Chapter 214
Aircraft were different from flying swords.
Flying swords were convenient and fast, you just gotta prepare a flying sword and chant the sword formula, creating a layer of light above the flying sword. Thereafter, you just gotta step on it and fly however you want!
Flying horizontally, flying vertically, flying backwards, flying upside down, it didn’t matter. Additionally, regardless of whether it was windy or rainy, or if there was lightning or snow… none of that would affect the flight of the flying sword.
But it was different for an aircraft…
An aircraft was greatly affected by all kinds of external environmental factors; apart from those, there were also rules set by human beings that restrained the freedom of the flight of an airplane.
Song Shuhang and Senior White were both sitting in the classroom, listening to the instructor explaining some of the basic knowledge with regards to piloting an aircraft.
For instance, he mentioned the calculations of the data pertaining to take-off and landing, loading and trimming calculations, not forgetting the acquisition and analysis of basic weather information. There was also aviation code of conduct for flying, or airspace analysis of flight training area and airfield, as well as all kinds of light indicators used on the airfield.
A lot of basic knowledge, etc.
The instructor compressed and summarized all the information and content that ordinary people generally required many days to memorize and learn, and explained it to Song Shuhang and Senior White at an incredibly fast speed.
About more than an hour later.
After the instructor had finished his lecture, he drank some water and said, “Those are more or less the general theory and knowledge of flying.”
Truth to be told, after explaining so much content within approximately an hour or so caused him to feel dizzy and light-headed. He didn’t fully believe that Song Shuhang and Venerable White were able to grasp all the above-mentioned basic knowledge.
Welp… in any case, he was just going through the motions. The two people before his eyes had already gotten their pilot license.
“Yeah, it sounds easy. Just that there are too many regulations and restrictions of all kinds.” Senior White kept the few theoretical knowledge books in his hands and nodded.
“There is no way around the restrictions. There are so many airplanes in the sky that, without proper management, accidents might happen. And when accidents happen, it basically would be a narrow escape from death. However, theoretical knowledge is rather simple, the flight regulations are just purely memory work.” Song Shuhang smiled as he replied.
“You’re right.” Venerable White nodded.
The instructor overheard Shuhang and Senior White’s conversation and sipped on his cup of tea as he secretly sneered— b*tch, please, these two fellas are still showing off!
The main points covered within the one hour plus lecture were enough to make him dizzy and light-headed, there was no way these two fellas could have understood them all!
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The remaining process was rather simple—after all, Song Shuhang and Senior White were not there to get their license, but to learn how to operate aircraft and circle one round in the sky. Hence, a few complicated and minor details were eradicated.
Thanks to Caselli’s arrangements, under the one-to-one guidance with the flying instructor, Song Shuhang and Senior White first learned some basic instrument operations, flight charts, and cognitive applications of radar in the flight simulator.
And then, under the lead of the instructor who was a ‘brave man with big rewards promised’ and ‘a daredevil who was not afraid of death’, Song Shuhang and Senior White got onto the flying academy’s helicopter.
Song Shuhang operated the helicopter first, with Senior White sitting at the back, learning.
During take-off, Song Shuhang’s heart was very nervous—an aircraft couldn’t be compared to a car, so if anything happened, it would be the end!
The flying instructor sat next to him, guiding him. There was nothing much to be said at the start—as long as he did not rise above 1000 meters, he was allowed to do whatever he wanted. Truth be told, it was not only Song Shuhang who was nervous, the flying instructor was even more nervous as he knew that the two fellas next to him were people loaded with money that allowed them to play with fire. They just learned the theory behind flying an aircraft, and they actually immediately operated one on the same day. If not because he was really in need of money, who would ever be willing to accompany these two fellas to play with their lives!
However, when the helicopter took off, the flying instructor was a little surprised—even though Song Shuhang looked rigid, and you could tell with one look that he was an amateur who was operating a helicopter for the first time, he did not make any mistakes during the process. He might be trembling with fear, but all was going rather smoothly.
After operating the helicopter and circling one big round in the air, the flying instructor unexpectedly could not find any fault with any part of his operation.
Did this dude already learn how to fly before, and is just here to mess with me? —The flying instructor secretly glanced at Song Shuhang— just like car racers taking normal Class C driving lessons?
Right, even if one has money, and loves the adrenaline rush from playing with fire, he wouldn’t go to the extent of treating his life as a joke, no?
Maybe this young man who’s called Shuhang and that man who’s called Song Bai had already operated other types of aircraft, and this time they want to master the techniques of operating private planes?
Thinking this way made the flying instructor’s heart a lot calmer. If that was the case, then Old Liu and him would have benefited?
Old Liu was another flying instructor who was also a ‘daredevil unafraid of death in the face of huge rewards’.
After continuing to circle another round in the air, the flying instructor gave Song Shuhang the command to land.
Song Shuhang carefully operated the aircraft, and descended in the direction of the airfield—even though comparing to a flying sword, it was much more inconvenient in several ways, but it won in terms of sense of security!
Song Shuhang realized that he himself actually enjoy such the feeling… extremely superb!
After the helicopter landed steadily, the flying instructor jumped out of it and ran to the other instructor who was ‘unafraid of death’ and said, “Old Liu, I just got done with one session on my side. In a while, I will take the other student for another session, and then get the two students to go to your side to try operating business jets. Are you ready?”
As he was speaking, he secretly went next to Old Liu and said, “Old Liu, lemme tell you, I can’t say for sure, but maybe these two students had already operated other types of aircraft, they aren’t entirely amateurs. They seem pretty familiar with piloting. This time the two of us have really profited!”
“Oooh…” Old Liu replied in an emotionless way, as though his mind was at somewhere else.
“Old Liu, what’s wrong?” The helicopter instructor was puzzled.
“Oh? Li Jr., nothing’s wrong. I’m fine.” Old Liu snapped out of his thoughts, with tears streaming down his whole face.
Earlier on, he was the instructor who did a one-to-one session with Venerable White inside the flight simulator, and spent a rather long time with Venerable White alone. Hence, he got affected and developed doubts with regards to his own outlook on life.
“Old Liu, don’t let your mind wander again, it’s very dangerous! I will bring the other student to go on another session; during that time, you should adjust your state of mind back to normal.” Li Jr. gave Old Liu some words of advice, then turned back around and prepared to take Venerable White to circle the helicopter in the air.
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Thereafter, when Instructor Li Jr. turned around to go back to the helicopter, he suddenly saw the student called Song Shuhang in the midst of putting on an extremely thick and heavy spacesuit!
What the f*ck, what is he up to?
What I’m teaching is how to operate a helicopter and not a space shuttle. We can’t go up into space, what’s the meaning of you wearing a spacesuit?
Also, the weather is so hot… does this student have a brain fade? Or does he have a brain fade? Or is it… a brain fade?
Song Shuhang could feel the instructor staring at him and laughed hollowly, “Yeah, hahaha. Instructor, you don’t have to care about me. I just couldn’t help but want to experience being an astronaut. Just ignore me, that will do.”
However, when Instructor Li Jr. saw Song Shuhang’s outfit, he still felt much unhappiness and a heaviness in his chest.
On the other hand, Venerable White was staring at Song Shuhang’s spacesuit in a curious manner. His face looked as though his interest was piqued and had the facial expression that seemed to be saying ‘I want to try it too’.
“Aircraft inspection complete, no problem. You can take off now.” At this time, the member in charge of inspecting the flight called out.
Senior White was very excited and got onto the helicopter in a hurry.
Even though Song Shuhang’s outfit was very heavy, he managed to climb agilely onto the backseat of the helicopter. Song Shuhang at that moment looked really huge, and filled up the backseat the minute he got onto the helicopter.
“Hahaha.” Song Shuhang hollowly laughed out of embarrassment. Luckily, he had the spirit-binding ice bead, or else he would have died from the heat.
“…” Instructor Li Jr. once again stared at Song Shuhang for a long time. After getting onto the aircraft, his heart started to get worried again and kept beating really fast. “You can take off, just follow the same steps as student Song Shuhang did the previous time; make sure you don’t go higher than 1000 meters.”
“No problem,” replied Venerable White.
Compared to Song Shuhang, Venerable White was a lot more stable—even though he had not operated any aircraft before, Venerable White had many years of experience flying around; he was very familiar with being in the sky.
Hence, when Venerable White operated the helicopter, he did not look like a newbie—he practically looked like an experienced pilot that had ten years of various kinds of experience under his belt.
After instructor Li Jr. scrutinized Venerable White, his heart was at completely at ease—wahaha, this time, he had really profited. He dared to bet ten bucks that this ‘Song Bai’ was definitely not a newbie!
The aviation school spent a huge sum of money to ensure that Old Liu and him take care of this pair of newbies, and even got premium insurance for them. Initially, he thought that he had to risk his life to complete his mission, but little did he expect that it would be a hundred times more relaxed than coaching ordinary students.
If such missions were called ‘high-risk mission’, then let these ‘high-risk mission’ get fiercer; he was more than willing to take on the challenge.
Yeah… of course, there was still something that made instructor Li Jr. uneasy, and that was the huge lump behind him—a Song Shuhang whose whole body was enclosed within the spacesuit.
No matter how you look at it, it still seemed wrong?
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The world of cultivators has always been hidden within the real world, but cultivators did not isolate themselves from it. They have always been keeping up with the times.
Ordinary people have the Olympics, Asian games, and other large-scale sports competitions, etc. There were also such competitions within the world of cultivators.
For example, there was a large-scale flying sword competition that was held once every ten years in different parts of the world, selected at random. It was very well-known.
Flying sword competition—as the name implies—was a competition of speed and skills! There were all kinds of traps and obstacles, as well as obstructing formations—the person who gets to the end point the fastest won.
The competition field was split into three different categories based on the different rankings of the cultivators, namely Fourth Stage ‘Riding Sword Competition’, Fifth Stage ‘Flying Sword Competition’, and Sixth Stage ‘Sword Flight Competition’.
As for Seventh Stage Spiritual Venerable cultivators and above… they were usually the big shots, and there were only a few of them. Additionally, they have been in seclusion for several hundred years, they didn’t have the means of joining such big flying sword competitions.
Moonset Sword Sect’s ‘Hurricane Sword’ Yang Yuxiang made quite a name for himself in the world of cultivators.
He was a Fourth Stage Riding Sword three-time champion! Based just solely on speed of his flying sword, he had already surpassed many ordinary Fifth Stage Spiritual Emperors!
Hurricane Sword Yang Yuxiang had already dominated the ‘Riding Sword Competition’ three times in a row; his goal was to clinch another championship for the Fourth Stage Riding Sword Competition before he got promoted to a Fifth Stage Spiritual Emperor, and complete the impressive feat of dominating the competition four times in a row!
For the sake of this goal, he had been working really hard on the flying sword evasion technique recently.
Three days ago, ‘Hurricane Sword’ Yang Yuxiang had gone from the eastern part of China to the westernmost part of China in one go, and followed the original route home. En route, he kept looking for all kinds of airfields and air bases.
As for why he looked for such locations, it was because ‘Hurricane Sword’ Yang Yuxiang had one huge hobby in all of his life—that is flying sword racing.
Furthermore, he liked to race with all kinds of aircraft.
Every time, he would fly next to an airplane, and then, in a spurt of energy, overtake the airplane. That kind of psychological pleasure was his ultimate love.
Besides, ordinary people couldn’t see him, so he could race to his heart’s content.
Today, he found an air base.
‘Jiangshui’s Civil Aviation Training Center? Oh, so it’s not an air base. But if they are students, they’re probably gonna be pretty slow… ah forget it, it’s still better than nothing. I didn’t even see a single aircraft on my way here.’ Hurricane Sword Yang Yuxiang secretly sighed.
He waited on the airfield for half a day and finally… a helicopter slowly rose into the air.
“It’s finally coming?” Hurricane Sword Yang Yuxiang laughed. A pity it was a small private helicopter, and its speed wouldn’t be anywhere as fast as he wanted it to be. He could only make do with it to satisfy his craving.
He waited till the helicopter took off and completed increasing its initial speed. Then, Hurricane Sword Yang Yuxiang rode his flying sword and zoomed right next to the helicopter. He first flew directly beside the helicopter.
That was his habit—the process of flying side-by-side with the aircraft for a while, and then charging ahead in a spurt of energy, ditching the aircraft far behind till it could not be seen at all.
It was simply hard to explain that kind of thrill with words alone.
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“Eh?” When Song Shuhang, who was sitting in the backseat of the helicopter, turned and looked at the window, he suddenly saw a figure of a person.
A human silhouette in the air?
Huh, it couldn’t be a cultivator riding his flying sword, right?
Song Shuhang had already opened his Eye Aperture, hence he could see a lot of things that ordinary people wouldn’t be able to—such as ghosts, monsters, and cultivators who ride flying swords.
However, these things were rarely seen in the city; apart from Doudou at home, Song Shuhang had never seen a second monster beast.
Cultivators riding their flying swords were also a rare sight… under normal circumstances, cultivators fly at an extremely high altitude, hence they couldn’t be seen by the naked eye.
Thus, it was really rare today that he actually saw a senior riding a flying sword, moving together with a helicopter next to him.
Just as Song Shuhang was deep in thoughts, suddenly, that cultivator that was flying next to the helicopter pulled a face at the people inside it…
Thereafter, the senior cultivator did a ‘running starting position’ pose on the layer of light above the flying sword, stooped and with his butt protruding. His mouth started crying out, “Ready~ ~ One, two… three!”
After the word ‘three’, the sword light zoomed right ahead, its speed as fast as lightning!
It was as though the sound of the word ‘three’ continued to echo in his ear, but the cultivator riding on the sword had already become a black dot as big as the pointed part of a fingernail.
“What does this mean?” Song Shuhang was baffled.
“Hehe, it was a provocation!” Venerable White laughed as his gaze became sharp.
“Provocation? Wait!” Song Shuhang suddenly felt uneasy, he immediately said, “Senior, could it be that you were mistaken, perhaps he was just just minding his business and passing by?”
Upon hearing their conversation, Instructor Li Jr. sitting next to them was very baffled—what exactly did their conversation even mean? Why was it that he could understand it when he analyzed their words separately, but when they were put together, he could not comprehend it at all?