But they were running too slowly now. The young man raised his hands, a cruel grin on his face: "I've had my eye on you for a while. You didn't flee in terror at the sight of us—you actually dared to act calm!"
Swish-swish-swish! Black energy bolts shot out one after another, each one drilling cleanly through the skulls of the fleeing intel agents. Their bodies staggered forward a step or two under momentum, then collapsed face-first.
After killing those idiots, he turned and charged at the rest.
Moments later, every Monster that hadn't managed to escape was exterminated.
The Deputy Group Leader of Jiang Ao's squad—a brawny, three-metre-tall youth—simply swept his gaze across the scene.
The ground looked ploughed; potholes and Monster corpses littered it everywhere.
"Deputy Huang, we killed 132 Monsters on-site. Three of ours dead, five injured," reported a bespectacled girl, stepping forward.
"The injured stay put—everyone else, pursue!" Huang Yong roared, leading the remainder in pursuit.
They had Mental-type trackers; there was no fear of the enemy escaping far.
For this operation Jiang Ao had deployed all of Squad Two plus thirty more from Deng Mengcheng's Squad Eight—over a hundred Awakened Ones in total.
"Yes!" The Awakened Ones grinned savagely. After being dragged around the country by incidents the Monster Association kept spawning, every one of them had a bellyful of anger; now they could finally sate their blood-lust.
A tide of Awakened Ones sprinted after the fleeing Monsters.
Out on the street, four or five Monsters running together looked panic-stricken, glancing behind as they fled.
"They're not chasing—great," panted a Monster with black beast-ears.
The howling wind and poor visibility were perfect for escape.
Thwip! The others had barely let out relieved smiles when the beast-eared Monster's head sprouted a hole.
"Who's there?!"
"Where?!
The remaining Monsters bolted in terror.
Thud-thud! Thwip! Before they'd gone far, holes bloomed in their heads and hearts.
They dropped one by one.
Tap-tap-tap! Once they fell, a woman with a bow emerged from the gale, looking relaxed. "Morons. No experience fighting Awakened Ones—fine against ordinary folk, though."
"Keep moving, or Jiang Ao's lot will finish off every Monster." Behind her several men and women stepped out, hands dripping blood from Monsters they'd casually disposed of.
Just then the woman raised her bow, drew it to full even without an arrow, and released.
Thwip! A distant thud, another body hit the ground.
"Then let's continue." Bow in hand, she moved forward without a sound.
On a rooftop in the distance, Qin Wan stood surveying the scene below; the wind wasn't strong enough to block her vision.
After a moment she looked up at Jiang Ao in the sky.
He flickered about, flicking wind-blades that sliced incoming telephone poles.
"Pathetic—only daring to hide up there stirring up wind." Qin Wan's face showed contempt.
Inside the tempest,the culling of Monsters continued.
Yus cowered in a seven-storey rental flat with Tolan, neither daring to breathe.
Enhanced hearing let them catch occasional distant screams.
"Yus, what do we do?" Tolan asked, frantic. With Awakened methods, staying put meant discovery sooner or later.
"Going out now is suicide. Wait." Yus had no better plan; his Monster-sharpened senses felt killing intent everywhere—step outside and die.
Elsewhere, Fang Wenyu frowned and shouted skyward: "Jiang Ao, if all you can do is hide up there making wind, then get lost—my Xuanjian Division doesn't need cowards like you!.
"Hmph. Whether I stay isn't up to you," Jiang Ao snorted.
He stretched out his left hand; wind gathered, and in an instant a three-metre spear of compressed wind formed.
Eyes icy, Jiang Ao looked at Fang Wenyu: "Since you asked for it, don't blame me."
Fang Wenyu stayed silent, focusing on the coming strike; he knew Jiang Ao's abilities well!
"Fang Wenyu, if you make this move unscathed, I'll withdraw immediately," Jiang Ao sneered.
He hurled the wind-spear—so fast it was in front of Fang Wenyu the instant it left his hand.
"Jiang Ao, think you're Level Six already? Take this!" For some reason Fang Wenyu felt a murderous impulse rise.
'Master was right—if I want my own justice, I have to sweep the trash blocking my path!'
He jerked his head up, eyes blood-red; invisible power flared in his hands and seized the spear.
He'd waited long for this moment: 'Die!'
The spear suddenly expanded into a three-metre sphere of wind that swallowed Fang Wenyu, its edges howling with lethal cutting.
In the blink of an eye the ground nearby was shredded to fine dust.
High above, Jiang Ao watched Fang Wenyu trapped in the wind-sphere, expressionless. "It's over. I designed this move just for you—did you really think it was a simple attack?.
He had hidden the real killing technique, "Gale of Shredding," inside. On contact the target would be encased by a sphere of a hundred-thousand rotating wind-blades that could erupt into nearly ten million slashes in an instant; surely Fang Wenyu would be gravely wounded.
As he considered this, Jiang Ao's heart suddenly lurched—an overwhelming sense of mortal danger.
"Not good!" Black whirlwinds burst out around him as countless invisible forces appeared.
Thud-thud-thud! His protective black gales melted like snow under the barrage.
Slash after slash landed, blood spraying. "Aaaargh—Fang Wenyu, screw your mother!" His scream and curses echoed across the sky.
A second later the wind-sphere imprisoning Fang Wenyu vanished.
Where it had stood, a figure drenched in blood appeared, skin shredded by countless cuts.