When he heard those words, Jungkook was taken aback. The corner of his lips turned downwards, though it was gone as soon as it appeared.
In regards to Lisa's whereabouts, he only pinpointed that she was in N City, but he didn't know what she was up to. However, he didn't have any intention of telling that to Donghyuk. Seeing that Donghyuk didn't have anything else to report, he raised his hand to hang up the call, looking unusually calm.
"Hey, Boss! Wait a minute!" Donghyuk realized that Jungkook was going to hang up for real, and he immediately collected himself. "Miss Cecily and Mr. Ying are gone."
"Gone?" Jungkook's fingers halted, and his brows furrowed.
Donghyuk was slightly concerned as he continued, "We made an appointment to meet here, but I haven't seen a hair of them until now."
Jungkook nodded, indicating that he understood, and hung up the video call.
Hoseok hurried stepped forward to show him a message that he just received. "Boss, Miss Cecily has just sent a message asking for help. The signal isn't strong, but we can probably pinpoint a location."
Jungkook gave a glance at it, and said lightly, "Send it to Donghyuk."
"We're not going to save her?" Hoseok asked, his eyes wide.
"No." Jungkook lowered his eyes, looking away and heading towards the top of the mountain.
Hoseok almost choked on his saliva over the shock, and he mulled over Jungkook's words for a while, trying to decipher whether there was any hidden meaning behind it. Finally, he sent the coordinates to Donghyuk, and added: Donghyuk, don't say that I didn't remind you. If you get into trouble, go and find Miss Lalisa!
After receiving the coordinates from Hoseok, he waved his hand in a wide arc, signaling to the big group that he was leading to head deeper into the mountain.
"Donghyuk, we're not going to greet Miss Lalisa?" Jeno said as he turned to look at the thin, slender figure.
Donghyuk didn't reply, nor did he turn back. He fiddled a little with the compass in hand after about ten steps, before he replied, "No need, she knows we're here."
"She does?" Jeno couldn't help but turn his head again. "She seems to be concentrated on painting, and doesn't seem like she noticed her surroundings, or us."
"Are you nuts?" Donghyuk glanced at Jeno, looking at him like he was the dumbest idiot in the world. "Miss Lalisa has such powerful mental strength, everything within ten miles of her wouldn't escape her, and you still think she uses only her eyes to see us? Do you think she's weak like a chicken, like you?"
Jeno was silent after that, recalling how the cave had disappeared into thin air the other day. He shook his head, wiping the expression off his face, no longer feeling any doubt at Donghyuk's words.
Three minutes later, he finally realized what the other had said about him. "... Are you trying to pick a fight with me, Yi Donghyuk!"
Donghyuk: ... This complete idiot!
***
"Sister Lisa, those people are weird. They keep turning to look at you." Junghwan sat beside Jiji, staring hard at it while he spoke.
Lisa raised her head, looking at him. "Those people?"
Junghwan pointed to Donghyuk and the others who were leaving. "Those."
"How can you see them?" Lisa was surprised, Donghyuk and the others were at least two kilometers away from where they were seated, how could Junghwan see them? Was his eyesight so great?
Junghwan said slowly, "Jiji showed me."
Lisa lowered her head, seeing Jiji raise its mechanical hand, a display on its palm. This had been specially installed by Lisa, and you could see the group of people leaving on the screen, being led by Donghyuk, as well as Jeno, who kept turning to look back at Lisa who was drawing.
Hearing Junghwan's words, Jiji glared with its mechanical eyes. "Don't call me Jiji, call me Master System."
Junghwan: "Understood, Jiji."
At this time, a middle-aged man holding a basket of vegetables saw them, and greeted, "Good morning, Miss Lalisa, Junghwan, Master Jiji. Miss Lalisa, Manager Liu is looking everywhere for you."
Jiji: "... !" I said don't call me Jiji!
Jiji, who had been happily playing with Junghwan suddenly stopped, turning to Lisa and said, "Beauty Lisa, someone has touched your formation."
Lisa packed away her drawing things, and got up to head into the village. "Don't bother, let's go find Manager Liu."
***
At the same time, Donghyuk had already reached the coordinates that he had received from Hoseok. However, all he could see were trees in the deep mountain, and no sight of a single person.
"It should be here, according to this. Why is there no fluctuation of chi or anything?" He fiddled with the compass again, walking a circle, but there weren't any clues to be found.
"Could it be that there's an array?" Jeno said. "San Tong, you've researched this matter, go and see if there's anything that's unusual around here!"
San Tong stared at the vast mountain forest ahead of them. After a long while, he reached out to pick up a stone from the ground, and threw it in a direction. The stone disappeared out of thin air, and his expression was surprised. "There's an array here, for sure. But there's no trace of it at all, and I've never seen this happen before!"
In regards to formations masters in the ancient martial arts world, the Baili family would definitely take the top spot. However, no matter how formidable they were, their formations still had traces that could be spotted, which can be seen through fluctuations of energies. He had never seen this kind of formation, where no fluctuation could be felt nor seen, as though it had been completely hidden!
If it was any other time, he would be enthusiastic and spend a lot of time studying it, however he had to resist the urge due to the situation on hand.
"I'll ask Young Master Hanbin about it." San Tong said, picking up his communicator to contact said person.
Hanbin was a recognized formation genius in the ancient martial arts world, and San Tong admired him greatly.
Donghyuk saw San Tong's solemn state, and knew that things weren't that simple. Their small team had been established for so many years, and this was the first time he had seen such a look on San Tong's face.
Hanbin's voice came through soon enough, and San Tong briefed him on the happenings.
"This formation composes of nine different formations linked together in a chain, each of them connected to the next one." Hanbin's voice was grave. "I've read about it before in an ancient text, regarding how to hide all traces of a formation. This method is recorded in the ancient texts, and I'm guessing it's a formation left behind by an ancient warrior. Don't do anything rash, San Tong. Wait for me to come!"
Donghyuk looked at the disappearing trees in front of them, and he muttered under his breath, "... too late."
They had already fallen into the trap.
The golden-haired Cecily was sitting on the ground, meditating. Her clothes and hair were in a mess, and when she saw Donghyuk, she got up immediately. Even though she had fallen into such a place, there was no fear on her face at all. "Was what Baili Hanbin said true?"
At the same time, Jaebeom and the others who were sitting a little way off also stood. He stared at Donghyuk for a long while, before opening his mouth, "Mr. Donghyuk, so you all have also fallen into the trap."
Among the people in the formation group, apart from Jaebeom, their clothes and state had seen better days.
"Not out of your expectations, Young Master Ying." Donghyuk nodded his head, then looked down at the communicator that had lost its signal.
"Mr. Donghyuk, the other communicators are useless in this place." Cecily stored over, her red skirt swaying in motion with her hips. She took out her own communicator, handing it to him. "Only mine is able to contact the outside world, try and see if you're able to get hold of Young Master Jeon."
"As expected, the technology of America is good." A flat-headed man beside Jaebeom remarked, looking at his own completely useless phone. "Any sort of communication device is useless in this place."
Donghyuk glanced at the communicator in Cecily's hands, and he asked, "Miss Cecily, this communicator was given to you by the elder, right?"
Cecily nodded. "Yes, it's good."
"Jeno, get your communicator out," Donghyuk said with a matter of fact expression.
Jeno took out his treasured communicator and passed it to Donghyuk.
After taking it in his hands, he immediately gave a call to Hoseok. The call went through immediately, and not only that, it was a video call that wasn't affected in the slightest by the signal problem. "Oh Hoseok, we're all stuck in this d*mned place now!"
"Boss said find your own way out." Hoseok said sympathetically, before hanging up the call.
Cecily looked at the communicator in Donghyuk's hands. "Your communicator is clearly better."
"Of course, this is a product of Nine Heavens. Miss Cecily, the one in your hand is also one." Donghyuk paused for a while, then continued, "But the R&D department of Nine Heavens produced only twenty units before feeling that it wasn't worth their time, and went to continue their research on the virtual world instead. They stopped producing it after that." He had never seen such a company before.
Cecily: "..."
Jaebeom looked up in a direction suddenly, and said, "It's coming."
"What's coming?"
"A killing formation. This time it's even stronger," Jaebeom said, a serious expression on his face. "If we follow what Hanbin said, this is the ninth array since we came in, which is also the last. We might not make it through this."
As soon as he said it, the faces of his subordinates and Cecily changed. They had been in this d*mned place for the entire night. The first formation had not affected them much, but there was a wave every two hours, and each one was more terrifying than the previous ones. If it wasn't for Jaebeom's guidance, they would have already been killed by the waves.
"Everyone, follow behind me!" Jaebeom suddenly shouted, retreating back quickly.
Donghyuk and the others quickly followed his instruction, following behind him tightly. A sea of fire suddenly appeared in the center of the area with heat surging in the air.
"Don't get close to the fire! It's a beast fire!" Donghyuk had seen Xixi breathe fire before, and whatever it hit, whether it was mountains or rocks, instantly became soot. The fire he was seeing now was similar to Xixi's.
A sea of fire, turbulent winds, and even spatial cracks followed one after another.
Jaebeom looked at the space above the sea of fire that had the spatial crack, and it was still expanding. The aura it exuded felt as though it was swallowing them, and if anyone touched it, they would be shattered immediately!
"What do we do now, Mr. Ying?" Cecily and Donghyuk stood at his side, doing their best to hold back the heatwave.
The protection treasures that everyone else carried were taken out and used, their life depending on it. If now wasn't the time to use it, then when would it be?
"Using heaven and earth as the medium, we can only... give up our life as sacrifice to the heavens," Jaebeom said as he slowly approached the ever-expanding spatial crack.
***
"Miss Lalisa, the profit statements are all here. Do you want to have a look at it?" Manager Liu said respectfully, handing the report to Lisa.
Lisa took it, and just as she was halfway through it, she suddenly raised her head.
"What's wrong, Miss Lalisa?" Manager Liu thought that something was wrong with the accounts, and he asked in a hurry.
"It's nothing. I need to go out for a while, I'll be back later at night." Lisa walked to the bathroom after saying that. The moment the door closed, her entire person vanished.
The next second, she appeared beside the spatial crack.
"Watch out!" Jaebeom was holding a dagger, blood flowing down his arm. When he saw the person appear, his eyes widened with surprise.
Donghyuk's eyes widened when he saw who it was. "Miss Lalisa, hurry and dodge!" He was dead, he had cursed himself when he mentioned Miss Lalisa just now, and if something really did happen to her, Boss Jeon would definitely skin him and cut him to pieces! He'd even raise him from the dead to do it if he didn't survive this!
But in the next moment, he took a breath of relief.
The person in the air stood calmly, her black hair flowing down her back like a waterfall, and a cold glint in her eyes. She raised her hand, the white slender contrasting against the dark, black cracks.
The scorching heat came wave after wave, but it didn't seem to affect her at all.
Donghyuk and his team felt like they would never forget this scene. That slender hand grabbed the crack in the space, and closed it up with her bare hands. The crack that seemed to shatter everything it touched had no effect on her.
The method she used was simple and rough.
"Oh Donghyuk, I think I'm still not awake," Jeno said, his voice low.
Donghyuk took another deep breath. "That was more powerful."
"Don't be stunned there, hurry and go." Lisa pointed in the direction of the door, her voice indifferent.
San Tong tried, he really did try to hold it in, but in the end, he couldn't. "Miss Lalisa, was this formation your work? If it is, it's extremely terrifying!"
"It's not." Lisa shook her head.
Hearing those words, San Tong breathed a sigh of relief. Before he could finish breathing though, Lisa continued, "This was an incomplete formation left behind by an ancient warrior. I patched it up, and was using it to hold people in. I didn't expect you guys to enter this place by mistake. Entering was one thing, but you didn't even manage to get out either."
There was a disappointed look on Lisa's face as she said this.
San Tong suddenly halted in his steps, his hands trembling to the point that he couldn't get any words out of his mouth. What the flying f*ck, patching up an incomplete formation was even more terrifying, okay?!
No one here knew more about formations than San Tong, and it was why he was also the most aware of how terrifying Lisa was.
A formation left behind by an ancient warrior, and she was able to 'patch it up'? Was that even possible?! San Tong looked back to find that the formation had once again disappeared into thin air, and he shook his head, wiping the expression of his face. He sent a message to Hoseok-[Hoseok, I don't want to live anymore!]
Cecily also wiped the expression of her face, and she walked to Lisa's side, her blue eyes full of wonder. "This miss, are you from the Baili family? I've long heard of how their skills in formations are top notch and incomparable, and it looks like it's true."
"I'm not." Lisa shook her head. "But I'm acquainted with Big Brother Hanbin."
"No wonder." Cecily smiled brightly, and she stretched her hand out to Lisa. "Nice to meet you, my name is Cecily. I'm from America's supernatural world."
"Lalisa." Lisa stretched out her left hand. "Nice to meet you."
"Which floor have you reached in the Trial Tower, Miss Lalisa?" Cecily asked suddenly. "I heard that that little demon girl, Jeon Tzuyu, has already reached the 62nd floor. You shouldn't be that far off from her, right?"
Lisa smiled faintly. "I'm not from the ancient martial arts world. I only did some research on formations."
Cecily's eyes widened comically. "Not from the ancient martial arts world?" The scene of Lisa using her bare hands to close the spatial crack flashed through her mind again as she said this.
Excuse me?
Lisa was calm as she continued, "I was the one who patched up the formation just now, Miss Cecily. That's the reason I was able to easily control it."
Hearing the explanation, Cecily nodded her head in stunned shock. "Ah, I see."
San Tong watched as Lisa lied through her teeth with a straight face, and the corners of his mouth twitched. He sympathized with Cecily. Lisa was never one to pull punches when it came to cheating. She had a pure and serious appearance, one that made it hard for people to doubt her words.
"Thank you again, Mr. Ying." Cecily turned to him. "I didn't expect a regular person like yourself to be able to see through the formation. As expected, China sure is full of talented people."
Jaebeom glanced at Lisa, who was still standing behind, and he smiled. "I also know Hanbin."
Cecily: "..."
"Where do you live, Miss Lalisa?" Donghyuk was tinkering with his compass again. "We're going to be here a while, is there a bigger place to live in?"
"How long will you be staying?" Lisa asked.
Donghyuk thought about it for a few seconds, and replied, "Not more than a week."
Lisa blinked, and thought a while. "It's about there then. Jiji, bring Mr. Donghyuk to meet Manager Liu."
It's about there? What's about there? Donghyuk was confused, and then he was startled out of it by the sound of a mechanical voice.
"Alright, Beauty Lisa." A robot appeared in front of them suddenly. "Please come this way."
"A robot?" The flat headed youth beside Jaebeom jumped in surprised.
There was a complicated look on Donghyuk's face as he followed behind the robot, why did Miss Lalisa have so many weird things at her side?
Cecily just looked at Lisa's figure thoughtfully, she could feel the respect that Donghyuk and the rest gave Lisa. It seemed that they... really listened to her every word?
It could be her overthinking it, right? Donghyuk and the rest only listened to Jungkook's orders after all.
Cecily's brows furrowed slightly, but she was quickly pulled out of her thoughts by the scenery around her.
Jiji was taking the lead, and it suddenly seemed like it remembered something. It opened the steel lid on its chest, taking out a small white bottle and throwing it to Jaebeom. "Beauty Lisa asked me to give this to you as the wound on your hand is deep. If you treat it now, it will affect the mobility of your hand."
"Thank you." Jaebeom took a while to react as he glanced at his wrist that had been hastily bandaged.
He never imagined that Lisa would pay much concern to his hand.
Hearing Jiji's words, Donghyuk also looked at Jaebeom's hand. "Young Master Ying, are you alright?"
"I'm fine." Jaebeom grasped the bottle in his hand, lowering his head.
"With Miss Lalisa around, everything will be fine!" One of Jaebeom's subordinates said. They had all seen Lisa's superb medical skills before.
Donghyuk: ... you guys really believe that scam?
Everyone followed Jiji to the village, and they were surprised as they walked. The roads in the village were well developed, with cars coming and going. Every house in the village were three-story bungalows, and the nearby mountains had been designed to be tourist spots.
How could this be a remote village, it was clearly even fancier than those cities!
***
In Manager Liu's office, Jiji knocked on the door before going in. "Manager Liu, these people need a place to stay."
"Hello, please come in." Manager Liu put down the papers in hand, and then took a stack of documents, handing them to Jiji. "Master Jiji, these are the company's previous quarter earnings. Miss Lalisa didn't manage to finish reading them."
"Alright, I understand." Jiji took the documents, and turned around to leave, but Manager Liu called it.
Manager Liu adjusted his glasses. "Master Jiji, Mr. Yu Namjoon called just now. He asked for Miss Lalisa to remove him from her blacklist, he has important things to tell her."
Jiji: "... I'll try."
Hearing the conversation between man and robot, the corner of the mouth of the people present couldn't help but twitch slightly. Donghyuk took the initiative to strike up the conversation again, "Manager Liu, what is your relationship with Miss Lalisa?"
"Boss-subordinate." Manager Liu said, smiling brightly.
As expected! Donghyuk face palmed internally, he knew it!
Cecily was also shocked. "I didn't expect such a young person like Miss Lalisa to have such a big company." But she was only shocked for a while. It was just a business in the regular world after all, she wasn't interested in it at all.
Donghyuk glanced at her, silently thinking in his heart, 'This doesn't even count as anything. If you knew that the entire Nine Heavens belong to her, you'd go nuts!'
It wasn't peak season for tourists, but there were still a lot of people who came here for their vacations. There were also a lot of foreigners who came here especially for the place.
Jaebeom stood in front of the entrance, looking at the bold, striking characters above it "Shan Sui Xiao Zhu".
The strokes were sharp, and the words were slightly slanted. It reminded him of a dragon flying into the sky, coming from nothingness and returning to the void. Under the noon sun, it was brilliantly radiant.
"This was written by Miss Lalisa the day before yesterday," Manager Liu explained when he saw Donghyuk looking up. "She said that the company name doesn't match our temperament here, and so she wrote these words. I immediately got someone to make it into a plate and hang it up yesterday."
Jaebeom stared at it for a long time, before finally saying, "Good words."
"That it is, and the calligraphy is well written." Cecily didn't understand the Chinese characters, but she could feel the confidence and willfulness radiating from the words.
The group of people followed Manager Liu all the way inside. Jaebeom looked at the wound on his wrist that had begun to scab over. He didn't remove the bandage, but followed after the others after looking at it for a while.
***
At this time, Lisa was sitting with Junghwan at the side of the river, fishing.
Baixing Village has turned completely into a large scale tourist fishing village. There were a lot of people fishing by the riverside, and Lisa was even earnestly wearing a fishing hat on her head.
Junghwan held the game console that Lisa had gotten for him out to her. "Sister Lisa, I can't pass this stage."
Lisa was leaning back on the chair, and she didn't raise her head at his words. "Ask Jiji to teach you."
"But Jiji isn't here." As soon as the words were out of his mouth, Jiji suddenly popped out of nowhere.
"Beauty Lisa, Yu Namjoon is looking for you." Jiji took the game console from Junghwan's hands, and passed the level with the speed of a robot. Junghwan's eyes lit up with worship and admiration at that. "Zhu Jackson is also looking for you. Professor Jiang even gave Master Jeon a call."
Lisa: "..." Why did he call Brother Jungkook? And then she realized that in the column of the form for 'parents', she had filled in Jungkook's name.
Jiji glanced at her. "Give Zhu Jackson a call if you're free, he's going crazy."
"I hold long grudges." Lisa said, straightening up.
Jiji: "..." Zhu Jackson, I tried! Can't help you anymore!
Lisa relaxed in Baixing Village, completely ignoring the happenings of the outside world, which was blowing up.
***
The international medical exchange that was held once every five years had begun, and people from the international medical organizations would take out their best research to participate in this meeting. This is an opportunity to learn and experience, and it was also an opportunity for the countries to showcase their medical skills. It was also a time where people took the chance to try to be famous and well known.
For example, Jackson. He became well known when he was in his junior year five years ago.
The recent medical breakthrough by China was too big, especially since they had also a new lab done for this, which made people of the International Medical Research Association jealous. They had all thought that China would definitely send someone with talent to attend.
They didn't expect that not a single from China was present.
"I'm sure they're afraid after seeing how good our research and brains are," The president of the International Medical Organization said, a relaxed smile on his face. The young girl that recently appeared had backed them all into a tight corner, and they were only able to breathe easy at this moment, "We've got research done by dozens of the top international doctors, how can one person be compared to all of this?"
"What you said it true, president"
"After today, those that went to China's medical labs will regret it, the technology that we have is way more advanced than theirs." The other nodded in agreement to these words.
These people were chatting easily with each other, and not a while later, they all received a message.
The City Court of N City had just released an announcement, a video, as usual, together with a commentary.
The explanations in the commentary were full of jargons, and it was all in Chinese. Even Chinese people had a hard time understanding it.
However, the cases mentioned in the video were all understood by the people in the international medical organization. It was regarding the research on humans in vegetative state, and every viewpoint was new and novel. The research on it was unprecedented in the entire medical history.
The idea was bold and forward, the explanation in writing was detailed without the slightest hint of omission of the research, as though they weren't afraid that someone could steal the fruits of this research.
At the end of the news announcement, they said, "Miss Lalisa is right, medicine exists to save those who are on the verge of suffering. There are so many people in the world, and what we can do, is to research from every possible angle to help release people from the sea of suffering."
The president of the International Medical Organization looked at the research. He had initially thought that the research of him and the dozen of top international doctors that they had done with countless sleepless nights were already shocking enough, he didn't expect that China would so easily throw out another research that would make all their own research topic look like nothing.
"This... how long has it been?" A doctor from England was also in a state of shock.
"This time, China..."
"Why don't these people belong to America?"
After the cell fusion matter, they had thought that no matter how much of a genius Lisa was, she wouldn't be able to create another shocking wave. Unexpectedly, the wave came one after another.
The doctors all looked at the translation of the results of the research, all of them in various different states of shock. If it was just the cell fusion research, just one, they could have accepted it. But this had only been a few months since then, right? Also, the research that the China Medical Laboratory kept pulling out was more and more impossible to comprehend. This is already beyond the entire world's medical level, right?!
Many of the doctors were silent in the exchange meeting, the main reason being that this matter had far surpassed their imagination, and was borderline horrifying in their minds. Lisa's performance was just too terrifying, was it even possible for a person's intelligence to reach this stage?
Oh my god!
"President, I'll take my leave."
"President, I will abstain from the exchange this time..."
The president waved his hand, letting all of them leave. He then looked at the assistant beside him, and took a deep breath before saying, "This Lalisa... the wave that Zhu Jackson had made the last time wasn't this shocking either, was it?" He was already at a loss for words. "Go and buy me a flight ticket to China, the earlier the better."
This was more terrifying than that d*mned Zhu Jackson.
The news announced by China spread like wildfire to every person in the medical field, and at the same time, countless top, well-renowned doctors were making their way to the Imperial Capital in a rush.
***
At A University, Jackson looked up blankly. "She blocked me."
"What did you do to her this time?" Professor Jiang stomped his feet anxiously. "She even sent me a text the other day, saying that she wants to change her major!"
Jackson: "..." Motherf*cker this Lalisa, throwing him into an early grave like this?!