Chapter Twenty-Nine: Drawing Attention

Wang Ling raced ahead, pursued fiercely by three broom-headed thugs. In no time, the four of them darted into a deserted alley. The silence was palpable; not a soul in sight, only abandoned factories flanking both sides. Worst of all, this was a dead-end alley, its farthest point sealed by a tall wall!

Seeing the fleeing youth halt at the alley’s depths, then turn and press himself fearfully against the wall, the three thugs slowed, ceasing their chase. With sinister grins, they closed in, savoring the terror etched across the boy’s face.

“If you don’t want to die, hand over whatever’s in your pockets.”

The thug in the lead stood before Wang Ling, flexing his knuckles until they cracked audibly, so confident he didn’t even bother to draw the switchblade at his waist. Against a skinny, not yet fully grown Eastern boy, a few threats would surely suffice to make him comply.

Yet, in the next instant, the thug’s body tensed. He felt a cold, hard object pressed against his forehead.

A white steel flintlock pistol.

Bang!

With the thunderous crash of the trigger on the old-fashioned gun, a flock of sparrows scattered from the tall trees nearby, their wings fluttering in panic. A single blood hole, wreathed in wisps of smoke, appeared at the center of the thug’s forehead; blood and brain matter oozed from it in a grim stream.

His eyes rolled back, a strangled, unintelligible sound escaped his throat, and he fell flat backward, his body striking the ground and sending up a cloud of gray-white dust.

After firing, the pistol vanished from Wang Ling’s hand, replaced instantly by a heavy iron battle axe. Gripping the haft with both hands, he swung the gleaming blade at the neck of another thug. Still stunned by his comrade’s sudden death, the unfortunate man barely saw the axe coming; there was no time to dodge.

With Wang Ling’s formidable strength—sixteen points—and the momentum of the twenty-pound axe, the thug’s neck was severed cleanly under the sharp blade. His head tumbled from the stump, rolling across the ground.

The last thug finally regained his senses. With a terrified cry, he spun and fled. Wang Ling gave chase, accelerating to close the distance. Before the thug could escape the alley, Wang Ling brought the axe down on his back, knocking him to the ground, then struck again at his neck, killing him.

Though Wang Ling’s physical attributes were high—bolstered by the Heart of Bikki—his average score was only about sixteen and a half. Facing three thugs, he could win, but all three carried switchblades; if cornered, he could easily end up wounded, perhaps even stabbed.

Instead, he lured them in, waited until their confidence peaked, then suddenly drew the pistol to dispatch one. In the shock that followed, and with the others unnerved by the sight of a firearm, he used the axe to kill another. The last, witnessing the swift deaths of his companions, would almost certainly flee—giving Wang Ling a perfect chance to hunt him down with accelerated speed, leaving no possibility of escape.

Thus, aside from the three points of mental power spent on acceleration, Wang Ling suffered no other losses. The expended mental power would soon recover on its own.

This was Wang Ling’s first true experience of killing. During the fight, he hadn’t thought much of it, but as it ended—seeing the blood-soaked axe, the severed heads, and the headless corpses sprawled on the ground—an overwhelming sense of nausea rose within him.

It wasn’t pure disgust, but a mingling of fear, discomfort, and a trace of excitement—a feeling hard to describe, as though a heavy stone pressed upon his heart.

Worried the gunshot might attract unwanted trouble, Wang Ling forced himself to ignore his unease, wiped the blood from the axe onto one of the thugs’ shirts, and searched their bodies.

There was no time to count his loot; he gathered the contents of three wallets together, took the three switchblades, and quickly left the alley. Soon after, dark warriors arrived, drawn by the gunfire, and found the three thugs dead and mangled. They searched the surrounding buildings in fury, but Wang Ling was long gone.

The restaurant owner was naturally questioned and revealed that the thugs had chased an Eastern youth away. But the facts were clear: one died from a gunshot to the forehead, two were killed with an axe. Could a frail Eastern boy possess a firearm? In this world, guns were precious—ordinary dark warrior leaders didn’t even own them!

The warriors surmised that the Mafia, once driven out of New York, had returned for revenge.

Regardless of the dark warriors’ theories, Wang Ling was now two kilometers away, enjoying an American breakfast in a diner: a plate of scrambled eggs, three blueberry muffins—cup-shaped cakes filled with blueberry jam—a large mug of hot skim milk blended with mashed potatoes, and a small piece of fruit pudding.

To enjoy such food in the mission world, unlike in the Dream Space, required no points. Though this was a post-nuclear alternate world, transactions were still made in US dollars. From the thugs, Wang Ling had obtained $862, enough for over ten days if spent wisely.

The switchblades were plot weapons, impossible to take out of the world—like the chef’s knife from the Mario world, they were useless to Wang Ling and discarded.

Aside from money and weapons, Wang Ling found three address books and several business cards (note: in this world’s timeline, the year is 19XX—no cell phones exist). Among them was even a card for the local police chief, evidence that the station was already under the control of the dark warriors.

The address books contained only names and numbers, mostly likely extortion targets, and possibly important contacts. Unfortunately, Wang Ling couldn’t distinguish their significance by name alone. He quietly tossed the useless books into the diner’s trash, keeping three cards:

"Bad Kids" Dance Hall
"William"
"Sister Linda"

From the notes on the cards, Wang Ling learned that the Bad Kids Dance Hall was a base for the lower ranks of the dark warriors, located in an underground plaza near Mike Street. William was the immediate supervisor of the thugs, and Sister Linda was the leader of the female gangsters.

“Most likely, these two are the elite leaders mentioned in Main Task Three. Killing them would enrage the dark warriors’ upper ranks and draw pursuit,” Wang Ling mused. He decided not to target the elite leaders. After all, the time limit for this task was seven days, while the first and second tasks were only five days each.

“Attacking the dance hall would certainly kill many dark warriors, but alone, my efforts would be insufficient. If an elite leader is present, even with Wang Long summoned, the risk of failure is high—not worth the gamble. It seems… teaming up with the other four justice-aligned dreamers is the wiser course, though I have no idea where they landed.”

After all, New York was vast; finding four people among countless millions was nearly impossible.

“Comparing both sides, the justice faction has only the Double Dragon brothers; the evil faction is a massive organization—completely unequal forces. Since both sides have five dreamers, it stands to reason the justice dreamers possess a significant advantage in strength.”

After pondering for a while, Wang Ling finished his breakfast quickly, paid the owner eleven dollars, and left the diner.

In the next two days, dark warriors on Mike Street suffered mysterious attacks; eleven thugs and seven hoodlums were killed, their bodies dumped at street corners.

The commotion was enormous! Not only did the dark warriors’ supervisors—William for the thugs, Ropo for the hoodlums—rage, but personnel stationed on the street increased tenfold, with meticulous searches from house to house. Even ordinary residents of nearby blocks became aware the dark warriors had been hit on Mike Street.

It was late autumn in this world, the weather bitterly cold. A thin, ragged, black-faced street child with yellow hair covering his brows huddled at the corner of a newsstand, watching indifferently as several broom-headed thugs menaced a passerby.

This boy was Wang Ling—having dyed his hair yellow to avoid attention for his black hair.

With his spatial pouch holding the pistol and battle axe, Wang Ling carried nothing visibly, nowhere to conceal weapons. Combined with his stature and appearance, any dark warrior who saw him dismissed him as a suspect. In fact, even the vegetable sellers on the street had been questioned during these three days, yet Wang Ling had only been asked twice: “Did you see anything unusual or anyone strange?”

Wang Ling’s public slaughter and street corner corpse dumping were meant to draw the attention of any arriving dreamers.

Unable to determine where the dreamers had landed, he could only use such drastic measures to lure them in. If the evil dreamers appeared, he would kill them—he was confident, with cards up his sleeve. If it was a justice dreamer, he would see if cooperation was possible.

No matter how unreliable temporary allies might be, combined strength was always better than fighting alone. Facing the dark warriors, a solitary force was too limited; relying on his own power alone, even the main tasks might prove impossible.

After all...