Outbreak

Sakamoto Tenryu’s mind worked quickly.

Zhafu was forcing someone to kill him.

Or rather, he was luring them into piercing one of the seals inside him.

Even the man in the suit was left speechless by this.

He felt that the Sword Saint was nothing special. What was there about this person that made him retreat?

All he could think was that his opportunity had arrived.

He was an assassin. If you exposed your back to him, weren’t you practically begging to be stabbed from behind?

The man in the suit knew he was no match for the Sword Saint, but that didn’t mean he was weak.

“Death-Chasing Wind.”

The flying dagger left his hand.

The blade cut through the empty air and shot straight toward Zhafu’s back. It was fast enough to break the sound barrier.

Sakamoto Tenryu’s expression changed.

“Don’t!”

The man in the suit heard him, but the dagger had already been thrown.

There was no taking it back.

The flying dagger stabbed into Zhafu’s back.

Clang!

Golden light surfaced, blocking the tip of the blade.

The man in the suit froze. This layer of protection was tougher than he had expected.

But in the next moment, cracks began to spread across the golden light.

The blade slowly sank in.

Zhafu stopped walking.

The dagger’s hilt disappeared into his body as well.

It had struck him directly in the heart.

Zhafu lowered his head and glanced at his chest, but he did not fall.

He smiled.

It wasn’t a smug or arrogant smile.

It was as if he had finally finished dealing with a troublesome matter.

“All right.”

He turned around and looked at the man in the suit.

“From this point on, you will face the consequences of the evil you have sown.”

The man in the suit stood rooted to the spot, his fingertips still held in the position they had been in when he threw the dagger.

He suddenly realized that something was wrong. He had hit his target.

Yet he felt none of the exhilaration that should have come from killing his opponent.

Instead, it was as though he had opened some kind of valve for Zhafu.

Black smoke began to rise from Zhafu’s body.

His skin rapidly darkened, while black markings crawled across his neck and the backs of his hands.

Sakamoto Tenryu tightened his grip on his sword.

There was only one thought left in his mind.

Damn it.

So Zhafu really had done it on purpose…

The assassin from Pei Luojia had become the key.

Zhafu looked at Sakamoto Tenryu.

But his smile was positively benevolent.

“Next time.”

His voice dropped slightly.

“Next time, I’ll kill you. But for today, I’ll spare your life.”

Sakamoto Tenryu did not argue.

For the first time, he felt that he should not have let Koji Takeda walk so slowly.

He should have kicked that kid out of there.

The man in the suit took a step back.

He wanted to curse.

No one had told him before he accepted the job that the target’s body had something like this sealed inside him.

One hundred million yen?

Even two hundred million wouldn’t be enough.

If he survived this job, he would have to apply for workers’ compensation when he got back.

No. He needed to claim damages for psychological trauma.

Zhafu’s body began to tremble.

It wasn’t from fear. Something inside him was struggling for control.

A moment later, he raised his head.

The face was still Zhafu’s, but the feeling he gave off had changed completely.

He let out a roar.

“Lin Mo! Lin Mo!”

Then even more voices emerged.

Men and women, old and young.

Some were hoarse, some indistinct, and some had been reduced to nothing more than sobs.

“Bastards from Japan!”

“You Japanese bastards!”

“I’m going to kill you!”

“Give me back my son!”

“My family is still waiting for me to come home!”

“Kill! Kill! Kill!”

“Kill them!”

“I will never coexist with Japan!”

The black contamination broke through the golden shackles and surged out of Zhafu’s body, spreading across the ground in every direction.

The flames blazing behind him leaped higher and burned redder.

The man in the suit looked at the black substance crawling toward him and wanted to run.

But the instant he lifted his foot, a section of white bone clamped around his ankle.

Zhafu—or rather, the things inside Zhafu—had no intention of letting him leave.

Sakamoto Tenryu drew his sword a few inches.

Sword light pressed down on the black aura beneath his feet, but it suppressed only a small patch.

He looked at Zhafu, who was kneeling on the ground.

Zhafu’s head hung low, and different voices continued to force their way from his throat.

The Sword Saint finally spoke.

“You never intended to defeat me from the beginning.”

Zhafu did not answer.

His response was one cry after another for blood.

The man in the suit swallowed.

“Mr. Sword Saint, if we leave now, is there still time?”

Sakamoto Tenryu glanced at him.

“With your speed, you should make it. But if we let these things run free, I doubt you’ll be able to collect your payment.”

The man in the suit shut his mouth.

Sakamoto Tenryu fully drew his sword.

“If you want to live, then fight.”

He stared at the faces emerging from the black aura.

“The two of us are already surrounded.”

A towering wave of blackness exploded into the sky, like a monstrous tsunami. Originating from the Yasukuni Shrine, it burst outward in every direction.

Far away, Koji Takeda sensed something and looked back.

Dark clouds had enveloped the entire sky above Yasukuni Shrine.

“This can’t be…”

Without a second thought, he turned around and ran.

Meanwhile, at the headquarters of the Defense Ministry, a group of people stood gathered around a screen.

No one spoke.

The footage was being transmitted in real time, showing the chaos at Yasukuni Shrine and the black aura spreading across the sky.

A bald man with a fringe of hair stood at the front, staring at the screen. His Adam’s apple bobbed.

“What’s going on? What exactly is this Zhafu?” he demanded in a low voice. “Contact Yanhuang Awakening immediately and demand an explanation!”

These Japanese were truly something else. They had no idea how to act, and absolutely no sense of propriety.

After causing such a massive disaster, their first reaction was not to investigate themselves, but to interrogate someone else.

A subordinate quickly initiated communications. His expression grew increasingly grim. After hanging up, he approached with small, hesitant steps.

“Minister! Yanhuang Awakening says this is karma—the karma left behind from the era of militarism, now returned to us.”

“Baka!”

“They also sent over a list.”

The subordinate swallowed hard. “More than half of our agents embedded in Yangcheng have been exposed.”

“There was also a sentence attached to the list.”

He recited the words exactly as they had been written:

“This is only a small warning. If you uncover anything else, the fate of the Korean superpowered youth group will be yours.”

Smash!

The glass on the table shattered.

The minister’s hand pressed down onto the shards, yet not a single thing happened. It didn’t even leave a red mark.

He did not look down.

“What exactly happened?”

He was breathing heavily, his brows tightly furrowed. He still couldn’t connect these developments with what was happening at Yasukuni Shrine.

“Why did things turn out like this in Huaxia?”

The subordinates exchanged glances. In the end, one of them spoke.

“I heard something went wrong in Yangcheng. Shiratori Keio must have betrayed the Empire.”

Before he had even finished speaking, the minister’s hand had already whipped across his face.

The man’s head snapped to the side. He clutched his cheek and did not dare make a sound.

“Why didn’t you eliminate Shiratori Keio?”

The man who had been struck shrank back, his voice trembling.

“We sent people to deal with him, but according to the report, Lin Mo stopped the assassination.”

Lin Mo.

The moment those two words were spoken, the room fell silent.

The minister had been about to continue cursing, but he opened his mouth, then swallowed the words.

He had seen quite a lot over the past few days.

Every fragment of intelligence sent back from Yangcheng had revolved around that name.

He had a rough idea of how the superpowered youth group had been wiped out, and what kind of condition those people from the Korean faction were in now.

The bald minister breathed heavily, then finally clenched his fists.

“Put the Yangcheng operation on hold. Do not provoke that man called Lin Mo. He is not someone we can afford to offend. Send reinforcements to Yasukuni Shrine first!”

“Yes, Minister!”

The subordinate responded and turned to leave, his footsteps considerably quicker than when he had entered.