The Charismatic Charlie Wade

During this time, the highway was sparsely populated with vehicles. Every so often, a car would whiz by, paying little heed to the
woman who had parked her vehicle in the emergency lane.
While parking on the emergency lane was a theoretical no-no, the mountain expressways saw less scrutiny. With light traffic and
breathtaking scenery, fatigued drivers often opted for a picturesque pit stop. No one batted an eye as they gazed upon the
passing vehicles.
The passing motorists showed no surprise at the sight of Morgana. However, she was vexed by the towering 100-meter bridge
that spanned two mountains, connecting two tunnels. This was the closest point on the entire highway to her Master’s retreat.
Unfortunately, there were no highway exits within dozens of kilometers in either direction since scarcely anyone lived in this area.
To reach her destination swiftly, her only option was to take the leap from here. Otherwise, she’d have to exit at a distant highway
ramp and embark on a day or two of mountainous trekking.
For Morgana, the leap was a trivial feat. But leaving the car here after her departure would lead to unnecessary complications.
Any concerned driver stumbling upon an empty car at the edge of a bridge might conclude it was a suicide attempt. A call to the
police would inevitably follow, leading them to the scene in haste.
They’d first seek signs of a fall or worse beneath the bridge. There would be no disguising the leap from this dizzying height.
Once the police unraveled that someone had jumped, miraculously surviving and disappearing without a trace, they’d spare no
effort to uncover the truth.
They’d employ the highway’s surveillance footage to identify the driver and meticulously trace back through the evidence.
Morgana understood well that despite her extraordinary abilities, she couldn’t elude modern society’s ubiquitous surveillance
systems. Leaving an image record wouldn’t be perilous in a nation of over a billion people, as long as she didn’t attract undue
attention from the police or higher-ups.
Her current objective was to vanish from this bridge with her vehicle. She was well-acquainted with the car; her years on the
Antarctic island had seen her mastering various vehicles. Her extended isolation hadn’t dimmed her knowledge of this world’s
technology.
Given her expertise with cars, Morgana swiftly devised a plan. She closed her eyes slightly, channeling a surge of potent reiki
from her body into the off-road vehicle. Then, she extended her spiritual awareness to survey her surroundings, patiently
awaiting the opportune moment.

Only when no other vehicles or people entered her consciousness’s reach did she snap her eyes open.
She pushed the off-road vehicle with empty hands and commanded, “Rise!”
As her words left her lips, it was as if the vehicle had caught a gust of wind. It rolled and ascended into the sky, a bizarre
spectacle unfolding before her.
Inexplicably, the over two-ton vehicle seemed to transmute into paper at that moment, tumbling gracefully through the air.
Morgana’s reiki enveloped it, allowing for a slow descent. Yet, maintaining such control over an object of such mass in the air
consumed her reiki rapidly.
As the off-road vehicle approached the bridge deck, she refocused her aura to enshroud only the fuel tank and battery. The
descent accelerated suddenly, concluding with a resounding impact that shattered branches along the way.
Fortunately, the reiki protection spared the car from igniting into a blaze; it remained unexploded, deformed but intact. After the
crash, tranquility reclaimed the valley. Morgana sprang to her feet, lightly touching down on the ground.
The valley was densely populated with various trees, and the off-road vehicle had plowed a path through the thick woods.
Morgana’s thoughts directed her reiki to gather the shattered branches, concealing the vehicle. She straightened her attire and
strode deeper into the mountains, without a backward glance.
***
Meanwhile, elsewhere,
All surveillance footage from that region had been swiftly transferred to a secure cloud server by Keagan Myers’ underlings.
Providing Maria with the server’s address and key, Keagan watched the surveillance videos with Jagoan in her boudoir.
Though there were no cameras in Shiwan Mountain, Maria pinpointed Morgana’s figure using the time she ascended the
mountain. They retraced Morgana’s journey from this surveillance point to the old town, all within the camera’s gaze.
Tracking Morgana’s route became an effortless task. In China, evading personal surveillance might be possible, but cars left a
digital trail nearly impossible to erase. Any road accessible to cars had its entrances and exits under constant monitoring,
complete with license plate recognition.
This massive volume of video and image data was cataloged with license plate labels, allowing for rapid retrieval. They input
Morgana’s license plate number and accessed footage of her on various roadways.

Morgana hadn’t foreseen anyone predicting her journey south, let alone Maria daring to act under her nose. She had never
expected someone to tail her at this juncture and start tracing her steps.
Within minutes, Jagoan and Maria had acquired comprehensive data, including the times and locations where Morgana’s car
appeared in all traffic monitoring systems. Jagoan focused on the most recent data, which revealed that half an hour prior, her
car had sped through the highway to Shiwanda Mountain in the southern province, reaching a service area at 120 kilometers per
hour.
The surveillance that captured this data lay just outside the service area, between the entrance and exit. In other words, her car
had bypassed a service area, continuing along the main road.
Jagoan studied earlier monitoring nodes, finding it strange that the car had been recorded at roughly 5-minute intervals, covering
about ten kilometers each time.
Thirty minutes ago, Morgana had passed the last recorded point, indicating she had traveled sixty kilometers since then.
However, there were no new entries in the system, suggesting a change in her driving status. Jagoan checked the next
monitoring location within the service area, finding it twenty-two kilometers ahead.
At her speed, Morgana should have reached this area ten or twenty minutes ago if she maintained 120 kilometers per hour. Yet,
her vehicle was nowhere to be found here. Either she had drastically reduced her speed to below 50 kilometers per hour or had
parked somewhere along these twenty-two kilometers.
Jagoan took a screenshot of this section on a satellite map and said to Maria, “We’ll wait and see. If Morgana doesn’t appear at
the next monitoring point, she’s likely left the expressway within this stretch.”
Maria concurred, “There are no service areas or exits along this twenty-two-kilometer stretch. If she’s left, it’s probably on foot.”
Jagoan nodded, adding, “This stretch primarily consists of viaducts and tunnels. To leave, she’d have to leap directly from a
viaduct.”
Maria agreed, “It’s improbable that the expressway conveniently reaches Jagoan Bazin’s retreat location. Morgana would have
identified the nearest exit on the expressway and continued on foot after abandoning her car.”
Jagoan pondered the situation, then said, “Our most passionate course would be to confront her and extract information, but
practically speaking, I’m no match for her, and she’s already aware of our presence. Showing up would raise suspicion. My

suggestion is to wait. If Morgana ditches her car here, we won’t be able to track it. We’ll wait in Aurous Hill for Morgana to re-
enter our field of vision.”