Then, he reached to his side, and a Spiritual Longsword materialized in his hand.
A fierce battle erupted between the human and the Mutant Beast, both at the Peak of Tier Two.
"BOOM..."
"ROAR..."
The sounds of explosions and monstrous roars rang out one after another, weaving together as they echoed into the distance.
A few Mutant Beasts resting in the shade heard the commotion from afar and looked on with curiosity.
Although they were curious about who was fighting, they figured both sides must be incredibly strong to cause such a commotion. Rushing to the scene might get them caught in the crossfire, so all the Mutant Beasts that heard the fight decided to stay away.
...
「Spirit Realm, Dongwu City.」
Inside the Red Blood Gang’s meeting hall, Fang Jingtang had lost his usual composure. On any other day, he would remain unfazed by even the most major events, always devising a solution.
He hadn’t slept all night, and his face was etched with weariness. His brow was tightly furrowed in anxiety.
A Red Blood Gang sub-boss looked at Fang Jingtang in terror and asked.
"Mr. Fang, the Gang Leader has been assassinated. Those gangs that have always been against us are gearing up to make their move. What should we do now?"
The other sub-bosses in the meeting hall all turned to Fang Jingtang, hoping that he, as always, could devise a way out of their current predicament.
"I’ll tell you what we’re going to do after everyone is here," Fang Jingtang replied to the sub-boss who had asked the question.
He then glanced around the meeting hall and noticed that many seats were empty.
Such a disaster had befallen the Red Blood Gang, and Fang Jingtang had summoned everyone to discuss the gang’s future.
A long time had passed since he called the meeting, yet people were still missing. This displeased him, and he spoke with a grim expression.
"It’s been this long. Why aren’t Old Li, Old Chen, and Old Wang here yet?"
Fang Jingtang had named several influential sub-bosses in the Red Blood Gang. Hearing this, the others just exchanged glances, none of them knowing the answer.
Just as everyone in the meeting hall was waiting for the remaining sub-bosses to arrive, a subordinate burst in.
"This is bad..." The subordinate who rushed into the hall was frantic.
"What happened?" Before Fang Jingtang could ask, the other sub-bosses blurted out the question.
"The... the treasury! Something’s happened at the treasury." Those few panicked words from the subordinate made the color drain from every sub-boss’s face.
The treasury was where the Red Blood Gang kept its funds, making it arguably their most critical asset. After all, it held the wages for every gang member, as well as the pay for all the workers they hired at the docks.
If all that money was gone, they wouldn’t be able to pay the gang members or the dockworkers. The consequences would be enormous—a crisis on par with their Gang Leader’s assassination.
"What happened to the treasury?" Fang Jingtang shot up from his seat, pressing the panicked subordinate for an answer.
"It’s gone! It’s all gone! All the money in the treasury is gone!" the panicked subordinate cried, delivering the exact news no one in the hall wanted to hear.
"What the fuck did you just say?!!!" one of the hot-tempered sub-bosses roared, striding forward. He grabbed the subordinate by the collar and hoisted him into the air.
"It wasn’t me! I just went to the treasury to find my friend and ask him to get lunch. When I got there, I saw that all the guards had been killed.
The treasury doors were wide open, and all the money chests inside were gone!" The subordinate, dangling by his collar and terrified the enraged sub-boss would kill him with a single punch, hastily explained what he had seen.
THUD. After hearing the subordinate’s frantic account, the sub-boss released his grip, dropping the man to the floor. He then stormed out of the meeting hall.
The other sub-bosses in the hall knew exactly what he was doing. They shot up from their seats and streamed out of the hall, all rushing toward the treasury.
「A short while later.」
Inside the Red Blood Gang’s treasury, the space that should have been filled with chests of money was now completely bare. Not a single chest remained.
"..." The sub-bosses’ faces contorted as they stared at the empty treasury, their teeth clenched as rage surged within them.
"COUGH... COUGH... COUGH..." Just then, a faint coughing sound came from a corner, and all the sub-bosses turned to look.
Fang Jingtang led the way, rushing over to the faintly coughing figure.
The one coughing was a subordinate with a caved-in chest, blood spilling from the corners of his mouth. He’d been lucky; the attackers hadn’t killed him in one blow, and he had miraculously survived.
"Who attacked the treasury and stole the money? Tell us, now!"
The gravely injured guard spoke in a weak voice, "It was... Old Li, Old Chen, and Old Wang. The three of them brought men and did this."
"Impossible! How could Old Li, Old Chen, and Old Wang do something like this? It’s absolutely impossible." One sub-boss, a friend of the accused trio, shook his head in denial, refusing to accept what the guard said.
"It was them. At first, they weren’t going to attack us. They tried to persuade us to join them.
They said that with the Gang Leader assassinated, the Red Blood Gang was finished. They said we needed to flee Dongwu City as soon as possible and start over somewhere else.
When a few of us refused to go along, they... they struck us down..." The gravely injured man recounted the events.
"..." The Red Blood Gang sub-bosses fell silent. They hadn’t wanted to believe it either, but after hearing the dying man’s story, it all sounded horribly plausible.
In an instant, the sub-bosses’ faces twisted in fury. A torrent of curses erupted from their mouths as they damned the three traitors and their entire families to hell.
Some genuinely hated the three for betraying the Red Blood Gang and stealing its money. Others, however, were secretly filled with regret. ’Why was I so stupid?’ they thought. ’Why didn’t I think of pulling a job like that first?’
The Gang Leader’s assassination had already pushed the gang to the brink of collapse.
Now that traitors had completely cleaned out their treasury, no one had the slightest inclination to think about the Red Blood Gang’s future.
As the sharpest mind in the Red Blood Gang, Fang Jingtang watched the sub-bosses, each lost in their own schemes. He sighed to himself. ’Morale has collapsed. It’ll be impossible to lead them now.’
But even though morale had collapsed, Fang Jingtang wasn’t ready to give up.
"Everyone, split up and chase those three traitors! They’re carrying a fortune; they can’t have left Dongwu City yet.
As long as we get that money back, the Red Blood Gang can still overcome this crisis! We won’t be swallowed up by other gangs. In fact, we’ll grow even stronger and make more money than ever before!"
Hearing Fang Jingtang’s speech, the scheming sub-bosses paused. Their previous thoughts of packing their bags and scattering to the winds began to fade.
If the Red Blood Gang could actually survive this, the sub-bosses were, in fact, quite willing to stick around.
After all, while other gangs might take them in, they would never have the same status they enjoyed in the Red Blood Gang.
"Don’t just stand there! Go after those three traitors!" Fang Jingtang urged when he saw the sub-bosses staring at him motionlessly.
"Mr. Fang," a sub-boss asked doubtfully, voicing the question on everyone’s mind, "if we get the money back, do you really have a plan to get us through this? And to make us even more successful afterward?"
"Have I ever made an empty promise since joining the Red Blood Gang?" Fang Jingtang shot back, his face a mask of confidence.
Having received their answer, the sub-bosses nodded. Then, as if shot full of adrenaline, they rushed out of the treasury, gathered their subordinates, and set off in pursuit of the three traitors.
...