[Tea Stains]

When Chen Miemie saw the two people opposite him, his first reaction was that they must be highly capable.

The reason was simple: their appearances perfectly matched his impression of super powerhouses.

On the left was a middle-aged man dressed as a gentleman, wearing a formal suit and holding a cane.

If it were just that, he wouldn't necessarily seem like a powerhouse. The key was the monocle he wore. Behind the lens, there was no eyeball in his eye socket; instead, there was a pendulum constantly swinging back and forth.

A pendulum easily brought to mind the concept of time, and no matter where you were, time-related abilities were not to be trifled with.

Chen Miemie recognized the person on the right; he was someone recorded in the study materials.

It was an old man from the Spirit Race. His real name was unknown, codenamed [Tea Stain], and his profile listed him as [Mystery] 4.

It was said that he drank a mysterious tea broth year-round. Combined with his [Mystery], his teeth, nails, and even the wrinkles of his skin were dyed with dark brown tea stains.

These tea stains were as hard as armor and emitted a refreshing tea fragrance.

Even more bizarrely, he could scrape the tea stains off his body to brew tea. The drinker would gain a day of his memories, while he would gain the drinker's sense of taste and smell for a day.

Judging from their team composition, [Tea Stain] leaned towards support and intelligence transmission, meaning the middle-aged gentleman was highly likely a combat specialist.

"I've long heard of Sixiang City's hospitality, but I didn't expect to meet such enthusiastic people as soon as we entered." The middle-aged gentleman placed a hand on his chest and bowed to Cassan in greeting.

"A greeting without an introduction is hardly polite."

"You are correct, madam. However, I would like to save my introduction for... after I kill you."

In the next second, the middle-aged man suddenly attacked. With blinding speed, he drew a rapier from his cane and lunged straight at Cassan in a flash.

The rapier was as fast as lightning, aiming straight for Cassan's throat.

This was a guy who would bow one second and shamelessly launch a sneak attack the next.

The man's speed was indeed fast, but Cassan had already warned Chen Miemie in advance that a fight was imminent. How could she not be prepared herself?

Salt sand spread out from the fingernails of both her hands, transforming into ten long, sharp claws.

The salt sand claws clashed with the rapier, sparking as the sharp edges ground against each other.

Cassan was also a close-combat fighter, and she engaged the man in direct melee.

Both the rapier and the claws were piercing weapons, not known for their brute strength. Their fighting styles resembled two assassins in a life-and-death struggle at close quarters, every move aimed at a vital spot, risking their lives on the edge of a blade.

A battle between assassins was a contest of agility and movement.

Chen Miemie could see clearly now that his previous judgment had been inaccurate.

This middle-aged man did not possess any time-related abilities. Instead, his entire body acted like a pendulum, swaying left and right on the ground, making his footwork incredibly erratic and unpredictable.

His moves didn't look particularly flashy, lacking even the slightest visual effects, but they were actually very strong. He was someone who had essentially maxed out his evasion; no matter how powerful an opponent's attack was, it would be very difficult to touch him.

Unfortunately, he was facing the [Critical Point Dancer] today.

What Cassan excelled at most was dancing on the edge of a blade.

Those split-second critical points between life and death were not dangerous to Cassan; rather, they were the source of her power.

The dancer stood on her tiptoes, her steps matching the frequency of the pendulum's swing. Like a butterfly, she continuously weaved back and forth between the swaying pendulum.

The situation was obvious: the middle-aged man had fallen at a disadvantage. Furthermore, he was stuck to her, making it difficult for him to break away.

Naturally, his partner wasn't just going to stand by and watch. [Tea Stain] threw a large cloud of brown powder toward the area where the two were fighting.

This was powder ground from tea stains. It wasn't poisonous, but if Cassan inhaled it, it would be equivalent to drinking the tea brewed from his stains, and her sense of taste and smell would be manipulated.

Taste and smell, unlike sight, were not absolute deciding factors in a battle. However, for two top-tier assassins dancing on the edge of a blade, even a slight interference could be fatal.

A flash of murderous intent crossed Chen Miemie's eyes.

These two bastards—one looked like a proper gentleman and acted polite on the surface but secretly launched underhanded sneak attacks; the other threw powder and drugged people to force a two-on-one fight.

The tea powder scattered above the man and Cassan, spreading out into a large cloud in the air and gradually falling.

Now it was Cassan who wanted to pull back and leave the powder's range, but the man clung to her, refusing to let her go.

"Damn it, it's hard to completely dodge the range of this powder." Cassan had already begun holding her breath.

Chen Miemie made his move.

Centered around Cassan and the middle-aged man, a moonlight shield in the shape of an inverted bowl appeared.

The tea powder fell onto the shield and was completely blocked out. Unable to fall vertically, it could only slide down the curve of the shield to the ground far outside it.

This was a new technique Chen Miemie had developed, though strictly speaking, it wasn't fully successful yet.

His original intention was to create a life-saving, omnidirectional protective shield similar to a mage's barrier.

Unfortunately, with his current [Mystery], the moonlight shield was rather soft and couldn't withstand high-intensity attacks.

Later, he upgraded it.

Inside the moonlight shield, he reinforced it with a layer of flowing pure water.

The effect was much better, but while the water shield increased its defensive strength, it also reduced light transmission, blocking the vision of the people inside. Because of this, Chen Miemie still wasn't very satisfied with it.

After blocking the tea powder, Chen Miemie didn't stop.

He headed straight for [Tea Stain].

Chen Miemie's intervention made the two opponents incredibly anxious.

Since they dared to come to Sixiang City, they were here to stir up trouble, not to throw away their lives. The intelligence work they had done beforehand was even more extensive than Sixiang City's.

They also had partial data on Cassan.

The reason they went for the kill after just a couple of words was because they had calculated that they could eliminate the two with zero or minimal losses.

Unexpectedly, Cassan was much stronger than their intel suggested.

The middle-aged man failed to instantly kill Cassan and instead found himself in a passive position.

And now, an even more fatal factor had arrived.

Chen Miemie, a newly graduated rookie, wasn't in their database at all. He was a completely unfamiliar and mysterious figure.

Just based on that last move—conjuring a large-scale shield out of thin air—he was definitely not someone to be trifled with.

Sure enough.

[Tea Stain] reacted quickly, immediately retreating to put some distance between them.

He stared fixedly at Chen Miemie, his clothes billowing without any wind, clearly brewing some powerful technique.

The next moment, Chen Miemie applied even more pressure on the two opponents.

He lightly tapped the ground with the tip of his foot.

Transparent, water-like wings appeared behind him. He rose into the air and hovered at a low altitude, exuding an incredibly imposing aura.

"Damn it! He can fly!" [Tea Stain] was in no mood to praise Chen Miemie's stylishness.

The middle-aged man also had a gloomy expression, unable to maintain even his basic gentlemanly smile. A cold glint flashed in his eyes.

"We can't drag this out. Let alone the fact that this is Sixiang City, just dealing with these two means we won't be able to walk away without paying a price."

Chen Miemie flapped his wings, slowly inching closer to [Tea Stain].

Just when Chen Miemie was only three meters away from his target.

[Tea Stain] suddenly dropped his fearful expression, revealing a smug look of a successful scheme.

"Haha, you fell for it, kid! You should have used that moonlight shield on yourself. Tea Fragrance: Burst!"

It turned out that Tea Stain knew very well that in direct combat, his tea powder attacks were far too conspicuous, making it difficult to actually hit his targets. Therefore, he had developed a much more insidious method: a tea aroma. He would hide the scent in the air, allowing it to accumulate until it reached the perfect concentration before triggering a sudden, explosive effect.

Chen Miemie, boasting an Immortality rating of 9, looked at the tea aroma swirling around him and felt a tinge of concern.

"Hey, this tea aroma didn't come off your body too, did it?"

Tea Stain curled his lips. "Of course it did."

"You've just given me another reason to kill you." Chen Miemie's gaze turned hostile.

"Oh? Is that so? I really want to see the look on your face when you lose your sense of taste, smell, and sight all at once."

"Interesting. So you've been hiding a trick up your sleeve from the rest of the world. You can actually manipulate vision."

"Heh heh, when the tea aroma enters the eyes, it blinds. Every outsider who learned this secret is dead, and you're about to join them!"

Over a dozen meters away.

The sound of Tea Stain and Chen Miemie's conversation drifted over.

The middle-aged man's lips curled into a smirk as he launched a psychological attack on Cassan. "Aren't you worried about your partner? If he dies, you'll be next."

Cassan appeared highly anxious on the surface, though her acting was slightly exaggerated. "Oh, I'm so scared."

In her heart, however, she was sneering.

Heh, kill my partner? The Cube Tyrant tried over twenty different methods and still couldn't kill him. A Hazard Level 5 anomaly couldn't even control or mutate him. If you can actually kill him, I'll chop off my own head and hand it to you.