"ROAR!"
"ROAR!"
With thunderous roars that shook the air, two Wild Men whose bodies had been completely encased in metal armor charged forward. Each wielded a massive steel club, advancing like heavily armored tanks as their footsteps crushed the pavement beneath them.
"They're here again?"
Fang Li stepped out of his car and watched the two mechanized Wild Men rushing toward him. A faint smile slowly appeared on his face.
'Clack...'
The 'Moon Blade' slipped into his hand, its edge gleaming with a dazzling arc of light.
'Tap...'
A barely audible footstep sounded. Then, Fang Li disappeared.
'Whoosh!'
Like an invisible blur, he completed his dash before the piercing sonic boom of his movement could even catch up. The distance between him and the two charging Wild Men vanished in less than a hundredth of a second.
'Slash!'
The sound of cutting sliced through the air, not once, but twice. The two perfectly synchronized slicing sounds rang out together.
The charging mechanized Wild Men suddenly froze. Still holding their steel clubs high above their heads, they stood motionless like machines that had abruptly shut down. A moment later, their bodies split cleanly apart at the waist.
'Boom...'
Their massive upper bodies crashed heavily onto the ground. Sparks crackled from the severed sections as the electronic glow in their eyes gradually faded away. Only their lower halves remained standing where they were.
Without even glancing back at the two machines he had killed in an instant, Fang Li calmly sheathed the Moon Blade at his waist. Then he took out his cellphone and contacted the Hero Association.
"Hello, it's me. Two more mechanized Mysterious Beings have appeared here. They haven't caused any major damage yet, but their threat level should still qualify as Demon. Send someone to recover the remains."
---
Several days had passed since the battle against the mechanized Savage Leader. During those days, Fang Li had repeatedly been ambushed by mechanized Mysterious Beings. It was as though someone had completely set their sights on him. Without warning, they would appear and attack him wherever he happened to be.
By now, he had already lost count of how many times it had happened.
Fang Li already knew what was going on. Someone had recovered the corpses of the Wild Men that he and Sylvia had previously defeated and used those bodies as raw materials to create mechanized soldiers. The apparent purpose was to test the performance of these mechanical weapons.
Perhaps this was merely one experiment among many. Using the bodies of Mysterious Beings as the foundation for weapons was certainly an interesting concept, but at most, it was only one of the scientist's countless research projects.
The current attacks were simply field tests to determine whether that particular approach was practical.
As for Fang Li, the newly promoted S-Class Hero who had originally defeated those Mysterious Beings, he had become the perfect free test subject for evaluating the combat capabilities of these mechanized soldiers.
Far from finding the situation troublesome, Fang Li welcomed it.
'I was just worrying about where I'd find more high-level Mysterious Beings. This is like having a pillow delivered just when I'm getting sleepy.'
That was something he had realized after defeating the mechanized Savage Leader. Killing the mechanized Savage Leader had rewarded him with '480 Killing Points', only twenty points short of the reward for defeating a Dragon-level Mysterious Being.
That confirmed Fang Li's earlier suspicion. After being mechanized, the Savage Leader's strength had indeed approached the Dragon level.
After all, when Fang Li had originally killed the Savage Leader, he had received exactly '100 Killing Points', no more, no less. It was precisely the reward corresponding to a 'Demon-level' Mysterious Being. Now that the Savage Leader had been rebuilt and brought back to life, Fang Li hadn't expected that killing him again would still reward him with Killing Points.
Because of that, Fang Li concluded that the scientist hiding behind the scenes would continue sending more attacks his way.
Sure enough, the corpses of all the Mysterious Beings that Fang Li and Sylvia had defeated when they first arrived in this world seemed to have been recovered by that scientist and converted into mechanized weapons.
Moreover, every single one of them had become significantly stronger. Although none of them were as powerful as the mechanized Savage Leader, the ordinary mechanized Wild Men were still evaluated as 'Demon-level' threats. Each one was worth '100 Killing Points'.
Including the mechanized Savage Leader, Fang Li had earned over '2,000 Killing Points' in just the past few days. Combined with the '800 Killing Points' he had accumulated previously, his total had now reached '3,000 Killing Points'.
With rewards coming this easily, Fang Li naturally didn't mind letting the scientist continue playing his little game.
However...
'I imagine he's almost out of materials by now.'
The first attacker had been the mechanized Savage Leader. After that came five mechanized Wild Men. Three more had attacked the day before yesterday, and yesterday, there had been quite a few as well. But today, only two had shown up.
It was obvious that the scientist was nearly out of Mysterious Being corpses suitable for mechanization. Not to mention that research and modifications required funding; no matter how wealthy the scientist might be, if the project couldn't produce meaningful results, he'd eventually have no choice but to abandon it.
And why wasn't he getting useful results? The answer was simple.
'I appreciate the Killing Points you've been sending me... but I'm not going to obediently cooperate with your experiments.'
From that point onward, Fang Li had made a point of instantly killing every mechanized soldier that appeared. Since every battle ended in an immediate, one-sided kill, the scientist couldn't gather any meaningful combat data.
By now, he had probably realized that Fang Li had no intention of cooperating and was beginning to give up on using him as a test subject.
The proof was yesterday's incident: instead of targeting Fang Li, the mechanized Wild Men had attacked Sylvia while she was recording a new song at her agency. The scientist had clearly started searching for other targets to test his mechanized soldiers.
"What a shame," Fang Li muttered. "I was actually starting to enjoy this."
He genuinely meant it. Whenever mechanized soldiers attacked him, he not only earned Killing Points, but afterward he could also report the incident to the Hero Association as part of his hero activities.
That increased both his achievements and contribution record, helping improve his ranking. It was killing two birds with one stone. Otherwise, Fang Li would never have willingly allowed someone to keep plotting against him from the shadows.
'The next time the hero rankings are updated... I should move up quite a bit.'
Thinking that, Fang Li continued filing his report with the Hero Association.
Unexpectedly, the staff member on the other end of the call sounded both relieved and anxious.
"Mr. Fang Li, your timing couldn't be better! We were just about to contact you!"
Just as Fang Li was wondering what was going on, the staff member hurriedly continued.
"Please head to City Z immediately! A 'Dragon-level disaster' is approaching the city!"
Those words made Fang Li raise an eyebrow, his eyes narrowing slightly.
"A Dragon-level disaster..."
Recalling the events of the original story, Fang Li thought he knew exactly what it was. He had already guessed what incident was about to unfold.
(End Of This Chapter)
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