Not far from the active battlefield, another corner of the Dark Zone junkyard was plunging into a bone-chilling atmosphere of death.
The elegantly dressed man strolled leisurely amidst the scattered corpses.
His face was detached, cold to the point of absolute apathy, as if the lives that had just perished beneath his feet were nothing but worthless weeds.
From his ring-adorned hand, fresh, crimson blood dripped from the head of an innocent refugee, whom he was casually dragging upside down by the hair.
Down in the mud, a middle-aged man knelt prostrate, trembling violently like a leaf in the wind.
He slammed his head repeatedly onto the ground, begging in a choked, desperate voice:
— “Please, sir…
please, boss, spare my life!
I have an elderly mother and young children…
Please, sir…”
SLASH…!
Before his desperate plea could even finish, a razor-sharp, razor-thin strand of Sophion thread—resembling a death god’s blade—sliced through the air.
A clean, sickening slice echoed.
The man’s body froze instantly, and the top half of his head from the nose up was cleanly sheared off, sliding away to the side.
The headless corpse collapsed heavily into a pool of blood, twitching a few times before going completely still.
He casually tossed the head in his hand to the dirt, pulling a handkerchief from his suit pocket to slowly wipe away the blood clinging to his fingers.
Glancing up at the sky, which had just been completely cleared of dark clouds by a terrifying force to reveal radiant rays of sunlight, he muttered in a flat tone:
— “I wonder what kind of thing was just shot into the sky to vaporize a massive downpour instantly like that?
That psycho…
he must have found the real target.
Time to go join the fun.”
With that, his body gave a slight bend, and he glided through the air as swiftly as an invisible gale, heading straight toward old man Akaisin’s shack.
Clash of the Echelons
Returning to the central battlefield.
By now, the sky was completely clear, yet the pressure on the ground remained suffocatingly tense.
Old man Akaisin and the blood-bandaged freak were locked in a close-quarters melee of an entirely different echelon.
BOOM!
CRASH!
BANG!
Despite his frail frame and reliance on a cane, every martial stance old man Akaisin unleashed carried incredibly bizarre and enigmatic trajectories.
The decaying wooden cane in his hand transformed into a myriad of ash-gray afterimages, relentlessly targeting his opponent’s vital pressure points to end the battle in a single breath.
However, the psycho was no pushover either.
His combat instincts were as wild and razor-sharp as a feral beast’s.
Roaring continuously, his hands unleashed tyrannical waves of energy, deflecting and blocking all of the old man’s lethal strikes.
The collisions between their opposing Sophion generated shockwaves that tore up the surrounding earth.
Not far away, Shin gradually regained consciousness after nearly suffocating to death.
Clutching his bruised throat, he gasped desperately for air and staggered to his feet.
Witnessing the old man dueling the monster single-handedly, Shin gritted his teeth, channeling his crimson-and-black aura to charge in and assist:
— “Old man!
I’m coming to help you!”
Noticing his adoptive grandson rushing over, Akaisin didn’t turn his head but instantly roared, his voice brimming with absolute majesty and command:
— “You little brat, stay away from here!
Leave this match to me alone!
Take Kento and get out of here right now!”
Shin skidded to a halt, shouting back in stubborn defiance:
— “But old man!
That bastard is too strong!
We only stand a chance if we join forces!”
— “DON’T YOU DARE ARGUE WITH ME!!!” Akaisin’s eyes flared as he let out a thunderous roar.
“GET KENTO BACK TO THE SHACK, NOW!!!”
The old man’s sheer rage and unyielding determination made Shin realize the gravity of the situation.
He bit his lip hard until it bled, uttering not another word.
Turning on his heel, Shin bolted toward the crater where Kento lay unconscious.
He hoisted his younger brother onto his back and ran like mad toward the dilapidated shack, where little Loona was pacing anxiously with worry.
Witnessing this, the blood-bandaged freak narrowly slipped past one of Akaisin’s cane strikes, casting a mocking glance after Shin as he sneered:
— “Hahaha!
You grandfather-grandson trio sure are affectionate, aren’t you?
Even facing disaster, you still protect each other!”
Akaisin retracted his cane, standing firmly under the morning sun as his ash-gray eyes fired back with freezing coldness:
— “At the very least, we still possess humanity—which is more than all you twisted, degenerate wild animals combined can say, you little shit!”
The moment the words left his lips, a bizarre light flashed in Akaisin’s eyes.
He swiftly formed a hand seal with his left hand, barking out in a deep resonance:
— “All-Matter Exchange Art!”
VÚT!
The space surrounding the bandaged freak warped violently.
In the blink of an eye, the positions of old man Akaisin and a piece of rusted scrap metal behind the freak’s back completely swapped.
The old man materialized flawlessly in the freak’s blind spot behind his nape, completely silent.
Channeling his entire reserve of ancient, ash-gray Sophion into his frail fist, he drove a full-power strike straight toward the freak’s spine.
Caught in a wave of sheer terror, the bandaged freak’s primal instincts flared as he desperately tried to spin around and block.
Yet, the velocity of this space-shifting technique was far too swift—he was completely unable to raise a guard in time!
BOOM!!!
At the absolute hair’s breadth of a moment, when Akaisin’s fist was a mere few inches from the freak’s back, a cataclysmic surge of power carrying the weight of ten thousand armies suddenly plummeted from the high heavens like a meteor.
This tyrannical pressure smashed directly into the space between the two fighters, detonating an earth-shattering energy explosion to bail the freak out.
BA-BOOM!!!
The terrifying explosive force forced Akaisin to pull back his strike, lightly gliding backward three meters to maintain a safe distance.
The Arrival of the Executioners
Dust, debris, and fractured earth slowly dispersed under the morning sun.
Emerging from the hazy mist was a familiar figure—the man dressed in the elegant, immaculate suit.
He stood there, his detached eyes staring down Akaisin as if looking at a pile of filthy trash.
Simultaneously, atop the crests of the surrounding junk mountains, their thirty-odd subordinates began to emerge in droves.
Gripping their weapons, they raised a deafening uproar, their bloodshot eyes reeking of slaughter, ready to swoop down on their prey at a moment’s notice upon their master’s command.
Adjusting his collar slightly, the suited man looked at the frail old man before him, speaking in a flat, indifferent voice:
— “Akaisin, is it?
Who would have thought a legend of the previous era would be living in seclusion in a dilapidated shithole like this. Follow the newest chapters on g.com.
It is quite an honor to meet you, old man.”
Akaisin clasped his hands behind his back, tilting his head slightly to look at the two leaders before scanning the lackeys surrounding them.
Clicking his tongue, his tone dripped with absolute disdain:
— “You punks look a bit too familiar…
What were your names again?
I’m getting old, so my memory is getting hazy—I just can’t seem to recall worthless trash names.”
Undeterred by the old man’s attitude, a faint smirk tugged at the corner of his lips as he slowly introduced them:
— “Allow me to reintroduce us so you remember.
This bandaged psycho over here is…”
GEN-PRIMAL “Jiang Fengmo” (The Mad Demon)
Pausing for a brief moment, he elegantly placed a hand over his chest, offering a polite yet thoroughly superficial bow:
— “And as for myself…”
GEN-PRIMAL “Cheon Do-jin”
Upon hearing those two names, especially the name Cheon Do-jin, old man Akaisin’s expression abruptly shifted.
The ash-gray Sophion surrounding his frame suddenly began to boil violently like molten magma, an astronomical surge of bloodlust locking dead onto the suited man.
Akaisin snarled, each syllable sounding as though it were forged in the depths of hell:
— “Oh…
So it’s you, Do-jin.
You absolute son of a bitch…
you were the one who brutally slaughtered my two beloved disciples all those years ago!
To think you actually have the balls to bring your repulsive face all the way out here today?
I must commend your courage…
and your worthless dog life!”
Cheon Do-jin let out an amused gasp, a calculating gleam flashing momentarily within his otherwise detached eyes.
He spoke nonchalantly:
— “In that case, let me guess…
Those two children I accidentally spared during the purge of your two students back then…
they are currently right here in this very junkyard, and just fought Fengmo, correct?”
Shifting his gaze toward the distant shack, he continued in his flat tone:
— “As they say, when you pull weeds, you must dig up the roots.
Since we’ve crossed paths today, I’ll gladly send you and those two seeds of catastrophe to reunite with their parents in the afterlife.”
Taking a heavy step forward, the decaying wooden cane in Akaisin’s hand suddenly unleashed a terrifying, crushing pressure, pulverizing the surrounding ground and stones into fine dust.
He roared:
— “You think a piece of shit like you has the right to lay a finger on them?
If you want to touch those kids, you’ll have to walk over my old corpse first!”
Akaisin swept his gaze across the thirty thugs lining the ridges of the trash mountains, letting out a booming, contemptuous laugh:
— “Quite a crowd you brought, huh?
A whole pack of able-bodied youths teaming up to bully a frail old man—do you bastards even know the definition of shame?
Keep this in mind: back when I was at my absolute zenith, not a single one of you shits had even been born into this world yet!
Fine then…
Today, let this hiding old geezer take on your whole damn squad all at once!”
END OF CHAPTER 8