novelraw Chapter 325: Assassin
Chapter 325: Assassin
The afternoons in Singapore were always shrouded in suffocating heat and humidity.
Located deep within Chinatown, the Gu Ji Zhai bookstore had its doors and windows tightly shut with heavy blackout curtains drawn, but the pervasive heatwave still seeped through the cracks in the brick walls, making the air inside thick and stagnant.
Lin Jie stood before the oak table piled high with maps and travel bags, slipping on the long black trench coat that had just been delivered by Su Sanniang.
Under the dim glow of the gas lamps, this Grotesque Armament named [Black Mercury] displayed a peculiar texture. The leather surface, shimmering with a faint blue iridescence, rippled with extremely subtle waves that matched the rhythm of Lin Jie's breathing.
He was organizing his final gear.
The newly reforged [Silencer], fresh from the old blacksmith near the funeral parlor, lay on the table.
This reborn weapon had not only inherited the neurotoxin but, thanks to the integration of [Withered Cicada]'s properties, now possessed the suppressing power to briefly nullify magic and extinguish spiritual nature.
"All the supplies have been packed."
Evelyn was carefully placing the final batch of alchemical reagents into a shockproof briefcase lined with cotton. She wiped the fine beads of sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand, then glanced at Julian, who was standing by the second-floor window, peering outside.
"The ship tickets are for eight o'clock tonight. We have one hour to transfer to the docks. The carriage arranged by Su Sanniang should be arriving soon.""Wait."
Julian stood by the window, gripping [Discipline] tightly, his voice carrying the distinct, mechanically cold tone influenced by the weapon.
"Something's wrong. The sounds from the street have vanished."
Lin Jie immediately stopped what he was doing upon hearing this.
Chinatown was the noisiest place in all of Singapore, filled day and night with the cries of street vendors, the shouts of coolies, and the gongs and drums from nearby theaters.
But right now, that constant, background-level clamor seemed to have been abruptly choked off by an invisible hand. A heart-stopping dead silence was seeping in through the cracks of the closed doors and windows.
Outside, the sky had darkened completely, though no one knew when.
It wasn't a normal sunset, but the unique, oppressive gloom of dark clouds before a tropical downpour.
Heavy cumulonimbus clouds hung low over the rooftops, shrouding the entire neighborhood in a leaden-gray shadow. The air pressure was dropping sharply, pressing against eardrums with a low, buzzing hum.
"They're here." Lin Jie's voice was calm.
He reversed his grip on [Silencer] and slid it into the specially designed sheath inside the trench coat. Then, he reached up and pulled the black collar higher, concealing the lower half of his face in shadow.
From the auction in Saigon to their landing in Singapore, the Black Lotus Sect's eyes were everywhere in the South Seas. Their stay at Gu Ji Zhai, though not long, was more than enough time for Yan Xilou's forces in the region to complete a tactical deployment from reconnaissance to encirclement.
"Boom!"
There was no opening statement, no attempt to persuade surrender.
The heavy nanmu wood door of Gu Ji Zhai was violently smashed open with brute force. The thick crossbeam reinforcing the door plank snapped in two under the immense impact. Amidst the flying wood splinters, several figures dressed in dark blue, tight-fitting short jackets and wearing bamboo hats charged in like phantoms.
The downpour outside finally chose that moment to unleash itself.
A gale, laden with raindrops, poured through the shattered doorway into the room, instantly extinguishing the gas lamps on the table. The entire first-floor hall plunged into a chaotic, dim grayness, illuminated only briefly by the occasional flash of lightning that revealed the cold, glinting blades in the invaders' hands.
They were uniformly forged from Burmese iron, horse-chopping sabers with talismans etched onto their surfaces.
"Kill."
The leader of the death squad uttered a short, raspy syllable.
This was an extremely professional assassin team.
The twelve death soldiers automatically split into three echelons the moment they rushed inside. The first echelon of three, brandishing their heavy horse-chopping sabers, charged directly at Lin Jie, who stood in the center of the hall. The blades tore through the air with a shrill shriek, sealing off all possible avenues of evasion for Lin Jie.
If this were the Lin Jie of before, facing such an airtight encirclement would have necessitated using [Mental Staircase] to boost his reaction speed or relying on the interference waves from the [Cursebreaker Vambrace] to force an opening.
But not now.
His gaze became exceptionally ethereal in that instant. His body leaned forward slightly, adopting a starting posture.
The [Black Mercury] trench coat he wore seemed to sense the surging spiritual nature within its host and the impending impact. The black, flowing light on its surface began to swirl wildly. A special force field, existing somewhere between solidity and nothingness, enveloped Lin Jie's entire body.
"Swish!"
The first horse-chopping saber descended with mountain-splitting force, aiming squarely for Lin Jie's left shoulder.
A cruel glint of triumph flashed in the death soldier's eyes. The tactile feedback from his hand confirmed the blade had indeed struck a solid body. But then, an utterly bizarre sensation traveled up the hilt.
The blade hadn't sliced into flesh. It felt like hacking into a block of solid ice coated in lubricant, or striking a mass of rapidly spinning mercury.
The immense kinetic energy was forcibly deflected, dissipated, and slid away by the force field covering the trench coat's surface.
The saber slid past Lin Jie's shoulder. Apart from eliciting a shower of dazzling sparks from the trench coat's surface, it didn't even cause Lin Jie's body to sway.
"Deflection."
Lin Jie silently recited the word in his mind.
Using the momentum of the sliding blade, his entire body advanced with a frictionless, eerie grace, as if gliding on ice.
His movement had no warning, no footfall. That extreme fluidity left a black afterimage on the retinas of the others.
The death soldier only saw a blur before his eyes. The target that should have been cleaved in two had vanished, replaced by a black specter that had slipped out from under his arm.
A cold light flashed.
The newborn [Silencer] traced a pale gray arc in the gloom.
It tapped lightly on the death soldier's wrist, a touch as fleeting as a dragonfly skimming water.
"Wither."
The power contained within the blade erupted.
The death soldier's wrist went numb. Immediately, the qi, blood, and strength flowing through that arm seemed to be instantly drained, becoming withered and powerless. He could no longer maintain his grip on the heavy horse-chopping saber. It clattered to the floor with a loud "clang!"
Before he could even gasp in shock, Lin Jie's left hand had already risen.
The muzzle of [Serene Heart] pressed directly against the underside of his jaw.
"Pfft."
The suppressed bullet pierced through the death soldier's brain, exiting from the top of his skull in a spray of red and white.
Instant kill.
This was just the beginning.
After dispatching the first man, Lin Jie used the falling corpse as cover. The tip of his foot tapped lightly on the floor, and his body once again transformed into a streak of black light, charging into the crowd behind.
[Black Mercury] granted him unparalleled mobility.
Within the narrow, cluttered confines of the bookstore's main hall, he was like a black fish swimming into the deep sea. Every obstacle became a fulcrum for him to pivot and change direction.
He ran and leaped sideways along walls at times, slid across the floor at others. Blades and sword glints always missed his shimmering trench coat by a hair's breadth.
With every pass, someone inevitably fell.
Either tendons severed by [Silencer], losing the ability to move, or lives silently reaped by [Serene Heart].
"Up there!"
The remaining death soldiers finally realized the man wreaking havoc on the first floor was a monster they couldn't handle. Several immediately changed targets, stepping on bookshelves in an attempt to charge to the second floor to deal with the gunman and the woman who seemed less threatening.
But they were wrong.
The second floor was the true no-go zone.
Julian stood in the shadows of the second-floor corridor. The lenses of his glasses reflected the occasional flash of lightning from outside.
His right hand tightly gripped [Discipline], wrapped in rusted iron wire, while his left hand leaned on the blackthorn wood cane, [Withered Thorns].
The power of absolute, rational rules made the scholar's gaze cold.
In his field of vision, those death soldiers attempting to climb up were no longer living people, but "erroneous coordinates" that must be corrected.
No need to aim, only to execute.
"Bang! Bang! Bang!"
Rhythmic gunfire rang out.
The bullets fired from [Discipline] traced impossible, zigzagging paths through the air.
The first bullet curved around a pillar, striking a death soldier's knee just as he was exerting force. The man screamed and fell from mid-air.
The second bullet penetrated through the gaps in the staircase railing, shattering the palm of another death soldier who was trying to throw a hidden weapon. That was the punishment for a "violation of the rules."
However, the ferocity of the Black Lotus death soldiers exceeded expectations.
Seizing the brief interval while Julian was firing, three other death soldiers formed a tight triangular formation and, using their fallen comrade's body as a shield, charged frantically up the narrow wooden staircase.
Facing the blades about to reach him, Julian showed not a trace of panic.
He raised the black cane in his left hand and brought it down heavily on the second-floor floorboards.
"Decay."
Accompanying the low utterance, a circle of gray, entropy-increasing ripples erupted from the cane made from the remains of a dead world tree.
[Withered Thorns] — Order Attenuation field.
The three death soldiers, who had been charging with unstoppable momentum, became sluggish and stiff the moment they stepped into those ripples. The cold, gleaming horse-chopping sabers in their hands lost their sharpness. Even the frenzied killing intent in their eyes grew dull and bewildered under the erosion of this decaying aura.
Physical laws were forcibly attenuated at this moment.
Those brief two seconds of paralysis were the distance between life and death for a hunter.
"Don't let them near the stairwell!"
Evelyn shouted from behind cover, sheltered by Julian.
She hadn't been idle either.
Over the past few days in the safe house, she had already transformed the entire second-floor platform into a temporary electrical trap zone.
Several hair-thin copper wires were hidden under the stair carpet and between the railings, connected to several high-capacity Leyden jar arrays.
When the last few death soldiers tried to force their way through Julian's fire blockade, Evelyn suddenly clenched her right hand, which wore the [Tesla Coil Glove].
"Charging... release!"
She slammed her palm onto a metal conductor ball connected to the copper wire array.
"Zzzzzzzzap—!!!"
Blue-purple electrical arcs erupted along the nearly invisible copper wires, forming a dense electrical net at the stairwell entrance.
The few death soldiers who had just charged up were struck by the high-voltage current. Their bodies convulsed violently under the powerful shock. Their weapons clattered to the floor. Acrid smoke rose from their charred skin before they tumbled back down like chunks of burnt charcoal.
The fight ended faster than imagined.
From the moment the door was smashed open to the last standing enemy falling, the entire process took less than three minutes.
Outside, the downpour continued to wash over the streets, the sound of rain masking the brief but fierce sounds of slaughter inside.
Lin Jie stood in the center of the first-floor hall, amidst the wreckage.
The [Black Mercury] trench coat he wore remained pristine. Blood that had splattered onto its surface simply slid off, repelled by the force field.
He slowly sheathed [Silencer] and holstered [Serene Heart]. Then, he walked over to the only survivor, the squad leader he had deliberately left with a breath of life.
This was the very man who had given the initial attack order.
Now he lay amidst a pile of scattered thread-bound books. The joints in his limbs had been destroyed by the toxins carried by [Silencer]. He could only glare at Lin Jie with eyes filled with intense hatred.
Lin Jie crouched down.
He pulled out the modified, stethoscope-style headphones with audio amplification that Evelyn had worked on. He pressed the suction-cup-like pickup head against the death soldier's Adam's apple.
"I know you've been trained. You're not afraid of death, and you won't talk."
Lin Jie's voice was exceptionally clear amidst the thunder.
"But as long as you're alive, your body will betray you."
"Heartbeat."
"Breathing."
"Muscle tremors."
"The faint vibration of vocal cords before you even intend to speak."
"I can hear it all."
He drew an ordinary dagger from his waist and gently pressed it against the death soldier's eyelid.
"Now, I ask, you listen."
"If your physiological reactions tell me you're lying, this blade will cut down."
This unique interrogation method finally elicited a flicker of fear in the death soldier's eyes.
"Let's confirm your identity first."
Lin Jie's voice was steady. He lightly tapped the dagger against the death soldier's tense cheek.
"Your sword techniques are systematic, your coordination seamless. This definitely isn't the caliber of some Chinatown thug gang that works for money."
Steady but slightly heavy heartbeat sounds came through the headphones. The death soldier was trying to control his heart rate through breathing.
"You are... a Black Lotus Sect death soldier."
The moment the three words "Black Lotus Sect" were uttered, the heartbeat in the headphones skipped a beat, followed by a brief, sharp spike.
Lin Jie watched the extremely subtle contraction of the death soldier's pupils and nodded.
"It seems I'm not mistaken. Identity confirmed."
He continued.
"Since you're an elite of the Black Lotus Sect, your operational orders must have come directly from the highest level."
"Tell me, where is Yan Xilou?"
The death soldier clenched his teeth, his throat convulsing violently. His heartbeat began to accelerate. He was resisting the pressure that name invoked.
"Not in Singapore."
Lin Jie stared into the death soldier's eyes, posing the first guess as if answering his own question.
The death soldier's expression didn't change.
"Then there's only one possibility left." Lin Jie's voice suddenly turned cold. "He's in Borneo."
"Boom!" The heartbeat in the headphones exploded like a drumbeat.
"It seems even separated by thousands of miles, you still hold that place in awe." Lin Jie watched the death soldier's breathing rhythm completely fall apart and supplied the final answer for him. "He's in that laboratory codenamed 'Garden of Eden,' isn't he?"
The death soldier's pupils contracted to pinpricks—a physiological sign of a shattered psychological defense.
"Good."
Lin Jie nodded with satisfaction. "It seems our intel is correct."
"Now, the next question."
"How far along is his experiment?"
Lin Jie applied a bit more pressure with the dagger in his hand, piercing a bit of the death soldier's skin. Blood seeped along the blade.
"Has it failed?"
"Or... is it nearly successful?"
When he heard the words "nearly successful," the death soldier's breathing frequency underwent an extremely violent disruption. It wasn't just fear, but a physiological reaction mixed with fanaticism and reverence.
A series of rapid, drumbeat-like heartbeats came through the headphones.
"Fusion stage..."
An involuntary, breathy sound squeezed from the depths of his throat was captured by the high-sensitivity instrument.
Lin Jie removed the headphones.
His expression turned grave.
He stood up, made a "clean up" gesture to Julian and Evelyn on the second floor, then slit the death soldier's carotid artery with the dagger, granting him a swift end.
"What is it?"
Julian descended the stairs, gun in hand, frowning at the bodies littering the floor.
"The situation is worse than we anticipated."
Lin Jie wiped the blood from the dagger.
"That death soldier's reaction tells me Yan Xilou hasn't stopped because of his failure in Egypt."
"On the contrary, his Living Holy Embryo project in Borneo has already entered the fusion stage."
"This means he has already begun forcibly injecting the spiritual essence extracted from UMAs into the body of that so-called artificial deity."
"Once the fusion is complete..."
Lin Jie didn't continue, but everyone understood what that meant.
A biological weapon possessing the power of an ancient god, yet controlled by a madman, would be born in these ancient rainforests.
By then, forget rescuing William; the entire South Seas, even the world, would face a catastrophe.
"We're out of time."
Lin Jie glanced at the wall clock.
"No matter how heavy the rain outside, we must leave immediately."
"To the docks."
"We leave tonight."
The three of them quickly shouldered their already-packed travel bags and turned to rush out into the vast curtain of rain outside.