On the other side of town.
Viggo Tarasov was racing toward the airfield when his phone suddenly blared. Seeing the caller ID, he realized it was someone from his primary gang headquarters. He mashed the answer button immediately.
"Viggo! Someone is tearing through the base! Aside from Tana and five of us holding the basement, everyone in the factory is dead! We need backup—now!"
Viggo's face froze, his teeth grinding together. "That damn Boogeyman!"
"Hold your ground," Viggo barked into the phone. "I'm sending men to you immediately. John shouldn't have the heavy weaponry needed to breach that security door. Just stay inside!"
Outside, lightning streaked across the sky followed by a low rumble of thunder—a storm was brewing.
Viggo had no idea who was truly responsible for the assault on his base. However, thinking back to the provocative phone call he'd made to John Wick earlier—a call intended to vent his rage—he assumed the Boogeyman had simply retaliated with extreme prejudice.
His convoy took a sharp turn, the airfield now in sight. Viggo gripped his phone, about to call for reinforcements, when he glanced in the rearview mirror.
A shadow had appeared behind them.
It was the black Dodge, driven by John Wick, closing the gap with terrifying speed.
Viggo's expression soured further. "Bastard!"
John Wick was driving the Dodge gifted by the Continental management as if he intended to push the pistons through the engine block. He had finally caught up just as Viggo's team reached the helipad.
With a masterful drift that sent a plume of gravel into the air, John floored the accelerator, keeping Viggo's tail lights locked in his sights. He exhaled a long, heavy breath. He had made it.
Inside the lead car, Viggo scrambled to dial Abram Tarasov. Avi, the gang's counselor sitting in the passenger seat, glanced back at the pursuing car and shouted to the driver:
"Dammit, floor it!"
"The chopper is right there! Move!"
Abram picked up the phone, and Viggo barked, "Abram! Take every man you have to the Brooklyn warehouse. It's under attack. Go now and back them up!"
"Brother, is it the Boogeyman?"
Abram was well aware that his brother had gone to war with John Wick over his nephew's stupidity.
Viggo looked back at the man behind the wheel of the Dodge. "No, the Boogeyman is right here with me."
Hearing this, Abram felt a surge of relief. "Don't worry. Whoever is looking for trouble at our home, I'll make sure they're ground into dust."
Task assigned, Viggo lowered the phone and took one last look at the pursuing John Wick. He closed his eyes and let out a deep, shuddering breath.
Meanwhile.
Inside the suburban Brooklyn factory.
Shiranui Hayate stood before the reinforced steel door, rapping his knuckles against the surface. It was a solid ten centimeters thick. He reached into his system storage and pulled out a stack of Explosive Tags. Worried that a single one might not be enough, he pulled out ten.
It wasn't that he was being stingy; he was simply calculating the structural integrity of the old factory. He wanted to blow the door, not bring the entire building down on his head.
He couldn't help but wish he had recruited Uzumaki Naruto already. A single Rasengan would have made short work of this "bank-spec" door without all the setup.
As for his own Chidori, he looked at the thick steel plate and decided against it. He had no desire to pull a "Sasuke"—getting his hand stuck inside the metal while being sprayed with bullets by the guards on the other side.
Setting aside those thoughts, Hayate began to apply the tags to specific points on the door, following the sequence of the Barrier Array skill.
Inside the basement, the guards heard the silence and began to whisper, wondering if the intruder had given up and left after being unable to breach the steel.
The Barrier Array was a skill Hayate had acquired through Umino Iruka. It allowed a ninja to link multiple explosive tags into a synchronized chain. It could be set as an automatic trap or detonated manually, with its power scaling based on the number of tags used.
Once the array was set, Hayate retreated from the stairwell and pressed his back against a solid wall to shield himself from the coming blast and flying debris.
He formed the Tiger hand seal.
"Burst!"
The array activated. The ten explosive tags ignited in perfect unison.
BOOM!
The force of ten synchronized tags was immense. The entire factory shuddered violently, and dust cascaded from the ceiling. Had the building not been sturdily constructed or had the blast hit a load-bearing wall, the structure might have collapsed.
Inside the basement, the air was filled with screams. The blast had blown the heavy steel door inward like a projectile. Three of the six guards, who had been standing directly behind the door, were crushed instantly by the impact. The others were badly battered by flying concrete and shrapnel.
Hayate didn't wait. He charged through the smoke, kunai in hand. Tana, though injured, tried to raise his rifle, but before he could squeeze the trigger, Hayate was beside him. A reverse-grip thrust drove the kunai through Tana's throat.
Hayate blurred again, appearing before a guard pinned by rubble. He drove the blade into the man's heart.
Squish.
The sound of cold steel meeting flesh. Hayate withdrew the blade and pivoted toward the next target.
Only two seconds had passed since the explosion. Of the original six, only Mord remained standing. Having been away from the door making the phone call, he had escaped both the door's impact and the flying debris.
But the sight before him shattered his mind.
"Demon!"
Mord screamed, holding down the trigger of his assault rifle. Bullets sprayed wildly toward Hayate.
Hayate's arm became a blur of motion as he swung his kunai. A series of metallic pings echoed through the room as every single bullet was deflected.
Mord's magazine ran dry, the rifle clicking empty. As he reached for the pistol at his hip, a kunai whistled through the air.
Swoosh!
The blade transfixed Mord's throat. He stiffened, gurgled once, and collapsed backward.
With that, every member of the Russian Mob inside the factory had been eliminated by Shiranui Hayate.