Nightmare’s Call

For Lin Sheng, getting cash was easy, especially after he found out the identity of the perpetrator who was aiming for his dad.

Carrying Larsthu’s leather trunk full of cash and ignoring the unconscious man and woman on the ground, he snapped his fingers. A crow flew by, circling in the air overhead. With the cash in hand, Lin sheng quickly left the scene.

Larsthu was one of the targets that he chose randomly. There had been three targets before this. And all of them were patrons who had won a fortune from Golden Grand Casino.

He tucked away all the money that he had gotten by burying them in the ground in the suburbs. He did not come purely for money. Chen Tan in Golden Grand Casino was his real target, while the robbery was only a smokescreen to hitting the business of the casino.

Besides, in the memories that he had acquired through killing his targets, he had found covert skills. In particular, Annie, the target that he had killed in the residence of Sir Kaarman, possessed pretty badass covert skills. He had learned how it worked though he did not inherit too much of it.

After robbing three persons in succession and hiding away the money, Lin Sheng took off his mask and returned to the scene where Larsthu was lying.

By now, the police had arrived at the scene with red throb lights of the police patrol vehicle flashing by the side of the road while police officers took statements from the two victims.

Disregarding the two victims, Lin Sheng laid his eyes on the tall and burly casino security personnel who were escorting a man. Wearing a black suit with a beard on his face, the man seemed to be the top manager of the casino. His face looked solemn as he spoke softly on the phone.

Lin Sheng blended into the crowd of onlookers, standing from afar under the lamppost, watching.

Not long after, as the police brought the two victims and left, the bearded man outside the casino turned around and was about to leave.

Lin Sheng quietly followed with swift and light footsteps. Coming to an alley, he turned in, quickly flipped his jacket and wore it inside out, and then put on a facemask and a cap.

Backing out from the alley again, he kept up with the bearded man in front.

Dark and quiet places were the hotbed of crimes in this country where street-surveillance cameras were severely lacking.

While walking, the bearded man seemed to be talking to the security personnel beside him.

Lin Sheng quickly lunged forward. The carrying case on his back suddenly clicked open with his black-sword sheath knocking silently on the back of the head of a burly bodyguard, who blacked out and quickly fell unconscious to the ground.

“Who the hell is it?” Shocked, the other bodyguards looked back. But it was too late; Lin Sheng’s speed was too fast. Five brawny men were hit on the back of their heads and fell senseless to the ground. While the rest were still dithering about whether to run or to fight, Lin Sheng had leaped forward, knocking every one of them, including the bearded man, unconscious to the ground.

Lin Sheng stood breathlessly in the dark. Taking out a dozen men in one go was quite a challenge to his current level of sword skills. Taking in mind that knocking them all out without killing them in just a few seconds required delicate control of one’s force, which was a hard row to hoe. Especially when considering his physical strength or the lack of it. But he managed to pull it off because of his recent training making him a little better than peers of his age.

After regularizing his breathing, Lin Sheng walked up to the bearded man, squatting down to check his body. Quickly, he found a cellphone, a stack of business cards, and a brown leather wallet. Printed on the business card were the beady man’s name and position:

Chen Risheng, General Manager of Golden Grand Entertainment.

He thought for a while and dragged the bearded man into the alley, not far away. There, he slapped the man on the face. When the man slowly came out of his unconsciousness and saw Lin Sheng, whose face was masked in a black scarf, he screamed. But Lin Sheng gave him another quick bash, stopping his yelp and followed by squeezing his throat with his foot. Now, the bearded man could not even utter a groan.

“Where is Chen Tan?” Lin Sheng asked quietly.

“You—”

Lin Sheng squeezed harder on his throat, interrupting his words. “Now, let’s try again—Where is Chen Tan?”

“I—I don’t know!”

Lin Sheng stomped on his left leg without warning, and a soft crack in the bone was heard. Just as the bearded man was about to cry in pain, Lin Sheng applied more pressure on his throat to muffle him.

“Let me ask you for the last time: where is Chen Tan?” Lin Sheng’s voice was cold. Since Chen Tan dared to bounty-hunting him, then Chen Tan should be prepared to be hunted.

“In—in Dongwu Tower… He’s staying there to-tonight…” The bearded man stammered.

“Dongwu Tower?”

“D’oh… You don’t want to go there! Red Stoats are there!” The bearded man retorted as if he had something else in mind.

“The Red Stoat brothers? Lin Sheng’s brows twitched and stepped on the bearded man’s mouth, rubbing all the black soil and dirt on the outsoles of his pointed black leather shoes in his mouth.

The bearded man tried to turn his face away, but the force of Lin Sheng’s foot rendered him helpless. Lin Sheng looked down, held the sword in his hand, and drew his sword slightly out of the sheath. That small part of the blade exposed in the slit reflected the cold, faintly yellow streetlight in the dark.

“Give me the exact location. And who are the Red Stoat brothers?”

The bearded man lay stiffly on the ground.

Twenty minutes later. Level-6, Dongwu Tower.

Chen Tan wore a nightdress leering at the blonde who was stretching her attractive body near the window. She was the reason he liked to stay here. Swirling the glass of light-blue cocktail in his hand before downing it all in his throat, he could not help but think of Chen Huan again.

He was sleeping with other women just to vent his desire. But to him, Chen Huan was different. He had never forced her. All this while, he had been quietly protecting her behind the scene.

He rose to his feet, walked to the window and overlooked the night skyline of the city down below.

“I’ve been working hard for six years for this land of prosperity,” he muttered. “It’s been six-year. From rag to riches, aside from the one million yuan from my father, I’ve never gotten any other help. The so-called transfer was only a dog and pony show.”

“You’re the man, Brother Chen!” said the blonde, leaned mousily in his arms.

“Will you stay with me like this?” Chen Tan said softly while grabbing the woman’s waist and pulling her to himself.

“I—” Just as the woman looked up and was about to answer.

“Staying to die together?” A voice was heard outside the door as a sword pierced straight through where the door lock was before retracting immediately.

The door was swung open as Lin Sheng sashayed in with fresh blood, slowly dripping down his sword. Outside, two hulk men kneeled death on the floor, eyes-wide-open with blood oozing out onto the surface.

Chen Tan turned his head, his pupils contracting. “Who the heck are you?” Before his voice trailed off, he had sprung up toward the cupboard nearby, reaching for the drawer.

A light flashed across the air, slitting Chen Tan’s throat wide open with blood spurting out continuously from the wound onto the carpet below.

“Aah!” The blonde grabbed a vase about to throw it at Lin Sheng. But a sword went through her forehead into her skull in extremely precision before she kneeled down and dropped face-down on the floor.

Lin Sheng stood there and waited quietly for a while. “There’s no black thread?” He was a little stunned before realizing that he had just killed a possibly innocent girl. It was an instinctive move when he killed her, but he had never wanted to claim an innocent life. Before this, all those who died under his sword were armed.

“What a shame…” This was undoubtedly his first time killing people in the real world. But the action seemed familiarly fluid in his head.

He calmly turned around, walked out of the room, and took the elevator down to the lobby. When he emerged from the tower, the crow circling in the air above him almost seemed to blend into the darkness.

Just then, a shrill was heard coming out of the tower. Apparently, someone was shocked to find the dead bodies.

The crow suddenly came down on Lin Sheng’s shoulder in a swoop before Lin Sheng picked up his pace and disappeared into the darkness.