Outwitting Blood Axe

Darkness rushed in.

Lin Xiao shut the iron door at the pipe entrance behind him, its hinges letting out a piercing screech. Darkness instantly swallowed everything. Only the firelight from the burning maintenance workshop in the distance seeped through the crack beneath the door, casting wavering dark-red shadows across the damp walls. Grey Falcon sat slumped against the wall, breathing heavily and unevenly. Blood loss was rapidly draining his body heat. One soldier fumbled for his tactical flashlight and switched it on. The beam cut through the darkness, revealing beads of condensation and spreading mold along the pipe walls. In the distance, heavy blows rang out from the other side of the iron door—the pursuers had arrived.

"Captain..." Grey Falcon's voice was so weak it was almost inaudible.

Lin Xiao crouched down, tore away the blood-soaked temporary bandage around Grey Falcon's arm, and pulled a first-aid kit from his tactical vest. "Hang on." His voice echoed through the enclosed pipe. "We're not done yet."

Under the flashlight beam, the wound was horrifying. The bullet had grazed the outside of Grey Falcon's left arm, tearing open a gash deep enough to expose bone. He had narrowly avoided arterial damage, but the blood loss had already reached a critical level. Lin Xiao sprinkled hemostatic powder over it. The powder hissed faintly upon touching the wound. Grey Falcon's body abruptly tensed, his teeth grinding together.

"Bear with it."

Lin Xiao bandaged him swiftly, his movements precise and efficient. The battlefield first-aid experience he had accumulated in his previous life finally came in handy. He knew that if Grey Falcon could not reach proper medical treatment within ten minutes, shock would take his life.

But Blood Axe's men were outside.

The pounding grew heavier. The iron door trembled, dust sifting down from the frame. It would not hold for long.

"Captain, what do we do?" a soldier asked quietly, despair in his voice. His name was Crow, Grey Falcon's youngest subordinate. His face still carried traces of youthful innocence, but it was now smeared with blood and ash.

Lin Xiao did not answer immediately. He stood, sweeping the flashlight through the pipe. This was an old main conduit, roughly two meters in diameter, stretching ahead into bottomless darkness. The air carried a pungent, stale mixture of rust, mildew, and some kind of chemical residue. Emergency lights were mounted along the ceiling every ten meters or so, but most had failed. Only a scattered few still flickered, emitting faint yellow light.

He closed his eyes, his mind racing.

Forcing their way out would be suicide. Blood Axe had brought at least fifteen people, and they were probably all outside the door now. They were well-equipped and had heavy firepower, while his side—six people, four injured, one seriously wounded, and almost out of ammunition.

He needed to create chaos and an opening.

Lin Xiao opened his eyes and removed the encrypted Purge Squad communicator he had seized from his belt. Its black casing gleamed coldly in the dim light. He pressed the power button. The screen lit up, displaying a list of channels—seven encrypted channels used internally by the Radical Faction, each with its own codename.

Back in the maintenance workshop, he had heard Blood Axe communicating with his men. One of them had a rough male voice, codename Iron Hammer, a minor leader under Blood Axe responsible for the outer perimeter.

Lin Xiao adjusted his breathing, recalling that voice's tone, rhythm, and accent.

He switched to Channel Three—the channel Iron Hammer had used earlier.

Then he pressed the transmit button.

"Captain Blood Axe!" Lin Xiao imitated the rough voice, making it urgent and terrified. He even deliberately added ragged breaths, as if he were calling while running. "Fletcher led men in a surprise attack on the underground laboratory entrance! They're taking the sample! Requesting immediate support!"

Silence filled the communicator for several seconds.

Only Grey Falcon's heavy breathing and the distant pounding against the iron door remained in the pipe. Crow and the other three soldiers held their breath, staring fixedly at the communicator in Lin Xiao's hand. Dust drifted slowly through the flashlight beam.

Then a response came through.

"What?!" It was Blood Axe's voice—violent, furious, and stunned beyond belief. "That old fox Fletcher! How dare he—"

"Captain, there are too many of them!" Lin Xiao continued the imitation, injecting just the right amount of panic into his voice. "At least twenty! We can't hold them! If they take the sample—"

"Damn it!" Blood Axe's roar nearly blew out the speaker. "Finish things here now! Leave two men to watch those wounded stragglers! Everyone else follows me to the laboratory!"

The communication cut off.

The pipe fell silent.

Then the pounding on the other side of the iron door stopped.

Heavy footsteps sounded, rapidly receding. Someone shouted, "Captain said leave two behind! Move!"

"Who's staying?"

"You and me! Everyone else, go!"

The footsteps split into two groups. One hurried away into the distance, at least ten people strong. The other—only two people—remained outside the door.

Lin Xiao slowly exhaled. His palms were slick with sweat.

It worked.

He had lured the tiger from the mountain.

"Captain..." Grey Falcon weakly raised his head, his eyes filled with a mixture of shock and admiration. "How did you..."

"I'll explain later." Lin Xiao tucked the communicator back onto his belt. "For now, we deal with those two outside."

He signaled for Crow and the other three soldiers to stay quiet, then silently moved to the iron door. Pressing an ear against the cold metal, he listened carefully.

Outside, the two guards were talking.

"Damn it, why do we have to stay behind?" a young voice complained.

"Quit whining." The other voice was steadier. "The captain told us to guard the place, so we guard it. Those wounded leftovers inside aren't going anywhere."

"But the laboratory—"

"None of our damn business. Whether they get the sample or not is the captain's problem."

There was a brief silence. Then the younger guard spoke again. "Do you think Fletcher really dared to take the sample? That's Asset K..."

"Who knows? That old bastard is crafty. Maybe he's had his eye on it all along."

As Lin Xiao listened, his mind analyzed the information. Fletcher—one of the Conservative Faction's upper ranks, responsible for logistics and resource allocation. If Blood Axe believed Fletcher was taking the sample, then whatever was in the laboratory had enormous value—enough for the factions to tear each other apart over it.

But the question was—was Fletcher really in the laboratory?

Or had his fake message accidentally hit upon some hidden truth?

Lin Xiao shook his head and pushed those thoughts aside for now. This was not the time to dwell on them.

He took two steps back and gestured to Crow. Crow nodded, raising the submachine gun in his hands—it had been taken from a dead Purge Squad member, and the magazine was still half full.

Lin Xiao pointed at the iron door, then held up three fingers.

Three.

Two.

One.

He yanked the iron door open!

The hinges gave a shrill screech. Outside, the two guards turned at the same time, their guns rising—

Crow opened fire.

The submachine gun sprayed bullets across the doorway, not at the men but at the ground in front of their feet. The concrete exploded, sending fragments flying. Both guards instinctively leaped backward, their gun barrels dipping reflexively.

In that instant, Lin Xiao moved.

He burst from behind the door like a hunting leopard. His first target—the younger guard. Lin Xiao grabbed the man's gun barrel with his left hand and shoved it upward. His right-hand dagger had already struck. The blade pierced the side of the guard's neck with precision, avoiding the artery but severing enough nerve pathways. The young guard froze, his eyes widening. A wet rattling sound escaped his throat before he crumpled to the ground.

The second guard reacted faster. He jumped back and raised his gun at Lin Xiao. But Lin Xiao had already anticipated the move—while taking down the first target, his body had continued forward with the momentum, and his right leg snapped out.

His boot struck the man's wrist.

With a crack, the wrist bone broke.

The guard screamed, his pistol flying from his hand. Lin Xiao gave him no chance. He seized the man's collar with his left hand and yanked him forward, then drove his right knee viciously into his abdomen. The guard grunted, his body folding like a shrimp. Lin Xiao released him, and he collapsed to the floor, curling up in agony.

The entire process took less than five seconds.

Crow and the other soldiers rushed through the door, their guns trained on the two incapacitated guards. The younger one had already passed out, blood slowly seeping from the wound on his neck. The older man clutched his stomach, face white as paper, but his eyes glared viciously at Lin Xiao.

"Y-you... who are you?" he rasped.

Lin Xiao did not answer. He crouched and quickly searched the two men. Aside from standard gear, he found a folded paper map in the older guard's inner pocket—a detailed floor plan of the underground laboratory area, with several locations marked in red.

"Sample storage... main control room... emergency exit..." Lin Xiao scanned the map quickly, memorizing the key information.

Then he stood.

"Captain, what do we do with them?" Crow asked, his gun aimed at the guards on the floor.

Lin Xiao glanced at Grey Falcon. Supported by two soldiers, Grey Falcon had barely managed to stand, but his face was as pale as paper.

"Tie them up, gag them, and throw them into the pipe," Lin Xiao said. "We don't have time, and we don't have mercy to spare."

The soldiers acted quickly. Using the guards' own shoelaces and strips torn from cloth, they bound their hands and feet tightly, stuffed cloth gags into their mouths, and dragged them deep into the dark pipe. Lin Xiao shut the iron door again and wedged an iron bar through the latch from the inside. It was crude, but it would at least buy them time.

Now they were back in the corridor outside the maintenance workshop.

In the distance, the fire in the workshop was still burning, though it had weakened considerably. Thick smoke poured through the cracks around the door, gathering beneath the corridor ceiling like gray clouds. The air was filled with the smell of charring and the acrid stench of burned chemicals.

Supporting Grey Falcon, Lin Xiao moved quickly through the corridor. His mind processed multiple threads of information at once: Grey Falcon's injuries required immediate treatment; they had to evacuate as soon as possible; but Blood Axe had gone to the laboratory, and if Fletcher was truly there, a firefight between the two sides might destroy the sample and data; and that sample and data were likely the key to uncovering the truth behind the Asset K experiment...

"Captain, where are we going?" Crow asked, his voice echoing down the empty corridor.

Lin Xiao stopped.

There was a fork ahead. The left route led toward the base's main exit. In theory, they could loop back to the rendezvous point at the Observation Station—Su Ying and the others should already be there. The right route led to the underground laboratory area.

Blood Axe had gone right.

Lin Xiao looked at Grey Falcon. His breathing was growing weaker, and nearly all his weight was pressing against Lin Xiao's shoulder. His body temperature was dropping, a sign of shock.

"Grey Falcon needs a doctor," Lin Xiao said in a low voice. "Now."

"But the laboratory—" Crow hesitated.

"I know," Lin Xiao cut him off.

He closed his eyes. Fragments of memories from his previous life surfaced—opportunities missed because of insufficient information, prices paid because of hesitation. In this life, he had sworn he would do better. But reality was that he could not save everyone, and he could not seize every opportunity.

He had to choose.

"You four." Lin Xiao opened his eyes and looked at Crow and the other three soldiers. "Take Grey Falcon and go left. Avoid the main passage. Use the ventilation ducts. Go to the Observation Station rendezvous point. Su Ying and Dr. Anna should already be there. Tell Su Ying that Grey Falcon needs emergency treatment. If Nightingale has a medical kit, use it. If not, find a way to contact the outside."

"Captain, what about you?" Crow asked.

Lin Xiao looked down the corridor to the right. From deep within the darkness came faint, distant gunfire—not scattered exchanges, but intense sustained shooting. The laboratory battle had clearly begun.

"I'm going to take a look," Lin Xiao said. "The sample and data cannot fall into Blood Axe's hands. And if Fletcher really is taking the sample, then whatever is in that laboratory is more important than we imagined."

"That's too dangerous!" one soldier blurted. "Blood Axe took more than a dozen men there. If you go now, it's basically—"

"Basically suicide?" Lin Xiao smiled, though there was no warmth in it. "Maybe. But some things have to be done by someone."

He removed another communicator from his belt—the one he had taken from the second guard—and tuned it to the same channel. Then he looked at Crow.

"You leave. Now. Don't look back."

Crow gritted his teeth, then finally nodded. He and another soldier supported Grey Falcon, while the other two took point, quickly heading down the left corridor. Their footsteps gradually faded, disappearing into the depths of the darkness.

Lin Xiao stood where he was, listening to those footsteps recede until they vanished completely.

Then he turned and walked down the right corridor.

Darkness wrapped around him like something tangible. The emergency lights became even more sparse, and some sections were completely black, forcing him to rely on his flashlight. The smell in the air changed—the rust and mildew were gradually replaced by disinfectant and the harsh odor of some chemical reagent. Pipes and cables began to line the walls, alongside warning signs that read: "Laboratory Area. Unauthorized Personnel Prohibited."

The gunfire grew clearer.

This was not a distant firefight but a fierce close-range clash. The sustained bursts of automatic weapons, the single cracks of pistols, and explosions—not grenades, but more like equipment rupturing after being shot through.

Lin Xiao switched off his flashlight and advanced slowly along the wall. His eyes gradually adapted to the darkness, allowing him to barely make out the corridor's outline. About fifty meters ahead, light flickered at the end of the hallway—not steady illumination, but flashing red and blue.

Alarm lights.

Something had happened in the laboratory.

Lin Xiao quickened his pace while remaining concealed. He passed a shattered observation window and saw a small preparation room inside. Tables and chairs had been overturned, documents were scattered everywhere, and dark fluid—blood—was splashed across the walls.

He continued forward.

At the end of the corridor stood a heavy blast door, now half open. Bullet holes marked the frame, and blood stained the door itself. The flickering light spilled through the gap.

Lin Xiao pressed himself against the door and cautiously peeked inside.

What he saw made his pupils constrict.

It was a massive underground space, at least ten meters high. Rows of laboratory benches and equipment filled the center, most of them overturned or destroyed. Glass fragments blanketed the floor, reflecting countless red points beneath the flashing alarm lights. Thick smoke and a cloying chemical odor filled the air, stinging his eyes.

But the most eye-catching thing was the object in the center of the room.

A cylindrical transparent incubation chamber, around three meters in diameter and more than five meters tall. The chamber was made of thick specialized glass, yet it was now covered in spiderweb-like cracks. Pale green liquid filled the inside, and floating within it was—

Lin Xiao's breathing stopped for a moment.

It was a humanoid figure.

No, not entirely human. It had a human outline, but its skin was translucent, revealing fluorescent material flowing inside. Its limbs were unnaturally thin, and its head had no facial features, only a smooth curved surface. It floated motionlessly in the liquid, but Lin Xiao could feel it—it was "watching" the outside world.

Was this Asset K?

And around the incubation chamber, a fierce battle was underway.

Two groups were exchanging fire. One group wore the black combat uniforms of the Purge Squad, roughly seven or eight people. Using lab benches and equipment as cover, they fired at the other group. The other group wore the gray uniforms of the Conservative Faction. Their numbers were about the same, but their formation was more scattered, as if they were trying to approach the incubation chamber.

Lin Xiao spotted Blood Axe.

The towering man stood behind a smashed centrifuge, gripping a light machine gun and firing wildly. Blood and ash smeared his face. His expression was savage, and he was shouting something, but the gunfire was too loud to make it out.

And on the other side—

Lin Xiao's eyes swept across the Conservative Faction's positions. Then he saw him.

An elderly man with graying hair, wearing a laboratory coat but holding a pistol as he crouched behind a control console. One lens of his glasses was broken, and his face was scraped, but his eyes were sharp and calm.

Fletcher.

He really was here.

Lin Xiao's mind raced. His fake message had become true—Fletcher was indeed trying to seize the sample. But why? As a senior figure in the Conservative Faction, why would he risk a direct confrontation with Blood Axe? Unless the thing inside the incubation chamber was important enough to make him disregard everything else.

The gunfire suddenly intensified.

Blood Axe's men launched a charge. Three of them rushed out from behind cover, firing as they advanced toward the incubation chamber. The Conservative Faction soldiers returned fire desperately. Bullets struck metal equipment, showering sparks. One Conservative Faction soldier was hit in the chest and fell backward, blood splattering across a control-screen display.

Fletcher shouted, "Hold the control console! Don't let them activate the destruction protocol!"

Destruction protocol?

Lin Xiao looked toward the main console beside the incubation chamber. Red warning text flashed across the screen, and a countdown was ticking down—03:47, 03:46...

Someone had activated the self-destruct sequence.

And Blood Axe's men were trying to charge over to cancel it—or perhaps seize the sample before it was destroyed.

Chaos. Absolute chaos.

Lin Xiao stayed behind the door, calculating. If he stepped out now, he would be facing fire from both sides. But if he did nothing, the incubation chamber and the thing inside it would be destroyed in three minutes. And that thing—whatever it was—likely held the truth behind the Asset K experiment.

He needed to create even greater chaos.

His eyes swept across the laboratory. Along the left wall stood a row of gas storage tanks labeled "Liquid Nitrogen," "Oxygen," and "Argon." On the right were electrical distribution boxes and main cable conduits. The central incubation chamber was connected to dozens of pipes and cables, several of which had already been severed by stray bullets and were spraying gas or liquid.

A plan took shape in his mind.

Lin Xiao removed the communicator and tuned it to Blood Axe's team channel.

Then he pressed the transmit button, this time imitating another voice—a younger, more panicked one, matching the tone of one of the guards he had heard outside earlier.

"Captain! Captain! Something's wrong!" he shouted urgently, his voice trembling for real this time. "Conservative Faction reinforcements are flanking us from behind! At least twenty people! We're surrounded!"

Blood Axe's roar came through the communicator. "What?! Where are they?!"

"The ventilation ducts! They came in through the ventilation ducts! They're moving toward our rear!"

"Damn it! Send half the men back to block them!" Blood Axe roared. "The rest of you keep charging with me! We have to get the sample before it's destroyed!"

Perfect.

Lin Xiao cut the transmission and watched the laboratory change. Sure enough, four or five people split away from Blood Axe's group and rapidly moved toward the rear entrance—the very entrance where Lin Xiao was positioned. Blood Axe himself led the remaining men in an even more frantic assault on the incubation chamber.

The pressure on the Conservative Faction surged.

Fletcher's men were pinned down, unable to raise their heads. Bullets rained against their cover. One soldier was shot in the head and died on the spot. Fletcher himself crouched behind the control console, his face livid, but his fingers continued flying across the keyboard—was he trying to accelerate the destruction protocol?

Lin Xiao hesitated no longer.

He took a grenade from his belt—the only one, taken from the first guard. He pulled the pin, held it in his hand, and counted silently.

Three.

Two.

One.

He hurled the grenade at the row of gas storage tanks on the left side of the laboratory.

The grenade arced through the air.

One of Blood Axe's men saw it and shouted, "Grenade!"

But it was too late.

The grenade landed between a liquid nitrogen tank and an oxygen tank.

An explosion.

Not a violent explosion, but a dull, muffled burst. Then the storage tanks ruptured. The liquid nitrogen instantly vaporized at room temperature, and white, freezing mist surged out, sweeping across half the laboratory like an avalanche. The oxygen tank ruptured at the same time, high-pressure oxygen mixing with the nitrogen mist to create a lethal, oxygen-rich cryogenic environment.

The temperature plummeted.

Even from outside the door, Lin Xiao could feel the bone-chilling cold rushing toward him. Inside the laboratory, white mist filled the air, dropping visibility to zero in an instant. The gunfire stopped, replaced by terrified shouts and coughing.

"I can't see!"

"Cold! It's too cold!"

"The oxygen concentration is too high! It could explode!"

Chaos. Absolute chaos.

Lin Xiao put on the gas mask taken from a guard—crude as it was, it was better than nothing—and rushed into the laboratory. The white mist felt almost solid, and his flashlight beam reached only two or three meters ahead. Relying on memory, he moved toward the incubation chamber.

He stepped on something—shattered glass, and warm liquid. Blood. He avoided it and kept moving.

Fighting sounds came from ahead.

Through the mist, Lin Xiao saw two figures grappling. One was Blood Axe's man, the other a Conservative Faction soldier. They fought in the freezing fog, their movements slowed by the cold. Lin Xiao did not stop, circling around them.

The incubation chamber was right ahead.

Pale green liquid sloshed within the cracked chamber. The humanoid creature still floated inside, but Lin Xiao noticed—its "head" had turned. Though it had no eyes, Lin Xiao could feel that it was "looking" at him.

Beside the main console, Fletcher was fighting one of Blood Axe's men. The old man was clearly no match for the younger man and had been pinned against the console, his pistol knocked away. The other man raised a dagger, about to drive it down—

Lin Xiao fired.

The pistol round struck the man in the shoulder. He screamed, and the dagger slipped from his hand. Fletcher seized the chance to break free, snatched up the pistol from the floor, and smashed the butt into the back of the man's head. The man collapsed and did not move.

Fletcher turned to look at Lin Xiao. Behind the gas mask, his eyes were as sharp as an eagle's.

"Who are you?" he asked, his voice muffled by the mask.

"Someone helping you," Lin Xiao said, turning his gaze to the console screen.

Countdown: 01:23, 01:22...

"Can you stop the destruction program?" Lin Xiao asked.

Fletcher shook his head. "Once the program starts, it can't be stopped. It's the highest-level security protocol."

"What about the sample?"

Fletcher looked toward the incubation chamber. The translucent humanoid creature was slowly raising one "hand" and pressing it against the inside of the chamber, directly toward them.

"It's awake," Fletcher said quietly, his voice carrying some complicated emotion—fear? Awe? Or something else?

Lin Xiao looked at the incubation chamber. The outline of that "hand" was clearly visible in the pale green liquid. Its five fingers were slender, the fingertips slightly curled, as if touching the glass.

Then the cracks on the chamber began to spread.

Crack.

Crack, crack.

The fine sounds of shattering were like ice breaking. Starting from where that "hand" touched the surface, the cracks spread in every direction, webbing across the entire chamber.

"It's coming out," Fletcher said, raising his pistol.

Lin Xiao raised his gun as well. But he was not sure—should he shoot? Shoot what? That creature? Or the chamber about to break apart?

Countdown: 00:47, 00:46...

There was not much time left.

And just then, Blood Axe's furious roar came from within the white mist.

"Find them! Kill them! The sample is mine!"

Heavy footsteps were closing in.