Dragon Raja: Lu Mingfei finds a Freylian

"Where is Chisei now?"

"The young master is still in the central control room, his attention completely focused on the deep-sea submersible," the old man paused, "but he inquired about the shift schedule for Kuroda's team ten minutes ago."

Tachibana Masamune's fingers slightly clenched within his wide sleeves.

This adopted son was far too perceptive. Even with most of his attention preoccupied with the deep-sea operation, he still instinctively sensed the unusual airflow on the platform. Just like when he was a child living in the mountains, he could always sense the approaching storm.

"Where's that girl?" Tachibana Masamune turned to another screen. The surveillance footage from the VIP room was frozen, with Frillie's figure, sitting sideways by the porthole, frozen into a silhouette. But upon closer inspection, it could be seen that the book "Geological Structure of the Japan Trench" in her hand hadn't been turned for seventeen minutes.

“There was no unusual activity. But Kuroda…” The old man hesitated for half a second, “He marked ‘the protected person is in stable condition’ in the handover log, but wrote ‘reinforcements need to be confirmed’ in the encrypted remarks column.”

Signs that loyalty is beginning to waver.

Tachibana Masamune closed his eyes. Memories flashed by like a revolving lantern. Thirty years ago, a female commissioner from Kassel College with similarly light-colored hair stood under the torii gate of Itsukushima Shrine, smiling as she handed him a German version of "The Nibelungenlied".

“Mr. Masamune,” she said, “some things, once done, cannot be undone.”

She was right. So on that rainy night, he had no choice but to personally plunge the dagger into her heart.

"Once the Shadow Group arrives, have Kuroda's squad stand by in the lower B7 area." When Tachibana Masamune opened his eyes, the last trace of warmth in the depths of his pupils had vanished. "There are 'experimental wastes' that need to be disposed of there."

The old man's back tensed almost imperceptibly. Section B7 is the biological sample incineration area; the so-called "waste" never refers to physical items.

"Patriarch, Kuroda is a rare 'Kyoshin-ryu' successor among the third generation of the Executive Bureau. He is his grandfather."

“That’s why,” Tachibana Masamune interrupted him, his voice icy, “Kyoshin-ryu emphasizes ‘a mind as clear as a mirror, untouched by dust.’ Once a mirror has a crack, it can only be shattered and recast.”

He walked to the control panel, his fingertips tracing a dark red interface—an encrypted channel independent of the main platform system, directly connected to a signal source in the deep sea. Ancient hieroglyphs danced on the interface, dragon script codes that only descendants of the White King could fully decipher.

The sacrificial rites are ready.

"The blood offering is coming"

"The door is about to open"

Masamune Tachibana typed in reply: "Clear noise".

send.

Three kilometers below the seabed, the rhythm quickened.

How long until the Trieste makes contact with the gate?

"Nine minutes and forty-two seconds." The old man glanced at the timer. "According to ancient texts, it takes the sacrifice of three hybrids with bloodlines of A grade or above as 'keys' to fully open the door."

"Lu Mingfei is S-class, while Caesar Gattuso and Chu Zihang are both A+," Tachibana Masamune said calmly. "More than enough."

It's even a bit extravagant.

He glanced at Frillie's surveillance footage one last time. The silver-haired girl remained in the same pose, but if the image were magnified four hundred times, one could see her index finger resting on the edge of the book page, tapping very lightly in a certain rhythm—not Morse code.

What is she trying to connect with? It doesn't matter anymore.

“Tell the Shadow Group.” Tachibana Masamune turned around, the light of the eternal lamp casting a deep shadow on his face. “After the execution, remove the target’s right eye intact and freeze it. That old madman Flamel has a habit of etching miniature alchemical matrices into the irises of his students; they might be positioning beacons.”

Where is the body?

"Feed it to the Ghost-toothed Viper." Tachibana Masamune looked at the deep-sea monitoring screen, where countless tiny red dots were emerging from the crevices of the trench rocks. "The Ghost-toothed Viper's teeth can crush alloys and erase all traces of life."

The old man bowed deeply, and when he left, his footsteps were as light as a cat's.

Standing alone amidst the data stream, Tachibana Masamune reached out and touched the light spot representing the Trieste in the holographic projection.

"Ha. The White King's revival requires sacrifices, and your arrival is perfectly timed."

Outside the window, the moon on the sea was tinged with an ominous dark red. A blood moon night is a time for sacrifices.

...

The upper level of the Sumeru pedestal, the VIP area corridor.

Kuroda leaned against the wall, which was kept at a constant temperature of 20°C, trying to let the cold touch overwhelm his unease.

The corridor lighting system has just completed an automatic dimming cycle and is now in "nighttime alert mode." The main light source is off, leaving only the dim green emergency lights spaced five meters apart at the base of the walls. This light keeps the pupils constantly dilated, and prolonged exposure can cause a slight sense of spacetime distortion.

Kuroda stared at the fire extinguisher cabinet on the opposite wall, its door reflecting his distorted image. The initial training of the Kyoshin-ryu school begins with mirror observation. Not just looking, but "observing," until one can see the flow of one's blood and the trembling of muscle fibers in the mirror.

Now, what he sees in the mirror is a disordered pulse.

A female voice from the dispatch center came through the headset: "Third team, reinforcements have arrived at the E3 elevator lobby. Please proceed to make contact."

"Received," Kuroda replied, his hand resting on the hilt of his sword.

It was too punctual, almost unnaturally so. From the time he submitted his question about the shift to the arrival of reinforcements, the interval was exactly fifteen minutes, the standard response time for non-emergency orders from the platform's internal security unit. It was as perfect as if it had been rehearsed.

"Captain?" a young teammate behind him asked in a low voice, "Should we retreat?"

Kuroda glanced at the VIP room door. The light coming through the crack in the door was steady and even, but just thirty seconds ago, there had been an almost imperceptible fluctuation in the light, as if someone had walked past the door and briefly blocked the light source.

Frillie moved behind the door. What was she doing?

"You two stay here," Kuroda gestured, "I'll go make contact."

"But the regulations require..."

“That’s an order,” Kuroda interrupted him. “Stay on guard and don’t leave your post unless I return in person.”

The two team members exchanged a glance and nodded.

Kuroda turned and walked towards the end of the corridor. The elevator lobby was fifteen meters behind the corner.

He heard breathing. The three men were breathing in perfect sync, a breathing technique trained for stealth operations.

Chapter 449 Kuroda: Run, Miss Frillian!

Then Kuroda saw them.

They wore uniform matte black combat uniforms with subtle embroidery of the Snake Clan's crest on the cuffs, but the collar insignia were empty, lacking unit numbers and pedigree ratings. Their three faces, pale as wax under the dim green light, had features so perfectly proportioned they looked as if they'd been molded from the same template.

Their eyes are very different.

Kuroda had seen many dead people's eyes—during missions, in training accidents, even at the funeral of his senior, Kyoshin-ryu. The pupils of the dead are unfocused, without any focal point. But the eyes of these three people had a focal point, yet behind that focal point lay emptiness. Like delicate glass beads, they could reflect images, but inside they were completely empty.

"Captain Kuroda," the middle man spoke, his voice flat like a synthesized electronic voice, "I'm here to take over the mission."

“The document,” Kuroda said, reaching out his hand.

The other party handed over a tablet. The screen lit up, displaying a transfer order stamped with the Tachibana family crest electronic seal, complete with authorization code, timestamp, and the issuer's signature.

Perfect, so perfect.

Kuroda's fingers traced the edge of the screen, where an invisible bump marked the anti-counterfeiting mark of the Executive Bureau's internal equipment. This tablet was genuine.

But the transfer order itself.

He looked up at the other person and said, "I need to get final confirmation from Director Yuan Zhisheng."

"The transfer order has the highest priority," the other party said calmly. "The highest priority order does not require confirmation."

Yes, that's exactly what the regulations say. Kuroda handed the tablet back and stepped aside to make way.

Three people walked past him. Their footsteps were synchronized, like breathing, even the rustling of their clothes was in sync. As they passed, Kuroda smelled a very faint odor, not the smell of sweat or cleaning agents, but a fishy smell mixed with the sweet, fishy scent of formaldehyde.

It's like they just stepped out of a biology lab.

Kuroda's hand rested on the hilt of the sword. It wasn't an iaido, but a wakizashi. Thirty centimeters shorter, it was more suitable for performing the Kagami-ryu's shrinking-ground technique in confined spaces.

He counted their steps. One step, two steps, three steps...

The moment the third person passed by him, Kuroda moved. He pushed off the ground with his left foot, his body shifting half a meter to the side like a piece of paper, and then struck the other person's neck with his right elbow.

【Mirror Heart Style: Paper Kite】

This attack was enough to knock out an ordinary hybrid for more than half an hour. But the opponent only staggered half a step, turned his head, and looked at Kuroda with empty eyes. There was no anger, no surprise. Like a machine looking at a malfunctioning part.

“Identification: Defiance. Execute elimination procedure.” The other two turned around simultaneously.

Kuroda drew his sword. The instant the wakizashi was drawn, the emergency lights in the corridor flickered off for a moment as his "domain" opened. Having mastered the Mirror Heart Style to its highest level, he could create a weak energy field around himself, interfering with electronic devices.

The blade flashed, drawing a silver arc against the dark green background. The target was the throat of the man on the left.

The opponent didn't parry, or even dodge. The blade sliced ​​into flesh, but the sensation was strange. It wasn't the smooth cutting of blood and flesh; it felt more like cutting into wet rubber—there was resistance, but no blood.

Kuroda drew his sword and retreated.

There was no bleeding from the wound, only a small amount of dark yellow mucus seeping out. A few seconds later, the muscle tissue at the wound's edge began to twitch and close. Immortality? No, it's...

“Bio-modification,” Kuroda gritted his teeth.

He had heard of this project. The Snake Clan, codenamed "Shadow Warriors," used alchemy to modify dying hybrids, replacing damaged organs with artificial ones, at the cost of losing most of their emotions and self-awareness.

So that's what the so-called "shadow group" means.

Three men attacked simultaneously. There were no fancy moves, just the most basic thrusts, horizontal slashes, and downward cuts, but their coordination was flawless, sealing off all of Kuroda's evasive angles. And their speed was incredible. The blade grazed Kuroda's right shoulder, tearing his combat uniform and leaving a white gash on his skin—half a millimeter deeper and it would have drawn blood.

It's poisoned; the knife has been laced with poison.

Kuroda stepped back, his back pressed against the door of the VIP room.

"Ms. Frillie!" he shouted, "Let's go! Let's go now!"

A soft sound, like a book closing, came from inside the door.

Three shadow warriors closed in again. This time they changed their formation: two attacked head-on, while one circled around to the side.

Kuroda took a deep breath.

【Mirror Heart Style Ultimate Technique: Clear Mirror Still Water】

His sense of time was stretched. He could see the subtle chipping on every blade, hear the 47 Hz hum of the ventilation filter vibrating three meters away, and feel the blood flow in his veins with each pump of his heart.

And, inside the door behind her, the energy flow of Frillie was steady and profound, like an ancient well with no bottom.

She wasn't panicking. What was she preparing? There was no time to think about it carefully.

The knife on the left came first. Kuroda sidestepped, parrying with his wakizashi. At the same time, he kicked the knee of the man in front of him with his right foot, hitting him, but the man only swayed, as if he felt no pain.

The third knife stabbed from the lower right, at a tricky angle.

Kuroda managed to twist his body, the blade grazing his side. This time it cut through the flesh, the burning pain followed by a rapidly spreading numbness.

Neurotoxins.

He staggered, his back pressed against the door. His vision began to blur. But the training of Mirror Heart Flow gave him a brief heightened sense of awareness when he was on the verge of losing consciousness.

He heard it. In the distance, at the end of the corridor, the sound of his two teammates falling to the ground was faint, like sacks hitting the ground. Were they taken care of by the same Shadow Warrior? Further away, a low tremor came from deep within the platform, like a giant machine starting up. And beneath the sea, countless tiny, dense gnawing sounds could be heard. The Ghost-Toothed Viper was gathering.