The Struggle Begins

Seeing that they were trying to form a circle around him, surrounding him and blocking off his path of retreat, Xavier quickly tried to break their enclosure. With their numbers and larger physiques, overwhelming him would be easy once they closed in on him together.

He couldn't allow that to happen, and picked out the one that appeared to be the most vulnerable and easy to take down, then bolted towards them.

With the metal pole in his right hand, Xavier could attack from a distance and chose to attack one of the two armed with knuckle dusters, which would only be effective if they could land a punch on him.

Swinging the metal pole towards his head, since that was the easiest and quickest way to strike down his opponents, the opponent was surprisingly able to block it and even grab the metal pole.

Xavier wasn't reliant on his weapon, but it was an advantage that he just lost, as he let go of it and followed up his first attack with a flying knee to the centre of his face.

After enduring the pole strike to his large forearms and managing to snatch the metal pole off Xavier, who gave up on it, his arms were weakened greatly, allowing Xavier to break through his boxer-like defence.

With his knee strike smashing past his arms and landing cleanly on his nose, he was launched stumbling backwards, but impressively didn't fall back or lose consciousness.

It seemed as though it was Xavier who had underestimated his opponents, who weren't all brawn.

I guess they weren't gangsters based on their size and appearance alone, and their large arms did help in terms of defence and raw power.

However, the heat of the battle, the adrenaline rush and the seething rage within him made it so that it was impossible to feel intimidated or afraid as he followed up after his knee strike.

Regaining balance and swiftly spinning around, Xavier thrust out his leg and landed a powerful spinning back kick onto his stomach, then jumped towards him, about to pound his face to ensure he had lost consciousness.

However, he was suddenly kicked from the side by another one of his opponents, and although he managed to block it, he couldn't follow up on his attacks and had lost his momentum.

"Damn it," he cursed under his breath, as the man who stopped him unleashed a flurry of punches toward him.

He was clearly a skilled boxer and was also equipped with knuckle dusters, just like the man he was about to take down, as he roared, "You dare to attack my brother! You fucker. I will kill you myself!"

It appeared the two with the brass knuckles were brothers and they did look alike, but Xavier couldn't care less about that and was more focused on dodging as many of the man's punches as he could.

With his large figure, he was a flat-footed boxer, making it so that he wasn't very agile or nimble, but it also allowed him to have more power through his punches.

He fought like your typical heavyweight boxer, and obviously didn't have the same level of skill and power, but wasn't far off and was also wearing knuckle dusters, making all of his punches much more lethal.

Laughing manically, the thug versed in boxing began to believe he had gained the upper hand, with Xavier being pushed back and struggling to endure his onslaught of fists.

However, Xavier was patiently seeking an opening and was managing to endure all the attacks relatively well, able to dodge most of them.

Suddenly ducking down as he spun around and swung his right leg, he cleanly swept the boxer's legs.

A large flat-footed fighter's weaknesses are their balance, flexibility and agility, which are subpar and unable to compare to a lean fighter that focused on speed and explosive power like Xavier.

Not expecting such an expertly executed low kick, he fell to the ground and quickly scrambled to regain balance and get up, but unfortunately for him, he was too slow.

Seeing the opportunity, Xavier went to kick him again in the head, seeking to crush him.

However, before he could completely knock him unconscious, another one of his opponents attacked him with a wooden bat, and he had no choice but to back away as he blocked the strike with his left arm.

Instantly, upon enduring the blow, his arm felt numb and heavy, but he couldn't back down, and the adrenaline made it so that he didn't feel most of the pain.

He had gravely injured two of the remaining 7 fighters, and they had been weakened and disorientated greatly, but he hadn't managed to completely take them down with the others intervening.

That allowed them to recover and also crushed his momentum, making it more difficult for him to face them all as one of the slimmer figures in the Black Hand Gang stepped forward to face Xavier.

"Your baseball bats and boxing won't do shit. Blunt weapons can't draw blood, and I am going to carve up this fucker," he said as he blocked the man with the baseball bat from continuing his attempt at taking down Xavier.

Taking out a relatively small flick knife, he licked it as he flashed Xavier an evil smile.

His eyes had a red glint and were those of a killer.

Xavier had fought against people armed with knives a few times, but from his hawk-like eyes and the way he handled the knife comfortably and swiftly, it was clear that he was experienced.

And fighting against a knife-wielding opponent was always difficult, with one needing to dodge all of their attacks.

However, backing down or retreating weren't options.