Chapter 270 - 266: The Deathly Silent Building

Chapter 270: Chapter 266: The Deathly Silent Building

They passed through the jet bridge and collected their luggage. Despite their physiques constantly drawing stares at the airport, the trio remained unfailingly polite and could converse with everyone in fluent Japanese.

This was to be expected of Hanato Doichi, who was of Japanese descent, but the other two surprisingly also spoke with flawless accents.

The issue of language barriers had always been on the association’s radar, but it was consistently pushed to the back burner by more pressing tasks. The event that finally brought it to the forefront was the battle in the Hua Country Capital.

The stakes of that battle were so high that Dawn deployed all the elite combat personnel they could mobilize on short notice.

The selection criteria included the members’ work and family situations in their civilian lives, their psychological fortitude, and whether they were free from other assignments. Considering the danger of a first-time engagement with Demons, combat strength was also a major standard.

With close cooperation from the state machinery, they were given the green light on all fronts. The battle was undoubtedly a great success, but it also exposed a major problem: communication!

Magic Power is a precious resource. Every Magic Controller has a finite limit to the Magic Power they can contain, and this limit doesn’t change even when the power is channeled elsewhere.

Although Qin Xiaoxia’s Magic Power had a terrifying ability to devour Demons under certain conditions, if that engorged Magic Power returned to his body and exceeded his personal limit, he had only two choices: use it immediately or let it dissipate.

Under these circumstances, using multiple Magic Controllers to inject members with a crucial burst of Magic Power for survival was already a significant drain. Using it for a continuous-consumption ability like producing sound through magical vibrations would have been far too extravagant.

Don’t assume the members of the Silent Knight Order are all just muscle-bound brutes. Surpassing human limits is a comprehensive process, which naturally includes enhancements to memory and comprehension.

After that, language learning became one of the basic courses within the association. But the languages of Earth were nothing; the truly torturous part was learning Magic Patterns.

The idea that one cannot interpret Magic Patterns without Magic Power is only relative. While having Magic Power greatly accelerates the learning process, the ability to simply read them—not write them—is almost an innate, soul-based perk for an awakened Magic Controller.

But if you can’t write without Magic Power, does that mean you can’t read them at all? No! You can learn them by rote!

Forcibly interpreting Magic Patterns this way, however, placed a tremendous burden and agonizing strain on the mind.

Even then, you couldn’t perceive the pictorial information embedded within the Magic Patterns, but you could at least understand their literal meaning, receiving roughly 50 percent of the total information.

If you thought learning Magic Patterns without awakened Magic Power was for reading scrolls, you’d be dead wrong. The organization had specialists among the Magic Controllers who tirelessly translated countless scrolls into every language. If necessary, they could even expend Magic Power to let you "see" the entire contents of an original scroll face-to-face through a perceptual interface.

Learning Magic Patterns was, simply put, self-torture! That’s right—self-torture! The mental and spiritual kind!

Baru, living up to his privately-circulated moniker of "Demon Leader," had never given up on finding shortcuts to help members train their souls. Learning Magic Patterns as a "mere mortal" was one such method.

And people could endure such self-torture?

They could!

To become stronger!

The sense of collective honor forged within the group was something outsiders couldn’t possibly imagine. It was unbearable to watch your comrades, with whom you’d faced life and death, grow stronger while you remained stagnant. Moreover, the sense of accomplishment that came with every ounce of newfound strength was immense, especially when it was unleashed upon Demons.

Compared to this appallingly inhuman coursework, learning other languages from Earth was practically a vacation!

For this mission, in just over a month, Clooney and Zuo Zhongqiu—who already had a basic foundation in the language—had improved their Japanese to the point where they could live in Japan without any hindrance.

Perhaps it was their friendly attitude, or perhaps it was their somewhat intimidating presence, but even in the most crowded places, they didn’t need to push. The crowd would naturally part for them, almost as if making way for a beautiful woman.

In the taxi, gazing at the neon lights flashing by, Hanato Doichi remarked in Japanese.

"I haven’t been back in five years. My hometown doesn’t seem to have changed at all."

The driver was a small-framed, middle-aged man. He had been slightly nervous when three men built like Terminators got into his cab, but hearing Hanato’s words, he finally concluded that the two Asians were likely Japanese.

Most taxi drivers get bored on the job, so they like to strike up conversations with passengers. This is true all over the world, and Japan is no exception. However, some companies there had recently forbidden their drivers from initiating conversations, so when a passenger started one, it was all the better.

"East Great Capital has always been like this. Fast-paced, and the cost of living just keeps getting higher."

"Sir, besides prices, is there anything else to worry about? Like personal safety?"

This was, without a doubt, the trio’s primary concern. Taxi drivers were, at the very least, usually well-informed about local happenings.

"That’s not so bad, but there’s no shortage of extreme deviants who vent their stress in nasty ways. There are some cases the police still haven’t been able to crack..."

One thing led to another, and the conversation in the car flowed smoothly. By the time they got out in front of their hotel, the trio had managed to glean a good amount of information.

"Hanato, looks like Japan is still pretty peaceful. We’re lucky."

"Not necessarily. Some Demons are extremely stealthy and quite intelligent."

The three stood talking in front of the hotel, then suddenly turned their heads in the same direction at the same instant.

"Right," Zuo Zhongqiu added. "It seems things aren’t as calm as they appear."

In their line of sight, several police motorcycles tore down the late-night road at breakneck speed, followed closely by a string of speeding police cars, including two personnel carriers.

It was just a fleeting glimpse, but the three still managed to see that the officers in those vehicles were holding more than just low-powered police sidearms; some were carrying heavy firepower.

"Let’s go take a look!"

Once out of range of the hotel’s security cameras, they pushed off the ground. A faint KACHA was heard as a small piece of tile in front of the hotel entrance cracked, and the three figures blurred and vanished.

...

Around the East Dajing TV Station, a large number of police vehicles had already gathered in a short time. Among them were regular police officers as well as more formidable-looking special police forces.

On nearby rooftops, snipers were already in position. Multiple quarantine cordons had been set up around the perimeter of the TV station.

Fortunately, the building still had a large plot of its own land—a rarity in a city like East Great Capital where land is worth its weight in gold—giving the police an ample buffer zone.

However, nearby residents had not yet been notified to evacuate. In response to public inquiries, the police were mostly saying they were pursuing a surrounded fugitive.

The authority of the Special Incidents Division in Japan was even more hamstrung than its counterpart in France had been. Even if they wanted to establish a wider buffer zone, they were constrained by various parties, including the local government and the Self-Defense Forces.

At the national level, Japan had yet to grasp a clear and intuitive understanding of the changes sweeping the world. Thus, much like the bizarre situation where their three military branches were independent and constantly at odds, the newly-established Special Incidents Division was not yet well-regarded in many circles.

It was the same old story: they appeared to have a transcendent status, but in reality, their power was restricted at every turn. Although they had temporary operational command, they had no authority over civilian resources and had to cooperate with the relevant local government agencies.

The officers who had been investigating the murder case earlier, including the man in the trench coat and the female officer, hadn’t made it out alive.

In fact, when reinforcements arrived, the building was eerily quiet. The police cars from the first wave were parked outside, completely empty.

"No one inside is answering any phones or radios. Either they’re maintaining silence, or they’re all unable to answer."

A plainclothes officer was reporting to a man in a distinctive white-brimmed police cap. "Unable to answer," of course, could mean anything from equipment failure to injury or death.

The reason the Special Incidents Division had been scrambled was due to the last, panicked call for help, which consisted of little more than frantic cries of "Monster! Demon! Help!" from start to finish.

"Alright. Send in the assault teams. Make sure all the lights in the building are turned on, and watch the shadows. If you encounter any survivors, escort them out immediately."

Outside the building, assault teams in various positions received the order to advance simultaneously.

At the main entrance, side doors, and underground garage, teams of black-clad assault officers carefully breached the building. At the same time, an assault team on the roof opened the door and entered from above.

Hanato Doichi, along with Clooney and Zuo Zhongqiu, couldn’t get too close. They could only observe from a distance, on the edge of the quarantine zone.

They sniffed the air. Carried on the cool night breeze, they could faintly smell the scent of blood.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the quarantine zone, six young people stood on a pedestrian bridge, watching the police-surrounded TV station from an even greater distance.