<blockquote>


    Cultivator


    This is a terrible idea, Alex. Do I need to remind you that you’re a ren?


    Alexander


    Take care of Althea


    Cultivator


    Don’t reply like you’re going to die!


    Answer my messages!


    </blockquote>


    Chunhua was right. This really was a stupid decision on my part, but I had made stupider decisions before. My choice wasn’t made using my head but with my heart. Not for any particularly good motive, mind you. Pretty much the opposite.


    After everything I’d researched, after hearing many stories about fraud and abuse and assault, I wanted to see it for myself: the fire I started and the desperate firefighters trying to put it out. Whether here or at home or anywhere else, blood would be drawn. Might as well get it done and get it out of the way.


    The elevator doors opened.


    I walked onto my floor; right away, I became the celebrity of the room. Eyes, looks, all gawking. I’d been missing for days, yet out of the blue, there I was like nothing ever happened. It was a packed house this morning. I figured so. Fujimura and his other execs didn’t want a mass panic and kept the investigation under wraps for now. For most of the employees, today was a normal day.


    That was what I thought initially, but I was evidently wrong. Everyone was loitering around the cubicles in small groups; they had been whispering to each other until I showed up. The TVs were off. No sales going on. Quiet as a ghost town, populated like a cemetery. Despite being colleagues for a little over a year at this point, they stared at me like a stranger. An outsider. Most were confused, definitely, but a select few directed their anger at me.


    Looking at all these people sobered me a little. It was likely that System Articles would get shut down after this. Just like me, everyone would be out of a job. It wasn’t their fault that Fujimura was an immoral bastard, but crime was crime. System Articles had built its wealth and reputation by using the desperate and poor as a stepping stool. It couldn’t exist, but I shouldn’t let myself get caught up in the guilt.


    Without talking or looking at anyone, I approached my cubicle. It hadn’t been cleaned yet. Surprising. As if to mock the situation, though, there was a small Glory Guild pennant resting on my keyboard. Hilarious. Well, guess I should clean my shit for them.


    Starting with the heaviest items first, they were stuffed inside my sling bag.


    “SHEN!” someone fucking shouted from across the floor and scared the shit out of me. That didn’t take long at all. “SHEN!” said the same maniac, shaking the whole damned floor with his stomping.


    Guess who it was? My old boss, Manager Husk, with new friends. He had bodyguards on each shoulder. They wore inconspicuous clothes, but anyone who spent at least a year in Ordo knew they were swords. Specifically, these asshats were Yoshita’s. I recognized their faces and knew their names (Sugihara and Takano), their specialties, and their [Slayer Rank]. Both were C’s. Middle-rankers.


    No wonder everyone was on edge. Swords like these meant trouble.


    I snatched a couple metal pens from my desk and slid them into my pockets. “What is it—?”


    “Where the hell have you been?!” Husk roared.


    “None of your business.” I patted my chair. “Not anymore. I’ll be out of your hair shortly, just let me pack my things and—”


    Sugihara and Takano blocked my cubicle off, and through the gap, Husk stood a few feet away. “You’re coming with us, Shen.”


    Takano lifted his shirt and bragged about an energy pistol tucked inside his waistband. It looked a little worse-for-wear, but like normal ballistics, a gun was a gun. If it worked, it hurt. Question was: were they bold enough to start a shootout in a public office? Honestly, the possibility wasn’t zero.


    I wasn’t going to call their bluff either way.


    “Alright, fine.” I hoisted my bag over my shoulder. “Lead the way.”


    Sugihara reached out—


    I batted his hand away. “Don’t fucking touch me. I said I’ll go.”


    The Yoshitas looked toward Husk for orders. He snarled but nodded. “C’mon.”


    Now it was my turn to have bodyguards. I was escorted between Dumb and Dumber with Dumbest leading the group. Dumber had a few fingers tickling his waist, eager to play with his toy. All the while, my former colleagues watched as we disappeared down the hall. They must’ve thought this was a funeral procession. They were right, just wrong about whose.


    We arrived at Fujimura Kieta’s office. Blinds down, windows covered, door locked. Husk knocked a couple times and I had the red carpet rolled out for me. This was an office fitting for a CEO of an immoral corp. Way too big, had meaningless decoration and awards and books, and not enough furniture to fill the space.


    “Go!” Sugihara hissed and pushed me inside. Someone within grabbed me by the neck and arm, dragged me to a red couch, and forced my ass down. They took my sling-bag and tossed it on the ground like it was garbage—to be fair, most of the shit inside was random junk.


    As soon as I picked my head up, something metal was pressed against the back of my head. That must be the energy pistol. Something else clicked behind me. That must be the door. Something above my head breathed like a fridge. That must be an isolation bubble. Good, we had everything covered.


    A blue screen opened in front of my eyes, visible for the whole room to see.


    [Threat to life detected]


    [Temporary Registration available]


    “[Register] and we’ll kill you,” Husk said.


    I nodded. Wasn’t planning on [Registering] anyway. It’d take too much time.


    In total, I had six on my ass: Takano and Sugihara were behind the couch; Husk and two Yoshitas (Kawakami and Aoki) were at the front. The swords were measly C-Ranks and had unremarkable specialties, focusing on physical combat rather than anything magical.


    Last but not least, I couldn’t forget about the bastard himself sitting behind his artisan-crafted desk: Fujimura Kieta. The pictures on our website had to be photoshopped because he was one ugly motherfucker. Crime took a toll on your body, it seemed. He was in his mid-forties but looked sixty; he was balding but refused to accept the fact; and he had wrinkles as deep as a trench in World War One.


    Fujimura gnashed his yellowish-green teeth together, his pink tongue slipping through and licking at the dull edges. Every muscle in his face rubbed together like rusted gears. Then, he exploded in a tongue-lashing of angry Japanese. He shouted at the top of his lungs, slamming his hands on the table, throwing things without aiming—just a greed-fueled rant of a criminal about to be busted.


    Eventually, he seemingly understood that I had zero clue what he was saying. He pointed at me and glared and glared, with all the rage of a king seeing his castle walls fall down.


    “Traitor,” Husk summarized, though his hushed but seething tone was completely his own. “You’re a traitor, Shen. We’ve given you everything—”


    “Oh, fuck off, don’t start on that cosmo bullshit—” A subtle push to the back of my skull suggested that I should shut up. I didn’t. “Save your speeches. I was never a member of your little club.”


    Husk bit his lips, taking my defiance worse than my “betrayal.”


    Fujimura shouted again in Japanese and Husk replied in the same tongue. They had a short conversation, presumably about what they were going to do with a little shit like me. When they finished, Husk curtly nodded.


    “You!” Fujimura pointed at me again. So he did speak English. Had a thick accent, though. “You made a mistake coming here, boy! Aoki, Husk!”


    Aoki and Husk sandwiched me on the couch. With them and the iron scratching my scalp, “discomfort” was the weakest word I could use. The former produced a communicator, turned a few dials, and Japanese leaked through the tiny speakers. Multiple voices.


    Aoki spoke into the comms, couldn’t translate.


    Husk explained, “You have a sister, Althea. You talked about her all the time before that man got to your head.”


    And there it was. I knew this was going to happen—fucking predicted it—yet, as soon as her name left his thin lips… A switch in my head clicked and my stomach transformed into a furnace.


    I hissed, “Say her name one more time, I dare you, you won’t be saying anything else afterwards.”


    Husk hesitated to speak, seeing something in my eyes that I couldn’t, but I knew what it was. That was brotherly love and he was on the wrong end of it. He cracked a broken laugh. “W-We have a gun pressed against your skull—!”


    “And I’m sitting next to you.” I stared at him without blinking, and the piece against the back of my head could be a backscratcher for all I care.


    Color drained from the dipshit’s face, and his lips trembled—


    “Shut up!” Takano was smart, pushing the pistol so hard that I was forced to bend my neck. Couldn’t let his buddy suddenly get cold feet and ruin the vibe, right?


    Husk grabbed the back of my collar and kept my head down, deliberately avoiding my eyes. “Y-You shouldn’t have fucked with us, Shen! You screw us over, we’ll end you. First, we’ll start with your cute little sister. It was easy tracking her down. She goes to Julius High School, and as we speak, she’s taking a nice walk there.”


    Aoki spoke into the comms again. He nodded at Husk, and Husk nodded back.The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.


    Husk shook my head. “Before we dump your body in the South China Sea, you’ll die hearing your sister’s screams. Imagine that, Shen. You lost your parents, now you’re losing the last family you have left all because you couldn’t keep your fucking eyes to yourself!”


    A twisted, almost psychotic laugh left me.


    Husk said to Aoki, “Do it.”


    Aoki relayed the order and turned a few dials. The volume was at max, now, and he placed the communicator on the table in front of us. It was a radio show, except for prank phone calls, we had live audio of a snuff film.


    Car doors slammed shut, Yoshitas started yelling, and footsteps filled the ambiance. I heard broken English and Japanese mixed together into incoherent sentences. Lasted all about three seconds before another sound added to the scene: rushing, smooth wind, and whistling leaves.


    Then, screams overwhelmed the speakers.


    A blue screen appeared in every sword in the room. Then a second screen, then a third, a fourth—you get the idea. They were status updates, punctually informing them that their friends were incapped.


    Aoki snatched the communicator off the table and yelled into it. “What the fuck was going on?!” he probably was asking. He shouted codenames, real names, begging anyone to pick up. Meanwhile, everyone in the room was listening with their jaws stupidly hanging and their eyes bigger than marbles.


    Husk shook my collar. “What the hell did you do, Shen?!”


    I grinned.


    “What the fuck did you do—?!”


    “Hello?” a voice came from the comms. “Is this on?”


    The room went silent.


    Chunhua cleared her throat. “These disgusting men earned themselves a trip to the hospital; though if it was up to me, I’d display their heads on your front-door, System Articles.”


    Another voice came on: “Now, can you please stop fucking around and wrap things up already, Alex? You know Uncle’s gonna kill you for being a dumbass.”


    “Heh…” Hearing Althea’s voice almost tempered the heat inside my chest. Almost. Nothing could extinguish the fire except for, hypothetically, feeling their bones crunch underneath my feet. Statistically-speaking, however, the odds were against me. Four C-Rank Slayers against a ren who didn’t have time nor room to [Temporary Register].


    Most people call that a suicide mission, but to me, this isn’t anything special.


    Husk had let go of my collar, his tiny brain trying to make heads and tails of what’d happened. Everyone was. Confusion, such a useful emotion. When no one knew what was going on, it meant they dedicated brainpower to untangle the mess—brainpower that they diverted from their original tasks. That meant a little slower reaction time.


    Takano wasn’t poking my scalp anymore with that iron.


    Husk glared at me. “Shen—!”


    Takano’s arm was yanked over my shoulder. His pistol got knocked out of his hand and took a first-class flight onto Fujimura’s desk, and the ugly fuck shrieked like he’d never seen a gun before in his life.


    “Kuso!” Aoki grabbed at me, until he found a metal pen jammed in his throat and started choking on it.


    “Oh God—!” Husk went from saying God’s name to crying for Him, as I impaled his hand clean through with my last pen—


    An arm snaked around my neck. Takano. Fuck. The choke squeezed tears from my eyes and casted fire through my nerves. I heaved forward and clawed for my fallen sling bag on the ground—


    Someone yelling. Not from pain. From adrenaline and rage. I blinked once and saw a blurry Japanese man charging at me. I kicked the table into his shins, making him fall and eat shit.


    That convenient distraction weakened Takano’s grip just enough. My fingers curled around a strap. In my next choked breath, his forehead got cracked open by what was effectively a sock filled with rocks. His arm loosened, and by the second hit, it slithered away.


    I leapt from the couch—


    An annoying bastard on the ground (Kawakami) grabbed my ankle. He couldn’t hold on when he got whipped in the face. He rolled over, grabbing at his nose.


    This time, I actually escaped the fray and found myself next to Fujimura’s desk. I dropped my bag. The man himself screamed like a little bitch and scampered to the far corner of his office, yet he had the audacity to yell at his swords. Presumably: “Kill that motherfucker! Don’t give him time to [Register]!”


    Sugihara yanked the bloody pen from Aoki’s throat and launched it. The pen was like a dart with the velocity of a fastball—had to be a [Skill]—but his aim was shit and stuck into the drywall behind me.


    Kawakami climbed to his feet only to find a flying office chair. I didn’t tell if he caught or ate it because Sugihara was already on the move. He pushed his friend aside, leapt over the crooked table, landed in front of Fujimura’s desk—and he faced the wrong end of an energy pistol.


    He gasped.


    I pulled the trigger.


    Sugihara dropped to the ground, wailing, as the stench of burnt flesh overwhelmed the room. He better count his stars. Instead of having his forehead stripped of skin and meat, his scalp had instead. There was a long burning, bleeding streak across his hair like someone had given him a bad waxing. It hurt, yeah, but he was screaming. Screaming meant he was suffering but alive—as it should be.


    The energy pistol was garbage, little better than welded scrap metal and backyard science. The discharge sounded dull when it should be satisfyingly sharp. Plus, there was an annoying delay between the trigger-pull and discharge. Felt like it was on medium-power too, so that meant decreased lethality. It was running out of life, but it’d serve me well.


    Kawakami reached for his waist and got nailed in the shoulder. His sleeve burned and the skin underneath melted into an ugly, charred crimson like an overripe tomato. The pain made him forget about attacking, and he retreated. He climbed over the couch as multiple shots rang throughout the office, burning holes into the pillows and cushions, and he tumbled over the back.


    He yelled Aoki’s and Takano’s names.


    Takano just finished wrapping a piece of fabric around his friend’s bleeding neck. He looked at me, I looked at him, and our eyes met like star-crossed lovers. He cursed and tried pulling Aoki off the couch.


    Getting shot in the hand discouraged him. Takano yelped and took cover, stranding Aoki there.


    Aoki banged a fist against the cushions. He shouted at his cowardly friends, something like, “Get me out of here!” or “Kill that fucking bastard!”. Probably both.


    I shot him three times in the chest. His shouting rippled into howling, holes burned in his shirt but his flesh burned hotter, and he rolled dumbly off the couch. Festered there, bled there, no fight in him left.


    But someone else had fight left. Someone who’d made a mistake. A weak hand reached from behind the desk and latched onto the sharp edge. Sugihara. His fingers were hammered in by the butt of the pistol, over and over, fingernails breaking open, until he got the message. For extra measure, I flipped the desk over. Everything fell. A monitor, papers and binders and files, office supplies, heavy paperweights, and the desk itself; crushing Sugihara and pinning him to the ground.


    I whipped the pistol around the room. Husk had joined Fujimura in their safe little corner and held onto his bleeding hand. When the barrel aimed in their direction, they cowered and raised their hands. Harmless fucks. No spine in them—


    The couch was flying at me.


    I jumped out of the way. It crashed into the wall, knocking down treasured pictures and diplomas and awards. They joined the trash on the ground in a shower of broken glass and small chips of wood. But trouble was coming in the form of two quick little legs: Kawakami, with something in his hand. An electric baton, seemed magically-imbued by a [Skill].


    He mightily swung, but the pistol acted like a decent parrying dagger. I knocked it away but he came for the backswing, then came from underneath, above, to the side—quick and relentless, all with the energy of a hyperactive child.


    The pistol had done good work, but after one eventual swing, I’m afraid its time was done. Kawakami batted it out of my hands and a satisfied, sadistic glint shone in his eyes; it was matched only by the electricity coursing through his sig.


    He said the one Japanese word I did know: <Die—!>


    Five ugly knuckles smashed into his chin. He was fast, but my fists were faster. Blood leaked through his pink teeth, and before he could raise his baton again, I was on him. I pressed my fingertips against the center of his chest.


    All I needed was a brief window. Sixteen strikes. If executed correctly, all it took was sixteen strikes.


    [Skill Error: Anti-Slayer Technique - Sixteen Point Incapacitation]


    And I had. Like most of his friends, Kawakami kissed the ground screaming but he was the unluckiest one. To everybody, he was getting burned alive with no visible fire. The fire existed inside his body, flaring throughout his Phenomenon Production System from head-to-toe. His internal mana exploded from within, having the same sensation of being boiled alive.


    If I’d used Sixteen Point Obliteration instead, well, the pain would be a lot worse.


    “Kawakami—!” Takano exclaimed from the other side of the room, seeing his buddy cry and roll around like a bratty toddler.


    Then, Takano saw me.


    There was a specific fear that only Slayers could feel. In a world of superpowers and magic, there existed freaks unimaginably stronger than you, so strong that you could only kneel and submit and hope for mercy. Overwhelming power beckoned overwhelming emotions, after all.


    And Takano had that fear in his very eyes.


    I slowly walked up to him.


    This was the moment that defined Takano. Would he beg or fight?


    I had my answer when his foot shot out and I caught it. A weak kick, though. I shoved the dumbass against the door.


    In one smooth motion, I showed him what a real kick looked like. It snapped the door’s hinges and popped the isolation bubble. Takano fell as the door did, hard, but he rolled backwards onto soft carpet and got spritely to his feet.


    “Fuck you!” he said in a thick accent, but his actions didn’t match his words. Looked angry, talked angry, but he was retreating.


    I calmly approached.


    Takano roared and swung widely with his bad fist.


    I caught his arm and backhanded him. “Stop that.”


    He stumbled backwards and spat blood onto the carpet. “Asshole! Chicken fuck!”


    “Get better insults.” I primed a punch.


    Takano reflectively gasped and put his arms up, shaking. The punch never came, until he lowered his guard and ate a fist to the nose. That time, that time dealt damage. Both to his body and the soul. It seemed whatever courage he had evaporated at that moment.


    He turned tail and scampered away, leaving a thin trail of blood as shameful evidence. Unfortunately for him, Takano was running into the main floor populated by a few dozen eyewitnesses. As soon as he broke into the space, a dozen gasps and exclamations shattered the unnerving silence.


    Takano stopped in front of the cubicles, hand over his nose. He pointed at a random lady. “You! Police! Call the police—!”


    The “criminal” kicked him into a cubicle wall. Didn’t know who this belonged to—I forgot—but that didn’t matter now.


    Takano shrieked as I grabbed him by the collar. “H-HELP! This man will kill me—!”


    I punched him. I bloodied his face. I shattered bones. The nose, the orbital. Teeth popped from his mouth and rolled on the ground like marbles. His cheeks were puffed up, red and purple. My hands were covered in blood. His blood. Lips bruised and pink—


    “SHEN—!” Something bonked against the back of my head. A weak hit, like getting hit by a plastic bat.


    I looked over my shoulder and found Fujimura holding Kawakami’s baton. Whatever he saw in me, it was enough for him to drop the fancy stick and fall on his ass.


    I let go of Takano. He limply fell sideways, mouth barely moving.


    Fujimura crawled away from me. “M-Maniac! He’s a maniac! Someone call the—!” I caught up to him. “WAIT—!”


    I stomped his head in. He’ll live, with facial reconstruction surgery.


    That was four, technically six if you counted the useless shits.


    I sighed and finally had a chance to catch my breath. Everyone was staring at me again, this time there wasn''t any confusion or anger. Only fear. About half of the people here were hiding behind something or someone.


    “Show’s over,” I said. “I—“


    The elevator dinged, and a squad of blue uniforms and bronze badges rushed into the office. Ordo Police Department, the city’s finest, with semi-automatic rifles bouncing on their chests and bulky body armor that could stop most forms of ballistics. Looks like someone already called the police.


    They shouted, “Police! Police! Hands up! Hands up!”


    I was the first to do so—


    “It’s him, officers!” someone said behind me. That was a voice I didn’t want to hear. Husk leaned against a wall, showing everyone his impaled hand. “A-A gun! He has a gun!”


    Motherfucker, I should’ve knocked him out.


    For my negligence, I was rewarded with half a dozen rifles pointed at me. Instead of shaking hands with badges, they pushed my head against the carpet and cuffed me.


    They drew blood from my arm. “What the fuck…” one officer muttered. “He’s clear! Don’t bug him! I repeat, don’t fuckin’ bug him!”


    Good, at least they wouldn''t poison me.


    This was going to be a long day.