Chapter 22: Morbid, Darkened

Feng Mu’s pupils contracted. He dodged sideways, his head ducking as his right hand swept upward.

Zhang Tong transformed his fist into a claw, reaching out to hook his fingers—tinged with a sinister, dark hue—toward Feng Mu’s skull.

"Such swift movements, such vicious techniques."

Feng Mu’s heart skipped a beat. The right hand he had meant to drive into Zhang Tong’s throat instantly changed course, his wrist blocking the strike near his ear. He dared not test his speed; in this life-or-death moment, he lacked the confidence to do so, leaving him no choice but to retreat and defend.

Little did he know, one step back leads to a hundred. In a martial duel, where life hangs in the balance, a single error that forfeits the initiative can become an insurmountable chasm between survival and death.

"Heh!"

Zhang Tong’s eyes flared with a brilliant, predatory light. He lunged with his claw, his ferocious nails piercing skin and muscle as easily as tofu, sinking deep until they clamped onto the bone beneath. Feng Mu’s wrist was shredded, his entire arm went momentarily numb, and his dagger dropped limply from his grasp.

"Is that all you’ve got?"

Zhang Tong was incensed. Having gauged the depth of his opponent, he found him surprisingly weak—or rather, not weak, for the man had managed to scalp him earlier. While that had been a sneak attack, the strength behind it was significant; yet, his movements were rigid, errors were frequent, and his combat experience was laughable.

Zhang Tong squeezed his right hand shut, the muscles in his arm bulging as he prepared to rip the bone right out of Feng Mu’s flesh.

"Who gave you the nerve to lock the door? So afraid you’d have nowhere to run?"

Zhang Tong grinned hideously. He caught the falling dagger in his left hand, the tip flicking like a viper’s tongue toward Feng Mu’s heart.

*The essence of martial combat may look like the strong crushing the weak or the fast overwhelming the slow, but in reality, it is the wicked crushing the wicked. When two people fight to the death, the one who survives isn't necessarily the stronger or the faster—it is almost always the more wicked.*

*If he is wicked, you must be wickeder. If he is crazy, you must be crazier. Only then can you kill him and survive!*

The vicious roar of his martial arts instructor echoed in Feng Mu’s mind. What had been incomprehensible back then now made perfect sense, seasoned by the scent of his own blood and the stifling atmosphere of death.

Feng Mu suddenly understood, followed immediately by a sharp, gut-wrenching terror.

His heart felt as though it had been seized by an invisible hand, skipping a beat as he realized the fatal mistake he had made. That step—he shouldn't have dodged. It looked like just one step, but in truth, he had stepped onto the edge of a cliff. By allowing his wrist to be captured, he was trapped on that precipice, forced to endure the beating.

"Will I really be beaten to death here?"

The sheer horror of impending death gripped his every cell. Feng Mu’s tongue grew stiff, his throat constricted, and his breath hitched in a spasm. His dark pupils were webbed with terrified, bloodshot veins. The world around him fell into a dead silence, muted, leaving only the thunderous pounding of his own heart. The surging blood pressure made his eye sockets swell, the capillaries rupturing in a gruesome display.

On his retina, a previously dormant, dim icon began to flicker with golden light.

[Frenzied Blood] was responding to the stimulus of his blood loss.

***

[Frenzied Blood]: When I lose blood, I am strengthened in every aspect.

"My wrist is spraying blood, ahhhhh! I’m so scared, I don’t want to die, ahhhhh!!!"

Feng Mu’s vision clouded with a crimson hue. Under the stimulus of blood loss, his reason and cowardice transmuted into pure madness. He let out his first savage roar since entering the room—angry, bloodthirsty, and ravenous.

*Rip!*

With a sound like heavy fabric being torn asunder, the five fingers clamped around Feng Mu’s wrist were ripped clean off. Three fingers remained hanging by shreds, while two fell to the floor, a mangled, shocking sight.

Zhang Tong didn't even feel the pain at first; he stared in horror at the jagged stumps, where strands of torn flesh and nerves were still trailing.

"I didn't capture his wrist—he tore my hand apart!"

Zhang Tong was stunned by Feng Mu’s strength, but there was no room for hesitation in the face of death. The loss of his fingers ignited his primal ferocity. He surged forward instead of retreating, channeling all his remaining strength into a final thrust of the dagger.

"Die!"

"Die!"

Two savage, violent roars overlapped into a single, grating sound. The blade pierced through taut muscle and struck a rib, jamming abruptly and sending a shower of sparks flying. The bone and the blade clashed in a brutal deadlock; the already deformed handle could not withstand the pressure and snapped in two.

The vicious energy in Zhang Tong’s chest broke just like the handle. He released his grip, letting the useless hilt fall to the floor, his eyes fixed in disbelief on the broken shard of blade embedded in his opponent’s chest.

Feng Mu pulled it out with a steady hand and, in one fluid motion, drove it back into Zhang Tong’s throat.

Black blood surged from Zhang Tong’s mouth. He stared at Feng Mu’s chest, where the metallic sheen of his ribs was visible, seemingly wanting to ask something, but only a wheezing, leaking sound escaped his throat.

Zhang Tong clutched his neck and collapsed backward, falling into a row with the "corpse" of Ma Wei lying beside him.

With the threat of death removed, the crimson hue in Feng Mu’s eyes faded slightly, though his pounding heart continued to churn with malicious, homicidal urges.

Feng Mu kicked Ma Wei’s "corpse" and spoke in a hoarse, chilling voice: "If you're awake, stop pretending, or you'll just have to stay asleep forever."

The lingering effects of [Frenzied Blood] had heightened Feng Mu’s senses; he could hear the frantic rhythm of Ma Wei’s terrified heart.

Zhang Tong, relying on the constitution of a Level 2 Martial Artist, was not yet dead. He clutched his throat, his face deathly pale, and glanced to the side.

"Ma Wei isn't dead, just unconscious. This guy didn't use a knife when he snuck up on Ma Wei—so he only drew steel on me. Was he only here to kill me?" Zhang Tong’s mind was in turmoil.

Ma Wei stood up shakily, meeting Zhang Tong’s complex gaze. He stammered in a panic, "Brother Tong, I... I just woke up."

After speaking, Ma Wei quickly averted his eyes, swallowed hard, and cautiously sized up Feng Mu.

***

Ma Wei was lying. He had been awake for a while, but seeing the two men locked in such a ferocious struggle, he hadn't dared to intervene. Besides, with his low martial level, going in would only be a hindrance; it was better to stay on the ground and play dead.

He had thought Brother Tong would win. He couldn't be blamed for the outcome, could he?

Feng Mu sneered, not bothering to expose him. He didn't know how close the two were, but he figured that when faced with life-or-death choices, even the deepest bonds could be discarded.

Feng Mu asked coldly, "Is he your boss?"

Ma Wei didn't understand what Feng Mu meant, but the chilling gaze of the man before him was too terrifying to ignore. He didn't dare lie, so he replied minimally, "Yes."

The act of killing Zhang Tong had fundamentally altered Feng Mu’s mindset. He was no longer tense or flustered; he didn't even need to deliberately feign a villainous persona.

Feng Mu said in a low voice, "Do you want to live or die?"

Ma Wei answered instantly, "Live! I want to live!"

"Good." Feng Mu pulled his phone from his pocket with one hand, opened the camera, and commanded, "Kill him, and you live."

"Huh?" Ma Wei was struck dumb with shock.

Zhang Tong shook his head frantically, his throat wheezing, but he lacked the strength even to crawl. His eyes were filled with despair.

Feng Mu held the phone up, the lens pointed at Ma Wei, his calm voice sounding like a grim reaper demanding a debt. "Hurry up. If he breathes his last before you do it, you'll be joining him on his way."

Ma Wei understood. His expression was a portrait of internal conflict.

Feng Mu frowned and mocked, "How much does he pay you a month? You want to die for him? It’s not like gangs these days are famous for their loyalty, right?"

In his past life, the gangsters in the movies were all about the money. In this life, a world even crueler than the last, did gangs really value loyalty? Feng Mu didn't believe it. But he also understood that in places where no one believed in it, the punishment for betrayal was always the most brutal, because cruelty was the only thing holding their code together.

"Fine, you can die together then." Feng Mu sneered and lowered the phone by an inch.

Ma Wei’s face twisted. He fell to his knees before Zhang Tong, tears and snot streaming down his face. "Brother Tong, I'm sorry. Don't blame me. I haven't even had a chance to be a big shot yet—I don't want to die!"

Amidst his weeping, Ma Wei pried Zhang Tong’s hands away, grabbed the blade, pulled it out, stabbed it back in, pulled it out again, and stabbed again.

Zhang Tong’s eyes gradually lost their color. In the final moment before his consciousness faded, he didn't think of the days they had spent scrounging for scraps as children, nor anything else. He thought of the woman who had been lying in the hospital two days ago.

That was exactly how he had stabbed her to death!

"Come on, smile for the camera." Feng Mu felt not a shred of pity. Kindness toward a beast is cruelty toward humanity.

In the frame, the blood-stained Ma Wei wore a twisted, insane smile.