Old Tang, Where Are You?

"Father! Father! Help!"

Father Chen had just answered the call when the panic in the speaker's voice made him frown. "Explain yourself. What happened?"

"It's the Zhou Family! It has to be the Zhou Family... They're not playing by the rules, Father! They sent a bunch of genetically modified hybrid bloods after us, and they can cast Word Spirits like spells! Daoist Sects' Palm Thunder, flame Xing Yi Quan, Dustless Land rebounds... This is definitely illegal bloodline modification!"

"What did you say?" For a moment, Father Chen could not make sense of that string of nonsense.

"A-Also! They're bombing our cargo warehouses with tactical missiles! Hahaha, they've gone mad! The Zhou Family has completely gone mad!"

The voice on the other end was filled with shock and an inexplicable frenzy. If not for the fierce gunfire and blaring alarms clearly audible in the background, Father Chen would have thought the caller was drunk and making a scene.

"Calm down! Hold on a little longer. Victory will be ours soon... I'll arrange family reinforcements. We also have Gattuso's support. The Zhou Family wouldn't dare make too much of a scene in the open—"

"It's useless, Father! The situation is against us in every possible way!" The other side nearly shouted in a broken, tearful voice.

"We should pull out and run! The area outside the base compound is full of people from other great families! I contacted them, but our people outside have been stopped. They must have prepared to block reinforcements and cover up the aftermath. They're planning to join forces and swallow us whole! Father, check whether people from those families have already ambushed the area around the house!"

Realizing the severity of the crisis at once, Father Chen tensed. He quietly summoned a burly hybrid blood responsible for arranging the manor's security personnel. Once the man understood the urgency, he immediately left to prepare for possible enemies lurking outside.

Father Chen then asked the person on the line, "Has the Zhou Family breached that testing center?"

"What?" The voice in the receiver was clearly taken aback.

"I'm asking whether the Zhou Family has breached the testing center—the one near the medical research institute and the warehouses! If they haven't entered that facility's underground levels, then keep holding it and wait for reinforcements!"

"N-No, there's no hostile activity over there..." The other side clearly did not understand the significance of his words. "No, Father, why do we have to defend that place? What exactly is in the underground levels of that center—"

Father Chen hung up before the other person could finish. He did not believe his children had the right to know about that place, even if they were his blood descendants.

Next, he had to gather the family personnel scattered across other locations. He truly had no time for idle chatter or making small talk with Gattuso's people.

After all, the only thing they cared about was that piece of cargo, Nono...

Father Chen used his communicator to call several more numbers and issue orders one by one, but even that did not put him at ease. What lay in those underground levels was far too important...

He began arranging drivers and guards as well. If they could break through the great families' blockade outside, they were to take him to the base compound immediately. Even if something unexpected happened, that was still the safest place to go.

A faint sound of wind suddenly came from behind him.

Like something sharp slicing through the air.

Father Chen felt a sudden surge of mortal danger, but an instant later, a piercing agony twisted through his body and seemed to nail him in place. A short blade resembling a Japanese wakizashi had pierced through his back and emerged from his chest.

Dark blood sprayed everywhere.

"Y-You actually..."

Father Chen weakly turned his head and saw Nono's cold, severe face. Her attack had been so fast that even the bodyguards waiting in the shadows had failed to react.

At that moment, Nono's golden eyes blazed open, filled with fury and hatred. Several striking, sacred white scales had climbed across her fair cheeks, reflecting a crystalline chill beneath the night lights.

Underground level of the Chen Family base's medical research institute.

Zhou Minhao's fists glowed red with heat, his presence overwhelming. He threw a Cannon Fist from Xing Yi Quan at a burly hybrid blood desperately trying to flee. An astonishing explosion of flames erupted from his fist and swept outward, turning several people nearby into "firemen" caught in a torrent of raging elements.

After landing the blow, Zhou Minhao swiftly retreated into the darkness.

Chen Family armed personnel were still firing continuously from the shadows. Unfortunately, the lighting system had already been destroyed, leaving this area lit only by a few clusters of fire amid deep darkness.

Moreover, those Zhou Minhao had set ablaze were their own people. The intense heat spreading through the surroundings also made it difficult for the infrared sensors to distinguish the many misleading heat sources.

Zhou Minhao was not worried about the gunmen. In the darkness, he only needed to use magic to enhance his hearing. By tracking their positions through sound, he could evade and even counterattack.

Just one left.

The enemy's unceasing firepower seemed intended to suppress their advance, but in truth, it exposed their lack of reinforcements.

After estimating the number of shots his opponents had fired, Zhou Minhao circulated magic in advance to strengthen his legs. The instant they hurriedly changed magazines, he surged forward as a streaking shadow.

A Crushing Fist that caught them completely off guard instantly burst forth with rushing Flame Light, swallowing the panicked personnel and turning them into charred humanoid shapes amid the raging fire.

"Zone B has been cleared."

Zhou Minhao returned to the stairwell entrance according to their agreed contact signal. Around him, the team members also reported over the comms that Zone A had been cleared, Zone C had been cleared, and so on.

Everything seemed to be going smoothly. Next, they needed to continue exploring the deeper levels of the building. The lower levels might be experimental zones even more dangerous than the archives, perhaps hiding dangerous models of Death Servants. They needed to gather their combat strength before proceeding.

But as Zhou Minhao looked around, he suddenly noticed that the team was missing one grinning, carefree fellow.

Wait, where was Old Tang?

At that moment, the underground testing center received a king of flames.

Invisible heat radiated from Norton's body, rapidly baking and melting the sturdy locks and thick alloy doors.

In that instant, hidden automatic machine guns activated and spat dense, vicious barrages of metal bullets. Yet they disintegrated in midair, and the concealed mechanisms behind the secret doors melted and failed one after another under the heat.

Norton strolled unhurriedly through the dim underground corridors as if he were not in an enemy stronghold, but walking through the Dragon Path of his own Bronze Palace.

Norton continued melting through a metal archway—these humans' painstakingly built defenses were as good as nothing to him—and found a huge, muscular serpent-like Death Servant crouching ahead.

The unfortunate Death Servant barely had time to do anything before its entire body rapidly burned away, becoming a silent cloud of ash.

The sight terrified the other Death Servants crawling through the passageways. They let out shrill, infant-like cries of terror and fled madly deeper through the archway or into other narrow hidden passages, desperate to escape that frightening high-temperature Death God.

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