Infinite Fighting

Zhang Ji was startled.

Although he knew this world’s weapon technology was relatively advanced, he was still a bit stunned now that he was actually facing it.

If that last attack had hit him, even with his perfected Iron Body Skill, he figured he would have been in for a world of hurt.

This just highlighted his weakness: his Spirit was too weak, his perception not keen enough.

Li Long could anticipate the enemy’s attack before they even made a move, but Zhang Ji hadn’t noticed a thing until it was almost on top of him.

"Be careful,"

Li Long warned Zhang Ji.

The words had barely left his lips when he and Wang Quan’s figures suddenly vanished from in front of Zhang Ji.

The next moment, they had already engaged the enemies in the pitch-black space.

Zhang Ji’s movements were slower, but he had no intention of retreating and charged forward as well.

Two figures were sent flying, one after the other. They were two suits of armor, knocked away, but the people inside were unharmed. Li Long’s goal was merely to repel them and create distance.

Immediately, Li Long gave chase, taking on two of them by himself.

Of the remaining two, one faced off against Wang Quan, while the other took aim at Zhang Ji, preparing to fire again.

This time, however, Zhang Ji was prepared and dodged in advance.

BOOM!

The ground behind Zhang Ji was blasted black by the shot.

The opponent wasn’t a professional martial artist; his reaction speed was seriously lacking.

Without a connection to the big data network and relying solely on the armor’s own processing chip, trying to hit a martial artist like Zhang Ji, who had a degree of Spirit cultivation, at this range was nothing but a daydream.

BANG!

Before he could fire another shot, Zhang Ji’s fist had already struck his chest plate.

The feedback from the impact was subtle. Zhang Ji felt his power being dispersed across the armor; its structure was surprisingly similar to his Iron Body Skill.

’Sure enough, the principles are all the same, just expressed differently!’

SHING!

Zhang Ji ducked his head abruptly.

A slender, pitch-black blade, about one and a half meters long, had swept over his head.

Something was off about that blade. The moment it appeared, Zhang Ji felt the hair on his arms stand on end.

Normally, he wouldn’t even have this reaction if he stuck his hand into a small, household-grade cutting machine.

SWISH! SWISH!

The opponent slashed out with the blade. Zhang Ji didn’t dare to block it head-on and could only evade.

He retreated to the wall, but the opponent slashed with the blade regardless.

Zhang Ji thought it would get stuck, but the blade seemed to meet no resistance at all. Half of it sank into the wall and still swept through as if cutting tofu.

A little dust fell, and Zhang Ji’s keen eyes noticed something.

’A high-frequency weapon?’

’It’s already been implemented?’

’That’s much earlier than I thought.’

He had previously believed these sorts of things were only invented after the Sage King War, once the development of martial arts was encouraged.

’Military tech is really light-years ahead of civilian tech.’

SWOOSH!

Another slash came at him.

This time, Zhang Ji spread his arms, his body suddenly leaning back at a nearly thirty-degree angle to avoid the attack. Then, with a light sweep of his hand on the ground, he somersaulted around to the opponent’s side.

Crane Form!

White Crane Sweeps its Wings!

After quickly using the momentum to right himself, Zhang Ji struck out with both palms, forcefully slapping the opponent’s wrists.

BANG!

The opponent wasn’t injured, but his wrists were involuntarily twisted, preventing him from making another effective attack.

Tiger Form!

Tiger’s Clap!

Zhang Ji closed in, his fists rapidly striking the opponent’s joints. He gave him no chance to build up power, targeting the neck and head in particular. Just as his opponent was about to counterattack, Zhang Ji drove his elbow into the man’s neck, forcing him back several steps.

Leopard Form!

Leopard Continuous Fist, Leopard Elbow to the Throat!

The man’s back hit the wall, and his movements faltered.

He clearly hadn’t expected to be so completely suppressed by Zhang Ji.

He threw a fierce kick. Boosted by the armor, the blow was powerful enough to shatter a boulder.

Zhang Ji’s footwork was light and evasive. His arms made light contact with the leg, and then, using the momentum, his body spun, throwing the man more than ten meters away.

Snake Form!

Serpent’s Coil!

The man landed, shook his head slightly, and then tried to get back up.

However, before he could fully rise, a buzzing explosion rang out.

WHIR! CRACK! BOOM!

Zhang Ji’s charged kick landed on his head. Even with the armor’s protection, the man’s entire brain buzzed.

Iron Body, Charged Power!

Dragon Form, Unified Strength!

The immense force was beyond what he could withstand.

He was sent sliding by the kick, but Zhang Ji pressed his advantage, following up with two more kicks.

Soon, the armor stopped moving. The parts Zhang Ji had kicked were deeply caved in. The man’s brain had probably been turned to pulp.

Zhang Ji looked back. Wang Quan and Li Long were still fighting, and both held the advantage.

He never would have thought that he would be the first to finish his fight.

But on second thought, it made sense. Although Wang Quan was a Grandmaster of Leopard Form Fist who also practiced Snake Fist, his power couldn’t compare to the unified strength of Zhang Ji’s Iron Body Skill combined with Dragon Form. And Li Long was fighting two opponents with highly damaging attacks, so he had to prioritize evasion before he could go on the offensive. Without using an ultimate move, it was bound to be a bit more troublesome.

He was about to go help when Li Long slapped away one of the men who got too close and said to Zhang Ji, "There’s one more. You go after him first. We’ll be right there."

Hearing this, Zhang Ji immediately turned and rushed off in pursuit.

Seeing Zhang Ji give chase, one of the men fighting Li Long raised his arm to fire at him, but Li Long’s figure flashed. With a close-range Tiger ram, he sent the man flying.

...

The tunnel was long. Zhang Ji calculated it was about five kilometers, a straight shot, but he didn’t know where it led.

Soon, Zhang Ji saw light, and he walked toward it.

It was a blast door that had already been opened.

Outside the blast door was a platform.

The platform where the lighthouse stood.

Zhang Ji walked onto the platform. The sea breeze hit him. He was surrounded by the ocean, and in the distance, he could see the silhouette of Shanli Island.

Suddenly, he looked up at the huge lighthouse.

At the top of the lighthouse, a man in silver-white exoskeletal armor was looking down on him.

Song Yuan had figured his men couldn’t stop these Grandmasters, but he hadn’t expected Zhang Ji to arrive so quickly.

Unfortunately, they were on a secret mission this time. They couldn’t call on core computational support, and for weapons, they only had one hand cannon and one high-frequency oscillating blade. Everything else was just an auxiliary tool. Otherwise, these Grandmasters wouldn’t have won so easily.

BOOM!

Song Yuan’s shot missed.

And Zhang Ji was already running up the stairs inside the lighthouse.

Atop the fifty-meter-tall lighthouse, Zhang Ji and Song Yuan stood facing each other.

The space wasn’t very wide, surrounded by an alloy guardrail. It was like a miniature arena.

With a flick of his wrist, Song Yuan extended a long, black blade from his right arm.

Though he wasn’t a Grandmaster, he was a professional Sixth Rank martial artist.

Supplemented by this set of equipment, he wouldn’t necessarily lose a fight against a Grandmaster.

Zhang Ji’s gaze paused for a moment on the lighthouse’s lamp. There sat a small incubation chamber, and inside it was a purplish-black heart, pierced with tubes, still beating.

Zhang Ji immediately guessed that this must be their true objective.

SHING!

Before Zhang Ji could think further, his opponent had already charged, blade in hand.

The angle of the slash was treacherous, and Zhang Ji only narrowly avoided it.

His heart tightened. ’A master!’

The next instant, a relentless flurry of strikes followed.

Zhang Ji dodged clumsily. The space was limited, and feeling he couldn’t completely defend against the opponent’s attacks, he became slightly hesitant.

There has always been a gulf between armed and unarmed combat.

Humans are naturally suited to wielding weapons; it’s an innate talent.

Only for those B-rank and above could this gulf begin to be bridged.

And only at A-rank and above could it be almost completely ignored.

Before that, fighting a weapon with bare hands was almost always a losing battle.

But Zhang Ji’s martial arts system was already established, and he really couldn’t find a suitable weapon.

If you gave him an Alloy Saber, he probably wouldn’t be as effective as with his fists; it would likely just hinder his movements.

SSSK!

Zhang Ji failed to dodge in time, and his back was lightly grazed.

The opponent’s high-frequency oscillating blade met with rare resistance, its movement slowing for an instant as if it were cutting through alloy.

And a bloody line appeared on Zhang Ji’s back.

The moment the wound appeared, his muscles clenched around it, instantly staunching the flow of blood.

Zhang Ji kicked out, forcing his opponent back several steps. He crashed into the guardrail with a clang.

The two created some distance. Zhang Ji reached back to touch his wound, took a deep breath, and abandoned the idea of stalling for time until the others arrived. He was ready to face his fear!

THWUMP!!

A dull thud echoed from under Zhang Ji’s feet as his body shot out like a spring. Song Yuan met him with his blade, but Zhang Ji met the attack directly with his bare arms.

They clashed head-on.

The next moment, the blade made contact with Zhang Ji’s palm.

Zhang Ji clearly felt the force of the high-frequency vibrations.

His skin was torn, and the muscles beneath could not withstand it either.

’But it will still take some time for it to tear through me.’

’And that’s enough time for me to strike!’

WHIRR! CLANG!

At the cost of his left palm, Zhang Ji slapped the blade aside, forcing Song Yuan’s right arm violently backward.

Song Yuan was astonished by the force of the blow, but before he could process it, Zhang Ji’s full-power strike, backed by his unified strength, had landed on him.

BOOM! CLANG! CRACK!

The alloy guardrail was shattered by Song Yuan’s impact, and his body was sent flying out.

While in mid-air, the thrusters on his back flared with blue plasma flames, barely stabilizing his body.

He had a flight module installed, but it was just a semi-defective civilian model. It would burn out after less than ten minutes of flight, so he tried to avoid using it unless he had to, only activating it briefly in emergencies.

Right now, he had been forced to use it.

In the palm of Zhang Ji’s left hand, a wound deep enough to show bone was rapidly closing as his muscles contracted. It was a good thing his bones were hard enough; otherwise, that slash would have taken his hand off.

Song Yuan raised his arm and aimed at Zhang Ji, a light glowing from within the hand cannon.

Zhang Ji’s expression changed, and he instantly dodged aside.

BOOM!

The spot where he had just been standing was melted by the intense heat. The blast also destroyed the section of the staircase he needed to get back down.

Song Yuan immediately fired another shot, forcing Zhang Ji to dodge again.

Zhang Ji’s face darkened. ’Isn’t this just making me a sitting duck?’

He turned his head, saw the heart inside the lamp, and reached out to smash the glass, then cradled the thing in his arms.

As expected, Song Yuan hesitated.

But then, he aimed again and fired without hesitation.

Zhang Ji’s expression changed. "Dammit!" he cursed.

’I can’t believe this guy is so ruthless! He’s willing to fail the mission just to take me out?’

Without a second thought, Zhang Ji threw the heart aside, leaped off the lighthouse, and plunged toward the sea.

SPLASH!

After a fifty-meter drop into the sea, Zhang Ji’s body reeled from the impact.

Song Yuan flew toward the heart’s position and quickly caught it.

He had only pretended not to care; in reality, he cared far more than Zhang Ji. He had made a gamble, and he had won.

The next moment, he looked toward Zhang Ji’s position in the sea.

He couldn’t see any sign of him.

At the same time, the seawater in a large area nearby began to churn inexplicably.

GLUG GLUG GLUG GLUG!

BOOM!

A waterspout shot out from the sea and slammed into Song Yuan—or more precisely, into his thrusters.

His thrusters were immediately extinguished, and he fell from the sky, plunging into the sea.

The next moment, he felt an immense force twisting his head, exceeding the armor’s tolerance limits.

CREAK! CRUNCH!

Song Yuan sank into the sea, his hands still clutching tightly to the small incubation chamber.

But Zhang Ji easily pried his arms open and took the device.

With a surge of water, Zhang Ji leaped up with his prize, landing on the stone platform of the lighthouse.

Looking back at the surrounding sea, he mused, ’The Profound Heart Stream skills are insanely strong on their home turf. With just two Essences, it’s almost as effective as a perfected top-tier martial art!’