Chapter 97: On the Brink of Death

Translator: Exodus Tales Editor: Exodus Tales

Xia Fei’s heart sank upon hearing the words ‘self-destruct’. Who initiated the self-destruct sequence?

The space station was probably controlled remotely by Bosingwa, and he could not have been the one to initiate the self-destruct sequence. Someone must have taken over the remote control and initiated the self-destruct.

Thinking back on the Blood Raiders’ infiltration and several Adjudicators’ death, Xia Fei came to the conclusion that the Adjudicators from the classifieds investigation department must have inadvertently stumbled upon the Blood Raiders in the course of their investigation, which resulted in them being killed summarily to keep their mouths shut.

And when his group arrived, the Blood Raiders decided to destroy the entire space station once they concluded that they could not retreat in time. This would destroy the space station along with all the evidence.

Realizing this, Xia Fei decided to ignore Xiao Haili, who was in a battle to the death, as long as he could keep his own.

Xia Fei ran and soon arrived at the elevator at one side of the warehouse. However, there was not even a light indicating that he pressed a button when he tried to call the elevator.

“I’m trapped.”

It was the same situation when he arrived at another elevator. None of the elevator doors opened, and the warehouse was now sealed from the outside.

This space station was huge, and if it exploded, there was no way anyone inside of it could survive.

At this moment, Xia Fei remembered about the space station emergency handbook that Qin Mang had handed to him. The handbook specified emergency exits that all space stations should have. These exits were usually hidden in secluded locations that even the staff on the space station might not come to know the existence of.

Xia Fei accessed the microcomputer as fast as he could to bring up the emergency handbook.

“Found it!” Xia Fei saw that there should be air ventilation ducts in the ceiling of the warehouse, and he should be able to travel through them to escape.

Xia Fei then found the opening to the ventilation duct two hundred meters to his left, but it was four meters above the ground and closed behind a set of shutters.

Pushing off the ground, Xia Fei leaped in the air. He made a dozen or so rapid cuts with Chasing Light and chopped the shutter into pieces.

With one hand on the ventilation duct, Xia Fei flipped himself upward and managed to get in.

The ventilation duct was so dusty that he could barely breathe, but Xia Fei did not dwell on all this. He crouched low and scrambled along the duct as best as he could, all in an effort to escape.

The ducts were of varying sizes. Sometimes, Xia Fei could stand up in them, while at other times, he found himself having great difficulty even squeezing himself through the narrower segments.

In front of him was a narrow duct that went along for a hundred or so meters long. Xia Fei pushed himself off with a powerful stomp and dove into the duct, straight as an arrow with his arms outstretched.

Xia Fei’s leap brought him nearly one hundred meters forward, and the exit was now in sight.

With his arms on either side, Xia Fei struggled to wriggle himself out of the pipes.

That was when Xia Fei heard the sound of a commotion on his left. Looking through the shutters that looked out into a massive room, he spotted eight Blood Raiders moving things out of the room in a hurry.

There was a Blood Raider with golden scales that seemed to be in charge. He was much taller than the ones he had seen earlier, and his tail, in particular, was notably long and thick like a python.

“Move the humans onto the ship quickly. The space station is about to explode,” commanded the golden Blood Raider with a deep voice.

“Human?” This caught Xia Fei’s attention. Upon closer examination, the Blood Raider seemed to be carrying metal alloy boxes, and by the looks of it, each of them appeared to be human coffins.

The coffins were arranged neatly on some unknown equipment, and there were two, thick pipes connected to each coffin.

A Blood Raider had very brutishly ripped off one of the pipes, and the white gas that came out of it quickly froze his leg. The Blood Raider howled in pain as he begged for his companions to help him.

It seemed that the coffins were on something that kept them cool. It was highly possible that the coffins contained a cryogenically-preserved human.

When that golden Blood Raider noticed this, he carried the coffin with one hand and used his other hand to stab through the head of the clumsy Blood Raider.

“Useless.”

The golden Blood Raider jammed all five fingers into the skull, and that clumsy Blood Raider died right then and there, without even managing to utter a sound.

“Hmph!” The golden Blood Raider walked toward the exit with one coffin in hand, completely unconcerned with the death of his subordinate.

This was when the synthetic female voice spoke again. “Warning! The space station will self-destruct in twenty-five minutes. All staff at hand, please evacuate from the space station immediately.”

Xia Fei was momentarily caught up with this before he continued his effortful crawl toward the exit once more. Right now, using what time he had to escape with his life was of a higher priority. As for finding out if there were real humans inside those coffins or learning the reason behind the Blood Raiders capturing those humans, it was best if he waited until he was safe.

The word ‘human’ stuck in Xia Fei’s mind as he ran; all of a sudden, a question popped into his head. Xiaoyu was also kidnapped out of nowhere; could she be in one of those coffins?

Xia Fei held back his curiosity as he focused on escaping.

The Blood Raiders had the numbers on their side, so there was no point in Xia Fei trying to go head to head against them. Not only would he not have the chance to escape with Xiaoyu, he might even lose his life in the process.

Moreover, the space station was in the middle of a self-destruct sequence. It would actually be a good thing if Xiaoyu was in one of those boxes, for she could at least escape with the Blood Raiders. Furthermore, it was possible that if he attempted to interfere, Xiaoyu could end up being destroyed along with the space station, and by no means was that an outcome he wished to see.

Presently, his only solution was to escape this communication dead zone, summon Lunar Eclipse, and use its superior combat weaponry to stop their ship.

When he arrived at this conclusion, there was no more hesitation in Xia Fei as he sped along the escape route, his eyes filled with determination.

A few moments later, his microcomputer regained its reception, and Xia Fei immediately used it to summon Lunar Eclipse.

Lunar Eclipse was parked just fifty-thousand lightyears away and would arrive in at most ten minutes.

“Bosingwa, what’s your situation?” Xia Fei continued sprinting as he regained contact with Bosingwa.

“Not good; there’s an insectoid battleship that appeared out of nowhere, and we are exchanging fire. What about Haili and Queiroz? Are they still with you?” Bosingwa asked with urgency.

Xia Fei could hear constant explosions coming from the other end, and the video was constantly shaking. Evidently, Bosingwa was in a sticky situation.

“It’s complicated. I’m not sure how Queiroz and Xiao Haili are doing, but I plan on escaping the same way I came in. Can the doors to the landing bay be opened?”

Xia Fei opted out of mentioning his exchange with Xia Haili. He knew that Queiroz was good friends with that guy, and Bosingwa might be unable to accept what had transpired at that time if he mentioned how Xiao Haili had tried to kill him. It would hardly do any good given their current predicament.

Bosingwa was quiet for a few moments before he said, “I’ve lost control of the space station, so I can’t open the bay doors. You’ll have to find a way out of the space station on your own; apologies.”

“Understood,” said Xia Fei. “I’ve summoned my ship; it’s called Lunar Eclipse. Don’t mistake it for a foe later.”

Bosingwa nodded, then asked with a quiver in his voice, “Are Haili and Queiroz alive when you escaped?”

“They are. Sorry.” As Xia Fei was struggling through a narrow passageway, he kept it short and concise.

Bosingwa let out a bitter laugh. “Don’t be. That’s what it’s like being an Adjudicator; you never know when you’ll encounter danger. I’m surrounded by enemies, so there’s no way I can help you out of the space station. Good luck.”

Xia Fei and Bosingwa shared a moment of silence. In the current situation, Bosingwa was in a tough spot as he was enclosed by enemies, whereas Xia Fei was trapped in a space station that was about to explode. There was not much they could do to help each other.

Xia Fei smiled and said, “I wish you good luck as well.”

Out of nowhere, Moon Song appeared on the screen and yelled angrily, “Mr. Xia, I order you to make it back alive!”

Just like that, Xia Fei shut off the communications, choosing to ignore the communication request that Moon Song had sent after the call ended.

Emotions played no role in a moment of life and death such as this. Xia Fei must remain calm and cling on tightly to any chance of escape.

After navigating through the air-ventilation system, Xia Fei arrived at the landing bay twenty-minutes before the self-destruct. A bright warp channel had opened up in space, and Lunar Eclipse arrived at the scene through that wormhole.

Xia Fei looked outside the window, only to find that the insectoid battleship was busy fighting Bosingwa’s Inquisitor-class frigate. They seemed to be too preoccupied to threaten Lunar Eclipse.

The most important thing now was to find a possible escape route, and Xia Fei was looking through the handbook for one.

Suddenly, Xia Fei’s eyes twinkled as he discovered that there should still be an emergency escape hatch under the landing bay, which was designed especially for emergencies. The bay door could be manually operated, and there was even a spacesuit stowed inside it.

As space was in a state of vacuum, even if Xia Fei managed to leave the space station, he stood no chance of surviving in space without a spacesuit.

Following the emergency handbook, Xia Fei successfully located the escape hatch. He then put on the spacesuit that seemed to have been untouched for hundreds of years, so Xia Fei could only pray that there would not be any issues with it.

Xia Fei grabbed hold of the circular handle to the pressurized door and turned it with all his might.

After eleven revolutions, this sealed door finally opened. Xia Fei angled toward the Lunar Eclipse and propelled himself into space as he pushed off the space station with his legs.

Far away was Queiroz’s ship, which was battling a weird insectoid warship. Bright lights constantly came out of the cannons equipped on the ships, looking like countless flashlights shining in the darkness of space, so bright that it was difficult to keep one’s eyes open.

Xia Fei turned on the propulsion system for his spacesuit as he navigated through space, making his way toward the Lunar Eclipse.

His spacewalk was a success, and Xia Fei made his way onto the command deck of the Light Eclipse moments later.

Using his ship, Xia Fei rushed toward the insectoid battleship, which was battling Queiroz, as fast as he could. The firing systems were locked on, and the anti-matter shells from the neutron cannon and the light missiles from the missile launcher were all fired at the same time.

The insectoid ship was going toe to toe with Bosingwa’s ship when the attacks from Lunar Eclipse caught them completely off guard. Three rounds of firing later, the insectoid ship’s energy shields shattered. With the energy shields brought offline, the anti-matter piercing shell could even more mercilessly make direct contact with the hull and armor of the insectoid ship.

Soon, huge towers of flames erupted from the ship.

A huge flash of light followed by the sound of an explosion. The insectoid ship was completely destroyed.

Xia Fei was still vigilant as he knew that there was another insectoid ship nearby and that Xiaoyu could very well be on that ship.

However, the strange thing was that his radar was not picking up any other ship in the vicinity at all, so it was highly possible that the ship had been fitted with stealth equipment.

“Thank you.” Bosingwa was relieved.

“There’s still another ship. Turn on your surge defense system, I’m about to let out a shock bomb,” Xia Fei said, gritting his teeth with a serious look on his face.

When Lunar Eclipse was being built, he had already considered the various situations that he might encounter, with stealth equipment being one of them. Although a shock bomb was not the best method to deal with invisible foes, it was the most direct and the most violent one.

A shock bomb would deal damage to its surroundings regardless of who it was, essentially dealing damage to oneself with the expectation that the damage to the enemy would be greater.

No one would like to use something so extreme aside from a madman like Xia Fei.

“Shock bomb? You have a shock bomb?” Bosingwa was utterly surprised. “I don’t have a surge defense system on my ship.”

Xia Fei smiled. “I’m sorry, then you’ll just have to bear with it a little.”

Bosingwa was completely shocked and quickly realized Xia Fei was not joking. He quickly turned around and yelled at Chen Dong and the others, “Get on the ground and brace yourselves! Grab something sturdy!

“He’s crazy!” hissed Bosingwa as he pushed the accelerator to the maximum. “What day and age is this? Who still carries shock bombs around?”

Xiaoyu’s cute face flashed in front of Xia Fei’s eyes. In order to rescue her, not only would Xia Fei use a shock bomb, he would even use a nuke without a moment’s hesitation.

“I won’t let them take you this time,” muttered Xia Fei as he pressed the red safety button on his command deck with strong intention.

A black bomb detached itself from the ship’s magazine and floated into the silent night sky.

It was just six minutes and seventeen seconds from the space station’s self-destruct.