The knuckle scraped against the matte scarlet blade, and the rain-soaked fingertips tightened ever so slightly ☠️🌧️. Leaning in the shadows behind the fence, mercenary Lynn squinted through his cybernetic eye; in the distance, an infrared red dot had just grazed the back of his shoulder 🔴. Behind him lay the old city’s no‑entry zone, demarcated by a giant corporation. These corporate vampires were intent on seizing ancient biological remains buried deep underground to forge bio‑weapons 🦠🔬—and anyone who dared stand in their way would be torn to shreds by the bionic hounds they’d unleashed. No one ever took this blunt training dagger seriously; its special non‑metallic material could slip past every security checkpoint and detection device 🔍🥷. Yet no one realized that, at this very moment, it was Lynn’s deadliest weapon. The skull‑carved hilt was the sole surviving insignia of his entire vanguard squad: during last year’s sweep operation, out of sixteen team members, only he remained alive. When the squad leader handed him this knife, his abdominal cavity had already been riddled with electromagnetic projectiles 🧯💀. The low growl of the bionic hound drew nearer, its infrared beam sweeping across the tactical backpack against which Lynn leaned. The blade’s light‑absorbing coating suppressed its thermal signature to near zero ✨. Lynn’s thumb curled around the grip’s anti‑slip ridges, his knuckles turning pale as he prepared for the next second: once the hound leapt over the fence, that scarlet dagger would strike with pinpoint precision into the canine’s neck‑mounted interface, bringing its runaway electronic systems to a complete standstill 🔌. Outside the fence, a blade of grass trembled, and the cold red dot settled steadily on the backpack’s position…