Chapter 22: The Kurotsukido Extermination Battle
Even as the enemies charged at her with guns blazing, Tang Xiaohua wore a manic grin. “Ahahahahaha!”
The bullets never reached her. They slammed into an invisible transparent barrier, smoking as they dropped to the ground with dull thuds. What DTMS didn’t realize was that this was the Tang family’s secret art: Poison Veil. At her current level, Tang Xiaohua could even block heavy machine-gun fire.
At first they had rushed her with sky-high morale, guns roaring, but when the bullets proved completely useless their sprint slowed to a jog, then a walk, and finally they stopped altogether ten meters in front of her.
Tang Xiaohua looked at the hundreds of DTMS troops standing there and spoke.
“The survival instinct is fascinating. I’ve seen it so many times, yet they always stop right about there. It’s like they can feel that taking one more step means death.”
Startled by her words, the DTMS soldiers instinctively took one uniform step backward. Just one more step and they would die. It was a perfectly natural reaction.
Seeing their fear, Tang Xiaohua threw her head back and laughed again. “What are you doing? Kill her! I said kill her!”
From behind, Iwate Motohito shouted in frustration at the terrified soldiers who had frozen in place. Unable to ignore his roar, the DTMS troops opened fire once more.
Bang bang bang bang bang bang!!!
Countless bullets tore up the sports field, sending clouds of dirt billowing into the air and completely hiding Tang Xiaohua from view. The thick dust swallowed not only the soldiers but Iwate Motohito as well.
With a mechanical whir, the anti-gas system in Iwate Motohito’s helmet activated automatically. “It’s not dust! It’s poisonous smoke!”
His warning was useless. No matter how advanced the combat helmets’ anti-gas functions were, they couldn’t protect the soldiers from Tang Xiaohua’s toxin. Only the premium model Iwate himself wore might have stood a chance, but the moment the toxic cloud engulfed them, it was already too late.
“Gaaah!”
“Kek! Keck! Kkeck!”
As the dust settled, every DTMS soldier collapsed, clutching their throats, bodies shaking violently while blood and vomit dripped from beneath their helmets. One by one they stopped moving, becoming nothing more than corpses.
In the end, everyone except Iwate Motohito lay dead, having writhed in agony before succumbing. Six hundred elite DTMS troops had been wiped out by a single use of poison.
“Oh? You’re using quite the high-end equipment, aren’t you?”
When Iwate Motohito stood motionless among the bodies, Tang Xiaohua smiled sweetly and walked toward him.
“Uwaaaaah! Monster! S-stay back!”
Iwate Motohito threw his gun away in panic and spun around to flee. Tang Xiaohua pointed at him with her index finger. The fingertip glowed green, and a beam of emerald light pierced straight through his shoulder.
“Aaargh!”
Iwate Motohito clutched the wound and collapsed, rolling across the ground. The shoulder hit by the beam was visibly melting away in real time.
“As expected… it’s boring. There’s no thrill at all.”
Having annihilated everyone so easily, Tang Xiaohua let out a long sigh. Everything felt dull. Even the battles that used to excite her had become too simple after she grew stronger. There was no longer any fun in it.
She looked at the drone filming her from a distance. “Can you people make this entertaining for me?”
Abyssal Enshrouded Body [Unique Legacy Trait]
A body steeped in the abyss cannot be invaded by anything else. Grants extremely high resistance to all status ailments except those caused by the abyss itself. Increases the maximum value of the Resistance stat by 1 and greatly improves the efficiency of the Resistance stat.
However, if the Resistance stat is lower than the Abyss stat after selecting this trait, the body will gradually undergo mutation. The greater the gap between the two stats, the faster and more dramatic the mutation becomes.
“....”
We watched the drone footage in real time and fell into silence. None of us could speak after witnessing one person torture hundreds of people to death.
“Was the future we saw one where we end up suffering the same way?”
“Yes. I saw two possible futures. In the one where you, Investor, took no action after I warned you, everything simply ended and no further future could be seen. But in the timeline where you did something, a different future appeared. I couldn’t see how the battle itself played out, though.”
That made sense. Without the trait I had just chosen, I would have simply ordered a retreat.
I stood up.
“This time I’ll go alone.”
“Are you sure you’ll be all right, Investor?”
“Probably.”
After reassuring the worried Seryutai, I stepped out of the transport vehicle. While we had been watching the DTMS get wiped out, Kiyona Hori had driven us close to Senboku Municipal Middle School, so it was only a short walk.
Passing through the school entrance, I saw Tang Xiaohua waiting for me among the corpses. She frowned when she noticed me.
“Just one person?”
“That one person can give you the thrill you’re craving, so don’t look so disappointed.”
“Good. Entertain me well. If you don’t, I’ll make sure you die in the most agonizing way possible.”
There was no need for long conversations before a fight. My calves swelled until they felt like they would burst, then I scattered the sand of the sports field and instantly leaped over the corpses to stand before her.
I threw a punch carrying the abyss within it. It was a basic straight punch from the Shinkai Yatsude style called Haro Okanfure—meaning “wave-piercing tentacle.” The technique incorporated the explosive fajin emission of Tongbei Quan, creating a penetrating sensation that would cause internal pain and back pain even from a hit to the chest.
Tang Xiaohua blocked it with her right arm in a disciplined motion. The cyber suit on her arm exploded, exposing the bare, pale skin beneath. The strike would have turned an ordinary person’s arm to pulp, yet her arm remained completely unharmed.
“It’s finally getting interesting, isn’t it?”
The green light in her eyes grew brighter as she thrust her fingers at me. The ominous green glow at her fingertips made it clear that anyone struck by them would be finished.
Tang Family Secret Technique: Three Yang Fingers – One Finger Pierces Through
There was no time to dodge at such close range. I raised my arm to block, just as she had done. The moment the glowing green finger connected, the cyber suit on my arm began melting away in spreading concentric circles.
As expected, this wasn’t ordinary poison but qi poison born from poison arts. Even the latest cyber suit couldn’t withstand it and was melting. Yet my forearm remained completely fine after taking the hit.
“Fun! This is so much fun!!”
Seeing my unharmed arm, Tang Xiaohua laughed like a madwoman and charged.
It was a relief. The trait was working perfectly.
Tang Xiaohua carried the Tang surname but didn’t seem to use hidden weapons. Her martial arts focused on hand techniques, kicking techniques, and palm strikes—pure close-quarters combat. She used poison to handle mid-range opponents and combined poison arts with martial skill against those who closed the distance. Long-range threats were left to the clairvoyant sniper we had captured.
It was a high-level, well-crafted style. However, with my superior physical stats, the overwhelming resistance granted by my trait, and myth-grade martial arts that stood at the absolute peak of this world’s power system, I was slowly driving her into a corner.
Of course, the gap in technique proficiency was significant, so ending the fight quickly wasn’t easy. If my Shinkai Yatsude proficiency had been higher, she would have been a cold corpse in under ten seconds. Because it was low, the battle looked fierce and drawn-out.
As the fight dragged on, an embarrassing situation developed. Most of my cyber suit had melted away from her poison arts, leaving me nearly naked. At this point only the most minimal coverage remained over my groin.
Tang Xiaohua could no longer defend without taking damage either. She had been using penetrating internal strikes the entire time, so while she looked fine on the surface, the accumulated internal damage was clearly making it harder for her to maintain her poison techniques.
“Now!”
I seized the moment she faltered, instantly circling behind her and locking in a rear naked choke. The instant I had her back, she erupted with poison energy like Pikachu using a million volts, but the lack of oxygen to her brain soon caused her to go limp.
“Whew…”
I tossed the unconscious Tang Xiaohua to the ground and turned toward the remaining Kurotsukido stragglers who had been watching our fight with tense expressions.
Something felt like it was dangling. Must be my imagination…
I looked down. The last scrap of cyber suit that had barely functioned like underwear had completely melted away from the final burst of poison she released. My shoes had already dissolved long ago. I was now completely naked. Only the helmet remained to cover my face.
“If you don’t want to die, drop your weapons and kneel!”
They were Chinese so they probably couldn’t understand the words, but my killing intent must have gotten the message across because they immediately began discarding their weapons. Honestly, even I would have surrendered if the person who had just defeated my supposedly invincible boss was standing there completely naked with his massive cock dangling while shouting threats.
That was the moment the long war between Kurotsukido and Taira Foods finally came to an end. Soon everyone in Akita would learn that at the very moment of its conclusion, I had been standing there naked with my huge dick swinging freely.
Was this a good thing? Or a bad thing?