The armored SUV didn't just park; it drifted into the abandoned shipyard, its heavy tires screeching against the wet asphalt.
Before Old Chen could even shift into park, I pushed my door open and stepped out into the freezing sea mist.
Warehouse 4 was a massive, rusted corrugated steel structure at the edge of the pier. Standing outside the heavily reinforced sliding doors was Old Master Ye Tianxing, flanked by a dozen massive syndicate enforcers armed with military-grade assault rifles.
They weren't aiming at the doors. They were backing away from them.
BOOM.
The heavy steel doors bowed outward with a deafening metallic shriek. A perfect, blood-stained fist imprint appeared in the center of the two-inch-thick metal.
BOOM.
"Mr. Chu!" Ye Tianxing gasped, hobbling toward me. The underworld boss looked genuinely shaken. "It's a monster. He smelled the fighters inside and tried to breach the main arena, but when we dropped the blast doors, he turned his attention to the exit. He's going to break through in seconds."
"Tell your men to lower their weapons," I said, striding past the armed guards without breaking my pace. "Standard ammunition will just piss it off. Open the door."
The enforcers looked at each other, then at Old Ye, who gave a sharp nod.
Two men rushed forward, throwing the heavy magnetic locks and hauling the sliding doors apart just as a third massive impact hit the metal.
The doors shrieked open, revealing the dimly lit loading bay of the coliseum.
The stench hit me first. Copper, ozone, and raw sewage.
Crouched in the center of the concrete floor was Lin Tian. Or at least, what used to be Lin Tian.
The protagonist's clothes were shredded. His skin was deathly pale, spider-webbed with thick, pulsing black veins that crawled up his neck and across his face. His eyes were entirely pitch-black, leaking a faint crimson mist. The blood of the three police officers he had slaughtered earlier was smeared across his jaw.
When the doors opened, his head snapped toward me. The demonic instincts inside him instantly recognized the man who had crippled his cultivation base.
A guttural, inhuman roar ripped from his throat. It didn't sound like a man; it sounded like two pieces of jagged iron grinding together.
"Chu... Feng..." he hissed, his jaw unhinging slightly as a wave of putrid, blood-red Qi exploded from his body.
"Look at you," I said softly, stepping into the warehouse alone. I casually unbuttoned my tactical coat, letting it fall open. "From the destined Dragon King to a rabid stray dog. The Heavenly Dao really must hate you to let you mutate into this."
"Die!" Lin Tian shrieked.
The concrete beneath his feet literally shattered as he launched himself at me.
He was incredibly fast. To a normal human, he would have been nothing but a blur of shadow and blood. But to my Master-Level Martial Arts enhanced eyes, his trajectory was completely linear. No technique. No finesse. Just the brute force of a starving animal.
His clawed hand swiped at my throat, the demonic Qi razor-sharp.
I didn't step back. I pivoted sharply to the left, letting his blood-soaked claws slice through the empty air where my neck had been a fraction of a second ago.
As he overextended, I dropped my right hand into my inner coat pocket. My fingers wrapped around the cold, textured grip of the Nine-Heavens Lightning Forged Karambit.
I drew the curved blade in a reverse grip and slashed upward in a single, fluid motion.
CRACK!
The sound of thunder echoed violently inside the warehouse.
The moment the meteoric iron blade made contact with Lin Tian's forearm, brilliant blue lightning arced from the metal. The tribulation lightning didn't just cut his flesh; it violently reacted with his corrupted blood.
"AARRGGHH!" Lin Tian screamed, a horrifying shriek of pure agony.
The demonic Qi surrounding his arm instantly evaporated into foul-smelling black smoke. The karambit sliced cleanly through muscle and bone, completely severing his right arm at the elbow.
He crashed into a stack of wooden crates, thrashing wildly. A normal blood fiend would have instantly regenerated the limb by burning its vitality. But the tribulation lightning left a jagged, glowing burn mark across his stump, entirely cauterizing the demonic pathways.
"What... what is that?!" Lin Tian gasped, a momentary flash of human clarity and pure terror returning to his black eyes as he stared at the glowing curved dagger in my hand.
"Pest control," I said coldly.
I didn't give him a chance to recover. I closed the distance in two strides.
Lin Tian lunged desperately with his remaining arm, trying to grab my chest to absorb my Qi. I effortlessly parried his sloppy strike with my left forearm, spun on my heel, and drove my right knee brutally into his chin.
His head snapped back with a sickening crunch. As he fell backward, I reversed my grip on the karambit and plunged the curved, lightning-wreathed blade directly into the center of his chest.
BOOM!
A shockwave of pure electrical energy blasted outward, shattering the overhead fluorescent lights.
Lin Tian's body convulsed violently as the Heavenly Tribulation Lightning flooded his system, hunting down and incinerating every single drop of the Demonic Bloodline that the plot had tried to force into him.
The black veins on his skin rapidly receded. The crimson mist faded.
He let out one final, rattling gasp, and then his eyes rolled back into his head. He went completely limp, pinned to the concrete floor.
I slowly pulled the karambit out. The blade was spotless, the blood having instantly vaporized off the metal.
[Ding!] [Target completely neutralized!] [The Protagonist's 'Demonic Bloodline' has been eradicated!] [Due to extreme physical and spiritual trauma, the Protagonist has fallen into a permanent vegetative state. He can no longer influence the plot!] [The Heavenly Dao has abandoned Lin Tian!] [Destiny Points -5000!] [Host gains 5000 Villain Points!]
I let out a slow breath, casually flipping the karambit and sliding it back into my coat.
Outside the warehouse doors, Ye Tianxing and his heavily armed syndicate enforcers were staring at me in absolute, deathly silence. They had just watched the pampered, billionaire heir of the Chu Consortium effortlessly execute a supernatural monster in less than ten seconds.
The look in their eyes wasn't just respect anymore. It was religious terror.
"Clean this up, Old Ye," I ordered, my voice cutting through the ringing silence. "Burn the body. Bleach the floor. Tell Captain Xia Luo the suspect accidentally fell into the harbor while fleeing."
"Y-yes, Mr. Chu! Immediately!" Ye Tianxing stuttered, bowing so deeply his back was completely parallel to the floor. The syndicate head had officially recognized me as a god among men.
I turned and walked back toward the armored SUV, the freezing sea breeze cooling the adrenaline in my veins. Lin Tian was officially dealt with. The first volume of the plot was crushed under my heel in a single night.
But just as I reached for the car door handle, the System chimed with a massive, blinding golden light that entirely obscured my vision.
[CRITICAL ALERT!] [Host has completely destroyed the First Protagonist of the Urban Realm!] [The Heavenly Dao is re-calibrating...] [Warning! To maintain world balance, the Heavenly Dao has prematurely summoned the Second Protagonist: The 'Dragon Sovereign' Returnee!] [Alert: The Second Protagonist has just landed at Jinghai International Airport, and his first target is the Chu Consortium!]
I froze, my hand hovering over the door handle.
A second protagonist? The Dragon Sovereign? I let out a dark, genuine laugh. The game wasn't over. It was just leveling up.
"Old Chen," I said, getting into the back seat of the Maybach. "Drive. I have a feeling tomorrow's board meeting is going to be incredibly entertaining."