Courtyard House: I fish in the heavens, a professional bird abuser.

The survivors climbed to the sixth floor faster than He Yuanchao had anticipated.

Fear is the best catalyst.

When those people saw the three Black Hawk helicopters parked on the tarmac, some of them burst into tears. Not tears of sadness, but the kind of wailing one feels when someone has climbed up from the depths of hell and finally touched the threshold of heaven.

The convenience store owner knelt on the ground, clutching his hunting rifle, muttering something—it was unclear whether he was thanking God or cursing.

The young mother held the baby to her chest, tears streaming silently down her face, but the corners of her mouth were turned up in a smile.

Angela stood to the side, clutching her teddy bear, her big eyes reflecting the gray fuselage of the helicopter, neither crying nor making a fuss.

He Yuanchao didn't have time to wait for them to vent their emotions.

"Jill! Assign boarding numbers! The elderly, children, and wounded will go on the first plane! Those who can fight will go on the second! The rest will go on the third!"

"receive!"

Jill's execution skills are unquestionable. She has experience leading teams in the police force, so she's adept at this kind of organizational and coordination work.

Payton also helped out. Although he still walked unsteadily, his voice was loud enough to intimidate people.

The two pilots had entered the cockpit and were beginning pre-flight checks. The rotor's hydraulic system started, emitting a muffled hum.

He Yuanchao stood at the edge of the tarmac, without boarding the plane.

Alice noticed.

Aren't you going up?

"There's one more thing."

He Yuanchao took the military communication terminal out of his pocket.

He typed a series of commands on the screen—an interface for remotely accessing the Hive B area control system through the Red Queen's backup privileges.

Alice walked over to him and glanced down at the screen.

"What are you going to do?"

"Wipe your butt."

He Yuanchao's fingers flew across the terminal.

The system architecture diagram of Hive Zone B unfolds on the screen—the floor plan of each layer, the electronic lock status of each door, and the temperature and air pressure readings of each area are all displayed in real time.

He had already moved most of the valuable items from Sector B. Gene samples from the culture tanks, the original progenitor virus stock solution in the liquid nitrogen container, data from the Red Queen's backup core, and the complete technical documentation of Project Nemesis—he took everything he could.

But there are still some things I can't take with me.

Those oversized culture equipment, reaction vessels filled with nutrient solution, and semi-finished biological weapons scattered in various laboratories—if these things fall into the hands of others, even just a small part of them, it would be enough to trigger another catastrophe.

While a nuclear bomb would raze Raccoon City to the ground, the Hive is located tens of meters underground. A tactical nuclear warhead with a yield of 5,000 to 10,000 tons might not be able to completely destroy an underground fortification of that size.

In case anything survives the nuclear explosion—

He Yuanchao did not intend to leave this potential problem unresolved.

"Self-destruct procedure for area B."

He brought up a deeply hidden submenu on the terminal.

This program wasn't written by him; it was one of the original security protocols of the Hive. When Umbrella built the Hive, they pre-programmed self-destruct functions for each area to prevent any uncontrollable biological leaks.

Ironically, when the actual leak occurred, none of the people under the umbrella had initiated this procedure.

He Yuanchao is now pressing this button for them.

He did not choose to detonate the entire area—that would have affected the structural integrity of Zone A and the sewage system, and the shock wave could have been transmitted to the ground through underground pipes.

He precisely selected three detonation points.

First: Zone B core storage room – now only empty culture tanks and abandoned pipelines remain, but the residual nutrient solution and biological tissue fragments still pose a high risk.

The second: the Nemesis Project laboratory—although he had copied the data, the biological samples and culture media remaining on the fixed equipment in the laboratory were enough for any organization that had mastered genetic engineering to recreate 60 percent of the core processes.

Third: The main power supply system of Zone B—the nuclear power module. Destroying it will permanently cut off the power supply to the entire Zone B. Without power, the still-operating refrigeration systems and sealed doors will all fail, and everything remaining inside will degrade or rot within a month.

He Yuanchao's finger hovered above the "Confirm" button.

It paused for a second.

Then I pressed it.

A line of red text popped up on the terminal screen:

"Self-destruct sequence initiated. Detonation countdown: 120 seconds."

There's no turning back.

He Yuanchao put away the terminal.

Two minutes later.

A dull tremor came up from the soles of my feet.

It wasn't the violent shaking like an earthquake, but a continuous, low-frequency tremor—like a giant beast turning over deep underground.

The city hall building swayed slightly. Fine ripples spread across the puddles on the helipad.

In the distance, a manhole cover suddenly popped up, and a plume of gray smoke shot out from below, reaching a height of about three or four meters before dissipating.

That's it.

From the ground, almost nothing appeared to have happened.

But He Yuanchao knew that dozens of meters underground, the three detonation points had been completely engulfed by the high temperature and shock wave.

The core area of ​​Zone B is now nothing but a pile of charred metal debris and collapsed concrete fragments.

Those culture tanks, those equipment, those remaining biological tissues—all turned to ashes.

"Alright."

He Yuanchao patted non-existent dust off his hands.

"Even if someone were to come and dig up the grave now, they would only find a pile of rubble."

He turned and walked toward the first Black Hawk.

Alice followed behind, glancing back at the manhole cover in the distance, still emitting wisps of smoke.

"You blew up the beehive?"

"Only the parts that shouldn't have been left were destroyed. What was due was already taken."

"When will you—"

"We'll talk about it once we're on the plane."

He Yuanchao stepped into the cockpit of the first Black Hawk.

The pilot who was originally sitting in the pilot's seat saw him come in and instinctively tried to move to the side.

He Yuanchao grabbed his shoulder.

"Don't move. You drive. I'll keep an eye on things."

He sat in the passenger seat, his fingers quickly scanning the instrument panel to check the status of all systems—engine normal, hydraulics normal, navigation had failed (satellite signals were cut off by the military after the nuclear missile was launched, but this did not affect visual flight).

"Raise the takeoff altitude to over 3,000 feet. Direction—due east. The farther away from Raccoon City as a straight line, the better."

The pilot nodded and began to increase the throttle.

The rotor speed slowly increased from idle, and the signature "whoosh whoosh whoosh" sound grew louder and louder, whipping up a gust of wind on the tarmac.

The crowd below instinctively crouched down, shielding their faces with their hands. Angela was held in Jill's arms, and the teddy bear was nearly blown away by the wind; the little girl reached out and gripped one of its legs tightly.

"Unit One is ready."

"Unit 2 is ready."

"Unit 3 is ready."

The three pilots reported in turn through the onboard intercom.

He Yuanchao glanced at the countdown.

The system projected a line of red numbers onto his retina:

Distance from nuclear bomb delivery - 01:38:22.

One hour and thirty-eight minutes.

enough.

The Black Hawk has a maximum cruising speed of 280 kilometers per hour, and can fly more than 400 kilometers in an hour and a half. That's enough to get it out of the blast radius of a nuclear bomb.

"take off."

He Yuanchao's voice was transmitted through the intercom to each of the three helicopters' headsets.

"Leave here."

The landing gear of the first Black Hawk lifted off the concrete surface of the tarmac.

The aircraft wobbled slightly twice before steadily ascending.

The second one followed.

The third one also took off.

Three dark gray helicopters, in a triangular formation, rose from the roof of City Hall and soared into the hazy sky of Raccoon City.

He Yuanchao looked back at the city below through the cockpit window.

That city where he spent countless hours underground, where he killed monsters and saved people, where he turned Umbrella Corporation's entire fortune upside down—

It is currently retreating at a speed of about twenty meters per second.

The swaying gray figures on the street grew smaller and smaller, more and more blurred.

Until the entire city transformed into a gigantic, gray, smoky geometric shape.

Then I couldn't see anything anymore.

Only clouds.

Gray, thick clouds with a chemical smell.