Chapter 35: Ye Sheng Runs Away from Home and the Department of Homeland Defense

The moment Professor Ye saw her daughter take flight, her heart tightened instinctively. Countless cases of failed rocket launches flashed through her mind, and she could almost smell the acrid scent of charred wreckage.

For a brief second, she even felt a pang of regret—regret for criticizing Ye Sheng earlier that day, regret for losing her temper with her.

However, when Professor Ye observed the aircraft carving a stable arc through the night sky with the poise of a precision-guided missile, her anxiety rapidly evaporated. Knowing her daughter’s character, she realized that this sudden ascent was likely a long-planned scheme.

She had understood one thing about her daughter back when they played chess together during Ye Sheng’s childhood: the girl was calculating. She was the type of clever person who could silently plan many, many moves ahead. One could not view "Sheng-sheng" as an ordinary rebellious teenager; if this girl dared to take to the skies, she must have already plotted the subsequent steps. Instead of worrying about her safety, it would be better to consider how this grand, attention-grabbing runaway stunt was going to end.

"Fine. Truly fine!"

Before the exhaust trail of the personal aircraft vanished from sight, Professor Ye dialed the 24-hour emergency hotline of the University of the Academy of Sciences. Scholars engaged in transcendent research often dealt with hazardous materials, so the school had established a department similar to a police rapid-response unit to help faculty resolve emergencies. If a professor encountered a crisis, they would report it to this office, which would then determine the severity and decide which relevant authorities needed to be notified. In short, the "Emergency Affairs Office" served as a megaphone. Scholars, having spent too long in their ivory towers, were often unfamiliar with external bureaucratic systems; if left to report things themselves, they would likely cause a scene. After all, professional matters should be left to professionals.

However, even though the duty operator had prepared themselves for the "professionalism" of the faculty, they were still thoroughly bewildered by Professor Ye’s report.

"So, you are saying that your daughter just ran away from home, and this runaway stunt might accidentally trigger the air defense system alarms, subsequently impacting national security, uh…?"

"That is correct."

"…Professor Ye, please hold on. I need to consult my superiors."

"No need for that. Go straight to the Homeland Defense Department; I don't have the clearance for this myself."

"…Please hold."

Professor Ye rolled her eyes. If she didn't have to follow school regulations to prevent gossip-mongers from making an issue of it later, she would have just called an acquaintance directly. She had a high school classmate working at the Homeland Security Department—wouldn't that have been easier than dealing with the school’s megaphone?

Ten minutes of back-and-forth later, Professor Ye finally managed to clarify the situation to the school. In essence, the matter wasn't complicated: "My daughter has flown into the sky!"

The capital was a place of hidden talents, and it wasn't particularly rare for some rebellious, rune-engineering-gifted kid to build their own aircraft and launch themselves into the air. At most, it would become fodder for cocktail party chatter among social circles. These contraptions built by young engineering prodigies usually lost control after reaching the height of four or five stories; while a crash might land them in the hospital, it was rarely a major issue for the authorities. In fact, low-altitude flight in the educational district didn't even require a permit. Some children from well-off, early-awakened families even rode flying transcendent creatures to high school just to hone their sense of aerial balance.

It wasn't until Professor Ye repeatedly described the rocket's launch posture and the massive scale of the event—coupled with another professor from her neighborhood reporting abnormal fire and explosions—that the operator finally realized... this was a big deal.

***

Thirteen minutes earlier, at the monitoring room of the "Shan-Hai" Integrated Air Defense Early Warning System, under the Homeland Defense Department.

Behind rows of military-grade spiritual-quantum computer screens sat a group of bored, weary-looking office workers. Suddenly, abnormal data fluctuations flashed across several screens.

[Sudden high-energy reaction detected in the Educational District, Longitude: ..., Latitude: ...]

Several duty officers perked up, though they remained unperturbed.

"Someone’s setting off fireworks again. Whose prodigy is it this time?"
"Haha, fireworks in the middle of winter, how nice..."
"The betting pool is open! Get your bets in!"
"I bet it's Qinglan University."
"Wrong, it must be Jingcheng University this time. Qinglan students have already made three headlines recently; from a probability standpoint..."
"Is there a chance it’s the faculty housing area of the University of the Academy of Sciences? I’m betting on them."
"Give it a rest. You lot from the Academy are all bookish nerds who only care about theory; how could you possess the romance of youthful rebellion?"
"What's wrong with the Academy?"

While they debated, a seasoned veteran quickly opened a notepad on his computer, jotting down his colleagues' bets with an expression of pure enjoyment. Working in the monitoring room of the Homeland Defense Department was a decent position—direct central oversight, excellent benefits, low stress, and occasional shift rotations. Aside from the limited career advancement, it was almost the perfect job for a fresh graduate.

If there were a transcendent faction known as the "Old Men Who Watch Monitors" (though there wasn't), everyone present would be the undisputed T0 version of that faction. But truth be told, the work was quite boring, especially during the night shift. Because national security was at stake, one could never slack off, yet most of the time, nothing happened. The country had been at peace for a long time, and the capital was in its heartland; there were rarely many emergencies. Thus, everyone actually looked forward to the students in the Educational District stirring up trouble to add color to their dull night shifts.

The most prestigious academic institutions were clustered in the Educational District, which meant that occasionally, some little genius with a unique way of thinking would perform some adventurous act of youthful passion. "Qinglan University," "Jingcheng University," and the "University of the Academy of Sciences" were the top three in the country, and the troublemakers usually came from these schools. After all, stirring up trouble required not only youthful passion but also formidable technical prowess.

In this era where transcendent awakening was maturing, high school students with exceptional technical skills were rarely buried by standard entrance exams. Whenever students in the district produced strange high-energy reactions, they would be picked up by the "Shan-Hai" system, triggering alarms in the monitoring room. The staff were long accustomed to these, jokingly calling them "fireworks," and would even run entertainment-based betting pools on the culprit's school, gender, relationship status, and hometown.

Just as the crowd was arguing, the veteran’s eyes suddenly lit up.

"Holy cow, wait! It's a small aircraft, vertically launched... Come on, take your guesses on how high it can fly!"

The veteran, beaming, added several blank lines to his notepad to start a second pool. He also pressed the blue alarm button on his desk. According to regulations, if a high-energy reaction was confirmed to be an unidentified small aircraft, a low-level blue alarm was sufficient. In reality, it was likely nothing—just kids playing around, probably just an oversized bottle rocket.

Laughter filled the monitoring room. Even among young geniuses, there were levels to this. A student from the Aviation Institute trying to fly with makeshift methods was certainly more entertaining than a chemistry student accidentally blowing up a septic tank while playing with alchemy. Some guessed a hundred meters, some two hundred, and one person went all-in, betting heavily on five hundred.

However, when the data on the monitor began to soar like a wild bull injected with chili oil, and the simulated trajectory of the unidentified flying object—calculated from the data—shot straight into the night sky over the capital with no signs of stopping...

The laughter in the monitoring room quickly dissolved into silence. After a long while, the veteran patted his own face, as if waking from a dream, and couldn't help but mutter:

"What the hell... are you firing an intercontinental ballistic missile here??"