Chapter 131 – Parting Ways and… Begin!

At two o’clock in the morning, Ningnan was still under martial law. From time to time, a few gunshots came from some corner of the city, sending another wave of fear through ordinary people curled up at home with their curtains drawn. But for most people, although the atmosphere was very oppressive, life had not yet collapsed. It was like experiencing a disaster: panic belonged to that period of time, and once it passed, life still had to go on.

This was probably already the better situation Huaxia could currently achieve.

“If the problem with the Spatial Gate can’t be solved, this situation will probably be broken very soon.”

After coming out of the residential complex, Su Lifeng thought with some emotion.

After chatting with Su Lian and the others until this time, Su Lifeng put on his equipment and left. His current appearance was very different from usual. In Su Lian’s words, he looked very much like someone going on a wilderness expedition.

But behind the teasing, all of their eyes showed worry.

Su Lifeng had originally wanted to say that he would definitely be fine, but when he thought again of the scene in his Precognitive Vision…

“Don’t worry,” he finally said, and nothing more.

That Spatial Gate had to be dealt with somehow. Otherwise, they too would face that almost irresistible crisis.

The ring road overpass.

This place had now changed from the important traffic route it once was into a cold and deserted blockade area.

After carefully circling around the area guarded by soldiers, Su Lifeng arrived near the entrance of the overpass.

The moment he approached, a figure walked out from the shadow beneath the bridge.

“You’re way too punctual.” Stranger’s face always seemed somewhat stiff, probably because he had been in the cold wind for a while. His tone no longer sounded quite so dry, but instead trembled a little.

But after getting closer, Su Lifeng discovered that it was because he was somewhat excited.

“Habit.” Su Lifeng naturally would not tell him that he had cherished the time spent with Su Lian and the others. He looked left and right, then asked, “I’m here now. What do we do?”

“Wait.” After Stranger finished speaking, he shrank back into the shadows.

Only then did Su Lifeng realize that he had probably been sitting here since afternoon. In the corner beneath the bridge were several opened ration packages and two empty bottles of mineral water.

What made him so invested, Su Lifeng did not know: the person he wanted to kill, or the matter of going to Shencheng.

“Why are you going to Shencheng?” Stranger suddenly asked.

Seeing that Su Lifeng did not answer, Stranger did not mind. Instead, he said, “For someone so young, it’s not easy to be this cautious. But waiting is waiting. Do you want to hear me talk?”

Su Lifeng looked at him in surprise. Stranger gave a self-mocking snort and said, “Maybe it’s because no matter what, I can’t calm down. Whenever I think of what will happen tonight…” He clenched his fists, and his joints cracked.

“You may have already made some guesses about my profession, right? It’s not hard to guess. Otherwise, how could I know Xiang Qianyan?” Stranger asked. Su Lifeng did not speak, so he simply continued on his own. “Actually, if you think about it carefully, the matter is very simple. It was just some grudges from back then… but because of that, my friend was killed. Human life is sometimes truly fragile. Maybe because of one tiny trigger, a person walks step by step toward death. If not for the person I want to kill, my friend should be the one doing what he does now. Safe, without risk.”

“I wanted to avenge my friend before, but I didn’t have the ability. But when I looked at him through the ice coffin, when I carried his ashes out, I swore that sooner or later, one day, I would kill that bastard. The day I became a Mutant, I was especially happy. I thought, I can finally take revenge. But after one trip, I lost two fingers.”

Stranger took off the glove on his left hand and showed Su Lifeng. “Sometimes this world is really fucking unfair. My friend spent his whole life as a good man, and I’ve never done evil in my life either, but neither of us was ever favored. Yet something that drives one person to despair may be nothing at all to another person. So, you’re my lifeline.”

Su Lifeng moved his lips, but in the end, he still did not know what to say.

“After I kill this person, I’ll go to Shencheng and kill the people who helped him frame my friend back then.” As Stranger spoke, the sound of a vehicle approaching suddenly came from far away. He drew a dagger from between his legs and said, “They’re here.”

And Su Lifeng, who had been listening quietly the entire time, had already spread his Bone Wings.

From beginning to end, he had not asked who they were going to kill, because the first time he heard Stranger say, “The method I’m talking about requires killing people,” he had seen grief and hatred in Stranger’s eyes.

Screech!

Just as the moving truck was about to go onto the overpass, a sharp sound of tires scraping the ground suddenly came from it, and it stopped.

“What just happened?” the driver asked in astonishment.

He turned his head and glanced at the window beside him.

In that instant just now, something seemed to have swept past beside it…

“Crack.”

A fissure abruptly split across the car window.

The driver was startled. At that exact moment, he heard the middle-aged man beside him, who had been dozing with his clothes covering his face, ask impatiently, “What is it?”

“M-maybe a bird,” the driver said after hesitating for a moment, clearly very afraid of this man.

“A bird scares you? What, you don’t have one yourself?” The man abruptly sat up, glaring at the driver in great displeasure as he cursed.

But very soon, he discovered that the driver’s reaction seemed somewhat intense.

The driver’s face was pale, and his whole body trembled as he stared behind the man.

“What are you doing? Are you sick?” The man froze for a moment, then cursed angrily.

But even as he cursed, he reached out to one side, then abruptly turned his head. The muzzle of a gun aimed outside the window, and he was about to pull the trigger.

“Bang!”

After a muffled sound, what shattered was the glass. Before he could pull the trigger, a long Bone Wing had already pierced through his wrist.

“Ah!” The man screamed, while staring in disbelief at the young man outside the window.

He wore a baseball cap, and a pair of blood-red Bone Wings spread behind him, fanning slightly. When he raised his head, he seemed to look at the man with eyes that regarded him as an insect. As for the man’s act of taking out a gun, he did not care in the slightest…

“Ah!” In the blink of an eye, the man had already been flung out of the truck by Su Lifeng.

“Handle him yourself,” Su Lifeng said.

The driver was completely dumbfounded. Looking at Su Lifeng’s ferocious figure beneath the night, he felt his entire body trembling.

He could not clearly see Su Lifeng’s appearance, nor did he dare to look. But those two pairs of blood-red Bone Wings did not allow him not to see them!

“Don’t… don’t kill me…” The driver had just begun speaking in a trembling voice when his eyes rolled back and he collapsed.

Stranger tossed the unconscious driver behind the seat, then sat in the driver’s seat.

He fell silent for a moment, then said with great gratitude, “Thanks. Also, you’re still a little stronger than I thought. I had prepared quite a few plans, but in the end none of them were needed. I owe you for this trip. After I reach Shencheng, I probably won’t appear in front of people again, but if you need help, you can go find Xiang Qianyan again.”

Su Lifeng glanced at him and nodded. When this person killed, he did not drag things out, nor did he lose control of his emotions. Faced with an innocent driver, he had not made a move either, and now he even remembered the favor.

If not for the wrong timing, perhaps he would have been someone worth befriending.

“Tomorrow, unless absolutely necessary, you’d better leave Shencheng as much as possible. Or at least stay farther away,” Su Lifeng suddenly said.

Stranger froze. This was the first time Su Lifeng had taken the initiative to mention Shencheng…

After more than two hours of detouring by car, the truck stopped in the outskirts of Shencheng.

This was Su Lifeng’s first time seeing the situation outside a city… Shencheng was different from Ningnan. Part of its suburbs were purely residential areas, not industrial zones. But now, this place was desolate. Buildings were charred black, all the windows had been shattered, and burned marks covered the ground everywhere. The entire area seemed as if it had slept for a long time in ashes.

Yet Shencheng farther away still seemed prosperous.

“This is what war is like.” Stranger sighed, then extended his hand toward Su Lifeng. “I hope we can still meet alive one day. I also wish you everything goes smoothly.”

“Goodbye.” Su Lifeng shook his hand firmly and said.

These words were sincere.

However, after Stranger left, Su Lifeng did not hurry away. Instead, he took out his phone, dialed a number, and said, “Su Lian, are you ready?”

Su Lian’s voice came from the other end. “Already OK.”