Shadow Mist

At midnight, the harbor lay as silent as a graveyard beneath the deep sea. The sea wind carried the stench of rotting seaweed and rust, whimpering through the container canyons like the cries of lost souls. Searchlights, like the pallid eyes of giant serpents, swept futilely through sea fog thick as ink, illuminating rust tears running down the containers. In the distance, the lighthouse beam resembled the single eye of a dying beast, casting warped, trembling patches of light across the black sea and making the scene even more eerie.

Xiang Yi sat cross-legged in the absolute darkness of his room, the curtains shutting out the last trace of outside light. His eyes were closed, his breathing faint as a thread, and his body twitched slightly from the tremendous drain. A cold system interface floated in his mind's eye, scarlet numbers dripping like blood:

[Mental Power: 105/150 (continuing to plummet like a draining blood bar)]

[Energy Points: 0/300]

Two resilient mental links, like tempered steel cables, pierced through space and remained tightly fastened to the edge of the harbor. One was cold and sharp, transmitting tearing agony and numbness like countless ice needles stabbing into flesh; the other was vast and profound, carrying the trajectories of revolving stars. Every convulsion of pain from Lanling King's wounds struck Xiang Yi's temples like a sledgehammer! Every icy numbness fed back by the toxin made his own fingertips feel as though they had fallen into an ice pit! Maintaining these two "spider threads" across space was madly draining his already exhausted sea of consciousness!

Target: "East Sea Freighter—Hold 7." The smuggled relics were merely a cover. The possible Pure Energy Crystals were the key to turning everything around!

"Sir, location." Xiang Yi issued the command through the mental link, forcibly suppressing the pain of his soul being torn apart. His voice was taut as a steel wire.

"My lord, the target freighter is docked at berth C7. Locked on." Guiguzi's reply rang directly through his consciousness, carrying a tranquil force that soothed the unrest. "The vessel is 185 meters long with three decks. The target hatch is on the lower port side amidships. Guard deployment: four deck patrols, in pairs, crossing the lower passage entrance every five minutes. Two fixed sentries inside, positioned on either side of Hold 7's door. An infrared sensor grid covers the door and the first half of the passage. A faint energy fluctuation has been detected inside. Confirmed location: a metal crate in the front-left corner."

The freighter's structural layout, guard positions, patrol routes, and infrared grid coverage unfolded clearly in Xiang Yi's mind like a holographic projection. Xuan Weizi was this invisible eye.

"Lanling King, status." His thoughts shifted to the other burning link.

"No issue, my lord." The reply remained cold as a blade. Yet Xiang Yi could clearly "feel" the stiff spasms of muscle at the other end of the link, as well as the sluggish flow of energy under the toxin's corrosion—the deadly poison of Demon Cutter was frantically devouring this sharp blade.

"The plan remains unchanged. Sir Guiguzi, create a disturbance and draw away the guards at the lower passage entrance. Lanling King, infiltrate through the opening. The crystals are the target! Prioritize the crystals! Watch for traps. If it cannot be done, retreat immediately!" Xiang Yi's mental command was resolute.

"Understood!" The two minds replied at once.

Harbor, berth C7.

The enormous freighter crouched like a steel beast lurking in ink, casting a heavy shadow. At the lower passage entrance, two guards in black leaned against the cold bulkhead, the red tips of their cigarettes blinking through the dense fog. Above them, the clang-clang of patrolmen's boots on the metal deck rang with the regularity of funeral bells.

Suddenly!

"B-Boss?!" The guard on the right side of the entrance abruptly straightened, his voice cracking with extreme terror. His flashlight beam shot into the depths of the passage like a startled venomous snake! At the end of the beam stood a blurry figure in Zhang Tiankui's signature silk robe, holding a blood-dripping katana and silently baring his teeth at them in a sinister grin!

"Where? What boss?!" The other guard instinctively raised his shotgun and looked along the beam, only to freeze as if struck by lightning! That blurred face twisted and swayed beneath the pallid light, but the robe's design, the outline of the figure... it was clearly Zhang Tiankui!

At the instant their minds shook violently and they fell into utter confusion and panic, one of them even twitching his fingers toward the trigger before forcibly holding himself back!

A shadow even darker than ink silently slid down from the top of a container less than ten meters from the entrance! Lanling King! He pressed close to the cold container wall, perfectly merging with the shadows of the blind spot. His right shoulder wound sent tearing agony through him under the strain of extreme stealth, and the toxin's paralysis slowed his movements, yet his gaze remained icy.

Deep in the passage, that grinning figure of "Zhang Tiankui" suddenly twisted and dispersed beneath the concentrated flashlight beam, like a nightmare bubble being punctured!

"An... an illusion?!" The guard's voice trembled with lingering fear, and cold sweat instantly soaked his back.

At the moment their minds faltered and their attention was completely seized by the bizarre illusion!

Lanling King moved!

His body sprang from the shadows like a crossbow bolt drawn to its limit! His target was not the distracted entrance, but a "dog hole" blind spot precisely calculated by Guiguzi through Xuan Weizi—a gap between a massive ventilation duct and the freighter's rusted steel plating, barely wide enough for a slender body to squeeze through, the theoretical fatal weakness in the infrared grid!

His bones creaked under the unbearable pressure! The wound on his right shoulder scraped violently against the rough edge of the duct, and blackened poisonous blood immediately seeped out! The infrared alarm's buzz was already hissing at his ear like a venomous serpent! Just as that shrill buzzing was about to reach its highest frequency—

Hiss!

Lanling King's body slipped into the deeper darkness inside the passage in the final fraction of a second, like a boneless fish! Behind him, the deathly buzzing stopped abruptly.

"Team A! Team A! Is there a situation at the lower entrance?" A deck guard called through the radio.

"N-No problem! A stray cat! It was a stray cat!" the entrance guard howled in lingering panic, crushing out his cigarette with savage force while his fingers still trembled faintly.

In the lower passage, the air was as murky as a rotten lung. Under the dim, sickly green emergency lights, Lanling King moved close to the shadows cast by the cold pipes covered in condensation, each step precisely avoiding the scanning range of the surveillance cameras. Guiguzi had already synchronized the blind spots in his field of vision. The agony in his right shoulder and the numbness spreading through his arm clung to him like maggots on bone, leaving his fingertips cold and stiff. The target was ahead—Hold 7!

The heavy, rusted alloy hatch stood at the end of the passage like the fangs of a giant beast. Two guards built like iron towers held automatic rifles and stood on either side like door gods, their gazes alert. Above the hatch, the camera's red light blinked. A faint icy-blue glow seeped through the crack beneath the door, rousing Lanling King's spirits!

"Physical lock plus electronic passcode lock. Guard positions fixed. The camera's view covers a fan-shaped area ten meters in front of the door. The energy source inside has been confirmed: a metal crate in the front-left corner." Guiguzi's information arrived simultaneously.

"Draw away the guards. Create a ten-second blind spot." Lanling King's thoughts were cold.

"As you wish."

At the connection point of an old ventilation duct near the passage ceiling, thick with grime, a pale golden point of Xuan Weizi light flickered.

Splat—boom!

A muffled explosion rang out! Years of accumulated filth, mixed with rust powder, fragments of moldering rat corpses, and unknown chemical residue, burst from the crack in the duct like a century-old abscess being squeezed open! It instantly engulfed the area before the hatch!

"Argh—! My eyes! Ugh—!"

Caught completely off guard, the guards were sprayed across the face and head with the foul, poisonous filth! Their eyes burned as if sulfuric acid had been poured into them, and horrifying red blotches instantly spread over their skin! They let out shrill screams, tears and mucus streaming down their faces as they vomited violently, instinctively throwing down their weapons and staggering frantically backward!

At the same time, the surveillance camera above the hatch was completely plastered over by thick grime, leaving its view pitch-black!

Now!

Lanling King shot out of the shadows at the side! He did not rush toward the hatch. Instead, he leaped into the air, kicked off the cold bulkhead slick with condensation, changed direction midair, and slammed like a cannonball toward the cover of an inspection opening hidden above the bulkhead by a massive pipe!

At the instant his body broke through the thin alloy cover and slipped into the inspection opening, a pair of emotionless eyes briefly opened a narrow slit in the deepest shadows among the cargo inside. An icy gaze swept over the breach before closing again in an instant, like a venomous snake feigning sleep.

"Boom!" The cover twisted out of shape! The scraping sound quickly vanished into the depths of the ducts.

"What was that sound?!" One guard forced open his swollen, teary eyes and looked toward the shaking cover.

"Damn it... this cursed place..." The other guard was still vomiting his guts out.

Inside Hold 7, the space was vast and cluttered. Amid the cold scent of preservatives, a thread of pure energy hung in the air like a frigid spring. Its source was a waist-high metal crate covered with an oilcloth in the front-left corner, icy-blue light seeping through its cracks.

Lanling King silently dropped down from the top of a wooden crate. His eyes locked onto the light source. Guiguzi's warning sounded: "Pressure sensor wires on the ground around the crate!"

Several nearly transparent metal wires, like lurking venomous snakes, appeared and disappeared in the dim light. Lanling King moved his fingertips, and several thin needles formed from shadow energy shot out without a sound, precisely disabling the sensor nodes.

He passed through the "snake formation" and reached the metal crate. Shadows flickered from his fingertips, melting through the padlock. He lifted the lid—

Icy-blue radiance surged forth! Amid several ancient bronze and jade artifacts, two fist-sized, round, translucent crystals floated silently like sapphires! Liquid starlight flowed slowly within them, releasing pure energy fluctuations powerful enough to make one's heart tremble!

Found them!

Lanling King's left hand shot out like lightning, reaching for the crystals!

At the instant his fingertips were about to touch them!

"Ninja Art: Shadow Bind!" A cold, hoarse Japanese shout, like bone being scraped, erupted without warning from the deepest shadows behind Lanling King! It was as though an evil spirit had crawled directly from the vertical pupil of that Beast statue!

Hiss hiss hiss—!

Several jet-black shadow chains, wrapped in ominous purple-black runes, shot out from the shadows in every direction like venomous pythons reaching from the abyss of hell! They were so fast they tore through sight itself! Before the bone-piercing chill and binding force even arrived, Lanling King's soul already felt frozen!

A trap! The lurking presence was ten times colder than the ninja captain at the altar!

Lanling King's pupils shrank sharply! His left hand was extended, his center of gravity tipped forward, and the poison in his old wounds severely hindered his explosive power. He was completely trapped in a blind spot! The deadly chains were already before him!

"Hmph!" An aged, majestic snort like an ancient bell boomed within Lanling King's sea of consciousness! Guiguzi!

Buzz—!

A vast, ancient will descended across space like a flood! Countless pale golden Xuan Weizi starlights surged into Lanling King's sea of consciousness!

[Guiguzi · Lanling King Bond Skill: Shadow Mist]—activated in actual combat for the first time!

With Lanling King at the center, churning, dense darkness erupted in an instant! Yet this darkness was no longer a pure black; it was a miniature cosmic nebula roiling with countless grains of golden stardust! The rules of space were forcibly twisted: light folded and refracted wildly like a shattered funhouse mirror, shadows became countless writhing, dancing living tentacles, and the air turned thick and heavy as liquid lead and mercury!

The rune-covered chains that had shot toward him slowed dramatically the instant they entered this twisted starfield, as if mired in mud! Their trajectories bent strangely! The originally fatal encirclement descended into complete chaos!

The range was small, but life and death hung on a single instant!

A sharp glint erupted in Lanling King's eyes! At the critical moment, he forcibly twisted his body! Enduring the pain, he drew the Shadow Dagger with his right hand and parried backward!

Clang! Clang! Clang!

Piercing explosions rang out! Sparks scattered through the warped light and shadow! The dagger barely knocked away the two deadliest chains! But the agony in his right shoulder and the toxin ultimately slowed his movement!

Thud! Thud!

Two slightly slower rune-covered chains wrapped fiercely around his left calf and right arm like venomous pythons! An icy, bone-deep binding sensation instantly spread through him! The purple-black runes on the chains writhed like living things, frantically draining his life force and shadow energy! Evil markings of the same color surfaced on his skin at once! Worse still, his outstretched left hand had already grasped the crystals!

Sizzle—!

An extreme chill surged up his arm! The skin touching the crystals instantly bloomed with pallid frost, and bone-piercing cold stabbed toward his heart like an ice awl! Frostbite!

"Die!" The high-ranking ninja shrieked from the shadows like a night owl. His body merged with the warped nebular mist as his black, poison-tempered ninja blade stabbed straight for Lanling King's heart with fierce killing intent! Fast as black lightning!

Life and death balanced on a knife's edge!

A frenzied blood-red light burst from Lanling King's eyes! Facing the poisoned blade aimed at his heart, he neither dodged nor retreated. Instead, he deliberately leaned his vital point forward, solely so the dagger in his right hand could slash the enemy's throat half an instant faster! It was a completely suicidal, mutual-destruction attack!

The high-ranking ninja had clearly not expected his opponent to be so insane! The thrust of his blade instinctively stalled slightly in the face of that resolve to perish together!

That instant was enough!

Ignoring the searing agony of frostbite, Lanling King clenched the two ice-cold crystals tightly in his left hand and shoved them into the specially made inner pouch against his chest! At the same time, using the chains' pull and the delay in the enemy's blade, he spun fiercely like a whipped top! The Shadow Dagger flared with ghostly light and slashed viciously at the rune-covered chain around his right arm!

Rip!

The rune-covered chain snapped apart! Purple-black backlash energy surged through the wound in his arm, bringing pain that seemed to tear apart his soul! But the chain around his left calf still remained tightly wrapped!

Lanling King did not hesitate! He pushed off with one leg, using the momentum of his spin to slam into the stacked wooden crates beside him like an out-of-control battering ram!

Rumble—!

The wooden crates shattered on impact! Countless sharp wooden splinters, like Poison Fangs, stabbed viciously into the wound on his already ruptured right shoulder! Black poisonous blood mixed with fresh blood sprayed out like a fountain! Where the chain bound his calf, flesh was mangled under the enormous impact, exposing bone beneath! The agony nearly tore apart his consciousness!

"Bastard! Kill him!" The high-ranking ninja's furious roar and hurried footsteps from the passage outside reached him at the same time!

Lanling King ignored the cries of pursuit behind him! Purple-black poison markings and crimson blood already covered most of his vision, while his heart beat slowly and heavily like the drums of the dying! Every breath carried ice shards and the stench of blood! Yet the thought, My lord needs this, burst forth with its final radiance in his nearly collapsing sea of consciousness like an undying star! It drove his shattered body to unleash terrifying strength. Dragging his nearly ruined calf, he lunged toward the nearest ventilation duct entrance like a savage bird with broken wings! His figure was instantly swallowed by darkness!

Xiang Family Villa.

Pfft—!

Xiang Yi's body jerked backward as though struck by an immense thunderbolt! Blood seeped from all seven of his facial orifices at once! His sea of consciousness felt as though it had been pierced and violently stirred by billions of red-hot poisonous needles! The scarlet warning in his vision flashed wildly like a funeral bell, dripping blood.

[Mental Power: 15/150 (Critical)]

The devastating impact from the other end of the mental link, the agony of near death, the erosion of the chain runes, and the extreme cold of the crystals raged through his soul like several poisonous dragons!

"My lord!" Guiguzi's thoughts carried an urgency unlike ever before.

Xiang Yi's teeth sank deeply into his lower lip, drawing blood! Using the last trace of strength he had left, like someone clutching the final vine at the edge of a ten-thousand-foot cliff, he let out a beastlike roar through the soul-rending agony and sent it down the link:

"Retreat—! Bring him back—!"

The cold sea wind poured into Hold 7 through the broken ventilation opening, dispersing the poisonous dust and warped nebular mist. The high-ranking ninja stood amid the wreckage, staring at the empty crystal crate and the puddle of thick fluid on the ground, mixed with frost and black poisonous blood. Beneath his demon mask, he released a low, inhuman roar. Outside the hatch, panicked guards were rushing in...

Half an hour later.

The shadows in Xiang Yi's room silently writhed, and an invisible force slowly carried forth a blood-soaked figure. It was Lanling King. Half his body had been drenched in viscous poisonous blood, which had hardened into a black-and-red shell. The exposed wounds were split open, the flesh curled back, their edges blackened, emitting the sweetly rancid scent of death and scorched muscle. His right shoulder wound was even more unbearable to look at, deeply embedded wooden splinters mixed with flesh, blood, and shattered bone. His face was gray and ruined like a corpse from a grave, his lips purple-black. Only a final breath barely sustained his life. His body shook violently beyond his control, yet those eyes reflecting Xiang Yi's image shone astonishingly bright even in his extreme weakness, burning with an unyielding will.

Guiguzi's phantom appeared beside him. Countless pale golden points of Xuan Weizi light circled Lanling King like Fireflies, desperately suppressing the rampant toxin and rune erosion, but the purple-black markings still continued to spread slowly.

Lanling King's chest heaved violently, every inhalation accompanied by a wheeze like a broken bellows. He used every last scrap of his strength to move the left hand that had not yet completely frozen. His movements were stiff and slow, like a mechanical arm rusted for a thousand years. Trembling, inch by inch, with extraordinary difficulty, he drew the two icy-blue crystals from the inner pocket against his chest.

The crystals' surfaces were coated with thick black blood and pallid frost, yet within them, pure icy-blue starlight still flowed and turned stubbornly, like stars trapped within a blood-drenched abyss yet never extinguished. Using the final strength of his life, he offered those bloodstained stars to Xiang Yi, who sat cross-legged on the floor with blood still staining his seven orifices. Every word seemed forcibly ground out from shattered lungs and a frozen throat, carrying the heavy stench of blood and the rasp of ice shards, yet each weighed as much as a mountain:

"My lord... I have not failed you."

Xiang Yi's gaze remained glued to Lanling King's shattered body, as though he had returned from an Asura hell. His chest hurt as though a massive boulder blocked it completely, and the suffocating sensation repeatedly darkened his vision. He did not look at the crystals that could change everything, now stained with the blood of loyalty. Instead, he suddenly reached out with a hand equally stained with his own blood and trembling uncontrollably, grabbing Lanling King's cold, stiff wrist with desperate force! His grip was so strong that his knuckles instantly turned bloodless, as though he intended to forcibly transfer the last of his own life force through that hopeless hold.

"...You've done enough." Xiang Yi's voice was hoarse and broken, like sandpaper scraping rusted iron, every syllable clogged with burning blood.

The room fell deathly silent. Only Lanling King's ragged breathing sounded like an old bellows being worked. Outside the window, the cold glow of the city's distant neon lights stretched like a river of blood flowing through hell, slashing diagonally through the darkness of the room and cruelly dividing Lanling King's blood-soaked figure and Xiang Yi's paper-white face onto opposite shores of light and shadow.