Bella rolled up the flying carpet and slung it diagonally across her back like a sword bag.
She tucked the pistol at her waist. Though it had no bullets, others didn't know that. To ordinary people, a gun was still an immense threat.
The katana was harder to explain. Claiming it was cosplay wouldn't fool anyone—who brings that on a plane?
Just say she'd found it! She was too lazy to think up an elaborate excuse.
Carrying her suitcase, she walked out of the grove. She planned to pose as an ordinary passenger and secretly observe the surrounding situation to determine her position in this whole affair.
She slowly walked back to the beach. The aircraft wreckage still floated on the sea surface, with various supplies, suitcases, and survivors scattered across an area exceeding two hundred meters.
The impact had been violent. A small number had died instantly, while more remained unconscious.
Nearly half an hour had passed since the crash. Besides Bella, some passengers with better constitutions had gradually regained consciousness.
They were all confused, with no idea what had happened.
The front half of the plane had tumbled during the breakup, throwing many passengers out of the cabin. Now numerous corpses floated on the sea.
Bella's movement from the forest back to the beach drew no one's attention.
She was posing as an ordinary passenger, but not playing dumb. When the time came to demonstrate capability, she still needed to do so. Authority was something that could never be surrendered to others.
"You, you, and you—help me get people out. I've had first aid training."
"This person's leg is broken. Carry them aside. You—go to those trees and find some sturdy branches for a splint."
"Concussion. Sir? Sir? Don't worry, calm down. Follow my instructions. Take a deep breath—inhale, yes, good. Now exhale..."
Bella and seven or eight of the first survivors to wake worked along the shoreline treating the injured.
She hadn't originally known first aid, but she'd seen and handled enough to gain some experience.
Natasha had taught her some battlefield first aid theory. Dr. Harrow had also shared his emergency techniques.
Her cheap sister's knowledge was all theoretical—she had no experience herself, much less to teach Bella. But Dr. Harrow's experience was genuinely useful. Bella had learned several emergency response methods for accidents and now applied them with much more professionalism than when she'd treated Duke at the White House.
She was demonstrating her abilities and gathering supporters. Others weren't idle either.
The flight from Hawaii to Tokyo served a route to a famous tourist destination. Among the passengers, Americans made up roughly thirty percent, Japanese twenty percent, with the remainder from around the world.
When people encountered major safety incidents like this, they automatically clustered around experienced individuals.
At times like this, there were no racial issues, no Democrat-versus-Republican politics. Everyone was a survivor. Saving lives was everyone's common wish.
When Bella stepped up to lead the rescue, many blindly followed her, contributing their effort.
She used her barely-adequate medical skills to save people. A man who seemed to be a Massachusetts police officer organized others to collect supplies from the shoreline while awaiting rescue.
A burly man led a group into the nearby forest to gather wood and prepare a fire.
The remaining crew members had gathered together with dark expressions, discussing something in low voices.
More passengers hadn't recovered from their panic yet, sitting dazedly by the sea, muttering prayers to God or the Virgin Mary.
How many had been on the plane? They didn't know, but they'd found over forty corpses at the scene. More than twenty passengers were critically injured. Even if they could reach Dr. Harrow or Dr. Strange, it wouldn't help—the scene lacked surgical tools and conditions, and they had no necessary medications. They could only tough it out.
The uninjured were nearly nonexistent. Bella hadn't been hurt during the crash, but Isshin Ashina had slashed her three times. Her shirt and back were covered in blood, making her look severely wounded.
Yet she persisted in saving people. Many young men and women deeply admired this. Look at her! So badly injured yet still saving others—what an excellent doctor!
Whether it helped or not, she was accumulating goodwill.
An image formed: lightly wounded but refusing to step back, with excellent medical ethics and superb skills.
The crew members hiding to the side went unnoticed by others, but she'd been watching them the whole time.
These people were definitely from The Hand. She had to eliminate them!
She felt this was what the divination meant by "humans"—at least part of it.
Many on the plane had witnessed Bella's confrontation with the crew. To prevent a shameless counter-accusation, she placed herself squarely on the side of the majority.
After treating the last patient, she stood up, her face full of righteous indignation, taking the initiative.
"There's something wrong with this crew! The plane had no malfunction whatsoever, yet we crashed on this beach!? Do you believe something so absurd? We must know the truth!"
With her high charisma, she'd rallied twelve men and six women.
Her passionate denunciation immediately drew responses.
Some survivors were particularly obsessed with "the truth." Once something involved the so-called truth, they acted like they'd been injected with stimulants.
The American survivors, comprising nearly thirty percent, followed her gaze toward the crew members.
"That's right! I hadn't thought of it before—why did the plane crash? There was no warning at all!"
"Exactly! The doctor lady is right! No thunderstorm, no extreme weather—how did we end up here?"
"We want to know the inside story! We want the truth!"
Thirty percent of Americans started shouting. Many of the Japanese survivors, already shaken and unsure what to do, nodded along.
The remaining survivors from various countries slowly stood up. They had the same doubts—why had the plane crashed? What was the reason?
Bella's appearance was now far from flattering, with bloody wounds still visible on her body. But everyone was in similar condition—no one could mock anyone else.
She seemed vulnerable, while the crew members huddled together with cold eyes became the focus of everyone's attention.
The survivors were all drawn in. Eventually, aside from a dozen too severely injured to stand, all the remaining survivors from the plane gathered together, surrounding the crew members in the center.
"This lady's question is very reasonable. The plane had no malfunction at the time—it shouldn't have suddenly crashed!" A survivor in the crowd who seemed to be an aircraft manufacturing engineer agreed with Bella's point. There was definitely something wrong with these crew members.
Surrounded by over a hundred people, the captain, co-pilot, and flight attendants—more than ten crew members in total—remained unnaturally calm. This situation looked wrong no matter how you examined it.