A Guide to Humanity’s Extinction

[Hint: The remaining power currently available for the ”Thunder God” form — 30%.]

’One percent of power can maintain the fused lightning state for one second. Thirty seconds should be enough to deal with these players,’ Ke Mingqing thought silently. He looked up, meeting the player Lan Feng’s gaze.

The man from Hong Kong stroked his red hair and crossed his arms, sizing him up with amusement as if looking at an insignificant NPC in a game.

There were no surveillance cameras inside the Death Crow base. Coupled with the fact that Ke Mingqing had crushed his own phone, Heimeng shouldn’t have any way to monitor the scene.

Of course, even if Heimeng did have that ability, Ke Mingqing couldn’t afford to worry about it right now.

He had to go all out to carve a bloody path out of here.

”You guys delivering yourselves right to my door is a huge help. It’s hard to say who’s actually surrounding whom here...”

As he spoke, Ke Mingqing’s gaze swept over the six players surrounding him, memorizing their features one by one.

...

1. Player [Lan Feng]: A middle-aged man in a floral shirt, sporting spiky red hair and a nose ring.2. Player [Genkawa Tsuguo]: A thirteen- or fourteen-year-old boy in a hoodie, shorts, and a frog hat.

3. Player [Huang Haolong]: A tall, burly man entirely cloaked in a cape. The exposed muscles of his arms were knotted, bulging like small mountains.

4. Player [Zi Duoduo]: A purple-haired woman wearing a jumpsuit and headphones.

5. Player [Amemiya Shida]: A massive, obese man in a white martial arts uniform. His hair was styled in a bizarre triangular shape, much like a sumo wrestler’s.

6. Player [Wang Jingjing]: A buzz-cut woman in a black rider’s suit, tightly clutching a motorcycle helmet to her chest.

...

While Ke Mingqing observed them, the six players were simultaneously examining his ”data” through their player panels.

Of course, every piece of that information had been manually filled in by Ke Mingqing himself.

[Codename: Giovanni]

[Category: esper]

[Danger Rating: E Rank]

[Ability Description: Creates feces to drown opponents. He has used this move to bury countless superheroes and magical girls. He is the most terrifying figure within Death Crow.]

[Weaknesses: 1. Severe germaphobe; 2. Hates being told he only wears one attendant uniform and never bathes. In reality, his wardrobe holds several identical sets of the same uniform.]

”Ugh! Could this guy’s esper ability get any more disgusting?” Zi Duoduo said, covering her nose. ”I can smell it from all the way over here.”

”An E Rank super-human species really talks big,” Lan Feng said around his cigarette. His shoulders shook with laughter, dusting ash onto his floral shirt. ”A few days ago, we even had a near A Rank magical girl running for her life.”

Lan Feng paused, then asked, ”But two E Ranks together is quite a match. Are you two siblings?”

”What if we are?” Ke Mingqing asked.

Lan Feng grinned. ”We just want your sister’s heart. We’ll leave as soon as we take it. We can both take a step back, so don’t go smearing a pile of shit all over us.”

”An esper and a vampire can’t possibly be siblings anyway. Have some common sense, okay?” Genkawa Tsuguo said with contempt from beneath his frog hat. ”Isn’t there reproductive isolation between those two species?”

”Before we fight, I have one question. How did you find us?” Ke Mingqing asked, controlling Giovanni’s body.

”Dead men don’t need to ask so many questions,” Huang Haolong said coldly, his head bowed beneath his cape.

”Let’s finish him off early. I’m sleepy,” Amemiya Shida said, looking down and picking his ear. ”I need to get back to Japan and start up my martial arts class so my old man won’t get suspicious.”

”The vampire is still on his back, so don’t act recklessly,” Lan Feng said, a cigarette dangling from his lips. ”It’d be disastrous if we accidentally break her. We still need her heart—an intact heart.”

Zi Duoduo tilted her head. ”If her heart can make someone immortal, why doesn’t it work when it’s in her own body?” She looked around at the group. ”Don’t tell me you guys never considered this. Seriously?”

The other five players suddenly fell silent.

”Who knows?” After a while, Wang Jingjing, the buzz-cut woman who had remained completely silent until now, spoke up.

Clutching her motorcycle helmet, she said with an indifferent expression, ”All I know is that tagging along with you guys from so far away just to kill a single E Rank super-human species is really something else.”

In the next moment, Lan Feng suddenly lifted his head and said, ”Anyway, let’s lock them up first.”

With those words, a faint golden light flashed in his pupils. Immediately after, an overwhelming sound effect, exactly like a slot machine spitting out a jackpot of gold coins, swept across the area with a loud clatter.

The dazzling golden light surged toward him. Ke Mingqing instinctively raised his right arm to shield his face as his vision went black.

A moment later, when he regained his senses, he realized he was standing inside a space that resembled a casino. Slot machines, billiard tables, and various gambling devices stretched in every direction.

Magnificent chandeliers cast dazzling light from above. Every single gambling machine was ringing loudly as coins continuously spilled from the slot machine dispensers.

Ke Mingqing looked around, slightly startled. ’A spatial skill? I guess I was bound to run into one eventually.’

”Giovanni, where are we?” Bai Ziling was stunned, her red eyes darting around.

”Don’t worry, I’m here,” Ke Mingqing said softly. ”Don’t leave my side. Don’t take even a single step away.”

Bai Ziling clung to him tightly. ”Okay.”

[B Rank Player Skill — Casino Domain (Sucks all opponents within a hundred meters into a Casino Domain, lasting for 300 seconds.)]

[Skill Description: Within the domain, you will receive a special billiard cue and an inexhaustible supply of coin bullets. You can use the cue to shoot the spinning coins.]

Lan Feng tugged at the collar of his floral shirt and reached into his chest, unexpectedly pulling out a slender billiard cue. He stroked his spiky red hair and curled his lips to reveal a large gold tooth. With a snap of his fingers, a shiny gold coin instantly appeared in his right hand. The coin was engraved with the face of a handsome, suave man.

”No way, you’re using the Casino Domain to fight a mere E Rank?” Zi Duoduo shrank her hands into her sleeves and waved the empty cuffs. ”You really are a loser. Are all Hong Kongers this cowardly?”

”What do you know? This is to keep them from running away,” Lan Feng shrugged. ”I’m worried that while killing this guy, I might accidentally slaughter the little vampire too. The loss would outweigh the gain.”

”Aren’t you afraid that he’ll get angry and burst your casino full of shit?” Zi Duoduo stuck out her tongue and asked playfully.

”Could you be any more disgusting?” Wang Jingjing crossed her arms and sighed. ”Let’s finish this quickly and get out of here. Who knows if Kuroki Hitomi will bring that Red Name Player chasing after us.”

”How would she even know where we are to come chasing us? Ridiculous,” Lan Feng chuckled, hefting his billiard cue.

Huang Haolong, his face completely serious, tore off his cape to reveal a tank top and trousers. ”With so many items out there, there’s bound to be one that can track us. Don’t underestimate them.”

”At this point, none of the other players are our match. The Red Name Player is no exception... We just need to lock them in the Casino Domain and deal with them one by one,” Amemiya Shida stated.

Zi Duoduo turned her head to look at the fat man in the martial arts uniform and giggled mischievously. ”Hard to say. What if there’s a shit-making ability user among the other players too? What’ll you do if they burst your giant stomach with feces?”

Amemiya Shida’s mouth twitched, the flesh on his cheeks bulging as his expression darkened.

The rest of them laughed.

While they were busy bantering, Ke Mingqing suddenly turned his head and whispered to the girl on his back, ”Bai Ziling, count to three in your head, then jump off my back immediately. Otherwise, I might accidentally hurt you.”

”Okay, I’ll listen to you.”

Bai Ziling nodded gently. Rather than making a motion to jump upward, she slightly tightened her grip on Ke Mingqing’s shoulders, feigning a preliminary movement instead.

”Start counting now...”

Ke Mingqing whispered. He turned his head and swept his gaze over the six players, his eyes finally settling on Zi Duoduo and Huang Haolong, who were positioned closest to him.

The distance between him and those two was merely twenty meters.

’They’ve seen my super-human species panel, so they definitely believe I’m an E Rank. Subconsciously, they’ll let their guard down. I have to thin their numbers in an instant.’

Ke Mingqing’s eyes flickered as he thought, ’The number two puppet’s attributes are only half of my main body’s. Its stats might not even be as high as these players’, but it’s enough to deal with them.’

At that thought, he suddenly leaned forward slightly and bent his knees.

’At this distance... I can strike first.’

The moment his thoughts settled, Ke Mingqing blinked and exhaled a deep, scorching breath of white mist. His pupils were instantly flooded with lightning that shifted between blue and black, gleaming brightly in the dimness.

Immediately after, Bai Ziling moved.

The white-haired girl kicked off Ke Mingqing’s back, her agile figure leaping gracefully into the air. Her snow-white skirt fluttered and spun under the dazzling golden light.

In that moment, their consciousness seemed perfectly synchronized, like dancers sharing the utmost tacit understanding.

’Fused Lightning Form,’ Ke Mingqing commanded silently.

[Warning: You have consumed all remaining power and entered the ”Fused Lightning” Form — blue and black lightning merge, birthing the most extreme, most dangerous color!]

[Fused Lightning will moderately increase the player’s ”Agility” attribute. The intensity of the lightning has reached its absolute peak, and it possesses a partial ”Devour” characteristic.]

The battery icon in the upper right corner of his vision emptied in a flash, the green liquid representing his power vanishing without a trace.

In that split second, the pitch-black and deep-blue lightning clinging to his body gradually merged, transforming into an ink-like hue of black and blue.

The ink-like electrical currents rapidly surged across every inch of his skin, washing over his cheeks and rushing straight to the top of his head. At this moment, it wasn’t just his pupils that had changed; every single strand of hair on his head stood straight up.

The arcs of electricity flowed like liquid ink, violently expanding outward like the quills on a hedgehog’s back.

Controlling Giovanni, Ke Mingqing raised his head once more. His appearance was now starkly different from just moments ago.

For a single second, the six players in the casino stared at this scene, falling into a momentary daze.

’Slaughter the closest ones first.’

In the next instant, Ke Mingqing stomped his feet against the ground, transforming into a streak of black-and-blue lightning as he shot forward violently.

The thick, ink-like lightning formed a dense curtain, a sprawling spiderweb that enveloped every machine along his path.

All this occurred within a mere tenth of a second. Slot machines were torn to shreds one after another. Berserk arcs of electricity danced wildly in the air, causing the casino’s lightbulbs to flicker and pop.

Other than Lan Feng, the other five players present couldn’t even clearly track Ke Mingqing’s movements.

By the time they snapped back to reality, the young attendant, crackling like the Thunder God, had already appeared behind Zi Duoduo and Huang Haolong.

Absolute silence.

A deathly absolute silence instantly descended over the casino. At this moment, Ke Mingqing stood quietly behind two headless corpses, each of his hands gripping a severed head.

In Ke Mingqing’s grasp, the severed heads of Zi Duoduo and Huang Haolong bore the exact same expression:

— an expression caught halfway between shock and sheer blankness.

Clearly, these two hadn’t even had the time to react before their heads were violently relocated. It was a truly pitiful sight.

A moment later, amid a wild torrent of black-and-blue lightning, Ke Mingqing slowly raised his head, his electric pupils facing forward.

His eyes met Amemiya Shida’s, the two separated by less than three meters.

The snow-white martial arts uniform fluttered wildly in the gale whipped up by the electrical currents. For the very first time, a look of pure shock appeared on Amemiya Shida’s obese face, the fat on his cheeks trembling like ripples in water.

Meanwhile, not far away, Lan Feng was equally dumbfounded. He took off his sunglasses, gripping his billiard cue tightly as he muttered hoarsely, ”Lightning? Wasn’t his ability making shit?”

Standing beside him, Genkawa Tsuguo and Wang Jingjing were completely frozen as well.

The three of them took another look at the panel floating above Giovanni’s head.

[Ability Description: Creates feces to drown opponents. He has used this move to bury countless superheroes and magical girls. He is the most terrifying figure within Death Crow.]

In the very next moment, as if in deliberate provocation, a red player name slowly materialized above Giovanni’s head.

— [Jin Chengwu].

Those blood-red characters floated in midair, reflecting in the eyes of the remaining four players and causing their pupils to violently contract.

”A Red Name... Player?” Lan Feng said hoarsely.

”How is that possible?” Genkawa Tsuguo muttered.

”We’ve been tricked,” Wang Jingjing said, her expression gloomy.

Facing Ke Mingqing directly, Amemiya Shida was utterly speechless.

This brief moment of absolute silence wasn’t broken until a heavy thump echoed through the air—the sound of Zi Duoduo and Huang Haolong’s headless corpses collapsing onto the casino floor.

”Giovanni!”

At the same time, Bai Ziling, who had leaped into midair earlier, called out softly. She spun her body, kicked off the ceiling, and used the recoil to land firmly beside Ke Mingqing.

The young man and the white-haired girl stood back to back.

In that moment, Ke Mingqing casually used his intertwined black-and-blue electrical currents to obliterate the two severed heads in his palms. He muttered softly, ”Four left.”