Chapter Forty-Two: The Death of Mu Feng

On the outer ring of District C in Ruxia City.

Night. Moonlight slanted down from the vast, starless vault above, spilling over the beautiful metropolis below. The paved streets lay empty, bathing quietly in the moon’s glow, a scatter of silver light glinting across the ground.

Then, without warning, two fleeting silhouettes flashed past, followed by a burst of hurried footsteps. The still air began to thicken with unease, as if a storm were about to break.

Tap-tap!

Down the street, Mufeng and Shangguan Youran were running for their lives, while dozens of meters behind them, the half-human, half-beast Heide and Mela closed in, hunting them down.

If one looked closely, a black figure could also be seen trailing behind them.

“Miss Youran, go ahead first. I’ll hold them off!” Mufeng said anxiously to the purple-haired girl beside him.

“No. If we leave, we leave together!” Shangguan Youran’s delicate face turned cold, her tone calm but absolute.

Yet with Heide and Mela drawing ever closer behind them, Mufeng clenched his teeth and said, against all reason, “Don’t worry, Miss Youran. I still have plenty of stamina left. I’ll only hold them for a little while and catch up!”

Before Shangguan Youran could reply, he spun around and charged back.

At the same time, his time-space ring flashed, and streams of white-blue cubes surged out, dense and countless, gathering, intertwining, taking shape.

In the blink of an eye, the giant sword and shield that marked him had appeared in Mufeng’s hands.

Shangguan Youran stopped, staring after the broad back receding into the distance. Her pale face flushed red with fury. “Mufeng, get back here!”

In her icy voice there was a faint tremor of self-reproach, for if she had not only just awakened more than ten minutes ago, Heide and the others would never have caught up.

Mufeng had already been nearly exhausted, yet he had carried her for more than ten kilometers. One could only imagine how grueling it had been.

“Miss Youran, go!” Mufeng called back without turning, stopping where he stood as the two beasts reached him.

“Go? Heh. Today, neither of you is getting away!”

As the vicious words fell, Heide and Mela transformed into monstrous forms, one after the other, and pounced straight at Mufeng!

Mufeng drove his shield forward and lifted the giant sword high with both hands, growling at the wolf-man and cat-woman hurtling toward him, “Blazing Flame Slash!”

Crack, crack, crack!

At that instant, the three-meter-long greatsword suddenly flared with yellow energy, lighting up the entire street. Then it came down in a single sweeping arc, carving out a blade of red flame that shot forward in an instant.

Wherever the sword light passed, the paving slabs on the street were uprooted one after another, leaving behind scorched gashes.

Mela moved first with astonishing agility. Bringing her two claws together, she let green light flicker over her body. She did not retreat from the incoming sword light, but instead met it head-on.

Swoosh!

Her body turned into a streak of green radiance and vanished, slipping directly through the sword light and lunging toward Mufeng behind it.

Thunk!

Knowing from the start that he was no match for her, Mufeng simply braced himself with the shield and blocked the claws that came stabbing through.

At that moment, Heide behind him suddenly sprang from the ground. With his thick right arm raised, he smashed it down against the sword light.

The two forces collided, and the red blade of light was shattered to pieces by brute strength. Riding that impact, Heide leapt high into the air, spreading the claws on his palm and tearing down at the human before him.

With his strength already all but spent, Mufeng was soon caught between the two beasts. Flesh was torn open across his body, and blood soaked the towering frame that had once stood so solid.

Shangguan Youran, a hundred meters away, immediately had red-rimmed eyes. At once, a device like a black electronic watch lit up on her wrist. She kept tapping the tiny screen, and a white information page appeared in the air.

“Please... get through...” Her voice was tinged with tears as she looked at the portrait of a middle-aged man that popped up on the screen. She was trying to contact her father.

But then a beep sounded, and four red words appeared: signal interrupted.

She froze completely.

All along the road, Shangguan Youran had tried dozens of times to contact her father and request reinforcements. She had even tried reaching the City of Mecha Technology. But every time the connection was about to go through to District A, the signal was severed, making it impossible to communicate with anyone inside the entire district.

Then, all at once, Mufeng’s portrait appeared on the black square watch. The screen enlarged, and his rough, familiar voice came through.

“Miss Youran, remember to visit Yue’er for me every year. She likes white orchids.”

That brief, plain sentence made Shangguan Youran’s heart tighten violently. She snapped her head up.

Her pupils contracted.

Right before her eyes, a blue energy bullet no thicker than a thumb sliced through the night and, like a ghostly projectile, pierced straight through Mufeng’s head.

Then that broad body fell stiffly onto the street.

“Ah...” Shangguan Youran stared dumbly, her beautiful eyes bloodshot, and then she turned and fled. Crystal tears scattered through the air behind her.

Who was it? Who was it?

She screamed inwardly with savage fury.

Who had colluded with the beasts? Who had sealed off all communication within District A? Who, exactly, was responsible for all of this?

She could not accept what had happened today. Her younger sister was still missing, and now Mufeng, who had remained by her side all this time, had died brutally before her eyes. For someone as cold as she was, this sudden reality was unbearable.

“Keep pursuing them!”

At the sound of the voice, a middle-aged man wearing glasses stepped out of the darkness. He was the Lu Yun mentioned by Heide.

Heide and Mela nodded and continued the chase. Since they had already been exposed, they could not let Shangguan Youran escape, even if she was the young mistress of the Shangguan family.

After the two of them disappeared, the bespectacled middle-aged man searched Mufeng’s corpse thoroughly, but found nothing he wanted.

Then he removed the time-space ring from Mufeng’s middle finger. Opening it, his face changed at once, and he muttered in shock, “Why isn’t it here?”

The next day, Nangong Yuchen got up early and slipped away while Shangguan Yueling and her sister were still lost in dreams.

He still remembered every detail of what he had done to the little loli yesterday. If she woke up, the first thing she would probably do was drag him into account, so he chose to run first and avoid a beating. He had personally seen Zhou Lingtian beaten half to death, foaming at the mouth, and Shangguan Yueling had not spared him either.

Much less him, after he had nearly thrown her out yesterday.

After taking a car to Star Academy, he found the campus nearly empty. Nangong Yuchen had no choice but to circle the training field once before heading to the bulletin board, where he carefully read the information on the special elite students competing in the tournament.

He excluded first-years outright. It was not arrogance; they simply were not worth his attention. His main focus was on the lists of second- and third-year students.

The special elite advancement match in two days was far too important to him. It concerned his parents, and so even with his confidence, he could not help but feel a trace of worry. This was not a lack of faith in himself, but rather because he cared too deeply.

Just as he was studying the rows of names and brief descriptions, a clear, melodious voice suddenly came from behind him.

“Nangong Yuchen!”

He turned around to see a gentle, beautiful figure walking toward him, and he smiled. “Morning, Angel.”