As Lu Li spoke, he tilted his head slightly, his gaze locking directly onto the woman positioned on the rooftop above, who had mistakenly believed her presence was perfectly concealed.
The moment Fusui Kure made eye contact with the man below, a freezing chill violently shot down her spine. The biological danger-sense hardwired into her brain began screaming at maximum volume, practically begging her to drop her weapon and run.
She had never felt this level of primal terror from anyone. Not even her brother, Raian Kure—the undisputed prodigy of the clan—projected this kind of suffocating, apocalyptic pressure. The man standing casually in the street below was insanely, catastrophically dangerous!
Her rigorous training as a top-tier assassin kept her hands perfectly steady on the sniper rifle, but her palms were slick with cold sweat. She had the crosshairs planted squarely between the man's eyes, yet under the blaring alarm bells in her mind, her finger physically refused to pull the trigger.
Just who the hell is this wanted criminal, Lu Li?!
CLINK—
With a casual, almost imperceptible flick of his finger, Lu Li snapped the heavy combat dagger pressed against his neck. The sheer kinetic force launched the broken top half of the blade violently into the air. It spun rapidly toward the rooftop and wedged itself flawlessly behind the trigger mechanism of Fusui's sniper rifle.
The young Kure sniper stared at her jammed rifle, cold sweat pouring down her face. He didn't even scratch his finger!
Lu Li didn't bother looking up at the roof again. He maintained his perfectly amicable smile. "Don't let your hands shake. If that gun goes off by accident, a lot of your people are going to die today."
An eerie, suffocating silence gripped the street for several agonizing seconds.
Finally, the young patrol leader standing in front of Lu Li slowly raised his hand. At his signal, the surrounding Kure members cautiously backed away, and the three snipers on the rooftops lowered their rifles.
He wiped the sweat from his forehead, rapidly adjusting his demeanor. "Mr. Lu Li, please forgive our severe rudeness."
Strength truly is the only absolute truth.
If Lu Li had been an ordinary criminal, the Kure Clan would have effortlessly subdued him and tossed him to the authorities. But he had decisively proven his overwhelming power, and in the underground world, true strength commanded absolute respect.
He could have easily slaughtered them all in the blink of an eye. Instead, he had executed an unimaginably complex maneuver to jam the sniper's trigger, invisibly neutralizing the conflict without shedding a single drop of blood. The Kure patrol leader wasn't an idiot; continuing to provoke this monster would be nothing short of suicidal.
"You are undeniably a profound martial artist. The Kure Clan welcomes your desire for a martial arts exchange. We still have our patrol route to finish, so she will escort you to the Patriarch's estate."
As the patrol leader spoke, a young woman in her twenties stepped out from an adjacent building. It was one of the snipers from the rooftop.
She was tall and athletic, wearing a black tactical vest that showed off her toned midriff and well-defined abs. A pair of hot pants and black thigh-high socks perfectly accentuated her fit, slender figure.
"Hello, Mr. Lu. I am Fusui Kure. You can just call me Fusui," she introduced herself.
Observing him up close, she realized the suffocating, apocalyptic aura from earlier had vanished entirely. However, she wasn't foolish enough to think her danger radar had malfunctioned. It simply proved that this man possessed absolute, surgical control over his killing intent.
In that microsecond earlier, he had genuinely been prepared to butcher every single Kure member on the street. That was why she had been so terrified.
"A pleasure to meet you, Miss Fusui. I'm glad we could clear up this little misunderstanding. I actually visited the mainland Wu Clan in my youth, and I had always heard your branch placed a high value on etiquette. For a moment there, I thought I had walked into the wrong neighborhood," Lu Li replied with a warm smile.
He wasn't entirely bluffing. The background identity the Terminus Space had fabricated for him was remarkably robust. While he was currently an illegal immigrant who had smuggled himself into Japan from a small country, his true origins lay in the ancient Eastern nation. According to his system-generated lore, he had indeed interacted with the mainland Wu Clan in his early years.
"I am truly ashamed. Please, follow me, Mr. Lu. Regarding your request for a martial arts exchange, we must officially consult the Patriarch first," Fusui replied, feeling a bit embarrassed.
As professional assassins, the Kure Clan kept close tabs on highly dangerous individuals. The moment Lu Li was placed on the national wanted list, they had pulled his file. Based on the reports, they had mistakenly profiled him as a deranged "thrill killer."
The dossier stated that his initial conflict with the human traffickers arose from a simple payment dispute. However, after killing the boss, he hadn't just walked away; he had methodically and brutally slaughtered all 28 members of the syndicate. To the Kure Clan, letting a volatile psychopath like that roam freely through their city was unacceptable.
It might sound hypocritical coming from a family of assassins, but the Kure rarely harbored sadistic perverts who killed for fun. To them, killing was strictly business. How many people genuinely loved their day job? Outside of active contracts, the Kure Clan highly valued social order and stability.
Of course, every forest had its bad apples. Her older brother, Raian Kure, was a blatant psychopath who genuinely derived ecstatic pleasure from slaughter. Despite being hailed as the absolute prodigy of the clan, he was their most infamous problem child.
"Mr. Lu... would you mind taking the back alleys with me?" Fusui asked hesitantly as they walked.
"Oh? Is there a problem with the main road?" Lu Li asked, slightly confused. Fusui didn't seem like she was leading him into an ambush. Why the sudden detour?
"I have an older brother who usually hangs around the main district. He has a notoriously bad temper, and I'm afraid you two might start fighting if you cross paths," Fusui explained.
The realization had just hit her. News of a terrifyingly strong intruder entering the village had undoubtedly already spread through their rapid intelligence network. Her battle-crazed brother was likely already hunting for him.
If Raian discovered that Lu Li had intimidated a Kure patrol squad on the streets, he would absolutely use it as an excuse to try and butcher Lu Li, claiming he was "defending the clan's honor." Fusui knew Lu Li was terrifyingly strong, but her brother was an absolute, unrestrained freak of nature. If they clashed, the collateral damage would be disastrous.
"Oh? That sounds incredibly interesting. I came here specifically to exchange pointers with your noble clan. If your brother is strong, a spar is exactly what I want," Lu Li grinned.
He knew perfectly well who her brother was. Raian Kure. The ultimate genius capable of an unprecedented 100% Removal rate. He was a violent, bloodthirsty battle maniac. Moral character aside, his raw combat strength definitively placed him in the absolute top tier of this world.
In the canon storyline, Raian fought the protagonist, Ohma Tokita, in the second round of the Kengan Annihilation Tournament and lost. But that didn't mean he was weaker. Raian was simply too arrogant; he had adamantly refused to use any actual Kure Clan martial arts techniques, relying purely on brute force to completely humiliate his opponent. Ohma, utilizing his own stat-boosting technique, the Advance, had managed to scrape out a technical victory.
In reality, Raian had completely thrown the match by playing with his food. Since the biological backlash of the Kure Removal was practically non-existent compared to the life-burning side effects of Ohma's Advance, a true, unrestrained deathmatch between the two would have been a massive toss-up.
"No... Mr. Lu, please, just follow me quickly. The clan compound is just up ahead," Fusui's face paled.
She genuinely did not want to see her brother fight Lu Li. Even though she fully agreed her brother was a complete bastard, her hyper-tuned assassin's intuition was screaming at her: If Raian fights this man, Raian will die!
Ignoring Lu Li's protests, Fusui grabbed his wrist and practically sprinted down the remaining streets until they reached the entrance of the Kure Clan compound.
Just as she was about to heave a sigh of relief—assuming the Patriarch would safely assign the calm and incredibly powerful Hollis Kure, the "Crying Demon," to test the guest—a voice violently shattered her hopes.
"Yo. You made me look everywhere for you."
The arrogant voice drifted down from the massive wooden Torii gate marking the entrance to the estate. Squatting perched atop the sacred gate, completely devoid of any reverence for the gods, was a young, heavily muscled man with short, light-blonde hair.
His pitch-black, white-pupiled eyes locked dead onto Lu Li. He looked exactly like a starving beast that had just spotted its next meal, radiating pure, unadulterated killing intent.
"Raian! We haven't even presented him to the Patriarch yet! Don't do anything stupid!" Fusui shouted, fine beads of sweat breaking out on her forehead.
Keeping his hands casually stuffed in his pockets, Raian Kure leaped down from the six-meter-high Torii gate, landing heavily right in front of Lu Li and Fusui.
His tight white tank top strained against his grotesque, bulging muscles, leaving absolutely no doubt about the catastrophic kinetic power housed within his frame. This was the Majin of the Kure Clan—a monster so unhinged that even his own family feared him.
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