The Cadillac pulled out of the alley.
Gao Jian monitored Don Quixote with his divine sense, only relaxing once he was sure the man had not followed them. He had infused Don Quixote with a strand of spiritual light, formed from a trace of Dan Dust from a second-grade Spring Renewal Pill.
Its life-sustaining effects were long-lasting. Even without enough food or a fixed place to live, it could keep someone alive for several years.
It naturally fell short of a sixth-grade Hundred Herbs Life-Renewing Pill, but it was still better than nothing.
He was just too poor.
Gao Jian was already planning to refine some ungraded herbal pills after returning home. Herbal pills were a typical form of non-spiritual medicine, popular among ordinary people. Low-level cultivators often traded them for money and everyday necessities.
Besides herbal pills, Gao Jian would also need to get some sugar and oil and cook up a batch of Grain-Avoidance Pills.
What? Authentic Grain-Avoidance Pills were not made from sugar and oil?
Never mind that. Just tell him whether eating them filled your stomach.
Watching Don Quixote crawl back into the little phone booth he called home, Gao Jian sighed. With modern productive capacity, providing everyone with a home should not have been difficult. Why couldn't it be done? Was there a problem with distribution?
If he had the chance in the future, he should at least try to push for it.
He did not know whether veterans ending up on the streets like Don Quixote were rare exceptions or a widespread phenomenon throughout the United States.
He would rather believe that Tang Qide's paranoia had driven him into the dead end of homelessness, rather than society itself. But from what he could see, society might bear more of the blame. Yet American society had not seemed like this ten years ago.
Had someone put a curse on the country's fortunes?
Forget it. He was no sociology scholar, and the complexities of how society functioned were beyond his understanding.
Gao Jian withdrew his divine sense, rested the back of his head against the leather seat, and let out a long breath.
That felt good.
A profound sense of safety enveloped him, so much so that Gao Jian actually began to feel a little sleepy.
"What happened to your hair?" Old Chen glanced at him in the rearview mirror.
Gao Jian touched his hair. "Oh, I took a nap on the beach in San Leon. The sea breeze was strong and messed it up."
"That sea breeze must've been pretty hot, then. It's scorched."
"I also got a light perm yesterday."
"I suggest you get your story straight."
Gao Jian gave an embarrassed smile.
Old Chen did not ask any more questions. Between the embassy and the consulate, he had seen every kind of person, Chinese and foreign, young and old. People unwilling to tell the truth had ten thousand ways to dodge a question. Gao Jian's efforts were child's play.
Still, the kid did not seem to have any bad intentions.
Outside the windows, San Leon's streets slid slowly backward in the dusk. Two days had passed since the geomagnetic storm ended, and power had been restored to the little town, though there were noticeably fewer cars on the streets than usual.
Old Chen checked every intersection, staying alert for any unfamiliar vehicles that might pose a threat, occasionally letting loose a couple of curses in the local Texas vernacular.
"Where's your phone?" Old Chen asked again.
"Broken."
"Are you about to tell me you don't know how it broke?"
"I really don't," Gao Jian said sincerely. "It was like that when I woke up."
If Old Chen had been an online store's customer service representative, he would already have been arranging a return and refund for Gao Jian. But he was merely a dedicated embassy driver with twenty years behind the wheel. His job was to get onto the Texas freeway and ship this little fellow back to China before the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation caught on.
Silence settled inside the car.
Soon, they left the local Texas roads and entered the freeway. But almost the instant they merged onto it, Old Chen keenly noticed that the vehicles around them were not quite "natural."
It was hard to describe the feeling. The cars they had encountered on the streets had all been "natural." After entering the freeway, that faint sense that something was off made him instinctively press the accelerator.
Sure enough, two Fords behind them broke away from the other cars, accelerating in unison.
"Trouble..."
Old Chen kept pressing the accelerator, and their speed soon reached 160 kilometers per hour. Under state law, that was well over the speed limit and could draw highway patrol officers at any moment. Yet both Fords behind them also floored it, sticking close.
One even accelerated further, looking ready to pull alongside the Cadillac, perhaps to force it to stop or even ram it from the side.
The Cadillac had consulate plates. Were they really this blatant?
No, they probably wouldn't dare. At least these weren't police cars. They were private vehicles.
Were they trying to use private cars as cover to cause a traffic accident and stop the consulate's vehicle?
Old Chen's heart sank. He glanced into the rearview mirror and saw Gao Jian sitting in the back with his eyes closed, resting as though he were asleep.
Young people really did know how to stay calm.
It looked like these old bones would have to teach the youngsters what a real Texas driving ace could do. He had raced in rallies when he was young.
Just as Old Chen prepared to accelerate again and shake off the two tailgaters, the wind suddenly howled.
A powerful gust swept in from the north side of the freeway, whipping up sand and stones. Fine grit struck the windows with a rapid patter. Several carefully selected sharp stones were also blown into the middle of the road, flying right beneath the tires.
Bang! Bang!
The two Fords suffered blowouts one after the other. At that speed, they lost control almost instantly, but another violent gust straightened them out. In the end, they merely spun a few times before coming to crooked stops on the freeway.
"Well, I'll be!"
Old Chen's eyes widened. Once he saw that their tires had blown, he burst into laughter. "Tried to cut me off and got what you deserved, huh? Hahaha!"
Unfortunately, his passenger in the back offered no response. His eyes were closed, and he appeared to be asleep.
Old Chen could only shut his mouth.
Gao Jian really was exhausted.
Mentally exhausted.
But he was not asleep. As he rested with his eyes closed, he even felt a little excited.
He had finally confirmed something just now: after twenty-four hours of recovery, the spiritual power in his body had been fully replenished. That was what made Gao Jian happiest.
In the two years since he had transmigrated, he had never completely depleted his spiritual power, afraid it would run dry. This had been the first time.
As he understood it, cultivators whose spiritual power was exhausted had to meditate and circulate it through their bodies to recover. That process inevitably involved drawing in spiritual energy. Thus, restoring spiritual power by absorbing spiritual energy was something almost all cultivators took for granted.
But now, it seemed that spiritual power could recover along with physical stamina.
To Gao Jian, this was a discovery no less momentous than "Why do apples fall?" From this moment onward, if he faced an emergency in the future, he would no longer need to be so stingy with his spiritual power.
He would no longer have to furtively draw on those three depleted low-grade spirit stones, either.
From now on, if he exhausted his spiritual power, he could just sleep it off.
Unfortunately, although his spiritual power could recover, its upper limit could not increase. That meant he would forever be stuck at early Foundation Establishment, and the rate at which he could output spiritual power would never improve.
Before you continue