The Favored Son of Heaven

The instant his body sensed that his opponent was in range, Qin Fen took a large step forward. As the Dragon Elephant Prajna Art circulated through his entire body, his muscles and bones cried out. True energy rapidly circulated within his blood, and the thick veins bulged as if they were close to exploding. His veins were just like green snakes spiraling around his arm. The normal-sized arm had expanded to double its original size in an instant to be in a state that was somewhat similar to when Okamoto Takeshi used the Great Monument Breaking Hand. However, there was something different. Qin Fen’s arm was more like an ancient steel whip.

Leafsky’s pupils contracted in an instant, a bit of a cold glow flickered like a star in the night sky.

In the instant Qin Fen charged upon him, everything disappeared in the world that Leafsky’s eyes captured. Nothing at all, except for that firm, fierce, and peerless arm. Leafsky’s sharp senses as a martial artist brought him boundless pressure as they detected danger, and his heart thumped violently at unprecedented speeds. The pressure squeezed him to the point that he felt like his body was about to explode.

Leafsky had no time to think. All that remained in his brain was shock. How could someone take the bitter internal art and display it to this degree? The Arhat Cloud Walk of the fitness exercise was truly akin in might to a legendary Arhat slaying a demon.

Leafsky’s instincts, forged from multiple battles, caused the Heaven Scorcher Halberd within his hands to tremble and the entirety of the large halberd spun rapidly like a top. It was akin to a silver dragon that could smash everything in its path, and it screamed as it sought to bite Qin Fen’s shoulder.

Leafsky had racked his brains to come up with this twisting silver dragon attack, and a hint of a smile could be seen in the corners of his eyes when he unleashed it. For every inch in length, the halberd was stronger, and the twisting killing aura of his attack could inflict heavy injuries before the move itself even lands upon the opponent.

A dark light flashed in Qin Fen’s eyes and he stepped out with a foot to stomp the ring with heavy force. His right arm swung into an explosive uppercut, fiercely smashing behind the halberd-head of the Heaven Scorcher Halberd to land on the body of the halberd itself. A wave of numbness flooded through Leafsky’s arms, as if they had been struck by a heavy rod. His gathered Sole Energy of Time Immemorial scattered in an instant, and the spinning rotation of the Heaven Scorcher Halberd stopped as well, flying from his grasp.

Qin Fen reached out and grabbed the halberd, pulling the halberd into his hands in an instant.

Leafsky was completely stunned in place. Though, surprisingly, he had been defeated before as a tester recently, never had there been a person who was able to jolt the weapon from his hands without using a weapon of their own. Yet this time his weapon had been wrested away.

Qin Fen was already upon Leafsky during his moment of daze.

This was the first time Qin Fen met an opponent who could let his mind completely wander in the middle of a fight. Defeating him with the Shaolin Arhat Fist would only dishonor the Shaolin Arhat Fist. The same Jitae Iron Hammer that the Neo Taekwondo practitioner Park Jong-Hwan used on that day with his legs smashed heavily into Leafsky’s skull.

Puff. Crack. Crack…

The realism of the Sky Battle Net appeared once more in the virtual ring. Leafsky’s skull was smashed into his chest by the enormous force.

As a series of crackles rang out from his skull, cervical bones, and sternum, and the sight before Leafsky turned into a sheet of black. A moment later, he heard the cold robotic synthesized voice sound out, “You have already died in combat. Please use a resurrection stone or wait out the resurrection time….”

The ring, which had just been fiercely and explosively hot, became incomparably quiet once more.

Qin Fen gently warmed up his hands and feet. Indeed, there hadn’t been a mistake with the probability calculations. Leafsky, the Sect Master of the Certain Victory Sect, should be one of the weakest among four-star warriors.

“Excuse me, do you want to immediately start the next test battle?”

The synthesized voice sounded in the air, lacking a trace of human emotion. Qin Fen hadn’t used any energy at all in this fight, so he simply nodded to proceed with the next one.

The scene before his eyes quickly warped and faded away, then warped and shook again, and a moment later, Qin Fen appeared in the middle of a new and different virtual scene.

This is…? Qin Fen eyelids twitched a few times. According to the rules, the second fight had its stage selected to fit the tester. Qin Fen understood this point early on. He just never thought that he would be whisked to the edge of the mouth of an enormous volcano.

He looked at the red lava that boiled and bubbled in the mouth of the volcano, situated not too far away from below his feet. Black smoke slowly rose, and Qin Fen could even feel the simulated high temperature.

Who was his opponent going to be this time? Qin Fen was very curious. Such an environment was quite suited for the Inferno Arts, the Blazing Sutra, and other martial arts where the cultivator’s true energy would possess super high temperatures.

“The system couldn’t have bugged out, right? Or is there something wrong with the current challenger’s head? A cultivator of the bitter internal art and the fitness exercise of fist forms actually wants to start a sect?”

A hoarse voice came piercing through rolling black smoke from the other side of the volcano. The voice seeped with intense arrogance and disdain.

A man with a large and tall build, seemingly around forty years old, walked slowly out of the smoke.

Qin Fen studied his opponent. His square face was quite angular, and his two thick eyebrows were like daggers. His skin was somewhat red as well, as if he had drunk some alcohol.

His hands didn’t possess a weapon of cold steel like Leafsky had. His large hands were quite tender, like the hands of a girl.

Flying Flames. Height of a hundred and eighty-seven centimeters. His arms spanned a hundred and ninety-two centimeters. Uses the neo martial art the Magma Art. Uses the combat technique the Dragon Fist.

A neo martial art was paired with the combat technique of paleo martial arts. Qin Fen suddenly became cautious. There were many different variations of the Dragon Fist, the most famous among them were the Azure Dragon Fist, the Coiling Dragon Fist, the Flame Dragon Fist, the Gold Dragon Fist, as well as others.

Flying Flames’s profile just stated the Dragon Fist, not a specific style of it. Clearly, this meant that he could utilize all variations of the Dragon Fist. He was a warrior that specialized in the Dragon Fist.

The man was forty years old and was only at the four-star strength with a neo martial art. Clearly, the man ought to have come from a decent family. It was just that his talent wasn’t good enough, incapable of ascending to higher realms. However, his combat experience had become incomparably rich from staying at the four-star level for so long.

“Young man.” Flying Flames was taller than Qin Fen, and he stood at a spot that was much more elevated than his. The gaze that looked down seeped with deep disdain. “Since you’re so poor that you can only cultivate in the beggar martial arts, why have you come to found a sect? Cultivating in martial arts isn’t something that poor people should do. It’s better for you to act like a sandbag if you have the time and make some extra money. Why have you come to cause trouble here?”

Qin Fen’s eyebrows slowly began to furrow together. The Dragon Elephant Prajna Art was often called the bitter internal art by others, and the Shaolin Arhat Fist was called the commoner fist form even more. But to be called beggar martial arts? There was too much humiliation associated with the word beggar, and it made him much more uncomfortable than his time with Leafsky.

“What’s wrong? Are you unhappy?” Flying Flames drew his face out long, his forehead piled with quite the intimidation. “Don’t you know how much trouble people like you give to us testers? Don’t think that I’ll thank you just because you’re giving me reward points. This is very bad. The system will believe that experts like me are farming reward points. Remember to submit a note to the system after I defeat you. Say that I didn’t hire you.”

….

Qin Fen suddenly recalled a few words that Enzo Rota once said about a certain person. “This here is a poser.”

A poser? When described using Lin Liqiang’s words, this was none other than someone who believed himself to possess a high set of skills and would humiliate someone he deemed to be weaker himself in order to satisfy his own vain heart.

Flying Flames’s behavior was very in line with Lin Liqiang’s explanation of what a poser was.

Flying Flames’s eyes were filled with pity, disdain, and confidence — they were practically seeping out. Qin Fen was a cultivator of the Dragon Elephant Prajna Art, and he had broken through to the four-star level from the third stage of the Dragon Elephant Prajna Art. However, the fourth stage of the Dragon Elephant Prajna Art wasn’t released by the Federation, so cultivators of the Dragon Elephant Prajna Art didn’t have a fourth stage internal art to cultivate in. They could only stay at four-star strength for the rest of their lives. Such an opponent could never become strong, so Flying Flames wouldn’t have to worry about them seeking revenge. He could humiliate them as he pleased.

It was impossible to wantonly humiliate someone in reality, but there weren’t any worries at all here in the virtual world. A sense of satisfaction, one not felt for a long time, rose once more in Flying Flames’s heart.

He knew that the more he humiliated a young man like this, the more the young man would want to fight. The fury of youngsters was easily provoked, and when rage got to a youngster’s head, the youngster would expose many holes and weakness in a fight. By then, Flying Flames could use even more humiliating words during the gaps created in the fight.

“Tell me. Do you feel especially spiritually empty every time work is over for you?” Qin Fen wasn’t mad, and not a hint of the flames of fury could be seen in his eyes. His kind voice seeped with a warmth that was hard to describe. He was like an old friend, long since they last met. “When you get back home, do you become very lost? Not knowing what you should be doing?”

….

Flying Flames was stunned. He didn’t expect Thirty-Six Hours’ response to be like this at all. Within the plain words was an intensely shocking power that penetrated the soul. Qin Fen’s simple words stirred true feelings in his heart.

As a small independent businessman, Flying Flames’s income fell short of the best but was better than the worst. However, this wasn’t enough to satisfy him. Instead, it made him feel a bit lost.

“Have you ever dreamed of doing something big when you were young?” Qin Fen paused for a bit. He spoke like a therapist from a hospital, “Do such thoughts reappear when you are lost? Do you come to the Sky Battle Net to realize the things you’re unable to satisfy in reality?”

….

Flying Flames’s mouth gaped slightly, unbeknown to even himself.  Does this young man actually recognize me? How else can he make such an accurate assessment for a first meeting? 

“One day you came to the Sky Battle Net and requested to open your own sect. During that day, did you discover that you were unable to realize your dream?” Qin Fen was incomparably gentle. His footsteps were very relaxed, not causing a single bit of vigilance in Flying Flames. “You didn’t want to resign yourself to such a situation, right? Yet you were unable to fight against that feeling of loss?”

Flying Flames nodded subconsciously, for he acknowledged Qin Fen’s words. He hadn’t sensed this part about himself at all, and he was shocked that a young man was able to know everything about him.

“Did you later find out in the future that you could transfer these lost feelings onto others?” Qin Fen raised a hand a pointed at himself. “For example, people like me. You especially like to watch people like me, who are applying to open a sect for the first time, lose? Do you like to watch my expression of pain as I lose? You like to destroy the dreams of people such as myself, those who seek to open a sect? You find delight in destroying such dreams?”

Flying Flames was really shocked. This was the first time they met, but Qin Fen had completely discovered the thoughts deepest in his heart. It was as if he had been stripped clean by Qin Fen and was baring himself naked, exposing everything about himself.

Compared to being stripped physically of clothes, having one’s mind completely stripped bare was far more terrifying.

Flying Flames shuddered out of nowhere. A certain emotion called fear quickly rushed through his entire body.

A small smile gradually formed on Qin Fen’s amiable facial expression. It was clearly a smile of kindness, but Flying Flames was able to feel a cold anger behind it.

“You… you….”