Xia Fei could not dare to believe his own eyes. That figure was so very familiar that he was entranced. Even though the strong floodlights were blurring his vision, Xia Fei could still clearly make her out from among the crowd.
Dressed in a long black robe with a hood covering half her face, under this nun getup was a slim girl—someone whom Xia Fei had had on his mind for a very long time and someone whom he could neither face nor mention the name.
Su Ruoyu.
It was her. It was definitely her.
Xia Fei’s intuition told him that this girl was none other than Su Ruoyu, the one who had occupied his thoughts daily and the very girl who had been missing for over two years, never once reappearing.
Xia Fei was a calm person, and it was frightening how he could maintain his composure in even the toughest situation., but this moment brought him a bit of warmth in his eyes as he felt some liquid welling up in them.
His body became stiff as the crazed yelling all around him suddenly disappeared. The thousands of rabid audience in the stands had disappeared, and even the air itself had disappeared. The only ones left in this world were just him and that girl who was struggling to carry a backpack which was much bigger than her frame.
Xia Fei flashed a smile to that skinny figure, and that robed girl shivered unnaturally for a while. She lowered her head, tugging at her hood as she kept her eyes stuck to the ground, not daring to meet Xia Fei’s gaze.
Xia Fei was upset. He did not understand why Xiao Yu would want to hide. If possible, he wished that he could just charge past the laser fencing, get up to the stands, and give her a tight hug, even if it was just for a second.
However, he did not do that, not because he did not want to but because he could not.
Beside Xiao Yu were several others who were similarly dressed in black. From her stature and behavior, it was not hard to tell that they were also women.
Xia Fei’s eyes soon cleared up and he used the few seconds he had to observe them, remembering every action Xiao Yu and the people around her made.
“Cough cough!”
Butcher intentionally coughed with his brows knitted. Xia Fei knew clearly what he meant. That momentary loss of his senses had not caused him to forget his current predicament. He turned around and faced Butcher.
Butcher blinked a few times as Xia Fei mechanically nodded, a response of sorts.
Xia Fei suddenly felt that this situation was very absurd. The little girl, who was constantly in his mind, had finally appeared again, so going by conventional logic, what would happen next was a grueling battle and a decapitation thereafter.
It had to be mentioned that Xiao Yu’s appearance was very timely. To see her right before he met his end, though it was just that blurry figure, was thousands of times better than being unable to see her ever again even. Xia Fei ought to feel gratified about this, for at least he knew now that Xiao Yu was still alive, who evidently grew up by quite a bit.
Xia Fei turned around and looked up at Xiao Yu again. The girl was staring at him fixedly; her gaze was so fiery that Xia Fei could feel his heart palpitating despite his combat suit.
This situation was awkward. Xia Fei had once imagined that his paths would cross with a pretty and grown-up Xiao Yu on some gloomy street, and never had he imagined that they would actually meet each other again in the hustle and bustle of the Blood Matrix.
The longest distance in this universe was not calculated in lightyears, but being unable to recognize each other despite sharing the same space.
Xia Fei knew that Xiao Yu was intentionally averting her gaze because she likely had her misgivings.
With a light brush of his spatial ring, Xia Fei pulled out a metal plate with the Adjudicator Union’s logo printed on it.
He held this plate high up with his right hand, smiling at the crowd as he showed it to them all once before wearing it around his neck.
The audience was puzzled. They had no idea what that metal plate in Xia Fei’s hand was or what he was trying to express at this time. Was this him trying to show off, or was this a panic move right before death?
The commentator for this fight magnified this plate and displayed it right there on the giant screen. Information indicated that it was a clearance token custom-made for the Adjudicator Union assessment. The clever commentator immediately used the interplanetary internet to check that Xia Fei had once been specially enrolled through the assessment, gaining admittance to the Heaven Execution Training Camp, as well as that extremely long match he once had against Chen Dong.
The audience instantly understood this as Xia Fei bragging about his past, of how he made it through the Adjudicator assessment. That plate ought to have been returned after the assessment ended, yet Xia Fei had held on to it for some reason.
He peeked through the corner of his eyes and saw that skinny, black-robed figure tremble again, much more violently this time, almost as if she could not control herself. Thankfully, the night winds were causing her robes to flutter about, so no one around her noticed this.
Xia Fei finally had no doubts that this girl was definitely Xiao Yu, for this plate originally belonged to her.
After the assessment ended, Xia Fei had gotten hold of two metal plates: one was for him and the other was meant to be Xiao Yu’s, but she had mysteriously disappeared by then.
Thus, Xia Fei had kept this token, which ought to have belonged to her, all this time. He kept it in the deepest corner of his spatial ring, all in the hopes that there would come a day when he could hand it to her by his hands.
‘So he hasn’t forgotten me after all this time.’ Two streaks of tears quietly flowed down the corner of this black-robed girl’s face, which she hurriedly wiped off with her sleeves.
An older woman beside her asked what happened, and she claimed that the sand being blown by the night winds got to her eye.
Seated on his throne, Hook showed a very impatient look. Xia Fei’s series of actions appeared to be completely meaningless in his eyes, so he called his underling to give the order for this deathmatch to begin.
Seeing someone shout Hook’s command from the stands, Butcher got into his fighting stance and rumbled, “Let’s begin. It’s either gonna be you or me who walks away from here alive tonight.”
The people who would often watch the Blood Matrix were very familiar with this line. Every time Butcher uttered these words, it meant that he was about to go all out and attack. Thousands of people applauded, clamoring for Xia Fei’s death.
This seemed to be a one-sided match. Innumerable people were on Butcher’s side, while very few were willing to take the risk of placing their bets on Xia Fei. After all, Xia Fei was a stranger to these people. Though they had introduced Xia Fei as a warrior who possessed the speed ability at a high cultivation, no one believed that the young man would be a match to Butcher.
Besides, Xia Fei had only gotten famous because of his performance during the Golden Finger Cup, and the majority of them still saw him as a mere mechanist.
“Alright!” Xia Fei growled. “Let’s enjoy this fight tonight.”
Bloodthirsty Screech flew out from his spatial ring and landed safely in Xia Fei’s hands.
‘I must win and find Xiao Yu, so I can take her back to Earth!’ Xia Fei roared in his heart.
Killing intent surged forth from Xia Fei’s eyes as his aura skyrocketed at that moment.
“WAIT FOR ME!” Xia Fei bellowed in a frenzy, his voice as loud as a clap of thunder that rang out all around him.
A single figure swayed upon hearing this. She knew that these words were not meant for Butcher but herself, instead.
Quietly, that skinny girl in a black robe nodded slightly, feeling her nose souring greatly.