Dragon Raja: Lu Mingfei Returns from Sekiro

“Sigh…” Lu Mingfei sat cross-legged, placing the wedge-shaped pill on his lap so that the firelight could shine on it.

"An escape game, huh..." He hadn't forgotten what the little boy Lu Mingze had told him.

He always felt there was some deeper meaning in those words.

With his skills, it wouldn't be difficult for him to sneak into other buildings and gather intelligence. Although he was helpless against soldiers firing volleys of gunfire, if he couldn't beat them, he could run away.

He didn't have any deep-seated hatred for those soldiers, so he didn't feel the need to kill them. He could simply hold his breath and hide.

He's a master at escaping; as long as the grappling hook is pulled fast enough, bullets can't catch him.

In a wide open space, even without the prosthetic arm, his speed and jumping ability alone would leave those guys far behind, eating his exhaust fumes.

Why is it an escape game instead of a stealth game?

He always felt he was about to have a flash of inspiration, but he just wasn't quite there yet.

"Never mind, let's go out and take a look."

"Even if you're going to run, bring enough food. Otherwise, in this desolate snowy landscape, you might starve to death on the road before you even find anyone."

Lu Mingfei picked up the hot wedge and cut the sled shorter.

He didn't plan to ski; he just wanted to increase the contact area of ​​his feet so that his legs and knees wouldn't sink into the snow.

In short, he planned to do as Lu Mingze said: scavenge for supplies, then get far away from the port and try to contact people outside.

He wanted to go back to that building, where there were the most people and the best chance of finding food and tools. Ideally, he'd get a dog sled to save energy.

He didn't care what the port was for; he just wanted to go back to the classroom where the sunlight streamed in, attend classes peacefully, doze off, play games with Fingel and Old Tang, yell and shout in the battle channel, and wait for winter break to eat late-night snacks and barbecue with Little Fatty and watch the latest anime series.

The chubby boy is already a senior in high school, and his aunt is arranging for him to study abroad.

Lu Mingfei missed those nights he spent watching "Code Geass" with the chubby boy. They might not have gotten along before, but when they were eating barbecue and complaining about Suzaku turning against Lelouch for Princess Euphemia, he felt that it was really nice to have a chat with someone like that.

He has to go back, and no one can stop him.

Lu Mingfei put on a large felt hat, covered his mouth and nose with a silk scarf, put on his goggles, sheathed his sword, and fixed the sled to his shoes. He looked like a fully armed soldier, ready to go to the final battlefield. It seemed that as long as he won this battle, he could go home and get married.

Fingel, who was sitting in the cafeteria collecting money, suddenly sneezed. He sniffed, tidied up the pile of paper bags, and then continued to wave, "Next!"

...

The duty lieutenant in the boiler room sat on a hard bench, holding a bottle of Red Label vodka.

"Damn it, why can they go to the nightclub and kiss nurses, while I have to be on duty here?" The lieutenant gulped down his liquor, his nose and face flushed red, clearly drunk.

No one ever comes to Black Swan Harbor, so there's no point in being on duty. The lieutenant thinks he should be dancing in the ballroom instead of sitting here all alone guarding a useless boiler.

If he pressed the communicator, he would find that all the channels were unreachable, but he didn't want to press it. Why would he connect to a channel only to listen to those guys bragging about which pretty nurse they were kissing?

He just kept drinking the liquor.

Lu Mingfei leaned against the wall. He couldn't understand what the person inside was saying. Due to the language barrier, he could only understand the sharp tongue-twisting sounds and continuous hiccups, which sounded like those of a lamb skewer vendor.

But it doesn't matter, body language is also a part of language, so getting that drunkard to lead me to the food storage warehouse shouldn't be too difficult.

Chapter Fifty-Seven: The Dying Swan

"Is the speech finished?" Major Bondarev asked the doctor who had just entered.

The major was a striking man, handsome and tall, with his iron-gray hair neatly combed back and styled with hair gel.

In the heated room, he was wearing only military shorts and a sleeveless vest, his muscles clearly defined and beautifully sculpted, making him undeniably sexy.

He arrived in the same carefree manner, gliding alone through the Arctic snow, sweating profusely in the sub-zero winds.

“Of course, they are enjoying their dinner right now.” The doctor smiled and closed the door, then used a cigar cutter to cut open a cigar for Major Bondarev.

“Humans are such a creature, so easily seduced by material things.” Major Bondarev, with a cigar in his mouth, sat by the fireplace and loaded a steel-core bullet into his magazine.

"Yes, that's how humans are; they're satisfied with just a little bit of material things." The doctor smiled throughout, his tone gentle and kind, like a amiable old father.

"Are you really not going to bring your little flower?" Major Bondarev pulled the safety lever of his gun, pointed the muzzle at his temple, and then listlessly tucked the gun into his belt.

“Flowers are precious because they are in the cold Arctic. We are about to go to the warm Baltic, where there are fresh little flowers everywhere.” The doctor stood in front of the mirror, buttoned up his shirt, and put on the sickle and hammer patterned cufflinks.

"The 48 vacuum bombs buried under the permafrost will detonate precisely at midnight. Operation 'The Death of the Swan' will begin today. We need to be at least ten kilometers away and must depart before 23 PM." The doctor put on his overcoat and glanced at his watch: "Is the Lenin ready?"

"No problem at all. The nuclear reactor and gas turbine are already running at full power, just waiting for us to board. But the blizzard is more intense than I expected, and visibility is only fifty meters." Major Bondarev exhaled a smoke ring, which gradually floated and finally expanded into a circle before calmly disappearing into the air.

"Trust the sled dogs; they are the spirits of the Arctic." The doctor wore three medals on his chest: the Lenin Medal, the Red Flag Medal, and the October Revolution Medal. "Starting at 21 p.m., the heating system will release hallucinogenic gases into all the rooms. As the amount of hallucinogens gradually increases, everyone will have more and more fun."

“If there really is a God, we must be going to hell.” Major Bondarev threw his half-smoked cigar into the burning fire and put on another military overcoat.

“God never punishes evil, otherwise I wouldn’t be this old.” The doctor smiled slightly. “While there’s still time, why don’t you tell me about the progress of your research? After all, we will soon become partners, and knowing this in advance will make it easier for me to conduct my research and planning.”

"You want to hear?" Major Bondarev narrowed his eyes, staring at the old man whose smile hadn't faded since he came in. "Alright, let me, the major, tell you about the projects I know."

...

There was a crack in the boiler room, through which Lu Mingfei could peek at the layout of the rooms inside.

The water in the sink reflected a dim yellow light under the lamp, and the murky water flowed slowly. Behind the boiler room was a cold storage room, from which wisps of white steam drifted out.

"Cold storage? Is it for something that needs to be kept fresh? Could it be... food!"

What else could need to be kept in the refrigerator if not fresh meat and vegetables?

A faint, intoxicating scent filled the air, and he thought of those strange syringes again.

He also felt that it might not be food inside. This was the experimental base of a mad scientist. Maybe there were monster specimens frozen in ice, or even a Frankenstein-like madman, frozen inside, waiting for a destined person to awaken him so that the destined person could fulfill Frankenstein's three wishes.

Lu Mingfei looked at the lieutenant drinking at the duty table. The guy was already completely drunk and might collapse on the table at any moment. A drunkard can't lead the way.

He pushed the door open, leaving it ajar, so that if someone came, the sound of footsteps would be clearer, making it easier for him to hide.

The duty desk was to the right of the door. The lieutenant's face was turned toward the wall between the cold storage and the door. In front of him was a rotating boiler.

From this position, the lieutenant could observe all movements; if the doors to the cold storage and boiler room were opened, he would notice immediately.

However, the lieutenant did not notice Lu Mingfei's arrival. Lu Mingfei did not deliberately hide himself; there was only him and a drunkard here, so there was no need to.

Perhaps he was too drunk, because the guy actually kissed the bottle. He seemed to treat the cold bottle as a nurse's fair skin, stroking it with his hands, his eyes glazed over, his body twisting. He remained unmoved until Lu Mingfei walked up to him.

Is Red Label Vodka really that intoxicating?

Lu Mingfei drew the wedge-shaped blade and placed it against the lieutenant's neck. The cool touch brought clarity to the lieutenant's eyes.

“You, take me to find food!” Lu Mingfei said in English. Because he was going to study in the United States, he watched a lot of American movies during the summer vacation and finally managed to pick up some of his old English level.

The lieutenant trembled and raised his hands. Lu Mingfei instructed him to stand up, take the Maklov pistol and belt from his waist, and hang them on his own waist.

Although he prefers using a knife, it's always good to have a gun.

"Don't kill me..." The lieutenant's legs were trembling slightly; he had drunk too much and was losing control.

Lu Mingfei wanted to bring the guy to his senses, so he took him to the sink and prepared to push his head into the water to wash his face. But when he got closer, he realized that the sink was not filled with water, but with fuel oil!

This was supposed to be cooling water for a boiler, but the boiler wasn't burning at all; the fire inside had long since gone out, and it was just running idle!

Is this normal?

Even a drunkard probably wouldn't do something as foolish as pouring fuel into the sink, and even if he did, he wouldn't remember to turn off the fire.

With just a small match, a raging fire would immediately erupt here. The amount of fuel was enormous, thick and flowing slowly. The sink's pipes ran through the walls to other places. Lu Mingfei didn't know how many rooms this sink connected to, but if it caught fire, an unimaginable tragedy would surely occur.

Lu Mingfei felt as if a dark web was shrouding this mysterious port. Looking at the timid lieutenant's military overcoat, he realized that this might not be a private base, but some kind of militarized secret location.

Some secrets are better destroyed than allowed to be leaked.

Perhaps this is the reason for the escape game. Lu Mingfei pressed the lieutenant's face against the cold iron wall of the freezer to help the guy sober up.

He needs to speed things up.

Chapter 58 You! Faker!

Renata crawled through the narrow pipe, her breasts bulging as she stuffed Zorro into her flat chest.

This is a ventilation duct, and of all the children, only her still-developing, slender body could climb into these ducts, which are less than 40 centimeters in diameter.

Before the officers and nurses went crazy, she quietly climbed up the Christmas tree and used a small wrench she had stolen at dinner to remove the filter from the ventilation duct.

Anton was stronger and faster than her, but without any skill, she easily shook off Anton and jumped from the top of the Christmas tree onto the ventilation duct opening.

The blizzard howled outside, and it was freezing cold inside the pipes. The last time she crawled around here, there was still warmth from the heating, but now there was only chill, and the remaining heat was about to dissipate.

These ventilation ducts were originally designed to deliver heating, so even restricted areas can be reached via these ducts.

She stopped at the fifty-eighth vent. It would normally be so hot that you would have to put something under it to touch it, but the heating had been turned off and there would be no more heat.

Renata placed her hands on the hot iron plate to restore warmth to her stiff fingers and make them flexible again.

She used a wrench to loosen the screws, removed the filter, and carefully jumped down.

The space suddenly felt much more spacious. There were no guards here, and even if there were, they were already intoxicated by excessive hallucinogens and lost in a dreamlike state.

The doctor seems to have put all the hallucinogens into the heating system; he's changed and no longer wants the children to have a nice ball before they die.

Renata pushed open the door to the small cubicle. Inside was a DShK 1938, an anti-aircraft machine gun with a 12.7mm caliber. One couldn't help but wonder if artillery shells were being fired from those bullet holes.

With a maximum range of 5.4 kilometers and a combat rate of fire of 125 rounds per minute, it can fire an average of 2 cannonballs per second. Weighing 180 kilograms, if it weren't for the well-lubricated wheeled support of this gun, she would have been left staring blankly at this heavy weapon.

Next to the weapons was a box of bread, all Russian-style large loaves of bread with a long shelf life; one loaf could last a long time.

The sled dogs next door were whimpering softly; they weren't alerting Renata, but rather expressing friendly goodwill.

Renata and they are friends, friends who would live and die together.

Renata blew a dog whistle, a sound that could call her friends.

Ataga took the first spot, licking her palm.

"Good boy/girl." She patted the sled dogs on the head and took off their collars.

There is a miniature locator in the inner ring, and every staff member at Black Swan Harbor is fitted with a locator, including the serving sled dogs.

Renata removed the collars from each sled dog, and all the tracking devices were thrown back into the sled dogs' sleeping kennels.

The gray sled had a truck-like tailgate. She lowered the tailgate, turning it into a ramp, and with the help of the dogs, pushed the heavy machine gun onto the sled.

"Hold on a little longer, we'll be free soon, and this time, you'll be free too." A faint smile finally appeared on that calm and expressionless face.

She embraced her friends, and Zorro the bear, sitting in the bread box, also smiled, seemingly happy to be reunited with the petite girl.