Chapter 55 The Hunter in the Abandoned Factory
Then—
A heartbeat entered the outer edge of Lynn's sensory range.
Approximately 180 meters away.
North side.
Approaching steadily.
Resting heart rate:
54 beats per minute.
The exact same rhythm as "Jack Miller."
He came alone.
No secondary heartbeats nearby.
No synchronized movement patterns.
No hidden support team.
Kingpin had abandoned team tactics this time.
A lone operative.
Lynn assigned him a codename internally.
Ryan.
Ryan spent nearly fifteen minutes circling toward the eastern side of the abandoned factory.
His route selection was precise.
Blind spots between buildings.
Interrupted streetlight coverage.
Limited surveillance exposure.
Professional infiltration movement.
He finally stopped outside the eastern entrance.
Duration:
Approximately two minutes.
Lynn listened silently from inside the factory.
Tiny sounds traveled through the darkness.
Adjustment straps tightening.
Night-vision goggles settling into position.
Metal fittings brushing lightly beneath layered clothing.
Equipment analysis completed automatically.
Two short blades.
Carbon fiber construction.
The friction frequency between sheath and blade identified the material immediately.
And something else.
A compact metal container attached behind the waist.
Throwing weapons.
Bullseye-style combat specialization.
Ryan entered through a shattered east-side window.
His landing produced almost no sound at all.
Completely different from Shadow Raven's operational style.
Shadow Raven preferred coordinated multi-angle advancement.
Team pressure.
Layered suppression.
Ryan moved alone.
Fluid.
Silent.
Like mercury sliding through cracks.
The green tint of the night-vision goggles swept across the first-floor workshop.
Rust-covered machinery.
Collapsed steel supports.
Broken glass.
Concrete debris.
Empty.
The target wasn't there.
Ryan began moving toward the second floor.
Meanwhile—
Lynn stood behind a load-bearing pillar on the western side of the first-floor workshop.
At the closest point—
Less than eight meters separated them.
He still didn't attack.
Not yet.
Ryan reached the second floor.
The warehouse level was smaller than the workshop below, but far more cluttered.
Discarded shelving.
Stacked planks.
Rolled canvas sheets.
Dust-covered storage frames.
He searched carefully.
No target.
Ryan stopped moving.
Heart rate:
54 → 62.
Not fear.
Instinctive alertness.
His subconscious had already realized something was wrong.
Then—
A voice rose calmly from downstairs.
"Were you waiting for me to reveal myself first?"
Flat tone.
Controlled volume.
No hostility.
Which somehow made it more unsettling.
Ryan's hand closed around the knife hilt instantly.
He didn't answer.
"When you visited my clinic two days ago," Lynn continued from below,
"your resting heart rate was fifty-six."
"A normal frozen-shoulder patient wouldn't have cardiovascular conditioning like that."
Ryan's expression darkened slightly.
He had been identified immediately.
"You also have titanium-carbide reinforcement around the scapula."
"There are only a few places capable of performing surgery at that level."
Ryan's fingers tightened around the blade handle.
At the same time—
He began moving silently toward the stairwell.
"So I'll stop pretending," Lynn said calmly.
Silence followed.
Ryan reached the top of the stairs and looked downward through the night-vision optics.
Green light flooded the workshop below.
And there—
Standing in the center of the abandoned factory—
Was Lynn.
Black long-sleeved shirt.
Gold-rimmed glasses.
Hands relaxed at his sides.
No visible weapons.
He looked less like a target waiting for an assassin—
And more like someone calmly waiting for a late-arriving acquaintance.
Ryan observed him for three seconds.
Then his right hand moved behind the waist instantly.
A steel throwing needle flashed into view.
Thirty centimeters long.
Specialized aerodynamic polishing.
He threw it.
Velocity exceeded forty meters per second.
Distance:
Roughly thirty meters.
Impact time—
Less than one second.
Lynn tilted his head slightly.
Three centimeters.
The needle grazed past his ear and embedded itself into an iron support pillar behind him.
Clang.
The metallic echo spread briefly through the abandoned workshop.
Ryan's hand froze slightly mid-motion.
Within ten meters, his throwing precision reached near-millimeter accuracy.
The target had been the carotid artery.
No ordinary person could evade that strike after release.
But Lynn hadn't truly dodged.
He had already predicted the trajectory before the needle left Ryan's hand.
Ryan abandoned elevation immediately.
He jumped directly from the stairwell toward the workshop floor below.
Both carbon-fiber short blades cleared the sheaths simultaneously.
The instant he landed—
The attack began.
Right-hand blade—
Horizontal sweep.
Left-hand blade—
Direct thrust.
Together, the trajectories formed a scissor-shaped kill zone designed to force retreat or lateral evasion.
Lynn chose neither.
He moved forward.
Analysis of All Things completed full breakdown of Ryan's combat system in under 0.1 seconds.
Bullseye-derived precision throwing techniques.
Japanese draw-slash methodology.
Filipino dual-weapon close-range control systems.
Three systems fused together.
Extremely versatile.
But versatility also created structural weakness.
None of the systems had reached absolute perfection individually.
Lynn rotated inward.
The right blade passed two centimeters in front of his face.
The displaced air brushed against the edge of his glasses.
At the same moment—
The left blade thrust toward his abdomen.
Lynn didn't dodge.
He caught the blade barehanded.
The carbon-fiber edge pressed into his palm.
A powerful force transmitted through the reinforced skin.
No blood.
No visible injury.
Ryan felt abnormal feedback immediately through the knife handle.
The sensation resembled striking reinforced metal.
His movement stalled for roughly 0.3 seconds.
Enough.
Lynn twisted sharply and ripped the blade from Ryan's grip.
Then threw it across the workshop.
The discarded weapon slammed against concrete with a metallic crack.
Ryan retreated immediately.
Fast.
Extremely fast.
Grey Falcon would have been neutralized already under the same circumstances.
Ryan instead shifted from offense to defensive repositioning in less than half a second.
"Your skin isn't normal," Ryan said coldly.
"No," Lynn replied calmly.
Exactly the same tone he used during ordinary consultations.
"Your blades can't cut me."
"Neither can your needles."
A slight pause.
"Would you like to try another approach?"
Ryan didn't answer.
Instead—
His remaining blade shifted into reverse grip.
Then he charged again.
This time—
At least thirty percent faster.
No restraint remained.
His attack style changed completely.
Gone were the large sweeping slashes.
Now—
Dense thrust combinations.
Every strike targeted the same location.
Lynn's eyes.
Correct tactical adaptation.
Luke Cage-level skin reinforcement could not fully protect the eyeballs.
Ryan had identified the weakness immediately.
His blade flashed repeatedly through the darkness.
Thrust.
Feint.
Angle shift.
Reverse stab.
Lynn's body moved with impossible precision.
Lean.
Sidestep.
Head tilt.
Minimal displacement every time.
Each blade strike missed by millimeters.
To Ryan—
The experience became deeply unnatural.
No matter how he altered rhythm or trajectory—
The target always remained barely outside the attack line.
Not reaction speed.
Prediction.
Ryan attacked seventeen consecutive times.
Not one thrust landed.
His breathing accelerated slightly.
Lynn counterattacked during the transition following the eighteenth thrust.
His right hand struck upward against Ryan's wrist.
The impact angle formed nearly ninety degrees against Ryan's own forward force vector.
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