Chloe's eyes lit up as she pointed at the figure that suddenly appeared ahead:
"Look, it's that Hooded Man. I told you I wasn't just causing trouble everywhere before! He really did only have a bit of his chin showing. You believed Colonel Whitey instead of me!"
Ren Yunying: "..."
"That's enough, shut up."
As they spoke, the transparent monsters around them had stopped moving at some point, standing still with confused expressions on their ugly, ferocious faces.
Chloe found it irritating and raised her knife to slash downwards.
After cutting off a few heads with no resistance, she finally felt somewhat satisfied and pushed through the crowd to move forward.
The Hooded Man was standing not far away, his posture surprisingly upright and dignified.
"Why are you here?" Chloe looked around and added, "They've all stopped moving. Did you do that?"
"How kind of you."
Her tone was casual and sarcastic, as if they were old friends who had known each other for years.
The Hooded Man's prepared speech died halfway, and he gritted out:
"Are we that close?"
Chloe exclaimed in surprise: "We're old friends, yet you get angry over a few words. How petty."
Hooded Man: "..."
He had almost forgotten that this person never played by the rules.
Meanwhile, Daniel and the others had gathered around.
He looked very tired, his whole body leaning on the handle of his war hammer, his voice lazy:
"Yeah, aren't you at least a small-time boss in the Viper Group? Why are you being so stingy?"
Qin Huaibei chimed in from the side: "Our boss is so beautiful and came over to talk to you, a guy whose face we can't even see clearly. Don't be ungrateful."
Katherine nodded silently.
Anderson emerged from behind, taking out a handkerchief to wipe Chloe's face.
The Hooded Man, who had just spoken one sentence before being ganged up on: "..."
He held back repeatedly, and finally said: "I haven't settled the score with you for what you did last time."
Hearing this, Chloe gave him a surprised look: "Settle the score? What score? Wasn't I just doing a good deed?"
Then, she thought carefully and said: "Or are you saying that you stopped these monsters as a reward for my good deed?"
A delighted expression appeared in Chloe's eyes: "Thank you, thank you! It was just a small gesture, no need to dwell on it!"
"..."
Ren Yunying couldn't help it and burst out laughing.
Although they couldn't see his face, everyone felt that the Hooded Man's face must have turned green with anger. His chest heaved violently, looking quite upset.
Afraid that he might keel over at any moment, Chloe quickly stopped joking:
"Alright, I'll stop teasing you. Let's talk business."
"There's no such thing as a free lunch in this world. You made these monsters stop, what are you planning to do?"
Only now did the atmosphere finally start to become appropriately tense.
The Hooded Man laughed, his voice very gloomy and malicious:
"The surprise you gave me last time, I still remember it clearly. It really made me lose a lot of face when I went back."
Chloe couldn't help but retort: "Isn't that because of your own incompetence? Why blame me?"
Silence, dead silence.
Ren Yunying turned to look at her: "Say less."
"Oh." Chloe rubbed her nose, and indeed didn't speak anymore after that.
The Hooded Man opposite them started trembling, presumably so angry that he couldn't speak coherently, which was why he hadn't said anything for a long time.
After who knows how long, the Hooded Man finally spoke again:
"Chloe, come here."
Hearing this, Anderson instinctively rushed forward to block Chloe.
Chloe thought for a moment, but ultimately pushed him aside, saying softly: "It's okay, stay put."
After reassuring him, she walked up to the Hooded Man.
By now, the frivolous expression had completely disappeared from Chloe's face.
"What do you want to do?"
The Hooded Man looked at her eye-to-eye, his tone unable to hide his smugness: "It's very simple."
"This rain contains a special powder we developed a day ago. You see those 1038s outside? This powder is the only thing that can control their movements."
As soon as he finished speaking, Daniel immediately took out a glass bottle and started collecting rainwater.
He had barely filled the bottom when the Hooded Man, unable to tolerate it any longer, raised his hand to stop the rain.
By now, the powder had been evenly sprinkled on the transparent monsters, ensuring they wouldn't come back to life.
Chloe looked back for a moment, then turned around:
"So? What are you trying to express?"
The Hooded Man spread his hands: "My demands aren't high. After all, apart from that day when you tricked me, I quite admire your other qualities."
"How about this? Today, if you kneel down here and kowtow to me three times, I'll let you all go. How about that?"
The entire scene fell silent.
Daniel was the first to react, cursing directly:
"Have you lost your f***ing mind? Did you drink some potion that made you completely insane, or did you bite your tongue and can't say anything sensible?"
"Asking Chloe to kowtow to you? Pah! Keep dreaming!"
"Who do you think you are compared to her status? What right do you have to bark orders here?"
The overly agitated Daniel was pulled back by Qin Huaibei, but it was clear that he was also angry, looking at the Hooded Man with very unfriendly eyes.
Chloe was the sole heir of the Vampires, a noble pureblood vampire. Kowtowing to an unknown small fry would be a huge joke if word got out.
The act of kowtowing itself doesn't represent much, but Chloe's own dignity indeed doesn't allow her to easily kneel down.
Given her status, it's very difficult to bow without any reservations.
But it's not entirely impossible.
Hearing this demand, Chloe instead relaxed:
"Is that all you're asking?"
The Hooded Man seemed not to have heard Daniel's shouting earlier. He nodded slightly:
"Of course. I consider myself a civilized person. As long as you kowtow to me, we'll consider the previous matter water under the bridge, all settled. How about it?"
Chloe thought for a moment, and finally said: "It sounds pretty good..."
As soon as she finished speaking, Daniel's shout came from behind:
"You can't kneel! Chloe, you can't!"
"How is this any different from boosting others' morale while crushing our own? He's deliberately trying to humiliate you!"
After all, from the last incident, anyone with eyes could see that it was the Hooded Man's own lack of ability that caused things to go wrong.
Just as everyone was at an impasse, the Hooded Man took out a box of powder from his pocket:
"I forgot to mention, the powder sprinkled earlier is only temporary. After two hours, these monsters will come back to life."
As he spoke, he looked towards the control panel that had stopped working not far away:
"Of course, that machine will start working again too. You don't want the disaster to repeat itself, do you?"
The Hooded Man's voice was low and hoarse: "If you don't kneel, I might as well release these monsters all over the world, let everyone know that the Vampire young miss, for the sake of her own face, caused a catastrophe across the entire continent. That would really be..."
Before he could finish, a silver flash grazed past his hand!
The bottle full of powder was knocked to the ground. At the same time, Chloe rushed forward at lightning speed, slicing off the Hooded Man's arm with one stroke. Her voice was cold and stern, her red eyes like blood:
"You're quite adept at moral blackmail, but too bad."
"Compared to kneeling, I prefer forcing you to bow your head to me."
