The acid rain in Sector 9 didn't just dampen the skin; it eroded hope. It smelled of sulfur and burning metal—the signature scent of a civilization rotting beneath the glitz of neon. Kenzo moved like a ghost, his shadow stretching long against alley walls covered in digital graffiti. On his back, Meixing remained asleep, her breathing slightly heavier as the air became contaminated by sewage fumes.
"We're almost at the waste disposal gate," Ling Er whispered, checking her Black-Market Deck. The blue light from the small holographic screen reflected off her anxious face. "But there's a problem. The radar signal ahead is suddenly dense. It's not Sentinels—it's rogue frequencies."
Kenzo stopped behind a stack of rusted, giant pipes. He closed his eyes, letting his instincts crawl outward. Without a Heart Chip, he couldn't detect radio signals, but through the Unshackling Realm, he could feel the vibrations in the air—irregular footsteps, suppressed raspy laughter, and the clatter of metal on metal.
"The Vultures," Kenzo muttered.
The Vultures were a bottom-tier mercenary group that lived off the scraps of corporate skirmishes. They were a collection of thugs who over-modified their bodies with cheap components, making them look more like monsters than humans. To them, nothing was more valuable than the "bounty" Neo-Heaven promised for the head of a fugitive.
"Come out, boy! We know you're there!" a hoarse voice shouted, followed by the clacking of plasma weapons being armed.
Kenzo slowly stepped out from the darkness. He set Meixing down carefully in a sheltered corner, signaling Ling Er to stay quiet. Before him stood seven men with various cybernetic modifications. Their leader was a massive man with hydraulic arms that hissed steam, his face half-covered by a rusted iron plate.
"Look at this," the big man laughed, showing teeth replaced with chrome fangs. "The legendary heir of the Lin Clan turns out to be nothing but a slum scavenger carrying a sick brat. A true insult to your ancestors."
Another Vulture, a woman with bulging cyber-eyes, spat toward Kenzo. "I heard you crushed the Steel Axe Gang? Maybe they just drank too much cheap Liquid Qi. In front of us, you're just chipless trash waiting to be stepped on."
Kenzo remained silent. His pitch-black eyes stared coldly at them, one by one. Inside his chest, Long Wei began a low growl—an ancient vibration demanding release.
"Boy, will you let these rusted rats insult your blood?" Long Wei's voice echoed with a cynical edge. "Use the Void technique. Let them know that steel means nothing in the face of a dragon's will."
"Give us the brat and the map you stole from Lao Ban," the leader stepped forward, his hydraulic arms creaking loudly. "Maybe I'll let you die quickly. If not, I'll hand your sister over to the Alchemist Union labs to be used as Qi-filter test subjects."
At those words, the air around Kenzo suddenly chilled. An invisible Qi pressure radiated from his body, causing the puddles of rainwater at his feet to ripple outward.
"You just made the biggest mistake of your miserable life," Kenzo's voice was flat, yet laced with lethal intent.
"Attack!" the leader roared.
Two Vultures lunged forward. One swung a vibrating blade while the other activated Tier 2 electric gauntlets. To the eyes of an ordinary human, their movements were lightning-fast, driven by chip-acceleration. But to Kenzo, who had opened his Lower Dantian, the movements were sluggish and full of openings.
Kenzo didn't dodge. As the vibrating blade neared his neck, he caught the edge with his bare hand.
Cring!
The sound of shattering metal echoed. The carbon steel blade disintegrated under the pressure of Kenzo's fingers. Before the attacker could scream, Kenzo launched a single punch into the man's chest. Using no digital energy—only pure muscle reinforced by the Unshackling Realm—he sent the man flying ten meters, smashing through a concrete wall.
"What?!" the woman with cyber-eyes gasped. She immediately unleashed a barrage of plasma bolts from her submachine gun.
Kenzo moved. He didn't run; he danced between the trajectories of the blue light projectiles. Every step seemed predicted by nature itself. He appeared in front of her in an instant, his palm landing on her cybernetic face.
Zzzt!
He didn't crush her face; instead, he sent a sharp pulse of Qi into her cyber-eye sensors. Instantly, her neural system suffered a short-circuit feedback, knocking her unconscious as smoke drifted from her eyes.
"Damn you, brat! What kind of sorcery are you using?!" the Vulture leader bellowed. He activated the overload module on his hydraulic arms. The pistons worked at maximum capacity, emitting ear-splitting thumps.
He swung a colossal punch at Kenzo, a blow carrying thousands of kilograms of hydraulic pressure.
Kenzo raised his left hand, catching the punch with an open palm.
BOOM!
The floor beneath Kenzo's feet cracked violently, yet his body didn't budge a single millimeter. The mechanical pressure was entirely absorbed by Kenzo's meridians and funneled into the ground through an ancient breathing technique.
"Your technology is a shackle," Kenzo looked the Vulture leader in the eye from just inches away. "You rely on machines because your souls are too weak to hold true power."
Kenzo gripped the mechanical arm. With a single wrenching motion, he twisted the thick steel as if it were a sheet of paper. The sound of metal screaming merged with the man's shriek as the hydraulic arm was forcibly torn from his shoulder.
"Aaaarrghhh! My arm! My chip!"
The remaining Vultures trembled in terror. They saw their leader—usually invincible in the slums—crawling in the mud with limp cybernetic cables dangling from his socket.
"Leave," Kenzo said shortly. "Or I will make your heart chips explode from the inside."
Without needing to be told twice, those who could still run dragged their unconscious comrades and vanished into the dark alleys. They were no longer thinking about the Neo-Heaven bounty; they only wanted to get away from the chipless "demon."
Ling Er emerged from hiding, her eyes wide with shock. "Kenzo... you... you destroyed an industrial-grade hydraulic arm with your bare hands? That's impossible even for a Tier 4 user!"
"It's not magic, Ling Er," Kenzo returned to Meixing's side and lifted her back onto his shoulders. His aura returned to a calm state, as if the battle had been a mere distraction. "It's balance. Machines need fuel; nature only needs breath."
"But you've attracted massive attention," Ling Er followed him with quick steps. "The Vultures will report this. We have to breach the waste gate before the Sentinels lock down the entire underground access."
They arrived at a colossal iron door covered in moss and rust. This was one of the few blind spots in the Iron City's walls, where chemical waste flowed directly out of the city. The stench was overwhelming, but it was the only way out.
"This gate lock uses Sentinel biometric encryption," Ling Er began connecting cables from her deck to the door's control panel. "I need two minutes to trick the system. Cover me, Kenzo."
Kenzo stood with his back to the door, staring toward the receding city lights. Xiao Hei slithered down from his neck, transforming into a two-meter-long black serpent. Its forked tongue flicked, tasting the tightening night air.
"Something is coming," Long Wei whispered. "Something stronger than those rats. A machine with an imprisoned soul."
Sure enough, from the end of the corridor, a giant eye-shaped surveillance drone hovered slowly, casting a red beam that swept the area. Behind it came the sound of heavy, rhythmic metallic footsteps.
A figure emerged from the fog. He wore pristine white armor with the Sentinel Order emblem on his chest. But most striking was the long sword at his waist, which emitted a stable blue electrical aura.
"Officer Li," Kenzo muttered, recognizing one of the corrupt law enforcers who frequently extorted slum dwellers.
"Lin Kenzo," Officer Li's voice sounded cold through his helmet modulator. "I didn't expect you to try and escape through this trash hole. Quite fitting for your 'Zero' status."
Officer Li drew his sword. The blade vibrated at a high frequency, slicing through the raindrops that touched it. "I won't take you alive. Your head alone is enough to get me promoted to Sector 1."
"How many people did you kill for that promotion, Li?" Kenzo asked, tightening his grip on Meixing's carrier.
"Many," Li answered as he lunged.
Li's speed was at the peak of Tier 3. His electric sword aimed straight for Kenzo's heart. Kenzo was forced back, dodging a slash capable of cleaving steel. However, the narrow corridor restricted his movement, and he had to ensure Meixing wasn't hit by the electrical sparks.
"Boy, let your little snake handle it!" Long Wei commanded.
Kenzo gave a soft whistle. Xiao Hei, who had been still, suddenly leapt at Officer Li's sword. Instead of being cut, Xiao Hei's slick body coiled around the blade.
Cisssss!
Steam rose as Xiao Hei's black scales met the high-voltage current. But Xiao Hei felt no pain; instead, it began to drain the electrical energy from the sword.
"What?! What is this creature?!" Officer Li tried to shake his sword, but Xiao Hei clung like glue.
Seeing the opening, Kenzo launched a counter-attack. He used the Heavy Palm technique. His palm slammed into Li's chest plate.
THUD!
The famously strong Sentinel armor buckled inward. Officer Li was thrown back, but the stabilizers in his boots kept him from falling.
"How dare you..." Li panted, his breathing heavy behind his helmet. He pressed a button on his wrist. "Activating High-Output mode! Core-Link 120%!"
Li's body began to emit a brilliant blue light. His Heart Chip beat so hard it sounded like a diesel engine. This was a desperate move; exceeding the chip's bandwidth could cause a Core-Burst.
"Kenzo, the door's open! Move!" Ling Er shouted from the gate.
Kenzo looked at Li, who was gathering massive energy for a final strike, then at the slowly opening gate, revealing the dark desert beyond.
"Next time, Li," Kenzo said.
He delivered a kick to a steam pipe above Li's head. The pipe burst, spraying scalding steam at hundreds of degrees, obscuring the view. In the chaos, Kenzo and Ling Er leaped through the iron gate.
Once outside, Ling Er immediately shut the gate and fried the control panel from the exterior.
BOOM!
An explosion sounded from inside the corridor, suggesting Officer Li might have just suffered a system failure due to the overload.
Kenzo took a deep breath. For the first time in his life, he inhaled air that hadn't been filtered by a corporate system. The air outside the wall was harsh, dry, and filled with wild Qi particles that felt sharp in his lungs.
Before them lay the vast Silicon Desert, a graveyard for the technology of the past and home to mutated monsters.
"We made it out," Ling Er collapsed onto the cold sand. "But now, we truly have no way home."
Kenzo looked at the sky. There were no holographic advertisements here. Only thousands of stars that had been hidden by the city's light pollution for so long. He felt Long Wei vibrating with excitement within him.
"We aren't going home, Ling Er." Kenzo stared toward the east, where black mountains loomed in the distance. "We are going to rebuild what they stole."
Meixing stirred slightly in his arms, opening her weary eyes. She stared at the stars in awe. "Brother... there are so many lights..."
Kenzo gave a small smile—a rare sight for the "Zero." "That is your future, Meixing."