78: Chapter 78 Gods Among Mortals

At this moment, in the airport control tower.

The hall was silent, and everyone was holding their breath.

On the electronic screen, the signal for flight 2289 flickered on the radar for the last time, and then, it vanished.

"2289, please respond if you can hear me."

"2289, please respond if you can hear me."

The calls rang out repeatedly, echoing through the radio channel, but there was not a shred of response.

They only knew that the plane's engine had exploded.

From an altitude of ten thousand meters.

There was no emergency communication, no distress signal; the signal simply vanished like that.

The atmosphere in the hall was like solidified concrete.

Someone clenched their fists, their nails digging into their palms.

Someone took off their headset and covered their face.

Someone was still mechanically repeating the calls, their voice growing increasingly hoarse.

Outside the control tower, black cars drove in rapidly.

The doors opened, and people in various uniforms walked in quickly.

Representatives from the Civil Aviation Administration, emergency departments, and the military.

They were led to the monitoring screens and informed of the current situation.

Everyone's footsteps were hurried upon entering, but when they saw the line "Signal Lost" on the screen, they all fell silent.

Then they began to wait.

Besides waiting, there was nothing they could do.

The radio channel was deathly silent.

Captains of other flights were also calling out; some voices were anxious, some were low, and some simply kept the channel open in silence, as if mourning for their peers.

Then, someone noticed an anomaly.

"W-wait a second."

A young analyst staring at the altitude monitoring data suddenly stood up, unaware that their chair had crashed to the floor.

"The plane's rate of descent is decreasing!"

Everyone looked over.

There was no signal on the radar, but the last few data points captured by the ground monitoring station were still flickering on the screen.

The plane's falling speed had originally been over sixty meters per second, with acceleration almost identical to free fall.

But now.

Fifty meters per second.

Forty meters.

Twenty meters.

The curve was flattening out.

"This is impossible," an old engineer muttered. "It's being slowed down by something supporting it..."

No one refuted him.

Because judging by the trend of those data points, this was indeed the curve that would appear if the plane were being steadily supported by some external force.

It wasn't support from an air current, nor was it the recovery of the plane's own power; it looked as if it were being precisely controlled by something.

The hall buzzed with discussion.

"Report this immediately."

A middle-aged man in a dark suit said in a deep voice; he was an official from the Xia Kingdom's Bureau of Spiritual Energy and Evolution Investigation who had just arrived.

"I want all the data—altitude changes, rate changes, trajectory deviations—all analyzed in real-time. Also," he paused, "find out who is on the plane and if there are any special individuals."

"Yes."

Meanwhile, people outside had also noticed the plane.

This sudden accident spread through the aviation enthusiast circles immediately.

A passenger plane with an engine exploding at high altitude, 323 people's lives hanging in the balance—the attention on such an incident was extremely high.

On a hillside near Hong Kong, several aviation enthusiasts with telescopes were already staking it out.

Their lenses were aimed at the projected crash site of the plane, hoping to capture something.

In the livestream, the chat scrolled with prayers and exclamations.

"Can anyone survive?"

"Praying."

"Is there a miracle?"

Then, the plane broke through the clouds.

Every telescope and lens aimed at it simultaneously.

The chat in the livestream stopped instantly.

One second. Two seconds. Three seconds.

Then, it exploded.

On the screen, a Boeing passenger plane was flying steadily.

Its right engine position had completely vanished, leaving only charred wreckage edges emitting faint smoke.

There was a gruesome gash on the fuselage, with the aluminum skin curled outward like a can ripped open by force.

The entire plane had no lights; all circuits should have been destroyed.

Yet it was flying steadily.

No shaking.

No falling.

No loss of control.

"Did I see that right?"

"The engine is gone and there's a huge hole, but it can still fly??"

"Do physical laws not exist anymore?"

"This level of stability—even a normal plane isn't this stable, right?"

The photos were screenshotted, forwarded, and uploaded.

In a short time, the entire internet's trending searches were dominated by this "impossible-to-fly plane."

Someone made an absurd joke: "It wouldn't be like a Superman movie where the plane is being held up by someone, would it? Hahahaha."

Below, there was initially a string of "Don't be funny."

"How long has it been since the Spiritual Energy Revival? How could anyone be able to fly and hold up a plane?"

But after the joke was posted, many people fell silent.

Indeed.

Engine explosion, fuselage damage, total circuit failure—there was no reason for this plane to still be flying steadily.

Unless... unless there was truly some kind of force supporting it.

"Since we have the Spiritual Energy Revival, flying and Divine Power aren't impossible, right?"

"But what level of power would that be? That's a plane, a several-hundred-ton plane, in the sky!"

"If it's true, how terrifying must that person's combat power be?"

"Impossible, wouldn't that just be a god?"

The discussion grew increasingly intense.

Some were questioning, saying that nothing could be seen in the photos, and if there really was something holding the plane, why couldn't the cameras capture it?

"Maybe it's just being held up by strong winds."

"I've held down Newton's coffin lid for you."

"It's a coincidence."

But those who seriously questioned it were quickly refuted: after the fuselage shell was ripped open by the large hole, a portion of the aluminum skin should have been hanging downward.

But after zooming in on the footage, one could see that the aluminum skin was collapsing inward, as if it were being wrapped from the outside by something invisible.

This was not normal.

The Xia Kingdom's government agencies began analysis immediately.

One group analyzed photo and video data, another retrieved airspace monitoring data, and the third connected directly to the control tower ahead.

The analysis results came out quickly.

The conclusion left everyone in disbelief.

"There is indeed something supporting the plane in flight."

In the conference room, an old expert with graying hair pushed up his glasses, his voice hoarse.

"Look at this deceleration curve; it's too uniform. It has remained stable from an altitude of ten thousand meters.

This is not air current support, not a recovery of the plane's own power, and it cannot be explained by any known physical phenomenon."

The hall was silent for a few seconds.

"Range?"

"Cannot be locked. There are no visible objects, and the radar has not detected any anomalous signals."

"Size?"

"Inferring from the distribution of the points of force, if there is a supporting object, its diameter is between two and three meters, with the point of action concentrated at the plane's center of gravity. However, this is just a mechanical deduction; we cannot see the actual situation at all."

He paused, his voice dropping a few degrees:

"A power of this level does not exist on Earth.

This is not human."

"Then what is it?"

"I don't know."

The old expert said these three words for the third time, "It could be a human who has evolved to an extremely high level, or it could be some unknown existence brought about by the Spiritual Energy Revival; we have no answer."

The only thing that could be certain was that this thing had saved 323 lives and had not shown any hostility throughout the entire process.

The news was immediately reported to the highest level.

Instructions were quickly sent back:

Investigate with all efforts, but absolutely do not initiate contact.

Maintain an observation distance, and do not take any actions that could be construed as a threat.

The other party's strength, whatever it is, is not something we can provoke.

Cheng Jian saw the news while he was on the training field.

He had just finished a high-intensity training session and was covered in sweat.

Recently, he had always felt a power surging within his body; that feeling made him both excited and nervous.

He had practiced the Human Breathing Method to his current limit, and his body's explosive power and endurance had grown visibly.

All of this was thanks to that person.

That person whose back he had only seen, whose name he didn't even know.

The person who had taught him the Human Breathing Method.

Cheng Jian picked up his water bottle and took a gulp, his peripheral vision catching the news scrolling on the display screen by the side of the field.

"Breaking: Passenger plane engine explodes off the coast of Hong Kong; the plane is currently flying steadily in an abnormal state."

He froze.

The screen was playing footage shot from the ground, showing the plane with its right engine completely destroyed and its fuselage damaged, flying forward with unbelievable steadiness.

"It wouldn't be someone holding up the plane, would it?"

Cheng Jian said almost subconsciously.

The next second, an image jumped out from his memory.

That day, he was in a mountain village helping residents move.

He suddenly heard a voice call his name, and he immediately turned and rushed out the door.

But he only saw a back disappearing at the end of the mountain road at a speed far beyond his imagination.

That person had given him the Human Breathing Method.

It was a training method that completely transcended the era and cognition.

Then that person disappeared.

Cheng Jian had never known just how strong he was.

Now, watching the plane on the screen supported by an invisible force, an absurd yet persistent thought surfaced.

Could it be him?

Impossible, right?

Cheng Jian shook his head.

This is a plane.

A three-hundred-ton plane.

At an altitude of ten thousand meters.

What level of power would this require?

He hadn't recovered from this thought when his superior ran in.

"Everyone, emergency information."

His superior's face wore an expression Cheng Jian had never seen before: shock, awe, and a hint of irrepressible excitement.

"The higher-ups have just issued a notice."

"According to real-time analysis by national research departments, there is indeed an unknown existence currently supporting that plane in flight."

Cheng Jian's pupils contracted sharply.

"...What?"

He immediately reported the existence of that person to his superiors as the prime suspect.

11 minutes later.

Over the airport.

A dilapidated plane was descending straight down through the air.

Below was the runway, ready for action, with fire trucks, ambulances, and rescue personnel all in position.

The crowd looked up at the plane in the sky that shouldn't still be flying, their faces full of disbelief.

The plane got lower and lower.

Three hundred meters, two hundred meters, one hundred meters.

The speed was slowly decreasing.

Finally, the plane's landing gear touched the ground gently.

No jolts.

No impact.

It was as steady as a feather landing on the ground.

Deafening cheers erupted from the ground.

Fire trucks and ambulances swarmed over, rescue personnel set up ladders, pried open the deformed cabin doors, and began evacuating passengers.

The elderly, children, and the injured were helped down one by one.

Chen Mo hovered ten meters above the crowd, invisible, watching quietly.

The passengers stepped onto the ground one after another.

Some knelt on the runway and kissed the ground, some hugged their welcoming families and wailed, and some just walked forward in a daze, their faces still wearing the bewilderment of having survived a disaster.

At this moment, an elderly man with graying hair walked out of the cabin door.

He stood on the boarding stairs, looked up at the sky, then looked down at the ground beneath his feet, his lips trembling.

Then, he said tremulously:

"Thank the gods."

The old man slowly knelt down, about to kowtow towards the sky.

In the air, many people had actually already formed a guess.

The plane's sudden deceleration, being steadily supported, the engine explosion yet still flying.

These unexplainable phenomena made the same word surface in many people's minds: Superman.

Or rather, a god.

The speculation that had already gone viral online was even more real in the hearts of the survivors at this moment.

So when the old man knelt to give thanks, no one found it strange.

But the old man's knees could not touch the ground.

An invisible force supported him, like an unseen palm, gently but firmly preventing him from kneeling.

The old man felt that force.

He froze, then suddenly realized.

It was him.

It was that existence that had supported the plane in flight.

He was right here.

"Thank you..." The old man no longer knelt but just bent his waist and bowed deeply towards the sky, "Thank you."

The passengers behind him saw this scene and also bowed towards the sky one after another.

"Thank you."

"Thank the gods."

"God bless."

Voices rose one after another, with crying tones, with trembling, with the reality of having survived a disaster.

And the nearby livestream cameras and the crowd of onlookers saw this scene clearly through telescopes.

An old man knelt towards the sky but was lifted by an invisible force.

"Holy shit"

"He is really there"

"That Superman is really watching"

"He is right there"

The chat exploded completely at this moment.

Chen Mo did not linger.

He also did not reveal himself.

He flew to high altitude.

Subsequently, the Force Field retracted the shock waves and air resistance it had been controlling.

The next moment, he shot into the sky.

The Force Field released its restrictions, the air was violently pushed aside, and a sonic boom exploded in the sky like a thunderclap.

Everyone on the ground looked up at the same time.

Amidst the clouds, a faint white streak suddenly tore open.

A sonic boom.

Exploding in the sky.

The sound reverberated over the airport like a declaration.

He had left.

"Did you hear that sound just now?"

"That was a sonic boom"

"He left at supersonic speed"

Among the crowd of onlookers, someone subconsciously swallowed.

"What kind of existence is this..."

"Humans cannot do such things."

Someone muttered:

"This is not a human."

"This is a god."

"God of the Human World."

Chen Mo hovered at an altitude of ten thousand meters.

Below, the airport lights were still flickering, and the crowd had not yet dispersed.

He noted this moment in his heart.

This was the first time he had displayed his power before the world.

At the same time, it was also the first time the world truly saw what a human could do.