"Elena?" Ling Qingyu called out to her second daughter, who wore black-tech spectacles with a gleam of excitent.
"On it, Mom. It's always best to kaboom first and talk later. So people only speak properly after a little shock therapy," ca Elena's cheerful response.
Her voice brimd with delight—just from delivering fire support for her mother, even if only once.
Ling Qingyu's lips twitched slightly. She hadn't even said anything yet, and Elena already understood.
And what did her daughter ant by kabooming first? This must be the last resort, always. Plus, it had been for so long Elena hardly acted. It was understandable for this little girl to beco exhilarated from her request. She must have been seeking her words.
How long had she been waiting for this? With Elena's inherently violent streak, the result wasn't surprising. Ling Qingyu never expected otherwise.
Her call drew the President's attention.
"I beg your pardon?" he asked.
"Your Excellency, how about we enjoy a little show before continuing our discussion?" Ling Qingyu smiled faintly. It wasn't a suggestion.
Though clueless about what this woman had in store, the President kept his composure and followed her gaze, turning toward the distant natural contours.
Elena's voice ca through again, precise and professional:
"Locating Mom's position and triangulating the intended target using visuals from her AR glasses.
"Target selected. Satellite confirms no human life detected. Simulating blast radius and post-impact results. Seventy percent wildlife impact, zero civilian casualties.
"Objective: Shock and Awe. One round, deterrence only. Weapon: Simple Railgun mode, single-fire. Requesting authorization to engage."
"Granted," Ling Qingyu murmured, her eyes scanning the augnted data and animations rendered by Elena's calculations.
The designated hill was isolated enough to minimize fallout—danger close, but within safe margins. Elena didn't need further instructions. She knew exactly what her mother wanted and executed accordingly.
She'd chosen the perfect site for both spectacle and psychological impact—visually impressive, yet far from any major consequence.
Ling Qingyu didn't even want to know what "Simple Railgun" ant. Judging from the simulation, it was already terrifying enough.
She also realized—with a slight pang of regret—that she'd never actually tested Elena's accuracy before this mont.
Still, Athena hadn't raised any concerns. If both she and Elena approved the numbers, things should be fine… right?
Xiao Yue, who had been eavesdropping on the entire exchange, could barely contain her excitent. She'd finally get to see Elena in action—bragging rights for life, especially against Tang Ziyi.
Noticing Ling Qingyu's and her secretary's strange behavior, the President and his guard exchanged confused, wary glances. Neither could grasp what was about to unfold.
The looming silence only heightened the tension, gnawing at the President's nerves. He had suffered enough shocks for one day. He didn't have the patience for gas—but he also couldn't afford to offend Ling Qingyu.
Just as he opened his mouth, Ling Qingyu raised a finger to her lips, silencing him gently.
"Shhh. Your Excellency, where's your patience? Let's take a mont to breathe, shall we? Just watch that beautiful hill over there…"
He swallowed and drew a deep breath, glancing uneasily at the spot she indicated. It was a scenic view—peaceful, picturesque. Nothing about it should warrant intense attraction. But that made it all the more suspicious.
As his nerves approached the breaking point, Ling Qingyu remained unbothered. Her earlier tension had long since vanished, leaving only a sense of anticipation.
Then, Elena's voice returned, cheerful as ever:
"One round, inbound. Happy Package en route. Don't forget to leave a five-star review… Splashdown in 85 seconds. Counting."
"Copied. 85 seconds. Standing by," Athena's cool voice chid in, taking over the monitoring.
She prepared to track and capture the projectile the mont it erged from the sea—no easy task for a satellite, but Miss System's gear wasn't ordinary.
Her satellites were boutiques of precision—generations ahead of their ti, never designed with limits in mind.
…
Far from Ling Qingyu's position—thirty kiloters off the coast and a thousand ters beneath the sea—schools of fish, both small and large, wiggled through the depths.
The aquatic creatures circled aimlessly, seemingly trapped in an invisible loop, as though sothing obstructed their natural paths.
At such depths, little could be seen—only faint flickers of light shimred down from the surface. But beneath the veil of darkness, a colossal shadow lood.
A brief glint of reflected light revealed it—a silent, man-made vessel cruising through the deep.
It barely disturbed the current, its presence so subtle that even the marine life swam close without fear. A submarine—shaped like a nuclear-class, yet so massive it dwarfed every known vessel on Earth.
Its sleek form hinted at overwhelming military power. Even though it was hidden, any expert would instantly recognize the subtle bulges along its surface—concealed turrets and missile silos masked by the hull.
Were the world to discover its existence, panic would surely follow. Size didn't always equate to superiority—but in this case, it was synonymous with absolute lethality.
Suddenly, a deep sonic click echoed through the waters, startling the nearby creatures and sending them fleeing. The sound, produced by a shifting chanism, carried the primal weight of a giant stirring from sleep.
One of the hidden turrets on the submarine's upper hull creaked open, releasing a stream of bubbles and an eerie tallic screech.
A long barrel extended outward and slowly rotated, aligning itself with a distant coordinate. The submarine began to ascend—not rapidly, and with no intention of surfacing.
It halted at around 500 ters below the surface, still subrged, still watching.
Then, the turret ca to life.
A pale cyan light ignited at the base of the barrel, tracing its way forward in a concentrated line. The upper and lower segnts of the turret flared with intense brilliance. Energy pulsed visibly through the conduit for a second or two—then, it fired.
In that instant, the ocean held its breath.
A thunderous shockwave followed, rupturing the silence with brutal force. The blast rippled across the radius, shaking the very fabric of the sea.
Fragile aquatic life, too slow to escape, perished instantly from the sudden pressure shift. For a mont, even the ocean current was disrupted, stilled by the sheer force released.
The projectile pierced through the sea like a spear of light, launching skyward in a column of foamy waves, staying underwater barely a second.
A localized tsunami spread outward in its wake, marking the departure of the destructive payload as it arced toward its calculated target above.
Once in the sky, the projectile followed its predetermined trajectory, linking with the satellites above to maintain course. Hypersonic shockwaves tore through the air with deafening velocity.
Monts later, the submarine quietly sank back into the depths, retreating toward the seabed like a guilty phantom—as if the colossal underwater tremor had nothing to do with it.
No human technology detected what had occurred. Even military-grade satellites tasked with monitoring the region failed to pick up the slightest trace—not the sonic boom, not the flash, not even the projectile itself.
Too fast. Too small.
Perhaps the only witnesses were aboard a nearby fishing boat. The sudden, violent turbulence tossed the fragile vessel in wild arcs, pitching it dangerously with each passing wave.
The captain and crew fought desperately to stabilize the boat, confused and terrified by the sea's sudden fury. They shouted to the heavens, praying fervently to their respective sea deities for rcy.
Thunderclaps echoed above. The sky rumbled. None of them could explain what was happening. They only knew one thing: the sea was angry.
…
Ling Qingyu, standing calmly, spoke of the landscape's beauty—vividly describing the contours of the hill and marveling at nature's quiet grandeur, as if she were truly enraptured by the view.
Despite the strangeness of it all, the President maintained his composure and listened politely—until she fell silent.
The silence wasn't without cause.
Athena's voice arrived with crystal precision: "Impact in ten… nine… eight…"
"A pity, isn't it?" Ling Qingyu chuckled, though there was a heaviness to it. "If only we could've skipped the trouble, that hill might've been spared. Not my fault."
"What's a pity?" the President asked, sensing sothing ominous without knowing why.
"Three… two… one."
In the very next second, both Ling Qingyu and Xiao Yue—thanks to their quick, godlike vision—witnessed a black object descend from the sky and smash into the top of the hill.
The mont the black object struck the crown of the hill, there was no explosion—at least, not in the traditional sense.
For a brief instant, all sound vanished. The world seed to hold its breath.
Then—
BOOM.
A delayed shockwave erupted outward, deafening and vast. It cracked like the heavens themselves were splitting open. The air distorted in a do, expanding violently with a concussive blast that flattened everything in a 300-ter radius.
The top of the hill didn't just collapse—it vaporized. The impact crater, almost surgically precise, was several dozen ters deep and scorched in a perfect circle. Molten earth sprayed like liquid fire, arcing through the sky before solidifying mid-air into blackened shards of glass and ash.
The lower flanks of the hill shattered as the kinetic energy rippled through the geological layers. Stones and soil—once compacted for centuries—were atomized near the epicenter, while the outer ring was launched skyward like debris from a volcanic eruption.
A secondary shockwave followed, spreading a ring of wind like a horizontal cyclone. Dust, trees, and anything loose were thrown away as if by an invisible god's wrath. Birds and insects that hadn't already fled dropped lifelessly from the sky. The air slled of ozone, scorched minerals, and burnt foliage.
Then ca the sound delay—reaching the observers half a second later. It hit their ears like a sudden thunderclap after lightning, compressed air howling with unnatural fury. The President instinctively covered his ears, staggering from the unexpected force.
A mushroom cloud of pulverized stone and vaporized minerals began to rise slowly into the atmosphere, casting a long shadow across the land below. The upper rim of the crater glowed faintly, thermal energy radiating from the sheer velocity of the projectile's descent.
Xiao Yue blinked in awe. Even she hadn't imagined this level of violence. "This… is just a railgun's simple mode?" she murmured, a touch of disbelief and reverence mixing in her tone.
Ling Qingyu remained still, her expression unreadable, watching the silent inferno consu the hilltop. She hadn't moved an inch. Only her hair swayed slightly, caught in the gust of localized mini-earthquake.
She and Xiao Yue, prepared for the impact, barely flinched and stood their ground. The others weren't so lucky
The President, anwhile, gawked at the scene with wide eyes, knelt on the ground from losing balance. "What on Earth?!"
Whether his legs gave way from fear or the trembling earth—perhaps only he knew. For all the diplomatic wars, internal turmoil, and political disasters he had survived, nothing prepared him for this.
This wasn't power. This was absolute dominance.
Ling Qingyu's voice broke the stunned silence, casual and emotionless. "This is your first and last warning, Your Excellency. Next ti, I won't aim for the hill. Tell them if they are ready to court disaster and believe they can keep here, this will be their last fate."
Athena's calm voice followed, as if reporting the weather. "Confird: impact successful. Target annihilated. No human or civilian casualties. Damage radius within calculated margin."
Elena: "Mom, You must not underestimate again."
Only then did the rumbling subside. The hill, once a proud natural monunt, was now a gaping wound in the earth.
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