Master of Kaidan
Chapter 52 Omen Seed

Chapter 52: Chapter 52 Omen Seed

Walking onto the street, Feng Xue habitually touched his hood, all the while silently praying he wouldn’t run into an Appraiser—for their sake, of course, because if his True Object attire was recognized, he’d have no choice but to kill them to keep his secret!

Since his arrival in this world, Feng Xue had always abided by the principle of not initiating conflict unless provoked. His sense of morality told him that even in a place devoid of ethics and law, he must maintain a basic standard of right and wrong, lest he lose himself.

But now, that had changed.

He was resolved to kill others for his own survival.

To put it bluntly, he had awoken his Dark Will.

It was an awakening of determination to do whatever it took to achieve his goals.

The place where the Corpse was as usual on the outskirts of a warehouse owned by the Cross Sword Union. Although only a few days had passed since the last trash day, like when he’d first arrived, many newcomers hadn’t accumulated the necessary Cognition. Lacking a full understanding of the power system in this world and the Manager’s gangs, they were forced to stake it all for survival before their Cognition ran out.

Clearly, unless those who’d just crossed over brought some kind of bizarre Golden Finger with them, it was unlikely they could shake the local factions’ power—after all, those discarded by their original worlds as trash had no right to inherit the powers of those worlds.

Revealing his Corpse Collector profession, Feng Xue pulled a cart loaded with more than a dozen Corpses. With the assistance of the Transport element and his Inner Strength, his power had greatly increased compared to before. Although he still couldn’t draw a three-hundred-stone Strong Bow, pulling a cart with a dozen people was a breeze for him.

This time, however, he didn’t dissect and Refine the bodies for Recycle as usual, nor did he follow the official process of dumping them in the wilderness. Instead, he skirted the landfill area, choosing places to dispose of the Corpse based on seclusion and remoteness, the same criteria he’d used for selecting a temporary residence.

After offloading a Corpse from the cart, Feng Xue took out a Black Ball from his Storage bag and placed it on the chest of the Corpse. Then, he pulled out Chen Xiyao’s bottle and poured some of the pale yellow liquid onto the Black Ball.

Having done all this, he didn’t linger for a moment and immediately went to the next location.

The dozen or so bodies were quickly scattered throughout the landfill area, and he circled back to the cabin where Chen Xiyao was staying.

"Are you ready?"

"Mhm," Chen Xiyao nodded vigorously, but as Feng Xue turned to leave, she finally couldn’t help but ask,

"Will you come with me?"

She’d said it!

At that moment, Chen Xiyao felt like a student who had just submitted their exam paper at the end of term, her body relaxing considerably. All her previous worries vanished in that instant, only to be replaced by anxiety about the outcome.

She looked at Feng Xue nervously, only to see the man smiling in a way that was rare for him—

"Right now, I can’t go to your world, but as long as you remember me, we will meet again someday."

Chen Xiyao felt somewhat disheartened, but facing the Spirited Away-esque answer, she still mustered her spirits, lifted her head, and asked seriously, "Really?"

"Really."

Feng Xue looked at the pinky the girl extended and hooked it with some resignation, without any vows like "Liars will swallow a thousand needles," just starting to act in silence.

They didn’t have much operable time and couldn’t afford to initiate a pre-battle romance drama that would span three or four episodes at this moment—nor was it possible for them to have a dramatic last romp before the battle, as in Western films.

Chen Xiyao, carrying a cardboard box, followed behind Feng Xue. With the aid of her inner strength, it only took a few minutes for them to return near the house where they started.

Though it was near, the distance was still at least two hundred meters away, for Feng Xue could be certain that the house was now under surveillance, and now was not the time to storm in.

"Do you still remember everything I’ve told you?" Worried that Chen Xiyao was too nervous, Feng Xue asked again. Hearing the question that Feng Xue had asked several times today, Chen Xiyao replied helplessly:

"Yes, I remember. When you say ’begin,’ I’ll put on the cardboard box, ignore everything, and walk straight toward the door. As long as I grab the doorknob, I’ll be able to push open the door and return, right?"

"Correct, but you’ve forgotten one thing. If there’s someone blocking the door, you must wait for them to leave or for me to kill them; otherwise, you might be caught before you can get in." Feng Xue emphasized again. While he was an incessant nagger like an old mother, Chen Xiyao inexplicably felt very reassured, nodded her head humbly, lifted the cardboard box, and covered herself with it.

Watching Chen Xiyao disappear from his view, Feng Xue took out the Pseudo Artifact pocket watch that had been infused with "Time," "Stop," and "Tool" from his chest, looked at the time, then hooked his hand, somersaulted, and leapt onto the rooftop. Utilizing his assassin enhanced vision, he gazed at his former dwelling from afar, quietly awaiting the calm before the storm.

Tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock...

The second hand ticked away, and suddenly, from Feng Xue’s original dormitory, a burst of hurried footsteps came. A man rushed out from behind the door, mounted an extremely flashy motorcycle, and with the loud roar of a ghost fire, rode away into the distance.

Seeing this, a slight smile appeared on Feng Xue’s lips. The first step of the plan was a success!

Indeed, just as Old Li had said, "Professional labels do have requirements for their jobs. The Corpse Collector who doesn’t collect a corpse will lose his job, and some jobs are even more stringent." Without a doubt, the "some jobs" Old Li referred to was the Manager.

And what was the Manager’s task?

To manage a landfill site?

Or to manage the "Nothingness"?

Or was it to manage the passages leading to the residential areas?

Thinking back to the gangsters who would rather die than let Suture pass, Feng Xue had a new idea—

Could the duty of the Manager be to combat the Omen that appeared in the landfill?

A few days ago, even if he had thought about this, Feng Xue would have had no solution, but a few days earlier, when testing the abilities of the Black Ball in the wild, he discovered that this thing could induce the Omen to mutate, gradually understanding the essence of this object—

It was a collection of garbled codes, a "heap of shit" constructed from incorrect information, though not particularly contagious, its enormous and Twisted ’Cognition’ shared similar properties to that of the Omen itself.

After verifying that he could use corpses and the True Object provided by Chen Xiyao as a medium to cultivate the Omen with the Black Ball, he gave it a very fitting name—Omen Seed.

And now, the seed had taken root and sprouted, and the Manager, as expected, had been successfully lured away.

Leaping down from the rooftop, although he couldn’t see the cardboard box, Feng Xue knew that Chen Xiyao was by his side. He flicked out the Suffocation Blade with his right hand and wielded the Holy Mother in a reverse grip with his left, saying with a calm tone:

"Begin!"