Chapter Ninety-Three: Fierce Battle on All Sides

Kou Li had not expected his opponent to be so ruthless, truly indifferent to the fate of his comrades. In his brief hesitation, the enemy had already rushed up, crouched with knee bent, fist clenched as if about to explode, stamping his foot hard against the ground before launching a crushing punch straight at the heart!

A thunderous bang resounded as the blow landed squarely on Cao Ying’s chest. Blood spurted from his mouth in a crimson arc, the force of the punch so great that even Kou Li’s own form trembled from the impact.

Something was wrong—the force of the punch dispersed outward, an empty-fist feint! Real power, he knew, should detonate within the body like a cannonball, not leave the attacker’s whole frame shuddering after impact—this was not a true cannon punch.

Trouble! But his earlier hesitation had already doomed him. The foe, for all his savagery, was cunning as well. With a sudden contraction of his limbs, he slipped away like a cicada shedding its shell, his body seeming to merge into Cao Ying’s. His arms shot out from under his armpits, palms locking together, fingers entwined, palms iron-blue, pressing downward and narrowly evading the flashing blade, squeezing the sword’s body like an iron anvil.

At that instant, the hair on the back of Kou Li’s neck bristled, a cat’s pelt raised in alarm—a surge of utter danger swept over him.

From the side, the deep ring of a blade sliced the air. Zhai Guan, gripping his great guandao in reverse, flicked the blade upward in a hooking arc. The essence of this cut lay in the sudden jolt of power—so massive was the weapon that a single tremor could fling aside even the heaviest arms. Should it strike flesh, it would instantly rend bone and sinew, armor offering no protection.

It was by virtue of this very technique that Zhai Guan had distinguished himself among the imperial troops of the Thirteen Northwestern Routes; before the gates of Yanmen, he alone had held back a thousand-strong cavalry of bandit-blades, felling man and horse alike with his mighty weapon.

Three lines converged, just as the ambushers had intended: Kou Li would be forced to withdraw his sword and retreat. In so doing, he would save the man, leaving his own back exposed to Zhai Guan’s full onslaught. The moment his guard dropped, the foreign assassin’s bone-breaking throws would seize him, and even the finest martial skills would not save his life.

But the mind could not outpace the fist. With a cold snort, Kou Li summoned force from his dantian, sending it through his three joints in sequence—hip to knee, knee to foot, foot to sole—then rebounded upward with tenfold speed. His palm dark as a demon’s claw, he seized and twisted, sending a surging, tumultuous force through his sword.

The assassin shrieked, recoiling his hands as if burned; a moment’s delay and his wrists would have been severed. Even so, blood spattered from his palms.

Seizing the opportunity, Kou Li lunged diagonally upward, pores contracting, body rounded and compact, spinning with Cao Ying as if the two were one. With a flick, the sword slid back into its sheath; in the next instant, it flashed forth, cleaving with explosive force.

In the bitter wind and cold rain, amidst the shrieking gusts, the guandao and the foreign sabre met in a thunderous clash. The shock and explosive power mingled, sparks tracing the blades’ edge while the ground beneath both men split open.

Zhai Guan braced himself, stamping down and retreating three paces, each step leaving a deep print. Kou Li shuddered, channeling all force into the armored Cao Ying, who was flung several yards away, landing directly in the path of the deadly ambush behind.

The attacker had no choice; reversing his qi and blood, he dug his heels into the ground, bracing himself against the oncoming body and the bone-shaking jolt of the great blade. With a guttural cry, he spat blood.

Sword coiling, turning, drawing, and releasing force—all seemed effortless, but in truth, it fused the segmented explosiveness of bamboo-joint power, the hard-soft transitions of internal boxing, and the lethal precision of sword-drawing technique into one seamless strike.

The timing was flawless, the use of force exquisite. In this moment, Kou Li’s martial art reached its zenith.

With this move, Kou Li turned certain death into dominance, his form as fierce as tiger or dragon, charging straight for the cannon.

“Stop him! He’s going to destroy the iron cannon!”

“Brave man, take my blade!”

The wind howled violently. Charging to meet him was a tall warhorse, astride which Hong Jiguang and his mount moved as one. Drawing on the horse’s momentum, his family blade technique unleashed a savage, cleaving strike—a horizontal cut known as the Leaping Step, Turning Moon Slash, derived from Lord Guan’s Dragging Blade. At this speed, there was no need for turning; the whole force of his body coiled and released, mingling with the three-hundred-pound weight of his steed to make the blow even more devastating.

The combined momentum of rider and horse, coupled with the blade’s reach, was the infamous “reaping wheat” method favored by steppe raiders. But for the imperial army’s current strength, the Han people on the frontier would be little more than sheep awaiting slaughter.

Hong Jiguang was sympathetic to the Burning Body Martial Hall, but he was a man of the court, a soldier against bandits. With his orders in hand, he would show no mercy, not even to civilians.

Kou Li did not dodge. Instead, he unleashed his inner breath, swelling his veins and viscera, muscles bulging, blue veins rippling beneath his skin. Channeling the essence of dragon form and the frame of tiger fist, his ten fingers flexed, joints cracking, his body dropping low, eyes flashing with electric light, fixed on the horse’s eyes. He let out a monstrous roar.

“ROAR!”

To the warhorse, the man before it seemed in an instant to transform into a huge, spotted, savage tiger, baring fangs and claws, fierce eyes shining, a fetid wind swirling as it pounced.

The horse screamed, rearing with flailing forehooves, the blade technique broken. Kou Li crouched, bent his knees, pressed his back low, adopting the Five-Flowered Mountain Seat, the Tiger Embracing Hammer—Tiger Ascends the Mountain!

Shoulders striking, back thrusting, upper and lower limbs acting in harmony, and with a mighty heave, nearly five hundred pounds of horse, man, and armor were hurled two zhang away. The horse’s head smashed into its rider, the horse’s body crashed onto his own. Amid the deafening impact and rising dust, the unmatched Hong Jiguang, master of blade and fist, was battered into unconsciousness, ribs and nose broken, blood spraying.

This brief delay gave Zhai Guan, the foreign assassin, and the ambushing officer time to close in. Of the three, Zhai Guan was the preeminent weapons master of the Burning Body Hall; the other two were hardened battlefield veterans from the north. Their skills in health preservation might lag behind, but in martial prowess, their killing arts rivaled the most advanced schools, their destructive power even greater.

The ambushing officer struck first, twisting his step and smashing his fist, the surface of his hand red as blood and steaming. Kou Li’s pores prickled with alarm. He countered with the Tiger Claw, blending the gathering force of the Cotton Palm, sidestepping, hand gripping the cannon’s barrel, catching and pressing. The essence of the Cotton Palm lay in using ultimate softness to overcome ultimate hardness.

A cannon of several thousand jin was, under this borrowed force, flung back toward its attacker—the officer with the shadowed face!

He did not dodge, but punched at it, as if detonating a powder charge. With a thunderous roar, the earth split, branches and leaves showered down, and the air rang with ceaseless noise.

The cannon’s surface now bore a scorched fist-mark, and it rebounded with even greater speed.

“Gunpowder Force!” Kou Li realized at once the danger he’d sensed—his foe had mastered a unique explosive power.

What was Gunpowder Force? It was achieved by repeatedly inflating and deflating the muscles, until the skin turned crimson and emitted steam, greatly enhancing strength with an explosive effect. It demanded mastery of both body-hardening fist and skin-forging palm techniques.

“Well struck!”

Seeing the cannon barrel crash toward him again, Kou Li shouted, unleashing the full might of muscle, bone, skin, and flesh. With force from his four extremities, he swept aside all before him.

Pressing a raised hand against the cannon, he generated force from his spine, moving in step with his body; retracting was releasing, releasing was retracting, hard and soft entwined, broken yet continuous. His body seemed to ride atop the cannon’s barrel, slipping away just as Zhai Guan’s great blade slashed down—vanishing as the cannon itself met the strike.

With a shriek of metal, blade and barrel sparked in a shower of fire. Unable to withstand the thousand-jin force, Zhai Guan was forced back several steps, limbs aching, qi and blood in turmoil, swallowing a mouthful of blood by sheer will.

The other two were likewise forced back, while the shadow-faced officer suddenly shouted, “No! The cannon’s been ignited!”

Within the iron cannon, a shot had long been loaded, but the cannoneers had been knocked senseless in the chaos. The fuse-lit torch had fallen to the ground.

No one had expected Kou Li to be so audacious as to ignite the cannon while it was still spinning. At such close range, it would kill anyone nearby.

In these moments, facing four opponents, Kou Li unleashed deadly moves one after another. With imperial soldiers closing in all around, he had been searching desperately for a way out—and the cannon offered the perfect chance.

The fuse would burn for only four to five breaths. In that brief span, the three blood-crazed adversaries battled him fiercely. Kou Li, wielding both internal and external power, shifted between supreme softness and ultimate hardness, his attacks relentless and unyielding.

Yet the officer’s explosive force and Zhai Guan’s blade were equally deadly—contact meant certain death or crippling injury. But between their exchanges of power, there were fleeting moments when Kou Li could erupt in counterattack.

Apart from the short-range grappling specialist, the three clashed with Kou Li over a dozen times in four breaths, neither side gaining the upper hand. He seemed like a perpetual engine, while the other two were like devastating weapons.

If this struggle continued, perhaps Kou Li could exhaust and overcome two of them—or perhaps they would fell him with a barrage of killing strikes before their own strength waned. More likely, however, before he could wear them down, their joint onslaught would leave him mortally wounded, doomed to perish with them.

Kou Li’s mastery of internal boxing meant there were no gaps in his defense, but their life-and-death techniques shattered balance and transcended limits.

But this would never be the true ending—for the several-thousand-jin iron cannon was about to roar!