Those two little underlings hadn't failed to consider that their former boss should be a ruthless character, but it genuinely never crossed their minds that this person would soon top the Hunting District bounty list, subsequently blow their boss away, and swallow up their entire territory.
It was only much later that they learned this person was the newcomer from the Republic District they used to talk about. Not only was he unafraid of guns, but he also frequently jammed the muzzle right against other people's foreheads.
Not long after Zhai Ye arrived in the Republic District, he was targeted by various factions. He was put up on the Hunting District dark web, and at its peak, the bounty on his head easily exceeded seven figures.
It made Zhai Ye feel like blowing his own brains out just to cash in the reward.
People in the Hunting District targeted him, loathed him, and wanted his life—he knew all of this, and it was entirely within his expectations. After all, for a newcomer to annex territory at such a speed while practically carrying a cheat code, if it were him, he would want to strangle the guy too.
Yet who told him that he was the one with the cheat code? Zhai Ye thought. If it is oneself, then one can just practice a little double standards.
He truly had come out of the Republic District, and the cheat code had been brought out from the Republic District as well. This cheat code was absurdly powerful; once unleashed, no one in the Hunting District would survive.
This item was one of the regulations forcing the Hunting District to abide by the rules of the game, kept in the most heavily guarded national archives of the Republic District. The fact that the Republic District was treated with a modicum of deference by the Hunting District owed a great deal to it.
A sealed ampoule of virus stock solution.
It was extremely contagious, and the onset of the disease was exceptionally rapid; without medication to suppress it, people would die within a week at most. In a certain sense, it was also quite considerate—it precisely identified the receptor proteins on certain cells within the bodies of beastmen and would not harm other living organisms.
A smokeless nuclear weapon, researched in secret across multiple generations of scientists while the Republic District had not yet split from the Hunting District. When the Republic District officially separated from the Hunting District, it issued a clear warning to the Hunting District: if anyone in the Hunting District posed a threat to the Republic District, the entire Hunting District would be buried with them.
The Republic District would be fine—citizens holding Republic District ID cards would be vaccinated, and the antibodies and specialized drugs within their bodies would protect the people of the Republic District.
And this was merely one of the Republic District's warnings to the Hunting District.
Therefore, when facing the Republic District, the Hunting District would yield step by step. The Republic District also knew when to stop, making no further excessive demands outside the treaty.
Naturally, the portion Zhai Ye held was not taken from the classified archives; he hadn't landed that kind of heaven-defying script of an overpowered protagonist. The vial of virus in his hands was far weaker in efficacy than the virus stock solution in the Republic District archives, but it was still highly contagious and equally lethal.
His father and grandparents had all participated in the virus research. When leaving the Republic District, his father had given him a genetic lock safe. After explaining the contents of the box, his father hadn't said much else to Zhai Ye, simply silently sending him off to the Republic District border and telling him that if he couldn't survive out there, he could always come back home to beg for food.
Before parting ways, his father had pushed aside Zhai Ye's high-necked sweater, touched the wound at the back of his neck beneath the bandages, clicked his tongue in disapproval at the surgeon's poor knife work, and muttered that the wound still hadn't healed after all this time.
That was the price the Republic District made Zhai Ye pay in exchange for allowing him to leave—the Republic District had implanted a controller in the back of Zhai Ye's neck. If Zhai Ye launched an attack against the Republic District, a high-intensity electric current would instantly claim his little life.
The controller was something implanted in the highest-level criminals within the Republic District. The magnitude of the current could be controlled, and when necessary, the location-tracking function could also be activated.
His father must have felt a bit of heartache, but he didn't voice it. In the very end, he sighed and said to Zhai Ye:
"Actually, I have a small team in the Hunting District."
Zhai Ye looked at his father in confusion.
"There's an armory."
Zhai Ye looked at his father in confusion and mild shock.
"Forget it, it's nothing much. I was just afraid the Republic District would kick us aside the moment they finished using us, so I prepared a few things in advance, that's all."
His father pressed down on his shoulders, turning him around to face the chaotic yet free road stretching out ahead.
"Go on your way."
Thus, carrying that genetic lock safe containing the virus and wearing the controller, Zhai Ye barged into the Republic District, dug out the people he had buried everywhere long ago along with the "few things" his father gave him, and pulled off quite a few major operations.
At that time, Zhai Ye was only in his early twenties.
Armed with his cheat code and innate talent, he was as comfortable as a fish in water in the Hunting District, as if he were someone who had grown up here since childhood. There were many people and matters he had laid the groundwork for back when he was still in the Republic District, just waiting to turn things upside down this time around.
It was the madman's demeanor he had always yearned for.
His father's "few things" acted as an even greater booster: manpower, material resources, and connections. Everything was complete the moment he entered, directly allowing him to overturn the world.
Before being killed by him, many people cursed bitterly:
"You're just fucking lucky, you scumbag from the Republic District! Without that father of yours, what the hell are you?!"
"You don't have an ounce of real skill yourself!!"
"You scumbag carrying the Republic District virus, get the hell out of the Hunting District!"
Facing those ferocious, enraged faces, Zhai Ye felt the utmost pleasure.
"If you have the ability, why don't you bring a cheat code too?"
A single bullet was enough to make those people shut up. Gossip and slander couldn't hurt him; the various scars on his own body were enough to fill him with self-confidence.
He was smart enough, strong enough, and lucky enough. With the right time, favorable geographical position, and harmony among people, he, Zhai Ye, was destined to carve out a world for himself in the Hunting District.
As for the people who loathed him—if they had an issue, they could just stop breathing.
Take Hua Sanji, for instance.
If he wants to find him eyesoresome, then so be it, but why attack his aesthetic sense? What's wrong with his taste?
Truly lacking in class.
Zhai Ye curled his lips in a pout, casting a glance at Lauks and Jiang Jin beside him.
"I get it," Zhai Ye said.
"Get what?" Lauks asked, playing along.
"You two, stay away from me." Zhai Ye made a shooing gesture, putting on an expression of disgust. "It must be because you two stand too close to me that he said I have no taste."
Lauks laughed in exasperation. Just as he was about to speak, he noticed Jiang Jin take a step closer to Zhai Ye, standing right beside him.
"The master told you to stay away," Jiang Jin said to Lauks very naturally and politely. Lauks froze for a moment, then smiled rather ferociously.
"He said, you, two."
Playing deaf, are we?
"You." Jiang Jin's tone was calm and resolute.
Get lost quickly; I don't want to see you again.
Resignedly, Zhai Ye batted them apart one by one with his hands and led Jiang Jin away from the battlefield.
He quite liked watching the live spectacle of the two of them bickering, but right now, he really didn't have the mood for it.
He was in a rush to find out whose ghost was responsible for the people who had escaped near the Rainforest.
Judging by how Zhuo Yu had rambled on and on about this and that just now, this person definitely didn't belong to him. But the closest pharmaceutical facility to them was in Zhuo Yu's territory; who else could so casually subvert his people and plant a surveillance device right under their noses?
Could that scatterbrain Shi Yu handle this? Zhai Ye thought with a sense of melancholy.
He better not let them ruin his drugs.