During the better part of the day Huang Tian spent in seclusion, several more major events shook the outside world.
Two cities in Ao Nation had fallen. The Feilü Archipelago had lost more ground. The casualty figures grew uglier by the hour—
And within Great Yan, the Yanwu Department, an entirely new and powerful agency, made its official debut, along with the announcement that Huang Tian would serve as a Yanwu Department councilor, which set off quite a stir.
Beyond that, Warrior-rank martial artists had finally begun to appear in various parts of Great Yan. Every one of them was courted and celebrated as a genius. Some even copied Huang Tian and started livestreams, working with their local city hall to clear out fierce beasts—but compared with Huang Tian, their fighting skills were far, far too crude. They relied on nothing but raw brute force, charging and crashing about. Killing unranked fierce beasts was all right, but against a Beast Soldier they not only came off worse, they nearly got themselves killed, frightening the patrol officers backing them half to death; after that the officers flatly refused to let them take the field again—
This badly dented the confidence of these new martial artists. They had assumed they would cut down fierce beasts as easily as chopping vegetables, and only now did they understand that the distance between one person and the next can be vast. They had no choice but to settle down and learn practical combat techniques—
Click.
The door opened, and Huang Tian walked out of his quarters with his war saber slung across his back. Lao Gao was posted not far from the door, eyes sharp, as though warning others to keep their distance.
"Huang— Councilor, you're out of seclusion?" Lao Gao blinked, then said with delight.
Huang Tian smiled and nodded, asking as he walked, "How are things in the city now?"
Lao Gao hurried after him. "Much calmer. The fierce beasts in the eastern and southern districts have been mostly wiped out, and nearly all the Beast Soldiers are dead. Plenty of citizens dare to leave their homes now. Over in the West District, Chief Guan is leading a sweep, and it's making progress. In Xinguang District, up north, all we can really do is keep the situation from getting worse. There have been casualties, but—there's nothing to be done—"
He sighed, a little helpless. "From what I hear, Shangyuan City is actually one of the better off. In some cities, on the very first day of the Great Change, the whole Patrol Bureau was smashed by a flood of fierce beasts before anyone was prepared. After the mutation the beasts got smarter—some are a match for an adult human—so powerful beasts can organize them, and the first thing they wipe out is the biggest threat at hand. Apart from the army, the Patrol Bureau is the greatest threat to them. And once the Patrol Bureau is destroyed, order in the whole city collapses. Hundreds of thousands, even a million people can only huddle at home, waiting for a rescue that may never come—"
Shangyuan City had held together as long as it had for two reasons. First, no fierce beast of great strength and high intelligence had yet appeared in the city. Second, Huang Tian alone had killed so many Beast Soldiers that the beasts' strength had been badly sapped, easing the pressure on the Patrol Bureau and letting it concentrate its forces on clearing one area at a time instead of being forced to spread itself thin, a few people here, a few people there.
After another sigh, Lao Gao asked, "Are we heading back out to clear fierce beasts? I'll notify Captain Liu and Xiao Yang right away."
Huang Tian nodded. "We're going to Xinguang District. Have Xiao Yang get the drones ready and film with them. Once we're in Xinguang, the three of you just look after yourselves—no need to follow me. I'll be moving fast."
Lao Gao was briefly taken aback, then answered, "Understood!"
About ten minutes later, a Patrol Bureau vehicle rolled out of the Experimental High School gate. Huang Tian sat with his eyes closed, resting; Liu Yang drove; Lao Gao kept watch; Yang Qiu checked over the drone equipment.
Nearly twenty minutes on: "Xinguang District!" Liu Yang said, stopping the car.
The four of them got out. Yang Qiu immediately sent the drone up and started the livestream, while Liu Yang scanned their surroundings and listened to the beast roars rising and falling not far off. Uneasy, he asked, "Are you sure going after them alone won't—"
Huang Tian gave a light laugh. "Don't worry. My strength has improved again since I came out of seclusion. A few fierce beasts can't do anything to me."
With that he waved the three of them off and took a single step.
BOOM!
The ground split. Wind and thunder seemed to follow him as he shot off like a fired shell.
A hundred and twenty meters a second!
And that was with him deliberately holding back, showing only War General-rank strength. Even so, Yang Qiu's drone nearly lost him.
"So fast! Way too fast!" Yang Qiu was stunned; he hurriedly adjusted the drone's speed and camera angle to catch Huang Tian's figure.
A hundred meters a second and more, he raced and bounded down the streets like an afterimage, flashing past building after building. The many unranked fierce beasts he met along the way needed no saber: he simply punched them dead in passing.
And so everyone could see it: everywhere he passed, fierce beasts were struck and sent flying, and blossoms of blood bloomed bright and gorgeous.
"Holy shit, holy shit! How did Boss Huang Tian get this strong all of a sudden? That speed, that impact!"
"That's over a hundred meters a second, isn't it? Did the boss break through?"
"He must have! Yesterday people online were saying the boss was in seclusion; now he's out, so what's strange about a breakthrough?"
"Bro, come on, how is that not strange? According to the figures the authorities released, an ordinary Beast General tops out at seventy to a hundred meters a second at a dead sprint; only a stronger one can hold a steady hundred or more. Which means Huang Tian can already match a Beast General, at the very least!"
"Insane. The Great Change has only been going a few days, and I still haven't even gotten the basics of the guidance technique down, and the boss is already this strong! Aaah!"
"It's not really surprising. The news yesterday said Huang Tian has taken the post of Yanwu Department councilor, which means the state is definitely cultivating him as a priority—he won't be short on cultivation resources, so a fast breakthrough is only natural."
"Resources are one thing, talent is another. Anyway, the world's number one genius is worth every bit of the hype, and then some!"
As the stunned commenters argued, Huang Tian touched a toe to the ground and sprang upward, a great wind slapping his face, and in an instant he was on top of a building more than seventy meters tall.
The sun hung at his back, its golden light spilling over him. He stood at the summit of the tower with his war saber on his back, his expression cold, looking down over the vast city below like a Martial God.
The high wind whistled past. Huang Tian swept his gaze across the scene, and at once spotted fierce beasts everywhere below, all over the city. Then his eyes stopped, fixed on a vast plaza not far away.
On the plaza squatted a full forty-odd fierce beasts, seven of them Beast Soldiers: green-eyed cats, one-horned boars, iron-beak birds, fierce-fanged hounds—
Different species, and yet they could share one patch of ground. They had each kept their distance, and the mood was plainly far from friendly, each of them wary of the others.
Huang Tian did not know why so many beasts had gathered there. Perhaps they were up to something; perhaps they had sensed danger and banded together. It didn't matter.
What mattered was—
RUMBLE!
He leapt, shooting like a rocket straight at the plaza. Wind howled through the air behind him, a white wake of air stretching across the sky, and for the first time he drew his saber.
Clang!
With the clear ringing came saber light like a long river.
The blade light was like snow; the man was like a flying rainbow.
Pfft—pfft—pfft—
The moment the saber light fell, the iron-beak birds and green-eyed cats, famed for their agility, had only time to raise their heads before they were beheaded, heads rolling on the ground, blood jetting out.
Only then did the one-horned boars, the fierce-fanged hounds, and the other Beast Soldiers snap awake, and in their horror they tried to flee.
But the saber light was too fast, too fierce, too bright.
The snow-bright saber drove in through the open jaws of a fierce-fanged hound and out the back of its neck, then flew on to the neck of a one-horned boar and cut across; the head flew up, and the huge carcass, a thousand kilos and more, crashed to the ground and twitched.
Roar—
In the blink of an eye all seven Beast Soldiers were dead. The dozens of remaining unranked fierce beasts broke utterly, howling as they scattered; some charged for the edge of the plaza, some trampled each other, and some simply collapsed where they stood.
But whatever they chose, it was too late.
Huang Tian's figure quickened, and like lightning he wove through the herd, the saber moving with him, wisps of frostlight flickering in the air.
Pfft, pfft, pfft—
Heads flew one after another, blood mist sprayed in the air, and the screams grew fewer and fainter—
In a dozen seconds Huang Tian came to a stop, saber in hand, standing where he was, warm blood dripping from the blade and throwing back a lurid glow in the sunlight.
Ding—
He raised a hand and flicked the blade; it shivered, and the blood was shaken from it, the war saber returning to a frost-white gleam.
He slid the saber back into its sheath, picked a direction, kicked off the ground, and soared away—
"Holy crap, holy crap! That was so cool!" Watching the feed from the drone, Yang Qiu was red-faced with excitement, his blood racing.
Liu Yang's heart was pounding too. "So savage—now this is real violence aesthetics!"
Lao Gao was lost in admiration. "Sniper rifles and all that are so lame. Fist to flesh, blade to neck, that's the real thrill!"
While the three of them marveled, Huang Tian sped through Xinguang District, and every fierce beast he came across died under his blade. Not one of them lasted to a second cut.
His speed on the road was practically his speed at clearing beasts.
By late morning, the fierce beasts of Xinguang District had been all but wiped out. What remained were scattered unranked mutants and the rat- and insect-type beasts lurking underground. Those could not amount to much, and there was no need to spend more effort hunting them down; other places still needed clearing.
"How's the west side doing?" asked Huang Tian, once he had rejoined Liu Yang and the others.
Liu Yang answered soberly, "Good progress. Chief Guan's people have driven the beasts back again and again. Now they're either banding together to hold ground or taking the chance to flee the city for the outskirts—but we've posted people in the near suburbs too, to catch as many as we can."
Huang Tian nodded slightly. "Let's go reinforce them. Let's try to bring peace back to the whole city today."
"Yes!" Liu Yang said eagerly.
The four drove quickly to the West District. Ten minutes later, patrol officers in Patrol Bureau uniforms began to appear here and there along the empty streets, in teams of three or five, carrying firearms, faces grim; several Patrol Bureau armored vehicles stood nearby. This was clearly the front line.
Screech.
The car stopped and the four got out. Yang Qiu quickly sent the drone up, and Huang Tian, without wasting words, sprang off toward the distant sound of beast roars.
Whoosh—
Swift as the wind, he soon reached a firefight. Six patrol officers were squared off against nine fierce beasts a hundred-odd meters apart. Some of the officers worked drones to strike, some held submachine guns, and some lay prone, aiming sniper rifles.
Among the nine beasts were two Beast Soldiers: one the most common green-eyed cat, the other a hulking silver-horned ox.
Faced with the incoming bullets, even the thick-hided silver-horned ox was unwilling to take them head-on, while the green-eyed cat leapt nimbly onto a nearby building, its green eyes fixed on the officers.
At full effort it could hit thirty-five meters a second, which meant three or four seconds was all it needed to leap to the officers and kill every one of them.
Three or four seconds was neither very long nor very short. If it were hit in midair by a bullet, its weak defense meant it would certainly be badly hurt, so it kept waiting for its chance.
"Requesting support! Requesting support! Chunguang Avenue, near the Tesbang clothing store—two Beast Soldiers, one of them a green-eyed cat!" one officer said rapidly into his radio, very tense.
Tense he had to be. The green-eyed cat was one of the most common Beast Soldiers in the city, but that did not mean it was not dangerous.
In fact, apart from avian fierce beasts, it was one of the beasts the patrol officers most dreaded meeting. It was simply too agile; one moment of inattention and it would be in your face, and that generally meant death.
Beasts like the one-horned boar and the silver-horned ox were, by contrast, easier to handle. Thick-hided as they were, they charged like tanks, but they were not nimble; even an ordinary person with average reactions could deal with one if he had a firearm.
"Request—"
The officer with the radio was about to repeat himself when a great rushing of wind came from above. He jerked his head up and saw a figure dropping out of the air straight at the green-eyed cat a hundred-odd meters away, trailing a burst of air.
BOOM!
In the space of a blink the figure was in front of the cat. It panicked, tail flicking up by instinct, about to leap clear—but before it could flee, a pale bare palm closed over its skull.
Crack.
The head burst, red matter and white spattering across the ground, and a headless cat corpse dropped. In that same instant the figure flashed like lightning past the silver-horned ox and the other eight beasts.
Only a series of muffled thuds came through the air, and the officers saw every beast go down at almost the same moment, the silver-horned ox's eyes bulging like brass bells, blood trickling from its mouth, its great body twitching faintly.
Having killed nine fierce beasts with such ease, the figure did not so much as look back, but raced off into the distance.
"Who—who was that just now?" The officer with the radio was blank with shock.
"I caught a glimpse—it was Councilor Huang Tian!" his colleague beside him said, thrilled. "Only he could be that strong, killing nine fierce beasts in a few seconds without even a weapon!"
While the officers talked excitedly, Huang Tian had already reached the next fight and killed several beasts there just as easily.
About an hour and a half later, the fierce beasts of the whole West District had been cut down; only two hundred-odd fierce beasts were left, and they had banded together.
The Patrol Bureau had them surrounded on a long street. They were frantic—some giving warning growls, some stamping the ground in a frenzy, others glaring with murder in their eyes as if ready to fight to the death.
"A cornered beast will still fight," Bureau Chief Guan Lang ordered. "Don't be in a hurry to move. Let them stew a while, wear down their spirit. The situation is decided now; steady and sure is best, so that we don't take heavier casualties."
"Understood!" his subordinates answered.
But just then a calm voice came to them: "Half a day with the saber, and more than ten thousand fierce beasts slain. I have devised a single move: the Triple-Wave Saber. The blade comes forth like the tide, tide folding over tide, each wave pushing the next. One cut adds seventy percent to the force; hold the momentum of three cuts and the force is doubled. Watch, all of you, and learn."
As he finished, with a ringing clang the war saber left its sheath, and frost-white light poured down like a brilliant Milky Way.
Huala—
Wherever the saber light passed, severed limbs flew, crimson blossoms bursting open in the air one after another, the beasts' roars turning to wails in an instant; and in a scant few seconds the clamor stopped dead.
On the long street, all was cold and still.
Only one man stood there with a war saber in his hand, hundreds of beast carcasses piled around him, blood running like a river, the stench of it rising thick on the air.
Chapter 260