Superman Termination Manual

In the darkness, the glow from his smartphone illuminated the astonished eyes of the young man.

Ke Mingye stared at the date displayed on the screen, thinking to himself.

"The next return of the comet is on June 18, 2029, which is also the last day of the extinction mission deadline."

"Is it really just a coincidence, or could it be that this so-called system is the work of the comet named 'Qiyamate'?"

"If not, then the timing of this comet is far too late, arriving on the last night. Will it manage to collect the powers of the Magic Girls in time?"

He continued to ponder.

"If it's too late, players will still have to battle with the Magic Girls. Maybe, seeing that the Magic Girls are almost wiped out, it gave the comet the Sequence 0 Magic Card 'Day of Qiyamate'. What would they fight them with then? That card is a once-in-three-thousand-years kind of Magic Card, capable of destroying a country without surprise."

"Forget it, let it be whatever it will be."

Ke Mingye took a deep breath, turned off his phone, and the last glimmer of light in the room vanished, plunging his face into pitch darkness.

"Rest, there's work to be done early tomorrow."

With that thought, he closed his eyes, and his consciousness gradually sank into sleep.

A silent night passed, and the next day at five in the morning, a cold alert tone unexpectedly rang in his mind.

Ke Mingye opened his eyes to a notification panel.

[You have received a message from your friend "Fan Quan."]

[Fan Quan: Time to move. Their ship will arrive at the port of Huanjing North District in thirty minutes, hurry over now.]

Ke Mingye checked the message while yawning and rubbing his forehead.

Fan Quan had mentioned yesterday that today two players would arrive in Huanjing on a smuggled ship; one player's ID was "Cai Bing", a hacker who had long been in cahoots with Fan Quan, and another player known as "Paranoia."

Paranoia's mental state seems to be unstable; he said he was coming to Huanjing to challenge Qing Ya to a duel...

This was no different than a ticking time bomb, so the three of them agreed to capture him before he disembarked and tie him up in a deserted place to fend for himself.

"The ship is arriving this early?"

Ke Mingye thought to himself and glanced at the clock; it was only five-thirty, and it was still dark outside.

He then checked the daily bulletin.

[Obituary: On the night of June 20th, born in London, England, the player with the ID "Kachila" was killed by the supervillain "Divinity Communicator Phoenix."]

[Current global survivors count: 95 of 100]

"Damn it... Can you die a bit slower?"

Ke Mingye covered his face, sighing helplessly.

In just a few days, only ninety-five players were left. Maybe I should lead a surrender; if it comes to it, I'll kowtow twice to the Anomaly Control Bureau to see if they'll let us scrape by another year, he thought.

But on the bright side, the players who couldn't make it through the initial phase were either unlucky or inept. Filtering out these players early wasn't necessarily a bad thing, as it avoided dragging everyone else down later.

However, more than the deceased players, Ke Mingye was more curious about the term "Phoenix," those three words.

In the system panel, the prefix for Divinity Communicator Phoenix was "supervillain," not "superhero" or "vigilante"...

This was very strange; after all, in Ke Mingye's memory, Phoenix had always been a superhero and was highly sought after by the American people. The President of the United States had once said that if not for Divine Communicator Zeus, then Divinity Communicator Phoenix would be America's Zeus.

This shows how popular he once was.

However, ever since "Timekeeper" captured Phoenix and tortured him for several days and nights, Phoenix had completely disappeared, never to appear in the public eye again. Even the Superhero Association and the Anomaly Control Bureau had no news about him, and there was a time when the entire United States was searching for Phoenix.

Some even suspected that Timekeeper might have thrown Phoenix into the sea, so the U.S. officials used equipment to sweep the nearby sea areas, but still, they found no trace of Phoenix.

Unexpectedly, several years later, when Ke Mingye saw the name Phoenix, it was on the system panel, and Phoenix was now classified as a "supervillain"...

Absolutely bewildering.

"Was Phoenix driven mad by Timekeeper..." he wondered, "or was he controlled by Timekeeper through some method, like brainwashing or mind control?"

Ke Mingye soon gave up on delving deeper; these were not the things he needed to focus on now. One step at a time, he would complete today's daily tasks first.

[Today's daily tasks are as follows]

[1. Run 4000 meters (Reward: One lottery spin)]

[2. Purchase an item at a mall (Reward: One 50% discount shopping card)]

"A 50% discount shopping card, can it be used to buy skills too?"

He tidied his messy bangs, closed the panel, got out of bed, walked out of his room, and gently knocked on his older brother's door, asking softly, "Big brother, want to join me for a morning run?"

If Ke Xiaomo was inside, with his sharp senses, he would have heard Ke Mingye's call and would have gotten out of bed to open the door immediately.

Seeing no response from inside, Ke Mingye quickly assumed that his brother must have already gone out to exercise. These past few days, his brother had been getting up exceptionally early, likely going out to exercise around three or four in the morning as part of his warm-up preparations before facing the calamitous dragon.

He moved back to his room, locked the door, took out a set of clothes and a box containing spare sneakers from the closet, and then released the Deception Puppet from the windowsill.

Ke Mingye ordered the puppet to carry the set of clothes and the box, watching as its silhouette vanished into the gray line where the sky met the ground.

Then he turned, walked out of his room, quickly washed up, and headed downstairs by elevator.

Ke Mingye jogged along the edge of the Old Jingmai District, while simultaneously controlling a puppet that raced through the city.

Eventually, the puppet stopped in an alley close to the harbor in the Huanjing North District, dressed itself in trousers, shirt, and shoes, and then transformed its appearance into one that Fan Quan and others would recognize.

He adjusted his hair, turned, and walked out of the alley and down the stairs toward the harbor ground, where he saw Fan Quan dressed in a brown coat and suit pants.

"Ju... Didn't Qing Meng come?"
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As Ke Mingye approached Fan Quan and was about to ask where Ju Zipi and Qing Meng were, he remembered that Ju Zipi had gone to Japan to study the way of the Cowherd.

"She hasn't woken up yet," Fan Quan said.

"Typical of her."

"It's that ship," Fan Quan continued.

At those words, Ke Mingye turned his head to gaze into the distance, the sea breeze lifting his bangs.

At the gray boundary where sky met sea, shadows of a few fishing boats scattered across the surface. The morning light brushed over the grey, foggy horizon, breaking through the rolling sea mist that enveloped the sparkling waters.

A cargo ship slowly emerged on the horizon, its bulky body undulating on the sea as it gradually approached the harbor.

Fan Quan, staring at the cargo ship, said in a low voice, "The woman standing on the deck is 'Cai Bing'."

Ke Mingye focused his gaze and discerned the scene on the deck.

He saw a woman in a black raincoat standing at the bow, playing with her phone with one hand. She wore a duckbill cap, had shoulder-length curly hair, an indifferent expression, and a lollipop clutched between her lips.

Fan Quan continued, "The one sitting by the railing next to her is 'Bias,' who is our target. As soon as he disembarks, restrain him immediately. I'll use the taxi parked at the harbor to take him away."

"Okay, mission received."

As Ke Mingye spoke, he surveyed the man seated on the deck.

This uninvited guest was dressed in a black hoodie, his head covered by a hood, his face heavily bandaged, revealing only an eye riddled with blood vessels.

"What, like some bloodthirsty brute?"

Ke Mingye took a sharp intake of cold air, his heart thudding.

Fan Quan, with his hands in the pockets of his brown coat, said slowly, "Even the bloodthirsty brutes have come, with a get-up that screams a typical anime-style delusional twist."

"He certainly doesn't look easy to mess with."

"We still don't know much about him, but Cai Bing said this guy is very confident, or he wouldn't be uttering nonsense about wanting to challenge Qing Ya alone. Maybe he really is skilled."

"No worries, however strong he is, the three of us together can create chaos," Ke Mingye whispered.

Soon, the cargo ship stopped in front of the harbor,

and Cai Bing was the first to descend the gangplank, coming to Fan Quan's side and whispering something to him.

Following that, the player known as "Bias" slowly stood up from beside the railing, and made his way down the gangplank, the thudding of his feet on the metal sending chills.

"He's carrying a sword bag on his back, it might have knives inside," Cai Bing said.

"Okay, I'll get rid of him straight away," Ke Mingye said.

After disembarking, Bias looked up and surveyed the three people blocking his path, and coldly asked, "Who are you?"

"Failed Men," Ke Mingye said.

"Fan Quan."

"I've seen your name on the leaderboard; you're a player," Bias said, his bloodied eye wide and his brows furrowing under the bandages.

"That's right," Fan Quan calmly said. "I heard you came to this city wanting to challenge Qing Ya one-on-one, was that just a joke?"

"No, I'm serious," Bias said with a cryptic smile, "I'd advise you not to stop me, otherwise..."

Fan Quan sighed and turned to Ke Mingye, "Go ahead, he's definitely not normal."

"Okay."

"Don't come any closer you bastards!" Bias suddenly shouted, simultaneously removing the sword bag from his shoulder, unzipping it, and pulling out a blood-red knife, laughing as he covered his face, "You know I have a B-rank skill, right? You must be envious, this is... 'God's Luck.'"

As he brandished the knife, the air suddenly thickened, as if an invisible aura started emanating, enveloping the space.

Ke Mingye was startled, "Wow, this guy looks fierce, shall we retreat?"

"B-rank skill?" Fan Quan pondered for a half-second, cautioning, "Be careful of the knife in his hand."

"Right, let you bunch of ants witness, my B-rank skill," Bias said, licking the blood-red knife, "—'Magic Girl, Transform!'."

As his words fell, a blood-red cocoon of light spread from the handle of the knife, swirling around Bias's body, tightly enveloping every corner of his form.

Then, Bias lifted his bangs with both hands, and smiled seductively.

The cocoon enveloping him shattered in an instant, and a beautiful girl dressed in a red and black gown, holding a gigantic scythe, appeared before the three.

Ke Mingye was stunned, his eyes nearly popping out.

Cai Bing was also dumbfounded, her mouth slightly open, the lollipop she held almost falling to the ground.

Fan Quan was equally shocked, his glasses nearly falling off his nose.