Sin Becomes a God

Chapter 35: Doesn’t Look Very Strong

Japanese gangs that adhere to the spirit of Bushido are known for their extremely rigid hierarchy. When the five black Mercedes-Benzes came to a stop, the doors of four of them opened simultaneously, and twelve men in black suits and dark sunglasses stepped out. These twelve Sumiyoshi-kai members—who could be considered the elite—slowly spread out, shielding the second black Mercedes, whose doors had not yet opened, in the center. The twelve men in black all reached into their jackets, as if searching for something. This gesture caused passersby who had wanted to stop and watch to keep their distance. Inside the Hongyun Restaurant, which bore a “Under Renovation” sign, Jimmy—dressed like a punk—led a group of more than twenty burly men, each dressed in different styles to deliberately show off their tattoos, out to meet them. By comparison, the Sumiyoshi-kai—an international crime syndicate—resembled a regular army, while the Ho Sing Wo gang members looked undeniably like street thugs. Jimmy, with his bleached hair and body studded with metal rivets, staggered toward the black Mercedes that hadn’t yet opened its doors, only to be stopped by Sumiyoshi-kai bodyguards. Jimmy curled his lip and, regardless of whether they understood Cantonese, called out flippantly, “Mr. Kambon Kazuo… our boss has been waiting for you for a long time…” Kambon Kazuhiko’s expression darkened inside the car. As a top student at Waseda University, he was not only fluent in English, French, and Spanish, but also spoke Mandarin and Cantonese with ease. Before arriving, Kambon Ichiro had put in a great deal of effort to prepare for this collaboration. Wasn’t the young man outside the car window none other than Jimmy, the right-hand man of Gao Lao Wen, the boss of the He Sheng He gang? But this Jimmy also had a little-known identity: he was Gao Laowen’s illegitimate son. The Sumiyoshi-kai was an international crime syndicate, and Kanemoto Ichiro was its third-in-command, poised to ascend to the presidency of the Sumiyoshi-kai. In contrast, He Shenghe was merely a local Hong Kong triad. For Japanese organized crime groups, which place great emphasis on strict hierarchical etiquette, Gao Laowen sending his illegitimate son to greet him—the third-in-command of the Sumiyoshi-kai—could be considered a blatant insult. Noticing the displeasure on Kambon Ichiro’s face, Jiro Onimaru drew the long sword at his side and said, “Acting Chairman… please allow me to deal with this young man who doesn’t understand the rules…” Seeing Jirō Onimaru—the Sumiyoshi-kai’s second-ranked fighter—eagerly vying to prove his loyalty right then and there, Kōmoto Kazuo smiled smugly and waved his hand. “Never mind. These Chinese have never known the meaning of etiquette… We’re here for the future of the Sumiyoshi-kai! Get out of the car…” As a late-stage second-tier martial artist, nothing across the street escaped Lu Renjia’s notice. When he saw Onimaru Jiro, sword in hand, and Kanemoto Ichiro step out of the car together, Lu Renjia narrowed his eyes slightly and cursed inwardly, “You fat bastard… you’re messing with me, aren’t you…Twelve gunmen, over twenty gangsters… plus a third-rate martial artist—it looks every bit like a gang boss negotiating… A figure of such high standing is only worth 500,000? Damn it… five million would be more like it…” After cursing the fatso, Lu Renjia began to feel secretly relieved. Over the past few days, thanks to the fifty-fold boost from the “Marrow-Cleansing Pill,” he had already cultivated the *Vajra Invincible Body Divine Art* to the “Iron Bones” realm, and the first four forms of the *Eagle Claw Hand* had reached perfection. Dealing with these ordinary people should be no problem at all. Just as Lu Renjia had suspected, the bounty for this mission was indeed five million—and five million US dollars, at that. Little did he know that Jiro Onimaru—whom Lu Renjia dismissed as a second-rate martial artist—was, in the real world, a renowned master of Japan’s Hokushin Ittō-ryū school. Having successively traveled through the souls of the film adaptations of *The Deer and the Cauldron* and *The Heavenly Sword and Dragon Saber: The Demon Cult Leader*—two “small thousand worlds” both rated above three stars in danger level—in these two worlds, he had encountered top-tier martial artists like Ao Bai, Long’er—the Holy Maiden of the Shenlong Sect—and Abbess Jiunan, who were unafraid of muskets and cannons, as well as innate martial artists like Zhang Sanfeng, who could move with ease amidst thousands of soldiers. As a result, Lu Renjia’s perspective had already expanded severalfold. Far away in the server room of the “Seeking the Way” Internet café in Shendu, both Xiao Bai and Fei Lao were intently staring at their computer screens. Xiao Bai, one of Asia’s top hackers, had already hacked into the entire Tsim Sha Tsui traffic surveillance system. “Sigh… Just a few days ago, he was acting like some martial arts grandmaster… Now that he sees the enemy has such overwhelming numbers, he’s lost his nerve, hasn’t he?” Xiao Bai shook his head and sighed. Fei Lao shrugged. “Never mind. Lu Renjia is just a scapegoat. Even if ‘Ghost Shadow’ were still alive, he wouldn’t have engaged in direct combat on this mission—he’d most likely have opted for a long-range sniper shot… After all, Jiro Onimaru, that master of the Beichen Yidao-ryu style, is also at the late stage of the Hidden Force realm… Plus, with twelve gunmen, charging in head-on would be suicide…” As he watched Kamben Kazuo appear on the screen, Xiao Bai’s hand was already resting on the keyboard. As long as Lu Renjia didn’t make a move, the moment Xiao Bai pressed the Enter key, the text message containing Lu Renjia’s photo would be sent to Kamben Kazuo and the others’ cell phones. Just as Xiao Bai was about to press Enter—intending to use Lu Renjia as a scapegoat to take the heat off the Fat Man—Lu Renjia on the screen moved. Seeing Lu Renjia’s movement, Xiao Bai’s finger—which had been poised over the Enter key—snapped back, and he exclaimed, “No way… He’s that gutsy? He actually dares to go up there… Maybe he really is a young bull unafraid of tigers…” “Uh… seeing how gutsy he is, even if he dies, we’ll have to find a way to recover his body…” the Fat Guy remarked with a sigh. Lu Renjia, dressed in an Armani casual suit, tossed the ice cream he was holding aside. This scene drew disdainful glances from passersby brushing past him, but what happened next left those same disdainful onlookers so stunned they couldn’t close their mouths. Lu Renjia leaped into the air, using the railing as a springboard with the tips of his toes. His entire body soared upward like a soaring eagle. While in midair, he channeled the Nine Yang True Qi into his ten fingers. In an instant, the nails on all ten of his fingers grew by more than ten centimeters, their jade-like whiteness gleaming with a terrifying metallic luster. Jiro Onimaru, standing guard beside Ichiro Kangben, was known as the “Man Who Slaughtered a Hundred.” As the second-ranked fighter of the Sumiyoshi-kai, he was naturally a battle-hardened veteran. With his cultivation at the late stage of Hidden Force, he instinctively sensed a dangerous aura closing in on him. The moment he turned, an expression of disbelief spread across Onimaru Jiro’s face. “A master? Damn it… Protect the Acting Chairman… There’s an assassin…” Onimaru Jiro’s shout was in Japanese, and the twelve gunmen accompanying him immediately drew their guns, aiming them at Lu Renjia, who was diving down like a soaring eagle. The members of the Heisheng Gang who didn’t understand Japanese stood frozen for a moment, but when they saw the Sumiyoshi-kai members reacting as if facing a major threat, they drew their guns as well. But for Lu Renjia—a martial artist who had mastered the Twelve Meridians and reached the peak of the Second-Tier realm—the twenty-meter-wide street was nothing more than the blink of an eye. Before a single shot was fired, Lu Renjia had already landed right in the midst of Kamben Ichiro and his group. Having slaughtered over a thousand people in the world of *The Legend of the Condor Heroes: The Demon Cult Leader*, Lu Renjia was naturally no longer the naive underdog he once was; he launched a lethal attack right from the start. “Young Eagle Spreads Its Wings…” Lu Renjia growled lowly. His ten jade-white fingernails, like ten razor-sharp scalpels, traced beautiful arcs as they sliced across the necks of the men in black who were about to pull the triggers. “Splatter… splatter… splatter…” The sounds of blood spurting from arteries merged into a symphony of death. Three gunmen, unable to react in time, clutched their gushing necks as they slowly collapsed to the ground. As they lost massive amounts of blood, their bodies convulsed and twitched; the twitching fingers of the three fallen gunmen actually pulled the triggers. “Bang, bang, bang…” Stray bullets flying in all directions unexpectedly blew the head off an unlucky member of the He Shenghe Gang. Seeing someone killed right on the street made the bystanders realize this wasn’t a movie. “Aaaah…” As the gunshots rang out, the pedestrians who had stopped to watch the commotion let out a series of screams and scattered in all directions. The hitmen who had accompanied Kamben Ichiro to Hong Kong this time were considered elite within the Sumiyoshi-kai, but in Lu Renjia’s eyes, aside from Onimaru Jiro, the rest were nothing more than ordinary people. To him, their sluggish movements were barely faster than a snail’s—such was the gap between an ordinary person and a martial artist. Often, by the time those gunmen tried to aim at Lu Renjia—who moved like a ghost—their own necks had already been slashed open by his fingernails, sharp as a scalpel. Watching Lu Renjia’s back as he slaughtered the Sumiyoshi-kai gang members as if cutting through vegetables, Onimaru Jiro—a master at the late stage of Hidden Force—faced the situation as if confronting a formidable enemy. After shoving Kanemoto Kazuo aside, Onimaru Jiro drew the blade in his hand. “Protect the Acting Chairman and get him out of here first!!!” Onimaru Jiro roared. As soon as he finished shouting, he gripped the hilt with both hands and tucked the blade’s tip back to his waist. He stood with his feet slightly apart, every muscle in his body tensing instantly, like a spring compressed to its limit, ready to spring into action. Masters of the “Dark Force” in internal martial arts possess physical prowess six times that of ordinary people. As he braced himself, Onimaru Jiro let out a low growl: “Beichen One-Strike Slash…” His taut muscles erupted with speed six times that of an ordinary person. Jiro Onimaru pushed off from his lunge stance, his entire body darting toward Lu Renjia like an arrow leaving the bowstring. The blade tucked at his waist swung out with the momentum—its immense force and astonishing speed transforming it into a silent, silver streak as it slashed toward the center of Lu Renjia’s back. Lu Renjia seemed to have eyes in the back of his head; just as the blade was about to strike, instead of dodging forward, he leaned back with the momentum. The Hokushin Ittō-ryū fuses mind, body, and technique into a single entity, emphasizing lightning-fast momentum and relentless forward momentum, with techniques as relentless as a gale, flowing ceaselessly. When Onimaru Jiro unleashed the “Hokushin Ichidō Zan”—the ultimate technique of the Hokushin Ichidō-ryū—he had already visualized his opponent’s evasion trajectories in three directions: forward, left, and right. As soon as his opponent dodged, the unbroken succession of techniques would follow in rapid succession like a raging gale. Yet Onimaru Jiro never in his wildest dreams imagined that Lu Renjia would actually dodge his strike by leaning backward. In that instant, Onimaru Jiro’s silent blade could not be withdrawn in time and actually sliced across Lu Renjia’s chest. In that split second as the blade grazed past, a look of disbelief flashed across Onimaru Jiro’s face, and he caught sight of the bloodthirsty grin on Lu Renjia’s face. “Eagle Claw Piercing the Heart…” Lu Renjia growled under his breath as the five jade-white fingernails on his left hand, accompanied by a gust of wind, lunged toward Onimaru Jiro’s throat, which he had been unable to retract in time. The ten-centimeter-long nails, as sharp as surgical scalpels, instantly pierced Onimaru Jiro’s neck and sank in without resistance. “Splatter, splatter…” Under Onimaru Jiro’s gaze of utter disbelief, Lu Renjia gave a sharp yank, instantly severing his opponent’s main artery and windpipe. Having dispatched Onimaru Jiro—a second-rate fighter in his eyes—with a single move, Lu Renjia ignored the victim’s gaze of unquiet death and, with a light tap of his toe, gave chase in the direction Kamben Kazuo had fled. Inside the server room of the “Seeking the Way” Internet café, Fatso and Xiao Bai were completely dumbfounded. Fei Lao and Xiao Bai exchanged glances, each seeing utter astonishment in the other’s eyes. From the moment Lu Renjia struck to his effortless defeat of Onimaru Jiro—the second-ranked fighter of the Sumiyoshi-kai—it all seemed like a dream. “Is this for real… Jiro Onimaru is really out of commission?” Xiao Bai asked uncertainly. Staring at the image on the computer screen of Onimaru Jiro lying motionless on the ground, Fei Lao replied blankly, “I guess… maybe… perhaps… Could it be that my luck has finally turned and I’ve struck gold? Did I actually find someone whose strength surpasses even ‘Ghost Shadow’? Quick, analyze his physical stats and see what they are…” Hearing Fatso’s words, Xiao Bai snapped out of his daze and immediately began typing commands at lightning speed on the keyboard, pulling up the video of Lu Renjia defeating Jirō Onimaru for analysis. When Xiaobai saw the data he’d analyzed, he was completely stunned. “T… more than twenty times! Damn… his speed… his strength—he’s practically on par with a master of Huajing Neijiaquan…” “What are you standing there for… Hurry up and send the evasion route to his phone! And… mess with all the traffic lights in Tsim Sha Tsui—we’ve got to hold off the cops…” Fatso shouted excitedly. “Got it! Watch this…” Xiao Bai replied, a look of excitement on his face as his hands flew over the keyboard, typing out command after command. The Fat Guy and Xiao Bai looked as though they’d bought a random bowl from a street vendor, only to have it appraised as a Tang Sancai artifact. The prowess Lu Renjia had displayed was something even “Ghost Shadow” couldn’t match—it was like discovering a massive treasure. Regardless of whether Lu Renjia managed to kill Kang Benyi this time, Fatso was determined to do everything in his power to ensure Lu Renjia returned safely to Shendu.