Fortunately, Ling Yun remained unchanged, and even if he did, Lao Liao wouldn't be able to see it in the pitch-black pipe, so there was no need to worry. The young woman, unlike Lao Liao, wasn't preoccupied with her own thoughts. In her nervousness, she didn't notice anything unusual about Ling Yun shooting down the rocket. Instead, she heard Ling Yun explain that the passage was blocked by the bricks and stones from the explosion, which actually put her at ease. She figured this would keep the soldiers on the other side, at least for a short time, preventing any pursuit.
But immediately, her sensitivity to the darkness made the young woman nervous again. She thought to herself, "This place is so dark, I can't even see where I'm going. How am I supposed to get out?" So she pleaded, "Young man, as long as you can take me and Lao Liao out of here, we'll try our best to meet any request you have. Please, please don't abandon us."
Ling Yun remained silent. He had no goodwill towards the two people who had suddenly attacked him using their looks, especially after the young woman shot and killed the old demon. This lack of goodwill had almost turned into disgust. He hadn't considered helping either of them either. In fact, given the circumstances, saving people was unrealistic unless Ling Yun displayed extraordinary power and used advanced supernatural abilities to wipe out all the soldiers. But that didn't make sense either. Ling Yun was kind but not pedantic. Sometimes he had to save people, and sometimes he had to avoid them.
Clearly, Lao Liao and the young woman weren't exactly good people, but they weren't evil either. At most, they were just powerful figures in a power struggle within the underworld, and they only survived because they hadn't encountered an ambush or someone stronger; otherwise, their fate would have been as tragic as those who were shot. Ling Yun wanted to turn around and leave these two gangsters to fend for themselves, but no matter what, he couldn't bring himself to kill them, and he didn't know what to say.
Old Liao took a deep breath: "Young brother, I know you are an extraordinary person. It's a rare opportunity for us to meet you. Actually, I also know that for gangsters like us who fight and kill all day, death is nothing to regret. It's just that my life is not important here. She is still young and shouldn't die so young. I hope you can have mercy and take her out so that she can give my wife and children some money and live a stable life. I hope my child can study hard, get into university, and find a good job after graduation. That would be enough for me. I risk my life for my wife and child, isn't it all for a better life?"
"Old Liao..." The young woman suddenly felt a lump in her throat and an urge to cry.
“Grab my hand and come with me.” Ling Yun sighed and grabbed the young woman’s hand. He couldn’t stand seeing other people’s emotions. “About three kilometers from here, there’s an upward passage. You can get out of there.”
"Thank you so much, young man." The young punk girl was overjoyed and grabbed Ling Yun's hand, thanking him repeatedly.
"Young man, I won't thank you enough for such a great favor," Old Liao said in a deep voice. "Although I, Old Liao, am nothing special, just a lackey working for the boss, I will definitely be there whenever you need me in the future."
Ling Yun smiled bitterly, "What would I need you two for? To kill or set fires? Never mind, today was just an accident. Since you two are with me, I'll take you out. Actually, your underworld's power struggles are far removed from my life. I hope we won't have the chance to meet again in the future."
"That's true." Old Liao gave an awkward, self-deprecating laugh. "People like us are disliked not only by the police, but also by ordinary people. We're a complete cancer on society."
"Old Liao!" The young punk girl shrugged her shoulders in displeasure. "How could you say that? By the way, young man, since you're not a gangster, why did you come to the Never Sleeps Bar? I heard that the thugs guarding the door only let gangsters in."
"That's exactly what I was going to ask you. Actually, I came here to look for someone," Ling Yun said.
"Who are you looking for?" Old Liao and the young woman asked in unison.
Ling Yun sighed: "It's that old demon you killed."
"Old Demon?" the young woman and Lao Liao exclaimed in surprise. "What do you want with Old Demon?" the young woman asked.
“I don’t know him,” Ling Yun said. “But he once sent two assassins disguised as campus police officers to kill me, and I suspect he might have been contacted by some drug dealers I know, so I’ve always wanted to find him and get to the bottom of things. Actually, I already looked for him last time, but unfortunately I couldn’t find him. This time I came here after inquiring about Lao Yao, but before I could find Lao Yao, you had already killed him.”
Old Liao smiled wryly: "Then I'm really sorry, young brother. Actually, neither of us knows the old demon. It's just that our young master has a grudge against the old demon, so he wants us to kill him. If we had known you earlier, we wouldn't have killed him, or we could have waited until you finished asking about your affairs before killing him."
The young woman shook her head and said, "That old devil is very cunning. He's not so easy to kill. We've tried to kill him secretly several times, but he's always escaped because he's too wary. If I hadn't used my looks to lure him here this time, it wouldn't have been so easy to kill him." As she said this, there was a hint of smugness in her tone, as if using one's looks to kill someone was a very satisfying thing.
Ling Yun shook his head inwardly. These two had been involved in the underworld for a long time, and naturally possessed a kind of sinister aura that ordinary people couldn't understand. Old Liao seemed alright, at least he looked like a man. But this young punk girl didn't seem like a decent woman. Was her looks something to be sold so easily? And she exposed her body in public without the slightest shame. Ling Yun could only be speechless at this kind of fierce woman.
However, it seemed that neither of them knew anything about the old demon, which made Ling Yun somewhat disappointed. Perhaps he was destined to never be able to find out the truth about this matter. In fact, in Ling Yun's heart, it didn't matter whether he found out the truth or not. No matter how powerful the assassin was, he couldn't pose any threat to him. It was just that this matter was completely inexplicable, so Ling Yun always wanted to find out the reason. Unfortunately, things didn't go as planned. Even as a powerful superhuman, there were times when he was helpless.
The young woman thought for a moment and said, "Old Yao is a big shot in the underworld. He not only deals in drugs, but he's also been involved in countless assassin brokerage deals. Many underworld figures have been killed because of him. Even if he were alive, you could interrogate him in person, and he might not be able to remember which deal it was or why. Actually, you just said that you've never been involved in the underworld, so the only possibility is that you offended one of those drug dealers you mentioned, or that you unintentionally ruined their plans. That's why those drug dealers went through Old Yao to hire assassins to kill you."
Ling Yun nodded silently. Although the young woman wasn't a great person, what she said made a lot of sense. He had almost no connection with the underworld; the only person he had a grudge against was Qin Zhengwei and his two companions, who always saw him as a thorn in their side and wanted to get rid of him as soon as possible. So, aside from all other possibilities, there was no other explanation besides the drug trafficking group behind Qin Zhengwei.
In fact, the little delinquent's words had always been Ling Yun's deduction. However, Ling Yun always wanted to get to the bottom of things himself, so he became somewhat anxious and hesitant.
With a loud bang, a muffled roar came from hundreds of meters behind the three people. After a violent tremor around the pipes and the ground, cement and brick fragments fell down again.
"What's going on?" Old Liao and the young girl asked in unison, their voices filled with fear. At this moment, Ling Yun had become the backbone of the group, as if no matter what difficulties arose, they were nothing in front of this young man.
Ling Yun frowned: "They are using heavy weapons to bombard the area blocked by bricks and stones."
"What do we do now?" The young woman grabbed Ling Yun's arm and asked in a trembling voice, "We've really messed up this time. I never imagined that the military was doing arms deals with foreign arms dealers. I was dreaming of double-crossing them. I was so overconfident. Now that we've seen their secret, they'll probably hunt us down to the ends of the earth."
Ling Yun thought to himself, "You finally have some self-awareness now? Where were you before?" He gently pushed the little delinquent's hand away and said, "I have a way to deal with them. Cover your ears, otherwise the sound wave from the gunshot will rupture your eardrums instantly."
After the two obediently covered their ears with their hands, Ling Yun raised his pistol and aimed it at the dozens of soldiers on the other side of the landslide who were using rocket launchers to bombard the bricks and stones, hundreds of meters away around the bend. In the panoramic view, the gunshot landed on the head of a soldier who was crouching down carrying a portable rocket launcher.
Chapter 142 Fire Stream
(There will be another chapter at 9 PM tonight!)
Ling Yun gently pulled the trigger. From the moment he killed the mysterious sniper who was targeting arms dealers, he no longer relied on gunpowder to propel the bullets. Although the Glock 18C had a huge magazine capacity, its long-range power was pitifully weak. The bullet that killed the sniper was imbued with Ling Yun's incredibly powerful telekinetic abilities, which allowed it to detonate the Barrett's enhanced bullet mid-air and then pierce through the opponent more than 500 meters away. Otherwise, relying solely on the bullet's own inertia, it probably wouldn't even have flown off to who-knows-where.
Even with their ears covered, Lao Liao and the young woman could still clearly hear the deafening gunshot, as if a dozen grenades had exploded simultaneously right next to them, causing their minds to buzz. They were utterly horrified; was Ling Yun firing a gun or launching artillery shells?
A flash of light appeared in the darkness. The streak of fire from the bullet illuminated the boy's calm, expressionless face, then flickered briefly at the curved corner before disappearing into the distance.
In the panoramic view, the bullet's speed was slowing down, the cartridge case had already detached, and the bullet's breech was propelled at high speed by ripple-like telekinetic propulsion, despite the sharp angle at the front maximally piercing air resistance. However, the immense force still turned the invisible and thin air in front of it into an incredibly hard wall. The temperature of the bullet's bright yellow copper-like metal surface rose rapidly, turning red-hot like molten lava in a short time. Then, a layer of bright flame rose around the bullet, quickly turning crimson. The metallic bullet melted in the flames, becoming a stream of pure liquid metal.
A stream of fire, only the thickness of an index finger, pierced through a five-meter-thick brick and stone collapse in a fraction of a second, then silently left a charred hole of the same thickness on the forehead of the soldier about to launch. Under telekinetic control, it veered in the air, piercing the skulls of eight soldiers before reflecting back and merging into the gunpowder concentration area of four rockets that were already in the firing state.
So, just as a large number of troops were about to reach the front of the collapse, they witnessed an unforgettable scene: blinding flames illuminated the tunnel, and then an incredibly powerful shockwave composed purely of fire burst forth from the collapse, rushing out of the pipe exit in 0.1 seconds. The bodies of dozens of soldiers, like stones thrown by a catapult, drew countless beautiful arcs in the air before crashing heavily in front of the ashen-faced general and the dazed Smith.
Half a minute later, darkness regained its dominance.
"Let's go," Ling Yun said calmly, taking the young woman's arm and leading Lao Liao slowly into the distance.
……
"It seems I was wrong." After a long silence, the general sighed softly, his eyes suddenly turning sharp as a knife. "Give me a call. We have to use their power."
Two hours later, Lingyun stopped.
“There’s an exit here; you can get out from here,” Ling Yun said.
Old Liao and the young woman looked around. The passage was still pitch black. Although it was no longer completely dark, it was still impossible to see anything. Based on their speed, they estimated that they were about eight kilometers away from the underground cavern. Despite being in the dark and walking as if on a rope, they were still moving very fast. Of course, this was mostly thanks to Ling Yun.
"Where's the exit?" the young girl asked curiously. She couldn't see anything at all and had no idea how Ling Yun could see it. They groped their way down in complete darkness, completely disoriented, and were simply being led by Ling Yun. They were increasingly amazed that the young man seemed to be walking on a smooth road in broad daylight, without encountering any obstacles or delays.
Ling Yun raised his arm and fired several shots at a 45-degree angle at the top of the pipe, which was several meters ahead. This time, he did not use telekinesis to control the bullets. However, a cracking sound came from the top of the pipe, and several broken concrete bricks fell down, creating a large hole in the top of the pipe. Faint starlight immediately shone in, and the three of them were instantly illuminated.
Old Liao and the young woman were overjoyed and rushed over. They looked up at the irregular circular hole, which was about half a meter in diameter. From there, they could see the stars at night. Obviously, this circular hole led directly to the ground. However, they didn't know where the ground above was. If the two of them climbed up, they would be surrounded by the army, which would be extremely bad.
Ling Yun slowly walked over. "The exit I was talking about is this one. There's actually an abandoned, dry well up there. The bottom of the well is right above the pipe. If you break through the partition between the two, you can get to the ground. There are steel ladders on the well walls. You can climb up there without worrying about being discovered."
Old Liao gave Ling Yun a deep look: "Young brother, I, Old Liao, really misjudged you. I once heard our young master mention the existence of extraordinary people in this world, and I always thought it was just nonsense. I never expected to actually encounter one today. As I always say, great kindness needs no thanks. I suppose you don't need anything from me. However, if you need anything in the future or if it's inconvenient for you to do something, just let me know. Even if it means death, Old Liao won't hesitate."