Chapter 6: How did you get here? By the rooftop!
Su Jiannan, dressed like a successful businessman, had just stepped out of a black luxury car when he was met by a ruddy-faced, portly middle-aged man.
“Mr. Su! A pleasure to meet you! A pleasure!”
The middle-aged man enthusiastically gripped Su Jiannan's hand. His large, rough palm, like a fan, was surprisingly strong, with the force of some wild beast. Su Jiannan’s face twitched imperceptibly. He quickly squeezed and then let go.
“A pleasure to meet you, a pleasure. I didn't expect Mr. Zhou to personally greet me. It seems your side places great importance on this project.”
“Why wouldn’t we?”
Mr. Zhou’s plump face curved into a proud smile, and his words poured out like a machine gun.
“After all, it’s a newly discovered Jingchu cultural site. The municipal government treasures this treasure, talking about ‘developing cultural industries and building cultural confidence.’ They even started preparing academic seminars before the excavation was finished. Once those experts finish their meeting, we construction investors will immediately follow up. Haha, now competing for GDP is like a war…”
Then Mr. Zhou suddenly slapped his head and said grandly, “Oh, I got carried away for a moment. I can’t let Mr. Su—our client who contracted our big project—keep standing while we talk. Tonight, I’ll treat you, Mr. Su! Let’s go to that old established Tianxianglou!”
Su Jiannan observed the situation and, seeing Mr. Zhou’s genuine enthusiasm, did not decline. “Alright, alright, then I’ll drink to my heart’s content with Mr. Zhou—”
He lifted his foot to leave, but felt someone tugging at his clothes.
It turned out a girl had also gotten out of the back seat of the car. The girl wore an elegant suit dress, her skin was like congealed mutton fat, and her face possessed both the clear features of Europeans and the gentle warmth of an Eastern woman, making her charming and yet proudly aloof.
The girl furrowed her brow, “Dad, drink less, pay attention to your health.”
“Alright! Dad will listen to you!” Su Jiannan readily agreed to his precious daughter Su Xiaoqiang, “It’s getting late, Xiaoqiang. Go for a walk outside and then head back early. Let Uncle Li drive you. Dad has booked the presidential suite at the hotel…”
The two bosses happily went off to the banquet, but Su Xiaoqiang thought her father definitely wouldn’t listen to her and would continue to drink excessively despite his health condition.
“Boring, what’s there to explore here…”
Su Xiaoqiang saw Uncle Li, who was waiting by the car like a motionless statue, and turned to walk towards the brightly lit area.
Suddenly, a red-haired man walked from the roadside and stopped Su Xiaoqiang, asking in standard Mandarin, “Excuse me, do you know how to get to this place?”
Su Xiaoqiang stared at the phone screen he showed her, blinking. It was an unfamiliar foreign phone brand… But seeing his hurried expression, she didn't chat much and simply pointed in a direction.
‘Strange, on his phone screen… it seemed like I just saw words like ‘murder and cover-up’… I must have seen it wrong.’
Su Xiaoqiang buried her inexplicable thoughts, wanting to ask if he needed a ride in her sports car.
Looking up again, the red-haired man had already vanished.
Damn it, how did he disappear so fast?
— — — —
Old Tang felt like he was going to die.
“Brother, you’ve got the wrong person, I’m really not Wei Gong Shirou! What’s more, brave hero, spare my life!”
Old Tang had just poked his head out from the ruins when he was met with merciless sniping from the other side.
Violently flying projectiles formed multiple straight lines of metallic streams, shattering the glass windows, and blasting dense, shallow pits into the thick concrete layer.
After cursing him as a pervert, Old Tang quickly retreated like the wind, making a swift getaway.
This place, like ruins, was an abandoned building area much more remote than the Chu Culture venue, instantly identified as a half-finished project site where the developer had fled and no one took over.
Old Tang got lost while looking for the mission location and unknowingly ended up here. As soon as he tried to sneak into a building, he was ambushed by an enemy.
Walking towards him was the lean young man Zhou Yuxuan. At his feet, countless exposed concrete rebar decomposed and converged, forming sharp, spinning projectiles.
Truth Spell: Iron Stream—also known in the West as Sequence 80, Spirit of Words: Iron Stream.
This ability can control metal elements within its domain, using them for attack or to create objects.
Zhou Yuxuan, using projectiles created by the Spirit of Words, combined with the automatic loading magical tools (Alchemic guns) made with the Zhou Family’s refining techniques, could achieve an enhanced shotgun effect. Coupled with the dense rebar around, it formed an almost infinite ammunition supply environment—though even without rebar, the fired bullets could be recycled by the Spirit of Words.
“Wei Gong Shirou, are you afraid to face me?”
The hidden Old Tang loudly complained, “You’ve got the wrong person! You're talking about my buddy, he's not here, and he's from Dongying. I can't speak a single word of Japanese!”
“…” Zhou Yuxuan stopped. He had only seen Wei Gong’s file; Old Tang, such an insignificant character, had been overlooked. After a while of searching, he found a familiar face from a large pile of hunter files:
“You are Ronald Tang?”
“Ah, yes, yes, yes. I’m Old Tang, Wei Gong brother’s loyal old partner.”
“Then why aren’t you acting together? Why did you abandon your companion and come here alone? Never mind Wei Gong, this is not a place for hunters like you to be. Or did you get information you shouldn't have known?”
Zhou Yuxuan’s face was stern. This place was originally designated as the meeting point for the Zhou Family and several other mixed-blood aristocratic descendants for tomorrow, not far from the ruins. Miscellaneous people like hunters were not allowed to mix in; their meeting point should have been at the venue further away.
“Brother, I was wrong, brother! I just simply got lost, it’s really not that complicated!” Old Tang said with a mournful face.
“The data shows you are a veteran hunter who has completed high-level missions multiple times. And you still make such a low-level mistake as getting lost?”
“...I’m truly sorry for making such a low-level mistake!”
Old Tang secretly grumbled to himself, in this day and age, no one believes you even when you tell the truth!
Zhou Yuxuan was about to say something more.
Suddenly, a strong warning surged in his heart.
Whoosh—
Zhou Yuxuan only managed to retreat half a step when a metal arrow shot into the ground. The arrow easily pierced through the reinforced concrete block a few centimeters from his foot, its power and precision being incredibly high.
He looked up. On the building’s rooftop, a red-haired man was holding a black bow, an arrow in hand.
“Are you Wei Gong Shirou?”
Zhou Yuxuan spoke. He was a bit curious; he hadn’t seen Wei Gong arrive by vehicle from anywhere nearby to go upstairs. Could it be that he ran straight across the rooftops all the way here?
Wei Gong Shirou on the rooftop stepped forward and replied: “That would be me.”
Then a dust-covered head with drooping eyebrows popped out from the center of the building, “Oh, Wei Gong brother, you’re finally here! Damn it, Mingming used to have such good luck, this time Old Tang really suffered for you!”
“What’s going on?”
“Brother, come down and talk first.”
So Zhou Yuxuan witnessed Wei Gong Shirou leaping from the rooftop, then using a balcony to swing into Old Tang’s floor.