Five yards ahead of the halted armored Maybach on the rain-lashed deck of the Yangtze River Suspension Bridge, the overturned thirty-ton gravel dump truck blocked all four westbound lanes like a jagged iron barricade.
Two hundred feet below the steel suspension cables, the dark river churned into frothing white whirlpools while crimson taillights and amber hazard lamps from stalled commuter cars stretched into the driving mist behind them.
At the apex of his forty-foot leap from the crushed truck cab, Lei Bao hurtled down through the freezing deluge straight toward the Maybach’s armored hood.
Barefoot and stripped to a tattered, oil-stained tank top, his skin was mottled with black bruises, and his eyes were bloodshot with wild, cornered fury.
For fifteen years, Lei Bao had ruled Jiangcheng’s construction underworld through raw violence. He had beaten contractors, crippled honest architects, and buried rivals in wet concrete. His ruthless reputation rested entirely on one terrifying weapon: his half-step Rank-Two cultivation and his family’s lethal Corrosive Iron-Sand Palm.
Now, his cartel was shattered. His bank accounts were seized. His enforcers were in chains. He had nothing left to lose.
“You destroyed my empire in three days, Lin Mo!” Lei Bao’s mid-air roar tore through the howling gale like a wounded beast. “You took my money, my yards, and my freedom! Tonight, you die with me on this bridge!”
He plummeted toward the Maybach like a falling boulder. His right palm was stained pitch-black from decades of soaking in poisonous iron-sand tinctures, radiating a foul, sulfuric heat that sizzled against the cold raindrops.
“Chairman, get down!” Tie Niu yelled, his eyes wide.
Tie Niu kicked the driver’s door open, drawing his heavy titanium baton with one hand and raising his Kevlar shield with the other.
“Guards, form a turtle shell!” Tie Niu commanded through his tactical radio. “Shield the Chairman with your lives!”
Around the Maybach, twenty young escort guards leaped out into the storm. Without a single second of hesitation, they locked their heavy riot shields together, forming an interlocking steel dome over the rear passenger door.
Inside the car, Lin Mo placed his hand on the door handle.
These twenty men are ready to take a lethal strike from a crazed martial maniac to protect me, Lin Mo thought deadpan. A good boss does not hide behind his security guards when he has the power to flatten the threat himself. It is bad leadership, and it is terrible manners.
“Tie Niu, stand down,” Lin Mo said.
His voice was calm and steady, yet it carried an undeniable resonance that cut through the thunder.
The twenty guards parted their shields.
Lin Mo stepped out onto the rain-slicked asphalt. The cold wind whipped his dark wool coat, but his expression remained relaxed, his hands resting lightly at his sides.
Lei Bao’s face twisted into a maniacal grin in mid-air.
“You arrogant little brat!” Lei Bao screamed, his voice thick with venom. “You think having billions in a bank account makes your skull bulletproof?! Take my life’s masterpiece!”
Lei Bao funneled every scrap of dark qi in his dantian into his right arm. The veins along his forearm bulged like black iron cords, swelling his hand to twice its normal size.
Ten thousand pounds of concentrated kinetic force, paired with corrosive bone-melting poison, whistled straight toward Lin Mo’s sternum.
At that split second, an earth-shattering tremor resonated deep within Lin Mo’s chest.
Over the past three weeks, Lin Mo had spent billions uplifting more than seven thousand honest souls. He had fed hungry couriers, saved ruined architects, healed wounded firefighters, and sheltered victimized families.
That boundless reservoir of pure, unblemished gratitude—the golden essence of seven thousand righteous people—detonated inside his energy meridians!
[BENEVOLENCE MERIT HARMONY DETONATION!]
[TOTAL ALLIES UPLIFTED: 7,150 RIGHTEOUS LIVES!]
[BREAKTHROUGH TRIGGERED: ADVANCING FROM RANK 1 ABSOLUTE PEAK TO RANK 2 EARLY MARTIAL!]
[TEMPERING SKELETON: CRYSTALLIZING BULLETPROOF IRON-JADE BONES!]
[FORGING MERIDIANS: AWAKENING INDESTRUCTIBLE TAICHU MERIDIAN ARMOR!]
A brilliant, jade-white luminescence flashed beneath Lin Mo’s skin.
Every bone in his skeleton, from his ribs to his vertebrae, absorbed the pure golden qi. The calcium and marrow transformed into a crystalline, jade-like structure denser than forged titanium. His skin hardened into an invisible mesh of bulletproof meridian armor.
Lin Mo did not dodge. He did not raise his arms to block. He simply stood tall and let Lei Bao’s full-power strike hit him square in the center of his chest.
CLANGGGGGGG!
The impact sounded like a twenty-ton steel wrecking ball slamming into a thousand-year-old bronze temple bell.
A circular shockwave blasted outward across the bridge deck, ripping sheets of rainwater into a white vapor ring twenty yards wide. The heavy Maybach rocked on its suspension, and puddle water flew into the air like glass beads.
Lin Mo did not budge. He did not take half a step back. His feet remained rooted to the wet asphalt like mountain granite. His black sweater did not even tear.
Lei Bao’s ferocious grin froze on his face.
The terrifying kinetic shockwave did not penetrate Lin Mo’s chest. Instead, under the unyielding laws of physical rebound, every single ounce of the ten-thousand-pound impact rebounded directly into Lei Bao’s arm!
CRACK-CRACK-CRUNCH!
A sickening chorus of bone fractures echoed through the storm.
Lei Bao’s iron-hard fingers snapped backward at ninety-degree angles. His wrist joint exploded into powder. His radius and ulna shattered into four splintered fragments, piercing outward through his bloody skin!
“AAARRRGGGHHH!”
Lei Bao let out a high-pitched, curdling shriek of pure agony. He staggered backward, clutching his ruined, dangling right forearm with his left hand, his face twisting into an expression of sheer, uncomprehending horror.
“My hand... my Iron-Sand Palm...” Lei Bao gasped, trembling violently. He stared at the calm twenty-two-year-old billionaire before him as if looking at a prehistoric monster. “You took my full-power strike... without taking a step?! Rank-Two Early Martial... Iron-Jade Bones?!”
Lei Bao fell to his knees in the freezing rain, coughing up mouthfuls of black blood.
“Impossible...” Lei Bao wheezed, his voice choked with terror. “Even the grand elders of the ancient martial sects in the Kunlun Mountains spend seventy years drinking spirit elixirs to temper Iron-Jade Bones! You are just a spoiled rich kid! How can your skeleton be harder than forged alloy?!”
Lin Mo looked down at the ruined cartel boss, his expression deadpan.
People spend seventy years freezing on mountain peaks to temper their bones, Lin Mo thought. All I had to do was buy tower cranes, pay honest masons daily cash, and build public libraries for teachers. Philanthropy is clearly much more efficient than meditation.
“When you build your strength on extortion and poisoned sand,” Lin Mo said calmly, “your bones will always be brittle.”
Lei Bao bared his bloody teeth. In a final desperate move, he drew a hidden spring-loaded dagger with his left hand and lunged toward Lin Mo’s knee.
Lin Mo did not even shift his feet.
He casually swung the back of his right hand.
THWACK.
The backhanded slap carried the effortless, overwhelming weight of Rank-2 Early Martial power.
The blow caught Lei Bao flush across his jaw. The two-hundred-and-twenty-pound cartel boss flew sixty feet through the rain like a discarded rag doll.
CRASH!
Lei Bao landed hard on the hood of an arriving dark-blue SWAT command vehicle, caving the reinforced engine hood inward by four inches. His dagger clattered away onto the wet bridge.
SWAT Captain Zhou leaped out of the passenger side, flanked by eight tactical officers with carbines raised.
“Do not move!” Captain Zhou roared, pinning the dazed, weeping cartel boss to the crushed hood with heavy steel handcuffs.
Captain Zhou looked up, seeing Lin Mo standing in the rain, completely untouched.
“Chairman Lin!” Captain Zhou said in astonishment. “Are you injured? Did this maniac strike you?”
“I am fine, Captain Zhou,” Lin Mo said, wiping a few stray raindrops from his lapel. “His hand slipped. Take him in.”
Captain Zhou shook his head in absolute bewilderment, gesturing for his paramedics to wrap the screaming criminal in restraints.
“When Lei Bao escaped the quarry raid, he stole this thirty-ton dump truck and crushed three police cruisers,” Captain Zhou said, wiping rain from his tactical goggles. “We thought he would hijack a barge across the border. We never imagined he would stage a suicide ambush here. You saved dozens of innocent drivers on this bridge, Chairman Lin.”
“Our city is safer without him,” Lin Mo replied with a nod.
Captain Zhou and his officers dragged the broken cartel boss into the armored paddy wagon. “Lei Bao has terrorized Jiangcheng’s construction trade for fifteen years. Tonight, the Black-Sand Cartel is completely erased from this city.”
Lin Mo turned back toward his Maybach.
Standing around the car, twenty young guards of the Righteous Iron Guard stood in a defensive perimeter, their Kevlar shields raised and their faces pale with relief. When Lei Bao had leaped from the truck, every single one of them had stepped forward to take the blow for Lin Mo.
[TARGET GROUP: COMMANDER TIE NIU & 20 RIGHTEOUS ESCORT GUARDS]
[AVERAGE GOODNESS SCORE: 93/100 — WILLING TO SACRIFICE LIVES TO DEFEND HOST]
[LOYALTY RATING: ABSOLUTE]
A loyal escort who steps into the path of an External-Martial striker deserves more than words of thanks, Lin Mo thought deadpan. A hundred thousand yuan in hazard pay ensures they can buy homes for their families. And the system ensures I make money doing it.
Lin Mo pulled out his phone and turned to Su Wan, who was stepping out of the car with an umbrella.
“Su Wan, issue an immediate hazard bonus,” Lin Mo said. “One hundred thousand yuan cash to each of the twenty escort guards who stood on this bridge. Total expenditure: two million yuan.”
Su Wan smiled warmly and tapped her phone.
BEEP.
A bright, triumphant chime rang out deep within Lin Mo’s mind:
[Ding! Detected spending of ¥2,000,000.00 RMB on Commander Tie Niu and 20 Righteous Escort Guards!]
[Target Integrity Verified: Absolute loyalty and courageous protection of the Host.]
[Triggered 100x Pure Benevolence System Refund!]
[Received Cash Refund: +¥200,000,000.00 RMB!]
[Funds deposited directly into Host Personal Liquid Vault!]
[Personal Liquid Vault: ¥34,052,180,000.50 RMB!]
[Benevolence Merit Points: +200,000 BMP!]
[Good People Network Expanded: 7,200 verified righteous allies (+50: municipal rescue police and tactical medics)!]
Thirty-four point one billion yuan in liquid vault balance, Lin Mo thought, feeling the warm, crystalline strength of his Iron-Jade Bones humming through his limbs. Two hundred million profit for handing out bonuses to men who risked their lives for me. Generosity is the only investment where you cannot lose.
The twenty guards slammed their fists against their chests in a crisp, thunderous salute.
“Thank you, Chairman Lin!” the men roared into the storm.
Tie Niu stepped up, opening the rear door for Lin Mo. His dark eyes brimmed with profound awe.
“Chairman... your martial cultivation...” Tie Niu said in a low, respectful whisper as he started the engine. “In ancient military records, Rank-Two Iron-Jade Bones can deflect high-caliber rifle rounds and repel lethal toxins without harm. Your skeleton has become an indestructible divine vessel. When our Nine-Palace Vitality Array tops out at the Sky-Tower, your resonance with the earth qi will be ten times stronger.”
“Rank is just a tool to protect good people, Tie Niu,” Lin Mo said with a faint smile, leaning back against the leather headrest. “Let us head back to the Sanctuary. Master Lu has an eighty-eight-story tower to finish.”
Before Tie Niu accelerated down the ramp, a grand, golden notification window expanded across Lin Mo’s vision, accompanied by a celestial chime that echoed through his soul:
[MAJOR MILESTONE ACHIEVED: BLACK-SAND CARTEL ANTAGONISTS FULLY NEUTRALIZED!]
[BLACK-SAND CARTEL & ZHAO CONSORTIUM CONSTRUCTION MONOPOLY DESTROYED!]
[HOST CULTIVATION SECURED: RANK 2 EARLY MARTIAL (IRON-JADE BONES & BULLETPROOF MERIDIAN ARMOR)!]
[CONGRATULATIONS HOST: SYSTEM UPGRADE UNLOCKED!]
[ACTIVATING: RANK 2 METROPOLIS TYCOON PRIVILEGES!]
[NEW CAPABILITY UNLOCKED: 10,000-METER METROPOLITAN VITALITY RADAR!]
[NEW CAPABILITY UNLOCKED: DEEP MORALITY & FRAUD FORENSIC SCANNER!]
[COUNTDOWN INITIATED: 48 HOURS UNTIL TAICHU SANCTUARY SKY-TOWER TOPPING-OUT CEREMONY!]