The vast Pacific Ocean met the horizon. The sky was pure blue, and so was the sea. Between that sea and sky, where the boundary was almost impossible to distinguish, the Airbus A319 skimmed steadily over the ocean like a nimble white swallow.
Ever since they had set off late last night, the journey home had gone smoothly.
The plane had taken off from Texas, following a great-circle route across the North American continent, passing over northern Canada, flying west over southern Alaska, and entering the North Pacific Ocean along the northern side of the Aleutian Islands.
Next, the Airbus A319 would continue diagonally across the northwestern Pacific Ocean, pass north of Japan's Hokkaido, cross the East China Sea, and finally land in Shanghai Pudong.
This was a standard great-circle route.
If Earth was roughly spherical, flying along the shorter arc between two locations gave the theoretical shortest path between two points on its surface. That was where great-circle routes came from. This route also thoroughly corroborated the fact that "Earth is round."
At the Airbus A319's cruising altitude of 12,000 meters, the curvature of the earth was visible to the naked eye. There was none of that sense of an infinitely extending plane he had experienced in Low Earth Orbit.
But Gao Jian no longer trusted his eyes at all.
He often stared blankly at the pure blue sky, pondering the true nature of this blue planet and the cause of this visual discrepancy. He even imagined that the world before him was an illusion conjured with a wave of some mighty cultivator's hand, that a flat earth or a spherical earth existed at that being's mere whim... yet his sense of touch told him all of this was real.
The Airbus A319 cruised at 850 kilometers per hour, or roughly 236 meters per second. It was a subsonic cruising speed, and also the normal speed at which an early Foundation Establishment cultivator flew on a sword.
Qi Refining cultivators could also reach subsonic speeds using movement techniques, but they could not maintain them for long. For most Qi Refining cultivators who had only just learned sword flight, managing to stand on a sword and wobble along at a few dozen meters per second was already pretty good.
How many sword-flight accidents happened back home every year? Some people fell, broke their necks, and became paralyzed from the neck down. Some were blown into the sea by strong winds and drowned. Some slipped off because the spine of their sword was too steep to stand on. Others liked heavy, broad swords, only to run out of spiritual power in midflight, hit the ground, and get cut in half by the broad sword falling after them...
Cultivators did not know how to be cultivators from the start, either.
As the entry stage for mortals pursuing cultivation, Qi Refining saw all kinds of accidents every year, with an endless variety of ways to die.
The death rate from these accidents was much higher than from hunting demonic beasts, pursuing evil cultivators, or exploring secret realms. What sect did not have a few deaths on its annual tally?
Outstanding Foundation Establishment cultivators like Gao Jian, who had competed in the Flying Sword Competition, were actually a minority. Some slower cultivators still could not fly even after reaching Foundation Establishment. Wherever they went, they had to tag along with their parents, all three of them standing on one sword.
Ah, I really miss those days.
Watching the outline of the continent grow clearer outside the window, Gao Jian breathed a sigh of relief.
"Looks like there won't be any danger."
Throughout the journey, Gao Jian had remained on edge, keeping his divine sense extended the whole time.
He had imagined no shortage of emergencies: incoming surface-to-air missiles, fighter jets taking off to intercept them, even a fishing boat carrying a World War II antiaircraft gun and somehow knowing in advance where to ambush the passenger plane.
He had even rehearsed several scenarios in his head about how he would save people and escape.
Fortunately, nothing had happened.
The Airbus A319 landed smoothly at Pudong Airport.
The international airport had regained its former bustle, with one flight after another taking off and landing, making this Airbus utterly unremarkable. As he watched the crowds milling around outside the cabin, Gao Jian's restless heart gradually settled.
I'm home.
Gao Jian did not even get a chance to linger in the jet bridge. The moment the cabin door opened, several black sedans with white license plates were already waiting.
He saw a few familiar faces.
CNSA's Deputy Director Bian and the agency's director of foreign affairs were both there. Beside them stood numerous expressionless people in dark jackets. Farther back were police officers on alert. Their leader wore a white shirt, and the bars on his shoulder insignia were just as numerous as Uncle Qi's.
Altogether, more than a dozen people stood there, representing administration, foreign affairs, public security... and several other departments.
Gao Jian spread his divine sense slightly and swept it over everyone.
There was nothing unusual about any of them.
"Director Bian." Gao Jian addressed his immediate superior, a distinctly aggrieved note in his voice.
"Get in the car first. This isn't the place to talk." Bian Xia sighed.
Accompanied by two people in dark jackets, Gao Jian got into the car.
Bian Xia got into another car. The officer in the white shirt exchanged a few quiet words with an administrative official, then entered another vehicle as well. Apart from the police on the perimeter, everyone else climbed into the cars one after another. In the end, a long convoy formed and left the airport.
Gao Jian sat in the heavily armored, bulletproof H9+, staring blankly into space.
So many people, so many senior officials, such a huge operation... looks like I've attracted some serious attention. Who knows where they're taking me? Judging by Deputy Director Bian's reaction, even he can't do anything about the situation.
Surely they aren't going to arrest me?
Gao Jian's thoughts ran wild.
Aside from him, there were two expressionless people in jackets in the car, and the driver clearly had a military background. He could not even find anyone to strike up a conversation with.
The convoy transporting Gao Jian drove out of the airport, left the Huangpu River behind, and headed north, passing through Yantai City, Lin City, Lüzhou City, and Jingzhou City in succession. Just as Gao Jian began to think he was being rushed to the capital, the convoy stopped.
They seemed to be at the boundary between Han Dong Province and Taidong Province.
It was a complex of buildings completely censored from satellite maps.
By the time they parked, evening had arrived. They clearly had no intention of giving Gao Jian time to recover from jet lag. Deputy Director Bian got out of his car, and only now did he have a chance to explain the situation to Gao Jian.
"Director Bian, what's going on?" Gao Jian was not allowed out of the car, so he could only lean against the window to speak with Deputy Director Bian.
Bian Xia crouched beside the window. "I should be asking you that."
He sighed repeatedly. "The director briefly described what happened to you, but he's even more confused than I am. I was supposed to ask Counselor Wang, but Counselor Wang suddenly lost his memory... what exactly did you do during those few days in the United States?"
Gao Jian gave a bitter smile. "I just went with Elon Musk to look around NASA's launch site... I didn't do anything else. Who knows what got into the Americans?"
Bian Xia's voice rose several pitches. "How could you get involved with a big capitalist like Elon Musk?"
Gao Jian was helpless. "He took to me right away. What was I supposed to do...? Going to the firing room was his terrible spur-of-the-moment idea. He dragged me there."
Elon Musk really is awful.
Bian Xia said somberly, "There are plenty of videos of you online, all edited. I watched them all. You stood in the middle of the venue, delivered an impassioned speech, and tore into several NASA officials until they couldn't save face. You even knew the SLS rocket hadn't been fully fueled-how did you know that?"
Gao Jian sounded aggrieved. "Elon Musk told me."
Bian Xia snapped, "He told you everything?"
Gao Jian nodded. "Of course. It's not like I have X-ray vision. Elon Musk personally told me the fuel tanks weren't full. At first, I wondered why he didn't bring it up himself. Now I've figured it out. His SpaceX and NASA don't get along.
"They look like they're cooperating on a moon landing, but there's actually a serious internal power struggle. SpaceX wants to land on the moon, while NASA wants to stall and pin the blame for a failed moon landing on SpaceX, then use that to suppress them. Elon Musk knew about this and needed someone to expose it. I just happened to be there, so he pushed me forward and used me as his weapon."
Bian Xia grew even angrier. "And then you opened fire?"
Gao Jian said bitterly, "Director Bian, I only graduated two years ago. How could I be that calculating...? Think about it. You're an outsider who's shown up on your sworn enemy's home turf, and the world's richest man calls you his brother. Every other word out of his mouth is 'my good brother,' and he practically wants to share a bed with you. Then he hands you this earth-shattering news because he wants to make you famous. Could you resist?"
Deputy Director Bian's expression twitched slightly.
He could understand that young people were hot-blooded, but it was also a fact that Gao Jian had not used his brain.
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