Zhou Ziwei then briefly examined the building and found that none of the hundreds of jade pieces stored there had been missing, but they had all been roughly searched.
It seems that the blood-red figure was quite alert. When it sensed its presence rapidly approaching, it didn't dare to linger for even a moment. If that guy had any greed for these jades, he would probably have already been trapped inside the building by Zhou Ziwei and wouldn't have been able to escape.
Zhou Ziwei recalled some relevant information he had gleaned from the Mita family in Japan, and the appearance of Ito Koji, the most likely young man to inherit the Blood Shadow's soul. He narrowed his eyes and remained silent for a moment before suddenly opening them. He turned around and rushed out of the exchange, pulling out his phone and hurriedly asking Wu Di for information about Qiao Mulin's address and company location.
Who knew that Wu Di didn't know much about Qiao Mulin, a businessman who seemed to have some background but didn't actually have much power in the local area. He had to have his subordinates investigate further before he learned the details.
After obtaining the approximate location of Qiao Mulin's residence, Zhou Ziwei immediately informed Wu Di of the situation and asked Wu Di to send some more people to dispose of the bodies. Then, without hesitation, he activated his force field space and appeared near Qiao Mulin's villa in the western suburbs of the county town at a speed that was almost like teleportation.
Then, Zhou Ziwei unabashedly unleashed a strong killing intent and strode recklessly toward the seemingly heavily guarded villa gate.
Before they even reached the villa's entrance, Zhou Ziwei's face contorted rapidly, transforming him into a completely different person.
Zhou Ziwei still needs to manage his Zhou Group, so if he were to go on a killing spree at this time, he would have to put on a different face to avoid ending up as a wanted criminal, which would be extremely bad.
"Qiao Mulin, you get the hell out here."
Zhou Ziwei knew, of course, that Qiao Mulin was not Xueying. However, Qiao Mulin acted so tough in front of him today, and seemed to have a great reliance on him. This made Zhou Ziwei wonder where he got such audacity. So after learning that Xueying was secretly causing trouble by his side, he immediately thought that Qiao Mulin's reliance was very likely that mysterious and vicious Xueying.
Under Zhou Ziwei's shouts and curses, the entire villa suddenly became a commotion. More than a dozen thugs rushed out of the villa carrying batons and sticks. When they looked up and saw a hideous face with pockmarks on it, as if someone had just splashed sulfuric acid on it, they couldn't help but shudder. Then they mustered up their courage and started shouting and cursing again.
At this moment, Zhou Ziwei deliberately put on a rather unusual act, allowing the cameras on the villa wall to clearly capture his current appearance. He then said in a very hoarse voice, "Where is that idiot Qiao Mulin? I'm going to take his life... You bunch of bastards, if you don't want to die, get the hell out of my way."
"Where did this ugly bastard come from, daring to insult our boss? You're asking for trouble, aren't you?"
Although the bodyguards and thugs found Zhou Ziwei's appearance somewhat intimidating, they wouldn't easily back down given the sheer number of people in his group. They exchanged glances, one of them picked up a walkie-talkie to report the situation at the door, while the rest charged directly at Zhou Ziwei without hesitation.
Their boss is not a generous person. Since this guy has insulted their boss in public, even if the boss were here, he would definitely have him beaten half to death before interrogating the guy about his identity and background.
The dozen or so bodyguards were just ordinary people with some brute strength. Against them, Zhou Ziwei didn't even need to use any special abilities. He simply used brute force to charge at them and quickly beat them to pieces, leaving them crying and screaming on the ground.
Zhou Ziwei didn't indiscriminately slaughter these henchmen. After taking them down, he immediately started walking step by step into the villa again, and roared in a sinister voice, "Qiao Mulin, you idiot, get out here right now."
Qiao Mulin, of course, was not so obedient, and his only response to Zhou Ziwei was a series of crisp gunshots.
Qiao Mulin was never a peaceful person to begin with. How could he possibly run a jadeite rough business here without any armed forces?
However, the weapons he possessed were nothing more than ordinary pistols, not even a semi-automatic rifle. This level of firepower was practically nothing more than a tickle to Zhou Ziwei.
In order to put some psychological pressure on the other party, Zhou Ziwei did not dodge at all, and stepped forward step by step, letting the flying bullets hit his body like raindrops, but it did not stop his progress in the slightest.
In fact, as soon as Zhou Ziwei entered the villa, he used the soul power he released to detect that Qiao Mulin was not in the villa at the time. He guessed that since Qiao Mulin had broken his arm that morning, he was probably still in the hospital receiving treatment.
However, Zhou Ziwei's real target at this moment was not Qiao Mulin, so he slowly approached the villa, while using his soul power to scan the bodies of everyone in the villa and investigate the abnormalities they exhibited.
He continuously released the invisible pressure from his soul, believing that... under this pressure, if the blood shadow were hiding here, it would soon reveal its weakness.
"Ahem... Sir, what brings you to see my boss?"
Just as Zhou Ziwei was searching around, the bullets that had been fired from all directions gradually stopped firing. Then, a pale-faced middle-aged man, coughing incessantly, slowly walked towards Zhou Ziwei with weak and feeble steps.
Zhou Ziwei turned his head to look at the middle-aged man with the strange expression, then suddenly felt a wave of confusion wash over him. A voice seemed to be constantly repeating in his mind, "You're tired, you need to rest... Sleep! Get a good night's sleep... and all your troubles will pass..."
Volume 2 The Assassin's Nightmare Chapter 330 You'll Get Yours Too
As the hazy voice in his mind kept repeating itself, Zhou Ziwei felt his eyelids getting heavier and heavier, and his body subconsciously felt extremely tired. He really wanted to lie down on the spot and have a good sleep.
However, the moment this feeling arose in his mind, Zhou Ziwei was immediately startled. The pure soul power in his sea of souls surged, instantly expelling this inexplicable feeling.
Zhou Ziwei then remembered that Luan Yuqing had once said that when she was captured by Qiao Mulin, someone hypnotized her and almost made her reveal her secrets.
At the time, Zhou Ziwei didn't pay much attention to it. After all, even an ordinary person like Luan Yuqing could wake up at a critical moment under that person's hypnosis, so that person's hypnosis skills must not be that great.
However, Zhou Ziwei was greatly surprised when he encountered this person who was skilled in hypnosis. This person had almost hypnotized him, so this person's hypnosis skills must be extremely powerful.
If Zhou Ziwei hadn't recently mastered the technique of liquefying soul power and possessed the Bullet Head and the Heart of Flame, two treasures that could replenish his soul power by more than ten times in a short period of time, then encountering this guy today might have really led to a major setback...
It's important to understand that so-called hypnosis is simply a special skill that affects another person's mental world; it can even be understood as an attack method similar to a soul's roar.
However, this hypnosis is far less violent and intense in its damage to enemies than Soul Roar, but it is more subtle and eerie.
Zhou Ziwei's soul power was so immense that it was almost ten thousand times that of an ordinary person, yet even he was almost controlled by that person's hypnosis, which shows just how terrifying the hypnosis was.
Fortunately, the hypnosis technique could only have a slight effect when Zhou Ziwei was completely unprepared. Now that Zhou Ziwei knew the other party's tricks, this move was naturally no longer effective against him.
Although Zhou Ziwei's mind had completely returned to normal, he did not show it at all. The moment he regained his senses, he had already made up his mind to simply play along and pretend to be hypnotized. Perhaps this way he could lower the other party's guard and make it easier to lure out the big fish that might be hiding in the dark.
Zhou Ziwei had just scanned the entire villa with his soul power, but he did not find Qiao Mulin or Ito Koji, who might be the reincarnation of the Blood Shadow.
Since the main target isn't here, even if he displays his might and fights his way in, he can only kill a few more small fry at most, which won't do him much good.
As the eerie light in the eyes of the gloomy middle-aged man opposite him grew stronger, a dazed and confused look appeared on Zhou Ziwei's face. Then his eyelids slowly closed, his body gradually went limp, and he collapsed directly in the courtyard of the villa.
"Stop—no one is allowed to fire again."
Seeing that Zhou Ziwei had finally succumbed to his hypnosis, the middle-aged man with a gloomy face let out a long sigh of relief. He took out a snow-white handkerchief and gently wiped the fine beads of sweat from his forehead, secretly filled with fear.
What powerful mental strength!
The middle-aged man, his face grim, muttered to himself, "Luckily, I just received guidance from that ninja a few days ago. This allowed me to grasp the solution to a problem I'd been unable to solve before, significantly enhancing the effectiveness of my hypnosis. Otherwise, I probably really wouldn't have been able to subdue this person this time..."
In fact, when the first soul suggestion he sent into the other person's mind was instantly shattered by Zhou Ziwei's soul power, the guy had already suffered considerable damage, and his mental strength had been slightly affected by the backlash.
However, the gloomy-faced middle-aged man also knew that the person who had come to their door was a rather troublesome character. This person was not even afraid of bullets. If his hypnosis was also ineffective, then everyone here would probably be in dire straits.
Left with no other choice, the gloomy-faced middle-aged man had to risk having his spiritual power backfire and dissipate, as if it were free, he unleashed all the potential he had painstakingly cultivated over the past few days, desperately channeling it into Zhou Ziwei's sea of souls, temporarily using this powerful spiritual force to gradually control Zhou Ziwei's body.
Little did he know that the spiritual energy he later channeled into Zhou Ziwei's soul sea was completely enveloped by Zhou Ziwei's pure soul power. Although it didn't immediately rebound, it was completely isolated and would no longer have any impact on Zhou Ziwei's mind.
In any case, Zhou Ziwei's sea of souls was extremely vast. The middle-aged man's spiritual power was quite strong compared to ordinary people, but for Zhou Ziwei, it was just a drop in the ocean.
It's just a matter of creating a little space to isolate the middle-aged man's mental energy, which is naturally not a problem for Zhou Ziwei.
The middle-aged man, having exhausted his mental energy, also felt dizzy. He quickly waved his hand, ordering several thugs to come forward, lift Zhou Ziwei up, and throw him into an empty room in the villa.
"Mr. Zhu, this kid just injured so many of our people, shouldn't we give him a special treat and teach him a lesson?"
After throwing Zhou Ziwei into the room, one of the thugs, all smiles, bowed and scraped to the middle-aged man and said, "How about we break one of his legs first, and see if this kid dares to act tough again?"
Upon hearing this, Mr. Zhu glared fiercely at the thug, snorted, and said, "Your brother was one of the people injured by that kid just now, right? I'm warning you... that kid is not someone to be trifled with, so don't you dare mess with him. I only managed to control him with all my might. If you were to physically torture him and bring him back to his senses, would you bunch of good-for-nothings be able to stop him?"
"Didn't you see that just now? That guy's martial arts skills are so strong that even bullets couldn't hurt him. I bet even if you broke both his legs, he could still easily take you down. And with such amazing skills, he must have an extraordinary background. We can't just kill him like this before we figure out his background."
"So you'd better put away those crooked ideas for now! Nobody is allowed to touch that kid until the boss or Mr. Ito comes back. Hmm... but we also need to be careful he doesn't wake up on his own. So find some sturdy handcuffs and cuff his hands and feet tightly. But be careful when you do it, try to be gentle, and whatever you do, don't let him wake up, understand?"
The thug nodded repeatedly upon hearing this. Recalling Zhou Ziwei's ferocious appearance when he rushed into the villa, he couldn't help but shudder. He had no choice but to suppress his hatred for the time being. Following Mr. Zhu's instructions, he first used several pairs of handcuffs to cuff Zhou Ziwei's hands and feet to the iron pipes in the corner of the room. Only then did he feel slightly relieved. He then arranged for several people to keep a close watch on the door and outside the windows of the house, not daring to be careless in the slightest.
Zhou Ziwei overheard their conversation from inside the room and sneered inwardly.
As expected... the powerful backer that Qiao Mulin relied on must be Ito Koji, the inheritor of the Blood Shadow.
Since Ito Koji hasn't returned yet, I'll just wait for him here for a while. Speaking of which, that guy's burrowing skills are really a headache. If it were a head-on collision, Zhou Ziwei wouldn't be afraid of him, but that guy is a born ninja turtle. As soon as he senses danger, he burrows underground, making him really hard to catch.
But this time... when Ito Koji sees Zhou Ziwei hypnotized and handcuffed here, his wariness will probably be slightly reduced, right? And when that happens, as long as Zhou Ziwei has the opportunity to pick up that guy, Zhou Ziwei is absolutely confident that he can kill him.
Of course, if Zhou Ziwei were to use his Soul Roar, which can attack a wide area, he would be very confident in directly blasting that guy's soul away.
However, Zhou Ziwei's soul roar seems to have increased in power without him even realizing it. If he's not careful, he might injure many innocent people in this densely populated area. Furthermore… Zhou Ziwei has long coveted Blood Shadow's burrowing technique. If he could absorb Blood Shadow's soul directly… that would be the most wonderful thing. Anyone who can be called one of the world's top ten assassins must have a unique skill; it would be such a waste to have them destroyed so easily.
Zhou Ziwei was already quite frustrated by his failure to devour the giant's soul last time, and he absolutely couldn't afford to fail again this time. With nothing else to do, Zhou Ziwei, unaware of when Ito Koji would return, began studying the wisp of spiritual energy that originally belonged to Mr. Zhu, which was now enveloped by his own soul power.
In Zhou Ziwei's perception, this extremely aggressive spiritual power, strictly speaking, could clearly be considered a type of soul power. However, it should be a mutated form of soul power. Its origin was no different from that of soul power, but the characteristics it exhibited were completely different.
This is similar to how diamonds and charcoal are both elemental substances composed of carbon, but their atomic arrangements and bonding methods are different. Therefore, they form completely different substances.
One is dazzling and expensive, the other is dark, ugly, and cheap. The difference is so great that it's hard to imagine that these two things are made of the same element.
Zhou Ziwei tried to study the spiritual energy by wrapping it with his own soul consciousness for a long time, but he still couldn't find any results.
It seems that the formation of this mutated soul power requires extremely strict conditions, and Zhou Ziwei had absolutely no understanding of this before. It would be a miracle if such haphazard research could produce any results so easily...
If analyzing such mutations were so easy, someone would probably have been able to turn charcoal into diamonds long ago.
After studying it for a while, Zhou Ziwei realized that he was wasting his time. Rather than doing such useless work, he might as well just devour Mr. Zhu's soul and everything would become clear.
This is Zhou Ziwei's unique skill, so why wouldn't he take this shortcut? If Mr. Zhu hadn't provoked Zhou Ziwei, it would have been fine, but now that the two sides have made it clear that they are enemies, how could Zhou Ziwei be merciful and let go of such a good opportunity?
Time passed second by second, and finally, after more than half an hour, Zhou Ziwei's hearing, which had been amplified tenfold, accidentally caught an extremely faint sound drifting into the villa.
Because of the fact that the Blood Shadow's senses were exceptionally sharp, the last time Zhou Ziwei rushed back to the exchange, he was only a few seconds away from being escaped by that guy.
Therefore, Zhou Ziwei dared not easily release his soul power to probe the outside situation again. Otherwise, if that guy could even sense his soul power, then all his self-inflicted injury would be for nothing. So Zhou Ziwei could only use his most basic hearing to capture all information from the outside world.
With hearing ten times sharper, Zhou Ziwei could detect even the slightest sound within dozens of meters, something that no other keen sense could detect. That's why he chose this method. The faint sound was like a gentle breeze passing through the courtyard, but Zhou Ziwei could tell that this gentle breeze was completely opposite to the natural wind direction outside. This, of course, did not escape his ears.
"Why does it smell so strongly of gunpowder here? What just happened?"
A distinctly stiff, indifferent yet sinister voice suddenly rang out from another room, more than ten meters away from Zhou Ziwei's room. Although the voice was very faint, it was still crystal clear to Zhou Ziwei's ears, thanks to his full attention.
"Ah... Mr. Ito, you're back."
Mr. Zhu's voice then echoed from the room, clearly tinged with awe and fear. He must have been resting there when someone suddenly and silently crept up to him; it would be strange if he wasn't terrified…
"Answer my question, my patience is very limited!" The sinister tone clearly showed some anger, as if the speaker was holding back a rage.
"Yes, yes, yes... Mr. Ito..." Under the man's intimidation, Mr. Zhu's voice trembled slightly as he hurriedly explained what had just happened and also told Mr. Ito where Zhou Ziwei was being held.
"Hmm? Ruthless... He has superb martial arts skills, even bullets couldn't hurt him, yet you managed to take him down with your hypnosis?"
Mr. Ito clearly had some doubts about Mr. Zhu's words. From Mr. Zhu's words, he could easily figure out who the person who broke into the villa was. But if... the person was really the mortal enemy he imagined, with his ability to be among the world's top ten assassins, how could he have been so easily defeated by a hypnotist who was only slightly talented?
Could it really be that the other party was careless for a moment and ended up losing in the gutter?
Ito dared not trust anyone's words. Upon hearing this, he immediately snorted and said, "Take me to see," before transforming into a wisp of breeze and mysteriously disappearing from the room once again.
When Ito finally saw the room Mr. Zhu had pointed to, his expression changed slightly. He suddenly bent down and lay on the ground, listening carefully for a moment. Then he frowned slightly and suddenly waved his right hand. A wisp of blood-red mist immediately drifted out from his body.
The red mist emanating from its body formed a solid shape, almost like a tangible substance. Then, under Ito's command, it transformed into a wisp resembling a small snake, slowly swimming into the crack of the door to the room where Zhou Ziwei was.
Seeing the red mist spreading continuously in the small room, Zhou Ziwei sneered slightly, but his body remained completely still. Instead, he tried his best to draw a large amount of the soul power circulating normally in his body back into his sea of souls, allowing the blood-red mist to completely engulf him, making him as still as a dead man.
"Yoshi—" After carefully investigating, Koji Ito finally breathed a sigh of relief when he sensed that the person in the room was so weak that they seemed to be about to disappear at any moment.
He then patted Mr. Zhu heavily on the shoulder and said, "You did a good job, and with your abilities you actually managed to hypnotize that little kid... Hehe... Or maybe that kid deserved to suffer a bit. After this is over, I won't skimp on your benefits."
These two casual words from Koji Ito moved Mr. Zhu to tears. He immediately began to sing Koji Ito's praises endlessly, almost kneeling down and treating him as his living ancestor.
However, Ito Koji had no time to pay attention to this sycophant. Knowing that he would soon settle the feud that had lasted for two lifetimes, his heart stirred with excitement. Then, with a sinister smile, his figure transformed into a wisp of wind once more. No one knew how he did it; even though the windows were tightly closed, his blood-red figure appeared in the sealed room in a flash…
"Zhou Ziwei, is it? I know you're a master of disguise. This face can fool others, but it can't fool me... Hmph... You never thought you'd end up like this..."
The blood-red figure looked at Zhou Ziwei, who was lying diagonally against the wall, handcuffed in more than a dozen places, his life nearly extinguished, seemingly already in a deep sleep, and a sinister smile crept across his face…