Downfall X To Catch the Bandits, First Catch Their King X Sole Executive Authority

Tie Liao's gaze froze on Jiang Ye's face.

There was no pleading in his eyes, no fear, only a shock that seemed almost ready to spill from them.

In Jiang Ye, he saw the shadow of another man.

A man in a black coat, with an inverted cross tattooed on his forehead.

That same expression of utter indifference to any threat sent a chill through his blood, as though even his life were draining away faster.

"You..."

His voice was so hoarse it was barely audible.

"You're... a lot like that man."

Jiang Ye did not ask who the man was.

He simply looked down at Tie Liao, his gaze as calm as a pool of stagnant water.

His mind was racing.

As a seasoned survivor of Meteor City, someone like Tie Liao, who had lived on the knife's edge for more than a decade, could never truly be brought to heel.

If he could kneel and submit today out of a desire to live, he could rise and betray Jiang Ye tomorrow when another opportunity presented itself.

How could a great man born into this world languish under another's command for long?

Those words applied especially well in Meteor City.

Anyone who could become a gang leader had a backbone that could not be broken.

Even if Jiang Ye kept Tie Liao bound at his side now, sooner or later he would find a chance to escape, or secretly contact the Dawn Society and make a comeback.

Jiang Ye did not have the energy to keep a lurking threat that could turn on him at any moment.

Tie Liao stared into his eyes and saw that killing intent gradually take shape, becoming irreversible.

He clenched his hand abruptly.

The last of his Aura surged within him as he tried to force his body into one final, desperate struggle.

To win himself a sliver of hope!

But before he could move, he saw Jiang Ye casually curl a finger on his right hand.

Pfft!

The next instant, a sharp black shadow silently stabbed up from beneath the rubble where Tie Liao knelt, piercing clean through his chest.

The spike formed from shadow emerged from his back, its tip stained dark red with blood and gleaming wetly in the dim daylight.

Tie Liao's pupils contracted sharply, and his whole body went rigid.

He lowered his head and looked at the Shadow Spike protruding from his chest, sinking completely into despair and deep unwillingness.

"...No."

His voice was as faint as wind brushing past the edge of a sheet of paper.

"How could I... so easily..."

He raised his eyes to Jiang Ye.

In those eyes, once fierce, violent, and arrogantly confident, only confusion and bewilderment remained.

Then the light began to fade from them, like the last grain of sand in an hourglass slipping through his fingers.

Before long, his head drooped.

Tie Liao knelt on the rubble, a pitch-black Shadow Spike lodged in his chest, his back bent in a motionless arc.

Blood dripped down the edge of the Shadow Spike, spattering the ground with tiny dark spots.

A scourge of his generation had fallen!

Jiang Ye looked away without sparing him another glance.

He merely gave his wrist a light flick, and the Shadow Spike dissolved back into the shadows on the ground as though melting.

Deprived of its final support, Tie Liao's body toppled sideways onto the rubble stained red with his own blood.

Just then, two sets of hurried footsteps approached from the scrapyard.

Iron Wall and Shattered Eye arrived almost at the same time.

They rushed past the row of burning scrap heaps, treading over broken rubble and charred wreckage, weapons still in hand as they prepared to join the fight and provide support.

But when they saw the scene ahead, both froze in their tracks.

Looking closely, they saw Tie Liao lying in a pool of blood, his chest pierced through, his head tilted to one side, and his eyes already unfocused.

It was as if someone had pressed pause on the two men. For a moment, they forgot why they had come.

Iron Wall's hand, still gripping his shield, stopped in midair.

Shattered Eye's lips parted slightly, but the words caught in his throat and refused to come out.

Of course they knew Tie Liao.

The leader of the Shattered Iron Group, a ruthless man known throughout District 13, a Nen user said to be impervious to blades and bullets.

No one in any gang in District 13 dared confront him head-on; even Dodge, when he was alive, had not dared deal with him lightly.

And now he had died kneeling before Jiang Ye.

He had died cleanly, without so much as a final roar.

Iron Wall's Adam's apple bobbed.

He and Shattered Eye exchanged a glance, and each saw the same things in the other's eyes.

Shock and disbelief, as well as the thought of reassessing their young leader.

They could not help recalling the scene a few days earlier, when Jiang Ye had proposed that plan.

"To catch the bandits, first catch their king!"

Jiang Ye had stood before the map, pointing at the markings for the Shattered Iron Group and the Gray Rat Squad.

"You hold off the combined forces on the main battlefield. I'll go deal with Tie Liao and Shu Mu."

Iron Wall had immediately objected.

He thought that, given the Rust Bone Gang's current strength, even holding the two groups' combined forces at bay in a direct fight was already a gamble. If they also had Jiang Ye face two Nen users alone...

That was far too risky!

Gray Beak and Shattered Eye had voiced the same concerns.

They believed that no matter how strong Jiang Ye was, he could never fight two opponents alone, much less with the main battlefield tying them down.

But Jiang Ye had only glanced at them and said one thing.

"Do as I say."

Sole executive authority.

There was no room for discussion.

Iron Wall had felt as though a stone were weighing on his heart, terrified that something would happen to Jiang Ye while they held off the combined forces.

So as soon as he routed the enemy on the main battlefield, he had brought Shattered Eye to provide support.

Now it seemed they were the clowns all along.

Iron Wall took a deep breath, forced his surging emotions back down, and strode forward to kneel on one knee.

"Boss!"

"The combined forces have been subdued. Gray Beak is guarding the prisoners over there."

Shattered Eye followed him down onto one knee. His pale eyes did not dare look directly at Jiang Ye, but he held his back straight.

Jiang Ye merely gave a subdued grunt of acknowledgment, with little more in response.

He had expected this outcome, and it was not worth wasting words on.

His gaze passed over Iron Wall's and Shattered Eye's shoulders, settling on a path covered in rust and shadow at the far edge of the scrapyard.

The shadows there were swaying gently.

The next second, a huge black-and-white figure leaped silently from the shadows, its front lowered and a grayish bundle clamped in its jaws.

Divine Dog: Totality emerged from the shadows with the collar at the back of Shu Mu's neck in his mouth, dragging him along like a dead rat.

Shu Mu was still alive.

His Aura had been completely exhausted, and he hung limp in Divine Dog: Totality's jaws, his limbs dangling weakly like a fish whose bones had been pulled out.

His mouth was still opening and closing slightly, as though he were saying something, but his voice was too faint to reach Jiang Ye.

Jiang Ye looked at the figure being dragged back, a smile appearing at the corner of his mouth.

No matter how fast he ran, he could not outrun the speed at which shadows spread to form a path.