Trembling At A High Altitude

When he tried to call again, the call didn't go through.

Li Teng hastily packed his phone into a plastic bag and prepared to continue his way to the subway station.

"Go and save them! An entire family of three fell in!"

Just then, a cry for help suddenly came from the side of the road.

It was then that Li Teng noticed a young mother in the middle of the road, who, along with her two children, had fallen into a pit in front of them.

The pit seemed to be left over from construction, with a collapsed enclosure nearby.

The mother and her two children evidently hadn't noticed the enclosure and fell into the water as they walked.

By the time Li Teng looked over, the mother and children had already been struggling in the water pit for a while. The mother tried to push the children up, but couldn't exert any force in the water, and she herself was choking on water and about to sink.

Li Teng hesitated for a moment, gritted his teeth, and ran quickly to the edge of the water pit.

The two children had already stopped struggling, their heads submerged in the water, and the young mother was also exhausted, lying on the water's surface, about to drift away.

The edge of the water pit was very slippery. Reaching the edge, Li Teng leaned over to grab one of the children by the back and forcefully pulled her up, then reached out to grab the other child. He accidentally slipped into the pit himself.

Li Teng simply swam in the pit, grabbed the other child's back, flung him up over the edge of the water pit, then reached out, grabbed the young mother's hair, pulled her close, and pushed her up out of the water pit from behind as well.

All three were confused from being drenched, and after they got out of the water pit, they started coughing violently.

Fortunately, it wasn't serious.

The edge was very slippery, and after several attempts, Li Teng finally climbed out of the pit. Just as he was about to leave, the young mother grabbed him.

"Thank you! Thank you!" The young mother was about to kneel in gratitude but was held up by Li Teng.

"Be careful on your own! I still need to go save my wife and child!"

After saying a few words to them, Li Teng turned and rushed toward the direction of the subway station.

He didn't know what this mission was yet, as it hadn't been formally issued.

But since Zhang Mengdi had called saying she and Nana were trapped in the subway, Li Teng was determined to rescue them, no turning back.

The only issue was the distance; Zhang Mengdi's situation was already extremely critical, but with a ten-kilometer journey, he might have only run about a third of it.

Under these circumstances, all he could do was his best and leave the rest to fate.

After running for more than ten minutes, Li Teng's phone rang.

It was Zhang Mengdi; thankfully, she was still alive!

"Wife, how is it going?" Li Teng asked anxiously.

"Hubby, the water hasn't risen past my neck. Someone made a hole in the window, so it's easier to breathe," Zhang Mengdi told Li Teng.

"What about Nana?"

"A few gentlemen nearby are taking turns holding her up; we'd be in trouble without their help," Zhang Mengdi said as she started crying.

"Hang in there! Don't lose hope! The rescuers should arrive soon, and I'm on my way as fast as I can," Li Teng encouraged Zhang Mengdi.

"Don't run around outside! It's very dangerous! I'll find a way to bring Nana home," Zhang Mengdi voiced her concerns.

"If I didn't rush over, what kind of man would I be when my own wife and child are trapped? I can't talk more; you also try to conserve your strength! I have to get there as fast as I can!" Li Teng hung up the phone and continued to hurry toward the area.

...

The other side of the Earth.

Country of Sweet Air.

In the eight-member mission team that Li Teng was part of, there was a Caucasian named Sean.

After waking up from unconsciousness, he found himself in a car speeding along.

Outside the car, the wind was strong and it was raining, appearing quite severe.

"Where are you taking me?"

Sean asked the driver while looking outside the car window.

"Brother, aren't you headed home?" the driver glanced at Sean.

"Oh?"

Sean then realized this was the city he lived in before he went to prison.

He had actually come back?

Sean wasn't naive.

After thinking for a while, he quickly understood the situation.

He hadn't returned to the real world.

This must still be the prison's mission world.

As for what the mission was this time... it was unclear yet.

But one thing was clear: he had to ensure his survival.

With the stormy weather outside...

Sean couldn't help but get excited.

The city he lived in, Los Sanctum, was by the sea and could experience hurricanes every couple of years.

Whenever a hurricane occurred, the city would plunge into chaos.

During such chaos, they could take guns and 'shop for free' all over.

"Buddy, stop the car. I'm getting off," Sean told the driver.

"Alright, but you have to pay the full fare," the driver said as he pulled the car over to the curb.

After the car stopped, Sean pretended to get money but instead punched the driver in the head, knocking him unconscious.

Sean got out of the car, walked around to the driver's side, opened the door, dragged the driver out of the driver's seat, and threw him to the roadside. Then he sat in the driver's seat, started the car quickly, and drove off.

As he drove, Sean felt under the seat and found something that made his heart leap.

It was a handgun.

Generally, taxi drivers in Los Sanctum carried a handgun to prevent robberies.

But this driver hadn't even had a chance to draw his weapon before Sean had knocked him down.

As he considered where to go for his 'free shopping', Sean's phone rang.

Sean took out his phone and saw that it was from his wife, Catherine.

"Dear, I just picked up our daughter from school. We're stuck near the school because they say a hurricane is coming and might hit us at any moment. I need to find a place to take cover, and I might not make it home tonight," Catherine told Sean.

"Find a safe place to hide, and come back after the hurricane passes," Sean responded to Catherine.

"Oh no! A group of people are robbing! They're beating up an elderly couple! What should we do?" Catherine suddenly screamed, and her daughter screamed as well.

"If they want money, just give it to them," Sean furrowed his brows.

"Dear, we are so scared..." Catherine's voice trembled.

"What can I do? I can't get there in time. You're on your own now. I'm still driving; I can't talk much," Sean said and then hung up the phone.

Sean's car was passing by a convenience store, which sold various tools that Sean needed these past few days.

Sean got out of the car, entered the convenience store, and did some shopping, filling several large shopping bags.

After noticing there was only an elderly couple in the store, Sean raised his gun and shot them both, then grabbed the shopping bags and ran back to his car.

"The hurricane hasn't passed yet. Zero-cost shopping hasn't officially started. I must act first to fight for a survival advantage," Sean stuffed the tools and supplies he purchased into the trunk of his car and then returned to the driver's seat.

Just then, two policemen rushed over from nearby, entered the convenience store upon hearing gunshots, and saw the elderly couple lying on the ground. They quickly drew their guns.

"Could my luck be any worse? Zero-cost shopping and I encounter the police?" Sean panicked.

Right at that moment, a Black man happened to be passing by on his bicycle.

"Stop! You're under arrest!" Both policemen aimed their guns at the Black man on the bicycle.

The Black man, terrified, hurriedly pedaled faster.

"Bang! Bang bang! Bang bang!"

The two policemen fired more than a dozen shots, killing the man on the bicycle on the spot.

"The suspect robbing the convenience store has been shot dead!" One of the policemen reported on the radio.

Sean breathed a sigh of relief, gave the two policemen a thumbs up, and they smiled back in acknowledgment as he started his car and drove away from the area of the convenience store.

"The hurricane is coming; I need to stock up on some food. There seems to be a big supermarket up ahead," Sean drove along the block.

After turning the corner, there indeed was a large supermarket.

Right at the curb, a Caucasian couple had just finished shopping at the supermarket, loading a whole cart of groceries into their car's trunk.

The zero-cost shopping hadn't started yet, but the normal rush to buy had already begun at the supermarket. Besides the Caucasian couple, several other locals were also shopping frantically inside.

Sean guessed that by the time he entered, there likely wouldn't be many useful goods left.

He seized the opportunity, stepped on the accelerator, and charged over. By the time the Caucasian couple realized something was wrong, it was too late; they were hit and sent flying by Sean's car.

Sean got out of the car and transferred all the groceries from the shopping cart to his car.

Just then, the Caucasian man who had been knocked unconscious came to and began to shout, trying to get up.

Sean shot him in the head, and the man stopped moving immediately.

After the gunshot, cries of shock arose nearby; Sean had already returned to the driver's seat and quickly drove away from the area.

Not far away, Sean's phone rang again.

It was Catherine calling him back.

"Dear, those robbers have driven us into a building, and they are not only robbing us but also want to "do things" to us..." Catherine's voice was full of fear.

"Why are you calling me? Call the police!" Sean said impatiently.

"The police said they can't get here on time because the hurricane is about to pass," Catherine's voice trembled.

"If the police can't get there, how am I supposed to help?" Sean hung up the phone.

...

Li Teng was getting closer and closer to the subway station.

Although his physical fitness was trained as tough as an iron man, the ten-kilometer journey, full of frantic running and jumping, inevitably left him with wounds all over his body.

Li Teng was incredibly tired and extremely thirsty, so he went to a small restaurant by the road that was still open and asked the owner for two bottles of mineral water, which he guzzled down.

Two bottles of water, gulped down in one go.

But when it came time to pay, his phone kept spinning as he tried to scan the code, unable to complete the transaction.

He didn't have any cash on him either.

"No worries, just owe it! Snap a picture of the payment code, and you can settle it once you have internet access," the owner told Li Teng a few words.

"Thank you, ha…" Li Teng expressed his gratitude to the owner and then prepared to leave.

Since his phone map was also unusable, after going outside, Li Teng looked around for a moment, confirmed the general direction, and was about to continue running forward when he heard the restaurant owner shouting frantically from behind him.

"There's someone trapped in the black car in the middle of the road! It's an elderly person with two children!" the restaurant owner pointed to the black car in the middle of the road and shouted loudly to his neighbors.

Li Teng followed the direction the restaurant owner was pointing, and indeed, there was a black car in the middle of the street, with water nearly submerging its roof!

Two men rushed out and dived into the accumulating water, swimming vigorously toward the black car.

The restaurant owner looked around, found a blue barrel, and also jumped into the water to swim toward the car.

Li Teng picked up a rock from the roadside and quickly jumped into the water, swimming up to where the restaurant owner was.

As the two swam over, the restaurant owner told Li Teng about the perilous situation.

An elderly woman had seen the heavy rain and decided to drive to the kindergarten to pick up the two children early to take them home.

However, she had not anticipated that the car would get flooded on its way here, with the water level rising ever higher, and emergency calls were jammed, leaving her unable to get through, so she could only call her daughter for help.

In her desperation, the daughter used a food ordering app, found the restaurant's number near the car's location through a map, and contacted the restaurant owner, explaining the situation, which is how the owner knew there were people trapped inside the car in the middle of the road.

By the time everyone swam to the car, the water had almost reached the roof.

The car doors wouldn't open; Li Teng used the rock in his hand and forcefully smashed at the car window, once, twice, three times… until finally breaking it.

Water began to pour into the car cabin.

Li Teng quickly leaned into the car, pulled out a three-year-old child, and placed them on the roof, then he picked up another five-year-old child from inside and placed them on the roof as well.

Lastly, he helped the elderly woman out and carried her on his shoulder.

The restaurant owner placed the three-year-old child in the blue barrel, then pushed the barrel toward the street side.

The five-year-old child was carried on the back of another man, and another man helped Li Teng with the elderly woman on his shoulder. With the help of the four men, they quickly moved the elderly and the two children to the safe side of the street.

When they looked back, the car roof had already disappeared beneath the water.

"Thank you, we would have died in there if you were any later," the elderly woman said gratefully to the four men.

"It's nothing! Come sit in my restaurant and have some hot water," the restaurant owner said with a nonchalant expression.

"I still need to find my wife and children, so I can't stay long," Li Teng helped the elderly and the two children into the restaurant and then bid farewell to the restaurant owner.

"The road ahead is tough! Take this! Be safe!" the restaurant owner came out chasing after him and handed Li Teng a swimming ring.

"Thank you."

"It's nothing!" the restaurant owner waved his hand and turned back into the restaurant.

The road ahead was mostly two to three meters deep in accumulated water. Li Teng threw the swimming ring into the water and then, clutching it, swam strenuously forward.