Chapter 32: One Against Four
Before completely succumbing to the frenzy, Jiang Yao was abruptly interrupted by a powerful kick that sent her flying backwards. She skidded and rolled on the ground of the alley for six or seven meters before finally coming to a stop.
Holding her stomach, Jiang Yao struggled to get back on her feet. The clean T-shirt and jeans she had just changed into were already torn and damaged.
The ripped fabric revealed parts of her body, bruised and bloodied, making her look very disheveled.
“Eh? Isn’t this girl a mid-level attendant? How can she still break through her limits after going berserk?”
The middle-aged knight who had successfully ambushed her was momentarily taken aback when Jiang Yao landed, causing the assault from behind to pause.
“Hehe, that just means the surprise is even greater… There’s still another one in that courtyard, a great haul!”
His subordinate had easily overpowered Jiang Yao with one move and was confident that today’s hunt would yield plenty. The frail young man in the black shirt laughed even more happily, revealing his exceptionally attractive face, resembling a young star from the entertainment industry.
Jiang Yao’s expression changed drastically as she surreptitiously glanced in a direction a hundred meters away; her lips were almost biting through with anxiety.
“Give up… We have two knights and two high-level attendants. Our boss is still a baron, and if you surrender, you can die more easily.”
The middle-aged knight scoffed coldly, still eager to flatter his own high-level peak knight boss, even if that boss was still slightly away from being a so-called half-step baron.
As his words fell, two more black blood clan men stepped out of the darkness, one fat and one short.
“You guys are from the black blood clan… Aren’t you afraid of attracting the attention of hidden arrows and local noble knights with such brazen actions in the city?”
Jiang Yao wiped the blood from the corner of her mouth and slowly straightened up, staring intently at the weak young man in the black shirt who was gradually approaching.
“Haha, hidden arrows? Local knights?”
The young man revered as the boss let out a mocking laugh, his tone growing more sinister, “Hidden arrows? They might actually wish for fewer of you wandering blood clans. As for local knights, you mean the Wang family, right? Haven’t I eaten through enough Wang family knights in the past years?”
“Those old turtles, aside from blustering a bit, wouldn’t dare to let out a sound. To them, losing a knight is as simple as letting a chicken out of its cage.”
Regardless of the truth, the young man’s attitude was exceedingly arrogant at that moment.
Hearing such brazen words, Jiang Yao felt her heart sink. Watching the four approaching black blood clan members, her face turned ashen.
Bro… I might have to leave first… Jiang Yao raised her head and scanned her surroundings; her expression seemed to lighten slightly.
In just a second, a torrent of more desperate and intense energy erupted from Jiang Yao. It seemed as if all her blood and energy were being recklessly squandered at that moment, and her eyes grew red as if they were on fire.
With just three seconds, Jiang Yao, who had reached the breath of a mid-level knight, had swiftly eliminated one opponent!
“Monster… She clearly is just a mid-level attendant, how did she become a knight!?”
The chubby attendant, who hadn’t yet recovered from the previous shock, began to tremble.
“Damn it, what’s there to be afraid of? Our boss can take her on head-on! She has already overdrafted her energy, and we still have three people!”
The middle-aged knight also looked pale but could only brace himself and activate his own frenzy, urging his companions to attack.
“Alive! We want her alive! Haha, what a treasure, what a treasure!”
The young man didn’t care about losing a subordinate and instead laughed out loud.
Two figures rushed into the dark courtyard, one left and one right, almost simultaneously grabbing the girl who was teetering over the dead body of her companion.
“Ah!”
Crack! Jiang Yao’s two slender arms were almost simultaneously broken. Her upper body was thrown back, and a shrill scream filled with blood gushed from her mouth towards the night sky.
“How delicious… I can’t wait to dig out your heart and lungs…”
The young man slowly walked into the courtyard, his gaunt white face twitching with excitement, slightly sickly, as he sniffed the air repeatedly.
The terrifying aura that lingered a moment ago gradually extinguished; Jiang Yao’s frenzy had completely collapsed and lost control.
The area before her was already drenched in crimson, her jeans soaked with blood gushing from below, the stench of blood rapidly spreading through the courtyard. She felt like cotton, weak and powerless, yet her two broken arms were still restrained by the two men in black, like a condemned prisoner awaiting execution.
“Go… go to hell, heart and lungs…”
Jiang Yao smirked at the night sky, not looking directly at the young man near her, mumbling a bloody and contemptuous tone.
“Boss, we can head inside and grab the other one now…”
The middle-aged knight let go of the now incapacitated girl’s shoulders and stood up smiling.
“Ah!”
Before the young white-faced boss could speak, the girl’s body suddenly twisted and sank her teeth into the neck of the slightly lax middle-aged knight, eliciting a scream akin to a slaughtered pig.
The face of the young man changed drastically. In a fit of rage, he kicked Jiang Yao hard in the abdomen, forcing her to release her grip as she let out a muffled groan.
“Hehe… I’ve killed one, so that’s evened up… Bro… I’m leaving first…”
Jiang Yao collapsed completely, losing consciousness.
Touching the bite mark on his neck, the middle-aged knight staggered back several steps before standing dazed, seemingly confused.
A few seconds later, he began breathing rapidly, his eyes wide open, as if witnessing something horrifying.
It seemed something incomprehensible was happening inside him. The middle-aged man trembled, and all of his exposed skin began to turn black visibly. Even smoke emerged from his mouth and nose, his limbs shaking like rusted machine parts, and finally, he collapsed to the ground, resembling a dead fish charred from the inside out!
Before the others could react to the shock, a series of faint popping sounds came from several directions in the night sky.
The leading young man, along with the last black blood clan attendant, was simultaneously hit by something, sending up thick clouds of black smoke and several charred bits of flesh.
This was the typical lethality of a bullet hitting a human body, with the silver core inside the bullet penetrating the blood clan’s flesh.
Six men and women dressed in tight combat gear and tactical cloaks slowly emerged from atop the surrounding buildings of the courtyard, each holding a VSSM special suppressed sniper rifle.
The young man’s condition was somewhat better; he was hit twice in the waist and shoulder, but the chubby high-level attendant fared far worse, struck at least seven or eight times across his chest and back, with his neck half destroyed, charred red blood sprayed from the various holes in his body.
Without hesitation, the young man trembled hurriedly, vaulting over the alley wall and disappearing into the shadows of the layered buildings.
“I’m so sorry… I just nodded off, how did it come to this… I’m sorry, Xiao Yao…”
Several seconds later, the six gunmen approached the now desolate courtyard, surrounding Jiang Yao’s broken body. One of the girls knelt down, gently stroking Jiang Yao’s bloody and pitiful lower half, quietly sobbing.
……
……
In a lush park, there was an eerie silence, broken only by the occasional chirping of frogs and insects. Under the sparse illumination of the path’s decorative lights, the young man was sprinting wildly.
For a black blood clan member who has grown to be a peak-level knight, the lives and deaths of companions were never a matter of concern; breaking through the shackles of growth was the goal of every black blood clan member.
The belief that “those below the baron are mere ants” was deeply ingrained.
Suddenly, the young man’s foot came to a halt, and his pupils began to contract.
Not far away, by the green belt, a tall young man was quietly leaning against a street tree, his blood-red eyes silently watching him, a familiar killing intent radiating from him after a frenzy.
A peak-level knight whose strength surpassed his own, a true half-step baron!
Although the physical quality of a blood clan knight far exceeded that of ordinary people, and his wounds had already sealed under astonishing healing abilities, the two silver bullets still encapsulated in charred muscle tissue within him remained ticking time bombs.
Activating his frenzy now would only be counterproductive; unless absolutely necessary, there was no need to.
Gently touching the gunshot wounds on his waist and shoulder, the young man took a deep breath, his expression relaxing: “Brother, we are both just one step away, there’s no need for a fight to the death; it’s hard for everyone…”
Zhao Peng slowly stood up, remarkably pulling out a cigarette, lighting it with a snap, smiling at the defeated black blood clan knight before him, and exhaling a smoke ring: “No, we’re not the same. You’re a half-step into the underworld, while I am not.”
Zhao Peng leaned forward, a wave of air pressure surged, and he appeared before the young man, his distorted right hand and fingers stabbing directly into the young man’s left chest.
“Wow… ugh!”
The young man spat out a mouthful of blood, incredulously staring at the impeccably dressed youth before him who had a cigarette dangling from his mouth, a terrifyingly cold expression, his body trembling violently.
Yanking his right hand back, a still-beating heart emerged between Zhao Peng’s twisted fingers.
The young man convulsed as he slowly collapsed, his eyes wide open, almost bulging out of their sockets, as if dead beyond any hope.
Shaking his hand, the distorted right hand slowly returned to normal. Zhao Peng casually tossed the bloody heart onto the body of the black blood clan knight and then turned away, removing the cigarette from his mouth and exhaling another puff of smoke.
Another middle-aged man stepped out from the darkness, unzipping a body bag and stuffing the young man’s corpse and that heart inside…
