At the asteroid belt, Cillin was defending himself against his opponent’s attacks. Their speed was impressive, but even more impressive was the fact that they were perfectly used to space combat. It was as if they had become one with the protective armor they were wearing.
Each acceleration was just right and perfectly timed. There wasn’t any wasted movement whatsoever. They were already fast to begin with, but the acceleration made their attacks stronger as well. Assuming that they were assassinating someone in space, their success rate should be as high as it was in a typical environment. As expected of a real killer, they could always operate at peak performance no matter the environment they were in.
Cillin’s armor did not have an acceleration function, but it could neutralize the effects of his environment. Every time he took a step, spun on his feet or leap into the air, it was like he was moving in normal gravity.
There was another flash of light as their blades clashed again. This time though, the killer’s blade abruptly twisted around Cillin’s like a snake and shot straight toward his forehead.
Cillin crouched sideways at the same time he withdrew his own blade. He was able to block the sudden attack. Light flashed as their blades clashed yet again.
In the Eleventh Squad’s starship, everyone was watching the screens with serious looks on the face. However, the odd feeling in their chest grew bigger the longer they observed the battle. On the other hand, Eudy hid a sigh of relief. Unless he was sorely mistaken, this battle should end peacefully for everyone.
Cillin seemed to be locked in a stalemate with his opponent, and Wheeze wasn’t making any progress either. More accurately, it was avoiding combat at all costs as per Cillin had instructed him. Unfortunately for the whip user, the gray cat was so fast that they recognized the futility of chasing it almost as soon as the man-and-cat chase began. Not only was the cat more than fast enough to escape out of his range, it even had the time to look back and check if they were following. If they weren’t, then it would rush them down, land a scratch, then run away again.
“That guy must be feeling so frustrated right now,” commented Cary while watching the whip user chasing after Wheeze.
Xiao Shang and Mogas nodded in agreement. Wheeze’s antics had deflated much of the tension.
On the other hand, Phoebe’s reaction was much more pronounced. “Taipan Nahan! It’s Taipan Nahan!”
“Taipan what?” Cary and the others looked at her in confusion.
“I’m talking about that whip user! His name is Taipan Nahan, and he’s the reason I chose a whip as my weapon! I saw him in action once during my time in the A Squad,” Phoebe explained.
“Wait, you’ve seen him before?”
“Oh, excuse me, I meant that I saw his whip putting a giant hole in a person’s head.”
It seemed like only yesterday when she saw Taipan Nahan in action. He had inspired her so much that she decided to main a whip weapon for life; a chain whip to be exact because the type Taipan Nahan was using wasn’t suitable for her. Right now, she was incredibly excited not just because she hadn’t expected to meet him again, but also because she now had a combat footage of him to fawn over for the rest of her life. His face was still hidden, but Phoebe was satisfied with what she had already.
“Taipan Nahan… Taipan…” Eudy was trying to recall what he knew about Merciless. There weren’t much public information on the organization, and the fact that Taipan Nahan was working for them was one. However, it was rare to be able to put a name under the organization’s banner especially since the large majority of their members had never revealed their true face in public before.
In fact, Taipan Nahan was a combination of the man’s real name and codename. Taipan was his codename, and Nahan his real name. Taipan was the name of a venomous snake capable of extremely swift and rapid attacks. Judging from how he uses his whip, it was clear that the whip user had lived up to his codename.
That said, even a fast, venomous “snake” like him had trouble going up against Wheeze.
After blocking an attack and backing out of his opponent’s attack range, Cillin shot a glance in Wheeze’s direction just in time to see it catching Taipan Nahan’s whip between its teeth. It looked like the battle would end with Wheeze biting the weapon in half, but the spikes covering the whip suddenly withdrew back into the body. Immediately after that, a stream of electricity enveloped the cat.
“Meow dammit!”
Wheeze immediately let go and withdrew to the back. It was puckering its face for some reason.
Cillin’s mouth twitched the moment he saw this. He flicked his opponent’s weapon away before running straight toward Wheeze.
The dagger user paused, not expecting Cillin to leave the fight so suddenly. In the end, he decided to give chase.
Right now, both the Eleventh Squad and Merciless were very confused by Cillin and Wheeze’s strange action. Was the electricity so powerful that the cat’s brain was fried? Was Cillin running to Wheeze because he was worried about it? That was the foremost conjecture in everyone’s mind, but life had a way of surprising people as usual.
Cillin moved faster and faster. When even Wheeze’s whiskers were beginning to twitch unnaturally, he leaped toward the spot behind the gray cat. As soon as he leaped into the air, Wheeze open its mouth and—
POOOOOOOOO—
—spat out a storm of scraps straight at the two Merciless combatants.
To say that they were surprised would be an understatement. There wasn’t even enough time to jump out of the way. They tried to block the torrent of metal with their weapons as best they could, but there was just too many of them, not to mention that they came fast, furious and unpredictable at times.
As if that wasn’t bad enough, something clearly wasn’t right with these metallic scraps. Most of them were half melted and covered in some sort of unknown substance that was anything but a human’s gastric acid.
Yin Wushe was so surprised that he literally spat out the ice cream in his mouth. “What the fuck is this diet!?”
He jabbed the little fellow who was looking at the screen with an equally stunned expression on its face. “Can you eat metal if you want to? Won’t you get indigestion or something?”
It twitched its whiskers but did not say anything.
After Wheezing was finally done throwing up, it sneezed twice and shot out another rain of much tinier scraps. Still, it was nothing like the first.
Wheeze smacked its lips and wiped away the stains around its mouth. Then, it cocked its head and scratched behind its ear with its hind leg.
The two Merciless combatants who just finished blocking the Wheeze’s “surprise attack” froze all of a sudden. It was because they saw Cillin aiming at them with the PTS K.
They exchanged a look with each other before putting away their weapons. Then, they went back to their spaceplane. If this was a true battlefield, Cillin would’ve shot them long before they had finished blocking the torrent of scraps. Knowing how good Cillin’s shooting skills were, at least one of them would’ve been shot and possibly killed. They might have chosen otherwise if their opponent wasn’t Cillin, but they were facing him, and from what their intelligence gathered, he was as mysterious as he was dangerous.
Finally, the gun in his hands gave off an extremely dangerous feeling; dangerous enough that they did not want to risk taking a hit at all. Most killers strongly believed in their intuition, so it took them little time to make the retreat. They had already accomplished their mission anyway. While it wasn’t the best outcome it could be, they were certain that their boss had already found his answer.
This whole space battle was a farce to begin with. What type of killer would challenge their target to a duel in open space? The circus type? It didn’t even count as practice because this was a duel, not an assassination. Every real space battle they had participated before this one had ended with the death of their targets. This one was just a pretense the boss had set up to find his answer, and a passable game for them. That was all.
Meanwhile, everyone in the Eleventh Squad was wearing a dumbfounded look on their face. “Is that… it?” Why does it feel like we’ve been played for a fool?
After the two killers had retreated, Cillin put away his own weapon before slapping Wheeze on the head. “Let’s go. Also, pay attention to what you shove into your mouth next time, you glutton.”
“I know what I eat, okay? I was just full, and I felt incredibly nauseous after that electric massage that whip guy gave me. Also, the Robert Family’s robots are pretty difficult to digest.”
Wheeze transformed into its cyborg form and carried Cillin back to their starship after this. On the way, it asked, “Did you know they weren’t serious from the start, Cillin?”
“More or less. Also, my opponent used a retractable dagger with reflective light when he fought me. If this was a proper assassination, he should’ve used a blade that’s pitch black and non-reflective. The reason he didn’t is because this isn’t a serious fight at all.
“I have a question for you. Why do you think that the boss of Merciless, Yin Wushe had requested such a childish fight?”
“I don’t know. Why?”
“I reckon it’s because of you.”
“Me? What is he planning to do to me?!” Wheeze puffed up its fur immediately. There was nothing it loathed more than becoming another’s experiment.
“He might not necessarily be plotting something against you. There was a rumor that there was an ice cream lover in Merciless who’s very interested in half-cyborgs, and Yin Wushe fits the profile, doesn’t he? He’s had an ice cream in his hands every time we spoke with him, so I’m pretty sure it’s him.”
Wheeze remained silent for a few seconds before saying, “Do you think we should take him out first?”
Cillin pulled its ear. “Keep dreaming. That old man is slyer than you know.”