Hell's Handbook

Once on the plane, Su Jin shut his eyes to rest. Tang Ning had made sure that they all got first class seats, since that amount of money was nothing to Stellar Skies. Kano Mai wasn’t an employee, so her seat wasn’t paid for. But the price of a first class air ticket was nothing to Su Jin and Kano Mai anyway.

After the plane stabilized, most passengers closed their eyes and took a nap like Su Jin, while some went to the bathroom or occupied themselves with their own activities.

“Sir, do you need to change into a pair of slippers?” an air stewardess asked Su Jin politely.

Su Jin shook his head but thanked her anyway, “Thanks for asking but I don’t need that. Could you get me a glass of water?”

“Of course. I’ll get it for you in a moment.” She nodded and turned to check with the other passengers. Kano Mai wanted a glass of water too, while Thomas and the rest ordered other things. But when she got to a Caucasian passenger, he gave her a clearly irritated look.

“Get lost!” he yelled at her. He looked rather ill-tempered, and there was a violent glint in his eyes.

Su Jin was surprised by the sudden shout and looked toward the man, but Thomas whispered, “Mr. Su, it’s best that you don’t offend this man.”

“Oh? Why?” Su Jin was very curious. Thomas was someone who had survived some pretty bad situations, yet he was actually being cautious of someone now.

“There’s something wrong with the look in his eyes,” said Thomas with a frown.

“The look in his eyes?”

“Yup. I’m sure he’s killed more than one person before and he kills for fun. This sort of person is extremely dangerous. You might be stronger than him or know better techniques than he does, but when push comes to shove, you might not be a match for him,” explained Thomas patiently.

Su Jin nodded slightly. He trusted Thomas’ judgement. He had gone through many fights to the death because of the Handbook, but it was mostly with a bunch of monsters and supernatural beings. Compared to Thomas, he didn’t have that much experience fighting other humans, especially dangerous ones.

“Thomas, what about the look in my eyes? What sort of person do you think I am?” asked Su Jin curiously. He was now interested in what Thomas had to say about him.

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Thomas looked into Su Jin’s eyes, and besides seeing the almost black eye color that most Chinese had, he also saw a tiny hint of silver. But when he took a closer look, the silver glint seemed to have disappeared.

A few moments later, Thomas shook his head and smiled sadly. “I can’t tell.”

“You can’t tell, or you’re afraid to say it?” asked Su Jin with a smile. “Don’t worry, just tell me what you see, I won’t blame you for it.”

“You’re a rock,” said Thomas a little fearfully.

“A rock?” This time, even Kano Mai was curious. She couldn’t understand why Thomas would use such a word on Su Jin.

Thomas nodded. He explained in a hesitant voice, “After I came to China, I went to visit the temples and saw a lot of Buddha statues and the like. The look in Mr. Su’s eyes… are very similar to those statues.”

“Are you saying that I look unfeeling?” Su Jin was rather surprised. Based on his understanding of his own character, he was a warmhearted and sentimental person. Yet, someone was now saying he was like an emotionless piece of rock.

Thomas shook his head. “Not unfeeling, more like… indifferent! That’s right, the look in your eyes is indifference. Or at least, that’s what it looks like when you look at me. Ordinary people have such a look in their eyes too, especially when they’re looking at people or things that do not pose a threat to them or do not benefit them, like when they look at dust.

“But in this world, I’ve never met anybody who would look at me this way, not even powerful and reputable people, because I…”

“Because you’re also a very powerful person,” Su Jin finished the sentence for Thomas. He felt that Thomas’ description was a more accurate one. The only ones who posed a threat to him now were higher ranked owners and creatures he met in Challenges. The real world pretty much didn’t pose any threat to him now. Perhaps a nuclear missile would, but he had never been faced with one before. Also, now that he had this god-level body, he might actually be able to hold up against one.

The only ones in the real world who could make him sit up and pay attention were Xu Ran and other powerful owners hiding in this world like himself. But such people were a rare sight. Everybody remained where they were and lived their lives quietly. Having to deal with their monthly Handbook Challenges was bad enough, so if there was no need to, they wouldn’t fight each other.

Thomas laughed sadly and said, “I don’t think you see me as someone powerful at all, so I’ve been thinking all this time, exactly how powerful are you? Also… I really look forward to having a match with you!”

Su Jin looked at Thomas with some surprise. He had taught him a lesson the last time and thought that he would have given up trying. To his surprise, Thomas had the spirit of a warrior inside him. Instead of shrinking back in the face of someone more powerful, he took it as a challenge instead.

At the same time, the five martial arts experts on board with them had looks of contempt on their faces. They felt that Thomas and Su Jin must be really shameless characters to be boasting about themselves like this. The five of them were top martial artists of the country, after all. If Su Jin were also an expert, they would have heard of him by now.

Su Jin could sense their expressions very clearly. His psychokinesis had reached a point where he could sense immediately if anybody’s attention was on himself. He had reached a level where he could launch a sneak attack and most people would not be able to detect anything.

But Su Jin wasn’t bothered by their reactions. Just like what Thomas said earlier, these people did not pose a threat to him and weren’t of any extra benefit to him. They were just like dust to him. Why should he bother himself with what dust thought of him?

Su Jin was interested in the Caucasian man who raised his voice earlier, however. He sent a beam of psychokinesis into the man’s head and was shocked almost immediately. This man was actually an owner like himself.

“He’s about to start a Challenge?” Su Jin frowned. From his scan of the man’s thoughts, he found out that this man was about to embark on a new Challenge very soon. But it would be a terrible idea to do it on the plane, because owners would suddenly disappear when they entered a Challenge. They didn’t disappear for a long time, but it was long enough for someone to notice. Also, owners whose actions caused others to realize the existence of the Handbook would end up suffering severely for it.

That was why most owners would look for a private area before heading into a Challenge to prevent any unforeseen circumstances from happening. But this man had a dangerous idea. He was going to kill everybody on the plane to create such a space for himself.

“What a troublesome fellow,” thought Su Jin with a sigh. Governments around the world did not know who owners really were, but they all had an official term for everyone they suspected was an owner. Regardless of what term they used, all governments treated owners as very dangerous people.

And owners were treated as dangerous people precisely because there were owners like this man here. This man used his supernatural powers to create chaos for the world he lived in, and Situ Jin was hunting down such owners for the same reason.

Of course, Su Jin wasn’t going to let this sort of thing happen. His sense of justice was one reason, but the bigger reason was that they were in the freaking sky. Su Jin had a fear of heights, so he didn’t want to end up having to jump from the plane if he didn’t have to.

Su Jin flicked his fingers slightly, and everyone in the cabin, except the man and Kano Mai, fell into a deep sleep. Kano Mai was surprised when she saw this happening.

“What’s wrong?” she asked Su Jin.

He pointed at the Caucasian man and said, “He’s an owner and he’s about to massacre everyone on the plane so that he can start his next Challenge.”

Kano Mai nodded and shut her eyes to rest as well. She could leave something like this to Su Jin.

Su Jin smiled, got up, and walked toward the man, who had not noticed anything strange about the people around him yet.

“Hello there, could I talk to you about something?” said Su Jin.

“Get lost!” yelled the man as angrily as before. He didn’t even bother looking up.

Su Jin made a face and said, “I’m afraid I’m not going anywhere. I have a fear of heights, so I’m not going to watch you kill everyone on the plane.”

The man’s eyes widened and he looked up at Su Jin with a start. “How… how did you know that?”

“That’s not important,” said Su Jin with a shrug.

The man said, “You’re a Handbook owner as well!”

Su Jin nodded slightly and the man quickly said, “Since that’s the case, just pretend you didn’t know about this. I won’t get in your way and you won’t get in mine. How about that?”

But Su Jin shook his head, so the man glared fiercely at Su Jin and shouted angrily, “I’m trying to be polite here, so you’d better appreciate it. You might be an owner too, but it doesn’t mean I’m afraid of you. If we end up fighting, this plane is definitely going down. You’d better think twice!”

“That’s not necessarily true. As long as I don’t allow you to fight back, nothing will happen to this plane.” Su Jin shrugged. He could kill this man without anybody noticing, but that would be too disrespectful to his opponent. More importantly, though, it was better to confront him at a closer distance to make sure this man didn’t pull any stunts. This way, even if his psychokinesis failed for some reason, he could kill the man with a punch instead.

The man started breathing more heavily and was clearly ready to fight. But after Su Jin stared a little harder at him, the man couldn’t move anymore.

“What the hell?!” The man paled in horror and struggled with all his might, but it was useless.

“Ah, now I don’t have to worry.” Su Jin gave a pleased nod, then pressed a finger on the man’s heart, causing it to implode.

The man’s eyes flew open, as though he couldn’t believe something like that could happen. He was a Handbook owner, a person who was more powerful than the ordinary human and could torture them in any way he liked. How did things end up like this?

Su Jin withdrew his hand, then sat back down in his seat. He closed his eyes slightly, then sent a bit of psychokinesis into the man’s body. They were still in a plane and he didn’t want any unnecessary trouble, so he had left the man’s body in one good piece. That way, nobody on board would realize that this man was actually already dead.