Chapter 1384: Xia Fan versus Beast Tamer
Translator: Exodus Tales Editor: Exodus Tales
Though it looked like Xia Fan was blowing a whistle, Cheyenne could not hear a thing.
“Could he be making ultrasonic waves?!” Cheyenne was stunned. She could feel a buzz in her brain, and she immediately sucked in a mouthful of cold air.
As an investigator of the Special Bureau who had seen plenty of the world, Cheyenne had naturally heard of ultrasonic waves. People who had trained for an extended period of time could make those sound waves, using them to stimulate the brains of beasts so as to establish a magical connection with them.
This technique was called the Beast Controlling Technique; anyone who possessed this skill would be called a Beast Tamer.
The controlling of beasts through sound waves was different from the Beast Control special ability. The latter relied on telepathy to communicate with the beasts’ minds and hearts, while controlling beasts with sound waves was a long-known and more technical method.
!!
Every technical method shared one commonality, and that was the threshold was very high. After all, everyone required plenty of training to grasp a profound technique, and would need to seek out a proper teacher. That was also why those who could normally control beasts with sound waves were gray-haired older folks.
Xia Fan was so young, yet he had already grasped such a transcendent technique? How was that possible!?
Unfortunately, Cheyenne had forgotten that there was never such a thing as impossible in this world.
Not only was Xia Fan versed in controlling beasts through sound waves, he was even an expert at it!
Very soon, faint sounds could be heard coming from the ventilation shaft above the ceiling and the pipe that led straight to the sewers. At first, some small rats poked their heads out vigilantly, but soon could no longer resist the draw of the soundwaves and began to make their way to Xia Fan’s side. Like a group of servants bowing, they held their heads low and laid down on the ground before him.
Cheyenne felt as if she had difficulty breathing; aside from being afraid to make a noise, and slightly alarmed by the appearance of these rats, it was the remarkable performance that Xia Fan had shown her that left her breathless with admiration.
Besides his frighteningly keen reasoning and a.n.a.lysis ability, he had a sense of smell that was even more sensitive than a hunting hound’s, a deep understanding toward toxicology as well as an almost fantastical ability to control beasts through sound waves! Each and every one of these supernatural skills was possessed by the very young Xia Fan. This young man was simply inconceivable!
Of course, this was on top of the fact that according to first-hand witness reports, Xia Fan himself was a speed-type special ability user!
Opening the bags of snacks, Xia Fan poured out sugared peanuts, chocolate waffle biscuits, sandwich cookies, and cream pies to feed the little rats. Xia Fan even carefully broke up these snacks into small pieces so that it was more convenient for the little rats to eat.
Seeing these rats that liked staying in the dark corners of the hospital becoming happy and enjoying the feast, Xia Fan did not miss out on the chance to ask a few questions.
“Ah, how scary. Are any of you hurt?”
“Wow, it must have been really hard for you. Do any of you know where it went?”
“So I see. Did anyone see what that person looked like?”
Using sound waves to control beasts was not a special ability, which was why there was no way for Xia Fan to directly communicate with them through their consciousness. Only by posing questions could he help the little rats understand the situation and provide him with the information he needed.
The rats crawled, rolled, dipped their tails in a bit of water and began drawing on the floor. They used all sorts of methods to answer Xia Fan’s questions.
“Thank you everyone for your hard work. Finish eating what you can and hurry back. Bring whatever’s left with you and store it, so you can stave off going hungry in the future. Remember, be careful.”
As a woman, Cheyenne hated mice and such rodents, but Xia Fan instead treated these rats like they were friends, hearing their complaints and warning them to take note of their safety. Perhaps it was why Xia Fan had managed to grasp the ability to control beasts with sound waves at such a young age; his att.i.tude toward those small lives was essentially that of kins.h.i.+p.
After some time, the rats all left down the pipes, bringing away the leftovers in their paws or stuffed in their mouths. Some even dragged them with their long tails, carrying what they could back to their nests. Meanwhile, Xia Fan lightly waved goodbye to them, a bright smile on his face.
After the rats left, Xia Fan replaced the vent and pipe cover, saying to Cheyenne, “I’ve already gotten a good sense of what happened. The killer took control of a very small Golden Thread Snake and entered via the sewers. While the staff was not paying attention, it released the poison into a gla.s.s of water.
“Mister Roten drank a gla.s.s after his condition improved, and then died of the poison.”
With that, Xia Fan pointed to a paper cup in the rubbish bin. “If you take that cup to the laboratory, you’ll be able to pick up traces of the toxin’s residue.”
Cheyenne nodded and had the piece of evidence sealed in a plastic bag and made ready to bring it to the laboratory.
“Those little guys were not trained, so the information they could provide was limited,” Xia Fan then whispered, “The only useful information they told me was that the one controlling the Golden Thread Snake was a bald man.”
“Bald?” Cheyenne was startled, but promptly picked up her communicator and left the room to make a call.
…
…
The rest was left to the police to handle. Cheyenne and Xia Fan made their way to the hospital car park and drove the hovercar up to the highway, their destination being the airport.
“Will the killer be caught?” Xia Fan asked Cheyenne.
Cheyenne let out a light sigh. “That’s hard to say. After all, the manpower of the Special Bureau is limited. Brenia has a population of close to three billion, and there’s only our chief and four official investigators in the Special Bureau. Even if we were to include the logistics and support staff, there’s still just barely two dozen of us.”
“So few?” Xia Fan was shocked.
Cheyenne chuckled, “We make it work. After all, there’s only about one in every ten thousand ordinary folk that have special abilities, meaning there are fewer than thirty thousand special ability users on Brenia. A good half of them work for major corporations and won’t stay locally. After you eliminate those that are still too young, there’s only several thousand young adult ability users left.”
“That makes sense. The Special Bureau’s main purview are criminals with special abilities, and you won’t be involved with public security cases,” Xia Fan nodded along. “So, where are we off to now?”
“The airport. Mirrorsea City’s airport is one of the three largest main ports on Brenia, so we’re off to try our luck.”
—
The hovercar quickly left the city as they took the highway. The view was pretty as they traveled along the coast, with the sea spanning endlessly outward to their left and a nature preserve to their right. Xia Fan sat quietly in the pa.s.senger seat and admired the view.
Suddenly, the hovercar display screen flickered on and beeped warningly.
Cheyenne’s fingers tapped on the screen lightly and she said rapidly, “The police searched for a bald man according to the description we provided and spotted someone suspicious, but he ran off.”
“Which direction did he run in?” Xia Fan asked after a pause. “For him to run away after the police sought to question him, he’s surely suspicious.”
“It just so happens that it happened somewhere to our right, about forty kilometers away,” Cheyenne replied.
Xia Fan watched as she pushed a b.u.t.ton to activate the hovercar’s flight mode.
The vehicles that the Special Bureau had access to use had been specially modified, so while it normally looked no different from any ordinary hovercar, it could actually take flight in times of emergency, and even had the capability to travel underwater.
*Whoos.h.!.+*
Blue flames shot out from under the hovercar as the vehicle lifted up into the sky. It then did an emergency turn in mid-air, flying over the highway’s side barriers and entering the spa.r.s.e jungle area. It flew low, just above the canopy line, headed in the direction of the tracking signal the police had put up to search for the suspect.
Xia Fan could see three unmanned reconnaissance drones further in the distance that were presently making an aerial search of the place.
“We got him!” Cheyenne shouted suddenly.
Cheyenne actually drove rather aggressively for a woman. The moment she saw a dark figure on the ground running between the trees below, she immediately put the hovercar in a dive. The vehicle’s engines let out a screeching roar as they went swooping down!
“Oh no!” Xia Fan yelped.
Just in the moment their hovercar made its descent, Xia Fan saw a large hunting falcon come hurtling toward them, its head pointed directly at the front of the hovercar. It was clearly under the control of the killer, with only the thought of causing mutual destruction in mind.
Hurtling along at high speeds was very scary, and the moment a plane took off, due to the great speed they would be going at, even a tiny sparrow colliding with it could very well cause the aircraft to lose control. Obviously, there was no need to mention just what would happen if an adult falcon that weighed over twenty kilograms was on a collision course instead!
The impact from receiving such a head-on collision at such speeds would be akin to taking a cannonball straight on!
The hit came too suddenly and at too great a speed, so even though Cheyenne had turned in the opposite direction as much as she could, it still seemed there was no way to avoid a crash.
“Jump!” In the nick of time, Xia Fan suddenly used his strength to fight against the momentum and slapped the red emergency ejection b.u.t.ton in the center of the hovercar, while also reaching out to unbuckle the safety belts he and Cheyenne had on.
*Bamf!*
A dull sound echoed out as the transparent skyroof over Xia Fan and Cheyenne popped off. The two leaped away and out through that opening just as their seats began to shoot upward.
It was also at that moment the controlled falcon smashed right into the winds.h.i.+eld of the hovercar.
The winds.h.i.+eld immediately shattered, and while the falcon was dead upon impact, its body nevertheless continued forward with its inertia and smashed into the interior of the car!
*Kaboom*
Xia Fan had Cheyenne in his arms. She watched the flaming wreck of the hovercar after it exploded, a sense of having escaped the clutches of death coming over her.
The greatest strength of the speed special ability was not their combat strength, but more importantly, the superfast neural responses that were necessary to allow anyone to move at such high speeds! They could save lives by being able to make decisions at crucial moments and completing actions that would allow them to escape from death, things other special ability users could not achieve!
Taking off their seatbelts, popping the skyroof of their hover car and leaping away from the car; Xia Fan had taken just 1.3 seconds to execute those actions. If Cheyenne had been alone, she would probably still be struggling with getting her seatbelt off right now!
*Thud*
Xia Fan landed on the ground with Cheyenne, leaving two knee-deep pits in the ground from the impact. Xia Fan not only possessed the advantage of superior speed, but thanks to his consumption of Grade Nine energy crystals growing up, he also had a very st.u.r.dy physique!
He was able to land from a height of nearly a hundred meters and come out unscathed with hardly a change in his expression!
“Stay here, you’re no match for him!” Xia Fan said to Cheyenne.
‘I’m no match for him?’
Cheyenne felt extremely annoyed after hearing that. After all, she was the actual investigator, yet the younger Xia Fan said something so unbearable. It was like he did not show her any face at all!
But it was too bad; before she could even snap back, Xia Fan had already dropped her on the ground and sprinted off!
Speed!
Full speed!
Clocking a top speed of 153m/s!
That was a speed of over 550 kilometers an hour!
Xia Fan was like a cloud of dust hurtling right for that shrouded figure!
He was closing in very rapidly!
Xia Fan could finally make the person out, and the killer was actually not alone. He was still controlling a spotted cheetah, which was protecting him and watching his surroundings!
*boom!*
There was an explosion in the sky; Xia Fan lifted his head to look. Three unmanned reconnaissance drones were in the middle of being attacked by more falcons. Falcons were known to be some of the fastest living creatures, and the c.u.mbersome quadcopter drones were completely incapable of avoiding the falcons’ attacks. The drones came cras.h.i.+ng down from the sky quickly, so there was no way for the police to get an accurate position of the killer.
Even worse was the fact that the killer was actually controlling a total of four falcons and a spotted cheetah, which meant he was at least a Star Base Intermediate rank user!
People who possessed the special ability to control beasts at the Advanced Star Light rank could control up to three beasts, going up to six beasts once they reached Advanced Star Base rank. A clear indication of higher cultivation would be reflected by more beasts being controlled. This was clearly an enemy that was of a higher rank than Xia Fan!
Just as Xia Fan was about to catch up to the bald killer, there was a sudden change in the sky!
After the three falcons took down the drones on their trail, they all began to execute a dive, with Xia Fan as their target!
At the same time, the spotted cheetah by the killer’s side also came to an abrupt halt, turned around, and charged at Xia Fan, flas.h.i.+ng its sharp fangs and claws!
Three from the air and one on the ground: Xia Fan suddenly realized that he had been surrounded on all sides!