Clank, clank, clank!

Clang, clang, clang!

On the outskirts of Ghost Street, at a narrow intersection.

The dense sounds of metal clashing rang endlessly like heavy rain pattering on plantain leaves.

Surrounded by three Awakened, Zheng Wei's figure darted and shifted like a butterfly weaving through flowers, parrying lethal attacks coming from all directions.

"Try a little harder."

"Let me see how long you can hold out!"

A burly man wielding a spiked meteor hammer roared.

The massive meteor hammer, carrying a whistling wind, smashed the bluestone slabs by Zheng Wei's feet.

Splintered stones splashed, scratching Zheng Wei's calf.

On the other side.

A tall, thin man with the 【Poison Ivy】 ability slammed both hands onto the ground.

Seven or eight wrist-thick, barbed green vines Burst out of the soil like venomous snakes, wrapping toward Zheng Wei's ankles and calves.

"Oh no!"

Zheng Wei's heart tightened as she lost her balance.

The third Awakened quickly circled to her blind spot and lunged fiercely with a sharp blade.

After all, she was only one person.

The Awakened coordinated with extreme tacit understanding, and their abilities varied widely.

Under the high-intensity battle, Zheng Wei's physical stamina was heavily depleted. A wound was immediately slashed across her body, and her clothes were soaked with cold sweat and blood, making her look quite disheveled.

Bang.

The assassin struck again, at the exact moment he was less than half a meter away from Zheng Wei.

The sound of a sniper rifle suddenly exploded in the silent night sky, resembling the roar of the reaper.

Splat.

The assassin's upper body exploded like a watermelon.

【Anti-Materiel Sniper Rifle】

It could pierce the heavy armor of a tank; a human's fragile flesh was simply as vulnerable as wet paper.

In an instant.

Half of the assassin's body suffered a Burst into a bloody rain of flesh.

Shattered bones and internal organs sprayed out in a fan shape, drenching the nearby burly man with the meteor hammer from head to face.

"Ah??"

"What the hell is this?!"

The burly man wiped the brain matter from his face, scared out of his wits.

Someone was shooting potshots from the shadows; given the firepower of this weapon, even his own body couldn't withstand it.

Click.

On a distant rooftop.

Old Hu expressionlessly pulled the bolt, a smoking, piping-hot cartridge case bouncing out of the chamber and landing on the concrete floor with a crisp sound.

He glanced at the shattered Awakened, immediately picked up the heavy sniper rifle, and moved quickly across the cluttered rooftop terrace with a hunched back.

Shoot and scoot.

This was a sniper's most basic operation.

Old Hu was like a patient old hunter, wandering high up in the steel jungle.

Whenever an Awakened revealed a flaw or a companion fell into crisis, he would gift the enemy a bullet.

Bang.

Another loud bang.

The lower half of the tall, thin man controlling the poison ivy experienced a Burst.

His thighs and pelvis flew away, and his upper body fell to the ground, screaming and rolling, soon passing out due to blood loss and traumatic shock.

"Fuck!!"

"That old bastard is there!"

"Ten o'clock direction, behind the blue water tower!"

The Awakened in the sky held a walkie-talkie and reported to the others.

He floated mid-air out of thin air, his eyes emitting a sharp yellow light, resembling a falcon soaring through the sky.

Super-strong vision.

He could see mosquitoes a kilometer away clearly.

The moment Old Hu fired, he also exposed his position, and the other Awakened immediately swarmed over.

Rumble rumble rumble!!!

A dazzling orange-red fireball Burst open beside Old Hu.

The terrifying high temperature and shockwave instantly blew the iron water tower into smithereens, and boiling water and burning iron shards splashed everywhere.

"Caught you."

Near the rooftop.

An Awakened whose hands burned with raging flames sneered viciously.

【Fire Crow】

He thrust his hands forward fiercely, and two more huge fireballs with a diameter of over thirty centimeters appeared, whistling and smashing toward the rooftop.

Enormous power.

These fireballs were comparable to high-explosive C4 explosives.

Boom boom boom boom boom.

Flames soared into the sky, large patches of Burst, and shattered bricks and stones rained down onto the street.

"Cough cough cough..."

The second before the explosion, Old Hu gave a fierce jump, charging toward the rooftop terrace of a slightly shorter adjacent building.

The air wave flipped him to the ground, and he stabilized his footing only after rolling continuously for a few turns.

A large patch of his tactical vest was scorched, and his cheek was scratched with a long bloody gash by flying debris.

"The hardest one to deal with is the fellow in the sky."

Old Hu spat out a bloody glob of saliva, running wildly among the covers on the terrace while his brain spun at high speed, assessing the current situation.

Human radar.

If the floating Awakened in the sky wasn't eliminated, his position would be exposed at all times, and his advantages would vanish completely.

He had to shoot him down!!

Dodging left and right, Old Hu stopped beside a rusted external air conditioning unit, set up the heavy anti-materiel sniper rifle, turned the muzzle, and aimed at the pitch-black night sky.

Bang.

Flames spewed.

An armor-piercing bullet thicker than a finger stirred up a terrifying spiral airflow, whistling as it tore through the night sky and shot toward the Awakened in the sky.

"Want to hit me?"

"Naive!!"

The Awakened in the sky had extremely exceptional vision.

He started moving quickly before Old Hu pulled the trigger.

His floating body defied the laws of physics, twisting at a bizarre angle and charging toward the exact opposite side.

Swoosh.

Sure enough, the bullet didn't hit him.

But the wind pressure generated by the high-speed rotation of the large-caliber armor-piercing bullet still brushed past his body.

Rip.

The clothes on the Awakened's shoulder, along with a large chunk of flesh, were forcefully scraped and torn open, spraying blood into mid-air.

"Old thing."

"Damn it."

"What are the others doing, kill him for me!!"

Furious beyond measure, the floating man in the sky clutched his bleeding shoulder and issued commands to the others.

Rumble rumble rumble.

The covers around Old Hu Burst open one after another.

Rubble fractured.

The earth trembled.

The shockwave of the explosion shattered the nearby covers again and again.

He continued running for his life, barely finding a path to survival amidst the increasingly dense attacks.

Desperate situation.

If this continued, death was certain.

Old Hu took a deep breath and closed his left eye.

Since conventional means couldn't hit him, he had no choice but to use his own ability!!

When Old Hu opened his eyes again, his turbid pupils were scarlet like fresh blood.

Countless blood-red threads as thin as spider silk frantically spread and intertwined on the surface of his eyeball, finally focusing entirely on the very center of his pupil.

A cross!!

The blood-red fine threads inside the eyeball actually formed a bizarre crosshair.

【Mandate: Reapers Eye】

Its function was very simple: it could compress perceived time to the greatest extent and grant the weapon the 【Must-Hit】 attribute.

Old Hu rarely used this ability.

Reason one: There was no need; his marksmanship was accurate enough without using this ability.

Reason two: After using the ability, the eye that released it would suffer damage and temporary blindness.

Of course.

With such severe side effects, the ability was also formidable.

"Drip..."

A shocking stream of bloody tears flowed down the corner of Old Hu's right eye.

The pupil with the crosshair locked onto the Awakened's glabella, imbuing the firearm in his hand with a special power.

Bang.

Old Hu pulled the trigger.

The moment the gun fired, the bullet leaving the muzzle actually vanished out of thin air.

The man in the sky moved swiftly, wanting to use the same method to dodge this fatal blow.

Splat.

His head exploded without any struggle.

A ripe watermelon was struck by an invisible hammer, and flesh, bones, and mud all turned into a miserable bloody mist.

Unable to dodge.

Unable to evade.

The Must-Hit attribute of Reapers Eye seemed to lock onto causality, ignoring space and distance.

You could only take it head-on!!

The corpse of the man in the air fell from a height of a hundred meters, slamming heavily onto the ground.

"Hmph."

Old Hu snorted coldly and wiped the blood on his eye socket.

This eye of his was temporarily crippled; for the rest of the battle, he could only aim with his other single eye.

"What?"

"The captain is dead??"

Fire Crow was startled, and a trace of fear arose in his heart.

At this distance and height, even under rapid movement, he could be killed with a single shot??

"Don't just stand there."

"We've caught him!!"

On the other side of the roof, the other Awakened had surrounded Old Hu.

Fire Crow kicked his legs fiercely and, utilizing the bursting flames, also arrived near Old Hu.

Good!!

This was the opportunity.

"Go to hell!!"

Fire Crow raised his hands high, and two orange-red fireballs even more dazzling than before compressed crazily in his palms, causing the surrounding air to be scorched and distorted.

However,

the very moment he was about to hurl the fireball,

an extremely subtle sound of piercing through the air suddenly reached his ears.

Hmm?

Fire Crow froze for a second.

He suddenly felt that the world before his eyes—was tilting.

Not only was it tilting, but it also started spinning wildly.

In his spinning vision, Fire Crow saw a headless body.

That body was dressed exactly like him, hands raised high, with two orange-red fireballs floating in its palms that hadn't been thrown out in time...

Above the neck of that body, it was smooth as a mirror, completely empty.

It was cut off!!

Until this moment, Fire Crow finally reacted.

His head had actually been slashed off by someone with a single blade, rolling away as it spun.

Roll, roll, roll.

The human head landed and rolled twice on the concrete ground.

In the last second before losing consciousness, Fire Crow saw a wisp of black mist.

With his gaze barely moving upward, he saw a man holding a black chopper, exuding black baleful aura all over his body.

Yang Feng.

Like a ghost, he hid in the deepest shadows of this street, transforming into the top-tier hunter.

At the most critical moment.

At the most fatal moment.

Yang Feng could always appear suddenly and then deliver the most lethal blade to the enemy.

Thud.

The headless corpse fell to the ground, and the fireball in its palms lost control, exploding with a roar right on the spot.

Looking at Yang Feng again,

he had already vanished without a trace.

A thick mist of Fierce Spirit wrapped around his body, once again blending into the surrounding darkness as if he had never appeared.

Tap, tap, tap.

Yang Feng's footsteps were extremely fast.

He turned into an ink color richer than the night, shuttling at an incredible speed.

Splat.

A black blade light flashed past the corner of the alley.

"Huh?"

A female Awakened who was preparing to sneak attack Zheng Wei only felt a cool breeze brush across her back.

She reached out and touched her neck quizzically, just as she wanted to turn her body.

Swish...

A terrifying scene occurred.

Her body twisted slightly, and her upper body slid downward at an angle, dropping to the ground.

Warm blood plasma sprayed, and her internal organs spilled all over the ground with a swish.

When was she stabbed by the blade?!

Before her vision was swallowed by darkness, her beautiful face was filled with confusion and horror.

She didn't even know what she was killed by.

A dark shadow.

Flashed past, killed, vanished.

Yang Feng reaped life after life.

The true hunt had only just begun.