Chapter 2606 - 2598: Landing

Chapter 2606: Chapter 2598: Landing

The commander couldn’t help secretly complaining when he heard that—if you’re going to cohabit, then just cohabit; what other excuses do you need?

He knew quite a bit about Reporter Han—someone who’s truly neurasthenic, how could they possibly work as a frontline reporter for the military?

He nodded with a blank face. "Then we’ll change it. I’ll get your access control updated later. For now, shouldn’t the two of us get going?"

Beauty Lin didn’t stand on ceremony. Dragging her suitcase into the room, she popped it open right away and started taking out bottles and jars. At a glance you could see all kinds of clothes inside—outerwear, underwear, socks and so on. "It’s fine, no rush."

No rush my ass. Seeing those ladies’ garments, Elder Gao didn’t feel right sitting anymore, so he stood up with a smile and said, "Let’s give the young folks some space... how many cans of this beer can I take?"

"Take it all," Feng Jun stuffed the remaining cans into a carton and handed it to Elder Gao. "You two turn in early as well."

The two of them hurried out of the room. After Beauty Lin closed the door, she broke into a triumphant grin. "Ha, in the end you still had to invite me over."

"I just wanted to get some air," Feng Jun said helplessly. "Turns out once they came in, they wouldn’t leave... old as they are, their attitude’s still great. Sigh, nothing I can do."

"You know that’s how it is," Beauty Lin replied dismissively, then her eyes shimmered. "You’re not worried I’ll take advantage of you?"

"Take advantage of me... don’t even think about it," Feng Jun snorted coldly. "Letting you move in is basically giving you a Talisman, so others stop eyeing your position. But if you really can’t behave, I have plenty of ways to deal with you."

Beauty Lin had wanted to keep teasing him, but she couldn’t help recalling that transparent rubber wall just now. She snorted despite herself, her eyes turning red. "So I still can’t even measure up to Zhong Lijing... do you really find me that repulsive?"

That was... actually a pretty sharp example. Given Zhong Lijing’s seniority in Luohua, there was no way she should’ve started Cultivation so quickly. Back then Feng Jun hadn’t kept Little Feng Jun in check and bent the rules to let her cultivate early; some of the other Luohua members even had complaints.

But upon hearing this, Feng Jun’s first reaction was, "You folks really have quite the penetration into Luohua, don’t you."

Only then did he explain, "Zhong Lijing’s background is clean. I feel no pressure dealing with her. But there’s way too much tied up behind you. How could I be dumb enough to go looking for trouble?"

Beauty Lin blinked and asked in a pitiful tone, "But I still want to get a few doses of Life-Extension Elixir."

"And then chances are you’ll want to start Cultivation," Feng Jun retorted indifferently. "Human greed knows no bounds—like a snake trying to swallow an elephant."

Beauty Lin silently arranged her cosmetics and clothes, then suddenly started laughing again. "So it’s not that I’m not pretty enough—it’s that you’re wary of my identity, right?"

Feng Jun took out another case of beer, cracked a can open with a "pop," and answered lazily, "What matters is the result. Does the reason really matter? Anyway, you’re definitely older than Zhong Lijing."

Hearing that, Beauty Lin glared at him viciously, but after pausing for a beat, she smiled again. "Still, I can be your shield. Seems in your heart I’m not that worthless after all."

Feng Jun took a few gulps of beer, then let out a satisfied burp. "Whatever the case, I sleep on the bed, you sleep on the sofa."

"Your bed is huge!" Beauty Lin protested. "Worst case, we draw a line down the middle like Chu River and Han Border."

Feng Jun snorted. "The floor’s even bigger. Believe it or not, I’ll tap your acupoints and have you sleeping on the floor tonight."

"Stingy," Beauty Lin muttered softly, though the corners of her mouth were slightly curved up.

Either way, she’d ultimately managed to seize the chance to "cohabit" with him.

And just like he said, her moving into his room couldn’t possibly stay secret from her colleagues.

She spent ten minutes arranging her things, then sat down on the sofa and reached for the beer. "I’ll have a can too."

Feng Jun had also been resting up for seven or eight days. Looking at those big, pale, moon-like thighs made his eyes feel a bit dazzled, so he simply drained his can in one go and went straight to the bed to sit cross-legged and meditate.

Strictly speaking, there was no Spiritual Energy here, so his meditation was pointless, but... he could treat it as self-cultivation.

Beauty Lin had originally wanted to keep baiting him with a few more lines, but when she saw him actually start meditating, she didn’t dare keep provoking him—she could joke around when nothing was going on, but once Feng Jun got down to serious business, she truly didn’t have the guts to disturb him.

Five days later, the fleet arrived near Mars, engaged vector braking, and at the same time the seventeen ships began to separate from each other.

Feng Jun had held out for five days and really couldn’t take it anymore. He took the initiative to contact the commander, saying he wanted to head down to the Martian surface. "...You do your exercises; I’ll go scout out Mars’s situation."

The commander hesitated for a moment before replying, "Once the drills are over, we also plan to land on Mars, collect some rock and soil samples, and run scans and analyses of the Martian surface... you could go with us then."

Feng Jun refused without ceremony. "No need. I need to first survey whether there’s any extraterrestrial life here. That detection process could be dangerous for you."

The commander saw how determined he was, and of course couldn’t stop him, so he had someone find him a set of Space Mech Armor—he strongly suspected Feng Jun had brought his own mech along, but they’d finally managed to invite him here; it made no sense to let him use his own gear.

A single set of Space Mech Armor was very precious in the Space Army; for at least the next ten years, it would definitely be a non-renewable resource. But the commander knew very clearly: you can be stingy with anyone, just not with Feng Jun.

Beauty Lin heard the news and strongly applied to go with him, but Feng Jun asked her with open disdain, "Can you pilot a Mecha?"

"I can’t pilot a Mecha," Beauty Lin frankly admitted her shortcoming, but she also knew, "we can use a two-seater mech, I’ll sit in the copilot seat."

"Don’t mess around," Feng Jun shook his head. "Two-seater mechs are either damage control crew or fire support. Who uses a two-seater mech for recon?"

Beauty Lin pestered him but got nowhere. She personally saw him off to the vacuum gate, then watched, eyes wide, as he refused the escort from the other warriors, and—wearing his mech—made a solitary leap into the vast Outer Space.

Because she was seeing him off near the vacuum gate, everyone was in spacesuits, but even through the visors, the others could see the tears streaming from Beauty Lin’s eyes.

She knew he’d gone through a lot of danger in those other two worlds, but it was only after she’d witnessed his actions with her own eyes that she could truly feel just how much courage it takes to charge bravely into the unknown.

Yet as far as this particular operation went, Feng Jun’s assessment was: basically no risk at all.

Even the commander himself didn’t see it that way. He lowered his voice and spoke to Beauty Lin, "Mr. Feng’s actions are really inspiring. A mech landing on Mars is more dangerous than conducting exercises in Outer Space. For him to do this in front of everyone, the warriors are all itching to try it themselves."

"That’s a bit cruel, don’t you think?" Beauty Lin rolled her eyes at him. Even though the other party was a brigadier general, she wasn’t under his command.

"I’m speaking from the perspective of the bigger picture," the commander said indifferently, thinking to himself: whether there’s real feeling between you two is still up in the air, and you’re already lecturing me?

"I’m going back to my room," Beauty Lin turned and left. When she said "room" now, she meant the single cabin on Armor-2.

The commander couldn’t be bothered with her. He issued a series of orders, telling everyone to start preparing for the beginning of the exercise.

But it would still take quite a while to go from preparation to actually starting. The military had originally planned to run the exercise on the far side of Mars, but now that they’d found the Outer Space dust was relatively dense, running it on the near side of Mars wouldn’t risk being discovered either.

So the first thing on the table was: where exactly to set the exercise site?

Sister Han was a print Reporter, not a photojournalist. This kind of discussion needed images to set the mood; text wasn’t that necessary. So she quietly left and went to Armor-2 to ring the doorbell.

Beauty Lin opened the door, her eyes red and swollen. "Sister Han, what do you need?"

Reporter Han hesitated for a moment before speaking. "He’s very brave... could you talk to me about him?"

Beauty Lin froze for a second, then showed a bitter smile. "There’s no need to talk. Any description of him is never going to make it into an article... not a single word of it."

Reporter Han thought it over, still a bit unwilling. "There’s always a declassification date. I’ll just record it, not publish it. I understand how confidentiality windows work."

"Even so, you’re not the one who should be discussing this with me," Beauty Lin said calmly. "It should be your boss’s boss coming to say something. I know that for you to get onto this fleet, you must be trustworthy, but... it really shouldn’t be you asking me."

"Aren’t we roommates?" Reporter Han smiled. She knew the other woman was right and also understood the rules involved, but with a big scoop right in front of her, not digging at it felt like a betrayal of her professional instincts. "I’ll just ask one question... is Mars dangerous?"

Beauty Lin narrowed her swollen eyes, thought for a moment, then shook her head. "I don’t know... but anything less dangerous than what he faces, for other people is basically certain death. So I still support him going. I just wanted to go with him myself."

This was real feelings, then. Reporter Han sighed inwardly. "What do you think the outcome of this relationship will be?"

"What outcome could there be?" Beauty Lin gave a small smile. "I’m just enjoying each day as it comes."

Reporter Han’s jaw dropped in shock. So... she didn’t even have ambitions of the ’third party wins and becomes official’ variety?

Feng Jun had no idea any of this was happening behind his back. He didn’t feel at all that setting foot on Mars was particularly dangerous.

If he didn’t have to consider what other people might think, he wouldn’t even bother wearing a mech; he’d just fly there in his flesh body, wandering plate by plate like he had on the Tianqin Plane—actually, that’s how he’d done it in the Insect World too.

So after he put on the Space Mech Armor, he flew straight toward Mars at high speed—Mars’s atmosphere was extremely thin anyway; it couldn’t possibly cause him any serious harm.

The real business would start once he actually stepped onto Mars, because he had a whole series of experiments to run. After all, last time he’d piloted the Warship through Outer Space, but he’d truly never landed on any planet.

So he’d been fiddling with the Gathering Spirit Array Plate this whole time, just wanting to know: does Mars have Spiritual Energy?

(Updated to here, summoning monthly votes.)