by N. Heller
Lin Sanjiu figured that they must have been affected by the blast so they were incapacitated for a moment. She stretched out her body and accelerated toward the two people, hoping to create a net with her body to catch both of them.
As Lin Sanjiu got closer, she got a better view of their faces. Even though Rena's face was black with soot, Lin Sanjiu could still see the girl's frightened expression. Rena's mouth was opened as if she wanted to make a sound, but her voice was stuck in her throat. "Ahhhhhhhh!" On the other hand, Reno was screaming loudly as he was flung far from the building because of the blast. His voice resonated through the building, echoing through each floor.
"As long as they are okay, we can teach Derik and his gang a lesson later!" Mrs. Manas said to Lin Sanjiu, with a calmer voice.
Judging from the positions of both children, it was impossible for Lin Sanjiu to catch both of them. Lin Sanjiu give it a quick thought and decisively flew under Rena, as she was closer to her. As Reno flew out from the building a little later than Rena, his position was a little higher and had a few more seconds before reaching the ground.
When Lin Sanjiu reached for Rena with her skinless arm made of blood-red muscles, Rena was not afraid at all. In fact, Rena had never noticed that Lin Sanjiu was so cute. When she finally felt that she wasn't falling as quickly, she burst into tears, "I was so scared!"
Carrying an additional weight, Lin Sanjiu couldn't help being dragged down a little. Thankfully, her current state was far superior to when they were at that demonic building. Once she secured Rena, she rushed upward once again.
Reno continued screaming as he fell but, knowing that Lin Sanjiu was nearby, he couldn't help feeling relieved. For a second, his expression was just very weird. He didn't appear to be hurt badly. Just when Lin Sanjiu was at ease, she sensed a gust of wind from the back of her neck.
Normally, with the movement of air caused by the blast, she should not have noticed that bit of disturbance in the airflow. Yet, she felt it without any real reason, and it seemed familiar to her.
"Behind you!" Mrs. Manas shouted, Lin Sanjiu's scanning radius immediately expanded and her higher consciousness speedily create an image of what was behind her in her mind. A dark brown ball was flying directly toward Reno with a sharp whistling sound. Suddenly, there was a strong draft and the ball reached Reno before Lin Sanjiu.
When the ball unfolded and showed an arm, Lin Sanjiu was still several meters from Reno.
Everything happened too quickly. "Brother!" Rena shrilled. At the same time, Reno had been hit by that person's arm. He stopped falling downward because that impact threw him horizontally, straight toward the building. His body folded in a 90° angle as it headed toward the walls of the building.
One could only imagine how powerful that attack was since it changed Reno's trajectory even though he was freefalling. A few drops of blood fell on Rena's face. She closed her eyes involuntarily and started screaming in Lin Sanjiu's arm.
"Kill him!" Reno's body hit the walls of the bank building violently while Rena screamed. He didn't break through the windows of the building. It wasn't because he had bad luck but that human cannonball had already planned for him to hit a wall. When Reno hit the wall, the impact was so huge that he vomited blood. After that, his body slipped down to the ground following the walls of the building.
The human cannonball looked like he was going to follow up with another attack. There was another gust of wind, as if the man wouldn't leave Reno until he killed the teenager. Just then, the human cannonball unfolded and changed back into the dark-skinned man Lin Sanjiu met previously. He leaped and barely evaded Lin Sanjiu's attack, then held on to an air-conditioner unit and quickly got into the building.
Lin Sanjiu was too worried and anxious to chase after him. She quickly flew downward. Rena's pink wig had long been blown away. Her black hair, swept by the wind, whipped her face. Her tears leaked as she squeezed her eyes into two slits, bearing the painful upward gust of wind.
After a few heart-stopping seconds, Rena let out a suddenly sob without any warning. Lin Sanjiu finally caught Reno's ankle and broke his fall. With the current strenght of Lin Sanjiu's higher consciousness, it wasn't as difficult for her to hold on to the siblings as before. With some effort, she flew down slowly until she could put the two children on the ground.
"Brother!" Rena quickly rushed over to check Reno's injuries. While Rena went over to look at her brother, Lin Sanjiu did not dare to even relax her constant scanning. She extended her higher consciousness to its maximum scanning range. She spotted a few people on the rooftop shunning from its edge and concluded that they were Derik and the others. There was no one else hiding near them.
"Did you notice that?" Mrs. Manas said in a rather serious tone.
"Yes," Lin Sanjiu replied grimly.
When that dark-skinned man suddenly unfolded from his ball-like form, Lin Sanjiu saw that the "7" on his back had turned to "8" at some unknown time.
"Lin Sanjiu, I think my brother has internal injuries. He doesn't have any external wounds. What should we do?" Rena asked, sounding a little at a loss. Her voice snapped Lin Sanjiu from her thoughts. Rena didn't dare to move Reno too much so she held his head and sighed, "If only there was a doctor around here!"
Lin Sanjiu was jolted by Rena's words.
"There is a doctor here!" Even though he might not be reliable, he diagnosed the siblings' condition correctly back then. " If we just consulted him but not let him do any sort of weird operations, maybe it'll be alright?" Lin Sanjiu thought to herself."
"What did that cat said, he works in the provincial hospital, right?" Lin Sanjiu wrote. Reno had not fully recovered from his previous injuries, so it was quite unrealistic that he could survive these additional injuries. "What choice do we have? Let's look for that cat doctor!"
With her guarding them, Lin Sanjiu guessed that the cat wouldn't try anything funny if she was watching.
Rena's expression eased a little as if she agreed that it was their only choice now.
However, they could not leave immediately.
"Lin Sanjiu," Mrs. Manas said solemnly, "they're coming."
Even without Mrs. Manas warning, Lin Sanjiu already saw Derik and the others within her scanning range. They were rushing toward Lin Sanjiu and the siblings.
Chapter 232 - 2 VS. 2
Derik and his team, now standing in front of Lin Sanjiu, acted totally different from 30 minutes ago.
"Where is that boy? Derik asked while he smirked, showing the upper left row of his teeth. His voice was as gentle and amiable as before, but there was a hint of insanity on his ugly face. Lin Sanjiu didn't know why she didn't notice that before. There was something about the color of his eyes that made people uneasy. It was as if an artist had accidentally left a splotch of ink on his canvas. The color was uneven, too dark in some spots and too light in others, making it uncomfortable for someone to look at him for too long.
Rena and Lin Sanjiu did not reply and instead only responded by going into their fighting stances.
"Hehe," Zhu Mingchun chuckled, his slow-witted expression was long gone from his face. He narrowed his eyes, while cruelty dripped from his words as he said, "Brother Derik, they probably hid him nearby. Let me look for that brat?"
Hannie Huang, who was standing beside him, gave him a sidelong glance. Her red lips curled, as if she was sneering at him, or was just showing disdain.
Derik didn't even turn to look at him. Using a tone as if discussing about a prey, Derik seemed to ignore the presence of the two enemies in front of him, "Okay. But, you have to bring him back alive. As for the other conditions, you should already know."
Rena turned pale with fury. She had to hold on to the sides of her dress to keep her hands from trembling. Zhu Mingchun accepted Derik's condition and raced in the direction opposite from where Lin Sanjiu and Rena were facing. Rena, who had been eyeing him, immediately sprung into action. She followed in the same direction and leaped up. Then, she attacked Zhu Mi
ngchun with her [No depiction of body parts below the neck].
"You left your back exposed!" Hannie gave a sharp laugh at the same time her boots clicked noisily against the ground. Her nails painted with red polish flashed as she swooshed in and reached for Rena's back with her hand.
However, there was someone by her side. Obviously, Lin Sanjiu wouldn't let her get her way. Lin Sanjiu turned her body and threw her arm toward Hannie in a sweeping direction. Her c.h.e.s.t muscles moved showing her white bones.
Unexpectedly, Hannie did not back away even after seeing that Lin Sanjiu was targeting her throat. Instead, she stretched open her fingers and continued trying to reach for Rena's back. Before Lin Sanjiu could process her confusion, she heard a sound of moving air from behind her. She pulled her arm back and lowered her head. A shadow of a ball-like object flew past the back of her head. A chain-like shadow shook, and Derik pulled the ball-like object back to him. That was Derik's weapon, a meteor hammer. The metal chain was as thick as a person's t.h.i.g.h and there was a heavy metal ball attached to it.
Apparently, Rena had also sensed the danger behind her. She had no choice but to abandon chasing after Zhu Mingchun and jumped aside to avoid Hannie's attack. This all happened in a blink of an eye. Then, Zhu Mingchun tripped and fell heavily to the ground.
The first exchange between the two groups ended in a tie.
Zhu Mingchun, who had fallen, seemed only to care about catching Reno. He rolled aside and leaped up again, showing no sign of fighting back. Before Rena could catch up with him, she had already lost the opportunity. Hannie and Derik chased after her and Lin Sanjiu like haunting spirits. With that, Rena and Lin Sanjiu could only watch helplessly as Zhu Mingchun disappeared into the building behind them.
Lin Sanjiu exchanged a glance with Rena, who was beside her. They decided not to be bothered by Zhu Mingchun and instead focus on their opponents.
"Oh, aren't you going to chase him?" Derik flashed his one-sided smile again and said gently, "Both of you are pretty confident about that boy's hiding spot."
Lin Sanjiu eyed Derik coldly. She didn't have the mood to hear his bullshit. With a single thought, she flew into the air and swooped down, targeting him. As her higher consciousness form had no weight, her movements were so fast that no one could react. For Derik, this was his first time fighting with such an opponent. He thought he had already prepared himself fully for this fight, but everything happened in a blur. Before he could even defend himself, Lin Sanjiu had already appeared before him.
Next, he felt a sudden massive blow to his chin. The force of the blow was so strong that it felt like his chin had been pounded into his skull. He was struck so hard that for a moment he only felt a numbness and nothing else. Derik only felt the full age when the force flung him sideways in the air. He realized that he had bitten half his tongue and broke about five teeth. Pain radiated through his nasal cavity and mouth as he started bleeding. For a second, even his vision was blurred.
Lin Sanjiu did not even pause for a second, lunging at him. Scanning with her higher consciousness, she could see that Rena and Hannie were busy fighting. Lin Sanjiu did not have to worry about Rena for the time being. It was more important for her to finish off the little person in front of her.
The strength of her first punch was comparable to a collision with an oncoming train. If a normal person had been hit by that, he might even be decapitated. However, Derik only sustained some injuries. When Lin Sanjiu rushed toward him again, he dodged nimbly and attacked her with his meteor hammer.
Frankly speaking, his attack was swift and powerful. The weight of the metal ball itself was already quite impressive. Whipping it around using the chain created an even stronger centrifugal force. From the wooshing sound it made, it was almost as if the wind it generated could push someone to the ground. Lin Sanjiu jumped into the air and just stayed afloat. Though the chain of the meteor hammer was about five to six meters, it simply crashed heavily to the ground. When it hit the ground, it stirred up a large amount of dirt and dust.
Even though he had spotted Lin Sanjiu and the siblings flying in the air while he was on the rooftop, he had always assumed that they were using some sort of flying device. It didn't even cross Derik's mind once that this strange being that seemed to be made of flesh and muscles could actually fly at will, moving deftly like a duoluozhong.
After training her higher consciousness for such a long time, Lin Sanjiu finally realized the benefits of being in a higher consciousness form in battle. Calling it a cheat wasn't even an exaggeration. When she was just a brain, her higher consciousness felt faint, ephemeral. She was like a column of smoke which Rena could not even touch. However, after her training, her higher consciousness was so dense that it appeared solid and was tangible. Not only did her strength increase tenfold, she still retained her previous spirit-like attributes. For example, when Derik suddenly threw an egg-like object he had crushed in his hand, Lin Sanjiu instantly felt a weight on her shoulders. It was as if she was crushed by a thousand mountains. If the item was used on another posthuman, that person could only use their physical strength to resist the downward pressure exerted by the item if they didn't want to get squished to bits, and that was while fighting off Derik's sneak attacks. However, Lin Sanjiu did not have such a worry.
She relaxed for a second and that invisible weight squished her into a flat sheet. Yet, before Derik could smile, she had already squeezed herself out from under that invisible "mountain range". The function of that item which created that invisible weight was to flatten a person. Since Lin Sanjiu had successfully been flattened, the item lost its effect. Once Lin Sanjiu got out from under it, she regained her original form and was totally unharmed.
[Weight of Mt. Taishan] was an extremely pricey Special Item from the Twelve World Centrum. Just like that, Derik had wasted that item and his face even twitched from that loss. Then, he suddenly looked in another direction.
"That's some bad acting," Lin Sanjiu grumbled. After getting Mrs. Manas to help her monitor her scanned surroundings, Lin Sanjiu quickly chased after the man. "Obviously that jerk has a plan up his sleeves."
However, no matter what, she wasn't afraid. In fact, Lin Sanjiu was itching to see Derik's desperate face after he exhausted all his tricks.
Lin Sanjiu pushed open the main door of the building with her body and rushed into the lobby. When she reached it, the lights in the entire bank building suddenly switched off with a click. Darkness enveloped her surroundings. The effectiveness of her higher consciousness scanning was also affected. It took a few seconds before she could gradually see the outlines of her surroundings from the scanned image in her mind.
There was total silence around her. Nothing moved even after some time. However, Lin Sanjiu could clearly sense that Derik had already activated his ability.
Chapter 233 - Truth or Dare (1)
Hannie jumped into the air, lifting her heels from the ground. Using the momentum, she swung a black pipe downward. It hit the ground with a dull heavy metallic thud. Crooked cracks appeared on the hard concrete floor immediately and pieces broken concrete and dust filled the air. The very moment before, Rena leaped away and nearly lost her balance when she landed. When she looked down at her feet, she realized that the attack from Hannie had wreaked half the side of her shoes. If she was only half a second late, that black metal pipe would have landed on her feet.
A sudden fury rose from the teenage girl's heart.
"Hey, you aren't slow at dodging," Hannie flashed a smile with her red lips. She looked at Rena as if she was looking at a person's whose fate was already sealed. Hannie pulled the metal pipe from the ground nimbly and also stood straight. Tear. She tore off her mini skirt. Rena only realized then that Hannie had been wearing skintight shorts under her mini skirt all along. The black material had a sheen and looked very elastic. From the looks of it, Hannie was secretly prepared to fight all along.
"Why are these people spending so much effort to kill a few strangers?
What would they get from this?" Rena thought to herself and wiped her face with the back of her hand. She could feel the space between her eyebrows twitching. In her fourteen and a half years, this was the first time she was fighting a really strong foe.
After they exchanged quite a few blows, it seemed as though neither Hannie nor Rena had an upper hand. However, after Rena used her [No depiction of body parts below the neck] consecutively for a few times, her opponent had already figured out Rena's usual tactics. At the start, Hannie had no choice but to use her arm to block once. After that, she managed to evade all the attacks from Rena and was not injured even the slightest.
In contrast, Hannie had not even shown any hint of activating her ability. Using only a weapon, Hannie had forced Rena to retreat backward. And, now, Hannie had even ruined Rena's shoe. Rena bit her lip and kicked off her pair of shoes, which she had gotten from one of the local shops. She stepped on the hard cold ground with her white socks, feeling somewhat worried.
Hannie probably had way more combat experience than her. This was the first time she was fighting alone, without her brother and Lin Sanjiu.
"I tired of playing with you, little girl," Hannie suddenly broke into a smile. Her black metal pipe, which was almost 2 meters long, made a swooshing sound as she spun it few times in her hand, creating a blurred circular shadow, making it hard to see the pipe's original form. "Just be a good girl and die. You'll suffer less that way!"
The woman's sharp voice drew close to Rena abruptly. Hannie had suddenly appeared in front of the teenage girl. Stirring wind as she swung her black pipe, Hannie aimed her attack at Rena's neck.
If her attack hit its target, Rena's neck would have ended up like her shoes.