Transcendence

"What the hell, that works too!?" Xiao He thought helplessly. His ability actually worked on a typhoon...

"How is it?" Cui Man asked through the earpiece. Xiao He rolled his eyes. "It worked, sure, but I have no idea what I'm supposed to do."

"Think about it. Like flying into the air and flying in the opposite direction to weaken the typhoon's winds," Cui Man said discontentedly.

"Fine. First," Xiao He replied, "a typhoon contains energy equivalent to thousands of nuclear bombs. Trying to weaken its winds that way is pure fantasy. Given my mass, I'd probably have to fly close to the speed of light to offset its energy and reduce its power, and that's impossible!"

"And second?" Cui Man pressed.

"I can't fly!" Xiao He snapped. "That's the most important part!"

"So useless..." Cui Man muttered quietly.

"You people..." Xiao He gritted his teeth. "Stop calling me useless and trash every other word. If you can do it, then you do it!"

"How about lifting an island and swimming across the ocean against the typhoon's cyclone?" Ye Wanqing suggested.

"Are you people seriously taking this?" Xiao He was about to explode. "Don't you have some kind of think tank?!"

"Because research into 'stopping a typhoon with one person's power' can't get funding," Cui Man said flippantly, sounding as though she did not care about the mission at all. "If it doesn't work, forget it. Come back. There'll be another chance for you to make an appearance."

Even though Cui Man had said that, Xiao He had an indescribable intuition for some reason.

He felt like he could do it.

"I'll give it a try..." Xiao He muttered with a shrug. His ability was already active, so there was nothing to fear.

As long as his ability was active, he was impervious to blades and bullets. He could bench-press four or five tons. Neither waves nor gales could hurt him, so there was no harm in trying. Even if he failed, swimming back to shore with his strength would not be a problem.

With that in mind, he shouted to the pilot ahead of him, "Hey, man, eject me... Ah—!"

Before he could finish, the canopy above him suddenly opened. In the next instant, he and his seat were hurled out, leaving behind only a long scream.

"You didn't even tell me how to open the parachute!?" Xiao He raged as he drifted through the air in the wind.

Then the parachute automatically deployed from the seat, but it was useless. The airflow outside was too violent. The moment it opened, he was blown wildly about in midair, raindrops striking him like stray bullets.

The fighter jet had already turned toward the coast. Any farther ahead, the typhoon would grow even stronger, and even the fighter could not remain stable in such intense air currents.

Xiao He fumbled around and tore off his seat belt. The seat beneath him vanished into the gale in an instant, while he stopped in midair. There was nothing beneath his feet, and he had no sensation of standing on anything, yet he felt a peculiar force holding his body aloft. He could actually fly!?

"I couldn't fly last time..." Xiao He muttered in shock. He had not possessed this ability before.

But that made things easier. If he could fly, there were many things he could do. At the end of the day, typhoons followed the law of conservation of energy. A typhoon was also just moving air; if its energy was expended, it would naturally weaken.

Yet a typhoon's energy was too immense, equivalent to the energy released by thousands of atomic bombs. Human power simply could not erase it. But for some reason, Xiao He felt that he could do it.

His mass might be small, but if he flew fast enough for long enough, he could generate tremendous kinetic energy. As long as that energy was great enough, it could weaken the typhoon. It was just that...

Even without calculating, he knew that even if he flew fast enough, it would take a long time to weaken the typhoon. He did not know where his confidence came from. He simply felt that he could do it.

Maybe that was his ability—to defeat something called "Lin Tiannan"... whatever the hell that was.

"Let's go!" Xiao He psyched himself up, then flew toward the center of the typhoon.

The closer he got to the typhoon's center, the stronger the winds became, and the rain battered him more furiously. But Xiao He barely felt it, since he was now impervious to blades and bullets. The raging waves below could not reach his current altitude, and as he approached the eye of the storm, the sky gradually brightened... until a broken log thrown up by the hurricane came hurtling straight at him.

Xiao He's mind buzzed as it exploded into chaos. He lost his balance, and the scenery before him spun rapidly, but he quickly steadied himself in midair.

Flying felt strangely wonderful. It came naturally, as though he had flown like this in dreams before. He rubbed his forehead. Although the log had struck him head-on, it did not hurt much.

He looked up at the swirling airflow overhead, confirmed his direction, and began flying through the air at high speed.

With the thought of I'll just try it, he flew at his fastest speed against the direction of the swirling airflow. He had no idea how fast he was going, but the scenery around him spun past in a blur...

Meanwhile, thousands of kilometers away on the shore, Cui Man, Ye Wanqing, and the other technicians were observing everything through drones.

"My God... did you see that?" Cui Man muttered in disbelief. Then she turned to several technicians beside her and asked, "Can you get the drones any closer? The image is still too blurry."

"Sorry, Officer Cui, this is already the limit. The winds are too strong. If we get any closer, the drones won't be able to maintain stability," the technicians replied.

"Then wait a little longer. Maybe the winds will weaken soon," Cui Man instructed.

At that moment, Ye Wanqing narrowed her eyes and frowned. "What is that?"

Cui Man immediately turned to the screen. Where Xiao He had flown, a patch of ocean had formed a spiral and gradually risen, slowly connecting with the sky. A small tornado had actually formed inside the typhoon!

"Is something like this even possible?" Ye Wanqing muttered in astonishment.

"Scientifically? Who knows? There have never been Mutants in history," Cui Man said with a smile, looking excited. "But we know that a typhoon is a single-direction cyclone, while a tornado consists of multiple cyclones and has an outer layer of rising airflow, which is why it connects heaven and earth. So theoretically, as long as the conditions are met, a tornado can be formed using a typhoon."

"My guess," one of the technicians at the side said tentatively, "is that Xiao He unconsciously gained altitude while flying, creating an updraft. Combined with his movement against the typhoon's cyclone, that formed a second cyclone. When it merged with the typhoon's own cyclone, it met the conditions for a tornado. There was once a similar phenomenon in M Country, where a small tornado appeared at the center of a typhoon."

"Wouldn't that just make things worse?" Ye Wanqing asked with a frown.

"To be precise, the problem has already been solved," the technician said excitedly. "Tornadoes may be powerful, but they usually last only a short time—half an hour, maybe an hour at most—before naturally dissipating. And the typhoon's energy will naturally weaken as well."

"So he's already completed the mission?" Cui Man asked in surprise. Then she could not help letting out a sigh. "It seems I underestimated his power... What an incredibly powerful ability, to actually rise above a 'natural disaster.' Although its activation conditions are rather harsh, making its lower limit very low, its upper limit is also extremely high. In other words, no matter how strong Lin Tiannan is, Xiao He can become stronger."

"Tsunamis, earthquakes, meteors..." The technicians discussed excitedly. "If we named the end of the world 'Lin Tiannan,' could he defeat even the end of the world? Who would have thought this trash ability was actually so powerful?"

"Ahem." Ye Wanqing cleared her throat beside them.

"Of course, it's this powerful when combined with Miss Ye's ability," everyone added, remembering something. Only then did Ye Wanqing smile in satisfaction.

"His ability's upper limit still needs to be verified, but I don't believe it can be limitless," Cui Man said, cutting off the discussion. She pressed her earpiece and said, "Xiao He, mission complete! Retreat now! I repeat, mission complete, retreat!"

At that moment, Xiao He was standing in the middle of the tornado, staring in disbelief at the gradually forming vortex as seawater continuously lashed against him. He anxiously bit his finger. Did I screw up? I didn't eliminate the typhoon—I made a tornado too!

But Cui Man's voice came through the earpiece. "Mission complete! Retreat!"

"It's complete already?" Xiao He asked in surprise. "But I..." After thinking about it, he shrugged. What did it have to do with him? If they said it was complete, then it was complete. Take the money and leave. Wasn't getting paid to lie around his goal?

With that in mind, Xiao He ignored the tornado he had created, turned around, and left.

However, after he flew for more than ten minutes, the tornado gradually disappeared. As it vanished, the typhoon's power visibly weakened as well. By then, he could no longer see the vortex formed by the typhoon in the sky. While flying perfectly well through the air, he suddenly lost his support and fell toward the dark ocean below.

With a splash, Xiao He was swallowed by the seawater in the next instant. He quickly adjusted his posture and floated to the surface.

"This ability is way too literal. The moment I can't see the 'enemy,' it's gone," Xiao He said irritably, wiping the water from his face. The fishy, salty scent of seawater made him uncomfortable, and he was still roughly several hundred kilometers from shore. The good news was that even without his ability working, swimming back to land with his physical abilities would not be difficult.

After swimming for only a short while, a helicopter approached from the distance and hovered above him.