The Casualties Really Weren't That Bad! / Spend Like There's No Tomorrow! We Have to Spend!

Ever since Gotham Beast debuted, all of his records had proven one thing: he never left survivors, especially when it came to gangsters.

He didn't care which side you were on!

But at that moment, Warwick twitched his nose and looked around.

"Falcone on the left, Maroni on the right! Take out the right side!"

With that, he charged toward the team on the right like a bolt of lightning.

Maroni Family members: ???

Wait, was the Beast playing favorites? Or had he taken a bribe?

Meanwhile, after their initial confusion, the Falcone Family members erupted in ecstasy!

They had clearly been facing certain death and had even planned to drag the Maroni Family members down with them into the wolves' jaws. Yet Gotham Beast had suddenly changed his ways today?

He was only targeting the Maroni Family?

They had no idea why, but one thing was certain: they had survived!

However, Warwick, who had already charged in front of the Maroni Family's line, knew exactly why.

He only remembered something Dr. Hugo had said to him on the way here.

"Falcone came to visit the director today. It seems he also donated quite a bit of money to our hospital."

Anyway, the director had only ordered them to make a big enough commotion without causing too many casualties. So killing only Maroni Family members shouldn't count as too many casualties, right...

The casualties really weren't that severe!

The outcome naturally held no suspense.

Under the combined assault of Warwick, Ian, and Dr. Hugo, the squad from the Maroni Family was quickly wiped out completely.

Bodies were everywhere, and the scene was far from pleasant.

Forget ordinary human gangsters—even if Weapon Master were being ganked by these three in the top lane, his chances of surviving would be minuscule.

Leaving behind the wreckage and the trembling Falcone Family members in the restaurant, the three turned and vanished into the darkness.

They had only taken out two Maroni Family teams so far. The night was still young, and the commotion wasn't big enough yet.

They still had to hurry to the next fight...

When Li Wei groggily climbed out of bed to use the bathroom, he casually glanced at his shop system.

"Holy shit!!!!"

The number in the Soul Essence column struck Li Wei like lightning, nearly jolting him straight off the bed.

Li Wei:!!!

"No, I must have gotten up too fast just now. My blood pressure rushed to my eyes, and I'm hallucinating." Li Wei spoke as he lay back down. "Sleep a little longer, sleep a little longer..."

The moment Li Wei lay down, he climbed back up again with a blank expression.

What a joke. With his current physical condition, let alone getting up too quickly, even diving directly a thousand meters beneath the sea wouldn't cause any issues with his blood pressure!

How could he possibly hallucinate?

The Soul Essence balance was simply too outrageous!

Soul Essence: 6749

Just two hours ago, his Soul Essence balance had barely exceeded two thousand!

And now, only two hours later, it had increased by more than four thousand.

On average, it had doubled every hour!

It was even still rising nonstop!

Normally, Gotham City only provided him with an income of two to three hundred Soul Essence a day.

Had a war broken out in Gotham? How could so many people have died in just two hours?

At that moment, Li Wei's entire body stiffened. He suddenly remembered that, before going to sleep, he had sent Warwick, Ian, and Dr. Hugo out to make a huge commotion...

Don't tell him those three had started slaughtering the city.

But that couldn't be right. He had specifically told them not to cause too many casualties!

Thinking of this, Li Wei hurriedly closed the shop system and shifted his attention to Gotham City, using the vision granted by Mass Infatuation to inspect the situation.

Li Wei finally understood what had happened!

Good lord, a war had really broken out in Gotham.

That was right, a war!

The Maroni Family and the Falcone Family had gone to war!

The gangs were actually using nothing but heavy weapons in their fight!

Light machine guns, heavy machine guns—he had even seen rocket launchers in the hands of those gang members!

Even regular armies probably didn't have much more firepower than this, did they?

Gotham might have been Gotham, but even gangsters would never casually bring out weapons of mass destruction like rocket launchers under normal circumstances.

What gangs wanted was money and territory, not a field of ruins left behind after rocket bombardment.

Unless the war between both sides had already reached a certain level of intensity!

Greater firepower inevitably meant greater casualties, and that was one reason Li Wei's Soul Essence had surged!...

But...

That wasn't the main reason!

The main reason was Warwick, Ian, and Dr. Hugo.

The three were unstoppable in this war. Wherever they went, wails of misery followed.

Most of Li Wei's rapidly increasing Soul Essence balance came from their hands.

In Li Wei's view, this wasn't really a problem. Once the two major gangs officially went to war, these people would have died anyway. They were merely dying a little earlier.

The sooner they died, the sooner they could reincarnate!

The problem was that Warwick and the other two were exclusively hunting down Maroni Family members!

This war had originally been started by the Maroni Family. The Maroni Family had directly abandoned all sense of fair play, launching surprise attacks on Falcone Family strongholds with every kind of heavy weapon.

The Maroni Family held an absolute advantage.

Even after the Falcone Family reacted, they could only resist desperately. Such an enormous first-move advantage was not easily erased.

But with Warwick and the other two intervening, the gap between the sides gradually began to close.

By now, Falcone even held a slight advantage!

The tide had turned!

What Li Wei found most incredible was that the three of them had somehow reached a unanimous conclusion.

"Just killing all the Maroni Family members shouldn't count as too many casualties. It'll also cause a big enough commotion, so it completely meets the director's requirements."

When Li Wei heard those words come from the three of them, he froze completely.

Wiping out the Maroni Family didn't count as too many casualties?

How had they connected those two ideas?

Or did they have some kind of misunderstanding about what "not too many casualties" meant?

You guys were fucking unbelievable!

The Maroni Family was an underground overlord that controlled half the underworld.

Setting aside its strength, it had at least ten thousand members!

And that was only the number belonging directly to the Maroni Family, not including its branches or the smaller forces merely operating under its name!

The deaths of more than ten thousand people would be a major case even in Gotham!

Li Wei withdrew his gaze and glanced at his Soul Essence again.

Soul Essence: 7010

Mm, killing... made it rise fast.

Li Wei put on his robe, sat down in his office chair, lit a cigarette, and took a deep drag.

The feeling of nicotine entering his lungs made him somewhat nostalgic.

He had heard that high society people didn't smoke these things. They smoked cigars?

After Li Wei's thoughts drifted for a while before returning, he finally came to his senses.

He suddenly smiled.

That was right. Ten thousand deaths would indeed be a major case for Gotham.

But would he blame Warwick and the others, his own people, because of that?

Absolutely not!

Ten thousand deaths were a major case for Gotham, but not for him.

It was only ten thousand people. Compared to Gotham's population of over ten million, that was merely one thousandth.

It wasn't as if he had slaughtered the entire city.

It really didn't count as massive casualties.

Besides, the only reason he didn't want to cause too many casualties at once was so he wouldn't drain the pond dry.

The destruction of the Maroni Family would certainly trigger a massive reshuffling of Gotham's underworld.

A new order would bring new opportunities as well!

New outsiders would certainly pour into Gotham City too.

Things were simply flourishing!

Li Wei looked once more at his Soul Essence, which was still steadily rising.

Soul Essence: 7126

Mm, the efficiency was high. Perhaps by the time he woke up tomorrow morning, the balance would exceed ten thousand!

Maroni Family, farewell. Thank you for your generous contribution.

You were truly good people, and good people didn't live long in Gotham.

Didn't that complete the cycle perfectly?

After silently mourning Maroni for half a second, Li Wei took one final deep drag from his cigarette.

The flickering ember at its tip stood out vividly in the darkness.

Then Li Wei pressed that ember into the ashtray, extinguishing it completely.

"I'm really looking forward to it. Maybe tomorrow morning's harvest won't consist of Soul Essence alone..." Li Wei chuckled, got up, and lay back down on the bed.

With this income, he could go on a wild spending spree after waking up tomorrow!

This was a bed he had bought for one hundred thousand dollars!

As long as Gotham City hadn't been slaughtered, everything else was a minor issue!

Sleeping was more important!

A wild spending spree! Spending was mandatory!