“How can it be?! My Thunderbolt Punch has already reach such a high level that the power of my punches should’ve improved by at least nearly fifty percent. Even advance Clasping Yuan Realm martial artist shouldn’t be able to take my punches now, how the hell did he break it with a single sword move?! Is that the sword intent?! It can’t be!!”
Thinking of the term ‘sword intent’, Gao Yuan couldn’t help but instantly quiver. He stared at Ye Chen, who was shrouded by countless sparkling electric bolts, with a badly shocked face. In his eyes, Ye Chen’s average-looking body shape began expanding limitlessly at the moment, and that fierce sense of power released from Ye Chen’s body seemed to be capable of tearing the entire universe apart.
Followed by a loud and shrill sizzling noise, Ye Chen walked out from those electric bolts that had been roaring around his body. His blue outfit remained perfectly clean and stainless, and those thick streams of lightning bolts, which were combined from countless tiny electric bolts, were all shattered and dissipated by his sharp protective Zhen Qi even before they could approach his body. Those dazzling and seemingly terrifying lightning bolts were actually unable to hurt him even by a little bit.
“I’ve already taken three punches of yours, now you should try to take a sword move of mine.”
A sharp and fierce gaze zipped out of Ye Chen’s eyes, like two invisible and especially piercing beams of sword power, darting right towards Gao Yuan; Gao Yuan felt a chill ran down his spine in the following moment, even his fine hairs stood on end as his scalp went numbed.
“That’s nothing but a sword move! I’d like to find out how are you planning to break my defence with a single move.”
Gao Yuan indeed feared Ye Chen’s sword intent. Although he hadn’t fought against a possessor of the sword intent and learned its true power in the last season of the Hidden Dragon Rank, he could still clearly remember the tremendous shock created by someone’s sword intent; but luckily, this was not a Hidden Dragon Rank competition, and he still had plenty of time to build a solid defence.
“[Tunderbolt Triple Heaven]!”
Slightly lowering his body, Gao Yuan gave a deep growl as he abruptly joined his palms together then spread his arms; swiftly, he repeated the motion for three times. Along with his moves, three layers of dazzlingly blue thunderbolt defensive screen emerged in front of him in a row. Looking inside the three layers of screens, the world was badly blurred and everything began shaking.
“Who would know that this kid is actually capable of forcing Gao Yuan to use his full defence?!”
“Once a sword artist gained sword intent, his or her power would immediately immensely increase. Normally, ordinary martial artists could barely fight evenly against possessors of the sword intent who are at the same power level with themselves.”
“Nevertheless, I don’t think he can break all those three layers of defence merely with this move.”
Finding out that Ye Chen had attained the sword intent, the looks of most of the others turned serious.
Slightly flipping her hair which was fluttering in the air, Murong Qingcheng said with interest, “Small success of the sword intent, I assume only very few have reached this level among the younger generation martial artists in the entire South Zhuo Region.”
Qi Shaofeng paused briefly, then nodded and responded, “In the last season Hidden Dragon Ranking, thirteen competitors were possessors of the sword intent in total, and among them, two have achieved a small success of the sword intent. However, amongst all thirteen of them, only eight have gained ranks, while the other five were too immature in cultivation and were not capable of using their sword intents properly. I think they will all show up again in the next season of the Hidden Dragon Ranking.”
“The South Zhuo Region has a billion of people, but the number of sword intent possessors under twenty-four years old are only thirteen. I have never thought that the nine nations, the poor region where Lin Yue came from, can actually raise a young martial artist who has already reached a small success of the sword intent, so impressive.”
“Indeed, sword artists who have attained the sword intent are truly terrifying, they are able to maintain the peak status of their powers in every single second, and their sword intent can perish anything that would affect their fights negatively.”
Qi Shaofeng took a long and deep gasp as he looked at Ye Chen with a pair of passionate eyes.
“Just take this!”
After Gao Yuan constructed his defence, Ye Chen took a small step forward while gripping the sword hilt. He swung his sword from left to right, his move seemingly perfectly quick and clean.
Following his move, the air rippled like water surfaces, then it was cut open like a piece of paper.
Pop!
Pop!
Pop!
The three layers of thunderbolt defensive screen only managed to hold the sword Qi for a short moment, before they were punctured by the destructively fierce sword Qi. Gao Yuan, who was under the protection of those dazzling screens, spat a mouthful of blood out; at the same time, the lightning armour wore he was wearing instantly shattered.
“Is this how amazing the sword intent is? My defence is like nothing to him…”
Gao Yuan let out another mouthful of blood, then lowered his head.
The entire backyard fall into a deadly silence; at the moment, one could hear nothing but slightly rustling noise made by the plants. After a long while, people finally began talking.
“Gao Yuan has lost the fight, that kid won with a single sword move…”
“This guy’s incredibly powerful and talented, if he can step into a higher grade before the next season Hidden Dragon Ranking, another legendary figure might emerge.”
Standing in the crowd, Lin Yue was deeply shocked by Ye Chan and silently exclaimed, ‘It’s only been a couple of months since the last time I met him, yet his power has already increased by leaps and bounds, this Ye Chen is truly amazing.”
“Thank you.”
Ye Chen cupped his hands and slightly bowed to Gao Yuan, then stepped back to beside Lin Yue.
“Ye Chen, that was…”
“Just a Small Success of the Sword Intent.”
Before, Ye Chen’s sword intent was already very close to small success of the sword intent, and when the Ocean Beast ship sailed past the Natural Moat Gorge, Ye Chen’s sword intent was crushed by the Battle Emperor’s sword intent that had been lingering in the gorge; however, this had brought Ye Chen a new and deeper understanding of the sword intent. In addition to his crushed and regrown sword intent, he finally broke through from his old level and stepped into the Small Success of the Ssword intent.
The sword intent close to Small Success seemed to be only half a step away from the Small Success of the sword intent, yet the difference between the two was huge as the difference between ordinary men and freaks.
“Just as I thought.”
Lin Yue nodded and said with a long sigh.
Gao Yuan was defeated and dared not to challenge Ye Chen again, while the others quickly stopped talking about this fight after a brief shock. After all, wins and losses were as frequent as lunches and dinners to these young martial artists. None of these younger generation artists was willing to be the weaker one; if they lose a fight, they would take the loss as an alert, silently going back to train themselves even more severely in order to defeat their opponents one day and wash the shame off. This strong competition was exactly the reason why these young martial artists had been improving so rapidly. They surpass each other over and over again, and through this, their potentials were activated bit by bit.
When these younger generation martial artists hit their peak status, the truly powerful martial artists emerge one after another; it is when the real flourishing age of the True Spirit Continent would come.
“Murong, the last time, I have missed the chance to compete against you, what about we take a brief bout right now?” Another medium Clasping Yuan Realm young martial artist couldn’t bear waiting anymore, intending to compete against Murong Qingcheng and find out the actual power level of himself.
“Sure.” Murong Qingcheng smiled and responded.
The air suddenly became sticky and as thick as the water. At the same time, Murong Qingcheng silently flashed across the air and appeared in the middle of the battlefield. At that moment, many of the others felt a sudden pause from their minds.
“A force field?”
A shocked look appeared in Ye Chen’s eyes.
Lin Yue then said in a low voice, “Murong Qingcheng’s majored martial art is one of the two legendarily secret martial arts possessed by the Sky Flying Devil martial school, called Great Sky Devil Art. It is a top-ranked Earth Realm martial art divided into fifteen levels. The martial artist will be able to create a Sky Devil Force Field in the level-6, which can allow the martial artist to manipulate the air inside the force field to boost their movement speed to an extreme degree. Moreover, the power of enemies’ attacks can also be weakened, even entirely neutralized by the force field. This is a nearly invincible skill. Many people think she should be no less powerful than the top 10 of the last season Hidden Dragon Ranking.”
“However, the guy who challenged Murong is not an easy one either, his name is Wei Renjie, and he has attained the blade intent two years ago. He was ranked 37 in the last season Hidden Dragoon Ranking, even higher than Qi Shaofeng. I have no idea what power level he is now at. Attending this party is so worth it, I have never thought that we can watch such a high-grade competition here.”
Finishing his speech, Lin Yue felt that his blood even began boiling.
“Top-ranked Earth Realm martial art, Great Sky Devil Art, and the blade intent!”
Ye Chen slowly let out a long breath. Rank 6 institutions were indeed as powerful as people said that they even possessed Top-ranked Earth Realm martial arts; rank 7 institutions couldn’t even compare with them. Without a doubt, institutions beyond rank 7 were called as super institutions because their general powers were so great. As for that young man named Wei Renjie, Ye Chen was wondering why he wasn’t affected by the enormously great sense of power released by Murong, it turned out that was because he was a possessor of the blade intent. People who had attained the sword intent and the blade intent all have especially firm determinations, which allowed them to be hardly affected by other things or people; but of course, once a certain negative effect happened on them, that would still be disastrous, because gradually, their sword intent or blade intent might die out. If it affected severely, they might be disabled from achieving any martial accomplishment all their lives. Therefore, it could be said that any fight could be much riskier to possessors of the sword intent or blade intent than it was to the others.
“If you’re still at the level 6 of your Great Sky Devil Art, you might lose to me today.”
Wei Renjie laughed out loud and said while walking towards the battlefield step by step. Every step forward, the sense of the blade power released by him would grow stronger and greater, and when the seventh step was made, an enormous stream of blade power swooshed up into the air, cutting the surrounding air into pieces.
“Brother Wei, you seem confident.” Murong Qingcheng stood in the middle of the battlefield and said. The air surrounding her remained completely still, and it was not affected by the blade power at all.
“If I don’t have that confidence, I would have lost already. How can I be not confident about myself?”
Clang!
Pulling his blade out of the sheath, Wei Renjie launched the first move.
His sword move was activated with sword intent, and it was as rampant as an evil dragon. A sharp stream of blade power roared out towards Murong Qingcheng, who stood in not so far away. However, before the blade power even approach her, the ground around the area, which had a radius of one zhang surrounding Murong Qingcheng, sank down immediately; as for the one zhang in radius area around her, it was under the effect of her force field.
“Break!”
Murong Qingcheng took a step forward and slapped on the blade power with her long and slim hand.
Buzz!
The air instantly went twisted. Those slim and beautiful fingers, which seemed gentle and soft, contained terrifyingly great power, that it had even twisted the moving track of the blade power. The blade power stream was weakened by thirty percent once after Murong’s fingers touched it, then she easily slapped it into oblivion.
“[Terrifying Waves]!”
Wei Renjie gave a great growl. While gripping the blade hilt with both hands, he swung the blade down.
Boom!
A thunderous, tsunami-like noise rose from his blade, along with which, an unspeakably huge stream of blade Qi swooshed out of the blade and darted out, as if it was meant to devour every single person and object on its way. Even Ye Chen was slightly shocked by this great stream of blade Qi, just as Lin Yue said, as the ranked 37 martial artist in the last season Hidden Dragon Ranking, this guy was definitely a tough one.
“[Great Sky Devil Force Filed]!”
Murong Qingcheng’s look slightly turned serious as she pushed both of her palms forward and built an even stronger force field in front of her, attempting to crush this stream of blade Qi and those hazy Zhen Qi waves behind it.
Crack!
What suffered the first was the luxurious building behind Murong Qingcheng; it was split into two from the middle, leaving a gigantic gully on the ground. Right after that, Wei Renjie’s blade Qi went shattered as well; the blade Qi was twisted into an extreme degree when it was still half a zhang away from Muronng, then broke down.
“Great Sky Devil Art, level-7?!”
Wei Renjie stared at Murong right into the eyes, but he didn’t launch another move.
“Your blade intent should have already reached a small success, since you’ve managed to break a half of my force field.” Murong gave a typical faint smile and said.
Wei Renjie pushed his blade back into the sheath, shook his head and said, “I lost. The Great Sky Devil Art is a top-ranked Earth Realm martial art and incredibly strong. Your power must have improved since you’re now at the seventh level of it, I can never break your upgraded force field with my current power, I deserve to lose.”
‘Such a powerful art! But it is not perfect, its biggest weakness is nothing else but its difficulty, which made Murong Qingcheng improve very slowly. She has already stepped into the medium Clasping Yuan Realm, but she was still in the seventh-level of this Great Sky Devil Art, and it might take her even more time to break into the eighth-level; compared with her, although my Great Mystery Art is in a lower grade, but I can master it with much less time. I should be no weaker than her till I reached the ninth or tenth level of the Great Mystery art, hm, the good thing is I have been breaking through into new levels very fast, I’ll be there soon.’
While watching Wei Renjie admitting defeated, Ye Chen silently compared Murong Qingchen with himself.