TN: Hi~ I’m Misty, a new translator who will take over the series from now on. I may use new words but rest assured everything will stay consistent!

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At the same time, the Night Watchers' headquarters in Maple Leaf City.

"Artificial S-ranks will always be the top priority. We must find a way to break through this restriction set by The Witch. Only then can the Night Watchers truly become the leaders of this country, or even this world."

Li Tianliao sat cross-legged on a prayer mat, holding a gourd and taking large gulps of wine. After several swallows, he wiped the corner of his mouth with his sleeve and continued nonchalantly.

"That’s the big picture. To be honest, I don’t give a damn about the Night Watchers or whatever; I only care about myself."

"I just want to know how to break through to a higher level, and how to possess controllable artificial S-rank technology."

"In this world, in this country, S-rank is not the end, but it has already stuck almost all Hunters in place. When an A-rank reaches their limit, there’s at least a clue of where to go, but as for how to continue upward from S-rank, no one knows."

"Everyone knows the theory: ascending to S-rank is nothing more than the mutation or Corruption of the body's two major powers. SS-rank is full mutation. But in this world, aside from individuals born with Triple Corruption, I’ve truly never seen anyone break through to that level."

As the Minister of the Intelligence Department of the Night Watchers, the only people who could make Meng Tianrui act so submissively were Zhang Lu and the man before him.

At this moment, Meng Tianrui sat below with his head bowed, listening silently. He stole a glance at Li Tianliao; the old man was clearly 82, yet he looked like a middle-aged man in his forties or fifties, with a ruddy complexion and a thick, powerful voice.

With a bald head and a ring of stubbly beard, dressed in a white martial arts suit, he looked like one of those middle-aged men in the park pretending to be a mobster—nothing about him seemed particularly outstanding.

He had come to find Li Tianliao today to ask about the plan regarding Liu City.

After all, all current plans were being arranged by Zhang Lu, and it felt improper for him, the Minister of the Intelligence Department, to be left out.

As the General Headquarters Minister, Li Tianliao hadn't shown his face or given any instructions during this period.

"When I find the method, you’ll all have a share."

"Sigh, you say I'm at such an age... who knows how many years I have left? Before time, even S-ranks are but ants. I broke through to S-rank too late; I’m stuck here, unable to move a step forward. So, the future belongs to you all."

Like A-rank, the Night Watchers did not have a detailed internal classification for S-rank.

But there were gaps even between S-ranks. An S+ Hunter would have no problem killing a newly initiated S-rank. However, any Hunter who could reach S-rank usually had a few tricks up their sleeve, especially given the factions behind them.

Since the death of The Witch, looking back ten years, there were no public records of S-rank Hunters dying.

A few S-rank Corrupted had died, though. Meng Tianrui recalled that those few S-rank Corrupted were all killed by a coordinated siege of S-rank Hunters.

"I don't hold much hope for the SS-rank breakthrough. However, regarding Huaizhen’s side, I want to pave the way for him. He has already reached the limit of A-rank; S-rank won't be a problem for him, especially since he’s so young."

At the mention of Li Huaizhen, Li Tianliao’s eyes cleared up significantly.

"For the next Golden Ear Assessment, Huaizhen is certain to pass. That way, he’ll reach S-rank before he’s thirty, becoming the youngest S-rank in our entire Eastern District. If I can find the path forward, even if I don't succeed, I can forge Huaizhen into the Eastern District's next SS-rank!"

Li Huaizhen was actually only twenty-four this year.

Extremely young.

Even if he didn't reach S-rank by thirty, he would certainly succeed before forty.

Regardless of whether Li Huaizhen was particularly bright, no one in the Eastern District doubted his talent.

Even Wang Zhiyuan from Liu City was nowhere near as talented as Li Huaizhen.

Meng Tianrui nodded repeatedly. "The Minister is right. Huaizhen indeed has a boundless future. I believe he has the chance to become the spokesperson for all Night Watchers in the Eastern District!"

"Go capture a few people for me." Li Tianliao put down his wine gourd. "Fang Tiandi’s ancestral home is in Xinyuan. That’s a small place, nothing to worry about. Once you arrive, have the local Night Watchers cooperate with you to investigate Fang Qingxue’s family situation and bring the people back to me."

Fang Qingxue and Fang Tiandi were relatives. After Fang Tiandi’s immediate family left, the roots of the Fang family remained in Xinyuan.

In a sense, the move of Fang Tiandi’s immediate family away from Xinyuan was a good thing for the Fang clan. For certain interested parties, aside from Fang Tiandi’s family, the other miscellaneous relatives clearly held no utility value.

"Understood. Leave this to me, you can rest assured."

Meng Tianrui rose to leave. He didn't care about Li Tianliao’s plan.

He was a dog either way; he only looked for the subsequent benefits.

Moreover, he was already used to this business of kidnapping local families. It seemed like a tradition among the Maple Leaf City Night Watchers to specifically target weaknesses.

Compared to a head-on confrontation, this method was far more effective.

The fact that Li Huaizhen could grow to this level had a significant connection to him. Over the years, he hadn't even kept count of how many Hunters and robust youths with abundant Blood Power he had captured for Li Huaizhen.

Li Huaizhen was a Hunter with physical mutation. He could strengthen himself by absorbing the Blood Power of others. The stronger the target's Blood Power, the stronger the power Li Huaizhen gained.

Actually, it wasn't just Li Huaizhen; every Hunter could perform similar operations, but they simply didn't have a grandfather as powerful as Li Huaizhen.

To put it bluntly, Li Huaizhen had "eaten" his way up.

Li Tianliao doted on this grandson too much. Nearly twenty A-rank Hunters had been fed to him, and the number of other Corrupted and ordinary people was hard to calculate.

Within Maple Leaf City, there was a place called the "Nurturing Hall," filled entirely with children under the age of fifteen.

These children underwent "Corruption Modification" in the Nurturing Hall. The internal Hunters used every possible means to force mutations or Corruption to occur early in these children.

In the process, uncontrollable waste products were inevitably produced. These scraps would ultimately end up in Li Huaizhen’s hands.

***

Precise control of power meant punching a living person against a wall and physically exploding their body without damaging the structure of the wall. For a long time, Li Huaizhen had been pursuing extreme violence—a more "aesthetic" violence.

Poof! A mist of blood exploded, spraying all over Li Huaizhen. He grinned savagely, grabbing the head of a Hunter that had fallen due to the body’s explosion. With a full-force throw, it smashed through the barrier of a Hunter ahead and shattered that Hunter's body.

"Is this all the Liu City Night Watchers are capable of now?" Li Huaizhen stood on the third floor, walking step by step toward the dozen or so Hunters ahead.

Behind him lay over ten corpses; not a single one was intact.

From the first floor to the third, the floors were in total chaos—walls punched through, desks and chairs smashed to pieces. Anyone alive, regardless of status or strength, was slaughtered.

This was, in itself, an act of revenge.

What surprised Li Huaizhen was that the entire Night Watcher building truly lacked anyone capable of stopping his steps.

"Have Wang Zhiyuan come see me. If Wang Zhiyuan is dead, let all the living leadership come down. If they won’t come down, it doesn’t matter; I’ll just kill my way up floor by floor."

"If you won’t come down, then hide well. If I catch you, I’ll definitely skin you alive."

The narrow corridor did not hinder Li Huaizhen's performance at all. His fists worked in tandem; one punch descended upon a Hunter’s head, and the skull instantly exploded into a mess of red, white, and yellow. From the spine to the shoulder blades to the ribs, the sound of bones shattering formed a series of crackles, sounding like a balloon being crushed until it popped.

With a seemingly casual slap, a wall instantly exploded. An A-rank Hunter hiding on the other side preparing an ambush was sent flying, retreating more than ten steps before crashing into the wall behind him. For a moment, he bled from all seven orifices, his head spinning.

Thick fingers stabbed into the mangled corpse on the ground. Two fingers clamped onto the heart and ripped it out. The heart was still beating, pumping pulses of blood, before being stuffed into Li Huaizhen’s mouth in a few bites.

The way Li Huaizhen chewed the heart made him look exactly like a vicious Corrupted.

His face was covered in blood. As he opened his mouth wide, one could see the fascia of human tissue creating a "stringy" effect on his teeth. Yet, Li Huaizhen was dressed in a suit; the savage brutality draped in the clothing of human civilization looked exceptionally jarring.

"Run! Why are you running? Where is Wang Zhiyuan? Wang Zhiyuan!"

Li Huaizhen roared at the top of his lungs. The dense volley of bullets from several B-rank Hunters ahead couldn't even break his clothes; the overly powerful Blood Power formed a sort of psychic barrier on the surface of Li Huaizhen’s body.

Clang, clang. A field of deformed bullet casings fell to the ground. Li Huaizhen exerted force in his legs and slammed head-first into two heavy titanium alloy doors before they could close. A dent appeared on the surface of the titanium doors, but it was the surrounding walls that couldn't withstand such terrifying force and crumbled.

The still-intact doors flew out, crushing two B-rank Hunters to death on the spot. The survivors didn't dare stay on the third floor any longer, sprinting down the stairs.

At this time, a large amount of pale yellow mist began to flood the floor. This mist had a certain suppressive effect on Hunters with physical mutations, primarily weakening the enemy through numbing effects on Psychic Energy and soul power.

Li Huaizhen took a deep breath, sucking a large amount of the pale yellow mist into his body before exhaling it through his nostrils.

"Wang Zhiyuan, you didn't really die, did you?"

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Li Huaizhen threw punch after punch, like a human demolition crew.

The scene that had appeared countless times in his dreams was finally being realized. Li Huaizhen transformed all the hatred in his heart into power.

He had only one goal today.

Kill the high-ranking officials of the Night Watchers and then tear this place down.

A cleaner hiding in the corner was dragged out by Li Huaizhen. Although this cleaning lady was 61 years old, and although she was just an ordinary person—even a mute—Li Huaizhen still raised his hand, gripped her neck, and tossed her upward. After destroying her entire muscular system, he pinched the skin of her nape with his index finger and thumb and tore downward, ripping off more than half of her skin.

"Who are you... Wang Zhiyuan? Liu Jie? Zhou Tianqiang? An Changyong?"

Holding the skin up toward the hallway's security camera, Li Huaizhen grinned savagely. "No matter who you are, wait for me up there patiently."

Li Huaizhen was now completely certain: the Night Watchers of Liu City had truly been crippled by someone else.

Despite such destruction, not even an A+ rank had shown up, and there were only three A-ranks, all of whom he had killed.

He was very curious about who had done it.

If this were the Liu City Night Watchers at their peak, even if the two old S-ranks weren't around, he wouldn't have dared to act like this.

Li Huaizhen wasn't considering the big picture. He hadn't even thought about whether the two S-ranks of Liu City would come seeking revenge on his grandfather after this. He only knew that the Night Watcher headquarters was empty of power, and this was his chance for revenge.

He didn't believe that even if those two old fellows really came back, they would dare go to Maple Leaf City to demand an explanation.

It was only because of the opportunity today; otherwise, once his grandfather knew he had come to Liu City, he would surely make him go back and would never let him seek revenge.

"When I was 16, I watched with my own eyes as you turned my parents into Corrupted! I watched my grandfather end their final, pathetic lives!"

"You want me to let you go?" Li Huaizhen grabbed a female Hunter’s head, laughing loudly as she cried and begged for mercy. His face then turned cold as a stone in an instant. "Later, I ate their corpses. I said I didn't want to memorialize them every year; I wanted to bring them with me for revenge!"

"Look at me. Look at what I’ve become."

"This is all because of Wang Zhiyuan! This is all because of you Liu City Night Watchers!"

"Why are you crying? Why should you cry? You were an accomplice too; you deserve to die!"

Li Huaizhen ripped the female Hunter’s clothes open, his five fingers grabbing her left chest. He squeezed his palm with force, and his fingers instantly broke the skin and stabbed into the flesh. After the five fingers were submerged, he tore outward with force, nearly ripping the whole thing off.

The woman’s heart-wrenching screams only made Li Huaizhen more excited, acting like the seasoning for a fine meal. She kicked her legs wildly. The sensation of suffocation and the piercing pain made her nearly faint. Her hands gripped Li Huaizhen’s thick wrist like they were clutching a hard iron pipe; no matter how she scratched, she couldn't move the pipe in the slightest.

For her, fainting at this moment would have been the best thing.

At least she wouldn't have to watch her own heart being dug out and eaten alive.

***

What is a Hunter? What is a Corrupted?

Is the difference between mutation and Corruption really that big?

Looking at the images on the computer screen, Liu Jie actually began to ponder this question.

They all said mutated Hunters were treasures bestowed by The Witch to combat the monsters that existed in time—the Corrupted.

And now?

He looked at Li Huaizhen’s savage appearance as he ate a human heart, looked at the woman who still possessed a brief moment of consciousness after losing her heart, saw the expression of agony on her face, and then looked at the floor covered in unsightly corpses.

Until he saw Li Huaizhen get into the elevator, cold sweat instantly broke out on Liu Jie’s forehead.

If the Hospital Director hadn't told him he had to wait at the Night Watcher headquarters, he probably would have run away. He knew the Night Watchers were diminished now and truly lacked the strength to kill this guy in the building.

"Scared?"

Just then, a youthful voice suddenly sounded from behind.

Liu Jie was startled and hurriedly looked back, only to find that Jiang Qianyu had appeared behind him at some unknown time.

Since the Demoness Puppet started calling herself the Moon God, her attire had basically become fixed: a black robe with silver silk embroidery, a silver-white mask with black patterns, and eight black angel wings on her back. One look and anyone would know she was a "charlatan."

"Boss... no, Lord Moon God, you’re here." Liu Jie’s mind worked quickly, and he immediately corrected himself, standing up and kneeling on one knee before Jiang Qianyu.

"Your subordinate has absolutely no intention of running away; I will only fight to the end!"

"Stop pretending. Fear is human nature." Jiang Qianyu raised a hand to sweep away the office desk and chair. She sat down facing the office door, retracting her wings, and black quicksand automatically gathered beneath her to form a chair.

"Not only are you afraid, the big idiot downstairs is afraid too."

"Who is this guy? What’s his background?"

Jiang Qianyu propped her face with one hand, closing her eyes to sense a strong surge of Blood Power rapidly approaching from below.

No wonder Liu Jie had been beaten into such a state. This fellow below was indeed no pushover—A+ strength. But to be honest, at most he was at Black Snake’s level. In a one-on-one, this guy might be able to manage a 40/60 split with Wang Zhiyuan if he was lucky.

It was only because Wang Zhiyuan had been captured. If Wang Zhiyuan were really here, he could twist that guy’s head off.

Wang Zhiyuan’s four guards would kill him like it was a game.

So young, so reckless, and not weak.

Even if his talent was good, reasonably speaking, his brain shouldn't support having this level of strength at his age.

If nothing else, this guy’s identity was not simple.

"The grandson of Li Tianliao, the General Headquarters Minister of the Maple Leaf City Night Watchers. His name is Li Huaizhen. He has some history with Wang Zhiyuan; Wang Zhiyuan killed his parents," Liu Jie said.

"Li Tianliao..." Jiang Qianyu naturally knew who Li Tianliao was.

In that case, if she killed Li Huaizhen, Li Tianliao would definitely come to fight her to the death.

That old man had only this one precious grandson and was pinning all his hopes on him soaring to the heavens. If the last root of the Li family was cut off, heaven only knew what that old man might do.

She wasn't afraid of Li Tianliao; she was mainly worried about Fang Tiandi’s side.

If that old fox Fang Tiandi knew she had offended Li Tianliao to the death, he would 100% create an opportunity for her and Li Tianliao to duel so he could reap the benefits.

Ding.

The elevator from the third floor stopped at the twenty-sixth floor.

This was the floor where Wang Zhiyuan’s office was located, now occupied by Liu Jie.

Bending his head as he stepped out of the elevator, Li Huaizhen stretched his muscles. He clenched his fists tightly, his veins and bones tightening and making a crackling sound.

Standing in the hallway, looking at the two ornate doors ahead, Li Huaizhen reached out to adjust his tie. He took a step forward, and the large amount of blood splashed on him was instantly shaken off. He patted his suit; only a layer of dark red could be seen on the surface, with no obvious bloodstains.

It looked as if he was just here to discuss business.

"Wang Zhiyuan, will it be you..."

Li Huaizhen narrowed his eyes. He could feel a fluctuation of Psychic Energy inside the office ahead—not strong, but definitely not weak.

The high-level leadership of the Night Watchers was inside.

Standing before the two doors, Li Huaizhen reached for the door handles and pushed them open.

The office was luxuriously decorated, and the door frame was over three meters high, so he didn't have to bow his head to enter.

As the doors opened, Li Huaizhen tensed his muscles to guard against a strike, but the expected attack didn't come.

Two gazes fell upon him. Li Huaizhen knew who the fat person kneeling on the left was—Liu Jie, one of the high-ranking members of the Liu City Night Watchers. The aura he had sensed outside came from Liu Jie.

But Li Huaizhen’s attention was not on Liu Jie at all.

His gaze was fixed on the petite figure in the center of the office.

In the moment he opened the door, he felt as if he saw an ancient battlefield piled with corpses. The Blood Power rushed at him; the resentment and Blood Power generated by the mountains of corpses seemed to condense into a near-solid mass. The drifting wind and bloody rain converged into a river of blood, flowing into a heart and being transmitted into this monster’s body.

Li Huaizhen had grown up eating people; he had absorbed too much Blood Power and was very sensitive to this area.

At the first sight of Jiang Qianyu, Li Huaizhen knew this little girl was the same "kind" as him, except the number of people she had eaten was a thousand times his.

Only then would her body contain so much mottled resentment and chaotic Blood Power.

As long as power came through "eating people," that power would inevitably be laced with the marks of the original owners—marks that could never be eradicated and would flow in the body forever.

He didn't know what she had done, but the Blood Power in her body was actually very clean, as if it had been purified. Simply put, he didn't feel that the Blood Power in the little girl was chaotic—at least, it was much smoother than the Blood Power in his own body.

This was not a good thing—at least, not for Li Huaizhen.

This indicated that the number of "people" the opponent had eaten was even more than he had anticipated.

Unconsciously, Li Huaizhen’s breathing became heavy, and sweat appeared on his forehead.

"Young Master Li, why are you standing there without saying a word? Let me guess, were you going to say..." Jiang Qianyu stood up, the chair beneath her vanishing into a cloud of quicksand. The eight wings on her back unfurled, bringing a unique kind of beauty.

"Oh, fellow kind, you eat people too?"

Black quicksand gathered, enveloping the entire room. Strands wove together to seal the door behind Li Huaizhen. Jiang Qianyu turned her back, raised a hand, and a delicate knife condensed in her other hand.

She lightly cut her wrist with the knife. The fair skin was sliced open, but what flowed from the wound was not blood, but countless grains of black sand.

"Allow me to introduce myself. I am the Moon God."

Glancing back at Li Huaizhen, Jiang Qianyu already knew how to take down this big idiot.

"Moon God!?" Li Huaizhen was shocked. He hadn't expected to see the Moon God herself at the Night Watcher headquarters, especially in Wang Zhiyuan’s office.

At this moment, even a brain like Li Huaizhen’s thought of many things.

Why would the Moon God be here?

It couldn't be that she was a member of the Night Watchers?

Then there was only one explanation: including Wang Zhiyuan, the entire Night Watcher organization had been crippled by the Moon God.

Li Huaizhen found it hard to believe this reality. In his impression, the Moon God Cult was a trash organization; everyone from top to bottom was like a bunch of clowns not worth mentioning—the kind that might jump around now but would be slapped to death before long.

And now he was being told that Wang Zhiyuan was killed by the Moon God?

Li Huaizhen even thought that there must be someone behind the Moon God Cult.

Most likely, it was fostered in Liu City by another Night Watcher headquarters.

Only the power of another Night Watcher headquarters would have this kind of strength.

Li Huaizhen’s speed was so fast that even Liu Jie, who was beside him, couldn't quite see clearly. In the blink of an eye, he appeared behind Jiang Qianyu, his clenched fist smashing straight toward the back of her head.

Jiang Qianyu did not dodge. A mass of black quicksand appeared behind her and steadily caught Li Huaizhen’s punch. Li Huaizhen’s eyes widened, and his fists worked in tandem, every punch’s speed and power pushed to his absolute limit. He used his fists to create the sharp whistling sound usually made by blades cutting the air, leaving Liu Jie, the Minister, dumbfounded.

Uppercuts, straight punches, crushing punches, inch punches—whip kicks, straight kicks, roundhouse kicks, elbow strikes, knee strikes. Li Huaizhen was a Hunter with physical mutation; martial arts were a basic operation for him. Power and speed were the keys that determined his upper limit. This was completely different from the other two types of Hunters, to the point that Liu Jie, also an A+, couldn't see Li Huaizhen's movements with his naked eyes.

Aside from hearing the angry curses from Li Huaizhen’s mouth and seeing the constant splashes of black quicksand, not a single hair of the Moon God was harmed after his entire sequence of punches and kicks.

No matter how he adjusted his position or changed his footwork, the Moon God stood in place without moving, wrapping her body in the eight wings on her back and letting Li Huaizhen punch and kick as he pleased.

Li Huaizhen wasn't in a hurry either. He kicked out to shatter a mass of black sand condensed by Jiang Qianyu and instantly raised a fist to smash toward her head, which was protected in the rear.

A smile appeared on Li Huaizhen’s face. Could she still not be killed like this?

Unexpectedly, as Jiang Qianyu’s wings unfurled, she pulled up a net made of Primordial Threads with a wave of her hand. Li Huaizhen’s fist smashed into the net, and his entire arm was entangled by the fine lines. Li Huaizhen’s other hand swung a fist toward Jiang Qianyu’s temple; she didn't dodge, but instead used Li Huaizhen’s force to fly backward.

Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh. One Primordial Thread after another was thrown out by Jiang Qianyu. Before her body even hit the ground, Li Huaizhen stepped forward, and with a light flap of her wings, her body leaped into the air. With another wave of her hand, several more Primordial Threads shot out and pinned themselves into the ground.

The thickness of these Primordial Threads was exactly the same as the lines Lu Yunzhi used to tie up Meatball.

Jiang Qianyu also wanted to try the feeling of using fishing lines to tie up a big fish.

How could Li Huaizhen not see Jiang Qianyu’s intention? Everything from the defense just now to the dodging now was merely to drain his stamina and then set up these fine lines.

For a moment, Li Huaizhen truly had no means to counter.

He couldn't catch up in speed because the quicksand beneath his feet was increasing, becoming like a swamp and starting to swallow his body and restrict his movement.

As the fine lines increased, the space Li Huaizhen could move in was compressed to a minimum.

The quicksand on the ground gathered, already passing his calves; even taking a step was difficult. Seeing more and more lines wrapping around him, every movement caused the lines to tighten.

A punch thrown out resulted in ten fishing lines wrapping around his arm.

Standing still, the surrounding fine lines would immediately wrap around him under the control of that damn Moon God.

First, his arm was entangled, then one arm was wrapped together with his body. The only arm he could still use was easily caught by the Moon God when he seized a chance thinking he could give her a punch.

Only then did Li Huaizhen realize one thing.

It wasn't that the Moon God couldn't beat him head-on; she just wanted to toy with him.

The feeling of having all this strength but being unable to use it while being toyed with like a dog made Li Huaizhen feel extremely aggrieved. He let out a roar, yet he was still tripped into the quicksand by Jiang Qianyu pulling the fine lines.

"Hehehehe, hahahaha..." In the small office, aside from Li Huaizhen’s angry roars and curses, there was only Jiang Qianyu’s laughter.

Even Liu Jie was dumbfounded.

How could he not see it? Lord Moon God was playing around.

She was purely bullying him.

"Moon God, you will die a miserable death!" The quicksand covered Li Huaizhen’s body, and the lines wrapped around his whole body reminded him of the monster he saw Lu Yunzhi subdue today.

He remembered he had even said that guy was stupid back then.

"Since you dared to run out behind your grandfather’s back, you should have considered the current situation. Tell me, if I kill you, what will your grandfather do?"

"Will he impulsively come looking for me?"

Jiang Qianyu decided to execute Li Huaizhen publicly.

Rather than having one more unstable factor, it was better to deal with Li Tianliao directly.

It just so happened she wanted to see what kind of strength an S-rank truly possessed.

If she succeeded, she would take down the Maple Leaf City Night Watchers in one fell swoop!