Researchers Should Be Proficient in Combat

The Azure Demon Bear Beast was a wind-and-water dual-element Magic Beast that lived around rivers and coastal glaciers, surviving by catching fish and hunting seals.

What it excelled at most was using its peerless brute strength to snap trees, block off sections of river, and create small dams to catch the fish within—or relying on its immense strength and speed to knock seals unconscious with tree branches.

This showed that the Azure Demon Bear Beast was not stupid. Its intelligence simply could not perfectly bring its own strength into play.

And now, the muscles in the Azure Demon Bear Beast's arms contracted and twisted layer by layer. In the past, this had been the prelude to gathering wind pressure and swatting fish with its paws.

But now, this instinctive use of strength had been infused with martial skill. Origin Matter was precisely mobilized, stimulating its muscles and gathering like a vortex, pressurizing its wind force and arm strength again and again and again.

Then, it was released.

In that instant, a terrifying bear paw tore through the gale, made the atmosphere whimper, and blasted out a vacuum as it thundered forth.

—Sublimation martial skill, City-Breaking Palm!

"Are you kidding me?!"

Even the well-traveled Teres's pupils tightened at that moment. He immediately mobilized Origin Matter, raising his sword crosswise as a shield, and swiftly retreated to adjust his angle and evade the bear beast's city-destroying strike.

But even so, he was still a little too slow.

With a sharp crack, his entire body was sent flying by the bear beast's paw. He crashed into the wall of a three-story building, leaving behind a human-shaped hole.

Cracks spread without end. The entire building rapidly shook and collapsed. Wind-aspect Origin Matter, spreading and pulverizing everything in its path, could destroy even city walls—let alone a small building.

But at that moment, a figure burst through the rubble burying the building. A streak of azure sword light flashed through the air as he launched another attack.

Teres had not fallen—Sublimated, especially armored Sublimated, were extremely hard to put down.

Though he looked disheveled, with a huge bear-paw print on his armor, Teres himself was completely unharmed. At most, his sluggish brain was gradually starting to turn again, while his chest felt a little tight.

"Try this!"

This time, Teres truly regarded the bear beast before him as an opponent. A fierce wind erupted beneath his feet. He flashed forward and thrust in, slashing at the bear beast's right knee and forcing it to pull back its leg to defend. Yet its body tilted as a result, swept by the turbulent flow and thrown into a building on the other side, smashing through its wall.

Stone fragments and invisible air blades pulverized themselves and everything they struck the instant of impact, blasting out one depression after another and erupting into vast clouds of dust and rubble.

In less than three seconds, two three-story buildings had shattered and collapsed from the aftershocks of their battle.

"I warned you."

Shaking his head slightly, Ian was not worried that Teres would lose.

Teres might not have been among the very best in the Inspecting Knights Order, but outside of it, he was absolutely a genius capable of challenging opponents across minor ranks within the same Energy Level.

Even Viscount Avak had failed to gain an advantage against him. What could a mere bear beast that only knew a couple of martial skills do?

What concerned Ian more was that the team's progress would be delayed—he had already seen that the survivors in the laboratory were planning to flee. They had sent out the strongest force at their disposal precisely to hold them back and buy time to destroy or take away the documents.

That was unacceptable.

"Miss Hua An, help keep things under control. In a moment, around two or three Phantoms will come from the left—their main force has all been sent over. They want to keep us stuck here."

Silver-blue halos flickered in Ian's eyes as he swept his gaze over the surrounding streets, and sure enough, saw what he had wanted to see.

He turned his head and quietly instructed the fairy lady, "If things become critical, have Miss Mo Feng lend a hand too. The mutation information we've gathered this time is already enough to complete the mission, so don't be so diligent about writing the report. We might have to rewrite it later."

"That isn't a problem. Mo Feng doesn't like rewriting reports either." Influenced by Ian, Hua An also leaned close and whispered into his ear, "But what are you going to do?"

"We can't keep tangled up in battle like this. I'm going to find the route to the research room." Ian said without changing expression, "You know this is the Second Prince's mission... I'll be back in no time."

"Be careful." Being a fairy, Hua An surprisingly did not think this was a bad idea. Instead, she waved her parasol staff to cheer Ian on. "It would be best if you could capture a few prisoners!"

"Of course."

Saying so, he patted Frost Butterfly's little head, signaling for her not to follow him. Then, beneath the gazes of the two fairy ladies, he vanished at the far end of the street.

Underground, the ruined laboratory was filled with the air of frantic activity. Researchers and guards alike were moving materials as quickly as possible, preparing to leave.

The Azure City laboratory had no idea what had happened at the central laboratory, so when the crisis erupted, they chose to hold their ground and wait for Grand Duke Solin's support.

But several days had now passed. The Grand Duke's forces had yet to arrive, while the Empire's inspecting knights and other troops had come in two or three waves. They no longer held any hope for reinforcements.

Especially since this time, a young White Folk had even seen through that fact directly via the surveillance lenses. It had frightened many researchers out of their wits, leaving them utterly at a loss.

"Is it really reliable to send out the bear beast?"

At that moment, the gray-haired director was locking a briefcase stuffed with important documents.

His deputy, pale-faced, asked, "Director, honestly, it was already fortunate enough that those previous Phantoms did not lose control... The will-overwrite program has not been fully completed. Aside from a small number of test subjects, at most we can only hypnotize those Phantoms and aberrant beasts into believing that we are 'their own kind'..."

"They may not do as we tell them!"

"Enough nonsense. This counts as an experiment too. Trying it is better than not trying it at all!"

The gray-haired director looked at his deputy with indifferent eyes—the man was indeed broadly learned and deeply knowledgeable in his specialty, but he was always far too cautious.

But a true scientist had to dare to do what ordinary people dared not attempt... especially when their research was advancing for humanity's future. What was a little risk?

In any case, they would not be the ones dying.

With that thought, he still patiently lowered his voice and told his deputy, "Don't worry. Though these monsters are not fully under our control, because of the unknown loss of control at the central laboratory, as long as they encounter enemies, they will attempt to destroy them by every means possible."

"The nightmare-fused Azure Demon Bear Beast is an important test subject of the biological experiment group, and every one of them is dead—do you understand what that means? As long as we can obtain even a little data from the battle between the bear beast and the inspecting knight... the credit will be ours!"

"As for whether the bear beast will go berserk or turn around and attack us... haha, we'll have run away by then."

As his deputy's expression turned to realization and admiration, the gray-haired director smiled and nodded. Then his face hardened. "Understand? Move faster. Go pack up the documents!"

Watching his deputy scamper off to gather the documents, the director's formerly smiling expression gradually darkened.

—Damn it. The Grand Duke forbade subordinate laboratories like ours from using memory lattices to store data, leaving us with only paper records. It was definitely to stop us from secretly passing messages out...

Thinking this, he muttered through gritted teeth, "This is going to be hard..."

Some people were not unwilling to sell out their country. They simply could not find the channel to do it, the means to do it, or a good enough price for doing it.

Though the Grand Duke's territory was not yet a country, according to the gray-haired director's prediction, if this experiment had not gone terribly wrong, the Grand Duke would probably declare independence before the end of this year or early next year.

The gray-haired director was no fool. Though he ate the Grand Duke's bread, he had no intention of being crushed by the Empire alongside Grand Duke Solin.

Of course, he also knew that since Grand Duke Solin dared to do this, he must have some move in reserve. The man had definitely grasped some trump card that made him unafraid of the Empire's armies bearing down upon him, which was why he dared to turn the tables and declare independence.

But he did not know what it was!

And precisely because he did not know, the gray-haired director knew full well that he was probably not on the Grand Duke's list of people to protect.

In that case, taking his research results and defecting to the Spirit Cognition Institute should be a good choice.

Not long ago, he had also received an invitation from the Spirit Cognition Institute.

If not for the accident at the central laboratory, he might already have taken the documents and returned to the imperial capital with the Spirit Cognition Institute's envoy... How could he have ended up trapped in this godforsaken place?

Now, the guards belonged to the Grand Duke, and the other researchers were loyal to him as well. If he still wanted to betray the Grand Duke and join the Spirit Cognition Institute, then this director would be thrown to the aberrant beasts as feed!

There was no helping it... he could only pretend he was still one of the Grand Duke's people.

He could only force himself to be a little patriotic.

With such unwilling thoughts in mind, the gray-haired director looked again at the light screen in the central control room.

How is the battle going?

He looked toward Teres and the Azure Demon Bear Beast. The two sides were still deadlocked, having already fought their way seven streets away and brought down more than a dozen buildings.

If they had sufficient equipment, those at the Second Energy Level could even breach a city alone. Power at this level was entirely normal.

"How could this be?" Raising his brows, the gray-haired director felt something was not quite right. "After that previous squad of inspecting knights was ambushed, they also held out for several minutes, but they were still turned into pulp beneath the Azure Demon Bear's strength and martial skill—could this knight really be so strong?"

"Forget it." He stretched out a hand, revealing a bloodthirsty, deranged smile. "It's a half-failed test subject anyway. Remove the bear monster's restrictions... tear them apart!"

Though he was a Sublimated himself, as a researcher, he actually could not tell which side held the advantage in battle—but since they were running anyway, failed biological weapons that could not be completely controlled had no value in existing.

It would be perfect for covering their retreat.

Clearly, the gray-haired director's thinking was wrong.

Because researchers ought to be proficient in combat.

Just like now.

"Oh?"

An ice sword that chilled one to the heart pierced through the gray-haired director's shoulder blade, resting diagonally behind his heart.

Ian's voice sounded faintly. "Who did you want to tear apart?"