Chapter 300: Fratricide
“You should take my dad’s powers. It was him who said you could take the fall for me. He said your mother was vain and greedy. As long as we set her up to get pregnant, then pressured and lured her, she’d definitely choose him and abandon you.”
“Qin Leyang was also deliberately conceived. He kept telling your mom about the good life ahead. He was the one who visited you in prison. He didn’t want you to come out alive. He paid the families of inmates to target you, hoping you’d die in there.”
“He did all of it! I did nothing! Please let me go!” Qin Zhifei blurted everything out in a frenzy, exposing the past for all to hear.
“You ungrateful brat!” Qin Hu roared and kicked Qin Zhifei hard. The full-force blow slammed him into the wall before he dropped to the ground, coughing up blood.
“It was you! Back then, we could’ve paid 8 million to settle it, but you were too stingy! You said if we paid once, they’d keep coming for more, so you decided to find someone to go to jail in my place!” Qin Zhifei, being a power user, recovered a bit and got up, shouting at Qin Hu, “If it weren’t for money, none of this would’ve happened!”
“And now you want me to give up my powers to pay for your consequences? No way!” As he spoke, a fire dragon shot toward Qin Hu.
The crowd watching from the sides scattered in panic at the fire attack, peeking from rooms around the villa.
“You—” Qin Hu quickly dodged, but as the fire dragon missed, a series of smaller, compressed fireballs appeared behind Qin Zhifei.
These fireballs were clearly far more powerful than Qin Zhifei’s attack.
Xu Sa saw this and instantly realized Qin Hu was aiming to kill.
“Stop him,” Xu Sa said, turning slightly toward Liu Rui.
Liu Rui pressed down with his hand in the direction of the fireballs. The mini fireballs fell to the floor, leaving ping-pong-sized holes, all except one that landed harmlessly away from Qin Zhifei.
“Oh my, who tries to kill their own son?” Xu Sa gasped dramatically, covering his mouth. “Those fireballs could burn someone to ashes.”
“Yeah, that’s brutal,” Ning Yuan chimed in.
Hearing this, Qin Zhifei turned and saw the fireballs, realizing Qin Hu had tried to kill him. “You were going to kill me!”
He roared, his eyes bloodshot, and attacked without holding back.
“Wow, the son wants to kill his dad. What kind of grudge is that?”
“Yeah, a son like that isn’t worth having.”
“His dad tried to kill him first. What’s he supposed to do—just wait to die?”
“Exactly. A cruel father makes a rebellious son.”
Ning Yuan and the others continued fanning the flames, stirring up both sides, who were already furious.
Both men were fire-element power users. With no hesitation left, they were evenly matched.
Soon, they were both injured.
After their powers were exhausted, Qin Zhifei rushed up and started fighting Qin Hu with his fists.
At this point, neither remembered why they’d started fighting. They only knew to aim every punch at vital spots.
Only the sound of fists hitting flesh echoed through the villa, until even those began to fade.
The room fell into silence. Qin Zhifei could only hear his own breathing. He gradually slowed his attacks, realizing there was no resistance left. He weakened, his punches losing force.
He pushed at the man beneath him and trembled as he called out, “Dad?”
“Dad.” He forced a weak smile, hesitating to touch the body.
Xu Sa watched coldly. A middle-aged woman stepped out from the hallway, gracefully walked forward, and placed a hand on Qin Hu’s neck. After a moment, she said, “He’s dead.”
“You’re lying—” Qin Zhifei roared.
She slapped him cleanly across the face.
Wiping her hand, she looked at him with disdain. “You think everyone’s your dad?”
Qin Zhifei was stunned by the slap. Then, as if realizing what had happened, he collapsed onto Qin Hu, sobbing, “Dad, wake up… I didn’t mean to… Dad…”
The living room was in shambles, and there was no more drama left to watch.
Xu Sa stood up and approached. The woman looked at him warily. “What do you want to do?”
“Of course it’s…” Xu Sa spoke as he reached out a hand toward Qin Zhifei. A powerful surge of electricity shot straight into the center of Qin Zhifei’s forehead, shattering his crystal core.
“Ah—!” Qin Zhifei clutched his head and let out a blood-curdling scream, writhing on the ground.
“To take the crystal core,” Xu Sa finished his sentence, casually patting imaginary dust from his clothes. He looked around at the people hiding in the room and said, “He killed the man himself. It has nothing to do with us. As for his crystal core…”
“If you want the supplies, you can come and take them.” Xu Sa smiled coolly at the crowd, his chilling demeanor making no one dare respond.
Just like that, the group left the Morning Light Squad. Zhang Bijuan, sitting in the corner, seemed as if she hadn’t seen anything at all. She sat there dumbfounded, not saying a word.
*
Though Xu Sa’s words were meant to intimidate, not long after he left, Zhuang Mingxu’s supplies had already been delivered in advance to the Morning Light Squad.
The entire incident didn’t even alarm the enforcement officers of the guard unit.
As for the Zhuang family, after Antonio had spoken, Lu Xiao also released the members of the Zhuang family who had been detained.
But what awaited them was a completely unfamiliar scene.
The original power and influence were gone. Many of the smaller teams now knew they had tampered with things behind the scenes. It was impossible for them to gain a foothold in the capital again.
However, that was of no concern to the Only Squad for the moment. Just then, the Zheng family arrived at the villa in full force, with Zheng Yi in a wheelchair.
“Long time no see,” Zheng Yi greeted Zhuang Mingxu at the door.
The rain was pouring. Even with someone holding an umbrella for him, his hair and clothes were still damp with rainwater.
“It hasn’t been that long,” Zhuang Mingxu said, gesturing for them to come in.
Zhuang Ai Yi and Taotao were taken to a room where Qi Lin and others accompanied them. Lu Weiyi lounged boldly on the sofa, while Li Zhuang, Antonio, Xu Sa, and others positioned themselves around the room. Even without using their powers, their expressions gave nothing away.
“Young Master Lu, a pleasure to meet you,” Zheng Yi greeted Lu Weiyi proactively.
“A pleasure,” Lu Weiyi responded.
The two weren’t familiar, and Zheng Yi had come under the pretense of visiting Zhuang Mingxu, so he naturally started by speaking with him.
“I heard you were back in the capital. We should’ve met sooner, but things kept coming up. It got delayed until today,” Zheng Yi said, wheeling himself in and pointing to the goods his men brought. “I heard you established your own base. Since we know each other, I wanted to offer a small gift as congratulations.”
“You’re too kind,” Zhuang Mingxu said, watching as people moved goods into the courtyard until it was full. He was about to decline further when Zheng Yi casually added, “I heard you were looking for some people earlier, so I had my people lend a hand.”
Everyone in the living room looked over.
Zhuang Mingxu weighed the truth of his words and said, “Then I really must thank you. But were there any results?”
“Not many, we only found a few,” Zheng Yi said. “Since I was coming anyway, I brought them along.”
He signaled for his men to bring the people in.
Soon, seven or eight people entered in the rain—there were both elderly and children, all of whom looked cautiously at the crowd in the living room.
No one spoke at first. In the thick silence, Zheng Yi looked at Zhuang Mingxu, while occasionally glancing at Lu Weiyi out of the corner of his eye.
Lu Weiyi gave Liu Yang a nod, who then stepped forward to take the group aside to verify their identities.
Zhuang Mingxu and Zheng Yi exchanged a few more casual remarks until Liu Yang returned and nodded at Lu Weiyi, confirming the people were indeed correct.
Originally, if Zheng Yi had come alone, they wouldn’t have acknowledged anything, but now that he had delivered people without being prompted, even if he said nothing further, no one could be sure if he had more up his sleeve. After all, although their list hadn’t been handed over, word had spread, and anyone determined enough could piece things together.
This put the group in a difficult position.
Then Zheng Yi continued, seemingly offhandedly, “Recently, wireless communications across the regions have been slowly recovering. Occasionally, we can get news from other bases.”
“Is that so? We really haven’t paid much attention to that. We heard it’s unstable—sometimes you don’t get a single message for three or four days,” Zhuang Mingxu said politely.
“True. I have some idle hands, so I had them keep an eye out,” Zheng Yi said with a laugh. “And as it turns out, I really did come across some news. A few days ago, a coastal base sent out a distress signal…”
At those words, several people in the room instinctively turned to look. The younger Liu Rui couldn’t help but glance at Xu Sa to see his reaction. If they didn’t already know he couldn’t speak, he probably would’ve blurted out a question.
Zheng Yi didn’t draw it out. He continued, “They said their base was attacked by a mutated sea beast and they were seeking help from nearby bases.”
“I’ve only ever seen mutated land animals. The last I heard about mutated sea creatures was when you guys brought in that mutated seafood. I’m curious—what’s the biggest mutated sea creature you’ve seen? Can they really threaten human survival?” Zheng Yi asked.
“It’s not too bad. Our base is near the coast, and there aren’t any large marine creatures nearby. Usually, we just see fish, shrimp, and crabs—nothing too aggressive. In fact, they provide a good food source,” Zhuang Mingxu replied.
“That’s good. While there may be fewer zombies by the sea, these mutated creatures are still dangerous. If the ocean’s larger animals mutate, humans would really be at a disadvantage.”
“That base said they encountered a mutated octopus. Even in the past, big ones could reach seven or eight meters. Now that it’s mutated… just thinking about it is terrifying…”
“One wonders if there’s any safe haven for humans left,” Zheng Yi said, pretending to sigh.
In the heavy silence, Zhuang Mingxu chuckled and asked, “Zheng Yi, we’re all familiar with each other here—why don’t you cut to the chase? Throwing out all these lures—what exactly are you after?”
