Breaking Bad

“Xiao Liu...” Xu Xiaoyou muttered the name, striking a thoughtful pose.

Xiao Liu had felt something was off about this blonde girl from the start; he didn't recall seeing her in the steel plant. The previous events had pushed these doubts to the back of his mind, but now that he was idle, he quietly observed Xu Xiaoyou. The more he looked, the more unfamiliar she seemed.

“I’ll keep an eye on things here. No one is watching over there, go stand guard at that post,” Xu Xiaoyou naturally commanded Xiao Liu.

Xiao Liu gave an “oh” and shook his head, letting go of his cluttered thoughts. He adjusted the strap of his gun and walked in the direction Xu Xiaoyou pointed.

After sending Xiao Liu away, Xu Xiaoyou turned her attention to the door. As a card of hyper-perception dissolved into points of light, her eyes glowed. The heavy iron door became transparent, allowing her to see the scene inside the room. Faint sounds also reached her ears clearly.

A bucket of cold water was splashed onto the face of the unconscious Heisenberg. He woke up, scanning his surroundings with lingering fear until his gaze landed on Scarface, whose face was half-hidden in darkness. Just as Heisenberg was about to flare up, Scarface let out a scoff, pressing the muzzle of a gun against his forehead, forcing back whatever words he intended to say.

Pale light filtered down from the dark-blue ceiling. Heisenberg realized there was another figure in the darkness—broad-shouldered, narrow-waisted, with legs like a mantis. Standing nearly three meters tall, the upper half of this figure's body was also shrouded in shadow, radiating a heavy, intimidating pressure.

“Are you... Roman?”

Heisenberg suppressed his internal rage and fear, trying to make his voice sound calm.

Scarface chuckled, leaning down and tapping the black muzzle of his gun against Heisenberg's face. “What kind of trash are you to think you can meet our boss?”

Realizing the figure in the shadows was not the mastermind of Eight-Spider, Roman, Heisenberg chose silence. He lifted his head with a look of defiance, as if ready for whatever they might do.

Meanwhile, in the ventilation duct above the room, the members of the Night Walkers team were squeezed into the pipe that could only fit one person at a time. Through the gaps in the louvered vent, they peeked at the scene below. Vertical bars of light formed patterns on Mori no Natsu Kuri's face. Sparrow, pinned beneath her, couldn't help but complain, “Hey, Meijiu, you're crushing me.”

“I know, I know. Can't you move over a little yourself?” Mori no Natsu Kuri whispered. Her tall frame, nearly 1.7 meters, was restricted in the narrow duct. She had to crawl to support her body, her long legs having nowhere to rest. Bending them slightly brought them close to Sparrow's abdomen, so she had to wedge her knees into the gap between Sparrow's legs to avoid collapsing onto the girl entirely.

Sparrow was helpless. Fortunately, Mori no Natsu Kuri was lean enough that she could squeeze out a bit of space to shift. The friction of her body against the duct made a faint sound. Overextending her effort, her right palm suddenly lost its support and fell heavily downward.

A dull thud echoed from the ventilation duct throughout the room. Confusion flashed across Scarface's face as he quickly aimed his gun upward. “Someone's hiding up there!?”

Inside the duct, everyone turned pleading looks toward Night Owl, who had just crawled around the corner of the front pipe. He sighed, took off his mask, put a finger to his lips, and made “squeak-squeak” noises while mimicking the sound of four paws scurrying in the duct.

“Is it a rat...?”

Scarface lowered his guard and shook his head. Seeing Heisenberg still refusing to yield, he gave a cruel smile and cracked his knuckles with a series of pops. As he walked toward Heisenberg with ill intent, the tall figure in the shadows let out a heavy snort.

“Brother Long.” Scarface's expression changed.

“Leave him to me.”

The tall figure known as Brother Long stepped forward. As soon as he sat in front of Heisenberg, a powerful aura pressed down on the man, making it hard for him to breathe.

It was as if he wasn't sitting in front of a human, but a prehistoric beast.

The guest chair was crushed and deformed under the man's massive frame, turning into a tiny stool. A one-liter bottle of mineral water looked like a child's oral medicine bottle in his hand. His explosive muscles were like volcanoes ready to erupt at any moment, and his thick black eyebrows were twisted like steel cables, commanding respect without needing to speak.

“Selling this new type of moon sugar on our turf—are you tired of living?”

“Or are you just some fool who doesn't know the rules of the streets and blindly plunged into this swamp?”

Brother Long pointed at Heisenberg as if he had a thousand-man army behind him aimed at the man.

Heisenberg's spine was nearly crushed by the man's pressure. He gritted his teeth and forced himself to speak. “I want to see Roman!”

It was the same demand as before.

“You killed my student. This isn't going to end easily! I won't let you off...” Heisenberg's gums were almost bleeding. “Only Roman is worthy of sitting at the same table as me. I want him to apologize to me personally!”

“Can't you fucking understand human speech?” Scarface couldn't take it anymore. He stepped forward to teach Heisenberg a lesson, but Brother Long punched him into the wall.

Heisenberg was shocked. He didn't even see how the man moved. By the time he realized it, Scarface had been blasted into the wall like a cannonball. An indescribable panic surged in his heart, and his expression began to waver.

Brother Long sat before Heisenberg and gave a light flick. All the bones in Heisenberg's index finger were shattered, hanging limply to the side.

“You only have three chances to answer. Think carefully,” Brother Long said coldly. “Why sell moon sugar on our turf?”

“You bastards... Aghhh!” Three more of Heisenberg's fingers were twisted and broken. “You didn't keep your word! You were the ones who came to me for a partnership. You lied to me!”

“And why would bastards like you, who commit every crime imaginable—human trafficking, robbery, murder, arms smuggling—care about moon sugar? Your infamy is known throughout the entire Dragonfly Town!!” Heisenberg roared.

“It was your stubbornness that killed your student. Now your stubbornness and ignorance are going to kill you,” Brother Long said calmly.

He grabbed the man's wrist and gave it a gentle twist. Heisenberg's entire arm was dislocated, severely out of place. He convulsed in intense pain, his expression under the mask venomous and distorted.

“It was you bastards who killed my daughter! I'm going to kill you all to avenge her! I'm going to kill every last one of you!”

“I said, you only have three chances to answer.” Just as Brother Long was about to make his next move, the curtain by his ear lit up with irregular red light. He nodded thoughtfully and let go of the struggling Heisenberg.

“Our boss said that if you're willing to hand over the formula for the new moon sugar, you can leave here today. As for your daughter, we'll find a way to deal with it for you.”

Heisenberg sounded like he had heard the funniest thing in the world, his expression under the mask manic. “Deal with it? Are you joking? Hahaha...”

“Haruna she's dead, she's dead...”

...................

“No matter how you deal with it, what does it matter? Can the dead come back to life? Can she still call me 'Father'? Can she still happily run around me like she used to?”

“I don't want you to 'deal with it'...”

Heisenberg seemed to have lost all hope. Under the mask, he was already covered in tears. He lowered his head heavily, muttering something under his breath.

Brother Long frowned and leaned his head closer, wanting to hear what he was saying. Suddenly, the man looked up, a demonic roar exploding in his ears.

“I only want all of you to pay with your lives! You bastards must all atone for her!”

Under Brother Long's startled gaze, the man broke free from his restraints. He pulled a small bag of pure white powder from his clothes and slammed it onto the ground. That wasn't ground-up moon sugar; it was a bag of carefully formulated fulminated mercury, with a detonation velocity of up to 5,400 m/s.

“I'm here to send you to meet God, you devils!”

The man roared amidst the blinding white light and the hell of fire.