Chapter 9 Kill that b**st**d
Outside the entrance, the remaining mercenaries watched with burning confidence.
“Kill him, Boss!”
“Break every bone in his body!”
“Show this bastard what real power looks like!”
Kane let out a roar and rushed forward without slowing down. He gripped his giant axe with both hands and swung it straight at Justin's head.
Justin did not step back.
He did not dodge.
He simply raised one hand.
CLANG!
The axe stopped in midair.
Everything froze.
Kane's body stiffened.
His eyes dropped slowly toward the weapon.
Justin was holding the blade with his bare hand.
The people around them went silent.
Kane pulled hard on the weapon, but it did not move even an inch.
“W... what the hell is this?” he muttered.
Veins swelled across his arms as he tried again to free the axe from Justin's grip.
Justin looked at him calmly.
“This is the strength you brag about?”
“You call this the power of a king?”
Before Kane could answer, Justin twisted his hand.
CRACK!
A loud breaking sound exploded through the courtyard.
The axe shattered.
Half of the blade snapped apart and metal pieces scattered across the ground.
Kane staggered backward and stared at the broken weapon still hanging in his hand.
The mercenaries could barely believe what they were seeing.
“He... he broke Boss Kane's axe…”
“With one hand?”
“That weapon was custom forged!”
Kane suddenly lifted his head.
Before he could move—
BOOM!
Justin's fist slammed into his chest.
The hit landed clean and direct.
Kane's huge body left the ground immediately and flew backward like a heavy truck had smashed into him.
He tore across the courtyard and crashed straight through the entrance doors of the main building.
Wood exploded apart.
the glass became shattered.
The broken doors collapsed inward as Kane rolled across the floor inside the hall.
The mercenaries stood rooted in place.
Nobody spoke for several seconds.
One punch.
Their boss...
The man they called the King of Strength...
Had been defeated with one punch.
Inside the hall, the celebration stopped instantly.
Guests jumped back in panic as the ruined entrance burst open.
“What happened?!”
“Who crashed through the door?”
“Is that... Kane?!”
Kane lay among broken wood and shattered glass, blood running from the corner of his mouth.
Then—
Footsteps.
Slow.
Steady.
Justin walked through the destroyed entrance without hurry.
His hands were empty.
His eyes swept across the hall.
“I came for Anita Lawson,” he said calmly.
“Everybody else can stay alive if they stay out of my way.”
“Argh! What happened?!”
“How did that giant end up inside the hall?!”
“Wait… is that Kane?”
“The King of Strength lost?”
“No… no, that can't be real…”
Voices exploded across the hall as guests hurried backward from the entrance.
Kane's huge body lay among broken wood and scattered debris with blood running from the corner of his mouth.
Then another sound reached them.
Footsteps.
Slow.
Steady.
A tall figure walked in carrying two bloodstained daggers loosely at his side.
Blood dripped from the blades onto the floor as he stepped over the broken remains of the doorway and stopped inside the hall.
Justin slowly raised his head and looked across the crowd.
“Bring me Anita,” he said loudly. “I'm standing here already, so don't waste my time making me repeat myself.”
The hall became quieter.
At the VIP lounge above, Damien jerked upright so fast that wine splashed from his glass onto his sleeve.
“Who the fuck is that?” he snapped while staring toward the entrance. “Elder Daniel, what is going on? How did somebody break into my party?”
Daniel narrowed his eyes toward Justin and looked briefly toward the destroyed entrance behind him.
Kane.
Broken doors.
Dead silence from the guards who should have been protecting the hall.
Something was wrong.
Very wrong.
“I'll handle it personally, Young Master,” Daniel said in a cold voice while stepping away from the railing. “Whoever he is, he won't walk out of this building.”
Damien slammed his glass onto a nearby table.
“No. I'm coming.”
The two men headed toward the main floor together.
The moment guests noticed Damien and Elder Daniel approaching, whispers immediately spread through the hall.
“Young Master Damien is here.”
“Elder Daniel came too.”
“That intruder is finished.”
“Let's see how long he keeps acting tough.”
Justin remained standing near the entrance without moving.
Damien pushed through the crowd and stopped several steps away from him. His eyes swept across the broken hall, then toward Kane lying on the floor.
His face tightened.
Kane had been with the Lawson family for years.
Kane wasn't supposed to lose.
Yet here he was.
Broken.
In front of everybody.
Damien lifted his eyes back toward Justin.
“Who the hell are you?” he demanded. “Do you even understand where you're standing right now? You broke into my home, destroyed my guards, ruined my birthday party, and you still have the guts to stand there asking for my mother?”
Justin looked at him calmly.
“I came for Anita.”
Just four words.
Nothing more.
Damien gave a short laugh and stepped forward.
“You came for my mother?” he repeated. “Then you've already signed your own death warrant.”
His arm moved suddenly.
His fist shot straight toward Justin's face.
The crowd watched the punch fly forward—
—but it stopped halfway.
Justin's hand had already closed around Damien's wrist.
The sound of skin tightening echoed sharply through the silence.
Damien tried to pull back immediately.
His arm didn't move.
Justin's grip tightened slowly.
The muscles along Damien's arm strained as he tried harder to free himself, but Justin held him in place like a grown man holding down a child.
The confidence on Damien's face began slipping away little by little.
Justin took one step closer until barely any distance remained between them.
“I said your mother owes me a debt,” he said quietly.
Then his hand moved.
SMACK!
The slap landed so hard that Damien's head snapped violently to the side.
Blood sprayed from his mouth.
His feet left the floor completely.
Gasps burst from every direction as his body flew backward across the hall.
Several guests stumbled away from his path while shattered glass scattered beneath him.
Before Damien could crash fully onto the ground, Elder Daniel blurred forward and caught him around the shoulders.
The impact still pushed both men backward several steps.
The entire hall exploded.
“He slapped Young Master Damien!”
“He sent him flying with one hit!”
“Is this man crazy?!”
“That’s impossible…”
“He actually hit Young Master Damien…”
“No one has ever touched him before!”
The hall broke into chaos.
Guests hurried backward and bumped into each other trying to create distance from the center of the room. Several people pressed themselves against the walls while others lowered their heads, afraid of getting caught in whatever was about to happen next.
Justin remained standing where he was with both daggers hanging loosely at his sides.
He looked toward Damien and spoke in a cold, steady voice.
“Who exactly do you think you are to raise your hand against me?”
Damien let out a painful groan as Elder Daniel helped steady him.
Blood slipped from the corner of his mouth and dropped onto his expensive clothes. Something small struck the marble floor with a sharp sound and rolled across the hall before stopping near a frightened guest's shoe.
It was a broken tooth.
Several people stared at it silently.
Damien lowered his eyes and saw it too.
His face tightened.
His chest rose heavily while one hand slowly touched his swollen cheek.
All his life, people had lowered themselves when he entered a room. Wealth followed his name. Guards protected him. His family's power solved problems before they even began.
He had never needed strength of his own.
The Lawson name had always been enough.
But now, standing in the middle of his own hall, covered in blood and staring at his broken tooth lying on the floor, he suddenly looked nothing like the untouchable young master everyone knew.
“Young Master, are you injured?” Elder Daniel asked while keeping one hand ready beside him.
Damien wiped the blood from his lips with the back of his hand. He looked at the red stain on his fingers for one second before slowly lifting his head toward Justin.
The shock on his face disappeared little by little.
Something uglier replaced it.
His breathing grew rougher.
The veins around his neck stood out as his hand shot forward and pointed directly at Justin.
“KILL THAT BASTARD!” he roared at the top of his lungs.
