Chapter 214 – Next (1/2)

Chapter 214 - Next

Ye Wei remained calm the whole time, unmoved by the pressing energy surges and undaunted in the midst of screams and tremors. His eyes were focused on the tilting sword array, registering its every slightest sway.

He took a ghost step to the side as the array fell onto him, pulling his fist back quickly while his nose was close enough to smell the layer of evaporating ice on the swords. With a quick springing action, he threw a heavy punch.

There was no trace of Qi around the fist, but his skin, bones, and muscles were toughened by the energy that was outwardly absent. His knuckles were pointing straight towards the array, in which the air in front of him was quickly compressed, exploding shortly after. Marked by a series of ear-piercing noise, his fist crushed down on Luo Han’s stance countless times.

“Bang!”

The swords were blown to smithereens by the explosive force of Ye Wei’s plain but effective counterstrikes, turning into a small blizzard. The loud explosion did not help assuage the buzzing in their ears, so the initiates fortified their shields, nullifying the rain of ice shards while the ground trembled.

Each of them was an expert in combat, so the newcomers were all shocked to see an earth stance being countered by sheer physical strength.

“Impossible!” Baili Hengtian widened his eyes, staring at Ye Wei as though he was looking at a rare monster. He could not imagine even a beast or a demon equivalent in tier to the returned prime Warrior stage possessing bodily strength comparable to Ye Wei’s. “What is he!? Luo Han’s stance can even drop a three-star retuned prime Warrior! How can a newbie at ten-star condensed prime level withstand it with body strength alone!”

The Eternal Star Stance, created by a Supreme, was a Sky-grade body strengthening technique everyone in the palace didn’t even know existed. For a faint moment, everyone present began to feel a light sense of dread as they watched Ye Wei fight. They could all see how the young Runemaster possessed a strange power, an unfamiliar strength that nobody understood.

Ye Wei did not hesitate for a split second, and having visualized and predicted the sword array’s movement with his extraordinary soul-sensitivity, he calculated the shortest path to Luo Han. With the Starblink Steps, he turned into a beam of light and reappeared a hundred feet ahead at nigh instantaneous speed.

“Your turn to take a hit.”

The young Runemaster’s fist carried the speed of a shooting star, aimed at Luo Han’s chest.

‘Yin Yang Punch!’ Luo Han’s mind cleared up as the turbulence that came with Ye Wei’s punch brushed his face. He realized he had no time to obsess over why his stance was countered, because the cultivator who effortlessly nullified his stance was now on the offensive.

“Om!”

With both his arms drawing a semicircle simultaneously, Luo Han conjured a round shield in front of him. He then transferred all of his freezing Qi into his left hand while he condensed and heated up his will-force on his right. His hands’ fluid motion perfectly merged together the two extremes, and the essence of the burning sun and the freezing moon rotated, enlarging the shield.

“Bang!”

Just as the shield materialized, Ye Wei’s fist connected. Although the sheet of rotating energy was thin, but extremely resilient, the punch could not penetrate its defence. Ye Wei subtly swung his shoulder, giving his strike an extra push, and stretched the shield. His fist then powered on and hit Luo Han in the chest.

The moment Luo Han was sent flying, his shield bounced back the momentum that was applied to it. Ye Wei lost his balance, flung to the opposite direction.

Luo Han grunted as a drop of blood spilled from the corner of his mouth. He frowned, feeling his moderate injury. Ye Wei quickly used the Starblink Steps to outspeed the force that was reflected from his strike, looking calmly at Luo Han as he regained his balance.

“You will lose.” Ye Wei said with an appreciative smile. He could not feel the slightest sense of exhaustion, owing it to the Eternal Star boost that had given his body as much endurance as it had explosive strength, and this without tapping into the power of his Supreme blood. In contrast, he could sense Luo Han’s disrupted and decelerated Qi flow.

“Losing to you is not at all shameful.” Luo Han wiped away the blood with his sleeve. He stood up straight and smiled back. Graceful in defeat, his eyes expressed a slight but undisguised disappointment.

He couldn’t help looking back at the time when he was an initiate himself, and better appreciated Ye Wei’s strength; he had a feeling the young Runemaster was probably strong enough to challenge the black dragon list, enough to make the listers keep an eye on him.

“Haha, I was the strongest initiate before today. I was impressed by how I set myself up to be the rising star before today…” Luo Han looked at Ye Wei, mumbling. His competitive spirit had awoken.

“This will not be our only fight, and I do not plan on staying at the losing end! A word of advice, beware of the veterans, for they will come after you. Shaming initiates is a petty tradition, but it has its place.” He said frankly, sighed, and lifted his head.

“I hope fighting them will be as inspiring as our exchange today!” Ye Wei fearlessly replied, sincerely smiling.

“Farewell!” Luo Han could not understand but nodded, approving of the young Runemaster’s enthusiasm. He turned into a flash and returned to the magnificent villa at the hilltop.

Zhou Kuang and Bai Qing were silenced by what they just seen, as neither of them expected Ye Wei’s prowess nor could they figure out how he attained that crisp but tough fighting style of his.

“He won!”

“Two in a row!”

“He is a solid fighter.”

The initiates lowered their barrier, boiling over in excitement. They looked up at the levitating Ye Wei with great admiration.

“This is only the beginning. I wonder how tough the top listers are…” Ye Wei muttered while narrowing his eyes to look at the distant hills.