The Pandawan team might still be complete amateurs when it came to paragliding, but thanks to the assistance of the System through their visors, they were told when to pull their parachutes out. Worst possible case scenario, they would drop flat to the ground if they could not handle the parachute instructions. (And restart all over again since they would be severely handicapped from the long fall if they did not have enough chi to soften their impact.)
Despite the multiple times Bing Yong's group had been paradropping for the raids, the Bombardier Beetle Cultivator never got the hang of it. He was baffled how his girlfriend could enjoy this thrill. He had always dreaded it to the point that one time he had decided to completely forgo the paradropping, instead opting to jump from the plane to kill monsters. That was especially true with the use of his trusty small little buckler infused with chi to make quite a big splash in previous raids (And of course provide entertainment for the other Pandarens watching them doing so.)
But this time around, secrecy was of the utmost importance. If they were able to pull it off, they would have an edge in their upcoming fights. Even the usually loud Xiong Da had agreed that it was quite important this time around.
Jin had provided them with some details on this particular raid like they knew that this particular Mafia faction had many fighters focused on melee combat. Still, the Pandawan team was unaware of how many members or the numbers exactly that awaited them in the Merchants District. Was it a huge gang with an unlimited number of lackeys or a group small but strong enough to topple the standard Pandaren parties.
Hence, to them, stealth was of vital importance prior to scouting.
The airdrop was mostly a success thanks to the stealth inscription they used to descend into a nearby garden. They were similar to the ones used by the C130 plane that brought them to this particular raid instance with the only difference being that the parachutes only benefited from it for a limited time before the inscription powers wore off. That was also the reason why they had agreed to land inside the garden. They could have chosen a higher vantage point to plan their attacks but that would require them to have better coordination as well as some skills to land where they wanted to.
Not to mention, there were guards on certain rooftops and their unskilled landing could become the alarm needed to alert the rest of the Mafia group. The Pandarens might not know it but the Atrocity Mafia's demon combatants were not to be trifled with when it came to their extra sensory perception. Their training and combat skills honed through daily struggles in their fights to survive in the underworld had made even the most average guards very perceptive, enough to see through stealthy spies landing near them.
And since the Pandawans had no zero ideas or information on their target, the ever cautious officers had decided against risking anything. With the aid of the half mask visor's instructions, they all were able to land safely in the garden's field. Only Bin Yong was uncoordinated enough to land into a bush of flowers but Jia Le managed to help him out, though he did try to hide his embarrassment by taking a bunch of flowers to present to his girlfriend.
To their surprise, there were no guards around the garden while Bin Yong had struggled to come out of the flower bush. Captain Hei ended up being the last to land, skillfully removing his parachute vest, he made it disappear in his storage ring before looking at the group. The Pandawans quickly followed suit as they understood it was best to leave no evidence.
At that moment, Captain Hei raised his head as if to sniff his surroundings for a moment before beckoning them to follow him. With their training in urban police combat, the officers broke the team down further into groups of three with the officers and the Panda Captain in the lead.
This made Captain Hei's job easy as he gave quick, precise commands to the officers to delegate so they were able to keep their presence in the shadows hidden. Under the cover of darkness, they were headed towards a designated checkpoint. While the Demopolis City Raids were placed in the city itself, none of the Mafia members had any idea that the System was technically still in control of the place.
If the System wanted to, it could easily destroy the entire city on a whim. The citizens would be kicked out of the city and be left stateless (or city-less) until the Demopolis had been rebuilt from scratch. However, since both Jin and Rex had sensed a golden opportunity (one to earn money, the other the goodwill of the people), they had utilised the System's ability to arrange special places within the city via the Dungeon Core to create a sort of sanctuaries for the cultivators.
As they had seen in thriller movies, Captain Hei was leading them to a safe house which the System had specifically designated where the Pandarens could rest and reorganise themselves. In addition, those safe houses would act as shops, allowing them to restock and save points for people who had decided they had had enough of the raid.
By paying a fraction of the initial ticket, they would be able to return to the raid once again through those safe houses and even find parties to join if any teams were lacking in teammates and were unable to replenish their numbers. As a service, the System would portal them to the nearest available safe location (in short, out of sight from the Mafias) and allowed such Pandarens to rejoin back with their new teams.
When they reached the safe house, which was in a bas.e.m.e.nt of a secluded alley, they found that the safe house had a checkpoint that Captain Hei emphasised to activate in case they were killed. "Unless you wish to experience the pleasure of going for another ride and parachute drop. Either way, it's your choice. I am done helping you guys for now. At this point, it's all up to you, Pandawans. Time is ticking. Three teams of Pandarens have already started fighting with minor Mafia groups in the outskirts of Demopolis and the most efficient one has gained 6 points." Captain Hei announced before he informally saluted them and went through a door with the sign "NO ENTRY."
While Team Pandawan was a little disappointed that Captain Hei did not actually join them in a firefight, they were thankful that they had a place to gather their bearings and did a final restock of items within the safe house. It was quite a bit back breaking effort to reach the safe house but in doing so, Captain Hei had already pinpointed to them a few major locations that were swarming with Mafias. This was updated into the digital map Shi Zuo had loaded into their Pandamonium App group chat and into their visors.
After which the restock, Lee An took the first step out of the bas.e.m.e.nt and started to lead the group, only this time they split into teams of four, ready to kill some Mafia demons!
