Black Mist Surge

"Just let the fire burn? Not going to put it out?"

Outside, flames soared into the sky, a raging fire consuming the forest. If left unchecked, it could burn for who knows how long, spreading to who knows where.

"The fire brigade is on its way. If it's unavoidable, we'll just have to let it burn. Special circumstances, nothing we can do."

What could she do? Without using those powerful weapons, they couldn't eliminate the monsters in a short time. Destroying the monsters was the priority; they could figure out how to put out the fire later.

"What's going on? The meteorite shattered!"

Lu Chengchuan was in the middle of a conversation when an expert who had exited a vehicle discovered the meteorite had suddenly cracked open. Black Mist was pouring out of it like crazy, rapidly engulfing the camp.

Soldiers stepped forward to pull the experts away. Lu Chengchuan stood up, a sense of familiarity washing over him as he observed the spreading mist.

"Commander Li, you go with them." Zhou Yaning, sensing something was wrong, quickly instructed the soldiers to take the people away, deciding to stay behind and assess the situation herself.

The Black Mist spread quickly. If they didn't leave soon, something bad might happen. Li Shiwu had no choice but to have the soldiers escort the experts away.

The experts were terrified. The sounds of gunfire and screams had them hiding in the vehicles, barely daring to breathe. Now, with this sudden turn of events, they just wanted to escape as quickly as possible.

Under the protection of the soldiers, the experts and their assistants hurriedly boarded the armored vehicles.

"Do we still want to move the stone now?"

The Black Mist drifted closer, prompting everyone present to quickly retreat, fearing the mist might be poisonous. While retreating, Lu Chengchuan turned to Zhou Yaning, asking what they should do now.

"Wear it first. The thing... we'll deal with it later."

Zhou Yaning handed him a military gas mask, unsure if it would be effective, but it was better than nothing.

As for the meteorite, they might not have a chance to handle it.

The egg-shaped meteorite had cracked into several pieces, with even more mist pouring out. As the Black Mist expanded, the crowd retreated further and further. The armored vehicles left first, and the soldiers on the outer perimeter also received orders to evacuate.

Lu Chengchuan and the others retreated to a point more than ten kilometers away. Before leaving, Zhou Yaning had someone take a piece of the meteorite fragment.

The Black Mist continued to spread outward until it covered an area with a radius of more than ten kilometers around the meteorite.

"Yeah... same here, all Black Mist... Okay, we took a fragment... We'll head back now..."

Zhou Yaning hung up the phone, her expression grim.

"I received a message that five meteorites were discovered within the country, all cracking open at the same time. The director wants us to take the meteorite fragment back. You come back with us; I'll give you the thing."

Without waiting for anyone to ask, Zhou Yaning explained to everyone, addressing the last sentence to Lu Chengchuan.

He wasn't here to work for free. They had agreed beforehand that the Investigation Bureau would provide the martial arts he wanted, and Lu Chengchuan would provide his services to the Investigation Bureau.

In the car, Lu Chengchuan checked his gains.

In just this one night, he had gained 18 years and 61 days of lifespan, bringing his lifespan back to around thirty years.

Around two in the morning, Lu Chengchuan and Zhou Yaning returned to the central Armed Forces Department.

Anyang City was restless that night. Not just the Armed Forces Department, but many citizens were unable to sleep at home, hearing the rumbling explosions outside the city. Fearing an attack by a monster army, they were too scared to sleep.

At the central Armed Forces Department, Zhou Yaning had the meteorite fragment put away and took Lu Chengchuan to rest.

Before long, Lu Chengchuan had a new internal energy martial art in his hands.

Lu Chengchuan consumed two years of lifespan to raise it to perfection. Looking at the string of martial arts in the martial arts column, he had three Yellow Grade martial arts that he could fuse, but he didn't want to fuse them for the time being.

Fusion would consume ten years of lifespan, and he wouldn't have any extra lifespan to raise the level after fusion, so he planned to save up some more lifespan before upgrading.

He still had to kill monsters. Without killing monsters, he wouldn't even have the 'capital' to upgrade his martial arts.

In the morning, Lu Chengchuan didn't go back. Zhou Yaning said she wanted to go back to the forest to take another look.

Lu Chengchuan boarded a helicopter and flew to the location where the meteorite had crashed with several people from the Investigation Bureau. From a thousand meters in the air, Lu Chengchuan could see large swathes of scenery below.

Half an hour later, the helicopter returned to the site. The fire had been extinguished by dawn, leaving a large gray area in the forest, followed by a patch of Black Mist.

"The Black Mist has expanded again! It's now twenty-three kilometers from the center!"

Zhou Yaning took out a rangefinder. She found the coordinates from last night and compared them to the current edge of the Black Mist, discovering that the Black Mist had expanded several kilometers further outward.

Fortunately, there were no villages or towns around the forest; otherwise, a bunch of people would have to be relocated, which would be a lot of work.

"Have you found any monsters?" Lu Chengchuan asked her.

Zhou Yaning put down the instrument and shook her head. "No monster traces. Ground troops haven't found any anomalies either."

Unlike the Black Mist that appeared suddenly before, this Black Mist covered a large area, but no monster traces were found, which was another puzzling matter.

"Strange things just keep happening one after another. What's going on..."

Lu Chengchuan looked up at the sky. The world was changing too fast. All sorts of things had been happening one after another in the past month, and he hadn't figured out a few of them yet.

"Fly forward! Fly to this coordinate!"

Zhou Yaning told the pilot to fly forward. The Black Mist covered a large area, but the height wasn't very high. Ground troops had measured it, and the height of the Black Mist was only about ten meters.

"You don't want to go down there, do you?"

Seeing her posture, she wanted to enter the Black Mist to see what was inside. The situation inside was unknown, so she was just going to go in like that?

"Ground troops have been in, and no dangerous substances were detected. Mr. Lu, come down with me. You guys wait here." Zhou Yaning not only wanted to go down, but also wanted to drag him down with her.

"I have to go too? Are you sure it's not dangerous?"

Lu Chengchuan didn't want to take the risk. This wasn't like killing monsters. Killing monsters granted him lifespan, which was a matter of life and death. But the Black Mist in front of him didn't have any monsters, and might not even have an energy core. He probably wouldn't gain anything by going in, and it might even be dangerous. He really didn't want to go in.

"Where's all that energy you had for killing monsters gone? You're scared of just going into a Black Mist?"

"How can I compare to Captain Zhou? I only have two people in my family. If something happens to me, what will my family do?"

"If something happens to you, the country will take care of your family. I'm not even afraid, so what are you afraid of? I have a big family. If you want, my family can even take care of your mother."

Zhou Yaning insisted on dragging him down. Lu Chengchuan was speechless. This woman usually looked like she didn't like to talk, but when she really started, she just wouldn't stop.

"Alright, Captain Zhou, you're even more long-winded than my high school homeroom teacher. Let's just go in and out quickly, okay? Please stop talking." Lu Chengchuan agreed to fight, just begging her to stop talking.

"Xiao Ling, get us the rope."

Seeing that he had agreed, Zhou Yaning turned to Xiao Ling and asked her to get the rope.

The rope was tied as a precaution. If they really encountered danger, they could have the helicopter pull them up. The Black Mist wasn't a special space, so they could run straight out.