Superman Termination Manual - Chapter 84

Chapter 84 – 070 The Death of Fan Quan
“Indeed… he is Spider Man, without a doubt.”

Fan Quan whispered to himself, the light behind his glasses shifting. As he had expected, this unremarkable-looking youth was the real identity of Spider Man and also the son of Qing Ya.

His objective achieved, he couldn’t stay put; that would have been tantamount to waiting for death. He picked up the bottle of orange juice and slowly turned around, stepping towards the corner of the street and into a damp, narrow alley.

The moment his right foot stepped onto the alley floor, the three paper figures hidden in his sleeve began to tremble.

Fan Quan lowered his gaze, calmly glancing at the three little figures within his sleeve.

Through the reaction of the paper figures, he could clearly sense that the person named “Ke Xiaomo” was catching up to him from behind.

At the same time.

After bidding farewell to Ke Mingye, Ke Xiaomo slowly walked towards that vending machine.

In his eyes, Fan Quan slowly turned and entered an alleyway.

As his relatives entered the corner behind him, Ke Xiaomo’s figure instantly dissolved into a splash of ink towards the ground.

Subsequently, transforming into a long eagle-like shadow clinging to the ground, flapping its wings, as if a bird of prey soared straight up to the clouds from the bottom of a valley, that shadow quickly navigated to the alley behind the vending machine.

Half a second later, Ke Xiaomo rose to his feet from the center of the deserted alley, looking around, detecting no human presence. This was a one-way alley with no other exit.

The next second, he halted his roving gaze.

In the darkness, he glimpsed a colossal eye standing erect, its pupil shimmering with mesmerizing, colorful ripples, reminiscent of the aurora above the Arctic.

[Skill Name: Medusa’s Eye]

[Skill Effect: Unfurling an eye of Medusa mid-air, anyone who makes eye contact with it for a single second will be petrified on the spot; duration varies based on the ’mental strength’ attribute of the person, with higher mental strength resulting in shorter petrification time and lower mental strength leading to longer duration (max petrification of 2.5 seconds).]

What sort of ability is this? he thought.

In the instant of making less than half a second of eye contact with “Medusa’s Eye,” Ke Xiaomo had already shifted his gaze away, quietly observing the eye from the corner until it dispersed into a vague dust, scattering into the night sky.

“The man must still be nearby, otherwise there would be no need for such a tactic to delay me.”

Ke Xiaomo came to a conclusion in his mind.

As the strange vertical pupil disappeared into the darkness, Ke Xiaomo saw a golden-light-flecked crack hidden behind it.

Looking intently, inside the crack was teeming with dense religious script, almost enough to make someone with trypophobia scream and tear at their own throat.

However, in the blink of an eye, the crevice dispersed, the twinkling glow falling to the ground.

“That thing looks like… a door; it must be some kind of transportation medium. So, there’s no mistake, he’s likely nearby.”

Thinking this, Ke Xiaomo’s shape once again scattered across the ground like spilled ink, merging into an intense shadowous vapor.

Time rewound three seconds.

As Fan Quan entered the alley, he activated the D-grade skill “Medusa’s Eye” that he had just purchased on the skill sales page.

Subsequently, he recited the theoretical phrase for one of his paper figures: “Sacred Space.”

Using this ability, which he had once exhibited in an instance, he opened a portal to a location 20 meters to the west behind Medusa’s Eye and quickly stepped in.

Inside Sacred Space, there were bizarre scenes all drawn with “religious script,” at times revealing China’s Exorcism Rituals… at times, Christianity’s baptismal ceremonies… and at times, the Midsummer Night festivities of Medieval Nordic.

It seemed as if every scene he witnessed was related to the word “purification.”

When Fan Quan emerged from Sacred Space, he had stepped into the interior of a standard residential building.

Looking around, it was a very Chinese living room, complete with a mahjong table with an ashtray, old folding stools, an outdated television set, a Chinese knot, an embroidered wall hanging, and a six-person family photo.

Noises came from the toilet, where a woman in her fifties was applying a face mask in front of the mirror while shrilly shouting towards the living room, “Who’s there?!”

Fan Quan made no sound, simply stepping back two paces to press against the wall while looking down at the paper figures in his sleeve.

The first figure had already disappeared along with the “Sacred Space” pathway.

There were two paper figures left inside his sleeve.

One of them clung to his wrist, murmuring “The Allegory of the Cave,” “Metaphysics,” “Rationalism”;

The other sat cross-legged on his wrist, reciting “The Doctrine of the Mean,” “Benevolence as the Core,” “Integration of Knowledge and Action.”

Fan Quan blurted out: “The Allegory of the Cave.”

As his words fell, the wall behind him seemed to transform into an ancient cave with a blazing fire, dragging his shape into it.

Hearing the murmurs, the curly-haired lady rushed out of the toilet, hands on hips, scanning the living room, muttering to herself.

“What was that noise?”

She took a feather duster and circled the living room. After confirming no one else was there, she cursed “Crazy” under her breath, then strutted back into the toilet, continuing to apply the unfinished mask.