Ethereal Ascendance: A Journey of Transformation

While Luke Channing was reporting to his bosses, the missile launch countdown finally ended.

On the rescue team's side, one nuke was stopped by entering the code, the other blown up with the sub.

But the "Blue Palace" got badly damaged in the earlier fight. Many guards who woke up and curious onlookers started noticing something fishy and coming closer. Some even entered the area to check things out.

I didn't want to put on another show of "miracle" or "mysterious creature taking off" for regular Earth people. So I decided to leave the M-country presidential mansion area for now.

As for Franklin, Adrian checked and found he wasn't dead, even though Camille knocked him out earlier. He was just in a deep coma, but his body was fine.

We didn't want to lug this deadweight around though, so we left him for the rescue workers to deal with.

Just as we were about to leave and meet up with Luke Channing, Adrian and I saw something through the camera in the president's office. Where the sub had exploded and sunk, leaving the sea calm again, a white light suddenly appeared out of nowhere. It slowly rose into the air, then vanished in a flash!

"What was that?"

I couldn't help but shout in surprise. It looked just like an angel's body turning back into light when they die!

Except for one difference - angel light should slowly fade away. But the white light on the monitor disappeared in an instant.

This means it didn't merge with its surroundings. It was more like teleporting?

"No idea. There can't be angels in that sub, right?"

Adrian shrugged, not really caring about these little details. After all, it's hard to be sure what we saw on camera wasn't affected by something else. I switched the monitor view back to the missile control room where Cyra was.

Now we could see two Cyras in the room together. This meant Cyrae had returned!

Even though the nuke launch countdown ended, Cyra's injuries still hadn't healed. She still couldn't leave.

But with Cyrae back, things were easier. We saw her using healing magic on Cyra. With her there, Cyra should be up soon. I didn't need to worry about the rescue team's situation anymore.

"Let's go quick!"

Not far outside the president's office, we could hear guards getting closer! Adrian quickly took out a "Invisibble" arrow and gently poked both our cheeks with it. We instantly turned invisible.

I quickly shut off the monitor. With one arm around Adrian and the other carrying Camille's body, we finally escaped the "Blue Palace" area without anyone noticing.

But something still bothered me on the way. The last time we saw Cyra, she looked sad and dazed, like she'd been hit hard by something. She wasn't like that before Raydwin left. This made me wonder more if it had to do with Raydwin dying.

We hadn't flown far when Luke Channing sent more bad news:

"The nuke launch from Histon base wasn't stopped! Team 3 finally managed to talk with the M-country soldiers who woke up. But even though they agreed to enter the cancel code, there wasn't enough time!"

Nothing we could do about that! If we had to blame something, it'd be the long-standing bad blood between the two countries. The earlier fighting wasted way too much time!

But this nuke was headed for H-country's Shine Metropolitan City. This made the H-country bigshots super nervous!

"This intercontinental missile carries a hydrogen bomb close to 10 million tons! There's still some time before it reaches the target. H-country command center already told Shine Metropolitan's government to quickly evacuate everyone and start emergency intercept measures. But there's not enough time. The chances of successful interception are super slim!"

After hearing this, things looked really bad. I suddenly remembered Cyra's mom lived in Shine Metropolitan City like my parents. She was clearly in the nuke's blast range too. So I quickly asked:

"Does Cyra know about this?"

"You mean the angel Cyra who survived on the rescue team? I got news that she finally managed to stop Number 11 Feliciana, and got in touch with us after."

Luke Channing and H-country command center got their info from the same place. They had no clue it was actually a nobody "human magician" on the team pretending to be Cyra who stopped Feliciana.

Cyrae never wanted to reveal she was on Earth. So after she left earlier, Raydwin was the only one talking to H-country command center.

Unlike Adrian and me who could watch the monitors, the command center could only hear voices. They still didn't know there was an injured real Cyra with Raydwin the whole time! Even when they found the cancel code, they thought Raydwin just got lucky and guessed it somehow.

"Oh right! Cyra mentioned something. She said she still had some kind of connection with Raydwin after he went into the sub. So she told us the last things she knew before the sub blew up."

Suddenly Luke Channing changed the subject, going back to talking about Raydwin who died.

Hearing this made me remember the communicator Raydwin threw to Cyra earlier.

From what Luke Channing said, soon after Raydwin got to the sub's command room, he told Cyra the sub's nuke launch system was totally different from the control panel on shore. First, two people had to turn two keys at the same time to unlock the control panel. Only then could they enter the code to cancel the launch.

But they only found one key in the sub. The other key was missing! Raydwin thought the higher-up officers who took over the sub earlier might have hidden it, or even destroyed it!

There wasn't enough time left before the sub's nuke launch to make any other long-term plans. Raydwin had no choice but to blow up all the explosives he was carrying, taking out the whole sub with him!

He found out the nuke in this sub was actually aimed at where the sub itself was - this whole base area!

Launching a nuke at yourself? Obviously this crazy thing would never happen normally. It must've been the vampire ancestor Rasambla giving orders to change the sub's target before he died. This was to get revenge on Cyrae who killed him.

Even though that's all Cyra said she knew, I could tell she was hiding some details.

Thinking carefully, there weren't many people left on the whole rescue team. If this nuke launched, the sub couldn't move to escape the blast zone! They'd die either way. In the end, blowing up the sub to stop the launch would only really help Cyra!

When angels are almost out of light element magic power, even they'd have a hard time surviving a nuke blast. And this wasn't some half-baked nuke like Reed made before. This was the most advanced strategic nuke weapon made by modern Earth people.

I suddenly understood why Cyra looked like that at the end! Knowing Raydwin, he probably gave Cyra some long-distance "passionate confession" before blowing himself up. But this time, he really was dead for good...

"Cyra's reaction was kinda weird. When we told her Raydwin was confirmed dead, she acted totally different. She kept insisting Raydwin wasn't dead, that he was still alive..."

But then Luke Channing continued in a troubled voice. This confused me again. I couldn't help blurting out: "What do you mean exactly? Does she think Raydwin can't be killed by explosions?"

This guess made sense. Raydwin wasn't a normal person, he was a Battle Qi awakener. Even though his Battle Qi ability was still weak, his body was way stronger than normal people.

But when it comes to surviving explosions, I personally thought it'd be really hard to survive blowing up all the strong explosives he was carrying!

"Not exactly... She mentioned God in her message. I guess it's some kind of belief in your world? Cyra kept saying her 'Lord' stepped in to save Raydwin's life... But she couldn't give any proof. She just kept repeating Raydwin should be with her 'Lord' now... Isn't that the same as being dead?"

Luke Channing's voice started sounding more and more troubled. Mostly because this stuff was way beyond what he could understand. He stumbled over his words for a while before finally explaining it all clearly.