“All we have to do is kill this motherfucker,” Dane declared, his eyes burning red, fixed intently on Alexander, leaving no room for doubt or hesitation.
“Fuck. So much for playing dead,” Alexander murmured under his breath.
“Mr. Ban told you this?” Dillen’s voice wavered, his hesitation palpable as he struggled to comprehend the gravity of what was being proposed.
“No, not directly. But his son, Taker, did. He gave me the pill, along with the other two pills meant for you guys. And I saw the documents—our implementation orders, all signed and ready. All we need to do is kill this bastard and add our signatures. I know what you’re thinking, but once we finish the job, we’re as good as his men, solid and untouchable.”
“But…” Dillen began, his voice trailing off, only to be abruptly cut short by the sharp sound of glass shattering.
The other guy, a bundle of nerves barely contained, suddenly sprang to his feet, fury igniting in his eyes as he hurled an empty bottle against the wall. The glass exploded in a chaotic spray, the sound echoing like a gunshot. “No buts! I’m in! I’ll fucking do it!” he shouted, his voice trembling with a mix of fear and adrenaline.
“Are you out of your fucking mind? This is just the high talking! Are you really ready to kill someone over something like this?” Dillen’s voice cracked as he tried desperately to be the voice of reason, his eyes darting between the others, searching for some semblance of sanity.
“No, it’s you who’s out of your mind! Roy’s the only one here with the balls to do what needs to be done. In this cutthroat market, do you honestly believe you’ll land a job after graduation?” Dane calmly stated, his words laced with venom and bitter truth. The room fell into a tense silence, even Alexander couldn’t deny the harsh reality. The job market was a battlefield, and cultivation had rendered men more efficient than machines. Jobs, well the ones that everyone wants, were hard, very hard to come b. unless you were above average in in cultivation talent. And that too by quite a good murine.
“And suppose you do have the talent and the connections, but what about us? We don’t, and we’ve made our choice. If Dane and I go through with this, do you think we’ll leave you behind as a loose end? A witness roaming free? No fucking way,” Roy chimed in, his voice, a low, dangerous growl, shifting the atmosphere in the room completely.
“And besides,” Dane interjected, his voice cold and calculating, and, a bit helpless “if someone like Mr. Ban asks you to do something, are you even allowed to say no?” His words hung in the air, heavy with implication and unspoken threats.
A thick, oppressive silence followed, the kind that made your skin crawl and your heart race. Dillen finally caved under the pressure, his shoulders slumping as he backed off. “Fine, fine. You do whatever the hell you want. I won’t participate, and nether will I open my mouth. I’ll keep my head down,” he muttered, his voice laced with defeat as he sank to the floor, his spirit crushed.
“This won’t—” Roy started to press, his voice rising, but Dane quickly cut him off.
“Enough. It doesn’t matter. Even if Dillen doesn’t get his hands dirty, just by sitting here and not alerting the authorities, he’s implicated. He’s as guilty as the rest of us. Now let’s focus on the job. We need to do this right,” Dane said, his tone firm and final as he turned his gaze toward their target—his golden ticket to a better future.
As for Alexander, he wasn’t worried. Not in the slightest. He could see right through their bluff. They were trying to intimidate him, to scare him into submission, maybe even capture it all on video. But unfortunately for them their target was not that naive.
Still, Alexander toyed with the idea of asking Dillen to join him, just to mess around a bit. But before he could act on the thought, dillen chickened out. A part of their planed paly, no doubt.
His thoughts were abruptly interrupted as he instinctively rolled to the side, narrowly avoiding a torso sized concrete slab came straight for him, curtesy of Dane. But in the next moment Alexander came face to Alexanderc with Dane's fist
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The impact was brutal. Alexander felt the fist sink into his flesh, every nerve in his face screaming in agony as the blow sent him flying across the room like a ragdoll. He crashed into a pillar, his body crumpling on impact, but there was no reprieve.
“What the fuck!” he managed to gasp, barely catching his breath before Roy charged at him, brandishing a jagged, broken bottle, aiming to drive it into Alexander’s gut with deadly intent.
“Throat! Aim for the fucking throat!” Dane barked, his voice filled with cold, ruthless precision as he swung a thick metal rod, aiming to finish the job. Alexander’s reflexes were sharp, but not sharp enough. The rod connected with a sickening thud, the force behind it driven by the sheer power of an e-grade cultivator.
The blow sent Alexander spinning through the air, his body twisting and contorting as he tumbled to the ground. He hit the floor hard, the impact jarring, and as he came to a stop, a harsh cough racked his body, blood spilling from his mouth.
This time, it wasn’t a joke. At first, he had felt nothing—his senses were numbed by the initial shock, his pain receptors overwhelmed. But now, the pain hit him like a freight train, crashing through every barrier of his consciousness, drowning out everything else. His body screamed in agony, a relentless, searing pain that consumed him whole.
He reached up to touch the spot where the rod had struck, and his fingers brushed against the swollen, blasted skin, the result of the sheer, unforgiving power behind the blow. Unlike the punch to his face, this was something his body couldn’t shrug off. His knees buckled as he tried to stand, but the pain was too much—his vision swam, darkening at the edges as he teetered on the brink of collapse.
He could feel it—at least two or three of his ribs were broken, maybe more. There were cracks running through his ribcage like fault lines, and the ominous sensation of internal bleeding gnawed at him from within.
By the time the two bastards reached him, Alexander’s vision had cleared just enough to make out their shapes. There was no exchange of words, no hesitation—just cold, calculated violence. The rod swung down again, a blur of deadly force aimed right at him. Alexander twisted his body with every ounce of strength he had left, narrowly avoiding the blow by a hair’s breadth—only to find himself in the path of Roy’s kick.
The impact was brutal, sending him tumbling across the ground like a ragdoll. It was only thanks to his constitution, bolstered to a solid 4, that he could withstand Roy’s kick. If not for that, more of his ribs would have surely shattered. But before he could even finish the thought, he was already moving—instinct kicking in as he jumped back, the metal rod slamming into the ground where he had just been, the force of the blow kicking up dust and leaving a jagged crack in the earth.
Alexander knew what was coming next. The deadly rhythm of their attacks. He bent his body backward, barely dodging another flying kick from Roy, the wind from it rustling his hair.
In the next split second, Alexander let go completely, collapsing onto his back as the metal rod whistled through the air, passing just inches above his head where it would have surely caved in, and downright smooshed his skull. The sound of it slicing through the air was terrifying, a reminder of just how close he had come to death.
As he hit the ground, Alexander didn’t waste a moment. He rolled away in a frantic, desperate scramble, the rod following him like a predator hunting its prey. It smashed into the ground, leaving a trail of destruction in its wake, each impact sending shards of concrete flying as Alexander barely kept ahead of it.
But as soon as he stood up, he was met with a roundhouse kick from Roy, which he managed to stop with his palms. The force sending him skidding.
And even then, in the little next moment, he had to duck to the side as Dane straight up threw the rod at him, destroying half of the pillar behind him, like a shot from a fucking cannon.
What the fuck was it, a weapon? No, that was not it, it glowed as the same color as Dane’s body. Green. It was a simple thick rod the motherfucker has coated in his Qi. A distinction of rank E from the initial Xeo level.
And just as predicted, Roy’s attack came. This continued for a while, in which time Alexander was mostly, well entirely, dodging as Roy went after him, not giving him a breather and Dane, he just destroyed almost a part of the floor with his reckless attack.
Yes, Alexander was aware of it. As Dane recently, well quite literally, evolved to E rank this morning, his uses or his Qi was very crude, borderline wasteful. So he was burning through huge amounts of Qi every moment, but that truly did not matter much, as not only E grades had a large amount of Qi compared to a Xeo 9 but also it had been just around 6 minutes the fight, well, ok, the chase started. And Alexander had to admit he was not looking good. Heck, he doubted he could last another 6 minutes.
Though he fought beasts in the forest, and also had quite a number of points in the strength state, but ultimately that did not matter. As the main problem of his was the first rod blow that connected.
That place was bleeding, most likely his muscle being burst from the sheer force. Which he did not notice at first. Due to constant attack. But now, not only was there a huge bleeding problem, but also his ribs were breaking, and the nerves of that side were quite literally messed up.
Alexander needed to finish them up quickly, yes finish them. At this point, there was no doubt in his mind that they were here to end, well there was no point in sugar-coating it now. They were here to kill him. The sheer thought of that sent shivers through his body. Not of fear but one of anger. What the fuck, they wanted to kill him just because he beat him up. That Taker deserved a beating.
Alexander narrowly dodged another angular swipe of the rod as it slammed at the side creating a mini crater. As he stepped to the side, avoiding a punch from Roy.
No, not at all, that motherfucker deserved to die. Alexander was consumed by anger. This was truly a childish thing.
But no matter how childish or mature the situation was, it was not good for Alexander, he avoided another punch from Roy by sidestepping as in the next moment another pile of rubble crushed into him sending him flying, no doubt courtesy of Dane.
Alexander started to see dizzy in his eyes again, and also red, as he saw Dane coming at him, his face that of a beast with his rod drawn to a mighty swing.
He needed to do something, but what. The swing just came for him, as he instinctively ducked, the swing slamming right into the pillar behind him getting embedded into it as the sharp debris dug into Alexander's neck and back as he was just beneath it
Suddenly time slowed as Alexander got a clear look at the ferocious face of Dane and the crazy look of Roy. Suddenly something flipped, and Alexander came to a decision.