Chapter 102: Bar
2023-10-23 | Author: Rowing Without Oars 233
Blüdhaven, Badger Bar.
The colorful lights flickered on and off, as if an unseen hand were playing with the switch. The changing lights would sometimes resemble a vast, azure sea, casting all sorts of shadows on the dance floor. At other times, it was a crimson glow, like blood staining the ocean waves, eerie and grimly sinister.
The people on the dance floor moved their bodies in a state of self-abandon, the frenetic music deafening. Strange patterns shifted on the bar's walls, and eerie sounds pulsed intermittently.
The bartender behind the bar was tall and elegant, with well-defined features. His neatly combed black hair perfectly accentuated his sharp facial features. He wore a flawless black suit and a white shirt, his long arms skillfully mixing drinks. His smile was gentle, yet held a certain allure.
"What can I get for you?" he asked with a standard, professional smile.
Orin Vale had just sat down at the bar, having used his mimicry ability to change his face.
"Just coffee," Orin Vale said.
"Of course."
A moment later, a steaming cup of coffee was placed on the bar.
But as the cup was passed to him, Orin Vale noticed a dark tentacle emerge from behind the bartender, covered in sucker-like structures. The limp tentacle was holding a small eyeball, which it plopped into the dark brown coffee.
Having done this, the bartender casually retracted the tentacle and smilingly pushed the coffee across the bar toward him.
"Enjoy."
Orin Vale looked at the large eyeball that had just been dropped in, then at the smiling bartender, and for a moment, he didn't know what to say.
*Seriously, is it really okay to add something so sanity-draining right in front of me so blatantly? Shouldn't you at least pretend to hide it?*
*Or... could it be that ordinary people can't see it?*
As the thought crossed his mind, Orin Vale quickly considered the possibility. Perhaps the utterly bizarre scene he had just witnessed was, in fact, concealed by some kind of mental or visual shield, making it invisible to ordinary people.
Most similar methods didn't work on him. But clearly, the strange bartender before him didn't know that.
Orin Vale remained outwardly calm, preparing to continue his covert observation. Just then, someone sat down next to him.
"Two whiskeys, with olives."
It was a red-haired woman. She spoke to the bartender.
"One for this gentleman, please."
As she spoke, she winked at Orin Vale, intentionally or not, showcasing the deep trench and endless scenery of her northern hemisphere.
"Thank you," Orin Vale said politely.
The woman sat a little closer and smiled. "You look like a novice, sir. First time?"
"A few times," Orin Vale said. "But the last time was quite a while ago."
He was telling the truth. The last time he'd been to a bar was before his transmigration, thousands of years ago.
The woman giggled. "So you're an old hand after all. I couldn't tell."
"I manage," Orin Vale said lightly.
Influenced by certain senior masters who shall not be named, he was particularly good at driving a Jeep.
"Are you confident in your shooting?" The red-haired woman continued to lean closer, bringing with her a wave of fragrance.
"I never miss," Orin Vale said calmly.
This was no boast. Shooting was a basic course. The skills of a top graduate were no joke.
"Such confidence. But I like it..."
The woman smilingly tried to entwine herself around him, just like a water snake slithering through the grass.
But without another word, Orin Vale's right fist shot out with a whoosh.
As if the air had exploded in a confined space, the wine glass in front of the bar was blasted into powder. The red-haired woman's head snapped back as she was sent flying sideways, crashing through a table and smashing all the bowls, dishes, and wine bottles on it to smithereens.
The woman's neck bent at an odd angle, and she collapsed unconscious amidst the scattered shards. A wave of glitched, corrupted data, like a distorted image, rolled across her pretty face, and in an instant, she transformed into a dark, six-eyed monster.
It was nothing special, just a kind of disguise technique similar to a holographic projection. To Orin Vale, it was something he could see through at a glance.
The others were the same.
The moment he threw the punch, the entire bar erupted into chaos.
The bartender shouted, and several twisted tentacles emerged from behind him. The people on the dance floor stopped dancing and leaped out, each revealing a monstrous, ferocious face. A woman in a red robe clung to the ceiling with all four limbs, like some boneless animal, crawling along the ceiling like a large spider. Her long hair hung down, creating a grotesque and terrifying scene.
The strong man sitting next to him at the bar roared and swung his right arm. His arm transformed completely into a bone blade-like form, slashing sharply toward Orin Vale's neck.
They were all aliens.
It turned out that from the very beginning, there wasn't a single human in this bar.
Of course, that included Orin Vale.
*Like, who isn't an alien here anyway?*
Orin Vale sat calmly in his seat, peacefully watching the bone blade swing toward him. It sliced through the air with a whoosh, rapidly closing in.
Until it was a hair's breadth from the tip of his nose.
It stopped.
No, it wasn't just the strong man. The bartender shooting tentacles at him, the woman crawling on the ceiling, the entire room of aliens surrounding him, the airborne shards, the liquor from the shattered bottles—in that instant, everything hung suspended in mid-air.
It was as if someone had lowered the gate of the river of time. The once-gushing torrent was instantly blocked, reduced to a mere trickle. The flow of time slowed to a crawl, as if carried on the back of a great tortoise, inching forward.
This was because Orin Vale was too fast.
His movements were fast, his brain processed just as quickly, and what naturally appeared in his vision was a "bullet time" effect.
He slowly rose from his chair, unhurriedly dodging the sharp edge of the bone blade. Passing by the strong man, he casually extended a finger and lightly poked the cheek that was frozen in a roaring expression.
In this seemingly static time-space, even the most casual poke, when amplified by supersonic speed, would be imbued with astonishing force. A shockwave slowly rippled out from the point of contact on the strong man's cheek. The skin on that ugly face immediately rippled like waves slowed down a hundred times, looking utterly ridiculous.
Two other aliens, seemingly from different races, were charging shoulder-to-shoulder toward the bar. Orin Vale sauntered in front of them, glanced over, and lifted their claws, positioning them to strike each other's heads. Then, he applied a light, opposing force to their arms.
He strolled through most of the bar, delivering a punch here and a slap there, turning a charging brute around, or dragging one alien into the path of a teammate's attack.
After making a wide circle back to the bar, he sized up the bartender, whose face was contorted in slow motion as he fired his tentacles. After a moment's thought, he flicked his right hand and grabbed all the tentacles.
He pulled the tentacles, kicked off the wall, and leaped. He performed a somersault past the ceiling, casually tying the tentacles into a tight knot around the fan.
Landing back on the ground, he dusted off his hands, walked back to the bar, and sat back down in his original spot, crossing his legs.
The next moment, the strong man at the bar's neck snapped, and his entire head slammed onto the floor. A pair of alien "good buddies" suddenly clawed each other in the face, letting out mutual screams of pain. Several aliens face-planted, while a few others spun in place. Another large brute charged furiously into the toilet, unable to stop, and slammed its head into the bowl, taking a big gulp...
The bartender screamed as he was launched from behind the bar, his knotted tentacles caught in the ceiling fan. The fan whined as it was ripped from the ceiling, crashing to the floor with the bartender and smashing a table.
In a single instant, the entire room of incomparably fierce aliens was lying scattered on the floor. Some were lying down, some were sprawled out, and some were hanging on the wall. Only Orin Vale remained in the entire room, sitting calmly with his legs crossed at the bar, as if none of it had anything to do with him.
"Now,"
Orin Vale sat in his chair, glancing at the room full of groaning aliens.
"Does anyone else want out?"
(end of chapter)