Mystical Journey

Garen watched Light Path pick up her teacup slowly and sip from it. The aroma of tea wafted around the living hall.

“It looks like you have been trying to avoid meeting Yuria on purpose.”

Light Path nodded.

“You are absolutely right, I have been avoiding him on purpose. Or rather, I’ve been avoiding them.”

Garen had also collected a significant amount of information in his Energy Machine Imprint, so when he heard that, he could also guess what she meant.

But he still needed Light Path to unveil all of the mysteries. He turned his gaze to the woman seated across from him.

Light Path was a very elegant woman with fair skin and looked like the slightly voluptuous wife from a rich family, rather than a powerful bounty-hunting mercenary.

“I don’t know if you’ve heard the name Zhi Jinqin,” she said in a low voice.

“Zhi Jinqin?” Garen searched through his memories. “Never heard of it.” He shook his head, the name was completely foreign to him.

“Then you must be familiar with her other name,” Light Path smiled slightly, “Yurijie.”

Garen frowned.

“What do you mean? What does it matter if Yurijie has another name?”

“Of course it doesn’t matter,” Light Path continued. “But what if that name was also the Commander-in-Chief of the White Crab Army? Would you still say it doesn’t matter?”

“The Commander-in-Chief of the White Crab Army? Are you joking?” Garen instantly laughed. He knew Yurijie, that weak little girl, and she had studied under him as well, so she could also be considered his disciple, like Yuria. However, Yuria had too much potential, so Garen neglected Yurijie most of the time. She was not very conspicuous, and now Light Path was suddenly telling him that this little girl was the Commander-in-Chief of an international mercenary army like White Crab? It was as absurd as someone randomly running up to you and saying that Old Wang next door was the military commander of some country.

“I’m starting to wonder if you really are Light Path. How can you prove your identity to me?” said Garen casually, leaning into his chair.

“That would be easy to prove.” Light Path clapped her hands, as though she had long since expected this.

The woman who had driven Garen here earlier appeared again and placed a box in front of Garen.

“Please look at this.”

The woman retreated, and Light Path extended her hand slightly, signaling Garen to open the box and check.

“There are pictures of the siblings and me inside, all the photos starting from when they were fifteen, as well as all of my identification documents, and most crucially, my occupational papers. As a mercenary and a bounty hunter, I have my own security code with the National Security Agencies of many large countries, you can feel free to check my information through your connections.”

Garen opened the box and flipped through its contents.

“I can understand that there’s no reason for you to lie to me, but I still find it extremely hard to believe that Yurijie is the White Crab Commander-in-Chief.” He remembered how Yurijie acted around him, she had always been obedient and inconspicuous. No, she could barely even be called inconspicuous, she was practically non-existent.

Suddenly he felt something amiss. He had always been an extremely alert man, but until now, he still did not have a constant, deep impression of the person he had stayed with, day in and day out, while he was teaching her his skills.

Garen instantly felt something was wrong.

Light Path, who had been paying close attention to his expression, smiled slightly.

“It seems like you’ve noticed something wrong as well.”

Garen frowned and pulled up all of his memories regarding Yurijie, checking them carefully. But he noticed that no matter how he checked them, his information on Yurijie seemed to constantly covered in a veil of fog, so everything was blurry and unclear.

His frown relaxed. “That’s somewhat interesting.”

Light Path smiled and took out a phone. The screen was illuminated and showing several pictures of a girl’s life.

“Look at this.”

Garen took it and saw that the phone screen was slowly showing pictures of a girl who looked a lot like Yurijie.

“These are the pictures from the life of a girl called Zhi Jinqin from more than seventy years ago. I pulled them out from a country’s Security Databank. You can check the Databank any time,” Light Path said with a straight face. “Yurijie and Zhi Jinqin are essentially the same person.”

“Then how would you explain her sending the White Crab Army to assault us?” Garen asked, putting down the phone.

“Zhi Jinqin is a psychopath.” Light Path smiled wryly. “If I said that she cut off my legs and blinded my eyes, would you believe me?”

Garen raised an eyebrow. “Just what is happening here? Please explain it to me in detail.” He knew the summarized Plot, but he never knew that there were so many details hidden so deep.

Light Path nodded. She picked up her cup slowly and sipped from it.

“In that case, I’ll need to start from more than eighty years ago…”

********************

International Center of Disease Control.

In the clean large white hall, many medical workers were running past each other, and several emergency stretchers were constantly being sent to the many different research labs. Some of the workers had gone to get samples and reports regarding all sorts of different data, and they walked hurriedly, going in and out of the many large labs.

“How is the situation! Right now!” Inside the Central Information Hub.

Several people dressed in white uniforms were gathered together, discussing how to deal with the disease emergency.

“It’s not looking good! The range of the virus contagion has expanded by fifteen times over one night! Initial evaluations have confirmed that it is an airborne contagion!” said a white-haired old man nervously.

“It feels like we’ve gone back to that Carpo Virus incident back then…” Another old professor sighed. “Immediately the highest Code Red alarm, and inform the National Health Ministries. We have to control the spread of the Yuri’s Kiss virus as soon as possible. Announce the symptoms.”

“What about quarantine methods? And disinfection measures?” someone else asked urgently.

“High-temperature disinfection, the aerial quarantine area must not be smaller than one kilometer!” replied an old professor urgently.

“This virus is too terrifying! The mortality rate is actually higher 99%!”

Beep!!!

All of a sudden, the piercing wail of a siren rang out through the entire center, and a screen instantly appeared on the left of the old professors.

It was a map of the world.

The map started off completely blue, but right now, on the three main continents, a red dot was spreading at a speed fast enough to be seen by the naked eye.

“This is…!!”

Everyone was shocked by the sudden turn of events. Thr live broadcast showed that the spread of the virus, indicated by the red area, was moving faster than anyone could have imagined.

“At this rate… within twenty hours… the whole world will have been utterly infected!!” Someone began to panic.

“Is… Is this the end of humanity?!” The old professor’s voice started to tremble.

**********************

In the busy capital city

The compact crowds squeezed against each other, flowing endlessly along the pedestrian street.

Bang.

A cola bottle fell from the hands of a little girl carrying a doll.

“Yangyang? What’s the matter?” Beside her, her mother seemed to have noticed something was wrong with the little girl, so she bent down and frowned, asking.

“Mommy… My head hurts…” The girl raised her head, her face white and crumpled.

“Did you catch a cold?” The mother crouched down and touched her daughter’s forehead.

But a terrifying thing occurred, the little girl’s eyes began to bleed with bright red blood that flowed down her cheeks like two bloody streams.

The mother was completely stunned.

Just a moment later.

Ahhhh!!!!

The screams seemed to explode from different parts of the city at the same time. Men and women, old and young.

The crowd had been thrown into an uproar. Many people covered their eyes, but the blood kept flowing down their cheeks, dripping onto the floor.

Countless viruses multiplied quickly and without stopping in the air, and flowed with the air currents, reaching further and further out. Humans, animals, even plants, everything became a target for their infection.

****************

Ka-chak.

The picture was set into film just like that.

“Not bad, let’s have one more.” A pair of newlyweds was taking wedding photos on top of the skyscraper.

The photographer smiled wide, telling the two of them to lean closer to each other.

Smiling, the groom pulled the bride into his arms gently, then closed his eyes and leaned over to kiss her.

“Kellen…” Before he touched his girlfriend’s soft and sexy lips, he heard her panicked and terrified voice. “Kellen, your eyes… they’re bleeding!”

“What?” The groom felt moisture on his face, so he reached out his hand and wiped it. The blood all over his hand pierced his eyes.

“Wha… what is this!?”

“Send him to the hospital, now!! Quick, quick, quick!!” The photographer was the first to respond.

****************

“Yuri’s Kiss.”

“Up until now, infected patients have appeared in 50% of the Red Nation’s territory, and according to the report from the International Center of Disease Control, this virus must be controlled immediately, or else it could very well spread to the rest of the world within twenty hours!”

The International Union started an emergency long-distance conference.

“Time is short, I’ve already summoned Special Forces, the special division whose members were modified specially for disease prevention are taking the necessary measures for quarantine and the like.”

The President of the Red Nation looked solemn.

“All factories will stop production and do everything in their power to aid the disease control!” the President of Slann said sternly.

“Seal off all the relevant ports and prevent exit or entry, quarantine the Red Nation for now, and remind all the citizens to wear the emergency-distributed gas masks.” The President of the Black Federation suggested an effective strategy.

“I’ve sent the general proposal to the two of you, do execute it as soon as you finish reading through it. We don’t have much time.”

“We’re putting all our efforts into creating a vaccine for the virus.”

“Don’t we at least have a way to slow down the spread of the virus?”

“No. My team of experts told me that this virus primarily destroys the human brain and nerves, and since it’s too fast-acting and too powerful, the immune system doesn’t even have time to react. Rather than calling it a virus, it’s more like a weapon of war, a biological weapon specially designed to kill people!” said the Red Nation President in a deep, low voice.

“I got some news from my information network, apparently the source of this Yuri’s Kiss came from the inventions of an organization called White Crab Island. The experts told me that the place is now constantly broadcasting a special wave that can use the magnetic field of the planet to spread all over the planet. At the same time, it’s constantly providing this Yuri’s Kiss virus with the best living conditions and even the energy for it to grow!”

“It’s like a wireless charger?” The Black Federation President’s face darkened.

“That’s right.”

“Summon the elite troops right now. Within three hours, I want to see the White Crab Island completely sunk into the ocean,” said the Slann President coldly.

“Why don’t we just sink it with bombs?”

“We need the relevant information to save the citizens who have already been infected.”

“Then it’s decided.”

“Agreed.”