"Cough..." Silver blood spilled from his mouth. He glanced back at Qi Ming, then quickly ran into the night, escaping the Defense Team's pursuit.
Kishida shoved Yamanaka aside. "Damn it! Tomorrow, we'll have the Police Bureau mobilize. We'll definitely catch him and bring him back!"
But something happened that very night.
The next morning, Qi Ming was the last to arrive at the Command Room after receiving the notice. The moment he entered, he felt an exceptionally heavy, oppressive atmosphere.
Mamoru Shirogane told him that the Kaitel Alien who had escaped the night before had killed someone.
Qi Ming was somewhat surprised. "He acted that quickly?"
Mamoru Shirogane said, "The victims were a married couple named Umeda. The Kaitel Alien killed them in front of their son and daughter!"
Umeda...
Hearing that surname, Qi Ming sensed something was wrong. After looking at the photos, his heart involuntarily sank.
These Umeda siblings, whose parents had both died, were the brother and sister who had lived with Homura throughout all of Ultraman Leo!
In the original Ultraman Leo series, it was the Zulurk Star Alien who killed the children's parents.
But in this world, no matter what the Zulurk Star Alien tried, he could not get past Qi Ming. He had been unable to hurt anyone.
Qi Ming had thought the siblings' fate would have changed with the flap of his butterfly wings. Who would have thought...
Kishida's face darkened as he slammed a fist onto the table. "Damn it! If we'd killed it yesterday while it was still a statue, this wouldn't have happened!"
Yamanaka also looked gloomy. The wounds from yesterday's beating were still hurting.
When he faced Qi Ming, his expression was somewhat awkward. He regretted it deeply now as well.
Nagi Saijo's face was pale. Rarely, she was visibly downcast and said nothing.
In her eyes, this had been entirely preventable. Qi Ming had originally intended to kill that alien, but the three of them had interfered and caused this mess.
Of course, Qi Ming would not say something as inhumane as, "As expected of Vice-Captain Nagi Saijo. Since she's an orphan herself, she cleverly made others experience the same feeling." There was no point blaming each other now.
If there was going to be a reckoning, it could wait until they had dealt with the many immediate troubles. Holding a blame-sharing court now would only intensify the conflict.
The situation was already severe and complicated. He could not let the team fall apart too.
Though Yamanaka and the others were difficult to put into words, they could still be of some use.
He asked Emi, "Have you found that alien?"
Emi shook her head. "No. None of the surveillance cameras captured it, and the Police Bureau hasn't found any clues either."
Qi Ming said, "Its counter-surveillance awareness is quite strong. Including this released Kaitel Alien, there are now five kinds of aliens active on Earth."
The Crow Aliens, the Mokujin Alien, Abobas, the Natan Alien, and the Kaitel Alien.
Five simultaneous threats were enough to make anyone's scalp tingle.
Qi Ming remained relatively calm. If he could kill all these aliens, it would be a huge harvest. His Star Bestowal Points would definitely reach ten, and he could conduct another Star Gathering.
He had a feeling that next time, he would definitely gather a powerful being.
Mamoru Shirogane felt that things were going badly. "If they appear and cause trouble together, even mobilizing all of Japan's military forces may not be enough to suppress the situation."
Qi Ming glanced at him. "If they really all show themselves at once, the Kaitel Alien should fight Abobas first. Don't forget that they have a grudge against each other."
There were conflicts among these five aliens as well.
"Alright, everyone, pull yourselves together."
"What's happened has happened. What we need to do now is figure out how to curb the situation from worsening and spiraling out of control, and prevent another tragedy like this."
"Now, let me go over the intelligence I know and analyze the current situation for everyone."
Though he was the newest member of the team, Qi Ming displayed a quality known as leadership at that moment, his calm emotions influencing everyone around him.
Everyone instinctively moved closer.
"Let's start with the Crow Aliens. Their heads look like crows', while their bodies are like humans'. A whole group of them came here, using Shrinking Ray Guns to capture humans and planning to take them back to their planet as slaves."
"Although there are many of them, none of them can grow giant. They only have one spaceship barely worth mentioning, and even Falcon 2 is enough to deal with them."
Emi raised her hand and spoke up, saying that Abobas had been driven away yesterday, and all the humans he had kidnapped in recent days had been rescued.
With all his gains wiped out, would Abobas go after the Crow Aliens' captives?
Qi Ming said, "It's possible. I don't know whether he'll come, but the Mokujin Alien will definitely seek out the Crow Aliens, because one of his prey, Zara, was taken by them."
He told everyone that this Mokujin Alien liked playing a kind of "hunting game."
He shackled two residents from another planet, Lucia and Zara, in handcuffs and exiled them to Earth,
Then, as the hunter, he pursued them as prey.
He could grow giant and possessed a certain level of combat ability.
Emi said, "That's way too cruel!"
But Yamanaka had a different opinion. "If Qi Ming's intelligence is correct, then this is a matter between aliens. It has nothing to do with Earth. We don't need to interfere."
It was Yamanaka, after all—the one who wanted to hand Ace over to the Hippolito Alien. It was not surprising for him to say such a thing.
In any other team, such a view would surely have been drowned in spittle.
But in this Defense Team, a gathering of all sorts, his view received quite a bit of approval.
Mamoru Shirogane seemed to want to speak but stopped himself, his gaze flickering.
Nagi Saijo tacitly agreed.
Kishida also felt that the situation was complicated. Several aliens were eyeing Earth greedily, and they truly had no extra energy to concern themselves with the love and hatred between aliens.
As long as he did not invade Earth or destroy cities, they should not intervene.
But Kishida clearly still possessed some sense of shame. After saying that, he coughed and added a supplementary clause: "Of course, by the values of our civilization, this sort of thing is certainly wrong, and we should condemn it on moral grounds."
Qi Ming said, "By your reasoning, Chris Maya and the Mokujin Alien are also 'a matter between aliens.'"
Before you continue