece things together.
In the sky, the swirling red light beyond the thin clouds swept rapidly toward the mountaintop where the “radio telescope” stood, casting the hills, already shrouded in the twilight haze of encroaching dusk, into a flush of red, as if brimming with cheerfulness.
Fang Tian’s voice carried a hint of confusion, tinged with a naive, disbelieving tone.
{You… this you…}
{They are all my dearest children. If you are willing, they can accompany you through the lonely, vast night.}
Yang Zicang opened his mouth in stunned silence. He had never imagined that such words could come from the lips of a young man who appeared honest yet aloof, aloof yet gentle and spirited.
Amid the bewilderment and creeping chill of hundreds of thousands of onlookers, countless eyes—directly or indirectly—watched as the crimson whirlpool clouds illuminated the sky, revealing hot air balloons one after another hidden in the dusk, rising upward and gradually drifting into the heavens.
The hot air balloon demons, exuding enchanting shimmering patterns and graceful serpentine textures, floated like budding flower blossoms yet to bloom, swaying as they ascended into the sky.
{You, you are their ‘Father,’ Father Li Mi? Oh no, sir, m-Mister.}
{You may address me as such, my wandering nephew. I am their father, Li Mi!}
“No—!” Lü Bu yelled in despair, on the verge of collapse.
{My children need the mightiest guardian to protect their safety when they venture out to play. So that they can return safely every few days, are you willing to become their knight protector? Fang Tian!}
{I am willing, Father-in-Law.}
“Aaaaah!” Lü Bu roared in frantic desperation, clutching his head like a madman.
Boom, rumble, rumble!
Thunderclouds churned violently!
“Fang Tian!” Lü Bu stormed in fury, staring at the thundercloud that had completely left him behind.
Its vortex had already shrunk noticeably.
The violently quaking red thunder gradually revealed a gentle whirlpool.
The thundercloud churned the air, seemingly drawing the dozen or so hot-air balloon Demonic Nightmares—elegant curves like inverted dewdrops—toward it.
{I see it… I see it… such a beautiful circle, such beautiful big eyes…}
Even the thunder within the clouds grew much gentler.
Faint flashes of electric light flickered, like tingling caresses and leaps of joy, waiting for the impending night of no longer loneliness.
{Aooh… she’s blinking at me~ Aooh~ How blessed I am… Father-in-law!}
In space, Fang Tian, as if bewitched, let out unbearable, excited groans.
The hundreds of thousands watching this scene were utterly numbed.
“Fang Tian! Aaah!” Lü Bu anxiously stamped his feet.
The members of the Xiongying Group huddled around him, trembling, at a loss for what to do. They were all stunned, feeling this couldn’t be real.
At this moment, Lü Bu finally pulled out a phone he had never shown anyone before—a device with fine, scale-like patterns.
The cracked, tiny screen of the phone flickered awake like a flower-screen unfolding from drowsy slumber.
{Is it time to renew the chat again? Can’t he hear you anymore?}
The man madly pressed the numeric keys of the Demonic Nightmare-phone:
“Quick, quick, send a text to Fang Tian. No, call a satellite phone!”
The Demonic Nightmare phone slowly extended the antenna hidden inside its body, a few seconds later.
{Oh… can’t get through, it won’t respond to me.}
The Demonic Nightmare phone twisted its eye to look at the large transmitting terminal in the distance, and the figure of the hot air balloon Demonic Nightmare drifting towards the horizon.
{They have already clouded Mr. Fang Tian’s mind.}
“Ah!” Lü Bu, completely unhinged, threw the phone to the ground fiercely.
As for the people at the headquarters, each one was more baffled than the last. They still couldn’t confirm that this was something caused by their own side.
A broken line shot in, and Director Yu’s spirits lifted.
[Li Mi wants to make an active investment in me.]
[Li Mi invested 1R in me.]
[Well done, Li Mi, from now on, you’ll be…]
{I am Li Mi. Now is the most crucial moment to attack the Xiongying Group. Move immediately, right now!}
“I… alright, alright!”
Director Yu immediately turned around, his hands trembling with excitement. He held back the urge to cheer, a model emerging on his chest, and the threads on his back extending into the void, away from the crowd.
[Su’e… it’s up to you!]
……
Yang Zicang’s jaw nearly dropped.
He couldn’t imagine that the liaison from the headquarters, who had been trying to contact him just now, would pull off something like this.
He recalled the “Sky Lantern Plan” Li Mi had mentioned to him a few months ago. Now, his mind was filled with exasperation. What nonsense about hitting satellites—they were actually sending a package to the other side.
{Sigh.}
Xiao Machao let out a desolate sigh.
{“Let’s go. Some things are not for us to envy.”}
“Envy… wait.” Yang Zicang suddenly stared blankly at the train beneath his feet.
For no reason, a sense of ominous foreboding settled over him.
He did not voice it out loud…
But the chilling dread brought by his intuition grew thicker by the second.
{“Having Little White Shadow by your side is already plenty good.”}
“I—!”
Suddenly, a flash of radiance shone ahead, and a woman’s figure abruptly appeared beside Lü Bu.
The moment his companions reacted,
Bang!
A bullet glowing with red light slammed into Lü Bu’s skull, the man nearby driven to madness.
After that shot, the woman, her body surrounded by a red glow, clutched her pistol, unable to move a muscle. Through pain, she roared hoarsely from her throat:
“Lü, you bastard! For the murder of my comrades, I’ll have my revenge today!”
In Su’e’s eyes, the skin of the young man code-named Lü Bu cracked open, but the faint red light radiating from his skull’s bone beneath was neutralized to an ashen gray, then flashed red once more.
“Not now.”
Lü Bu lifted his head, slightly calmer, glaring fiercely at the woman he had burned to charcoal last time.
“I’ve already super-funded myself—a ten-thousand-year fund. I will soon Set Foot on Fate’s Path, right after this battle ends.”
“Lü Bu!” The members of Xiongying Group around him stared in disbelief.
Boom! A layer of energy manifested into the shape of floor tiles wrapped around Lü Bu, shielding him from the White Shadow Nian Dragon’s attack.
“Yang Zicang,” the young man turned his head, his gaze tinged with a hint of despondency. “Ha, did you think I wouldn’t be wary of your psychic power…”
Thud! Lü Bu’s head drooped slightly.
A “Void Zero Dagger,” adorned with gray ripples, pierced through his heart.
He turned his head sluggishly; beside him, a man with sunglasses gazed at him calmly.
“You…”
The people surrounding Lü Bu instantly fell into chaos—some lunged forward, others scrambled to flee.
The man said, “On the night we contained the Defender, Sun Xin, who was waiting atop that building for Ma Chao’s arrival, was sent away by me using temporal reversal.”
Lü Bu’s eyes quivered. “You… have defected to…”
“There’s no defection.”
The man in sunglasses was enveloped by a slowly rotating mass of half a “Taiji Fish” energy, like a distorted drop of water.
“Though it may sound grand, the model color isn’t the core of factions—good and evil are. Tong Wenqi, you’ve been lost for too long.”
In Lü Bu’s gaze, the divine light slowly faded, growing dim.
The hundreds of people threatened by Xiongying Group surged forward with shouts.
Shaomin pulled out his shortsword and said, “Brothers, don’t be reckless!”
Tong Wenqi led his people running in from another entrance. These representatives from headquarters tried to calm the crowd, gradually stabilizing the fruitless temporally consuming battle.
“Yang Zicang, I know you’re anxious. Come quickly—I’ll accompany you down.”
This boy, who was slightly older than Boboli by a year or two, squeezed through the chaotic crowd and said.
Su’e’s hands began to move, “And me.”
Shao Min, who had already lost the chance to win, took off his sunglasses.
“If you don’t mind, I can tag along as Crimson’s liaison. However, in my current state, I can no longer use my abilities.”
Inside his two pupils, two circular shapes condensed from mist slowly rotated, like something out of a cartoon toy.
“It’s you… Okay, let’s go.”
Yang Zicang nodded, and the train carried him closer to the pool as the five alien-colored barbs shone with even greater brilliance.
……
Mu Xiaoyu and others, through the arrangements of Li Mi’s people, watched the footage of the Demon Hero Hall via a mental link relay.
She, along with Zhang Yang, Liu Ming, and some ordinary people who had not yet obtained their own models, witnessed this scene in stunned silence. It was only then that Mu Xiaoyu realized that the hot air balloon she had made had been turned by Li Mi into a Demonic Nightmare monster to lure the satellites in the sky.
Within this sealed, foreign dimensional space of the theater, a dozen ordinary people who had not obtained their models watched the television broadcast reels, embracing each other in excitement.
The ominous cloud of threat hanging over the entire city of 41 was instantly dispelled by that unknown individual.
“I feel like I’ve become an unsung hero,” Mu Xiaoyu said, touching the tears at the corners of her eyes, her voice choked with sobs.
Liu Ming gave her a pained look and let out a soft sigh.
Before anyone could savor the moment, the screen suddenly showed Lü Bu being ambushed.
Mu Xiaoyu saw Yang Zicang. Looking at the young man who had been unseen for nearly half a year in the footage, his skin glowed brighter and he seemed more handsome, but an air of deep exhaustion now emanated from him, stirring a hint of concern in the girl who herself was uncertain of her feelings.
“We’ve fallen too far behind,” Zhang Yang murmured softly.
“I hope Zicang knows… I… I contributed too,” Mu Xiaoyu whispered, lowering her head.
Yet she was unaware that, in the subconscious perception of everyone there, the three of them were the most harmonious presence, the most comfortable people to be around.
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