About fourteen left. I could sense several of them inching away toward the exit, but unfortunately for them, I was standing in their way.
Having seen how I had brutally put down their comrades, the gangsters had lost their nerve and wanted to flee. The delinquents in particular appeared to have pissed their pants or something, judging from the smell and the darkening of color around their crotch.
"No…no…"
"Impossible…how is this possible?!"
"It's just one guy! One guy!"
They were stumbling away, shaking their heads in disbelief. Only one among their number remained unperturbed.
"What are you waiting for?!" Zhou roared, brandishing his machete. "There's only one of him and so many of us! Get him! No matter how strong he is, he can't take on all of us!"
Several of his men turned to gape at him, evidently wondering if they had heard him right. One of them gestured toward the broken bodies lying sprawled on the ground.
"Boss Zhou, didn't…didn���t you see that?! He has already killed half of our people! All by himself!"
"So what!?" Zhou snarled as he charged at me, swinging his machete. "Then fight harder!"
A few of his cronies exchanged disbelieving glances, as if to ask if fighting harder was going to make any difference. The delinquents on the other hand were frozen in fear, unable to either fight or flee. They stared at me, rooted to the spot.
Qi Fu Ren in particular was just standing there and staring at me blankly, his fingers gripping his knife so tightly that the color was gone from his flesh. He was breaking out in cold sweat, obviously understanding that he was doomed.
After all, he was the one who murdered my friend and triggered my current rampage. He knew instinctively that there was no way I would let him go. That even if I somehow ignored the gang members and the others, I would definitely hunt him down even if I had to dedicate all my attention to it.
"No matter how strong he is, he's only human!" Zhou snapped, slashing at me. I stepped to the side, avoiding the deadly blade by a hair's breadth. "He'll get tired, just like any other person! Once he's exhausted, there's no way he'll be able to deliver any more of those killing blows!"
"Killing blow? You mean this?"
Sliding to the side to avoid another slash, I them smashed my fist into his chest. Zhou gurgled, blood dripping from his mouth. He slumped over and dropped his machete and tried to stagger back, only to realize that he was stuck.
Staring down in disbelief, he saw that I had punched him so hard that my fist had gone through his chest, pulverizing his heart and exiting through his back. Blood continued to drip down the length of my arm, even as I yanked it out.
The light faded from Zhou's eyes and he collapsed.
His men shrieked and began to break.
Qi Fu Ren tried to make use of the confusion to escape, but I kicked his feet out under him, sending him crashing onto the ground. He fell to the ground with a grunt, and I kicked his face so hard that I knocked several teeth loose. Blood spurted from his mouth and he howled, clutching his jaw. I stomped on his knee, breaking it, and he let out a bloodcurdling cry.
"Run!"
"Go! Get out of here!"
Seeing my brutal treatment of Qi Fu Ren, the other gangsters and delinquents sprinted for the exit as frantically as they could, determined to escape the nightmarish hell they found themselves in.
"Going somewhere?"
"HIIIIIIII!!!!!"
They came to a stop when they saw that I was suddenly in front of the door. I had shut it when I stepped inside, even locking it, and to see that I was now standing in their way, several of them dropped to their knees in despair. Others scrambled away hurriedly.
"When did he…?!"
"That was fast! Just how fast is he?!"
I didn't reply. There was no need to waste my breath talking to men who would be dead within the next few minutes.
My baseball bat swung out and one of them lost his head, literally. His skull exploded in a mist of blood and bone shards.
"NOOOO!"
"Monster!"
"Demon!"
While I swung my bat and massacred the survivors, almost all of whom had lost the will to fight, they screamed and hurled verbal abuse at me. I couldn't help but laugh when I heard the words they used to condemn me.
"Monster? Demon? Are you in any position to call me that?" I cracked the head of a fleeing gangster, almost decapitating him. I glanced at where the corpse of Pang Zi lay. "You kidnapped my friend and murdered him in front of my eyes. You tried to kill me too. And now when the tables are turned and you're the one being beaten, you change black to white and label me a monster? Just how thick-skinned can you be?"
By now, there were fewer than five left, and three of them dropped to their knees, prostrating themselves before me. Two delinquents and one gangster. They began blabbering almost incoherently.
"S…sorry, sir! We are very sorry! We regret what we've done! We swear, we will never bother you again! We will even become your slaves! Just spare our lives, please!"
"Sorry, Boss Shu! It's not our fault! It…it was him!" one of the delinquents pointed accusingly at Qi Fu Ren. "None of us wanted to kill anybody! That bastard was the one who went and made the decision to murder Pang Zi on his own!"
"Yeah! It's all Qi Fu Ren's fault!"
I watched their tear-streaked and sniveling faces in disgust, but didn't say anything. Instead, I walked past them and proceeded toward Qi Fu Ren, who was cowering at the back.
"I…I'm sorry. Cong Bro, I'm sure we can discuss this, right?" Qi Fu Ren raised his hands. His legs trembled, and I could smell something pungent from him. The coward had pissed his pants, and he was barely able to stand. "This…this whole thing is just a joke! A…joke! So…forgive me, all right?"
He then threw himself at my feet, smashing his forehead against the ground again and again.
"I'm sorry! I'm very sorry! Please forgive me! I had eyes, but I couldn't see Mount Tai! I should never have targeted you or your friend! Please treat this as a little joke! I'll…I'll find a way to compensate you!"
"A joke?" I repeated incredulously, and then pointed my bat at Pang Zi's body. "You tried to murder me as a joke? You killed my buddy as a joke?"
"Ah…that…that…sorry, I've gone too far! I'll…I'll serve a life sentence in prison! I'll turn myself in! I'll accept the punishment for my crime! Will that be enough?"
"How about I joke with you too?" I asked.
"Eh?" Qi Fu Ren raised his head to stare at me, tears and snot on his pathetic face. "I…I…I understand! I deserve to be laughed at too!"
I obliterated his head with a swing of my stolen bat. I didn't just knock his head clean off his shoulders. It literally ceased to exist, with nothing remaining of his pathetic face but droplets of blood, shards of bone and strips of flesh.
"I'm making the same kind of joke as you," I proclaimed sarcastically as Qi Fu Ren's headless corpse floundered about before keeling over. I turned to the remaining three delinquents and gangster. "How was it? Was it funny?"
"…ah, that's…"
"Y…yes! It's funny!"
"Very funny! Boss Shu, you really know how to joke!"
The two delinquents were bowing down and trying their best to flatter me. I merely stared at them before pushing my glasses up.
"Really? If it's such a funny joke, why aren't you guys laughing?"
"Ha ha ha ha!"
The three of them forced out laughter, trying to make a show of clutching their stomachs while groveling before me. I studied them for a moment, revulsion increasing inside my chest. These losers didn't even have the resolve to fight to the death, to resist until the very end. Yet they were happy to join a gang and bully other people.
Typical bullies. They only knew how to pick on the weak, and only had the guts to pick fights where they knew they could win for sure.
Honestly, even if I didn't have the power to fight, I would still come to save Pang Zi, no matter the odds. I would just go about it differently. Perhaps I should have thought of a better plan. I failed to predict Qi Fu Ren's ruthlessness…his lack of hesitation in murdering my friend.
I still had a long way to go.
After the awkward laughter, the three of them fell silent, watching me fearfully. I smiled coldly as I approached them.
"Anyone else who knows about this?"
"N…no."
"Qi Fu Ren said not to inform anyone else. The less people who knows about this, the better."
"Boss Zhou said he will take care of everything…that we don't have to bother anyone else." The sole surviving gangster gulped. "The rest of the Black Serpent Gang is embroiled in a turf war with the Ghost Bear Clan."
"I see. That's good." I had heard something pretty good. "You can go now."
The three of them brightened up at that, and rose to their feet. They quickly sprang for the exit.
None of them saw the baseball bat coming from behind. So intent on their departure, they didn't even notice their companions' deaths, one crashing down when I caved his head in, another gurgling as I rammed the baseball bat through his bat, and the last one when I snapped his neck with a swing of the weapon.
I watched their corpses fall over silently. I knew I couldn't let them go. They knew far too much. If word got out, then I would be arrested for murder. I couldn't let that happen.
"…"
I tried to take a step, only to fall to my knees. Holding my hands up, I saw that they were shaking violently.
This was the first time I had killed somebody. Not just one person, but about thirty people. The first time I witnessed death in front of me.
Nausea overwhelmed me and I gagged, doing my best not to throw up. Closing my eyes, I felt beads of cold perspiration forming all over my face. Huffing, I clenched my fists and held my stomach, doing my best to keep the acidic reflux down. I could taste the bitter bile in my throat, and my hands wouldn't stop trembling.
"Not a pleasant sensation, huh?" A voice whispered inside my head. Cold and demonic. I couldn't help but shudder while listening to it. "This really is your first time killing someone."
"I had no choice…" I coughed, my tongue burning with acidic reflux. "They…they killed my friend. They would have tried to kill me too. I was only…fighting back."
No. I could only use the excuse of self-defense for the first part of the fight. After I won, and when the gangsters and delinquents broke down and started to flee, I continued to massacre them. Not because I needed to, not because it was the only way to survive, but because I wanted revenge. I had lost myself to anger.
My hands were now stained with blood.
But if I didn't kill them, then my secret would be out. I didn't know what would happen specifically, but it was likely that I would be arrested and locked up.
No. I didn't want to go to prison.
Why did this have to happen? Why couldn't these bastards leave me alone? Why did they force my hand?
Then I realized that I was being hypocritical here. Yeah, they might have cornered me, but I was the one who made the decision to kill them. I was the one who decided to annihilate all thirty people here, to silence them instead of sparing their lives.
I should take responsibility for my choices and shoulder the sins that I chose to commit.
Still feeling very ill, I forced myself to my feet. I cleaned the baseball bat of my prints and then left it next to its original owner after getting his prints on it. Then I burned Zhou's corpse, to ensure that nothing could be traced back to me…skin, hair, blood or whatever that could have been left inside his chest when I punched a hole cleanly through his body.
Glancing around, I suddenly had a good idea. Using qi, I gathered some of the blood and painted it on the ground.
"GHOST BEAR CLAN'S DECLARATION OF WAR."
I didn't know who the Ghost Bear Clan was, and I honestly didn't care. What was important was to stage the whole thing to look like the outcome of a gang war. That would take the attention away from me. Hopefully, the police wouldn't suspect anything, and I was aware that the gangs and secret societies knew how to take care of themselves.
Heaven knew that such underground wars and massacres were common. Additionally, the Ghost Bear Clan had no knowledge of me, and thus wouldn't suspect me at all.
Good thing the gangster revealed that little tidbit of info on his own, otherwise I wouldn't be able to palm the deed off to the enemies of the Black Serpent Gang. This should take the heat away from me, assuming they were telling the truth. Even if they weren't, there was no way the other members of the Black Serpent Gang would be able to believe that I had single-handedly slain thirty of their members.
Once I had ensured that I had erased all evidence, I staggered out of the warehouse. Of course, I made sure to erase any prints I might have left on the door, both inside and outside. Still gagging, I proceeded back toward a more urban environment.
I heaved and shook my head, still unable to say anything. Instead, I returned home straight, taking the train. On the journey back, I ran through several simulations on how I was going to explain this to the police.
Once I reached home, I contacted the police and made a report, showing them the text message I had received from Pang Zi's smartphone. I used the excuse that my smartphone had run of battery, and thus I didn't know I had gotten the message until I had reached home and began charging my phone. A plausible enough explanation, and I thanked my lucky stars that I didn't rise to the provocation and sent a reply. Otherwise my fabricated story would fall apart.
The police would move to the warehouse and discover the slaughter within its walls, but by then, that was their story to tell. Not mine. As I suspected, they would report it in the papers the next day as a gang war. And I had to visit Pang Zi's parents to offer my condolences.
"Damn it…"
I didn't know how I was going to face them, but I would have to figure something out. And soon.