You, a living person, are telling me I've served in the underworld for ten years?

He walked along the quiet, dimly lit back alley next to the parking lot toward his parking space, turning the special car key between his fingers.

As soon as Chen Yang stepped into the darkest alleyway, nestled between two old buildings, his eyelids twitched slightly.

The feeling of being locked on by a malicious gaze is a hundred times stronger than the feeling brought by that thug in the bar!
Whoosh!Whoosh!Whoosh!
The sound of something cutting through the air came almost simultaneously from the front, back, and above! Two burly men blocked the alleyway in front, and two figures wearing leather jackets blocked their retreat. Meanwhile, on the fire escape stairs of the old building above and next to them, a hunched-over, yet swift-moving black shadow suddenly pounced down!
He gripped a dark, claw-shaped short blade in reverse, aiming it straight for Chen Yang's nape with a stench! The speed and ruthlessness of his movements far surpassed the limits of what ordinary humans could achieve!

The two men charging at him head-on were utterly unpretentious. One unleashed a massive iron fist, whistling through the air, as it crashed down on Chen Yang's head, while the other delivered a vicious whip kick to his lower body, the leg movement as fierce as a steel whip! Combined with a claw strike from above, they instantly sealed off all of Chen Yang's space to dodge!

The attack was imminent! Yet, in an extremely subtle instant, Chen Yang's figure underwent several unbelievable distortions!
*Thud!* The iron fist that should have struck his head only grazed a stray strand of hair at his temple;

Bang!
That fierce sweeping leg only tore through the air where he had just stood;

The most dangerous spot was the back of the neck; the dark, beast-claw dagger pierced through Chen Yang's skin almost touching its warmth before suddenly missing its mark!
"what?"

Five sounds of surprise and doubt came simultaneously from different directions.

Flashlight!
Chen Yang's left hand, like a crane's beak, struck the "Taiyuan" acupoint on the wrist of the man whose fist had missed! It seemed like a light touch, but the man was struck as if by lightning, and his entire right arm instantly went numb and out of control!

Right leg sweeps upward! What seems like a casual groin sweep is so fast that it leaves a trail of afterimages, a precise "second strike, first strike"!
A sickeningly sharp crack as bone broke!

The guy who used the sweeping leg was still in the momentum of the whip kick when a terrifying force, coming from directly below his attack but rushing upwards, slammed into his waist and hip joint!

His body folded up strangely and flew backward like a tattered sack.

With a "thud," he crashed into the brick wall next to him, slid down, and immediately lost consciousness!

Behind them, the black shadow that pounced down saw a blur before its eyes, and the target vanished.

Immediately, an overwhelming force slammed into his shoulder and back!
"puff!"

He was as if he had been hit by a speeding heavy truck, spitting out blood as he slammed hard against the metal plate of the fire escape staircase with a loud metallic wail, before falling to the ground motionless.

The remaining two people blocking the front and back alleys were killed in less than a second from the moment they launched their attack until their three companions were instantly crippled!

A hint of shock flashed in the eyes of the two men, but they showed no fear or intention to retreat. Instead, they let out a beast-like roar at the same time, and their eyes instantly turned a strange crimson!

Their muscles visibly swelled up, and their veins bulged out like writhing dragons!

A sense of overwhelming violence, far exceeding anything seen before, spread out.

"The medicine is effective!"

Chen Yang's eyes narrowed, and he immediately understood the source of this power and that strange scarlet eyes!
These five individuals possessed explosive power far exceeding the limits of ordinary humans, but they had absolutely no spiritual energy or holy essence within them. They only had brute force derived from the life potential forcibly stimulated and extracted by drugs! They were very similar to the unfinished products he encountered at the black-clad men's stronghold, but these individuals seemed to have lost their sense of pain and fear, falling into a deeper state of berserk madness!

"Roar!"

The two men, their eyes bloodshot, pounced again, their movements even faster, their strength and speed having indeed increased significantly! Their fists, accompanied by a whooshing sound, blocked Chen Yang's left and right sides!
Chen Yang stopped dodging.

He lowered his body slightly, like the roots of an old tree, and met the attack with both palms!
boom!boom!
It was like two pieces of raw iron colliding violently!

The shockwave exploded through the alley, kicking up dust from the ground.

The two drug slaves, enraged and driven to madness, seemed to have crashed into an unshakeable iron mountain! Chen Yang's arms remained completely still!
The two men were thrown back several steps by the enormous recoil, the muscles in their arms twisting and trembling strangely, clearly their tendons had been forcibly torn! But they seemed oblivious, shaking their throbbing arms, letting out a roar, and charging forward again with their lives on the line!
"Brute force is acceptable, but ultimately it's not enough for anything important!"

Chen Yang snorted coldly, his figure approaching like a drifting catkin, his attack as swift as lightning!
This time, I will show no mercy.

Click!Click!
The chilling sound of bones breaking echoed rapidly! Chen Yang's hands moved like butterflies flitting among flowers, or like weapons tearing tendons and bones apart, instantly crushing the arms and shoulder joints of three people, and finally pointing a finger at the vital point in one person's heart!

"puff!"

The burly man's roar abruptly ceased, his eyes bulged, blood seeped from his seven orifices, and his entire robust body slumped down like mud, completely lifeless! The violent aura dissipated from his body in an instant.

The person still standing, along with the drug slave beside him who was clutching a strangely twisted arm, whose bloodshot eyes had faded by half and who was now watching his companion fall to his last breath with horror, all froze, as if frozen in place.

"Dead... dead?"

The drug slave, his arm severed, stared at the corpse on the ground, his voice trembling uncontrollably. The sight of his companion's internal organs being ripped open instantly crushed the madness and courage he had been forced to maintain through the drugs. The stark reality of death extinguished any remaining ferocity in him.

Chen Yang indifferently glanced at the still-warm corpse on the ground, then turned to the two remaining drug slaves who were trembling like leaves.

"Now, we can talk properly."

He walked up to the two men, his shadow enveloping them. His voice was low, yet it carried the chilling coldness of death.

"Tell me, where did you get this drug that can make someone incredibly strong and painless for a short time? The man I just killed was the consequence of not telling the truth. Do you want to try it too?"

Seeing their companion's gruesome death—eyes wide open, face contorted, blood streaming from his mouth and nose—and feeling the palpable, soul-freezing killing intent emanating from Chen Yang, their last shred of bravado completely crumbled.

The person whose arm was crushed was so terrified that he lost control of his bladder on the spot.

"Big brother! Big brother, spare me! Spare me!"

His face was covered in snot and tears, and his voice was trembling with sobs and extreme fear.

"I'll tell you! I'll tell you everything! I wouldn't dare lie to you! The medicine... we bought it from 'Black Wolf'! It's... it's over at the old industrial base in the west of the city!"

"Who is Black Wolf? What does he look like? Where does the transaction take place?"

Chen Yang pressed for an answer.

"I...I've never seen your face before!"

Another drug slave, who was slightly calmer, rushed to answer, his voice trembling violently.

"Each transaction involves depositing money in one place and then retrieving the goods from another designated point! It's all one-way instructions!"
That place is... the former site of the Dingfeng Chemical Plant in the western suburbs!

Their hideout is probably there!

Those people are really weird! You...you're going alone, it's too dangerous, brother! You'll really die!

"They're not like us drugged thugs who just fight. Their people..." His face showed an expression of extreme terror.

"Their people are like monsters! Once when I went to pick up some goods, I saw a person in the distance, squatting in a red water that looked like a big plastic bucket... taking a bath!"
That water…it looks like…it looks like blood! He seemed to be thinking of something extremely terrifying, and his teeth were chattering.

"You killed our brothers, we admit it! But if you go there, you'll really be dead! Don't blame us for not warning you then!"

As Chen Yang listened to their descriptions, his eyes remained unwavering, only sharpening with a colder edge. A blood pool? More powerful drug-infused beings? It seemed the source of this potion's circulation was deeper than he had imagined.

"Enough talk! Lead the way!"

Chen Yang picked up the terrified drug slave and carried him to the parking space like a chick.

"Let's go to the old Dingfeng factory in the western suburbs! I want to see what kind of monsters are taking a bath there!"

Another drug slave with a broken arm struggled to climb, but Chen Yang turned around and unleashed a burst of energy that sealed his acupoints, causing him to collapse.

"You stay where you are."

Someone will come to 'invite' you within an hour.

He dragged the pale-faced drug slave to the car, opened the passenger door, roughly shoved him inside, and got into the driver's seat himself. Before starting the engine, he pressed a miniature communicator in his ear.

"River Team, capture two drug slaves, leave one alive in the back alley of 'Dark Night Song'. I'm following the clues to an abandoned chemical plant called 'Dingfeng' in the western suburbs. The location will be sent to your terminal simultaneously."

There might be a crucial source or testing site for the drug there; there are signs of a 'blood pool.'

After saying that, without waiting for a reply, he hung up the call and slammed on the gas pedal.

The vehicle roared with a deep, resolute roar, piercing the dim night like a ferocious beast pouncing on its prey, speeding toward the forgotten steel ruins on the western outskirts of the city—the former site of the Dingfeng Chemical Plant, shrouded in unknown dangers.

The night was as thick as ink, almost swallowing the beams of light piercing through the SUV.

The desolate wilderness of the western suburbs was so quiet that only the lonely roar of the engine and the screeching sound of tires crushing gravel and dead branches could be heard.

Outside the car window, the last hazy glow of the city had long since vanished, leaving only an endless, oppressive darkness.

Inside the car, Chen Yang's face, illuminated by the dim light of the dashboard, appeared as sharp and calloused as steel, devoid of any emotion. In the passenger seat beside him, the drug slave he had hastily grabbed was curled up in a ball, trembling uncontrollably. The clattering of his teeth was the only, irritating sound in the dark space.

He looked at the road ahead, torn open by the headlights, and felt that the outline of the abandoned factory deep in the wilderness was like an ancient beast lurking in eternal darkness, slowly opening its filthy, pungent maw, waiting to devour everything.

The ruins of the Dingfeng Chemical Plant, with their massive, rusted, and peeling steel skeletons casting grotesque and twisted shadows under the thin moonlight, resemble abandoned tombs of giants. Wild grasses, reaching half a person's height, grow wildly from the cracks in the cement and the broken windows, swaying like ghostly hands in the damp, cold night wind.

The air was filled with the pungent smell of rust, chemical residue, and some indescribable mixture of decay.

Chen Yang parked the car behind a pile of waste materials that offered a panoramic view of the entire factory area, and turned off the engine and lights.

He glanced at the almost limp medicine slave beside him, his voice as cold as ice deep in the Siberian permafrost.

"If you make a single wrong move on the way later, or if I find out you've played any tricks..."

"No... I wouldn't dare! Big brother! This is it! It's that most dilapidated workshop up ahead! The... the basement entrance is inside!"

The drug slave was so frightened he almost wet himself. His voice was trembling with tears as he pointed to a huge workshop in the distance, where most of the walls had collapsed and only the steel frame remained to support it.

"I...I swear!"

"Get down and stay here."

Chen Yang pushed open the car door, and a rush of icy air instantly entered.

He left the drug slave in a hidden spot to serve as the final coordinates and witnesses, while he himself moved with a swift motion, like a wisp of weightless smoke, silently merging into the shadows of the factory and heading towards the target workshop.

Each step left only the faintest trace on the corroded, soft mud, and his breath was barely audible. He was perfectly integrated into this desolate ruin.

Chen Yang's steps did not falter even though he was still more than ten meters away from the dilapidated entrance of the workshop, which was almost just a door frame.

He was deliberately trying to alert the enemy! He had barely stepped into this open area—

"Halt! Who goes there?"

Several bright beams of flashlight, like sharp swords, shot out from several dark corners and pierced Chen Yang's body! Accompanied by shouts, five or six men wearing drab gray jackets, whose eyes revealed a vigilance and ferocity that was out of place in the dilapidated environment, surrounded him. Their movements were not amateurish, and they quickly took up advantageous blocking positions.

They had no obvious weapons, but the bulging silhouettes of their waists and the ruthless aura in their gait clearly indicated that they were bloodthirsty desperados.

Chen Yang stopped, raised his hands, and a smile that was a mixture of nervousness and anticipation appeared on his face.

"Brothers! Don't be impulsive! I was introduced by Blackie! Blackie from the West District! Everyone in the underworld calls him 'Iron Rod Blackie'! He has urgent business to discuss with Brother 'Old Ghost'!"

The wariness in the eyes of the people who surrounded them did not diminish.

"Dark-skinned?"

One of the men, who seemed to be the leader and had a centipede-like scar on his chin, shone a flashlight on Chen Yang's face several times.

Why didn't he come himself?

"Hey, don't even mention it!"

Chen Yang looked sullen and annoyed; his acting skills were worthy of an award-winning actor.

"He and his brothers 'Crippled Wolf' and 'Pillar' and a few others have really messed up tonight! They've got a tough customer. Not only did they lose one brother, but Pillar's arm is crippled, and Blackie and Crippled Wolf are scared out of their wits and are hiding in the city, too afraid to move!"

Let me come over first, tell them I've mentioned their name, what happened today, and that I need to buy the 'red soup' medicine. Old Ghost Brother might give me face!

He paused deliberately, then lowered his voice as if he were still feeling fear.

"That opponent is a fucking bastard! He's ruthless... They even told you guys to be careful lately... That guy's been asking around our area!"

He deliberately revealed some "dangerous" information to increase the persuasiveness of Blackie and his companions' encounter.

"The medicine in the red broth?" The scarred, burly man frowned slightly. One of his men whispered a few words quickly in his ear, clearly confirming Blackie's identity and the details of the potential conflict tonight. The scarred man stared at Chen Yang, sizing him up. (End of Chapter)