When Lin Xiao dragged the last United States soldier, who was howling for his parents, out of the Humvee, his phone was still wedged between his ear and shoulder.
"Right, one of those old war movies. The explosions sound really realistic." Speaking gently to May on the other end, he gripped the belt of the white soldier, who weighed a good two hundred jin, with one hand and carried him like a chick to the flagpole outside the camp's tents. This camp was a temporary posting for the American military deep in the mountains, and few people came here. His five comrades were already hanging in a neat row from the flagpole, all suspended upside down from the crossbar by their tactical belts, looking just like strips of cured meat waiting to dry.
"Are you sure everything's all right over there? Why do I still hear someone screaming?" May sounded worried.
"The TV's too loud. Dolby surround sound, you know." Lin Xiao's expression remained unchanged as he nudged a soldier still groaning on the ground with his toe, signaling for him to be quiet. The soldier immediately clamped his mouth shut, not daring to make a sound.
Lin Xiao's current look was quite distinctive. A garish Arab headscarf covered half his face, a brown wig swiped from some unlucky fellow sat on his head, sunglasses rested on his nose, and he wore a loose robe picked up at some market or other. He looked like some kind of cheap superhero impersonator, but he called himself "Super Earthling." Among the militants and American troops in Afghanistan's three eastern provinces, that name had already become something that gave grown men nightmares.
"All right, get some sleep early. Don't stay up binge-watching." May offered a few more reminders before hanging up. Lin Xiao tucked the phone inside his robe, into a pocket he had sewn himself-terrible workmanship, but practical-then turned to face the six United States soldiers hanging upside down.
He took off his sunglasses, revealing smiling eyes beneath. The smile did not reach their depths.
"All right, gentlemen. Our lesson in morality and the rule of law begins now."
The only one of the six soldiers still conscious, a sergeant with a scar on his face, glared at him with bloodshot eyes and forced a few words through his teeth. "Who the fuck are you?"
"Super Earthling," Lin Xiao said earnestly, sounding as though he were announcing an officially certified trademark. "A Super Earthling from Earth, dedicated to maintaining world peace. You may call me Teacher."
He pulled a belt from beneath his robe. He had swiped it from a disarmed militant. It was good leather, made in Italy, though who knew how it had ended up in an Afghan mountain valley. He snapped it through the air with a sharp crack, and all six soldiers shuddered.
"You made four mistakes tonight." Lin Xiao held up four fingers, counting them off one by one. "First, drunk driving. Second, firing weapons in a civilian neighborhood. Third, speeding in a military vehicle. Fourth-and most importantly-you disturbed my future girlfriend."
He walked up to the first soldier and looked down at the unlucky man hanging upside down. Blood had rushed to his face, turning it liver-purple, and his eyes were filled with fear and confusion. He still had not figured out how this masked brute calling himself Super Earthling had stopped a Humvee at the roadside with his bare hands.
"So, here are your punishments." Lin Xiao flicked the belt. "Ten lashes each, plus a five-hundred-dollar education fee. You can choose not to pay-but I guarantee that if you don't, you'll have an extremely unforgettable night."
After a round of loving instruction, the six men's wails rang to the heavens. Once it was over, their trouser pockets were turned inside out. Crouching beside the flagpole, Lin Xiao smoothed out the confiscated bills one by one, counted them, and stacked them neatly. Exactly three thousand dollars, no more, no less. He stuffed the money into another, better-hidden pocket inside his robe, then stood up and dusted off his hands.
"Class dismissed," he said, then drew a dagger shimmering with faint blue light from his waist and traced an arc through the air.
The next second, he vanished.
The six soldiers hanging upside down stared at the spot where he had disappeared as the flagpole swayed gently in the night breeze.
Lin Xiao appeared on the roof of an abandoned home fifteen hundred meters away. Leaning behind a low adobe wall, he removed his wig and headscarf and let out a long breath.
"Doupao, settle the mission."
"Ding-three-star mission 'Teach the troublemaking United States soldiers a lesson' completed. Mission rating: A. Distributing rewards... Reward: strength +2. Additional reward: none."
Lin Xiao raised an eyebrow, clearly unsurprised by the result. He opened his attribute panel, and a blue screen spread out before his eyes:
Strength: 500 Intelligence: 18 Agility: 16 Charm: 18 Mental power: 13
Five hundred strength. He stared at the number for a long while, the corners of his mouth slowly lifting.
Nearly three months had passed since Tony's kidnapping. During those three months, he had swept through every mission location within five hundred kilometers of Bagram Air Base. From Kandahar in the south to Mazar-i-Sharif in the north, from Jalalabad in the east to Herat in the west, his footprints covered all of Afghanistan. He had cleared out every three-star mission and managed to grind through several four-star ones as well. As for five-star missions-he was waiting until the window of opportunity on Tony's side arrived.
Now, however, not a single mission above three stars that he could solo remained.
"Ding-the host is advised to proceed toward unexplored areas in southern Afghanistan. This region contains numerous militant strongholds that have yet to be cleared. Several missions rated four stars or higher are expected to become available."
"Not going," Lin Xiao said.
"Ding-the host is currently undergoing rapid growth in strength. It is recommended that you seize this window of opportunity and continue advancing-"
"Not going." Lin Xiao stood up, brushed the dust off his robe, folded the wig and headscarf, and stuffed them into his canvas bag. "You think I don't know what you're up to? 'Unexplored areas in the south,' my ass-that's the Taliban's home turf. You want me to solo the Taliban? Do you think my brain's made of muscle?"
"Ding-the host's current strength value is five hundred. In conventional combat capability assessments, this already exceeds-"
"Exceeds what? The Hulk? Thor?" Lin Xiao rolled his eyes. "Doupao, you can't fool me. Five hundred strength is pretty intimidating against a bunch of ordinary people carrying AKs, but if some shell comes flying at me, I might not die, but it'll still hurt."
Lin Xiao tucked the Blink dagger behind his waist, slung on his canvas bag, and started back. "With what little I can do now, I wouldn't even count as a dish in front of this world's big shots."
He was telling the truth. Five hundred strength sounded impressive, but this was the Marvel Universe-Thor could hammer out a meteor crater with one blow, and Hulk could stop a Leviathan with one punch, never mind that Purple Sweet Potato Spirit currently sitting on some planet in the universe waiting to collect the Infinity Stones. Against them, his strength had probably only evolved from "dies in one slap" to "can take two hits before dying."
By the time Lin Xiao returned to his little room at Bagram Base, dawn was breaking. He closed and locked the door, then tipped his enormous canvas bag onto the bed, its contents clattering across it.
Three hundred thousand dollars. That was the "pay for his trouble" he had earned over the past few months.
Sitting cross-legged on the bed, Lin Xiao sorted the crumpled bills by denomination, smoothed them out, and tied them up with rubber bands. Three stacks of hundreds, six stacks of fifties, and enough smaller bills to fill half the canvas bag. This money came from the "education fees" he collected during missions-a little for teaching robbers a lesson, a little searched out after disarming militants, and occasionally some extra pay for his trouble from targets who really were not short of money.
He stacked the money neatly, then took four items from another pocket and lined them up before him.
The first was a watch. Its face was that of the most ordinary digital watch imaginable, with a black plastic case and a rubber strap. Pressing a button on the side popped up a sight. The thing looked like a children's toy, but the description displayed on the system panel was anything but childish: "Conan's Stun-Gun Wristwatch, C-grade rule-level item. Can render a single target briefly unconscious at random. Ordinary targets are guaranteed to fall unconscious; the probability of unconsciousness for high-level targets is determined randomly." The note read: "A concealed weapon even an elementary schooler can use. Surely you can find a use for it?"
What did "rule-level" mean? It meant this thing ignored most physical defenses. However thick your skin or tough your armor, one dart would still put you down if you were meant to go down.
Lin Xiao put the watch on his left wrist, examined it, and nodded in satisfaction. A two-meter-ten brute wearing a children's watch did look somewhat incongruous, but practicality was all that mattered.
The second item was a pink magic wand. Its handle was white plastic, with a rotating pink heart-shaped gem set at the top and three little stars along the side. A casual shake produced sparkling flashes and the opening of an unbearably sugary backing track. This was the "Balala the Fairies Transformer," an A-grade item, and the first A-grade item he had obtained. The system description read: "A magical transformation device from an other-dimensional fairyland. Uses specific music and dance movements to channel the magic within the body and complete a magnificent transformation. Invincibility frames apply throughout the transformation. Upon completion, all attributes increase by 120% for thirty seconds, and basic magic attacks are unlocked for five minutes. Cooldown: twenty-four hours."
The first time Lin Xiao read that description, his eyes had gone wide. A 120% increase in all attributes-five hundred strength became eleven hundred for thirty seconds. The effect was downright heaven-defying. Then he saw the usage requirement: "Must complete the designated transformation dance, approximately two minutes long, and loudly sing the transformation incantation."
Two minutes. Dancing. Singing. The incantation was "Balala energy, ukalaka, little fairy, full-body transformation."
He placed the transformer in a wooden box he had picked up at a secondhand market specifically to hold it. Once it was inside, he solemnly locked the box away at the very bottom of his canvas bag and zipped it shut. An A-grade item, and its ultimate destination was permanent storage.
The third item was a USB drive. Its black casing bore a handwritten label with lettering so neat it looked printed: "Liu Mouhong's 'Compendium of Materia Medica' Workout-Complete HD Collection." A D-grade item, its system description was extremely concise: "Follow along to gain slight increases in strength." The note read: "Those with herniated discs should exercise caution."
Lin Xiao had plugged this drive into his beat-up laptop and followed along for three weeks. It did work; his strength had increased by about seven or eight points. But that was not the point-the point was that this thing had shown him how much more absurd the system's lower limits were than he had imagined. If even workout videos counted as items, would he eventually draw laundry detergent commercials, the recipe for Lao Gan Ma, or square-dancing tutorials from some parallel world?
The fourth item was a thread-bound book. Its cover was yellowed rice paper, bearing four large brush-written characters: "Lingbo Weibu." Inside was a complete set of illustrated footwork instructions, accompanied by densely packed formulas and annotations. Rated C-grade, its system description read: "A supreme art of the Carefree Sect. At full mastery, allows the practitioner to dodge and maneuver within the smallest spaces, passing through armies without a scrap of clothing being touched. Note: difficult to cultivate; requires the circulation of internal energy. A mental power of at least 20 is recommended before studying it."
Lin Xiao turned two pages, then discovered he could not understand a single word. The formulas were written in classical Chinese, things like "When the creative origin employs all nines, the laws of heaven are revealed" and "Earth is utmost yielding, yet firm in motion." After reading for ten minutes, the only thing he understood was the four characters on the cover.
Lingbo Weibu was stuffed into the deepest compartment of his canvas bag. It could wait until his intelligence or mental power increased some more.
Finally, he took a bottle of pale green agility potion from his bag, the only non-strength attribute potion among his mission rewards. It added five agility.
Lin Xiao pulled out the stopper, tilted his head back, and downed the agility potion in one gulp. It tasted like unsweetened mint water, cold enough to make him shiver.
"Ding-agility updated: 16 + 5 = 21."
Lin Xiao flexed his fingers, feeling that his joints were much more nimble than before.
He lay back down on the bed, pillowed his head on his hands, crossed his legs, and gazed at the hanging light on the ceiling. Morning light squeezed through a gap in the curtains, drawing a long, thin bright line across the ceiling.
Three hundred thousand dollars. Five hundred strength. Twenty-one agility, and a few items.
It would not be out of the question to stop now, take this money and equipment back to New York, and peacefully work as a clerk. After all, Coulson had already made him a permanent employee, and Fury intended to mentor him personally. His standing in S.H.I.E.L.D. would only rise once he returned. Drinking tea and reading the paper at work, going to May's for free meals and teasing Peter afterward, occasionally taking care of a street robber for a one-star mission reward-that life would already be more comfortable than what most people in this world had.
But I still need to save Tony, or these three months will have been for nothing. Once I get back, I can also cure the system of its rotten habit of only adding strength. When I settle down and don't need to do missions anymore, won't you lose your mind?
Lin Xiao rolled over and closed his eyes, the corners of his mouth curving upward.