Era of Mist

Tokyo Wolf was at the same hospital as Xiaowei. Not many hospitals were still open in all of Tokyo, so there wasn’t much of a choice.

Shi Tiexin didn’t bring many people, just Ah Fei and a few errand boys. Combined with the men already stationed there to help Ah D, they could easily handle most situations.

Upon entering the hospital, he found the atmosphere even grimmer than before. The number of injured had increased significantly, jamming the hallways. From their clothes, mannerisms, and speech, Shi Tiexin knew that a good number of these new patients were Biker Gang members who roamed the streets.

Compared to the previous patients, these new ones were more severely wounded; severed limbs and crippled bodies were everywhere. Their expressions were numb and hopeless. No one was shooting the breeze; instead, many were crying softly to themselves.

Suddenly, he heard the frantic sound of running nearby. Shi Tiexin looked over and saw a group of people crowded around someone, shouting something urgent and heart-wrenching. But in a moment, those shouts turned into wails. Medical staff quickly pushed through the crowd and covered the bed with a white sheet. It was the hospital’s last act of mercy; they simply had no resources left for a rescue attempt.

SWISH. The body under the white sheet was wheeled away on a gurney. The hospital was overflowing, and anyone deemed beyond saving had to be cleared out quickly. Everyone accepted this; even those who had just been wailing raised no objections.

As the gurney passed Shi Tiexin, he raised a hand to stop the orderly. His underlings pushed the orderly aside. The orderly cooperatively took two steps back, keen to avoid a conflict with these men who were clearly bad news. Ah Fei, ever observant, eagerly reached out and lifted the white sheet for his boss.

Beneath the sheet lay a young woman—at least, her body was that of a woman.

As for her face… there wasn’t much of a face left to see.

Her features were wrapped in layer after layer of bandages, with large bloodstains seeping through. The bandages clearly didn’t cover all her injuries; wounds and burn marks were visible at the edges. The woman was perfectly still, already dead.

Shi Tiexin looked at the silent orderly. “What happened to her?”

Ah Fei immediately translated, though Shi Tiexin could already understand.

“Severe knife wounds to the face, followed by burns. Blindness, infection, lack of medicine and treatment… the result was inevitable.”

Shi Tiexin waved his left hand, and Ah Fei lowered the sheet. It fell back onto the deceased’s face, and blood seeped up from underneath, staining the raised areas a vivid red.

From the woman’s clothes, Shi Tiexin could tell she was one of Tokyo Wolf’s people. ‘It seems Tokyo Wolf didn’t just lose his own hands, but the lives of his men as well.’

Shi Tiexin continued on and soon found Tokyo Wolf.

He didn’t know Tokyo Wolf’s real name. On the streets, aside from Fujiwara Jizhen, everyone used nicknames and titles; real names were rarely used. But he clearly remembered Tokyo Wolf’s proud and untamable demeanor, the imposing way he moved with his large entourage.

But now, Shi Tiexin could hardly believe that the broken man sitting on a random mat by the hospital bathroom door was the same Tokyo Wolf.

Shi Tiexin stood before him and asked in a heavy voice, “Couldn’t get a room?”

Tokyo Wolf’s dry eyes twitched. He looked up, his gaze fixed on Shi Tiexin. His face was blank, yet it seemed to hold a thousand expressions. His eyes were vacant, yet they seemed to contain a whirlwind of complex emotions. After a long moment, he finally opened his mouth and uttered a sigh-like sentence in Japanese, his voice barely a whisper.

Ah Fei couldn’t help but lean in closer. “What did you say?”

Tokyo Wolf repeated himself, but his voice was even lower, like someone talking in their sleep. Before he could finish, his face twitched, and he began to sob silently, which then turned into suppressed, painful weeping.

If he still had his hands, he would surely be clutching his head and wailing. But he didn’t. All that was left of his arms were the roughly bandaged upper portions. With all his might, the short stumps could only cover his face, hiding his vulnerability and despair.

A master who had once been a big name on the streets was now just a cripple by a hospital bathroom door.

Shi Tiexin watched him, his expression complicated. But he didn’t offer any more words of comfort; it would be useless. With such devastating losses, there would be no more Tokyo Wolf.

But just now, Tokyo Wolf had said something. Ah Fei hadn’t caught it, but Shi Tiexin had heard it loud and clear.

“Defeated by an invader, no longer Japanese”—those were Tokyo Wolf’s exact words. Shi Tiexin figured he must be repeating what the attacker had said.

Who had defeated Tokyo Wolf?

‘Me.’

‘Come to think of it, Fujiwara Jizhen has likely met the same fate, because he, too, was defeated by the same person.’

‘Me.’

An “invader.”

This course of action and this tone of voice instantly reminded Shi Tiexin of a certain group of people.

He had a feeling this wasn’t over.

“Go find a nurse and ask if Tokyo Wolf’s severed arms are still around. If they are, bring them here, quickly!”

“Yes, sir!”

The underling sprinted off and returned a short while later, surprisingly fast.

“Boss, they actually have them! They were just sitting by the operating room door, propped up in a corner like a few pieces of firewood. I wouldn’t have even noticed if someone hadn’t pointed them out.” The underling came over, holding four bloody objects. The act of holding severed human limbs with his bare hands gave him a strange expression. After handing them to Shi Tiexin, he quickly and discreetly wiped his hands.

Shi Tiexin took the severed limbs, his expression unchanged as he examined them. Tokyo Wolf was right beside him, but he just continued his suppressed weeping, ignoring his own dismembered arms.

“Boss, you had them find the severed arms… are you going to work some magic and reattach them?” Ah Fei’s expression was a little excited. “That’s how it always happens in the novels I read. Are you going to show us what you can do today, Boss?”

Shi Tiexin gave Ah Fei a strange look. “What kind of garbage have you been reading? I don’t know medicine.”

“Then, Boss, why did you want these arms…”

“Quiet,” Shi Tiexin snapped, then silently stared at the four limb fragments in his hands.

Humans only have two arms, and Tokyo Wolf was no exception. The reason there were four pieces was because of a blade—a sharp blade. Looking at Tokyo Wolf’s wounds, Shi Tiexin could almost see the blade as it sliced down.

Although Shi Tiexin had never trained with weapons and couldn’t imagine the angle or technique of the strike, just looking at the severed arms told him one thing. It was definitely an incredibly sharp blade, sharp enough to cut a falling hair, and it was definitely wielded by someone who knew their way around one.

Shi Tiexin carefully inspected the wounds, searching for the trajectory of the cut.

Not long ago, this sharp blade had struck Tokyo Wolf’s hands. It sliced into his palm between the middle and ring fingers, then pushed through the carpal bones and wrist joint with unstoppable force.

The blade’s edge passed through the gap between the ulna and the radius, splitting Tokyo Wolf’s entire forearm into two vertical halves with the skill of a master butcher. Then, it sliced past the outside of his elbow, sending the half on the pinky-finger side flying.