Chapter 235: One-on-One-on-One
"I'm telling you, it's real!"
Oliva waved a finger, emphasizing his point with an exaggerated pout. "I was in
such a hurry to get here that I didn't even have time for my morning grooming.
That's why my hair looks a bit flat."
He pulled out his phone, swiped through his gallery, and thrust a photo toward
Ren Shiroki and Fusui Kure.
The photo showed a massive concrete wall, dozens of meters high and spanning a
hundred meters in length. On it was a giant mural of Oliva himself, wearing a
serene, heroic smile and pointing toward the horizon. Behind him, a crowd of
prison guards and inmates were depicted weeping openly, as if moved to tears by
his sheer magnificence.
"I forced the inmates to paint this," Oliva explained proudly. "This is my true
daily image. Not bad, right?"
Ren and Fusui leaned in, studying the digital image with clinical intensity.
"The hair looks like they added a bit too much volume," Ren noted.
"Mm. And they definitely moved the hairline forward a few centimeters," Fusui
added.
Their critiques made Oliva's head throb. He sighed, retracted the phone, and
decided to change the subject.
"Anyway, let's focus on getting the hostages to the ground floor. Official
Sonoda is waiting, and he is a very serious, very punctual man."
Oliva gestured for the group to follow him.
The group began their descent. Ren scanned the hallways as they moved. "Where's
Sikorsky?"
Arisa shrugged. "No idea. He looked really, really mad, screamed 'URAAA!' at the
top of his lungs, and just bolted out of the room."
"He's still in the building," Oliva assured them with a wink. "When I arrived,
the MPD had already cordoned off the perimeter. The sewers and maintenance
tunnels are locked down. There is no escape."
"Nice. That's perfect!"
Ren finally felt at ease. He continued escorting his sister and the others down,
keeping a predatory eye out for the Russian convict. He didn't want Oliva to
steal the kill before he got a crack at him.
Due to the police perimeter and the sudden intrusion of multiple high-level
combatants, the units from IDEAL and The Worm had been unable to evacuate. They
were trapped inside the skyscraper.
They were scattered across different floors, using their numbers to hold
defensive positions and maintain comms, hoping to negotiate their way out with
the authorities. But every few minutes, another squad went silent,
systematically neutralized by the monsters roaming the halls.
Oliva led the way, with Ren and Fusui acting as the rearguard. The five hostages
were sandwiched safely in the middle as they navigated the emergency stairwell.
As they reached the eleventh floor, the sound of a struggle echoed from around
the corner.
BOOM!
A mercenary was launched through a set of double doors, slamming into the
opposite wall with enough force to crack the masonry. He hit the floor
twitching, too broken to even let out a moan of pain.
A second squad of hitmen rushed the corner, only to be forced back by a series
of rapid-fire strikes. They couldn't even gain a foothold.
"You lot want to go too?"
Ohma Tokita stepped out from the shadows of the hallway, facing the hostiles. He
hadn't bothered searching for hostages; his only focus was dismantling the
threat.
Unlike most professional martial artists, Ohma had been raised in the lawless
district of The Inside. He was a master of asymmetrical warfare and was
perfectly at home in a bloody hallway brawl.
The hitmen fell one after another under his relentless assault. The final
survivor, cornered and desperate, lunged with a combat knife.
Zip!
Ohma sidestepped the thrust, his left hand seizing the man's wrist. With a fluid
twist of his hips, he misaligned the man's force, shattering his balance.
[NIKO STYLE: REDIRECTION KATA - WILLOW]!
THUD!
Ohma followed up with a clinical body blow to the liver. The hitman vomited
blood and collapsed in a heap.
It was only then that Kazuo Yamashita poked his head out from behind a vending
machine. He had been hiding there the whole time, clinging to his courage by the
skin of his teeth.
Ohma shook the blood from his hand and looked at the group by the stairs. He
gave a sharp nod. "Path is clear. Go."
Ren raised a hand in thanks, but before he could speak, a blur of motion
streaked past him.
Whoosh!
A petite silhouette lunged at Ohma with terrifying speed. She targeted his head
with a high-roundhouse kick.
POW!
Ohma raised his forearm to block the impact. He immediately dropped into a
crouch, evading a follow-up heel-sweep. The attacker didn't stop, snapping her
right leg upward in a vertical drop-kick. Ohma caught her ankle with his wrist
and shoved her back.
"Hah!"
The attacker performed a backward flip, using the hallway wall as a springboard
to launch herself forward again. She closed the gap in a heartbeat, seizing Ohma
by his collar and hooking her leg behind his knee, attempting a high-speed
takedown.
The execution was flawless, but it hit a wall. No matter how much leverage she
applied, Ohma remained rooted in a rock-solid horse stance. He was immovable.
"You're a hell of a lot tougher than those terrorists... but you're way too
light," Ohma noted.
He cocked a fist as if to strike but stopped it inches from her face. He
couldn't actually hit her—she was one of the "hostages," and clearly just a kid.
It was Karura Kure.
The Kure princess made no effort to hide her objective. She clung to Ohma's
collar, her legs wrapped around his waist.
"Fusui-nee! Look! I found him!"
Karura was beaming with delight as she introduced Ohma to her cousin. "I saw him
at the Kengan matches the other day. I've already picked him out! He's the one!"
Fusui grinned, offering a thumbs-up. "Destiny, huh? Congrats, Karu-chan!"
The exchange left the civilians bewildered, but Ren's mind flashed back to his
knowledge of the Kure Clan. For over a thousand years, the Clan had sought out
"Elite Seeds"—top-tier martial artists from the outside world—to improve their
bloodline through selective breeding.
In the modern era, they didn't rely on kidnapping or force. But if the target
happened to be a legendary fighter, then it was a match made in heaven.
Karura tightened her grip, leaning her face close to Ohma's. The young Ashura
stared at her special, black-sclera eyes.
"What do you think you're doing?" Ohma asked, his voice calm but confused.
Karura didn't hesitate. "I want to have your babies."
Ohma: "..." Ohma: "..." Ohma: "...Eh?"
The sheer bluntness of the statement caused Ohma's brain to short-circuit. The
man who feared no army was left paralyzed by a teenage girl.
Fusui roared with laughter. "Damn, Karu-chan! Straight to the point!"
Ren looked at Fusui. "You aren't exactly the queen of subtlety yourself..."
Fusui ignored him.
Ohma's eyes bulged as he processed the words "Babies," "Me," and "Have." The
concepts circled his head like a whirlpool before his mind went completely
blank. He reached up, grabbed Karura by the armpits, and manually "peeled" her
off his body, setting her gently on the floor.
Then—ZIP!!
He turned and bolted down the hallway, disappearing around the corner in a cloud
of dust.
"Whoa... Ohma-san's brain overloaded. He's actually running away!" Kazuo
Yamashita shouted, sweating buckets. He looked at the group, then at the empty
hallway. "Wait! Ohma-san! Don't leave me here!!"
The manager scrambled after his fighter.
Karura prepared to give chase, but she was suddenly hoisted into the air by her
collar. Oliva had "plucked" her off the ground like a kitten.
"This is a warzone, not a dating app, little lady," Oliva said with a
comforting, booming laugh. "You'll have plenty of time for romance later. For
now, let me finish my mission and get you out of here."
Karura pouted but stopped struggling.
The group continued their descent, passing more neutralized hitmen. As they
reached the seventh floor, the sound of steady, disciplined footsteps echoed up
the stairwell.
Unlike Ohma's frantic brawl, these steps carried a heavy, overwhelming battle
aura.
The newcomer rounded the landing. It was the Underground Arena Champion, Baki
Hanma, searching for his girlfriend.
Baki's eyes swept the group, confirming Kozue was safe. He let out a visible
sigh of relief, his shoulders finally dropping an inch. He stepped forward to
take Kozue's hand, intending to lead her out.
But Oliva stepped into his path.
"Hold on, kid. Leave it to me." Oliva was enjoying himself now. He offered a
provocative smile. "My official contract is to neutralize the mastermind and
rescue all the hostages. You should just go home and wait."
"Contract?" Baki looked up at the giant, his suppressed frustration finally
finding a target. "Who the hell cares about your contract?!"
ZIP!
Baki unleashed a high-torque heavy punch. It slammed directly into Oliva's face,
actually drawing a few drops of blood from the giant's nose—the first damage he
had taken all night.
Baki drove forward, launching a vertical uppercut aimed at Oliva's jaw.
BANG—!
The strike was powerful enough to KO a heavyweight boxing champion, yet the
moment it connected, it stopped dead. Oliva had tensed his massive trapezoids
and neck muscles, absorbing the entire impact through his spine.
Baki retreated two steps, his eyes widening as he took in the sheer mass of the
man.
"Mm..." Oliva savored the sting of the punch, looking slightly disappointed. "I
expected more from the son of the Ogre..."
Baki ground his teeth. "You're strong... but your defense doesn't look like any
martial art I know." The Champion's curiosity flickered. "What the hell do you
have to eat to grow muscles like that?"
Oliva's expression shifted into a brilliant, warm smile. "An easy question..."
He reached out, taking Kozue's hand and gently placing it back into Baki's. He
gave both of them a friendly pat on the shoulder.
"Besides 'Love'... is there anything else in this world that can truly make a
man strong?"
Oliva offered a gentlemanly nod, inviting them to proceed as they wished. Baki
stood in a daze for a moment before leading Kozue up the stairs. No one asked
what he was planning to do. He was Baki Hanma; he didn't make empty threats.
Oliva, Ren, Fusui, Arisa, Karura, Marco, and Hina Hongo—the group of seven
finally reached the first-floor lobby.
The grand hall was silent now, but the scene was a slaughterhouse. Massive
structural damage was visible everywhere. The marble floor was littered with the
remains of IDEAL and Worm units. The bodies had been dismantled with savage,
primal efficiency—some had literally been ripped apart.
"That looks like my big brother's work," Fusui noted, looking at a particularly
messy corner. She scanned the room, but Raian was gone. "He's still hunting. He
didn't follow us down."
Ren looked toward the hotel's grand entrance. Outside, dozens of patrol cars
were parked, their lights bathing the street in strobing blue and red. Hundreds
of armed officers had the building surrounded.
But what caught Ren's eye was a single, jagged "Trench" cut into the pavement at
the threshold of the doors. It spanned the entire width of the entrance, as if a
god had drawn a line in the earth to separate the building from the rest of the
world.
Compared to the loud, messy destruction of the lobby, this singular cut radiated
a sense of focused, terrifying violence that was impossible to ignore.
Oliva rubbed his chin, studying the mark. "Mm... this looks like the Ogre's
signature, doesn't it?"
Oliva gave a playful chuckle. "To him, a line like this is probably just a 'No
Entry' sign for the weak."
He gestured for the group to cross the threshold.
But as they approached the "Line," Ren Shiroki suddenly pulled back his foot. He
stopped right at the edge of the trench.
Oliva smirked. "As I thought?"
"Nice. That's perfect!"
Ren turned back toward the dark interior of the hotel, a predatory grin on his
face. "I think... I want to play in this building a little while longer."
(End of Chapter)
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