Chapter 50
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Translator: True Detective
Chapter: 49
Chapter Title: Flame - 2
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Boom!
A relentless barrage of punches poured forth without pause. Profound inner energy. The supreme techniques reproduced without the slightest deviation.
Martial arts that had reached the pinnacle sometimes transcended the human body. Elevating mere combinations of hand and foot movements beyond their limits.
Those who had broken through the barriers of Three Harmonies into One and Five Energies Converging to the Origin through training, enlightenment, and real combat could imbue their forms with intent. That realm was called the Transformation Scripture.
The renowned Taoists of the Nine Great Sects ascending to immortality, entering the realm of sages through their cultivated martial arts—that was the proof.
The clans' martial arts were not meant for cultivating the Dao. Compared to the Nine Great Sects, the path was far more arduous.
But did that mean the clans lacked talent? No one who hadn't reached the Transformation Scripture could dare call themselves a king.
The Peng Clan's Blade King. The Nangong Clan's Sword King.
And here, the Fist King.
"I'll show you wench what Heaven Beyond Heaven looks like!"
He couldn't afford to rush. Victory still tilted in his favor, Huangfu Hu thought.
Boom! The shockwave made the ground writhe. His dantian, tempered for over fifty years with elixirs and the Hundred Meridian Washing Technique, seemed to surpass the limits of inner energy.
When it came to accumulating qi and directing inner energy, the Huangfu Clan stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Shaolin at the forefront of the martial world.
Thud!
Each step of his advancing stance drew forth refined true qi without waste. Whoosh! The thrusting fist roared like a cannon.
She took the hits head-on. The Divine Maiden did not dodge.
"Die!"
She neither fled nor hid. With those same fluid gestures, she deflected the ferocious assault.
Did that mean it was perfect defense? No.
"Die!"
The damage was steadily accumulating. Blood trickled from her pale lips.
Each technique chipped away bit by bit. He could clearly feel the shockwaves striking her meridians. Not wanting to let up, he pressed the attack harder.
"I'll finish you!"
Kwaaang! Gathering his inner energy for the ultimate strike, Yellow Dragon Ascends to Heaven. A hazy yellow aura rippled around his uplifted fist.
The Transformation Scripture used the character for "become." It meant transcending humanity into something more.
The Iron Blood Fist King's energy swept the ground like a yellowish dragon.
The trajectory mimicking the Yellow Dragon engulfed the Divine Maiden. Kwakwakwa! Dirt and ash billowed up in clouds of gray smoke, embers drifting through the air.
He had poured in considerable energy. Even the Sword King would have suffered grave wounds if unable to block it.
Had he slain her? The Iron Blood Fist King stared intently, harboring a sliver of hope.
But the Divine Maiden did not fall.
"Is that all?"
Her arm, blackened and dead. Her feet unmoved by even a step. Her lips twisted in an eerie smile.
And once more, her gestures subtly shifted. Even now, she was growing without respite.
Who was she learning from? It was obvious. She was absorbing the Iron Blood Fist King himself. Like a yokai from folktales mimicking a human.
It was revolting.
"Th-this...!"
The Iron Blood Fist King was utterly revolted. It felt like staring at a wooden puppet instead of a person.
The Huangfu Clan's Pressure Point Crushing Technique swept through every acupoint as it rose. The numbing paralysis should have hindered even thought, yet was she born with a constitution that ignored pain?
Gnashing his teeth, Huangfu Hu circulated his true qi once more. His fist loaded like another fiery cannonball.
"Fall already!"
The Divine Maiden's arms crossed, blocking the first punch.
"Give up!"
Her slender gesture halted the second punch.
"Just die, damn it!"
The third punch followed. Hwoong! Pale fingers enveloped his fist like a gentle breeze, deflecting it effortlessly. The Iron Blood Fist King's pupils widened in shock, as if entranced.
Enemy true qi climbed his right arm, greedily devouring his inner energy like wildfire. Earth Soil Art.
A technique that projected true qi across space.
It was a secret ultimate art passed only to the Huangfu Clan head. No one could imitate it after seeing it once.
Without piercing the flow of qi down to its finest details, the caster themselves risked qi deviation.
"How...?"
It was unbelievable. He stared at his own hand twitching wildly. Unmistakably the hallmark symptom of the Earth Soil Art.
The Divine Maiden was the same. She gazed at her demonic fingers shaking. With eyes full of curiosity.
Her demonic, sticky black qi trapped his inner energy in its torrent. Amid the ceaseless reverse blood true qi, the yellow qi lost its luster.
Crack! A chilling sound of bones realigning. Astonishingly, the Divine Maiden suppressed the Earth Soil Art first.
Snap! Her tattered skirt brushed the ash. The battered Divine Maiden took a step forward.
Only then did Huangfu Hu's fingers stop spasming. But his mind still reeled from the shock.
"How... how could such a monster appear in the world?"
The murmur escaped him unwittingly, not expecting a reply. Yet.
"You."
The answer came unbidden from the girl standing tall.
"Shut your mouth..."
"That Flying Heaven Golden Blade fellow never remembered in the end. Do you remember?"
It couldn't be true. A pathetic mind game. Yet her voice pierced his heart. Her soft tone cracked the Iron Blood Fist King's iron will.
A faint doubt that it might be sincere. Huangfu Hu looked at her in bewilderment.
The girl's face smiling faintly. Her exceptionally beautiful features. Her snow-white skin stained with blood.
Why was this?
A memory from years ago flashed by.
"You..."
That Palm Treasure Blade had not been fake.
They had verified it countless times. The techniques and materials from the era of the Flash Guest. The clan's scholars had reached the same conclusion.
Authentic.
It had flowed all the way to the distant Western Regions, only now surfacing in Mount Firebrand.
A chance to defeat his lifelong rival, the Sword King. The perfect moment to surpass the Nangong Clan. The Iron Blood Fist King knew it. In the turbulent jianghu, opportunities like this never came twice.
"No way."
He had no choice but to let the Dragon Star Clan pursue. He had dispatched the clan's elites despite the strain.
An unnamed village pointed to by an old map. Ignorant villagers who knew nothing.
And among them, someone's eyes.
- Patriarch, that girl is strange.
- Send her to the Tang Clan; they can verify authenticity. If we get good elixirs in return...
The girl physician hiding in the shrine seemed to have an unusual constitution. He had planned to sell her to the Tang Clan to recoup some losses.
However.
"No."
Wasn't there a report that, fleeing desperately in the rainy night, she slipped and fell from a high cliff?
It wasn't just the Huangfu Clan's warriors who concluded that. Even Zhang Yi of the Dragon Star Clan, the best in Guangdong at hunting people, agreed.
Then why was his body trembling? Why was his sharp mind whispering the truth?
How much was real, and how much was lies?
"You... you died..."
"Did I?"
Her skin was white as snow in winter. Too transparent and pale to pass for human.
Am I seeing things?
"No..."
The Iron Blood Fist King thought.
It couldn't be.
"You died! The dead can't come back!"
A frenzied surge of inner energy drawn to its limit.
In the end, as a martial artist of the jianghu, the Iron Blood Fist King chose the one technique available to him. The first form taught to warriors joining the Huangfu Clan.
Rushing Fist.
"Demon or yokai, it doesn't matter! I'll show you a realm you can never take away!"
Whooo! The leaking qi waves made the surrounding earth resonate. The Fist King poured all his power into this final strike.
The horizon of intent permitted only to Transformation Scripture warriors. Entering the realm of transcending perception required offering everything. Behind the Fist King, an illusion materialized.
A massive yellow giant clad in armor opened its eyes. Its majestic form was at least three times Huangfu Hu's size.
It was the shadow he had chased his entire life. An endless legacy passed from father to son, and son to grandson.
"Fist King Eternal!"
The manifested qi of the Huangfu Clan thrust forth a massive fist brimming with the certainty of victory.
The girl raised her head. She beheld the giant pronouncing judgment upon her, the kingdom established in Guangdong. And its king.
"..."
A silent hand extended.
Overflowing true qi supported her bruised arm. In place of unresponsive nerves, bundles of inner energy lifted it.
With each heartbeat, accumulating true qi dyed her surroundings black, ever blacker.
Clack! The steadfast wall of intent blocking the girl posed two questions.
- What mindset do you wish to imbue in your movements?
- Is your resolute will prepared to contain it?
But the answer had been given from the start.
Infinite hatred loaded into a gentle hand.
Reverse Heaven true qi nurtured through enduring pain.
Whoosh!
Embers caught on the charred debris. Flames rose in response wherever her qi spread.
If the giant behind Huangfu Hu embodied the Huangfu Clan as a colossal deity, then the image now forming behind the girl was.
Black inferno consuming all.
Huangfu Hu's pupils dilated. His eyes filled with terror, as if witnessing something forbidden.
The pale hand met the thick fist. And in the next instant.
Slender fingers pierced the Iron Blood Fist King's chest. Cough! The fallen king vomited blood in agony. His eyes, mingled with venom and fear, beheld an illusion.
"So hot... the world is full of fire..."
Thud.
Amid the blaze devouring the golden field, the colossal deity collapsed.