Elimination

"Bang..." A gunshot echoed across the area. Kenwa glanced up at the sky. Seeing that silhouette still circling and gliding above, he cursed under his breath. Although he had learned marksmanship in the military, his fighting style leaned toward close-quarters combat, and true third-limit masters were virtually impossible to kill with firearms at range, so he had never taken shooting to heart. Moreover, the target in the sky was no stationary bullseye, but one moving swiftly through the air. The winds sweeping in from the sea were stiff, and with his shooting ability, hitting it was next to impossible. The others looked toward him, their eyes silently asking whether they should step in and shoot the target down. He gave no response. This was a port. A single gunshot could still be covered up, but if shots rang out in rapid succession, the security guards would come rushing over without fail. Not that he feared them, but having to find a new hiding spot would be a nuisance. This position was quite good, and he had no desire to relocate anytime soon. Sitting inside his vehicle, Chen Chuan observed the situation below through the field organism by borrowing Chaoming's perspective. The port was vast and teeming with people; finding the target seemed a daunting task. At this moment, he was awaiting Commissioner Cao's telegram. Once a specific zone was confirmed, the search radius would shrink. So long as he went there in person and extended his field or spirit, he could pinpoint the man's whereabouts. Just then, however, he heard a gunshot. It came through Chaoming's boundary credential, and from the sound of it, the shot had been aimed straight at Chaoming. He immediately had the field organism make an adjustment. The display on his boundary credential abruptly zoomed in, revealing the sector where the shot had likely originated. This technology came from the Winged Blade Company, originally designed for aerial combat organisms to track down enemy traces, and it served perfectly here. Through the magnified feed, he saw a cluster of people below, along with a man sitting in their center who had just lowered a rifle. Even without an active conscious entity to run a cross-check, the instant he laid eyes on the man, he confirmed his target. Judging by that area's location, it was less than four kilometers from where he was. Chen Chuan stepped out of the vehicle and gave an order to Yu Xiao over his boundary credential. Understanding immediately, Yu Xiao took a squad and set off toward the port government office in an armored vehicle. That Kenwa could stay inside the port with a band of armed militants without facing inspection meant either the port officials were compromised or he enjoyed protection from certain figures higher up. Given that even an official pardon had been issued, the latter possibility was exceedingly high. During this operation, Chen Chuan did not require their cooperation; it was enough as long as they didn't get in the way and cause trouble. He cast a glance at the black speck circling in the sky and walked in that direction. Inside the container yard, Kenwa lay with his hands pillowed behind his head. Watching the lingering shadow wheeling overhead, he felt that the gunshot from earlier had drawn the bird's attention straight to him. This made him inexplicably irritable. If only he had one of the custom-made javelins from his homeland, he was supremely confident he could skewer it even from this distance, as those javelins were engineered specifically to impale birds in flight. In his homeland, the ancient First People had trained animals to observe and monitor their enemies. But as the First People dwindled, those who possessed such a skill had become rare. Thinking of this, he suddenly realized something. His pupils constricted, and he sat bolt upright from the ground, barking, "On guard!" All the gunmen around him were veterans he had brought from the Linakes Federation. Most, like him, were of mixed First People blood—hardened military professionals equipped with advanced combat implants. At his shout, every man snapped to ready status. Though they did not know where the enemy was, this spot had not been chosen at random. There were only two passable routes into the area; as long as they sealed them off, outsiders could not breach their position quickly. Sentries watched from high vantage points, capable of spotting anyone who approached. Kenwa picked up his weapon: a long staff with a massive steel ball tethered to its tip—the hammer-ball staff, renowned among the First People. At that moment, a spine-chilling sensation crept over him. He saw nothing, yet sensed extreme danger—the thing inside his body was sounding an alarm. Driven by that warning, the tendrils outside his body pulled taut one after another, throwing him into a state of utmost alert. Yet right then, a thunderous jolt rattled his mind. A wave of dizziness washed over him, making him stagger. Then he saw one of the sentries perched high above slump sideways and plummet from over six meters up, crashing heavily against the ground with a solid thud. Not just him—farther away, the sounds of collapsing bodies and clattering firearms followed in rapid succession. Within a single breath, every gunman he had brought had lost consciousness and crumpled to the ground. He shook his head violently. A cool sensation welled up from his spine, permeating his brain in an instant and clearing his head at once. Clear footsteps echoed from the distance. Looking up, he saw a young man in civilian clothes walking toward him, wearing an unbuttoned Disposal Bureau uniform overcoat loosely over his shoulders. His pace was unhurried, his expression placid. Kenwa glared at the newcomer, gripping the hammer-ball staff tightly. He had smashed countless bodies to pulp with this weapon, but right now, it offered him not the slightest sense of security. What had struck him earlier had to be some form of spiritual power. He knew full well that someone wielding such power was completely beyond his ability to match. Shock, fury, and fear churned in his heart. He had never expected to encounter a fighter of this caliber before even stepping foot into Center City. According to his expectations, this should have been utterly impossible. People of this level were all in Center City guarding political dignitaries or securing critical zones; how could one possibly run off to the port of a peripheral city? Could he have come specifically for him? What a joke! Mobilizing such an elite expert for someone like him was entirely unnecessary and made no sense at all. What the hell was going on? Chen Chuan stepped onto the open ground and looked at Kenwa ahead. Reaching into his pocket, he produced Kenwa's wanted poster, unfolded it, waved it toward him, and asked in an easy tone, "This is you, isn't it?" At this moment, all trace of optimism vanished from Kenwa. Driven by overpowering dread and the raw will to survive, he roared, and his external implants instantly injected a massive dose of potential-unlocking stimulants into his body. With a resounding boom, the ground beneath his feet detonated. Leaping from where he stood, he whipped the hammer-ball staff upward and hurled it forward with all his might, sending the massive steel ball chained to its tip hurtling down toward Chen Chuan with a howling whoosh! Chen Chuan's eyes mirrored Kenwa's leaping silhouette. Though the man's momentum was intimidating, bursting with tremendous power in a fraction of a second, the motion appeared exceptionally sluggish in Chen Chuan's eyes. Watching the steel ball draw closer and closer, just as it was about to reach his face, he finally released the wanted poster, reached out, pressed his hand against the steel ball, and gave it a gentle outward flick. In an instant, guided by a forceful pulling momentum, the ball was deflected toward the rear flank, its downward smashing force abruptly redirected into a forward-dragging pull. Chen Chuan had made his move precisely at the climax of Kenwa's jin surge. Every fiber of Kenwa's mutated tissue and muscle was taut to the limit. While the stimulant boost had granted him greater raw power, it had also stripped away his ability to finely regulate his force. Thus, the moment the steel ball flew forward, it dragged his entire body along with it, leaving him unable to pull back in time. Chen Chuan watched calmly as Kenwa careened toward him. A leg swept up from below like a whip, snapping right into Kenwa's skull as a surge of Mind Jin poured into it. With a loud bang, Kenwa's head burst open midair. Brain matter and blood sprayed outward, with a single droplet of bloody fluid flying straight toward Chen Chuan. Chen Chuan's raised hand had not yet lowered; with a simple pinch of two fingers, he caught it less than half a foot from his face. Now it could be seen clearly: it was no droplet of blood at all, but a stubby, thick worm, squirming frantically between his fingers. Even he could sense waves of powerful struggle from it, and at the same time, he noticed his second self undergoing bouts of blurring. He watched it for a moment, then squeezed his fingers together. With a snap, he crushed it into oblivion. Only then did Kenwa's headless corpse fall limply from midair, crashing to the ground with a dull thud. The fluttering wanted poster drifted down as well, settling among the mangled remnants of brain tissue. Seeing that the man had been dealt with, Chen Chuan prepared to contact his subordinates to handle the cleanup. Yet just as his hand touched his boundary credential, his eyes flickered. Something wasn't right... That thing earlier had delivered itself right to his doorstep, almost as if terrified that he wouldn't notice it. He lowered his hand and walked slowly over to the corpse. After watching it for a few moments, he raised his foot and stomped down. At that very instant, Kenwa's spine arched violently upward, as though something was about to burst out from within. Yet before it could fully emerge, Chen Chuan's foot crushed down on it. With a loud crack, Kenwa's body exploded under the clash of inward and outward forces, exposing something resembling a twisted worm inside. It possessed a segmented body fringed with long, slender filaments clinging to bits of residual flesh and blood. It appeared Kenwa had completely replaced his own spine with this creature, its dense limbs on either side tethered into the rest of his body. The moment the thing was exposed, the signs of blurring on his second self intensified, accompanied by waves of indistinct whispering that seemed aimed at corrupting and bewitching him. Chen Chuan's expression did not waver. Applying force through his foot, he ground it directly into the paving stones beneath him. With a sharp squelch, the creature burst instantly into a cloud of blood mist, and a thick pool of deep red blood spread across the ground beneath his feet.