Chapter 7: Making a Move

Chapter7: Making a Move

"Hack him to death!"

At Sun Jiu's command, the dozen-odd trusted Paoge brothers behind him instantly lunged forward.

Li Jun rose abruptly, arms spreading wide to clamp onto the backs of the chairs to his left and right, wrenching them with force.

Amid a teeth-grinding screech of twisting steel, two chairs bolted to the floor were ripped free and hurled at the two Paoge brothers leading the charge.

Bolstered by the enhancements of various martial arts, the power contained in Li Jun's arms now rivaled that of ordinary mechanical prosthetics.

The two chairs, trailing a monstrous howl, smashed the two men unconscious on the spot.

"Go to hell!"

A lithe, young Paoge brother pounced, gripping his saber with both hands and cleaving down at Li Jun's skull.

*Clang!*

Li Jun raised his hand, striking after but arriving first, slapping the blade's spine squarely. The young Paoge brother instantly lost his balance and pitched forward.

Before he could regain his center of gravity, a searing pain shot through the web of his thumb; the long saber flew from his grasp in a flash.

Then a streak of cold, pale light sliced across his vision.

*Pu-chi!*

The Paoge brother crashed to his knees with a clatter, hands clamped tight over his throat, yet unable to stem the blood gushing through his fingers. His eyes dulled into a gray, dead stillness.

[Proficiency Points Acquired: 5]

Through the fine text floating on his retina, Li Jun looked toward another Paoge disciple brandishing a long saber before him.

Blade-light flickered, wind howled; the momentum looked terrifying.

Judging by the blade's trajectory, the opponent had clearly infused a saber-art martial skill.

Among the gangsters of the Jie'e District, practitioners of martial arts were numerous.

This wasn't because martial arts possessed overwhelming combat power; the main reason was that they were cheap and convenient.

Especially after the Great Ming Ministry of War popularized basic martial arts injectors in the military, vast quantities of low-level martial arts began flowing into the civilian world via the black market.

The barrier to entry for learning martial arts plummeted again and again; the trashiest boxing or saber styles could be bought for a mere ten or twenty thousand Great Ming Treasure Notes.

A martial arts injector pierced a blood vessel, and the quintessence of the art loaded into the subconscious, allowing the learner to grasp basic forms imperceptibly.

Though not necessarily more useful than buying a gun, it at least made one tougher than an ordinary man, and guns weren't drawn often in gang conflicts.

However, while the barrier to entry was low, the price that followed was that mastering a martial art further became extraordinarily difficult.

A rootless tree wishing to grow into a towering giant must exert a hundredfold effort.

This was why the major gangs had many martial practitioners, yet few who could step into the Martial Dao Sequence and defy the heavens to change their fate.

But these bottlenecks did not exist for Li Jun, who possessed the Martial Arts Proficiency System.

As long as he had enough Proficiency Points, he could push a martial art to its peak in a short time.

In Li Jun's eyes, such inferior moves were riddled with flaws, breakable with a probing hand.

Li Jun's feet shuffled, crossing steps, and he crashed effortlessly into the dazzling saber momentum, backhanding a slash that split the man's face open.

Five fingers hooked the corpse's skull; with a single arm, he swung the body, smashing the Paoge brother circling behind him for a sneak attack to the ground.

Amid screams of snapping bones and tearing tendons, Li Jun's tall, lithe figure surged forward, the blade tip driving straight into a heart.

[Proficiency Points Acquired: 3]

[Proficiency Points Acquired: 6]

In the blink of an eye, three kills. The whole process was clean and sharp; where the blade-light fell, blood-light rose.

The Single Saber Method, a basic Great Ming military martial art; its essence was crude and violent, summed up in two words: "Kill Enemy."

Sun Jiu, who had been standing afar with arms crossed, now had bloodshot eyes, his clenched molars grinding with a *ge-ge* sound.

"Motherf*ckers, a bunch of trash! All of you, scram!"

Sun Jiu roared, the Ming-style scale armor on him bursting apart as his stacked muscles swelled, revealing silver wires crisscrossing his torso.

The ends of the lines connected to his elbows; the limbs above the elbows had been replaced by two mechanical arms.

Sun Jiu resembled a raging bear; his speed wasn't fast, but his pressure was suffocating.

That Yazi tattoo seemed to come alive with his movements, climbing his neck to glare viciously at Li Jun.

*Clang!*

Following a deafening ring of metal, Li Jun looked at the long saber in his hand, now twisted and rolled at the edge, and frowned subconsciously.

Before stepping into the Sequence, the advantage of prosthetic replacement technology in individual enhancement was still too obvious.

Compared to cultivating martial arts and tempering the body, Sun Jiu's method of slicing off two wrists to gain the striking force of a thousand catties had an incredibly high cost-effectiveness.

"I've long found you an eyesore, the Red Flag's best fighter, Fifth Brother? I see you're just a hammer!"

Having shattered Li Jun's weapon with one punch, the grin on Sun Jiu's face grew even more manic. He pressed his advantage, pouncing before Li Jun.

His hulking frame like a bear standing upright, two mechanical palms slammed straight for Li Jun's head.

This "Twin Peaks Striking Ears" came ferociously; if it connected solid, even if Li Jun had swapped his skull for alloy, he'd be flattened like a rag bag.

That Sun Jiu was regarded as a confidant by Zhao Dou, sent to guard the Nine Dragons Arena where gold flowed daily, proved his strength ranked among the top of the Paoge Society's younger generation.

Palm winds clashed, forming a piercing whistle at the ear canals, stinging Li Jun's eardrums.

At the critical moment, Li Jun's body drew back like a taut bow; his right leg rose like a raging dragon, the sole crashing into Sun Jiu's jaw.

*Thud!*

Flesh and bone collided, a solid, dull thud echoing from the impact!

Sun Jiu's figure swayed, staggering backward like a drunkard.

Clearly, his cerebellum had suffered a violent concussion, causing a momentary loss of balance.

Fortunately, he had a bio-chip implanted in his brain; otherwise, that kick would have instantly stripped him of combat capability.

In his daze, Sun Jiu felt a howling wind before him; instinctively he arched his body to protect his vitals, his iron fist blasting toward the source of the sound.

*Thud!*

Sun Jiu felt a sharp pain in his chest; the wires coiling around him erupted with strands of blue arc light, his feet involuntarily retreating several steps in succession.

What strength! What hard skin!

"War Soldier Formula? Iron Cloth Shirt?"

Blood trickled from the corner of Sun Jiu's mouth, his face flushed dark red. He gritted his teeth: "You actually infused this many martial arts?!"

Li Jun couldn't be bothered to answer. His right foot touched down and lightly tapped; his whole being shot out like a cloud-soarer, his left leg whipping toward Sun Jiu's neck!

Leg-shadow like a saber; the sound of tearing air made Sun Jiu break into a cold sweat. Even with high-strength ceramics implanted in his neck, he didn't dare take this whip kick head-on.

Sun Jiu raised his right elbow horizontally beside his neck, his left hand's five fingers hooking like iron claws toward Li Jun's calf.

"Even if you learned Iron Cloth Shirt, so what? I don't believe a Grade 9 body-forging martial art can produce skin harder than steel!"

A ferocious glint flashed in Sun Jiu’s eyes, but the very next second, Li Jun’s raised whip-kick slammed violently onto the ground, striking the cement floor with a thunderous *bang*.

"A... a feint?!"

Footfall like thunder, figure like lightning!

Li Jun displayed terrifying bodily control, forcibly switching moves within a hair's breadth, his bent elbow driving straight for Sun Jiu’s chest like a spear!

Sun Jiu’s face underwent a drastic change, the chip in his brain screaming frantic warnings.

But his body simply couldn't react in time; he could only watch helplessly as the muscles in his chest twisted and tore, his sternum shattering and caving in.

"Brother Jiu!"

"Brother Jiu!"

Cries of alarm erupted all around.

Under the horrified gazes of the Paoge disciples of Zhao Dou’s faction, Sun Jiu’s massive, nearly one-meter-nine frame flew horizontally, smashing a vast swathe of the densely packed chairs to splinters!

Sun Jiu’s current appearance was utterly terrifying; blood seeped from his features, the cave-in at his chest visible to the naked eye.

The back of his skull was even worse—flesh and blood mangled, half his scalp peeled back, sizzling and crackling against the exposed bone of the brain-computer interface.

Li Jun shook the blood from his fingertips, a translucent shard lying in his palm, still clinging to scraps of skin tissue.

It was precisely the bio-chip plucked from Sun Jiu’s occipital bone!

This bio-chip was low-grade, but it possessed the basic memory backup function.

With this thing, Li Jun held the ironclad evidence of Zhao Dou’s collusion with outsiders.

Objective secured, Li Jun didn't press the killing blow. This was Zhao Dou’s turf, after all; dragging it out invited complications.

But just as he turned to leave the fight pit, a heart-rending wail suddenly tore from Sun Jiu behind him.

"Second Master, this Li Jun is mad! He charged in without rhyme or reason and started killing—several brothers died by his hand! You must get justice for us!"

Li Jun’s departing step froze instantly, his head snapping back toward the figure now standing beside Sun Jiu, brows knitting tight.

"Second Master? Kuang Qingyun?!"