Super Gene Immortal Chapter 9

"What can I do for you mister Danfeng?" Lux asked in a super professional voice.

The hologram of Danfeng pause for a moment at the weird way of answering before letting out a little chuck, "Mister Sen, I would like to extend a most courteous greeting to you! Wouldst thou be so inclined to join me and my cohorts in the establishment known as Twilight for drinks and a gift." He said in as proper and as pompous a voice as he could muster.

Lux was happy that Zhang Danfeng played along. It was rather fun and good to know that the guy had a decent sense of humor.

"A gift you say?" Lux stroked his chin for a moment, "I suppose that I can put aside my plans of world domination for a few hours to receive my early tribute from such a devoted follower. You will set such a good example for the rest of rabble and peasantry."

"Hahaha, Sen what's gotten into you? You are usually so serious, everything alright?" Danfeng asked looking genuinely concerned.

Lux waved off the concern, "I know, but I just had a really good hunt in the Sanctuary and I'm feeling rather loosey goosey. Just enjoy the fun me before old serious me takes back the controls."

"Hey, I'm just trying to look out for my brother from another mother. You can talk to me if you ever need to vent. You know that right?" Danfeng said seriously, "But anyway, get your ass on over here to Twilight and you can tell me about this hunt that's got you so happy."

Lux stretched and glanced around his room before nodding, "Alright, I'll be over there as soon as I can manage. Order me a sweet tea while I'm on the way and tell them to add extra sugar."

"Gotcha bro. Safe trip."

Lux changed out of his hunting clothes to something that didn't say he was going to engage in a mass shooting. No need to go to a restaurant in all black combat attire. Lux was already pretty intimidating up close because his well above average height. Then he called up the premium AV taxi service to take him to the Twilight Tavern, which was actually more of a restaurant than a tavern. But it had nice music always playing and an overall good atmosphere. Zhang Danfeng, Han Sen, Han Hao and Xue Xi had frequented the place growing up. Lux's commlink had lots of pictures and selfies of times spent at the place, so at least he knew where it was and what all went on there.

The trip was barely five minutes long and Lux soon found himself in the Tavern looking for wherever Danfeng was seated. With a quick text he found that Zhang Danfeng had reserved one of the private rooms and he made his way up to the room.

Inside was Zhang Danfeng and surprisingly Han Hao was there too. Lux hadn't expected it, but Han Hao was blatantly ignoring him so Lux just did the same and smiled at Danfeng as he entered the room.

"Ah there he is!" Danfeng said gesturing to a seat with large glass set in front of it, "Take a seat, I've got something to show you."

Lux took his seat and took a sip of the sweet tea… none of the restaurants in this world seemed to make a good, sweet tea. Lux was wondering if he was going to need make his own blend and start his own brand of southern style sweet tea to be able to get a taste of home… maybe he'd introduce cowboy hats, and big buckles as well… thoughts for later.

Danfeng meanwhile manifested beast soul that condensed down into a long curved dagger that looked like a fang. "I got really lucky! And got this Mutant Saber-Toothed Tiger beast soul. It is way better than my current weapon, and Han Hao was telling me about how down on your luck you've been in your shelter… Did you really stab a girl in the ass on your first day?"

Lux chuckled at that, "To my great misfortune yes, I did. She was using a shapeshifting beast soul and was in the shape of a lion. I didn't know the area, or the people yet. I just saw a beast in the area where ordinary creatures were supposed to be and stabbed before asking questions that I should have." Lux shrugged, "And damn you are definitely one luck bastard to not only find a mutant but also get its beast soul."

Danfeng shook his head at Lux's story and sighed, "Well not much you can do about the whole thing now I guess, but I figured that since I got this new and awesome weapon, I could give you my old one."

With that Danfeng bent over and retrieved a sheathed broadsword from the floor and set it on the table in front of him. Lux was actually touched by this gesture. Danfeng was gifting him an alpha z-steel alloy broadsword that sold on the market for a million dollars. The fact that Danfeng wasn't thinking about money at all and was just handing over his old sword as a gift was a touching gesture that made Lux feel guilty for not spending some more effort to be the guy's friend. He was obviously a good dude.

"Don't even think of rejecting it. Even if you do have something already, it is a gift. Also, Han Hao said he wanted to speak to you about something and that is why he is here actually." Danfeng said as he misinterpreted the look in Han Sen's eye.

"I… thank yo-" before Lux could finish talking the door to the private room burst open and an obese wild Karen appeared!

Lux could practically hear the boss battle music, actually literal as there music in the Tavern that would go great with a boss battle blaring, as his fugly aunt, Han Yumei, rounded on her son Han Hao and began a tirade.

Han Hao barely got a word in edgewise as she berated him for ditching the opportunity to go to a party/get-together of Planet Roca's elite scions. Apparently, Lux's friend Lin Beifeng was in attendance, and the guy was a big deal. Son of the owners of the biggest mining company in the Alliance. And Lux's aunt was disappointed and irate at Han Hao for hanging out with his friends rather than trying to become friends with the bigshots of the Alliance.

Han Hao was dragged out of the private room under the half concerned half amused gazes of both Lux and Danfeng.

"Your aunt is…" Danfeng started, seemingly at a loss for words.

"Outrageous? A vile Karen one step away from dying her hair blue? A walking tub of lard that should be confined without food for a few years to help her lose about half of all that fat? A parasitic leech? A vile clone of Rosie Odonnell? She makes Caseoh look like one of the smallest streamers ever? Has her own satellites?" Lux just listed off things one by one, "Yeah, I know. And it doesn't really matter, my extended family has already proven themselves to be greedy bastards. I have already written them off as a lost cause. Even Han Hao. You have shown me a hundred thousand times more solidarity and been a million times better as a friend. You are more family to me than those people are."

Danfeng looked at once please with what Lux had said and horribly amused by the commentary. Before shaking it off, "Umm… is now a good time to tell you that I also have an invitation to that party and was planning to invite you after this?"

Lux smiled at that, "This is perfect. We should go. I wonder how they'll react to seeing me hanging out with Beifeng?"

"You know Lin Beifeng?" Danfeng asked, genuinely surprised.

Lux nodded, "I saved his life on a hunt like two months ago and brought him back to the Steel Armor Shelter… he was originally from Glory Shelter I do believe. Pissed of an entire herd of Mommo Beasts by killing one of their young. We got trapped on a the side of cliff together for like two weeks."

"Damn, that's some crazy luck!" Danfeng let out a long whistle before grinning like a wolf, "Well what are waiting for? We've got a party to crash!"

The pair took a quick detour to Han Sen's house to deposit Danfeng's gift before they headed to the venue of the party. Not a huge detour, but a bigger one than Han Sen's relatives who went straight there.

Walking into the venue, it was a snazzy place that had been rented out. Like a whole five-star hotel, kind of snazzy. Lux looked around to see that his cousin and aunt were in the greeting area waiting their turn to socialize in the main galla/ball room.

Just then, as if by happenstance, Lin Beifeng walked by the main doors and glance out into the greeting area and spotted Han Sen's smiling face. The guy immediately did an almost perfect ninety degree turn and beelined it straight towards Lux. Ignoring everyone else as he approached with a giant grin on his face.

"Sen! I finally found you my brother!" He cried as he pulled Lux into a hug.

Lux wasn't very comfortable with hugs, but he gave the guy a pat on the back and tight squeeze before taking a step back and giving him a raised eyebrow look.

"You've been looking for me? I know I gave you my number back in the Sanctuary, you could have just called." Lux said.

Beifeng released a sheepish chuckle, "I seem to have misplaced whatever I wrote it down on… So after asking around and finding out that you live on Roca I came here to try and find you since I couldn't seem to track you down in the Sanctuary."

"Ah… I was just part of a hunt for a Sacred-Blood creature and was out of the shelter for about a month. I probably should have tried to find you before that to make sure you were settling in well at Steel Armor Shelter, but you have probably picked up on the rumors and my reputation by now." Lux said apologetically.

"And all of those rumors are nonsense and slander!" Lin Beifeng declared loudly, "Except the one about you being Qin Xuans boytoy, I hope that ones true for your sake. I know I'd let her do disgusting things to me if she wanted to." He chuckled and nudged Lux's ribs with an elbow.

 Lux laughed, "That makes two of us. But that is one rumor that is… quite exaggerated. Just a poor choice of phrasing on her part and boom, everyone thinks we are together now." He shook his head a little bemused, "And the funniest part about that is that I'm pretty sure that she has no idea that she started the rumors herself. She drags me into training rooms all the time and tries to beat me within an inch of my life. Good practice all things considered though."

"Aww pooie. I was hoping that my brother had bagged the baddest baddy in the shelter through his pure rugged charm and charisma. Bragging rights by association and all that." Lin Beifeng looked a little glum but perked up, "So tell me about that hunt you just went on."

"Well, it went like this..."

Lux and Lin Beifeng chatted for a good half hour before Beifeng had to go. It was his party and he was running its functions. Lux exchanged contact info with the guy before he and Zhang Danfeng headed out. Lux returning home to get a good night's sleep.

Lux got up bright and early the next day. The plan was to head into the 1st Sanctuary and go off to the Dark Swamp to explore and get some new buffs. So, he geared up and set out to the teleportation station… maybe he should look into buying a Telepad for the house?

Looking up what it would cost to get a private Telepad installed at his Lux was making his way to the train station when there was a sudden pressure wave and low rumble in the air. The holographic display on his commlink glitched out and his connection to the network dropped for a moment before coming back and a holographic "Warning" was displayed along with an emergency tone screeching at him before and automated message began playing on a loop. Not just from his commlink, but from speakers around the area as well.

"Warning, unidentified potentially hostile space craft detected in your area. Remain calm and please proceed to the nearest bunker or shelter."

The message hasn't even finished the word 'Warning' when a massive fireball streaked across the sky almost directly overhead. Lux's eyes widened as he took in the sight just before the giant ball of fire crashed into a large school building only two blocks away from where he was standing.

Lux was moving before he even really thought about what was going on. Summoning up his armor to surround him along with his newly acquired wings and taking off towards the building. As he got closer to the site of the crash Lux could see that the spaceship, which looked like an orb, had survived the crash with almost no visible damage. It hull made of some super alloy that must have made z-steel alloys look like paper in comparison.

The spaceship was a Shura scouting vessel. The Shura were the reason why humanity was under one big government instead of having dozens of different nations. Humanity were the ones that referred to the Shura as Shura, mainly because the true name of the alien race was completely unpronounceable to humans. The Alliance claimed that they didn't know why the Shura were at war with humanity, but they were. And humanity's only advantage was numbers. Shura technology was better. Shura physiology allowed them to naturally train their bodies all the way up to the Demi-God stage without even entering the Sanctuaries, in fact, as far as anyone was aware, Shura were completely unable to enter the 1st, the 2nd, the 3rd, or the 4th Sanctuary. At this point, Lux may be among the privileged few who knew that the space they shared with the Shura was actually the 5th sanctuary. If a Shura did enter the teleporters and go to the 1st sanctuary they would be beset by a myriad of physical maladies from cancer to necrosis and would wither away within minutes of entering. Lux wasn't sure why, but that was what happened to the Shura whenever they tried to enter the Sanctuaries.

The Shura looked like humans for the most part. Honestly, the only real visible difference was their horns. Male Shura had one horn, and Female Shura had two. The horns were not entirely uniform as far as where on their heads it grew, but they generally jutted up from where the hairline was on their foreheads.

Humanity did not know much about Shura culture. But they had managed to piece together some stuff over the two hundred odd years of fighting. Both Male and Female Shura wore masks over their faces from early in their childhoods. This mask along with their horns were their public identity, signifying many things like social status and rank. Though Lux would bet money on it being a more upper echelon and military thing in their society and less of a species wide thing.

Anyway, the presence of a Shura vessel on planet Roca was a strange thing. Roca was mainly a commercial planet, well within the border of the core worlds of humanity. Roca was nowhere near any battlefronts. It was separated from any active warzones by at least a dozen star systems. How this Vessel managed to find its way here to Roca and crash land onto a school was quite the concern. Lux didn't have time to ponder though, there were people to help.

The school was much larger than the schools that Lux normally thought of on earth. This particular school was a fifteen-story building. The fact that it hadn't collapsed by having a ship drop on it from orbit showed how sturdy construction was when some z-steel alloy was used in support structures. Just in general building materials were so much better than they had ever been on earth. The Shura ship was imbedded in the top third of the school. And just above where the ship had crashed, a classroom had collapsed atop it. Lux could see the bodies of children who had fallen out of building when the floor beneath their feet buckled, and he felt sick to his stomach at the sight.

Just below the collapsed classroom was a young girl, dangling from a steel beam that had jutted out of the walls right beside the exposed Shura vessel, and she was screaming for dear life. Lux hadn't paused at all, and he had barely spotted the girl when he was already beside her in the air. Grabbing her and holding her tight to his armored form.

Lux had only just retrieved the little girl when the hatch on the Shura vessel hissed open. Revealing a large, though badly wounded Shura warrior, clad in armor from head to toe, a mask and a golden horn jutting up like some kind of demon mask from Japan. Golden horns meant that this Shura, whoever he was, was an important and powerful individual. In the Shura's right hand was a large black katana-like blade. The Shura's green blood was leaking from dozens of rents in his armor.

Lux froze for a moment. Unsure of what to do, he needed to get the kid to safety. And he was probably going to have to have to fight this Shura. He activated his Shapeshifting beast soul, and dove for a window as he summoned up his Sacred-Blood spear, only barely managing to block a powerful slash by the warrior who seemed like he was going to go all out for his last hurrah.

Lux managed to get the girl into the building and yelled at her to run while he turned to deal with the Shura. Hefting his spear, his golden armor molded around his centaur like form, Lux was as prepared for battle as he was going to get right now. Which was a good thing. The Shura didn't wait, it charged at him with frightening speed. Even more frightening because this guy was already seriously injured, and he was still obviously superior to Lux in strength.

Lux wasn't this Shura's match, the katana-like blade whistled through the air faster than he could see it and he was completely unable to block the attack. An attack which dug into and through the armor over his right shoulder slicing deep into Lux's flesh and nearly into the bone.

Lux gasped at the pain, the spear falling from his grip and the beast spirit returning to his sea of soul. He was now very aware of the fact that even with his current armor he was not entirely safe. He wasn't scared or anything like that, but his right arm was cooked for the moment.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, the blade got stuck in Lux's armor and flesh for just a moment, and he took advantage of that moment to throw a haymaker into the Shura's face which rocked it back a step as it yanked its blade out of his body. Lux wasn't sure what that freaking mask covering the Shura's face was made of. But it had felt like he'd just punched a steel plate. Without the armor covering his hand Lux was certain that that one punch would have broken the bones in his hand.

Lux did not fear death, he did not fear pain, he did not even have a reason to be afraid at this moment. He summoned up his spear once again, this time in his left hand and drove forward with all of the skill and speed he could muster, falling back on his training in The Seven Deadly Thrusts. But it was almost like a child flailing a stick against an adult for all the good it did. The Shura deftly swept the spear to the side and closed the distance between them with a lunge. The katana-like blade piercing through Lux's side and leaving a deep gash.

Seeing that he was well and truly outclassed in all categories, Lux did the only thing he could think of that might hurt the Shura. He dismissed the spear once more and tackled the Shura. Pulling him bodily out of the side of the building and using his wings to accelerate himself and the Shura down at the ground at as high a speed as he could muster.

"You are insane human!" the Shura shouted the last thing he would ever say to another person as Lux kicked off him only about fifty feet from the asphalt and slowed his own decent while summoning his spear once more. After the Shura hit the ground, his body bounced a little, and Lux descended upon him with his spear and drove it through one of the already open rents that were in his armor.

Lux was fairly certain that the Shura had died on impact with the ground, but you can never go wrong with Rule #2: the double tap. Especially when the enemy in question was a superpowered alien. Lux sighed in relief as he looked around the alleyway that they had ended up in and reverted his shapeshifting back to human form, groaning at the pain. The Shura had really gotten him good a couple of times, and during Lux's mad bid to kill him, the Shura had managed to fully impale Lux. In fact, the blade was still sticking out of his chest and he was not looking forward to removing it. Despite the pain, Lux applied the number one rule of all gamers "Loot the Body". And was disappointed by the fact that there was nothing to take aside from the sword.

Pulling the sword out of his chest, Lux nearly passed out from the pain. His personal system ensured that he didn't bleed, as bleeding was considered a debuff. So even though Lux had been heavily injured there was no physical evidence that could lead back to him. Even if there was, DNA testing was super unreliable nowadays due to Geno points heavily altering a person's genetics. So, it's not like the government would have found Lux by finding a sample of his DNA.

After this little adventure, Lux was not about to head into the Sanctuary. He needed some time to recover. So, he circled around back to his home. Using the sewers to avoid being seen. His injuries could very well have been recorded by thousands of phones and cameramen that had no doubt been watching the whole thing from afar. He was actually super lucky that he had landed in a place with no people nearby, because he was able get home without being seen.