Chapter 420: The Most Demanding Battle Since the Special Training!
Translator: Exodus Tales Editor: Exodus Tales
Fighting with two of the fourteen-stars martial artists from the Sacred Martial Hall? You could only become a disciple of two heads of department after you won the fight.
Qin Fen used to only think that he couldn’t become the official disciple of two heads because of the Sacred Martial Six-stars. Today he knew of such conditions after he listened to Ferrero’s explanation.
Ferrero had kept quiet prior because he was afraid of affecting Qin Fen’s mood in the special training, which might result in him failing to do his best in it.
“Then we shall fight.”
Yang Lie and Caesar who stood beside Qin Fen casually placed their hands on his shoulder as they made the decision for him.
Ferrero was also very familiar with Qin Fen’s small team. They are a single unit together, sharing everything except their spouses. Since both Yang Lie and Caesar accepted the challenge, it was equivalent to Qin Fen accepting the challenge.
“It may be a duel, but you still need to be careful.” Ferrero’s two long and golden eyebrows revealed caution and suspicion, “In theory, fifteen-star martial artists will never lose to a fourteen-star martial artist. They should’ve already understood this especially when the power of the Sacred Martial Six-stars still belongs to our heads of departments. For them to request a duel nevertheless is indeed unusual.”
Qin Fen nodded slightly. The rumors of the Sacred Martial Hall had crowned Wu Zun as the strongest, closely followed by the Sacred Martial Six-stars. Their powers were still vested in the two Halls and six Departments. The challenging martial artist must’ve reached the power of a grandmaster, as it is unusual for them to challenge knowing a fifteen-star martial artist would almost always defeat a fourteen-star martial artist.
“Right, the time and place will be chosen by us. Because you were promoted to fifteen star-cla.s.s…” Ferrero slid his index finger across the bridge of his nose, “The Sacred Martial Six-stars required that the venue of battle to be chosen by them”
“Making a fuss about the location?”
Several young martial artists’ eyes lit up as they suddenly understood the idea of the Sacred Martial Six-stars.
A duel between a fourteen-star cla.s.s and a fifteen-star cla.s.s martial artist would have the odds of winning tilting towards the latter. Especially for a monstrous opponent like Qin Fen, even martial artists of equal rank would find it difficult to defeat him in battle, let alone those below his rank.
Winning a battle had always been dependent on being at the right place at the right time with the right person. Qin Fen’s power far exceeded the fourteen-star martial artists and could be said to be in the “right time”. Therefore there was a need to handicap Qin Fen through stripping off his terrain advantage, placing him at the “wrong place”. Without these handicaps, Qin Fen would’ve easily won the battle before it even began.
“The Sacred Martial Six-stars also requested that two fourteen-star martial artists fight together.” Ferrero sighed, “You also know that promoting to fifteen-stars would make you qualified to learn the Wukong technique. I didn’t bring this up to you because of this very reason. Before you won the battle…”
“It doesn’t matter, I would get it after I win the battle, isn’t it?” Qin Fen showed a soft smile. The Wukong technique in the eyes of others wasn’t only a technique learned by a few, but a stringent technique that had high power requirements to be able to learn it.
However, this didn’t mean that Qin Fen had no way to learn the technique.
The moment he reached the power of a fifteen-star, the master told him about the Wukong technique.
The reason why Qin Fen did not immediately practice the Wukong technique was mainly because the flying speed of a fifteen-star-cla.s.s martial artist wasn’t as fast as his sprinting speed.
Additionally, he hadn’t fully mastered the Martial Emperor Dragon Fist technique. If he were to forcibly cultivate the Wukong technique, it would become very difficult to correct the flaws of his movement techniques in the future.
“That’s good.” Ferrero nodded rea.s.suringly, “Get some rest. I will meet with the Sacred Martial Six-stars tomorrow.”
Returning to his own room in Building One twenty-two, Qin Fen simply took a bath and went to bed without thinking anything about martial dao at all, only immersing himself in relaxation.
In the hall of the Invitation Department, Xue Tian leaned against the front desk and stared strangely at the female receptionist martial artist in front of him.
“Hey beautiful lady, did you say that Mr. Ferrero isn’t here?”
The female receptionist smiled sweetly, unable to hide her curious doubts in her eyes. The heads had never deliberately given orders on how to answer if anyone came looking for them when they were outside.
“Mr. Ferrero said he is very busy today, I am afraid he wouldn’t be able to make it in time, please come again next time.”
The female receptionist narrated Ferrero’s words with further doubts and confusion in her eyes. The receptionist thought of the embarra.s.sed expression of Ferrero when he was leaving the message to her and wondered what really happened.
“Understood.” Xue Tian turned and scratched his head and walked outside the door, “Alright, please pa.s.s this message to Ferrero: I will come again tomorrow.”
The hall was restored to its initial silence. After five minutes, the female receptionist picked up the phone and asked, “h.e.l.lo sir, Xue Tian has left. He said he will come again tomorrow.”
“Okay, thank you.”
Ferrero closed the badge communication tool. He let out a helpless smile and shrugged his shoulders as he felt the confused eyes of the Sakra opposite him.
“Can you go now?”
The Sakra stared at Ferrero with disdain. The one that never entered his office had appeared today. Yet, he didn’t talk nor do anything but only drank tea.
“Sakra, I would like to discuss something with you.” Ferrero put down his teacup and placed his elbows on the armrest of the sofa, leaning forward, “What do you think about switching rooms with me?”
Switching rooms? The Sakra’s right hand trembled a little while holding a cup of tea. Ripples began to form on the calm water as his stoic face displayed an unusual expression.
“Didn’t you hear it just now?” Ferrero said with slight embarra.s.sment, “I am hiding from Xue Tian. I can’t take it anymore, suffering like this because of him.”
Sakra’s cold face turned into a gloating smile. Seeing Ferrero’s embarra.s.sed expression was way better than beating him up personally, “What happened? Is he more talented than Qin Fen?”
“You can’t really put it that way.” Ferrero waved his hand, “Xue Tian and Qin Fen are both different types. Qin Fen is the type to work hard on something, only to apply it practically and creating something uniquely his own. Xue Tian, however, is like a giant sponge, absorbing and understanding all sorts of knowledge in a short time regardless of how complicated it is. All he does is learn but is not innovative…”
“Oh?” the Sakra raised his eyebrows with unexpected interest, “How fast?”
Ferrero’s face suddenly turned bitter, “Do you remember my ‘Thirty-Six Days of Sickle Sword Technique?’”
“Yes, I remember, it was good.” the Sakra gently raised his thumb, “The Seventy-two Earth Breaking Sword Technique was also pretty good.”
Ferrero’s body fell back to the sofa as he weakly lifted his shoulders, “In the past six months, he had visited me five times. The last time we met, I even taught him the Dual Swords Technique. And now, he’s come back for more…”
“What?” The tea from the Sakra’s teacup spilled slightly due to his trembling hands, “You said that he only spent half a year…”
“Yes, he spent half a year to learn the martial arts that requires a few decades for a lot of talented martial artists to learn.” Ferrero sighed helplessly, “If it keeps going on like this, I am afraid that I will have nothing to teach him one day.”
“Is he that powerful?” The Sakra looked at Ferrero with suspicion. It was not that he didn’t believe Ferrero’s words, but the story was just too ridiculous. Is Xue Tian’s ability even human?
Ferrero put his legs on the armrest of the sofa as he laid down on the sofa, “You don’t believe me? That’s fine. I will just stay here and you can stay at my place for a while to find out.”
The Sakra quietly left his seat and looked at the shameless Ferrero again before quickly leaving the room.
Ferrero smiled and stretched his body. Knowing him as an old opponent of his, Ferrero saw the courageous eyes of Sakra accepting the challenge. Ferrero felt that it was about time for Sakra’s confidence to be crushed by Xue Tian.
Did it matter even if it’s neo martial art? Neo martial art fighting also required knowledge of combat techniques. There was no reason for Xue Tian to be unable to pick up the combat skills of the Sakra.
In the Asura’s room, Fenghua Danyun stood in front of a row of quirky beakers, constantly mixing various medicines together while whispering, “A divine beast level martial artist from a Shura Holy Fetus. I can definitely cultivate one, personally train it into a divine beast martial artist! No! Maybe he can even surpa.s.s the divine beast martial artists in the future and become an even more powerful martial artist.”
In dozens of test tubes, weird liquids were constantly boiling, giving out a whistling sound that gave out weird feelings to people.
The Sacred Martial Hall on the surface went on as usual as the day went by with uneventful training.
The sun rose once again. Ferrero came to Qin Fen’s room early only to find that many people had already gathered in his room, including Caesar, Yang Lie, and the rest of Qin Fen’s entourage; Xue Tian was looking at Ferrero with a smile.
Ferrero saw a martial arts handbook written by Sakra in the hands of Xue Tian and coughed a few times to mask his embarra.s.sment, only to be slightly shocked by Qin Fen’s face as he walked out of his bedroom.
Ferrero knew that Qin Fen’s appearance was not ugly nor handsome.
However, Qin Fen was very different today from the usual. Dressed in a black warrior suit that showed the outline of his fit body, his long and unkempt hair that had grown for half a year was tied up behind his head. Complemented with his heroic presence, Qin Fen felt like an illuminator of blinding heat.
Maybe the word “handsome” wasn’t the best word right now to describe Qin Fen.
But his masculine charm and aura had indeed deeply attracted others, even more so than the feminine-looking guys.
“Wow, you look nice.” Fenghua Danyun leaned on the door frame and a.s.sessed Qin Fen. Her watery pupils exuding a weird smile.
Qin Fen couldn’t see through what Fenghua Danyun was hiding in her smile for a moment. He only felt an icy sensation cruising down his back at high speed, as if it was a premonition for unfortunate events that were about to befall him.
Qin Fen looked at Ferrero in front of him, “Master, can we leave now?”
“Oh?” Ferrero nodded again and again, “Of course.”
As the group exited the housing building, the young martial artists of Building One twenty-two had already waited downstairs.
Today was the first battle after Qin Fen’s special training. This thing was not only known to the young martial artists of Building One twenty-two, but also to the other martial artists who were concerned about Qin Fen. They were also very aware of this matter.
The two heads who also wanted to accept Qin Fen as their disciple were there as well. With the help of the intelligence-savvy people in the Recruitment Department, the news was spread across the corners of the entire Sacred Martial Hall.
The young martial artists in Building One twenty-one also waited early for them downstairs.
As he walked along, Qin Fen found that more martial artists were gathering behind him. Occasionally, some might guess the outcome of today’s battle, wondering if Qin Fen could defeat his opponent as easily as chopping a vegetable. At the same time, the martial artists were also guessing the venue of battle chosen by the Sacred Martial Six-stars.
Going through a variety of buildings, a huge lake appeared in front of everyone. Ferrero also halted his movements at this very moment.
Next to the lake, the projections of the Sacred Martial Six-star were floating in the air. Alongside them gathered a number of martial artists of the Sacred Martial Hall.
At a glance, Qin Fen noticed the two longsword-wielding fourteen-star martial artists among the crowd. Those two must be his opponent for today.
Both the opponents were ordinary-looking men. If you were to dismiss the longswords on their backs that gave out a chilling aura, it would be hard to notice their presence in a crowd.
It’s certainly those two middle-aged and ordinary-looking martial artists. Qin Fen was one hundred percent certain that those two martial artists would be his opponent for today.
Both of these fourteen-star martial artists seemed to be restraining their powers from their body language, unlike the martial artists of approximately eleventh to twelve stars. But for Qin Fen, who had trained his craft into a state of mastery, could immediately notice the battle intent beneath the skins of those martial artists.
“Decent strength.” Qin Fen gently nodded. His face displaying an expression of a senior tutoring their juniors, “Keep practicing and they might be able to attain the state of mastery.”
Although Qin Fen’s voice wasn’t loud enough, he used a little of his true energy to send his message to everyone present by the lake in this quiet confrontation.
Both of the challenging fourteen-star martial artists displayed an uneasy frown. Their eagerness to challenge was mostly extinguished in an instant.
The onlooking audience also nodded their heads in agreement with what Qin Fen said.
The Sacred Martial Six-stars let out a trace of light from their eyes. Qin Fen might have given an ordinary speech, but his speech contained his powerful martial dao aura. As the words left his mouth, he was able to influence the crowd into an agreement and even waver the spirit of his opponents.
At a young age, he had managed to take control of the battlefield with only his words. Ferrero laughed with pride and happiness.
“Attaining a level of mastery doesn’t fully ensure that one can defeat other martial artists that haven’t attained the level of mastery.” Fiend Star from the Sacred Martial Six-stars slowly said, “If a battle was decided with only the state of mastery, then most of the conflicts in the world should be settled by now. The charm of martial dao lies in its unpredictable nature, such as winning an unwinnable fight. It is the very aspect of unpredictability that made up the charm of martial dao.”
Spoken with the same calmness as Qin Fen, except slightly slower, Fiend Star’s speech gave the onlookers the feeling of sudden realization, as shown from their expressions.
Both of the fourteen-star martial artists that were going to fight against Qin Fen had their frowns returning to calmness in an instant as their expressions radiating an aura of them being one with their power.
Ferrero saw slight dissatisfaction in the Sakra’s eyes, who was quietly standing in a distance. There was nothing wrong in Qin Fen giving a speech to his opponents to control the scene before the battle. But Fiend Star, being a non-combatant in this duel had played dirty by speaking up for those fourteen-star martial artists.
Sakra mustered a faint smile as he felt Ferrero looking at him. The smile was understood immediately by Ferrero; Sakra was giving the message that Ferrero didn’t have the right to criticize Fiend Star for playing dirty, as playing dirty was what Ferrero loved to do.
Ferrero shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly. He didn’t care since he had already tricked the Sakra into switching rooms with him. He didn’t believe that the Sakra would not return the favor in the future.
Qin Fen put his hands behind his back as he stepped forward slowly. He did not display any expression of blaming Fiend Star. His intention in controlling the scene through his speech was to test out his abilities. He was satisfied enough since it worked out well.
“Excuse me…” Qin Fen raised his hand and pointed to the lake that was touched by sunlight, “Is this the battlefield?”
Fiend Star floated out from the six-star ranks and said slowly, “This is the battlefield, but it hasn’t been completed yet. It will take some time for it to form completely…”
Just as the voice exited his mouth, a middle-aged martial artist in a silver warrior suit came flying in the air. His hair, eyebrows, beard, and even his pupils were white. From afar, he looked like an old man in retirement age. However, when observed closely, his age wasn’t that much older than Sakra.
There was only a single person in the Sacred Martial Hall with such a maverick figure. Even for those that never met him before knew of his existence.
The Sect Master of the Internal Affairs of the Sacred Martial Hall, the Frost Dragon King, Yan Riguang! He specializes in the training of a neo-martial art known as the Demonic Art of Frozen Nitrogen Compression!
Unlike the Little Dragon King, Yang Lie’s ancient martial art of Xuanming Ice Freezing Divine Art, which had a different form of meridian inside, Yan Riguang’s Demonic Art of Frozen Nitrogen Compression was able to freeze anything outside the human body. With only a strike he was capable of gathering nitrogens in the air to produce a chilling cold. He was also known for his tyrannical ability in freezing an active volcano and make an ice sculpture out of it.
Moreover, due to his constant practice of the Demonic Art of Frozen Nitrogen Compression, Yan Riguang himself was gradually taking on the appearance of a corpse frozen to death.
Floating mid-air, Yan Riguang was like an ice G.o.d from the legends. As he looked at everyone below him and waved his left hand, everyone felt the temperature dropping around them, some even instinctively shuddered. The previous lake filled with water and sunlight was covered with a layer of silver.
It was frozen! When Yan Riguang struck, he froze the lake!
Fiend Star let out a faint smile on his face, “Now the battlefield is formed completely. Today’s battlefield will be a battle on the ice. Whoever gets knocked off the lake surface, gets knocked down, surrender, or fall into the water will be counted as defeat.”
Qin Fen gently exhaled a visible heat flow before jumping to the side of the lake and leaning over to touch the frozen lake surface.
This is…? Qin Fen raised his eyebrows. This looked like a crystalline layer of ice on a lake. The thickness of the ice layer shouldn’t be as thick as imagined, as it was probably half an inch at most.
Fighting on this ice layer rendered him impossible to attack with too much power without risking breaking and falling into the ice. The Sacred Martial Six-stars evidently did their research on his past battles before choosing such a peculiar battlefield.
Qin Fen stood up again and turned to look at the two opponents with a slight smile. “Your martial arts should be the Magnetic Flying Sword of the magnetic martial art?”
The onlooking martial artists weren’t that surprised this time. Neo-martial arts really did have a geographical advantage in this terrain, especially for neo-martial arts like the magnetic flying swords that could provide long-range superiority in battle.
“Yes! Wu Ke, Lin Ming! The neo-martial art of the Magnetic Flying Sword Technique!”
The two men roared their voices and circled around the edge of the lake for a few hundred meters before stepping on to the unstable layer of ice.
Qin Fen nodded slightly. Both opponents were still exercising extreme caution and kept their distance even when they held a geographical advantage, “I finally understand why they chose you.”
Qin Fen slowly set foot on the ice layer that wasn’t very solid and stable. The moment he set foot on the ice layer, the ice below his feel gave out a slight ripple, as if they were protesting the weight of Qin Fen which could cause them to collapse at any moment.
Wu Ke, who had a slightly bigger stature extended his arms. The seemingly lone magnetic sword behind his back suddenly split into eight swords like a peac.o.c.k displaying its feathers, as Wu Ke displayed the swords in a fan shape.
Clang!
One of the Magnetic Flying Swords was unsheathed and flew directly to his feet. Without sparing any moment to recover, the Magnetic Flying Sword had already launched him to a height of ten meters from the ground!
Wu Ke’s hands appeared behind him at the very moment, as Wu Ke looked down at Qin Fen on the ice. The scene resembled the myths and legends of the Shushan swordsman sect.
Magnetic Flying Sword technique!
Compared to ancient martial arts which required the mastery of the Wukong technique at fifteen-stars, the modern martial arts were aided with technology that allowed martial artists to easily attain a level unattainable by ancient martial arts.
Wu Ke looked down on Qin Fen with confidence in his smile. It doesn’t matter even if you’ve become a fifteen-star martial artist. Even if you mastered the Wukong technique at fifteen-stars, you still can’t keep up with the speed of my fourteen-stars technique – the Magnetic Flying Sword technique!
A fourteen-star martial artist bringing down a fifteen-star martial artist was almost impossible under normal circ.u.mstances. However, it didn’t mean that such feats were impossible.
Wu Ke was in the “right place”. He looked down at Qin Fen as he smiled calmly. He thought of a mythical legend where the swordsman of Shushan was constantly overlooking the mortals who were unable to fly.
Although stepping and looking down on the weaker ones felt good, how was it comparable to the feeling of Wu Ke winning and looking down on those that were supposedly stronger than him in star power?
Seven sharp flying swords emitted blue electric light visible to the naked eye and quietly floated around his body, the light of the swords gradually locking on to Qin Fen.