With both hands bound, Leyu no longer had the strength to fight back.
Even if he had any tricks left, surely Mu Feihong had already anticipated them—this was one of the downsides of widespread Combat Technique use; once you made your move, everyone knew your playstyle, maybe even your Combat Technique's vulnerabilities and weak points. There was no such thing as a 'surprise attack.'
Awakener battles were just like playing an RTS game without any fog of war. Two Awakeners with the same Combat Technique were like players picking the same race; different Combat Techniques, different races.
Therefore, an Awakener fight was just a competition in micro-control, details, and comprehension!
The Combat Techniques in circulation now were all versions forged by countless heroes over hundreds and thousands of years. Their power levels were practically neck and neck, and none were truly superior to the others—if there really was a most powerful Combat Technique, everyone would just learn that one. "People aren't morons."
So, in the game of real-life combat, the balance between Combat Techniques was actually pretty decent. Awakeners started with about the same Spiritual Power, so if you lost, you just weren't as good as your opponent, just a noob, with no excuses.
Leyu exhaled, thinking "I guess this 'tutorial' ends here," then quietly said, "Let me go, it's over."
At that moment, the inside of Leyu's left knee suddenly took a hard kick. His knee buckled and he almost dropped to the ground!
"Mu Feihong, the hell are you doing!?"
"Kneel down for old Lin who died!" Mu Feihong pulled the rope tight, his voice bursting with anger and hate, "Kneel for the Academy!"
"Says who!?"
"Says me, because you're under my control right now! On your knees!"
Mu Feihong kicked hard again, and a wave of weakness shot from Leyu's knee all the way up his leg. If Leyu didn't have a high pain threshold and could override his body with sheer willpower, he would've been forced to kneel already.
Leyu was both shocked and furious. "In my whole damn life, the only time my knees ever hit the ground was crawling under the bed looking for my dropped phone. Now I'm supposed to kneel for this shit?"
"I've never even kneeled to my own parents, and you want me to kneel to this bunch of nobodies?"
"I'm not Qian Yuliu, I don't owe any of you anything ... Even Qian Yuliu himself doesn't owe you a thing!"
But right now, Leyu's right hand was tied by rope, and Mu Feihong had his left arm in a lock. No way to fight back!
As Mu Feihong landed another kick and it looked like he couldn't hold out much longer, a random fact suddenly flashed through Leyu's mind. Gritting his teeth, he pressed the four fingers of his right hand against his thumb—and snapped it!
Mu Feihong, thinking he still had Leyu controlled, suddenly felt the rope loosen in his hand and sensed something was off. But before he could react, Leyu's elbow smashed straight back into his temple!
Biting Battle Technique: Hong Tu!
Mu Feihong didn't even have a chance to change moves or block, instinctively throwing up a Light Shield to soak some of the blow. Sure, Mu Feihong couldn't "turn light into armor," but he could at least whip up a shield quickly in a pinch.
But how could a rushed block stand up to a perfectly executed Combat Technique counterattack? With one elbow, Leyu shattered the Light Shield. The raw force and surge of Light Energy hit Mu Feihong's head like a sledgehammer, leaving his ears ringing, his vision spinning, his whole body convulsing. With a guttural cry, he coughed up a mouthful of blood and collapsed.
Leyu looped the rope around his hands, tying them up so the old bastard couldn't go off again.
So, once the light settled and things snapped back to normal, bystanders saw this scene: Qian Yuliu straddling Mu Feihong, tying his hands up like he was some criminal, Mu Feihong trembling, unconscious, blood pouring from his temple, doubled over on his own puke and looking absolutely pathetic.
"Mr. Mu!"
"Qian Yuliu you bastard, you actually beat Mr. Mu like this!?"
"We'll take on these Statistical Department thugs with our lives!"
Bam! Bam! Bam!
As the students looked about ready to riot, the agents quickly fired warning shots to push them back, Chen Fu stepped forward to hold them off, and agents Zhou Guangshi and Zhu Junjie ran over to drag Mu Feihong away.
"You ... don't you feel any pain?" Mu Feihong suddenly asked, panting.
Leyu stared in surprise at Mu Feihong. "Even in my last life, taking a hit like that to the temple would leave most people messed up for a while, maybe even kill them. Not to mention, I juiced my elbow with some buffs—this would've smashed rock. But Mu Feihong, who just took an elbow to the temple, snapped out of being stunned in less than ten seconds?"
"Guess this world's people rocked some near-superhuman physiques, all thanks to Spiritual Power ..."
Leyu shook his head. The reason he managed to turn the tables just now was because he suddenly decided to dislocate his thumb, letting his right hand slip free of the ropes.
"Doesn't hurt," Leyu said, expression blank, snapping his dislocated thumb back into place, "Not even a bit."
Leyu flashed himself a thumbs up, confirming the finger worked fine.
Of course it didn't hurt. "Residual Blood Physique" was hands down his best investment since coming to this world: no fear, no pain, always cool as ice.
This thumb-breaking trick was probably something a lot of people here knew about, and Mu Feihong had likely guessed what Leyu did. But he'd never thought Leyu would go this hard.
Snapping your own thumb by brute force probably hurt ten times worse than kicking a table leg with your little toe. The hardest part was muscling through the pain and not flinching. "Pain isn't a human weakness; it's a survival trait. Because people could feel pain, they didn't do dumb shit, and avoided things that'd get them hurt—species that didn't fear pain got wiped out long ago."
Only a guy like Leyu, who could flatline pain, could pull off a last-ditch counter like that.
"Heh heh heh ... Old Lin, you sure did raise a hell of a student ..."
No way to tell if it was sarcasm or praise, Mu Feihong laughed as he was dragged into the car.
"Pack it up, Zhou Guangshi, Zhu Junjie, you two take people and head back to the Statistical Department. The rest of you come with me to the Ou-Liu house," Leyu dove into the car, telling the agents to hurry up, or the students would have them boxed in two minutes flat.
We're out, we're out.
The targets weren't all at the Academy. Some, like Ou-Liu and other military school grads, had already graduated, so Leyu and his crew had to go grab them at their homes or workplaces, tearing down the streets of Xingke City in their armored pickups.
"Statistical Department! Ou-Liu, come out!"
"Statistical Department is here on business! Gou Huo, you'd better give up quietly, or your family will get dragged down with you!"
"Statistical Department on the job ..."
Now these raids felt a lot smoother. Basically, as soon as Leyu and company stepped out of the vehicle—before they even flashed the warrants—locals would scatter, and targets were usually at home or at work. The agents only needed to yell a couple threats and the marks gave themselves up right away.
"Now this is the secret police I remember ... What the hell was getting mobbed by students at the Academy supposed to be ..."
"Qian Yuliu, Chen Fu, did you guys arrest all of Teacher Lin's other students too?"
While sitting in the car playing with the light, Leyu heard the just-captured young man suddenly ask in a harsh tone, so he answered offhandedly, "It was the Statistical Department, not just our work."
"Still, you did a hell of a job, huh? Heard Teacher Lin's death was on you."
"Eh, not that big a deal, you're exaggerating."
"Bullshit!"
The young man suddenly kicked the door, shoved his cuffed hands through, and grabbed Leyu's neck, face twisted up like a demon's, "How could you do this? How could you!?"
"Su Song, let him go!" Chen Fu strode over and nailed the kid with a glowing cross-toed kick, sending him flying meters away. The young man rolled down the road three or four times, leaving a bloody skid, and passersby dodged around, emptying the street in an instant.
"You ... you guys ..." the young man coughed as he got up, his voice trembling with fury and grief, "Qianzi, Chuzi, how did you end up like this!? Weren't we supposed to ... change the world together?"
Leyu paused, and suddenly the guy's info floated up from his memory.
Su Song—a grade below them, got close through Teacher Lin, especially tight with Qian Yuliu and Chen Fu. When Qian Yuliu and Chen Fu graduated, Su Song had said he'd follow them, that they'd change society together.
But now ...
"Su Song, we didn't want this either. We're just following orders, but Teacher Lin, he took hostages ..."
"You hear yourself, Chen Fu? Huh!? Following orders? Statistical Department tells you to kill and you just go, they tell you to eat shit and you'd eat it, huh! Oh, I guess you would, seeing as how you're just their dog now! A mutt! Guess I was blind, you're all bastards! Trash! ..."
Su Song's shouts faded. After a while, Chen Fu got in the driver's seat in silence.
Leyu said calmly, "Who's next on the list?"
"Feng Chuanliu, lecturer at Xingke National High," Chen Fu said.
Xingke National High ... Leyu raised an eyebrow. Wasn't that the very school Qian Yuya attended?