No one answered Uesugi Ryu's question.
Uesugi Ryu did not say that purely to show off. He was stalling for time to stack buffs.
Talent Devour Soul activated. Detected sufficient soul strength. Mana increased by 132 points.
The moment the mana increase and system rewards arrived, Uesugi Ryu immediately began allocating points.
There was no time to think. He currently had 5 attribute points, which made things quite straightforward.
He directly chose Strength, Speed, Constitution, and Intelligence, each +1.
Uesugi Ryu was already very familiar with allocating points. The difficult part after allocation was controlling the surge in power.
But in the current situation, it seemed he did not need to control his strength at all.
---
Name: Uesugi Ryu
Race: Human (Undetermined)
Strength: SS+ [SSS-] (based only on base attributes, weapons and skills not included)
Strength: 16 [18] (SSS-)
Speed: 18 [18] (SSS-)
Constitution: 15 (A+) (Equipment +1)
Intelligence: 15 (SS) (Each point converts to 10 mana)
Mana: 670/884 (Recovers 24 per hour)
HP: 252
Overall Defense +86
Total Defense: 124.3
Equipment: Molten Abyss (State 2)
Mana Consumption: 14 per minute
Skills: C-rank Blood Frenzy, D-rank Phantom Clone, Instant Step, E-rank Hand-to-Hand Combat Mastery, Hand of God, Flash Technique
Energy: 86/100 (Remaining draws: 1)
Items: C-rank rare item Soul of the Broken Dragon, C-rank rare item Wine-Sack Rice-Bag, D-rank item Pharmacist's "Treasure", SSS-rated Quinque Elegy, S+ rated Quinque Jason (2), A-rated Quinque Destroyer, A-rated Quinque Qiying, Tranquilizer...
---
After entering berserk state, Molten Abyss no longer gave a noticeable boost to Uesugi Ryu's speed. It did not even show on the system panel.
After all, Molten Abyss had its limits. Its base material was only an SS-rated Kakuhou.
Looking at Arima Kishou nearby, Uesugi Ryu frowned.
This was also the first time Uesugi Ryu and Arima Kishou had met.
In this kind of situation, Arima Kishou could not openly hold back against Uesugi Ryu, but he would definitely interfere behind the scenes.
Killing Yoshimura Eto here would be difficult.
Uesugi Ryu had not originally planned to kill Yoshimura Eto here anyway. His plan had been to remove five or six or seven or eight of her Kakuhou as materials.
Now that the Clowns had entered to stir things up, he abandoned that plan.
There was no telling what that lunatic Furuta Nimura would do.
The Clowns were too complicated. Uesugi Ryu could not determine why Hoito Roma had appeared here.
If the Clowns and Aogiri Tree had formed an alliance,
then facing three SSS-level combatants at once would be somewhat troublesome for Uesugi Ryu.
He was not afraid of being surrounded, but Mado Akira and the others on the other side would likely be in danger.
For a moment, the scene fell into a deathly silence.
Uesugi Ryu was waiting for his stat allocation to finish while also observing whether they intended to gang up on him.
Hoito Roma wanted to run, but she was afraid that if she ran first, she would be targeted by Uesugi Ryu.
Yoshimura Eto was dealing with her injuries, regenerating her Kakuja shell.
As for what Arima Kishou was thinking, only he himself knew.
Two ghouls, one half-human, one "little dragon man". The four humanoid beings together probably had eight hundred schemes in their heads.
The crisp sound of footsteps broke the strange silence.
Arima Kishou gripped Narukami and rushed toward Yoshimura Eto.
Bright yellow plasma spheres shot out from the top of Narukami, flying toward Yoshimura Eto.
The plan to capture Yoshimura Kuzen as an experimental subject had failed.
Now the most important thing was to ensure Yoshimura Eto escaped successfully.
While attacking Yoshimura Eto, Arima Kishou's strike also placed the yellow plasma spheres precisely in Uesugi Ryu's path.
Seeing this, Uesugi Ryu understood something. He turned his head toward Hoito Roma, who was already fleeing.
"This is bad. This is bad. So scary."
A strong sense of danger surged through her. Hoito Roma's face twisted instantly.
Her upper body, which had been positioned on the head of her Kakuja shell, quickly shrank inward like a frightened rabbit.
The four-meter-tall Kakuja shell felt as fragile as paper, offering her no sense of safety.
She shouted desperately.
"Uesugi Ryu, are you not going to care about your little girlfriend? I did not come here alone!"
A Blood Shadow flashed.
The greatblade in Uesugi Ryu's hand drew a perfect arc.
With a clean motion, he severed the thick forelimb of Hoito Roma's Kakuja shell.
With a crisp crack, the limb fell to the ground, kicking up dust.
Hearing Hoito Roma's words, Uesugi Ryu's expression beneath the armor turned cold.
His lips parted slightly as he forced out a sentence through clenched teeth.
"That is none of your concern."
The voice was not loud, but the killing intent within it spread without concealment.
......
With a hand strike, Tatara pierced through the chest of the investigator in front of him, then tossed the corpse onto the snow like trash.
"Your lives are under my control!"
His expression was cold. His sanpaku eyes were filled with killing intent.
Behind him, a large number of Aogiri Tree ghouls rushed past.
At that moment, sharp whistling sounds suddenly cut through the air.
Two orange spiral crystals shot toward Tatara.
Noro, standing nearby, extended the thick claw-like kagune from his back to block in front of Tatara.
The spiral crystals struck Noro's kagune, paused briefly, then exploded violently.
The terrifying explosion directly blew apart Noro's kagune, and his body was riddled with holes from the fragments.
But in the next instant, dense blood threads spread from his body and pulled the broken kagune back.
His kagune and injuries were fully restored in an instant.
The smoke from the explosion quickly dissipated. Tatara frowned and turned to look.
Not far away, Kuroiwa Iwao stood with a cold expression and spoke.
"That line should be ours to say, you white-haired brat!"
Beside him, Shinohara Yukinori also looked serious.
The two stood shoulder to shoulder, firmly blocking Tatara and the others.
Behind them followed a large number of investigators.
Hōji Kōsuke's Quinque Hollow emitted orange smoke. The previous attack had come from him.
His expression remained calm as he said,
"Tatara-kun, we meet again."
Suzuki Juuzou stood behind Shinohara Yukinori.
He gripped his large scythe tightly, narrowed his eyes, and greeted Tatara.
"Good evening. Mr. Flamethrower!"
Suzuki Juuzou held grudges deeply. He had not forgotten at all how badly Tatara had injured him.
"Annoying pests. Kill them."
Tatara snorted coldly and gave the order.
Several masked ghouls stood behind him.
These were S-rated ghouls recently recruited by Aogiri Tree, most of them escapees from Cochlea.