30. Breakthrough?

As Lu Li came out holding the shotgun, someone sprang from around the corner and stabbed down at him.

A gang of traffickers had surrounded them, hoping to launch an ambush. But at this close range, the gun was even faster and more accurate.

Lu Li pulled the trigger. With a thunderous blast, he turned the attacker into a blood-spurting honeycomb.

Two more traffickers came at him, swinging their axes with all their might.

Lu Li fired on the spot and blasted one away. Then he racked the fore-end with a clack-clack, chambering another shell and blowing the second man's head apart like a rotten watermelon.

Three men had died in the blink of an eye, and the traffickers' ambush had fallen apart.

A small-time leader hurriedly shouted encouragement:

"He has to load a shell after every shot! Everybody, rush him together!"

"Let's fight this bastard!"

A crowd of traffickers charged at him with blades in hand. Some even hurled daggers from a distance.

Lu Li entered Spirit Concentration State. He tilted his head slightly, letting a knife skim past his ear, then raised his shotgun and fired!

Amid the roar, steel shot howled through flesh, turning the traffickers who had finally worked up the courage to charge into blood-soaked rags.

Then another shotgun roared. Xiao Cha had arrived.

It was clearly the girl's first time killing someone. Her whole body was shaking, but she had acted in hatred and shown no mercy.

They were only a gang of traffickers. How could they stand up to two shotguns? In just a few breaths, they were routed.

One man ran for the gate, but Lu Li shot him in the back and dropped him.

Another tried to climb the wall, but couldn't get past the barbed wire. Xiao Cha shot him dead, and his body hung there pitifully.

Only a few lucky ones managed to flee into the house.

A few had charged too far forward to escape. Seeing they had no chance of getting away, they tossed aside their weapons without hesitation and dropped to their knees to beg for mercy:

"Spare me, hero!"

"I have old folks and young children at home. My whole family depends on me..."

After the slaughter, the light in Lu Li's eyes could no longer be concealed.

As he watched the traffickers kowtow and beg for mercy, he asked softly, "Selling children is bad enough. Why go so far as to cripple them?"

Desperate to survive, the group didn't care about anything else. They hurriedly answered:

"It was all Steward Yi's doing. He wanted to go to the foreign concessions and extort money from the foreigners."

"That Yi fellow's a pervert. He likes torturing children!"

"Right! It has nothing to do with us!"

The traffickers clamored over one another, but in Lu Li's eyes, their faces overlapped with those of the Decapitation Gang members on Blue Star.

"They bully the weak, but when they meet someone stronger, they don't even dare admit what they've done. They're just things in human skin, pretending to be people."

Lu Li pulled the trigger. Amid the roar, he slaughtered the entire group of traffickers.

A few flecks of blood spattered across his fair face. When he turned around, he met Xiao Cha's complicated gaze.

The man before her had acted with decisive brutality. It was obvious this wasn't his first time, a stark contrast to his fair, refined appearance.

As Lu Li loaded shells into the gun, he seemed to be talking to himself:

"When I was very young, my great-grandfather told me he was only thirteen the first time he went into battle. He'd been terribly nervous. But the moment he raised his broadsword and hacked at the Devils, everything suddenly made sense."

"Whew..." Lu Li let out a long breath. "Now it makes sense to me, too. Turns out my convictions are pretty simple..."

At that moment, the boy's eyes shone like a collapsing galaxy.

His scattered thoughts and chaotic brain waves were gradually converging into "Alpha Waves."

These brain waves only appeared when a person's body and mind were in peak condition.

Before athletes delivered a world-class performance, their brains produced large quantities of "Alpha Waves."

When brain waves converged into "Alpha Waves," it meant a person was ready, had found their path, and had... conviction!

Xiao Cha stared at Lu Li, her face full of disbelief—this man was about to enter Meditative Entry!

Even more unbelievable was Yi Qingchuan!

Yi Qingchuan had arrived half a minute ago, but hadn't rushed to attack. He wanted to see what the newcomer was made of.

But that brief delay had let him witness what it meant to "break through in the middle of battle"!

Yi Qingchuan was stunned. "This is bad! He's entering Meditative Entry! I absolutely can't let him break through!"

Spirit Refinement was intimately connected to the human brain. Breaking through wasn't as simple as hearing a "ding"—it took time.

Yi Qingchuan was going to snuff out his breakthrough before it could happen!

His expression turned vicious, and he instantly sprang forward as a black blur!

His explosive speed could reach eighty kilometers per hour, carrying him twenty meters in a single second!

What was more, he used a unique movement technique to make himself smaller and slimmer, an inconspicuous blur.

Before Xiao Cha could react, Yi Qingchuan had already closed to within ten meters of Lu Li. He was about to kill him!

At that very instant, Lu Li turned with ease and met Yi Qingchuan's gaze.

The slowdown from Bullet Time had increased from 0.7 speed to 0.6!

In Lu Li's eyes, his enemy's speed was no longer beyond his reach.

With a deafening boom, he locked onto his target, pulled the trigger, and fired.

The hairs on Yi Qingchuan's back stood on end. He suddenly changed direction and dodged the shot!

Only then did Xiao Cha realize an enemy had attacked.

But she couldn't make out his movements at all. Her eyes dazzled as she fired two wild shots that didn't come close to hitting him.

Only Lu Li could keep up with his opponent. He repeatedly racked the fore-end to load shells and kept firing to suppress him.

Yi Qingchuan darted back and forth like a nimble leopard, changing direction and using the courtyard's water jars and trees to dodge every blast as he looked for a chance to close in.

He wasn't in a hurry, even if he couldn't get close.

The other man had a hunting rifle from the Anglo-Saxon Federation. It could hold at most eight shells. Once they were gone, Lu Li would be dead!

But the next sight left Yi Qingchuan dumbfounded!

Every few shots, Lu Li would instantly pull out a shell and push it into the magazine!

His movements were smooth and unhurried. He didn't even need to look down, and his suppressive fire never stopped.

The Alpha Waves were gradually changing Lu Li's brain.

He felt as if his body and mind were connected. Every muscle and every part of him had become as nimble as his index finger and thumb.

Yi Qingchuan's heart clenched. This was what countless martial artists dreamed of—Body Follows Will!

Having effortless control over every part of one's body was a blessing brought by Spirit Refinement's Meditative Entry!

"This boy is just one step away from breaking through!"

Yi Qingchuan was filled with regret. He should have rushed in and fought to the death right from the start!

But it wasn't too late to make amends.

In the end, the man was still just a cripple!

And by sheer coincidence, the traffickers who had fled into the house came charging out, holding up a sturdy jujube-wood table!

They wanted to prove their loyalty and earn credit, but they were also terrified by Lu Li's bloodthirstiness.

Knowing there was no way to make peace today, they were desperate to kill this murderous star.

And Lu Li seemed to have made a mistake in the midst of the chaos. He actually wasted his precious shells blasting the jujube-wood table.

The blasts punched three huge holes through it and killed the traffickers, but they also gave Yi Qingchuan an opening!

He took a deep breath. His thighs swelled abruptly, and with a single burst of force, he became a low, black blur. In the blink of an eye, he dashed toward Lu Li's face in a zigzag pattern!

This was Yi Qingchuan's signature skill—Treading Snow to Find Plum Blossoms.

A smile of assured victory appeared on his face. He was about to smash Lu Li to pieces.

But he had no idea that Lu Li had been hoping for an opportunity just like this!

Shotgun shells took up quite a bit of space, and he was almost out of the few he had in his pocket.

Besides, at a distance, a gun was merely fast. Up close, it was both fast and accurate!