113: Chapter 113 The Wrath of the Ghost

He didn't move.

He remained lurking at the top of that dilapidated building, like a lifeless stone.

But his gaze had already slowly shifted away from the courtyard serving as bait.

It landed on the adjacent department store building, which had long since been bombed down to its skeleton.

Inside the "Great Wall" Command Center, everyone was stunned.

"What is he doing?"

"The target building is at three o'clock. Why is he looking at the abandoned building at nine o'clock?"

Director Long didn't speak; he just stared intently at the screen, veins bulging on his forehead.

In the Livestream room, the hearts of hundreds of millions of viewers leaped into their throats.

[What is Master Xi doing? Has he given up?]

[Don't! Even if it's a trap, we can't just watch them get killed!]

[Master Xi definitely has a plan! Believe in him!]

In the midst of this suffocating silence, Chen Xi smiled.

It was a cruel smile, devoid of any warmth, laced with endless mockery and grim killing intent.

Facing the "Flapping Moth" that represented the livestream feed, and also facing the self-righteous hunter hidden in the shadows, he spoke calmly in a voice only he could hear:

"You want me to follow your rules?"

"Fine."

"Then I'll flip the chessboard on you."

As his words fell.

He moved.

The Chameleon Cloak activated, and his figure instantly merged into the shadows of the ruins.

He didn't charge toward that courtyard of death.

Instead, like an undetectable phantom, he circled in a wide arc and stealthily moved toward that abandoned department store building.

"Report! The Ghost is moving!"

"Direction, northwest! He hasn't entered the trap zone!"

"What does he want to do? Escape?"

On the bell tower, Nakajima Shinichi held up his binoculars, his brow furrowed deeply.

No.

This direction wasn't an escape route.

It was more like... a flanking maneuver?

"He wants to attack from the flank?"

"Impossible."

"There's no cover in that direction either, and it's too far from the core trap zone to effectively rescue the hostages."

A strong sense of unease began to spread in Nakajima Shinichi's heart.

He felt like he had overlooked something.

Some kind of crazy possibility that he completely failed to comprehend.

Just then.

He saw that the "Ghost" had already reached the base of the department store.

Then, he made a move that no one could understand.

From his backpack, he pulled out a massive plastic Water Gun that looked like a child's toy.

The Livestream room instantly exploded with activity.

[Holy crap?! A Water Gun? Has Master Xi gone mad?]

[He doesn't want to spray those Japs to death with a Water Gun, does he? What kind of new playstyle is this?]

[It's over, Master Xi is so angry he's confused; his brain has short-circuited.]

Inside the "Great Wall" Command Center, a group of top weapons experts and physicists were also completely dumbfounded.

They naturally knew the true power of this "Large Water Gun."

But what was he doing using it on an abandoned building?

"Demolition?!"

This absurd thought flashed through Director Long's mind.

Then, his pupils suddenly constricted to the size of pinheads.

He cried out involuntarily, "Quick! Calculate the structural model of that building! Hurry!"

Too late.

Amidst the ruins of Nanjing in 1937.

Chen Xi had already raised that brightly colored "Water Gun."

He didn't aim at the distant Japanese Army, nor did he even glance at the courtyard.

His targets were several core load-bearing columns of the massive department store building before him.

He pressed the switch.

There was no earth-shattering explosion.

There were no dazzling light effects.

Only a hair-thin, nearly invisible red beam of light shot out from the muzzle of the "Water Gun."

That red line, like a living venomous snake, silently hugged the ground and precisely sliced through the base of the first load-bearing column.

Chiii.

A faint sound, like a hot knife cutting through butter.

Where the red line swept, the hard reinforced concrete was instantly sliced like tofu, leaving a perfectly smooth cut.

Then the second one.

The third one.

Chen Xi's movements were calm, precise, and efficient.

Like an artist in the middle of a creation, he used that red beam of light to elegantly draw fatal red "dividing lines" on the skeleton of the abandoned building.

On the bell tower.

Nakajima Shinichi saw that eerie red line through his binoculars.

Before he could even understand what it was.

A slight vibration from deep within the earth reached him.

The bell tower beneath his feet began to groan under the strain.

He looked up in horror.

He saw the massive department store nearby, like a giant with its building blocks pulled out, begin to slowly tilt at a precisely calculated angle toward the trap-filled courtyard.

Boom.

Rumble—!

The delayed, deafening roar finally arrived.

The entire building collapsed with a thunderous crash.

The earth shook and the mountains trembled.

Countless bricks, rebars, and concrete blocks, like a flash flood, carrying dust that blotted out the sky, slammed down violently toward that courtyard of death.

"Take cover!!!"

Nakajima Shinichi let out a hysterical roar.

His well-trained "Hounds" also finally reacted from their shock.

They scrambled and crawled, searching for cover.

But it was all too late.

The collapsing building instantly buried their carefully arranged positions: two machine gun nests on the east and north sides, and one sniper point.

Massive clouds of dust, like thick fog, instantly swallowed the entire area.

Visibility dropped to less than a meter.

Over the radio came a cacophony of wailing screams and curses.

At this moment, Nakajima Shinichi's perfect trap was completely torn to shreds in a brutal, unreasonable manner that he could not comprehend at all.

The chessboard.

Had truly been flipped.

And the real hunt had only just begun.

The moment the dust rose, Chen Xi activated his Chameleon Cloak.

Like a true ghost, he charged into that hell composed of dust and chaos.

The anti-smog mask filtered out all harmful dust, and the thermal imaging function allowed him to clearly see the position of every enemy and the civilians huddled together, shivering.

He rushed to the side of the hostages.

The old man who had previously been publicly beaten by the Japanese Army had already fainted.

The youth protecting his grandfather stared wide-eyed, completely terrified by this scene that looked like the wrath of a god.

"Follow me if you don't want to die!"

Chen Xi grabbed the youth, his voice cold and devoid of emotion.

He had no time to explain.

With the utmost speed, he untied the ropes binding the hostages, then half-dragged and half-pulled this group of people, who had long since lost the ability to move, toward a certain direction.

That direction was precisely the ruins of the collapsed building.

The originally flat killing field had now been transformed by countless massive building fragments into a complex, natural maze of cover.

And Chen Xi was the designer of this maze.

He led the hostages, moving quickly through the maze.

Behind them, the sounds of gunfire and screams from Japanese Soldiers accidentally hitting their own in the dust continued to ring out.

A few minutes later.

Chen Xi emerged from the other side of the ruins with everyone.

"Run straight along this road and don't look back!"

He shouted at the youth.

The youth stared at him blankly, seemingly wanting to say something.

But Chen Xi gave him no chance.

He turned around and looked back at the area still shrouded in dust.

His gaze was cold and cruel.

The rescue was over.

Next came the judgment.

On the bell tower.

Nakajima Shinichi poked his head out from behind cover, his face covered in dust and disbelief.

He looked at the empty courtyard and the massive, still-smoking ruins of the building, his mind going blank.

The trap had been broken.

In a way he hadn't even imagined in his dreams.

This was no longer a tactic.

This was divine punishment.

A crushing blow of absolute power from a higher dimension that mortals could not comprehend.

For the first time, he felt shaken in the wisdom and professionalism he took such pride in.

Just what kind of monster was he facing?

Trembling, he raised his binoculars, trying to find the figure of the "Ghost" amidst the chaos.

Then, he saw it.

At the edge of the billowing dust, a solitary figure slowly emerged from the shadows.

He just stood there quietly, as if admiring his own masterpiece.

Then, he looked up.

His gaze seemed to penetrate hundreds of meters of distance, through the dust and darkness.

It locked precisely onto Nakajima Shinichi's line of sight.

Nakajima Shinichi's heart suddenly constricted.

What kind of eyes did he see?

No anger.

No joy.

Only a cold void that seemed capable of freezing even the soul.

It was a look reserved for dead things.