It took Yelena no time at all to seal the deal. Her Russian connection predictably meant barely anything since the protection deal with the Russian fleet was essentially sealed from the money they offered. Xia Lei generously handed out six million US dollars to the captain, one million each for all six of them.

After receiving the six-million-dollar deposit, the captain of the Russian destroyer boasted that any infiltration on the ship would mean war!

Aboard the ship, Xia Lei requested a laptop and some lead material from an officer named Ivanovic.

Xia Lei’s request naturally caught Ivanovic off guard. Suspicious of the pairing of his demands, Ivanovic proceeded to interrogate, “For the laptop, I can give you a military-grade standard, but why the raw lead material? What do you want to do with it? What do you have with you?”

Xia Lei reassured, “Captain sir, rest assured. I have no nuclear ingredients in my possession or any radioactive materials. If my words don’t sound convincing enough feel free to do a nuclear detection test on us.”

“For security precautions, I have to.” Ivanovic then retrieved a detection scan from one of the marines.

The Russian soldiers then proceeded to do a thorough scan on Xia Lei and his backpack, before moving on to the rest of the crew along with their belongings. Unsurprisingly, there were no suspicious detections.

Truth was, with the characteristics of the crystal skull, even if Xia Lei had a nuclear warhead in his possession, the detectors would not even be able to pick it up.

The results came as a relief to Ivanovic as he continued, “My friends, would you mind if I check the content of your bags?”

“No can do, sir.” Xia Lei rejected.

Ivanovic was on the edge once again as he could not wrap his head around Xia Lei’s strange request. It was well known among the sector that lead was most commonly used to contain radiation.

Xia Lei continued, “Captain, with all due respect, I’m sure you must be full of questions at the moment, but I can assure you that there is nothing in our possessions that would threaten this ship and the national interests of the Russian government. Which is why, for the sake of the six million dollars on your hands, try curbing your curiosity.”

“Hahaha…” Ivanovic chuckled. “You’re right my friend, I am curious. But with much consideration for your generous ‘donation’, I guess I’ll have to shift my curiosity elsewhere. Okay, you sit tight on my ship, and when you’re on board, nobody, not even the Americans can lay a finger on you.”

Six million USD was a lot of money for a Russian military captain. So why let that go to waste for some unnecessary answers?

Moments after Ivanovic left the scene, a marine soldier brought the materials that Xia Lei requested, a hacker grade laptop and a rectangular suitcase intended to store nuclear materials.

“Sir, I cannot locate any raw lead on board. All I have is this suitcase. It is mostly made from lead, I hope it could be of use to you. If it doesn’t fit your request please let us know, we’ll sort it out,” The Russian soldier was particularly amiable.

Well, why wouldn’t it work? With the suitcase, it’ll save me all the time needed to make one from scratch. He replied, “Oh this fits perfectly, thank you. One thing, I need you to keep this a secret. Here, a little gift for the favour.”

He then handed the Russian soldier a few five hundred Euro notes.

“My pleasure sir, feel free to call me up anytime you need,” The soldier happily accepted and left.

Money isn’t everything. But without it, he might’ve still been on that uninhabited island hunting for crabs.

After the marines left, Xia Lei placed the crystal skull into the rectangular radiation insulant suitcase. Subsequently, he dialled up Long Bing’s number through a satellite phone.

Ddu-ddu...ddu-ddu...

The calling process was the ordinary, now in the absence of the haunting sounds of ominous breathing. Seconds later, a familiar voice was heard on the other end of the line.

“Where are you?”

It was Long Bing. In her heart, Xia Lei’s whereabouts and his safety were, by and large, her top priority.

Xia Lei reassured, “I’m on a Russian destroyer, will be back in no time.”

Long Bing let out a prolonged sigh, “That’s great, been worried sick. The past days I never had a proper meal or even a decent rest.”

Xia Lei continued, “That’s not very good, you’re pregnant! Your health is key.”

“Well now that I know you’re okay, I’m sure I’ll have a much better appetite today.” Long Bing murmured. “Without you, I just couldn’t sleep. For the sake of your son, come home, alright?”

Xia Lei chuckled, “I miss you too.”

“Mm. By the way, do you want me to pass the phone to Siyao and the others? They’re also very worried about your whereabouts.”

Xia Lei replied, “It’s fine, you can pass on the message in my stead. I still have some stuff to handle. The reason I called was actually to have you convey a message to Tang Yuyan.”

“What do you need me to tell her?”

“Tell her that the CIA has an intelligence point in China. A cafe called Leaf cafe. The person in charge is a Chinese man called Yang Shan, a particularly cunning person.”

“Let me reiterate, you’re telling me to inform Tang Yuyan about this, knowing that she will immediately proceed to bring that intel point to the ground. Are you sure about this?” Long Bing made sure she heard it right.

Xia Lei continued, “The news of me faking my death has been exposed. I should have just updated her with this piece of intel back then. This was beyond my calculations.”

“If she knows you’re not dead…” Long Bing, for the first time in the conversation, voiced her dissent.

“Well let her be then.”

“Alright, I’ll go now.” A pause ensued before she added. “Hubby, take extra care of yourself. Whatever you do, think about us and your children, we’re waiting for you at home.”

Xia Lei was rather moved but simultaneously felt slightly guilt-ridden from the sex he had with Tsukino Kyoko.

“I’m hanging up now, bye.” Long Bing was ready to end the call.

Xia Lei blew her a virtual kiss.

Long Bing’s giggle was heard through the other end of the line, “Save it for when you come back, can’t feel it through the phone.”

Xia Lei couldn’t help but crack a smile at her mischievous reply.

It’s always nice to have someone waiting back home.

After ending the call, Xia Lei turned towards the rectangular radiation insulant suitcase as he mumbled, “So its mind control powers were actually through energy, the box sure comes in handy.”

If it was ineffective, he wouldn’t have successfully made the call to Long Bing. Taking that into consideration, he made it his top priority upon boarding the ship to find lead materials to insulate it from everything else within its radius.

Xia Lei then flipped open the laptop that Ivanovic handed to him, checked the hardware of the computer, then activated it to investigate its software and its contents.

He quickly identified the trojan horse coding in the system, as he reactively raised the edges of his lips for a half-smile. Ivanovic wanted to track his actions, but he had truly underestimated what Xia Lei was capable of.

Xia Lei promptly removed the trojan horse from the laptop and subsequently ran the system.

Now it was time to activate ‘Xiao Qian’ previously planted into the CIA.

His actions went smoothly as it took only twenty minutes to navigate into the CIA’s internal cloud drive, thereafter activating Xiao Qian from within.

That was where he would call it day, leaving the rest to Xiao Qian. Like a pixie in the woods, unless it chose to reveal itself, nobody would even know it existed.

Everything was going just as planned.

Xiao Qian was awoken from within the core software of the CIA, and like a tumour it rapidly manifested through the system. The moment the CIA was aware of its presence, it would be too late!

“Done.” Xia Lei was finally relieved.

Right then, a red warning pop up window showed up on the monitor of the laptop, front and centre, along with a warning message. You have been discovered.

“How is this possible?” Xia Lei was distraught. There is a better hacker than I am out there? That’s impossible!

The opponent was collecting his data, with the intention of tracking his whereabouts!

Xia Lei instinctively wanted to exit himself from the CIA’s internal system, but he quickly identified a major flaw in his knee-jerk reaction. It would take no time before the opponent located Xiao Qian!

“Bad idea, can’t let that bastard track down Xiao Qian!”

Convinced, he decisively chose to retaliate against the unknown enemy.

This was a virtual war between the unseen, and their ammunition was none other than combinations of ‘0’ and ‘1’s, stacked upon one another to destroy the opponent!

A minute later, Xia Lei reactively blurted. “The enemy isn’t a person, it’s a defence mechanism! The CIA had the God system! The Americans developed an AI of such phenomenal capabilities!”

Two minutes later, he managed to lose the CIA internal mechanism, and by the skin of his teeth managed to shake himself loose from detection.

Once completed, he turned the laptop off and unplugged its battery.

Sitting silently by the disassembled laptop, now just a pile of accessories, he thought to himself. “The God system sure is powerful, and very intelligent at that. It took hardly any time for it to find Xiao Qian...I wonder if Xiao Qian even made an impact on it.”

While on a video call with William Mussi, Xia Lei utilized the database of the CIA’s Kyoto intelligence point to implant Xiao Qian into its system.

He knew then that Xiao Qian was meant for a single-use attack. What was ultimately beyond his expectations was that he would be discovered within minutes, and now the next target would very much be Xiao Qian.

What would Xiao Qian be able to bring to the table would lie entirely to fate.

“Boss!” Tsukino Kyoko’s voice resonated through the cabins. “There’s a little issue out here, would you like to take a look?”

Xia Lei held onto the radiation insulant suitcase and strode towards the cabin alley. In Kyoko’s company, he strode towards the command bridge.

Through the windows, he quickly identified three F35 fighter jets whirling through the air above them, encircling them like vultures, seemingly on an investigation.

Ivanovic yelled into the broadcast mouthpiece. “Bloody hell, do they have free gas or what? Activate the radars on them!”

The Russian ship sounded the alarm.

The Russian destroyer initiated all radars, locking onto the three American F35 jets. The missile silos were subsequently unlocked and ready to fire.

Three seconds later, the three F35 fighter jets steered away towards the Turkish maritime border and vanished into the clouds.

Ivanovic turned towards the team with a smug look on his face. “Friends, did you see that? They’re just a bunch of cowards!”

Xia Lei smiled in response and gave Ivanovic a thumbs up.

The route back home was now a safe one.