Chapter 61 Forcible Seizure

"Then how can you prove these are yours?"

Xu Zhen sneered, pointing at the people behind him and adding, "Everyone saw that I was the one who brought people to retrieve the four rubber dinghies. The color matches the ones on the ground. Who knows if you, holding a grudge, secretly followed the people who borrowed the boats and snatched them."

Zhao Fangzhe spat on the ground and said disdainfully, "Your imagination is truly rich. Who would even want your broken boats?"

"I say the rubber dinghies are mine, so they are mine. I don't need to prove it. You're the ones raising doubts, so you should be the ones to provide proof."

Bai Xiao was unwilling to fall into the trap of proving herself. She also knew that Xu Zhen didn't genuinely care about who the boats belonged to. He was just looking for an excuse to give his act of seizure a veneer of legitimacy.

"Since you refuse to admit it, don't blame us for being impolite."

Xu Zhen felt her words were extremely arrogant. Furious, he waved his hand grandly and said, "Brothers, go grab these people for me and take back our boats and supplies!"

"Go, go, go!"

The dozen or so people beside Xu Zhen immediately became excited, raising their knives and clubs as they charged forward.

Zhao Fangzhe shot an arrow at the feet of several attackers, abruptly halting their assault.

"Don't be afraid, everyone!" Xu Zhen had suffered from Bai Xiao's bow before and had long since devised a countermeasure.

He produced a thick wooden plank from somewhere. With a wave of his hand, two underlings who had been hiding in the stairwell came forward, holding this makeshift shield in front of the group.

The Compound Bow was best suited for long-range attacks and was most effective when used unexpectedly. Once in a confined space, and with the enemy prepared, its effectiveness would be greatly diminished, becoming completely useless in close combat.

Xu Zhen's group, hiding behind the shield and not daring to show their heads, shuffled forward, intending to force their opponents back against the wall and subdue them without shedding blood.

"Keep them outside the stairwell door! Don't let them in!"

As long as the enemy was blocked outside the door, they couldn't pose a significant threat to everyone on the 12th floor. But if they were allowed inside, being outnumbered, they could easily find themselves in a difficult situation.

As soon as Bai Xiao finished speaking, she pushed off the ground, lunged forward, and kicked the wooden plank shielding Xu Zhen.

The other side hadn't expected a girl like Bai Xiao to possess such strength. Although they outnumbered her, the stairwell entrance was narrow, only allowing three people to stand abreast. Caught off guard, they were kicked back two steps. If not for the people behind holding them up, they might have tumbled down the stairs.

Seeing this, Bai Xiao slammed one leaf of the stairwell door shut. The other leaf was firmly held onto by Xu Zhen's side.

Shi Jun and Zhao Fangzhe, seeing the situation, hurried forward to help. The two of them leaned their weight against the closed door, with Cheng Ru and He Yuping adding their strength from behind.

For a moment, the four of them held the half-closed door against the force from outside, while Xu Zhen's gang pulled on the other half from the outside, preventing Bai Xiao from closing it completely. The long wooden plank, meant to block arrows, was wedged horizontally across the unclosed half of the doorway. The two groups reached a stalemate.

Although Bai Xiao's group was fewer in number, they held the advantageous position, creating a formidable bottleneck that was hard to breach.

Xu Zhen's group had long knives. Someone tried to reach over the plank to stab the people holding the door. Seeing this, Bai Xiao instantly pressed the ring on her left hand, drew her longsword, and swung it horizontally above Shi Jun and the others.

Holding the sword with both hands, she firmly blocked the two long knives thrust from the opposite side. Afraid Bai Xiao might close the other half of the door, Xu Zhen's men behind pushed the plank blocking the doorway with all their might, leaving only a gap for two people in front to swing their knives.

This, however, gave Bai Xiao a chance to leverage their force. She planted her right foot on the plank jammed in the doorway, using the pushing force from the crowd outside. Rotating her leg inward, she twisted her body forward, gripping the longsword tightly with both hands and swinging it forcefully. Blade and sword met, grinding together with a shower of sparks and a piercing metallic screech that drilled into their eardrums.

Bai Xiao's weapon, after all, was specially made by the game. The slender sword appeared fragile but was incredibly hard. In contrast, the opponents' broad knives, struck by this immense force, developed dense notches, their blades completely deformed. The hands of the two holding the knives were slammed back against the doorframe by the recoil with a heavy thud. Losing their footing, their bodies involuntarily fell backward, causing half the people behind them to lose their pushing force.

Bai Xiao, her reflexes honed by two life-and-death games, didn't pause for a second. She flipped back, retreated two steps, took a running start, leaped forward, grabbed the top of the doorframe with both hands, swung her body back, and then kicked her legs forward with tremendous force, sending the other half of the people behind the plank tumbling backward.

The person at the very back of the plank was squeezed by those falling in front and rolled down the stairs. Those in front were crushed by the heavy plank, howling in pain.

To capture the rebels, first capture the leader. She let go, landing on the plank, ignoring the cries of those beneath it. Stepping back to the ground, she kept one foot on the plank, bent her knee, leaned forward, and thrust her slender sword downward with her right hand, easily piercing through the plank and standing it upright.

She looked down at Xu Zhen, who had been squeezed against the wall. From under her clothes at her waist, she pulled out a handgun. The dark muzzle pressed against his forehead. Her expression was impassive, the ruthlessness tempered by the games condensed in her deep pupils.

"Get lost."

Xu Zhen had never seen such murderous intent in someone's eyes. Gender, beauty, age—none of these conventional values seemed to apply to the person before him.

He even felt that if he dared utter a single word of refusal, she would truly pull the trigger without hesitation.

In the eyes of everyone present, this series of actions happened in less than ten seconds. The situation was instantly turned upside down. No one doubted whether her gun was real or fake, feeling it was utterly pointless to question someone like her.

Not a single person dared to talk back. Their faces pale with fear, they didn't even retrieve the plank or knives from the ground, retreating down the stairs one by one like beaten dogs.

After all, this was still the real world where peace had long been the norm. Even after experiencing life-and-death games, even as social order crumbled daily, even as most people's actions began to skirt the edges of law and humanity, Bai Xiao could injure people, but she truly couldn't bring herself to kill casually. Killing wasn't like slaughtering chickens or fish; those were living human lives. Just because the world changed didn't mean people could instantly transform into cold-blooded killers. Moreover, these people didn't deserve death. She allowed them to retreat.

After Xu Zhen's group dispersed, she kicked the plank blocking the doorway aside and closed the other half of the door.

Turning around, she saw Zhao Fangzhe and the other three standing there dumbfounded.

After a long moment, Shi Jun finally found his voice: "You actually have a gun? A Glock?"

Bai Xiao raised the gun in her hand, examining it. Only then did she learn this type of gun was called a Glock. As expected of an ex-soldier, he was knowledgeable about weapons.

She admitted frankly, "It's not a real gun, just a realistic-looking airsoft pistol."

Shi Jun thought to himself that airsoft guns were also controlled weapons. Although less powerful than real guns, within thirty or forty meters, they could still injure people. Aimed at vulnerable spots, they could cause serious harm. How did she get one? This girl was an enigma.

Although he thought this, he wasn't foolish enough to ask such a private question.

Cheng Ru found it even more absurd. Looking at her completely unfamiliar cousin, she felt as if she had never known her. Never before had she felt the gap between them was so vast, like an unbridgeable chasm.

"After this incident, they probably won't dare cause trouble again for a while. It's getting late. Let's each take our things back and rest."

Bai Xiao looked at the mixture of shock and suspicion on the faces of the four before her. They seemed to want to ask more, hesitating whether to speak. But she didn't want to hear it and had no intention of explaining. After giving her instructions, she turned and went back to her room.

The matter of having a gun was simply too extraordinary. The next day, this news spread like wildfire throughout the entire building.