Acid rain, like countless poisoned needles, stabbed into Shen Lian's scorched ribs and tore into Lin Si's mangled chest. Two distinct kinds of agony tore at each other in the damp cold air—the icy chill of spiritual backlash entwining with the scalding burn of energy erosion, binding these two strangers together atop the wailing aerial taxi.
High above, eyes boiling with purple lightning had locked onto them. The violet-eyed assassin raised a hand; the energy brightness at its fingertip surged. Raindrops nearby instantly vaporized, twisting into a vortex of steam. This time, the gathered energy wasn't a thin beam. It swelled into a fist-sized sphere of light. Its core, a deep violet like a black hole, greedily swallowed the surrounding neon glow.
"Fuck... not again!" Lin Si coughed, blood flecked with electric sparks. His gaze was fierce, like a cornered hyena. His right hand clenched violently. The floating, twisted "Ghostgrudge Code Shard" instantly shattered into shimmering electromagnetic static and broken code fragments. Like hornets returning to their nest, they rushed into the charred neural port on his left arm. The flesh around the port was raw. Upon contact, Lin Si's face contorted violently with pain. A half-stifled, animalistic growl ripped from his throat.
Shen Lian, his spirit energy drained, felt his pupils constrict. Forced energy recall? This kid's using his life as fuel!
The shriek of death was upon them! The purple sphere tore through the curtain of rain, plummeting with annihilating force.
Shen Lian's bloody fingers scraped across the slick taxi roof. From withered meridians, he squeezed his last dregs of spirit energy, hastily tracing an incomplete yet ancient seal—not defense, but illusion!
Hum!
The roof's appearance distorted instantly. A thin layer of illusion, like a cheap hologram, spread over them, shifting their position half a meter! Under normal conditions, such a crude trick wouldn't fool a child. But now, amidst the chaos of acid rain, neon glare, and explosion aftermath, it offered their only hope.
*KRAA-BOOOOM!!!*
The light sphere slammed into the spot where they had been moments before. Reinforced alloy plating melted like hot butter. Crystalline edges fractured outwards. The shockwave flipped the entire taxi, sending it spinning towards a skyscraper's glass facade.
"Faster!" Shen Lian barked, grabbing Lin Si before the agony could sap his strength. His fingers dug into the buckling metal frame. Weightlessness swallowed them whole. Shards of safety glass flew like bullets.
Lin Si staggered from the yank, his torn chest making his vision flicker. Yet a desperate, vicious stubbornness kept him upright. The port on his arm, having just absorbed his weapon, erupted in a chaotic mix of purple sparks and blue static. Without hesitation, he slammed the wild energy into the hurtling vehicle—
ZZZAAAP—BAM!
An unnatural, non-physical force field pulsed. The falling taxi's path lurched violently, as if batted aside by an invisible hand. It scraped the building's edge in a shower of sparks, then plunged nose-first into a sewage-choked alley below.
*CRUNCH!*
The wreckage collapsed. Black smoke mingled with steam rising from the acid rain. The air stank of chemicals and rot. Rusty pipes crawled up the walls; malfunctioning neon signs flickered. Sewage lapped at their ankles. This was the rotten vein beneath "Fengdu's" glittering skin—the gateway to the Undercity.
"Cough... cough..." Shen Lian shoved a twisted door open, rolling into the icy filth. His rib wound burned. The backlash from his exhausted spirit energy felt like ten thousand ants gnawing his bones. He forced his head up, searching the sky—that cold purple glow hovered above, temporarily hidden by pipes and industrial exhaust, but clearly conducting a meticulous scan.
A brief respite. The countdown to death hadn't stopped.
"Hiss... fuck you, Long Yuan!" Lin Si's curse came from the wreckage. Half-submerged in the sewage, his hoodie clung to his lean frame. He clutched his chest; purple lightning danced within the wound like live wires, greedily chewing at the edges with an audible zzzt, eating away at his life. Sweat and rain slicked his pale face, but his eyes were razor-sharp as they fixed on Shen Lian—full of rage and suspicion.
"Daoist bastard... cough... your shitty spell nearly finished me!" he rasped, his voice like sandpaper.
Shen Lian wiped blood from his face, his gaze sharp as steel. "Stay put, and we'd both be charcoal now." His eyes flicked to Lin Si's charred port and the eerie wound on his chest. "That 'iron shard'... What cursed weapon is it? You're wounded by Long Yuan's power, yet you strike back with something similar?" The contradiction was the lethal puzzle left hanging from Chapter One.
Lin Si's eyes flickered. He instinctively covered the wound, his voice turning nastier. "None of your damn business! Three years' worth of credit points for my new heart module—fucking tin can blew it out! Now? I just wanna scrap it for parts!" His hatred for "Long Yuan" was raw and intense, focused solely on his loss. The deeper conspiracy went unmentioned.
Shen Lian felt a faint shift inside. At least we have one target in common? A fragile straw to grasp.
Above them, a sharp electronic whine suddenly ripped through the rain—different from the assassin's energy hum. Cold. Mechanical. Scanners. Crimson beams pierced the smog, crisscrossing the alley mouth.
"Night Wanderers!" Lin Si's face paled. "Long Yuan's mutts are fast!"
Disc-shaped drones hovered at the alley entrance. Their compound eyes glowed red. A synthesized electronic voice echoed down the alley: "Warning! High-level energy residue and illegal vehicle wreckage detected! All personnel, disarm immediately for scanning!"
Front and back. Escape routes cut off.
"No time!" Shen Lian pushed himself up, ignoring the agony lancing his meridians. "Want to scrap that tin can? Then follow me!" He pointed deeper into the alley—where pipes choked the space, neon burned erratically, leading to the true entrance of the underground maze. He needed time. He needed to recover spirit energy. He needed to shake the hunters, both above and below.
Lin Si glanced at the drones, then the murky alley depths. Struggle flashed in his eyes, quickly replaced by ferocity. He spat blood-tinged phlegm into the muck and grabbed a piece of bent pipe as a weapon.
"Lead! But play me false..." He shook the pipe menacingly. "...and I'll snap your ribs for cyber-rig supports!"
One behind the other, like wounded beasts, they plunged into the filth-ridden darkness. Sewage rose past their shins, biting cold gnawing at their bones. Deeper in, flickering holograms of cheap whores projected snowflake glitches; corners were piled with discarded cybernetic limbs; the stench of desperation and cut-rate stimulants fermented in the damp air.
Just as they rounded a corner—
High above, the purple figure slipped silently through rain and exhaust, hovering directly over the alley mouth. Those eyes, boiling with lightning, fixed with unnerving precision on Lin Si's stumbling form. For the first time, a faint, almost data-stream-like ripple of dissonance disturbed the killer's non-human consciousness:
Target individual... energy signature anomalous... conflict with core protocols... reassess threat level... Priority: capture/analysis...
Like a ghost, the violet-eyed assassin descended, trailing the signals of energy and life, into the sprawling maze woven of steel, sewage, and lies.