Chapter 404

"Bang bang bang bang..." Detective Kuhn opened fire with his gun on one of the lycans who had almost fully transformed into the form of a large wolf. Since they were in a battle, with a bunch of lycans no less, he forgot that his bullets had already been "blessed" by Caroline. The bullets fired from his gun glowed in bright red, and were not impeded at all by the tough skin and muscles of his target, and dug into his target's body just like a normal bullet would a normal human body.

"Get out!" Caroline bashed her shield with her axe, releasing an orange and red energy shockwave as a counter attack. The two lycans that unleashed the blood red shockwave were thus knocked back into the air. But the leader of the pack of five jumped back up, with his caved in chest mostly back to the original state, and before his two lackeys even landed on the ground, he lunged towards Caroline with his muscles all bulged up, his claws fully grown and extended, and his shoulders and chest releasing some kind of red steam seemingly consisted of boiling blood and sweat.

Caroline unleashed a series of quick kicks and knocked the leftmost lycan through the walls of the bar, but was not fully anticipating the leader lycan, and had to block this opponent's attack head on.

"Boom!" Caroline's body was also sent through the bar counter and the walls of the bar, and ended up landing and rolling on the parking lot. Her axe flew off from the clash, and its edge sunk into the wooden floor almost completely when it fell, leaving just the handle above the ground.

"Caroline!" Thomas tried to rush to the outside, but one of the lycans who were sent into the air grabbed onto a pillar in the bar and jumped towards him and Detective Kuhn. He had no choice but to clash with his opponent directly.

Detective Kuhn emptied his magazine in shooting one of the lycans, and while he was trying to reload his gun with another magazine, another lycan that was sent into the air by Caroline jumped back up the moment he hit the ground, and leapt towards him with his claws extended forward and his mouth open in bloodthirst.

A spinning shield flew from the side with a string of after images behind and knocked on the lycan's head in a loud "bonk" like a cartoon superhero's shield. The tough and blunt spinning edge of the shield, coupled with high temperature flames engulfing it became quite mighty a blow, and it shattered numerous bones on the lycan's face and sent him tumbling on the ground.

"Die!" the leader lycan swung his left arm and left claw at Caroline. This claw attack hit like a truck, and though the sharp fingernails did not pierce through the flaming Xuanli armor too much on the surface of Caroline's body, the brute force within it still bashed her to the side.

Before Caroline had a chance to stand up, the leader lycan jumped into the air and fell against the position of Caroline attempting another attack. Yet after a loud bang, all he was able to hit was the ground on which Caroline was standing.

Caroline was already on the side, around thirty feet (10 meters) away, with her whole body covered in orange and red flames and surrounded by a wall of wind. There were two charred footprints with small pieces of cinder scattered around in the distance between the two positions.

When Caroline raised her head and turned towards the leader lycan, shadows of flames were showing in her pupils and streams of hot air gushed out of her nostrils as she breathed. When the leader lycan lunged at her, she also lunged at him.

The leader lycan no doubt had tremendous raw physical strength and speed, and his body was coated with a thin layer of semi transparent blood red energy, which boosted the toughness of his defenses as well as the destructiveness of his physical attacks. But his fighting style was nowhere near what anyone would call well trained or skilled. He first launched a claw attack with his right hand against Caroline's neck, but Caroline just extended her left arm towards the leader lycan's wrist, grabbed his wrist, pushed left and twisted.

The leader lycan's right arm was thus parried to the side. And the next moment, Caroline turned her body and rolled into his arms, then instantly threw him over her shoulder. Before the leader lycan's back touched the ground, Caroline unleashed a quick kick onto the back of his shoulder and cracked several bones in the process.

The leader lycan turned and adjusted his body while in the mid air, and even though he was injured by the kick attack, he still landed on his feet and backed off a few steps. But Caroline did not intend to give him any chance to recover, and before he could stabilize his stance she already struck forward with a flaming palm strike. A giant energy palm made of solidified fire shot forward and crashed into the leader lycan like a speeding truck.

The leader lycan crossed his arms in front of him trying to defend himself, but the flaming palm strike was not like any other spells or special ability energy attack he encountered: the flaming palm was hardened and heavy like it was made of solid steel, yet it radiated an extremely destructive and scorching fire energy. The thin layer of red blood energy was instantly shattered, and the bones in both of his arms were turned into thousands of splinters and his skin, tendons and muscles were burned beyond recovery. He was knocked onto the ground and pushed onto an unfortunate van and some other unlucky cars behind it.

He tried to turn around and run, but a sword made of condensed wind energy pierced through his shoulder, and the next instant a rough but effective restraining spell was placed onto his body.

"Stop what you're trying to do, and tell me where the ledger is." Caroline coughed and said.

When Caroline dragged the almost half dead but still somehow conscious leader lycan into the now heavily damaged bar coughing and slightly wheezing, she saw that the other four lycans were either dead or severely injured and were left on the ground, while Thomas and Detective Kuhn were tied up and handcuffed to two chairs. Two men who came in with the bartender were standing beside them, each hand a gun to their heads. Caroline's shield and her axe were picked up by the bartender and last man that came with her and stashed behind them, to be kept away from her reach.

"So there is no honor among lycans or half lycans." Caroline threw the leader lycan on the ground and stared at the bartender with frustration and anger: "What do you want?"

"The ledger." the bartender looked at Caroline with a victorious smile.