Ding!
Jiang Yuanrui lay awake at home through the night. The notification sound from a text message made him, already as jumpy as a startled bird, shudder.
Ma Shi shot him a look of contempt, "It's just a text."
"Oh. Right."
Jiang Yuanrui took a deep breath and gave Ma Shi a friendly smile, but his hands were still trembling.
When he read the message from his older brother Jiang Hao, his eyes widened.
[Over a thousand Haori Chamber of Commerce branches have been destroyed.]
His mind went blank.
He had thought Lu Daoxing would come after him directly, but instead of trading one life for one life in kind, Lu Daoxing had set the fire directly to the Jiang family behind him.
The Haori Chamber of Commerce was the Jiang family's foundation and economic backbone.
More than a thousand branches had been wiped out and reduced to ruins overnight.
He didn't know how much the Jiang family had lost, but he was certain it was an astronomical sum.
And part of that astronomical loss belonged to him.
Jiang Yuanrui felt as if someone were gripping his throat. Even breathing became difficult.
He sprang to his feet and staggered to the window, pulling back the curtains and looking through the thick glass into the courtyard outside.
The night was dark, lights flickered, and aside from the guards on watch, nothing seemed out of the ordinary.
Yet he could almost hear Lu Daoxing's footsteps drawing closer from the distance.
"Lu Daoxing... when are you finally coming?"
While the Jiang family's senior members were calculating their losses and discussing countermeasures, Lu Daoxing struck again.
The first assassination took place at a Jiang family residence in District 1239.
Jiang Hao's son Jiang Changming, who had never awakened a Sequence ability, had just stepped through the front gate when an incomparably precise crimson bullet pierced his forehead. His head burst apart like a smashed watermelon, and he collapsed onto the bluestone paving outside his own home.
Blood flowed through the cracks between the stones, and the smell of blood spread throughout the courtyard.
The entire Jiang household was thrown into chaos. Servants rushed over, and maids screamed one after another.
Some Sequence users tried to find the attacker, but the killer had already vanished without a trace.
Only half an hour later, Jiang Hao's other son, Jiang Changxing, who lived in District 942, was also assassinated.
In his study, his throat was cut by a transparent thread finer than a spider's silk.
Jiang Changxing, a Sequence Level 4, didn't struggle at all. He quietly collapsed over his desk, his eyes wide open, unable to die in peace.
This was only the beginning.
Over the following days, members of the Jiang family died one after another.
The children and grandchildren of Jiang Hao and Jiang Yuanrui, even their infant great-grandchildren, were killed one by one.
Some died in their own rooms, some in their cars, and some in full view of the public.
No matter where they were, Lu Daoxing's killing intent always found them with perfect accuracy.
Their deaths varied, but the killer's methods were always the same, swift and precise.
An unprecedented panic settled over the Jiang family.
The Jiang family's strength was not to be underestimated. Even their openly known assets far surpassed the Zhao family several times over, and they had countless hidden pieces as well.
But that kind of strength was meant for competing against other powers across the negotiating table.
Against a lone wolf like Lu Daoxing, who simply flipped the table over, it was useless.
The only thing that could kill a lone wolf was a tiger.
Jiang Hao was immensely powerful. As the Tiger Card Ace of Hearts, he was confident he could defeat Lu Daoxing, who was carrying out murders everywhere.
He had tried hiding near the residence of one of his relatives, waiting for Lu Daoxing to appear.
But that strategy of waiting for the rabbit by the stump never gave him the chance to catch Lu Daoxing.
There was nothing he could do.
Jiang Hao and his five brothers all had large families, allowing the Jiang clan to flourish with countless branches. It was through this enormous extended family that the Jiang family had expanded so rapidly within the Safe Zone.
Now, however, that very advantage had become a weakness. Faced with Lu Daoxing's assassinations, they had no way to defend against them all.
Even if Jiang Hao could defeat Lu Daoxing, there was no way he could protect Jiang family members scattered across every district of the Safe Zone.
Many members of the Jiang family feared becoming the next victim and requested permission to take refuge at the Jiang family residence in District 6, but Jiang Hao flatly refused.
"My Jiang family has always had the final say in the Safe Zone. How can we be frightened by some sneaking rat hiding in the shadows?"
Jiang Hao's words were bold enough that no one dared question him.
But many people understood that he spoke that way not because he was confident.
Quite the opposite.
Jiang Hao was afraid everyone would gather in District 6.
The Jiang family's businesses throughout the Safe Zone all needed people to manage them. If everyone abandoned their operations and rushed back to the headquarters in District 6, the Haori Chamber of Commerce's outside business would grind to a halt.
The Warren Chamber of Commerce, Lotus Cloud Chamber of Commerce, and Zhao Chamber of Commerce, those wolves waiting on the sidelines, would greedily carve up the Jiang family's abandoned businesses, and the Jiang family would never recover.
Jiang Hao could never allow the Jiang family, which he had worked so hard to build, to be destroyed because of Lu Daoxing.
Even if Jiang family members died, they had to die outside.
Jiang Hao strictly ordered all his descendants not to leave without permission and offered huge rewards to hire assassins, but nothing came of it.
He never told anyone about Lu Daoxing.
Partly because his younger brother Jiang Yuanrui held the crucial position of Minister of Economy, and partly because the plan to seize Yang Dan's debt repayment God-Hunting Tools had been planned jointly by himself and Jiang Yuanrui.
But under the shadow of death, it was impossible to suppress the rumors spreading through the Jiang family.
Across every district, the Jiang family estates, once untouchable, had become enormous prisons filled with fear.
Inside lived a group of frightened prisoners dressed in suits.
The Jiang family's relatives, subordinates, and even the beggars living near their estates all whispered among themselves.
Everyone kept discussing the same question.
Who was hunting the Jiang family?
The answer was obvious.
Those who knew quietly mentioned one name, Lu Daoxing.
His wife had been driven to death by Jiang Yuanrui. That was why he kept assassinating members of the Jiang family.
Since every debt has its debtor, the Jiang family's anger was all directed at Jiang Yuanrui.
Most members of the Jiang family had no access to the family's highest secrets and had no idea why Jiang Yuanrui had forced Yang Dan into that situation.
From their perspective, it was simply Jiang Yuanrui's short-sighted greed over twenty Tier 3 God-Hunting Tools that had left them living in constant fear.
"Jiang Yuanrui brought this on us!"
"If he hadn't been so greedy and driven Lu Daoxing's wife to her death, would Lu Daoxing be murdering people like a madman?"
"Jiang Yuanrui has to pay the price!"
Anger spread rapidly throughout the Jiang family.
Jiang Yuanrui noticed it.
He saw the servants looking at him with cold eyes. Family members became evasive whenever they spoke to him. Even several of his trusted bodyguards quietly resigned and fled the Jiang family.
Every night, he felt as though the shadow behind him kept growing longer, as if a vengeful ghost might leap out of the darkness to claim his life at any moment.
Yet he knew better than anyone that the real nightmare had only just begun.
Because Lu Daoxing still hadn't come to kill him.