Six hours later, Hong Fei woke up.
It was noon, and the sun was blazing. After showering and changing into clean, casual clothes, he went downstairs and found Helen Zhao sitting by the window, flipping through a magazine.
Her long black hair fell naturally over her shoulders, while the thin gold frames of her glasses reflected specks of light, making the crimson on her lips seem even more vivid.
"Good afternoon."
Hong Fei greeted her, and Helen Zhao immediately broke into a smile when she looked up.
She rose to her feet and said somewhat shyly, "Mr. Hong, I wanted to wait for you to come back last night, but I was simply too tired later on."
Hong Fei waved his hand and walked to the seat across from her. "It's fine, sit down. I didn't expect to return so late yesterday either. I'm the one who failed as a host."
"You're too polite." Helen Zhao lightly brushed back her hair before adding, "I saw the news reports about what happened last night. Those two... strange creatures were truly terrifying. Fortunately, the military acted quickly. Although using artillery shells in the city shocked a lot of people, at least they kept the damage within a controllable range. If those two creatures had really started fighting, the consequences would have been unimaginable."
Hong Fei's brows formed half the character for embarrassment. "That's what the news said?"
"Yes. Mr. Hong, didn't you go to watch last night? Personally, I wouldn't recommend doing that again. The risk is simply too great, and completely uncontrollable."
Hong Fei gave an awkward smile. "How could I possibly have gotten close? I stayed very far away."
Ross really had no shame. He had directly turned the actions of Hong Fei's unidentified group into his own achievement. Only by doing so could he somewhat offset the damage caused by his string of failures. Hulk could be called an accident, but Abomination had practically been cultivated by Ross himself.
Helen Zhao nodded slightly, then her gaze drifted for a moment. "My guess is that both creatures last night were military experimental products. One of them had appeared before. Based on last night's incident, I think the military wanted to create something capable of dealing with the Hulk, but their experiment got out of control again." As she spoke, she gently shook her head and sighed. "Those two humans are pitiful."
Though her analysis differed slightly from the truth, it was more or less correct.
If it were not still too early, Hong Fei would have loved to drag her over to see Abomination. Perhaps it would inspire some new ideas in her biological research.
However, there was no rush. The Leader could temporarily take over that work, while Helen Zhao only needed to focus on conquering her Regeneration Cradle project.
Hong Fei turned and pointed toward an open area in the distance beyond the window. "Dr. Zhao, look. That's where the laboratory I mentioned will be built. The landscaping over there is excellent, and there's a natural lake. Behind it is the boundary of the estate. If necessary in the future, it can be expanded several times over. After all, there's no one else on this mountain besides me."
Helen Zhao's eyes lit up. "Can I go take a look?"
"Of course."
Hong Fei accompanied her outside, then waved over Number One, who was on patrol. "Take Dr. Zhao to inspect the laboratory site. You can also discuss the building design requirements along the way. Dr. Zhao, I have something to do. We'll talk later."
"It's fine. Go ahead and get busy."
Turning around, Hong Fei went straight down to the third underground level.
After passing through the corridor and entering the monitoring room, several subordinates immediately stood up.
Hong Fei smiled. "How is it? Still not awake?"
"Yes, Boss. There hasn't been a single movement from last night until now."
On the screen, Abomination lay perfectly still in an all-metal room. If not for the normal vital-sign readings, one might truly have thought he was dead.
"You've worked hard. Keep watching him."
"Yes!"
Afterward, Hong Fei entered a spacious empty room alone.
With a flick of his fingers, a green card appeared in his hand. He gave it a light toss, and the card transformed into light that flowed into the Card Slot.
When he activated it again, waves swiftly surged within the Card Slot. Hong Fei felt the energy in his body being rapidly drained, vanishing completely in the blink of an eye.
Fortunately, the amount of energy was not linked to his physical condition, so there were no outward effects.
The light emanating from the card grew increasingly brilliant. Once it became emerald green like a gemstone, the space before Hong Fei suddenly trembled.
Then, a tank rapidly formed from the bottom up. Its tracks, armor, cannon barrel, and other components appeared one by one, ultimately becoming a brand-new, flawless king of land warfare.
Without hesitation, Hong Fei flipped himself onto the turret and casually ran both hands over the thick cannon barrel.
It was still a 120-millimeter caliber, but this was a tank!
Visually speaking, Hong Fei naturally preferred this universally acknowledged king of land warfare.
Entering the cabin, the various display instruments and unfamiliar control mechanisms made Hong Fei even more excited.
This was what it meant to be impressed without understanding a thing.
He fiddled with it for a long time, feeling around here and there.
Before long, some of his energy had recovered. Hong Fei pressed his palm against the tank and willed it. Energy immediately surged outward, and in the blink of an eye, a piece of information appeared in his mind: as long as he wanted, he could fire the cannon right now.
Could an unstarted tank fire its cannon?
Hong Fei did not understand, but he was deeply shocked.
He hurriedly withdrew his energy and pulled back his hand. Only after a long while did he reluctantly return to the turret.
Sitting cross-legged, he took out his phone and began searching for information.
The M1A2SEP was the US military's current main battle tank, and the version bearing the SEP, or System Enhancement Package, suffix was the newest and most advanced model among them.
Its observation and targeting, fire-control, weapons, power, communications, vehicle-management systems, and other components left Hong Fei both delighted and somewhat confused.
Overall, it was not the crude iron brute Hong Fei had imagined, capable of simply charging around recklessly. It was an extremely advanced digital tank.
A moment later, he let out a soft sigh.
The benefits of digitization needed no explanation, but for a lone man and a lone tank with few enemies like Hong Fei, without the support of matching external systems or coordination with other combat units, the power and effectiveness this so-called main battle tank could display would naturally be greatly reduced.
So the question was, could this Skill Card only generate one tank? It could not possibly generate them without limit, could it?
Although he already had an answer in his heart, Hong Fei still wanted to try.
However, his current energy recovery was not enough for him to use the skill a second time. Then again, ever since his physical attributes broke through, his energy recovery speed seemed to have increased considerably as well.
His gaze fell on the tank again, and after pondering for a moment, Hong Fei shifted his perspective.
Those digital functions did not seem as important to him as he had imagined.
After all, his goal was not to lead Americans in overthrowing the United States. As things stood, his battles were usually small-scale and localized, and even the number of people deployed would hardly exceed a hundred. Fifty would already be pushing it.
In that case, one tank was enough, because this was not something just anyone had.
And taking another step back, condensing one tank had already consumed all of Hong Fei's energy. He did not have even a drop left over and could only passively wait for it to recover.
Unless this tank could use real shells in addition to energy. That required testing, but after seeing its genuine internal structure, Hong Fei was quite confident.
Besides, tanks were unlike other weapons.
Guns and ammunition could be bought on the street, and Mortars could be easily hidden, but once a sixty-ton behemoth like this appeared, exposure would inevitably cause an enormous uproar.
The simplest reason was that this was Eagle Country's main battle tank. There was only one manufacturer in the entire world, so where the hell had you gotten it?
Therefore, either do not use it, or if he did, he had better kill everyone who saw it.
Before you continue