Meanwhile, Lei Shi and Leng Shi were swimming at their greatest speed.
They cut through the lake like torpedoes.
The explosion of the ball of flames didn't leave them unscathed. Although they were not at the center of its explosion, they still received heavy damages. For instance, the lower part of Lei Shi's HTB suit was half destroyed, revealing parts of his legs and feet. Leng Shi, on the other hand, had the destruction of his HTB suit reached up to his back. However, they were still better off compared to the Green Jade Mamba who had the flesh of half its body from its stomach to its tail charred and disintegrated, leaving behind only its bones.
Even though the Green Jade Mamba lost the flesh of half of its body in the blast, it didn't die immediately, showcasing its high vitality.
When it saw Leng Shi and Lei Shi still alive and in the lake, it opened its mouth, attempting to spurt water towards them. But as it tried, the water streamed out at a very low pressure.
This wasn't due to being underwater, because even though they were underwater, the stream of water from its mouth still had the force to push and swirl him away like he was in the eye of hurricane, the reason for this was that, as the Green Jade Mamba had lost the flesh of half of its body, it also lost half of the muscles which it contracted to create enough pressure to form the stream out water that it spurted, secondly, it was due to the pain it was feeling from contracting the remaining muscles.
However, that didn't stop the Poison from flowing out of the fangs of its mouth.
The Green Jade Mamba's poison was still as deadly as ever, but its potency was reduced since it was diluted by the water of the lake, however, this didn't matter to Leng Shi and Lei Shi as they fled from the Green Jade Mamba at their top speed.
Under normal conditions, they wouldn't be afraid of the diluted poison of the Green Jade Mamba, but at that time, since some parts of their HTB suits were destroyed with parts of their flesh bare, they couldn't afford to even get close to it for fear of being poisoned.
Leng Shi and Lei Shi later flew up above the lake as they continued fleeing, because the water was dampening their speed, and so that they will be able to rest easy, knowing that the poison couldn't reach them.
As they fled, they began to feel confident that, this time around, they had truly lost their pursuers. But their excitement was cut short when, from behind them, out of the horizon, they saw Acme Company's guards' Carrier speeding towards them.
They were utterly and completely shocked. Leng Shi couldn't hold himself back any longer and asked in a tone full of annoyance "What the fuck is happening? How do they keep finding us?"
"I don't know! Didn't Zhen Shi remove the HTB suit's secret tracking devices when he took them to his study at that time when we got them newly? If he didn't do that, then what was he doing?" replied Lei Shi.
"If it's removing the secret tracking device, I'm certain Zhen Shi wouldn't fail to do that. They must be tracking us using a different method" Leng Shi said before he paused, seeming to be thinking.
"Hahaha, so that's what it was… I've got to hand it to them, they had us fooled, hiding it plain sight like that" Leng Shi laughed.
"What do you mean?" Lei Shi asked.
"What's the thing that Rank 4 HTB suits have that lower Ranked HTB suits don't have? What's the thing that shocked all of us, including Zhen Shi, after finding out that it was added to Rank 4 HTB suits? What is the first thing on the 'What's new' list of the Rank 4 HTB suit?" Leng Shi asked Lei Shi three questions consecutively.
Lei Shi looked serious as he seemed to be contemplating, thinking of an answer. Finally, he looked at Leng Shi and replied "Uhh... I dunno".
*Crash* Leng Shi lost balance and fell into the lake.
*Splash* he quickly flew out.
"Hey Bro!!" Lei Shi slowed to check up on Leng Shi.
"You piece of Shit!" Leng Shi cursed.
"Little prick! There I was, thinking that you had grown a brain" Leng Shi said harshly to Leng Shi before he rudely said to him "The person you hate the most is the cause of our problem".
"What?! The person I hate the most is.... Ryan!! That fucking Bastard, I knew he was evil right from the moment we met!" exclaimed Lei Shi seeming very annoyed.
"Kaashh" Leng Shi smacked his face using his right-hand. He did not know what to say to this brother of his.
"I know he's the culprit, but can you tell me how he's the culprit?" Lei Shi asked but he had already condemned Ryan. He was just looking for a reason to put the last nail in the coffin.
Leng Shi sighed but still answered him "It's just a speculation, but I'm pretty sure of it. Think about it, when we had lower Ranked HTB suits, it was always the same single secret tracking device, but this time around, even though the secret tracking device was removed, we're still being tracked. Zhen Shi always sweeps through the entirety of any of our new HTB suits just in case they're any other hidden things, all to be on the safe side. But this time, there was a new feature in the suit, the AI Monitor, and he most likely wouldn't have searched through that part much, for fear of messing up its configuration, and because he wasn't used to the new feature. So, what I'm saying is, whatever it is that's with us or in our HTB suits that they're using to track us should be from the part of our HTB suit's system's motherboard that contains AI monitor's chips.
"Wow, you're so cool Bro! But let me ask, how do you plan on convincing these people, who are chasing us like hounds, to stop and let us open our HTB suits and remove the AI Monitor chip from it?" Lei Shi asked sarcastically although he was truly surprised at Leng Shi's speculation, for it was plausible.
"I don't know. You think about it. At least, I've done well; I can't be blamed for lack of trying. You figure it out" said Leng Shi exasperatedly.
"Tch" Lei Shi didn't speak any further.
"Goddammit!!" After thinking for sometime and getting no result, except for seeing that the Carrier was gaining on them, and that they had passed over the lake and were now flying over land, meaning that they were in Nigeria, Lei Shi seemed to have gotten fed up. He cursed loudly and said "There's always a shortcut to everything. Hey, Ryan or whatever your name is"
"Yes Sir, how can I be of assistance?" Ryan, the AI Monitor, replied a second later.
"The Rank 4 HTB suit has an AI Monitor module, yes?" Lei Shi asked Ryan.
"Very well, Sir" Ryan replied
"Perfect. Can you switch it off" Lei Shi asked.
"Yes Sir, however, doing that will make me inactive and unable to help you" Ryan said sounding as though Lei Shi would die if he wasn't active.
"Don't worry about me, I can take of myself. It's been hard on you; I must've been a pain in the capacitor, haven't I? You should rest. Switch it off" said Lei Shi, sounding as if he was truly concerned about Ryan's well being.
"Actually, I don't need to rest. Besides, what would you do without me?" Ryan said, provoking Lei Shi.
"Switch it Off" Lei Shi said flatly, not wanting to play around anymore.
"There are restricti..." "Override" Lei Shi cut Ryan off while he was still halfway through his sentence.
"Goodbye Sir" Ryan said in an even tone, sounding perfunctory.
"Linda, do the same" said Leng Shi bluntly to his own AI Monitor.
BAMM
As soon they went inactive, two figures busted out of the Carrier and sped towards them.
"What the... two Rank 6 HTB Armor wielders?!! We're dead!!" Leng Shi exclaimed, as he tried to fly faster, to no avail.
"Hey, look on the bright side, the fact they only came out now means that they were changes on side. Maybe what we did actually worked" Lei Shi said comfortingly.
"There's no fucking bright side. We're both gonna die!!" Leng Shi exclaimed, his earlier despair not diminishing in the slightest.
Malcolm and Gideon, the two Rank 6 HTB Armor wielders, quickly closed the distance between them. The difference in speed with when they used the Carrier was appalling.
When they were within fifty-meters of Leng Shi and Lei Shi, they both pulled out guns.
*BOOM* without the slightest hesitation, they fired at the twins.