Stepping on the Demoness to become the strongest

The Asura King crashed to the ground, and Yan Yu sheathed his sword and turned back to Ye Jun's side, asking,

"How did you get here?"

"Did you really just slaughter the Asura King?" Ye Jun was also stunned.

Hadn't the Emperor of Heaven said that the Asura King couldn't be matched by a single person?

"Yeah," Yan Yu said casually, "just took a bit of a shortcut."

The "Hundred Birds Paying Homage to the Phoenix" creates a multitude of sword Qi afterimages, which are usually used to conceal the true form of the sword light, providing cover for the Sword Immortal to attack. Therefore, it also leads to a fixed way of thinking, that is, "the opponent's true form must be hidden among the sword light afterimages."

Targeting this kind of habitual thinking, one could intentionally do the opposite, leaving the range of the sword Qi afterimages with their true form and sneak up behind the enemy to attack using an Invisibility Technique.

In a past life, this tactic among Sword Immortals had a name that was famous far and wide, known as the "Rabbit Trick"—just like a magician deliberately attracts your attention with flamboyant maneuvers, while secretly slipping a rabbit into a hat.

Of course, in truly high-level Sword Immortal duels, what is emphasized is the art of emptiness becomes solid, and substance becomes void.

If you see the "Hundred Birds Paying Homage to the Phoenix" and immediately think the opponent is trying to attack from behind, they could just as well hide within the sword Qi afterimages and launch a direct frontal assault... In short, although there are only two variations, when executed by masters, they too can achieve an unpredictable effect.

In the live broadcast room, the director replayed Yan Yu's "Rabbit Trick" over and over again:

Sword Qi turns into shadows! Sky-stepping reversal! Landing and vanishing! Flashing behind! One hit, one kill!

Five tactical movements executed seamlessly in one breath, with a total duration of just two seconds. Even under slow-motion replay, they maintained a flowing speed and elegance, making the viewers in the live broadcast room erupt with excitement, with tons of astonished comments flooding the screen like waterfalls.

"It's really... really..." Zhou Erhe stuttered for quite a while, temporarily at a loss for words of praise, cursing his own limited vocabulary.

"Magnificent!" Xu Dongming suddenly exclaimed.

"Right, magnificent!" Zhou Erhe snapped out of his trance and sharply commented, "Five extremely concise tactical moves compressed into a two-second seamless execution, still retaining an ultimate sense of magnificence even under a slow-motion camera. At normal speeds in reality, probably no one could react in time!"

"This is the peak power of the Longcheng Flying General!" Xu Dongming didn't want to be outdone, quickly continuing, "Dear viewers in front of the TV, do you still remember the Longcheng Flying General's lightning-fast 'Gale Three Consecutive Strikes,' and how he nonchalantly walked through a minefield with explosions trailing behind him in the Three Isles Treasure Ship Secret Realm?

In this world of martial arts, nothing is indestructible except for speed, and once again today the Longcheng Flying General has proven that his mobility has reached a peak of perfection! From now on, his signature move won't be the 'Gale Three Consecutive Strikes,' but the 'Gale Five Consecutive Strikes'!"

"So the 'Three Consecutive Strikes' evolved into the 'Five Consecutive Strikes,' huh?" Zhou Erhe teased.

"Letting countless sword Qi afterimages remain in front, then flashing behind you for a second's kill, you tell me if that's frightening!" Xu Dongming shouted loudly.

"But what if the opponent sees the 'Gale Five Consecutive Strikes' and subconsciously defends their back?" Zhou Erhe joked.

"Then I just won't attack you from behind," Xu Dongming immediately argued, "I could attack from the left, from the right, or even jump above your head, what would you do then?"

In the Annan National Defence Academy, hearing the commentators discuss countermeasures to the "Gale Five Consecutive Strikes," the members of the Qingan Team also fell into contemplation.

Li Zhaojiang spoke after a moment of silence,

"Launching an attack with Invisibility Technique actually isn't hard to deal with, as divine sense scanning can break invisibility."

"The key is his speed is too fast," Li Minghu agreed, "you see him deploy 'Hundred Birds Paying Homage to the Phoenix' and conceal his figure, and before you have time to initiate a divine sense scan, he might have already circled behind you."

After a moment of careful thought, everyone felt it was really difficult to handle.

As the commentators said, in the world of martial arts, speed is unbreakable. You can understand all the mechanics, but what can you do if your reaction speed can't keep up?

You either learn from Ye Jun of Dragon Soar Team, whip out a Xuan Guang Ruler, and create a defensive shell covering 360 degrees around you, no matter from which direction the attack comes, or you simply have to train your reaction speed so as not to fall behind the rhythm of Longcheng Flying General in the future.

Whether or not it's possible to train that is another question—after all, reaction speed is something that heavily relies on innate talent.

"Haoran's second magical weapon should be one for defense," Li Zhaojiang decided.

While the Qingan Team was making tactical adjustments, the Huofeng Team was collectively silent.

Zhang Huaide didn't say much, after all, the mechanics had been explained by the commentators, and their analysis had no issues.

But Captain Zhou...

Her eyes casually glanced at Zhou Hongyu behind her glasses, only to see that though her face was expressionless, her hands clasped into fists on her knees hinted at the intense frustration brewing within her.

It seemed Captain Zhou had always regarded Captain Yan as the one to chase after. Now, the difference in their strengths was clearly visible, and there appeared to be no hope in the foreseeable future for her to catch up and surpass Captain Yan.

One could only hope that it wouldn't affect her subsequent performance.

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While Yan Yu and Ye Jun passed the first hurdle, Liu Longtao and Xie Ruoxi, unaware, continued along the mountain path of Black Dog Ridge.

Intimidated by the Jade Pivot Thunder in Xie Ruoxi's hand, the stray dogs formed from lonely ghosts dared not approach. However, they sneakily followed behind the two, their numbers growing larger and larger.

Seeing the situation turn dire, Liu Longtao knew that once these creatures amassed in enough numbers, they would eventually overcome their fear and swarm them—it would be safer to start fighting now while there were fewer of them.

"Get ready to make a move." He whispered to Xie Ruoxi.

Xie Ruoxi hummed in acknowledgment and took out an elixir medicine from her bag, popping it into her mouth and letting it dissolve slowly under her tongue.

Liu Longtao watched in surprise and thought to himself, ha, your True Yuan must be running out too, right? He snarkily transmitted his voice again, "If your True Yuan can't keep up, just say so. We can take a break. Don't fail us when the real fight starts."

"No," Xie Ruoxi replied, "My True Yuan is plentiful."

"Plentiful True Yuan?" Liu Longtao scoffed, "Then why are you taking that elixir medicine?"

"It's not elixir medicine." Xie Ruoxi took out a corner of the packaging to show him, "It's Maltesers."

Liu Longtao: .........

Seeing his defeated look, Xie Ruoxi instantly became more alert, quickly stuffed the packaging back into her pocket, and whispered, "Don't you start asking me for any, I only have two or three pieces left, and I don't have enough for myself."

"Who'd want your crappy snacks!" Liu Longtao almost blurted out, but managed to suppress the urge to scoff, continuing to whisper, "Prepare to kill dogs."

"Got it."

The two moved forward several dozen steps, then suddenly turned around and began their attack.

Liu Longtao demonstrated his swordsmanship, cleanly slicing several wild dogs in half. Xie Ruoxi was even more nonchalant, wherever there were more dogs, she casually tossed the Jade Pivot Thunder, killing three to four times more wild dogs than Liu Longtao, leaving even Lord Master speechless.

Aren't you going to save even a little bit of your True Yuan?

These ghosts disguised as wild dogs, with minds similar to animals, were caught off guard by the sudden attack, and immediately scattered like birds and beasts, disappearing in the blink of an eye, leaving behind only a few corpses and a rusty nail.

Liu Longtao scanned with his Divine Sense and found that the nail was actually a magical artifact, so he casually pocketed it.

They continued along the mountain path, unaware that the noise from the fight had reached far away, alerting the Onmyoji team led by Sato Hiroshi.

The group picked up the pace and moved stealthily to the spot, rounding a bend and, indeed, saw two figures walking ahead on the mountain road from a distance.

The man on the left, who had an oppressive presence even from behind, was the captain of Lu Country's Dragon Soar Team, Liu Longtao. He was known as the "Demon King of the Ferocious Dragon" by the Heavy Sakura, which couldn't be more telling―Liu Longtao had the combat prowess of a Demon King.

The female cultivator on the right... who is she? Don't recognize her. She's probably a minor character. Anyway, any slightly formidable cultivator from Lu Country would have been thoroughly researched by the Yin Yang Bureau, and he was sure he had never seen this person.

"One team, take a detour ahead and set up traps!" Sato Hiroshi quickly ordered, "Second team, follow from behind and maintain distance!"

"Maintaining distance" meant staying outside the range of the Rikoku Cultivators' Divine Sense scan. Onmyoji preferred to fuss over details in combat, and even the most straightforward Samurai class liked to meticulously consider the angle and force of every sword strike.

The first team, consisting of four Onmyoji, silently summoned their Shikigami and led their team to climb the rocks and ascend the cliff in order to intercept the two Rikoku Cultivators ahead; the second team continued to move stealthily forward, trailing behind Liu Longtao and Xie Ruoxi at the maximum distance their Divine Sense could scan―this distance depended mainly on the cultivator's own cultivation level.

The higher the level, the greater the scanning range.

Even though Xie Ruoxi was at the Marrow Cleansing Stage, her innate talent for cultivation was so exaggerated that her Divine Sense's scanning range was slightly broader than that of other same-stage Rikoku Cultivators.

She was on guard against the previous pack of wild dogs when she suddenly became aware of several sneaky, strange Transcendents who had entered her Divine Sense scanning boundary from behind.

"We've got enemies." She suddenly stopped and whispered to Liu Longtao, "Seems like Onmyoji." Explore more stories at My Virtual Library Empire

"Don't stop, keep walking." Liu Longtao reacted even faster and swiftly replied, "Pretend we haven't noticed them."

"Okay." Xie Ruoxi continued walking.

"Get your act together." Liu Longtao quickly reminded her.

"Oh, right." Xie Ruoxi immediately adjusted.

"You're not very calm, are you?" Liu Longtao finally found an opportunity to tease, whispering, "How did Yan Yu train you? You're still nervous at a time like this? Weren't you all imposing when you were killing your way here earlier?"

Xie Ruoxi thought to herself, what do you know, PvE and PvP aren't the same, are they?

Back in the team's internal training, she had never won against Lin Ning or Su Yunjin. She was nearly traumatized by Yan Yu, and now she had to fight life-and-death battles against top Transcendents from other countries. It would be strange if she wasn't nervous.

"Just relax, we'll win." Liu Longtao laughed heartily, "When it comes to experience fighting those scum, not even Yan Yu holds a candle to me."

"Ha!" As soon as Yan Yu was mentioned, Xie Ruoxi was distracted again, replying irritably, "You think you can do better than our captain?"

"Just watch me." Liu Longtao boasted.