chsdbacks Page 126
Page 126
But Hoshiguma knew that the Rat King had taken her words seriously.
And that's exactly what she wanted, and perhaps what Wei Yanwu behind the Rat King wanted—a closely contested and spectacular exhibition match.
Hoshiguma couldn't and didn't want to guess the ultimate goals of Wei Yanwu and the Rat King, but she believed that Yun Yi, who could easily "manipulate" the Inner Guard, wouldn't suffer any losses and would get the benefits he deserved.
That's good. This way, Xiao Yunyi, the Rat King, and Longmen will all be safe and sound, and they will all benefit from what they have gained.
Hoshiguma, who had been on edge ever since the Rat King appeared, finally and genuinely relaxed. "Thank you for your help."
Her undisguised display of past wariness elicited a soft chuckle from the Rat King, but his words were drowned out by a sudden roar.
The loud noise grew louder and louder in just a few seconds. The next instant, the bright and beautiful dome shattered, and the shards of glass reflected a silvery-white figure.
As the deep blue light swept across the horizon, a mech five people tall crashed to the ground.
A blue-glowing shockwave spread outwards and rolled around, blowing away the rescued, the bound, the fighters, the defenders, and the blood and flesh scattered on the ground, clearing a clean "battlefield" for itself, the Rat King, and Hoshiguma.
As the chilling air swept past, the Rat King, his legs firmly planted on the ground and his white coat fluttering in the wind, lowered his hand that had been shielding him from the gale and quickly scanned his surroundings.
The venue, which was originally filled with people and corpses, was now completely empty except for the three of them!
Volume Two: Fireworks at Longmen: Chapter 250 (Main Story) Turn to Ashes! (Part Four)
Hoshiguma also noticed the eerie emptiness in the venue. She looked at the mecha with a knowing look—although it was the first time she had seen it, the light band extending from her wrist and pointing directly at the mecha told Hoshiguma that this was probably the Nirvana.
It is also the place where those who disappeared in the shockwave went.
As she expected, inside the Nirvana, Yun Yi waved his hand and moved the prison, filled with all sorts of sinners, villains, and innocents, to a distance. Those who had been watching Hoshiguma and the Rat King were now lying inside with their eyes closed.
On the ground beside them lay bags containing evidence and information about their crimes. Thanks to the great Nirvana AI from the universe, it matched the information of each person in just over ten seconds.
Yun Yi sighed for a moment, then controlled the mecha to reach out to Hoshiguma and transmitted his voice through the puppet, "I'm here, little Hoshiguma. By the way, come back first, so you don't accidentally hurt her later."
“Okay.” Hoshiguma nodded, then turned to the Rat King, who couldn’t hear their puppet communication, and respectfully apologized, “She’s here, inviting me into this mech—”
"Go." The Rat King interrupted Hoshiguma's unspoken apology. Despite being an old man, the rat-beastman's eyes gleamed at this moment, and he grabbed the collar of his white leather coat and ripped it open with great enthusiasm.
Dressed only in a formal suit, he raised his cane with high spirits and pointed it directly at the Nirvana, declaring, "Next, it's my turn to settle things with her!"
Hoshiguma nodded silently once more. The moment she finished nodding, Yunyi, who had seen that she had finished her conversation, teleported her into the cockpit.
The Rat King's figure blurred and faded away, and now Hoshiguma was facing Yun Yi, who was looking at her with curiosity. "Little Hoshiguma, are you very familiar with the Rat King?"
“Yes, it used to be my boss, and it was very good to me.” Hoshiguma didn’t hide anything and pleaded directly, “So, I’m begging you, Yunyi.”
What was he asking? It didn't need to be said explicitly; he naturally hoped that Yun Yi would show mercy at the last moment after the victory.
As for why she didn't just say it directly... Hoshiguma pursed her lips, wanting to save face for her boss—though he himself might not insist on it.
As Yun Yi understood, he also sensed Hoshiguma's intense and complex emotions.
She scratched her cheek, a look of puzzlement flashing in her eyes. "Such a good relationship? But you weren't..."
When the Rat King is mentioned, they are not very respectful or polite, as if they have never had any dealings with him.
“It doesn’t care about other people’s opinions, nor does it care what it will become in people’s minds.” Hoshiguma whispered to Yunyi, “So, I don’t avoid it because it’s my boss, but treat it as usual.”
Yun Yi tilted his head. "Not elated by external gains, nor saddened by personal losses?" That's quite a calm and collected mindset.
“That phrase… isn’t used like that.” Hoshiguma chuckled, not mocking, but finding it amusing. “However, it’s quite fitting to describe the Rat King.”
"A person with a strong will? Could things not be as I thought—" Yun Yi, who had a good impression of people with strong will, suddenly noticed something was amiss while pondering.
She glanced down and saw the Rat King tapping his cane on the ground, summoning a thin veil of sand, before striding toward the Nirvana. "Hmm? It's attacking. Wait a moment."
As he spoke, Yun Yi manipulated the mecha, effortlessly drawing out the giant blade and slashing precisely and sharply at the flaw in the Rat King's sand wall.
The blade, radiating blue light and emitting a slight hum, sliced through the air, tore through the sand wall, and was then blocked by an even thicker layer of sand.
At this moment, the Rat King struck the ground again, and an invisible, sourceless wind instantly rose up and transformed into a deadly tornado. The sand and dust, which had somehow become so abundant that they were everywhere, also rose up and gathered together to form a bloodthirsty sandstorm, which swept menacingly toward the silver-white mecha that looked like it had never been through any weathering.
At the same time, the ground beneath the mecha's feet quietly turned into gravel and began to spin rapidly, creating a huge gravitational force that momentarily distorted the air, seemingly trying to halt the mecha's mobility.
If Hoshiguma hadn't hinted that this fight was an exhibition match, Yunyi would have made all of the Rat King's attacks miss with a score of 0-2, but that would have completely failed to demonstrate any deterrent power.
Therefore, Yun Yi's choice at this moment was to rely on the mecha's near-invincible defensive capabilities at the planetary level and directly confront it head-on!
"Thump—swish swish swish—" The sandstorm crashed into the mecha, and the sand, strong enough to cut through steel, scraped against the mecha tens of millions of times, but the mecha stood firmly in place without a single scratch.
Even the quicksand beneath its feet, capable of swallowing giant skeletons, did not affect it in the slightest. The mech calmly and easily took a step, tilted its giant blade, and calmly swung it at the Rat King.
The sparks from the collision exploded like fireworks, and the entire underground space groaned and began to twist. The enormous commotion caused a violent tremor even from a hundred meters away to the citizens above.
Yun Yi moved the knife aside, looked at the unharmed Rat King and the spiderweb-like cracks spreading across the underground space beneath its feet, and blinked. "Oh wow, it's actually alright..."
She had just enhanced the blade's sharpness with several layers before slashing down with all her might.
Yun Yi stroked his chin with his other hand. "Is the Nirvana's power weak, or is the Rat King's defense really that strong?"
Outside, the mecha touched its chin in unison. Even though the Rat King hadn't heard Yun Yi's voice, it could tell she was puzzled.
It chuckled rudely, as if treating a child whose understanding was not yet clear, "At this level, you haven't exerted a single bit of strength. Kid, put in more effort, and don't let Hoshiguma's chance to go out and make his way fall back into this old man's hands."
“…This old man!” Yun Yi admitted that he was also provoked, not because of the other party’s somewhat strange and superficially dismissive attitude, but because, “Tsk, Hoshiguma is mine!”
"Hmm? When did I become yours?" Hoshiguma, who had sat down on a bench and was watching the battle with one hand on Hannya and the other on the back of the chair, raised an eyebrow. "You can't say things like that, Yunyi."
"Didn't you already sign a contract with me?" Yun Yi looked at Hoshiguma with a wronged expression. "You are my contractor!"
“…Ah, that’s true.” Hoshiguma smiled helplessly. “Next time, remember to say it all. ‘Mine’ and ‘my contractor’ are not the same thing at all.”
I think it means the same thing!
Yun Yi muttered to herself, but quickly shook her head to clear her mind. "Fine, anyway, you're my contractor. This old man isn't going to take you away!"
"Okay, okay, good luck then?" Hoshiguma clenched her fist to encourage Yun Yi, but her tone sounded somewhat perfunctory and carried an inappropriate uncertainty.
Yun Yi glared at Hoshiguma with reproach, "Hey—Hoshiguma, do you even want to come to Ursus with me? That's such a perfunctory answer!"
侕|玖七柳@（九）盈伞ba镏ps:
Strange, how come I suddenly got dozens more favorites, reaching 2000? I need to arrange a bonus chapter—I haven't finished paying off my debt of author recommendation votes yet!
Well, the author will try his best to finish these two chapters before the end of Thursday.
Although I'm very happy, I'm numb :DT^T
Volume Two: Fireworks at Longmen: Chapter 251 (Main Story) Turn to Ashes! (Part Five)
“Sorry, I was just thinking about what happened earlier. Boss—the Rat King—often encourages gangsters to kill each other when dealing with them,” Hoshiguma’s gaze swept over the bloodstains faintly visible on the disc and around the cracks in the ground outside. “He also sends people to clean up the mess afterward… But just now, why did he openly send people to interfere in the process of the gang killing each other?”
Sending a few people to hide among the two sides, and then sending someone to show up or showing up himself when things are about right, would better fit Hoshiguma's impression of the Rat King's methods.
Even if it were meant to be a direct hint, it wouldn't make sense, because Gu Yanqiu's very existence is enough to suggest it to her:
Even if she hadn't asked about the third party's affairs at the time, Fydia, who had reached the top position but still couldn't see the situation clearly and whose emotional management was extremely poor, would certainly not have had the heart to hide it from her after discovering that her people and her opponent's people had perished together.
Instead, they might lose control of their emotions and self-destruct.
Hoshiguma didn't think that the Rat King, who had been able to steadily control the Lower City for so many years, was doing something unnecessary, so this anomaly must have been due to the Rat King's own considerations.
Hoshiguma just couldn't figure out what exactly these so-called considerations were.
While Hoshiguma was speaking and thinking, Yunyi had already exchanged blows with the Rat King more than ten times. The flying energy blades, which possessed a kind of numerical beauty, and the sand containing wind and power made the underground space even more dilapidated.
Chunks of reinforced concrete, poured to form this space, fell down, revealing the grand structure of the mobile city of Longmen behind it. No matter which way you looked, it was a dark, deep well.
Yun Yi issued a command, causing the Nirvana to take off and move away from the ground, which had lost enough foothold. With a wave of his hand, the still brand-new giant blade in the mecha's hand pointed at the Rat King, who was sitting cross-legged on a floating cushion made of sand and wind, looking quite at ease.
During their standoff, Yun Yi finally managed to respond to Hoshiguma, "The reason why people are so eager to enter the market, as you've described, is simply that the potential gains or stop-loss effects of their current actions far outweigh the gains and potential risks that would have been possible under normal circumstances, right?"
Hoshiguma knew this too, but the possibilities that could be derived from it were too numerous, and she still couldn't pinpoint the truth.
However, she didn't mind listening to Yun Yi's thoughts. Perhaps Yun Yi, who seemed somewhat detached from his surroundings, could point out some things she hadn't noticed.
Thinking of this, Hoshiguma stroked her chin, raised an eyebrow, and threw out a suggestion, "For example?"
Yun Yi swung his hand back, and the mecha spun in sync with the giant blade, deflecting the sandstorm summoned by the Rat King. Hearing Hoshiguma's question, he first offered his own speculation, "For example, the people you care about, or the bottom line you hold dear, have been touched."
After saying that, Yun Yi made several more political speculations, "There are also core foundational forces that have been affected and need to be intervened, the situation has exceeded expectations, and the attitude has been shown to threaten potential enemies, etc. Ah, now that you mention it, there are so many possibilities."
Yunyi immediately understood why Hoshiguma was struggling, because she was also struggling, trying to grasp the truth from a bunch of possibilities but having no clue where to start.
Her expression gradually lost its emotion, as empty as her mind when she was thinking. "I'm really not suited to thinking about these political matters."
“Don’t think like that. What you said fits the Rat King’s current state quite well,” Hoshiguma tapped the back of her chair with her fingertips. Against the backdrop of a dull and rhythmic sound, she raised her lips in praise. “Besides, you also pointed out that there is a high possibility that the people you care about have been affected. That’s impressive.”
Hoshiguma had subconsciously overlooked this point just now. After all, the only person who could truly influence the Rat King's decisions and potentially cause trouble was her precious daughter, and the Rat King had always protected his daughter very well.
Now, although it's still impossible to be sure which point is the truth, at least Hoshiguma will no longer ignore the possibility that something might have happened to the Rat King's daughter.
Yun Yi glanced at Hoshiguma, who was deep in thought, then turned his gaze away and fired a shot at the Rat King with a hint of anger, "Are you treating me like a child?"
"How could that be?" Hoshiguma replied with a smile after thinking for a moment. "I hadn't thought of that before, but you reminded me. Aren't you amazing?"
"Oh! Really?" Yunyi looked at Hoshiguma with surprise. Hoshiguma nodded affirmatively, and Yunyi happily clenched her fist. "Then I'm really amazing—"
As the two were talking, a special cannonball fired from the mech's palm grazed the sand and dust on the dodging Rat King and shot into the only remaining small section of wall in the underground space.
After the pitch-black object was embedded in the wall, it suddenly shuddered, then flashed with a blinding white light and exploded with a "boom".
The blindingly bright white sphere expanded rapidly with the cannonball at its core, turning everything in its path to ashes and quickly engulfing the entire underground space.
After greedily licking the underground space clean, the sun-like white circle gradually dissipated, revealing the intact mech inside, its fist clenched, and the Rat King, who quickly regained his composure after catching his breath.
Seeing that the Rat King was unharmed, Yun Yi, who had originally expected to break through its defenses, stopped talking and turned to observe the Rat King carefully with narrowed eyes. "Is its wind and sand Originium Arts? Originium Arts can create endless things out of thin air?"
The sphere created by that cannonball will unleash extreme heat upon contact with any material that is not equivalent to the mecha, turning everything it touches into ashes.
The Rat King is currently unharmed, and Yun Yi can only guess that it can continuously summon sandstorms to keep itself isolated from the deadly sphere.
"Whether it's possible or not depends on the strength of the person involved," Hoshiguma replied carefully. "The Rat King's strength should be in the category of being able to create an endless number of them."
She wasn't quite sure what the shell was for, so she remained calm about Yun Yi's question and the fact that the two of them were unharmed.
—The external projection of the cockpit has been the mech's primary perspective since the start of the battle. Hoshiguma only saw the mech fire one shot before the white light flooded her vision.
"No wonder." Upon hearing this, Yun Yi easily accepted that his guess was indeed true, and sighed, "It's quite strong." He then put the matter aside and began to think about the next attack.
After all, although Yun Yi knew the functions and weapon parameters of the Nirvana, he did not know the true power of those parameters in the real world.
Based on the system's assessment that the Nirvana could destroy a mountain with its full power, Yun Yi subconsciously thought that any attack from the Nirvana was just so-so, at most it could defeat a strong person from Terra, but it was impossible for it to kill the opponent instantly.
Only the Rat King, the person involved, knew how dangerous it had just been. If it had been even slightly weaker, if it had summoned the sandstorm a second later, or if it had paused even for a moment, it would have been reduced to ashes along with everything else in that terrifying white light.
The Rat King maintained its composure, suppressing its subconscious palpitations and regaining its calm. It could no longer test the waters here, nor did it have the means to do so!
In the instant he made up his mind, the Rat King raised his cane and struck it again.
Volume Two: Fireworks at Longmen: Chapter 252 (Main Story) Turn to Ashes! (Part Six)
The tip of the staff touched the sand cushion beneath the Rat King, and endless wind and sand intertwined. Deep quicksand appeared out of thin air and rose from the ground, carrying the Rat King straight towards a pitch-black dome.
Before leaving, it left behind a deep, resonant invitation: "Swire is in my hands. If you don't want anything to happen to her, come with this old man."
The silver-white mech swung its giant blade, slicing through the sandstorm that obscured its view. Yun Yi, inside the mech, looked up at the Rat King, which had become just a black dot in the blink of an eye, and asked Hoshiguma in confusion, "Is it threatening me? No, it called Swire a child, so what's the point of this threat?"
Such an intimate way of addressing her, isn't that clearly telling her that even if she doesn't follow, Swire won't get into trouble?
"Haha, I guess they need to give you a reason to catch up eventually." Hoshiguma chuckled a few times, relaxing.
In her opinion, the more the Rat King spoke in such a manner, the more "childish" the fight would be, and the less likely anyone she cared about would be harmed. Therefore, she was happy to see it happen. "Alright, don't stand there for too long, we should catch up."
"Well, just in case, I should check on Swire's condition first..." Yun Yi didn't heed Hoshiguma's judgment for the time being, but instead raised his hand and silently recited Swire's name.
Beside the light band connected to Hoshiguma, another, thinner light band instantly formed, and under Yunyi's probing, it gave her the answer that "Shihuaiya is at peace in body and mind."
Yun Yi breathed a sigh of relief, "Phew—she's really alright."
Hoshiguma couldn't see the band of light belonging to Swire, but she could guess, "Is it a doll? Did you contact the young lady?"
"No, I just confirmed her condition. Anyway, let's go and catch up with the Rat King." Yun Yi turned his head and coughed, quickly getting into position.
The Nirvana immediately trailed a continuous stream of blue energy behind it, turning into a blur as it swiftly chased after the Rat King.
“The young lady might be busy with something, so it’s better not to contact her directly,” Hoshiguma said understandingly, ignoring Yun Yi’s inexplicable guilty feeling. She focused her gaze on the external projection while concentrating on thinking about the Rat King’s previous actions. “Thank you for your hard work. You keep chasing after them while I review the current situation.”
Yun Yi nodded, not daring to disturb Hoshiguma who was willing to think for her, and turned her gaze to the outside world.
The Rat King was fast, but the mecha was even faster. In a short while, the mecha caught up with the Rat King. Yun Yi raised her hand and had the mecha, which was moving in sync with her, fire another cannonball.