Night's Nomenclature
Chapter 293: The surging power, the underwater killer

The moment the sound of Gene Lock opening echoed beneath the lake’s surface,

Qing Chen proved something.

That a Knight could complete challenges in the Outer World. His future would be a smooth road.

In the future, new Knights could also emerge from humanity in the Outer World, and the sea Qing Chen would Face^[-] would no longer be the Forbidden Sea.

The lake water was icy, but Qing Chen closed his eyes and let himself sink to the bottom.

He felt the surging power within his body, as if it would boil the entire Lake Weiyang. Beneath the surface, Qing Chen was like a deep-sea volcano, feeling ready to erupt at any moment.

The Reverse Breathing Technique was deactivated, and the previously closed Gene Lock reopened due to the breakthrough.

Moreover, it was replaced by a more magnificent power than before.

Using the Reverse Breathing Technique would cause the Gene Lock to close. Even after stopping the Reverse Breathing Technique, a normal person would remain in that state for an hour.

If one forcibly reversed it, they would Face^[-] the possibility of never being able to break through again.

However, that only applied to normal situations.

Completing the Trials of Life and Death was itself a process of opening the Gene Lock.

Qing Chen felt like he was back on Qingshan Cliff, transforming from an ordinary person into a Metahuman.

Knight True Qi gushed from the depths of his body, like the rising sun, endlessly gushing forth.

If in the past, his Knight True Qi could only fill his arms, now the additional Knight True Qi could also fill his legs.

At peak D-level, he was only a hair's breadth away from C-level, infinitely approaching the boundary.

Qing Chen could sense someone firing at the lake’s surface. Bullets, carrying the air, shot into the water from the surface, pulling out trails in the water.

But he didn’t move, letting those trails crisscross above his head, not at all worried that they would harm him.

At this moment, his body seemed to not need oxygen, and he could still survive underwater.

Because Qing Chen suddenly felt as if there was a fire burning in his heart, as if it would melt his heart.

The aftermath of the Gene Lock opening also cooled in the icy lake water.

But the fire didn’t stop.

Qing Chen recalled that Liu Dezhu’s awakening also had such a precursor.

Did that mean that all Awakened Ones experienced this during their awakening?

Slowly, the fire subsided.

But Qing Chen felt it hadn’t disappeared; it simply hadn’t accumulated to the critical point where it should truly break through, so it lay dormant again.

Li Shutong once said that Cultivation is the process of slowly excavating potential. Once a person’s potential is excavated, they lose the chance of awakening.

Therefore, Cultivators and Awakened Ones do not coexist.

But this unexpected event occurred in Qing Chen.

Ordinary Knights are only F-level when they complete their first Trial of Life and Death, while he was E-level.

In other words, following this process, Qing Chen could reach S-level by completing six Trials of Life and Death, becoming one of the few demigods in the world.

Completing the seventh would make him a true god.

What if all Eight Trials of Life and Death were completed?

Li Shutong said that the power of a world has an upper limit. You can infinitely approach a critical point, but you cannot break through.

Just like the Outer World, its rule is that ordinary people cannot become Metahumans.

You must use the rules of the Inner World to return and break the rules of the Outer World.

So, if the upper limit of the Inner World’s power is the SS-level god, how should Qing Chen’s potential be released? What about the immense potential generated by the extra Trial of Life and Death?

Thinking so much now is useless. Life is magical; it will find its own way out.

Qing Chen felt his post-breakthrough state. Every pore felt activated after the Gene Lock opened, breathing the oxygen in the water.

Strange, he hadn’t awakened, yet he had the ability to breathe underwater through his skin.

And while breathing through his skin, his Knight True Qi was rapidly depleting.

It was the Knight True Qi supporting underwater breathing!

Was this some kind of Knight ability? Why hadn’t his master ever mentioned it?

Was it because the waters of the Inner World were too dangerous, so Knights never tried underwater? Or…even though he hadn’t awakened, the two awakening precursors had still given him some unique abilities.

Qing Chen roughly calculated the rate of True Qi consumption but wasn’t in a hurry to leave.

He silently waited.

Because he believed someone would come down to die.

At this time, Zhang San stood by the gradually calming lake: “Boss, he jumped down and hasn’t resurfaced; his life or death is unknown.”

“Send someone down to take a look. Alive or dead, I want to see the body,” Huan Yu calmly said through the Bluetooth headset.

The thin figure sitting by the floor-to-ceiling window felt something was wrong. That Daybreak Boss, who had fought him several rounds, just died?

That Qing Chen, who killed so decisively on Laojun Mountain, also died in a bungee jumping tower?

Although they had sacrificed many people to achieve this result, Huan Yu felt things were too smooth.

Even he felt deep down that the other party wouldn’t die.

At some point, Huan Yu had developed a feeling that he could never kill the other party, so he needed to verify, he needed the other party’s body to prove whether this Daybreak Boss was truly dead!

“Be careful, I suspect he isn’t dead, maybe just a few fractures,” Huan Yu said.

Zhang San hesitated: “Even if he’s not dead, ten minutes have passed, he should be suffocating.”

“I don’t need to repeat the wonders of Metahumans,” Huan Yu’s voice sank: “Do as I say.”

Zhang San looked at his side. At this time, nearly a hundred assassins were reduced to only twenty or so.

He pointed to ten people: “You guys go down, bring daggers. If he’s not dead, kill him. If you can’t kill him, drag him underwater and deplete his oxygen. If he’s dead, bring his body up.”

The ten people looked at the lake water and then at the fluttering snow.

At this time, everyone knew the lake water must be icy. If they jumped in now, they might get severely sick.

However, they had no choice.

The ten people gritted their teeth, took off their clothes, threw them on the lakeshore, and dove in.

They swam towards the bottom of the lake but suddenly found a black shadow rapidly approaching from the lakebed.

Before one assassin could react, his neck was locked and twisted.

The black shadow didn’t stop, directly kicking off the corpse and, like a released arrow, charging towards another assassin.

Before the assassin could draw his dagger, the black shadow was beside him and twisted his neck.

The black figure used the corpses to move through the water, each burst of speed extremely fast, forming a stark contrast to the assassins slowly paddling.

It was nighttime, the visibility at the bottom of the lake was extremely low, and only after Qing Chen killed five assassins did the remaining assassins realize what was happening.

They trembled, looking at the dark lake bottom, the darkness filled with unknown dangers.

The winter lake water was icy, like knives cutting at everyone’s skin.

The underwater black shadow was like a shadow of fear, constantly reaping lives.

It even reminded the assassins of legends of water monsters.

The black shadow was too fast, not a speed a human could achieve underwater.

The assassins realized the black shadow was the sniper. Not only was he not dead, but he had been underwater for over ten minutes without suffocating.

Moreover, the sniper had no fractures and swam faster than anyone in the water!

When the black shadow approached, an assassin swung his dagger to block, but the black shadow casually deflected it, and the assassin felt something extremely sharp graze his neck.

Then, the blood spurting from his neck dyed the already dark lake water even darker in the night.

That was a Marionette infused with Knight True Qi, silently killing underwater.

Qing Chen not only killed the assassins one by one but also sacrificed them to the Marionette, so that the little snake seemed to be in a state of excitement, not at all minding being used as a weapon.

Slowly, the remaining three assassins knew they couldn’t win and swam toward the surface.

But it was too late to escape. Qing Chen, who had just reached D-level, had boundless strength. He chased the assassins underwater, used the Marionette to wrap around their ankles, and dragged the two assassins back to the lake bottom.

The last assassin struggled to swim to the surface. He felt he could almost see the light on the surface, the faint ripples under the lights of Weiyang Lake Park were right before his eyes.

The assassin reached out, trying to touch the surface.

But at that moment, the assassin suddenly felt something wrapped around his ankle, forcefully dragging him back.

His outstretched hand was only a few inches from the surface, then the assassin watched in despair as he got farther from the surface.

As if he would sink forever into the dark depths of Lake Weiyang.

Zhang San stood by the lake for a long time. He could sense movement underwater, but he couldn’t see what happened.

Lots of bubbles kept rising to the surface, but no one resurfaced.

Five minutes passed, exceeding the normal human underwater breath-holding limit. Even if the ten assassins hadn’t found the Daybreak Boss’s body, they should have surfaced for air.

Even if they were killed by the Daybreak Boss, the bodies should be floating up by now.

But the surface remained calm, nothing appeared.

The assassins around Zhang San were terrified. They felt the dark Lake Weiyang was like a man-eater, swallowing their ten companions whole.

At this moment, Huan Yu finally understood that the Daybreak Boss not only hadn’t died but also had the energy to withstand the cold lake water and kill ten assassins underwater.

This terrifying combat power, and the endless will in battle, was vaguely terrifying.

Huan Yu fell into thought.

“Something’s wrong. This Lake Weiyang is strange. Let’s go!” an assassin said.

Zhang San sneered: “Strange? It’s just that the sniper isn’t dead.”

“But he’s been underwater for over ten minutes, and we haven’t seen him come up for air,” an assassin said.

Zhang San pondered: “He prepared to use jumping into the lake as a retreat, maybe he also hid an oxygen tank at the bottom of the lake, and then killed us when we went down to look for the body.”

Huan Yu suddenly spoke in the communication channel: “No more attempts, retreat.”

For Huan Yu, these low-level assassins were merely tools. As long as Time Travelers kept appearing, he could continue creating them using his Inner World identity.

Zhang San was different. He was a real C-level Awakened One, and before the time-travel incident, he was a mercenary who had been in the Middle East for many years. He became a Time Traveler during a visit home.

Such talent is rare and has a bright future.

But even though Huan Yu treated these assassins as tools, this battle had severely weakened him.

Too many assassins died, and too much equipment was lost!

The most crucial thing was that he had lost so much, and the Daybreak Boss still wasn’t dead!

Huan Yu couldn’t take any more risks. A sense of great danger forced him to be cautious. He couldn’t treat tonight as a game anymore.

He needed to conserve his strength.

Zhang San led the assassins in retreat, running towards the entrance of Weiyang Lake Park.

Before that, after Qing Chen killed ten people, he didn’t stay at the bottom of the lake. He sensed his Knight True Qi was about to be depleted, and he was about to Face^[-] oxygen deficiency, so he swam towards the other end of Lake Weiyang.

He still had many important things to do tonight.

Because his battle tonight wasn’t as Huan Yu imagined, with everything prepared in advance.

He was truly reacting in the moment, just that his impromptu preparations were too thorough, leading the other party to believe he had been prepared.

But being well-prepared didn’t mean there were no flaws; he still had patches to apply.

Qing Chen was cautious. Even the immense joy of his recent promotion couldn’t dispel his strong resolve.

…

…

Zhang San’s group came in twelve business vehicles, seven people per vehicle, all full.

During the retreat, they didn’t even have enough people for each person to drive one car. There were only eleven of them, including Zhang San, and four couldn’t drive.

Facing the business vehicles parked at the entrance of Weiyang Lake Park, they finally realized how brutal tonight’s battle had been.

Fortunately, Weiyang Lake Park was located in the northern suburbs of Xian City, and it was late at night, so there were almost no tourists nearby.

Even leaving the cars there wouldn’t cause any problems.

“Let’s go, drive away six cars first, the boss will arrange someone to collect the rest,” Zhang San coldly said. He pointed to someone: “You drive for me.”

Zhang San cautiously observed his surroundings, then chose a business vehicle, approaching through the shadows between vehicles.

And after getting in, he didn’t sit in his seat but crouched like a cheetah. His figure was invisible from outside the window.

The assassins understood that Zhang San was worried that the sniper was chasing from behind!

The assassins responsible for driving were terrified. Even a master like Zhang San was so cautious; wouldn’t they, the drivers, be used as targets?

The assassins who weren’t driving followed suit, hiding in the vehicle, even somewhat thankful they couldn’t drive.

But before they could think more, a roar was heard in the night. A vehicle’s fuel tank was pierced by a bullet, and the entire car turned into a huge fireball.

The flames shot into the air, engulfing the three assassins inside.

The assassins in the car didn’t die immediately. The explosive power wasn’t as great as they imagined; it was just that the fuel from the fuel tank kept burning, giving them hellish torment before they slowly died.

Ordinary bullets couldn’t explode a vehicle’s fuel tank. This was a special incendiary bullet from a sniper rifle!

Zhang San was startled. Even on the Middle Eastern battlefield, snipers using this kind of special bullet were rare!

What was even stranger was that the bullets clearly came from the opposite side of the main entrance of Weiyang Lake Park.

In the night, he even saw the orange-red bullet with his peripheral vision, tracing a laser-like trajectory in the air.

But wasn’t the other party still at the bottom of the lake? How could they have left Weiyang Lake Park earlier and even found a new sniper spot?!

The other party was trying to wipe them all out!

But wouldn’t this Daybreak Boss get tired? After such a high-intensity battle tonight, why could he still maintain such abundant energy?

He didn’t know that when the second Gene Lock on Qing Chen opened, the boy was practically resurrected.

“Drive! Drive fast, towards 11 o’clock! The sniper is there! Charge at him, or you’ll die! Charge at him; he can’t hit the fuel tank!” Zhang San roared.

It was too late to avoid the sniper now. He had to rely on the mobility and number of vehicles, gambling that he could rush to the sniper’s location and then use close-quarters combat to eliminate the sniper!

Otherwise, they only had a dead end.

Some vehicles charged with Zhang San, while others turned and fled in other directions, but no matter where they went, it couldn’t change their fate.

The vehicles fleeing in other directions exploded one after another. Zhang San opened his right sliding door, ready to jump.

With a bang, the driver of Zhang San’s vehicle was shot through, blood splattering on his Face^[-].

But he wasn’t overwhelmed by fear. He crouched in the gap between the driver and passenger seats, controlling the steering wheel with one hand and pressing down the dead driver’s leg with the other, stepping hard on the accelerator!

Zhang San had spotted the sniper’s hiding place, on a large tree two hundred meters across from the main entrance of Weiyang Lake Park!

With a bang, the business vehicle crashed heavily into the tree, causing the tree to shake.

In that moment, Zhang San jumped out from the side door of the car, facing the sky.

He knew clearly that running blindly was meaningless!

In that moment of jumping, the man who had been born and died in the Middle East drew his pistol and fired wildly at the tree crown while in mid-air.

After he emptied the magazine, he fell heavily to the ground.

Controlling the vehicle, jumping from the side door, drawing the pistol, and firing upwards at the tree crown – the series of actions was fluid.

But there was no movement in the tree crown. It seemed that all his bullets had hit the air.

Zhang San’s heart sank.

…