28: Chapter 28 Knife Marks on the Stone Armor

The first flash of a blade lit up from the darkness.

A short blade, thirty centimeters long and single-edged, was shrouded in a faint, dark red glow.

The glow was not a reflection of light; it seeped from the blade itself, as if something was burning inside the metal.

The tip of the blade aimed straight for the Stitched Brute's throat.

The Brute raised its left arm to block, and the short blade slashed against its Petrified Skin.

Clang.

The sound of metal colliding with rock echoed through the narrow tunnel.

Yan Zheng saw the result of that slash clearly.

A shallow white scratch had appeared on the Petrified Skin.

Yan Zheng: (ꉺᗜꉺ)

"...It can break through the defense?"

Before his voice could fade, a second and third dark figure cut in from both sides of the Brute at the same time, one from the left and one from the right, their coordination as seamless as two hands controlled by the same person.

The ninja on the left slashed diagonally at the Brute's ribs with a short blade, while the ninja on the right threw out a chain that wrapped around the Brute's right arm.

Fine patterns were engraved on every link of the chain, and a dark red glow seeped from the patterns, tightly binding the Brute's arm like a glowing serpent.

The Brute let out a low growl and yanked its right arm violently, pulling the chain taut, but it did not break.

"That chain has been reinforced too."

Yan Zheng took two steps back, his back almost pressing against Skeleton Soldier No. 1's ribs.

"No. 1, No. 2, fall back to defend and pincer them."

Skeleton Soldier No. 1 turned around at the fork and moved rapidly toward the battlefield.

Skeleton Soldier No. 2 doubled back from deep within the passage, flanking the ninjas from behind.

The three ninjas' onslaught on the Brute did not stop.

The first ninja slashed three times in rapid succession, each strike landing precisely on the same spot on the Brute's left arm.

First strike: a white mark.

Second strike: a crack.

Third strike: a small piece of the scaled armor chipped off, revealing the white bone layer beneath.

But the moment the third strike landed, the damaged area on the Brute began to squirm.

Dark red granulation tissue grew frantically from the surface of the bone layer, wrapping around the wound, and then quickly hardened, forming a layer of scaled armor even thicker than before.

Adaptive Regeneration.

The ninja's fourth strike fell on the exact same spot.

There were no cracks, no chipping, and even the scratch was half as shallow as the first strike.

A short curse in Japanese came from behind the black mask.

Yan Zheng leaned against the tunnel wall, the lenses of his gold-rimmed glasses reflecting the dark red blade light as the corners of his mouth curled slightly.

"What's wrong? Can't cut through anymore?"

Yan Zheng: (ˊꈊˋ)

No one responded to him. The ninjas did not speak, nor did they halt their movements.

The ninja pulling the chain on the right yanked hard, pulling the Brute's right arm outward to expose a gap in its chest.

Using the wall for leverage, the third ninja leaped down from above, holding the short blade in a reverse grip and stabbing down toward the crown of the Brute's head.

It was a killing move.

The three of them acted simultaneously—one locking the arm, one creating a distraction, and one striking the vital spot—their coordination error not exceeding 0.3 seconds.

Against an ordinary opponent, this combo would have been more than enough.

But their opponent was not.

The Brute's left fist had already blasted out.

Its target was the ninja directly in front who had slashed three times.

The ninja's reaction was extremely fast, leaning back to dodge, but the Brute's fist was too massive, its entire forearm nearly as wide as the tunnel itself.

The ninja's dodge distance was not enough.

The wind from the punch brushed past his left shoulder, instantly shattering his scapula.

The ninja let out a muffled groan as his body slammed into the wall, bouncing off and landing in the puddled water, his short blade flying out of his hand.

At the same time, the downward stab from above struck the Brute's skull.

The dark red blade light sliced into the surface of the white bone, penetrating about two centimeters before getting stuck.

The regenerating granulation tissue on the Brute's skull grew rapidly on both sides of the cut, biting down on the blade like two rows of teeth.

The ninja could not pull the blade out.

The Brute swung its right arm, chain and all, flinging both the chain and the ninja holding it. The chain-pulling ninja was thrown three meters away, his back crashing into the pipes at the top of the tunnel, bending the iron pipes and causing sewage to spray down.

Skeleton Soldier No. 2 arrived from behind at this moment.

Emerging silently from the darkness, its bony claw grabbed the ankle of the ninja on the ground whose scapula had been shattered, and yanked hard.

The ninja was dragged two meters, and before he could resist, the Skeleton Soldier's other bony claw had already gripped his throat.

Crack.

The sound of the cervical spine snapping was as crisp as snapping a dry twig.

The ninja's body went limp, twitching twice before becoming completely still.

Yan Zheng: (ꈍ꒳ꈍ)

There were four ninjas left in the tunnel.

No, Yan Zheng calculated again.

Three had dropped down just now, plus there might be more lying in ambush deeper in the passage.

He turned his head to look at the feed from his remote vision.

Skeleton Soldier No. 2 had scanned deep into the passage before doubling back and had not found any more figures.

"Just these five?"

Just as he spoke, a faint sound of wind came from the other end of the tunnel, and two new dark figures crawled out of the drainage pipe on the left side of the fork.

Five.

Five in total.

"One is dead, four left."

Leaning against the wall, Yan Zheng's fingers brushed against the Scalpel he always carried in his coat pocket, but he did not take it out.

"Brute, prioritize the one on your head."

The Brute threw its head back and shook it violently.

The short blade stuck in its skull flew out, along with the hand of the ninja on the hilt.

No, the hand was still attached to the ninja's wrist; the blade of the short blade had been snapped out of the skull.

The ninja flipped down from the Brute's head, throwing three shurikens with his right hand the moment he landed.

The shurikens also glowed with a dark red light, pinning themselves into the Brute's chest, penetrating the first layer of scaled armor and sinking into the second.

The Brute looked down at the three metal pieces on its chest as if looking at an insignificant decoration.

Granulation tissue wrapped around the shurikens and expelled them from its body, clattering them down into the puddled water.

Then, the Brute raised its right foot and stomped down.

The gravel and puddled water on the ground were stomped into a crater, and the Impact spread along the ground, causing the two ninjas who had just crawled out of the drainage pipe to stumble.

In that brief moment of instability,

Skeleton Soldier No. 1 lunged from the side, its bony claws tearing open the back of one of the ninjas.

The ninja let out a scream, turning around to slash off the Skeleton Soldier's left arm.

Feeling no pain, the Skeleton Soldier continued to claw with its remaining right arm, grabbing the strap of the ninja's mask and ripping it off.

Beneath the mask was a young Asian face with cold eyes and tightly pursed lips.

The Brute's fist had already arrived.

One punch.

The ninja's chest cavity completely collapsed, his ribs piercing his internal organs as he slammed into the wall and slid down into the puddled water, his blood quickly dyeing the surrounding water red.

Yan Zheng: (✧ᴗ✧)

The remaining two ninjas exchanged a glance.

One of them pulled a black sphere from his waist and smashed it hard onto the ground.

Dense smoke instantly filled the entire section of the tunnel, reducing visibility to zero.

Yan Zheng closed his eyes, switching to the Skeleton Soldier's sensory perspective.

The perception of the Soul Fire did not rely on vision; what they "saw" were heat sources and the outlines of living beings.

The heat signatures of the two ninjas were rapidly moving away, retreating deep into the passage.

"Don't pursue."

Yan Zheng opened his eyes and waited for the smoke to dissipate.

The tunnel was a complete mess.

The puddled water had turned red, there were craters punched into the walls, Skeleton Soldier No. 1's left arm lay in a corner, and seven or eight wounds of varying depths on the Brute's body were slowly regenerating.

Three ninja corpses lay on the ground.

Yan Zheng stood up straight from the wall, straightened the front of his suit jacket which had been dampened by the water mist, and walked step by step through the puddled water to the ninja who had been killed by the Brute's single punch, then crouched down.

He reached out and removed the remaining half of the other party's mask.

The palm of his right hand lit up, and the system panel popped up.

[Non-standard human corpse detected. Bone density is 3.1 times that of an ordinary person. Muscle fibers have undergone occult modification, with trace amounts of Dark Energy residue present.]

[Material Quality Assessment: Excellent+.]

Yan Zheng pushed up his gold-rimmed glasses, the lenses dotted with tiny water droplets, reflecting the ninja's pale, defeated face.

"Gentlemen, your bones certainly live up to your reputation."