Blade's Startling Thunder

"Oh?" Liu San was slightly surprised. That slash of his, while not at full strength, was enough to instantly kill an ordinary martial artist. Yet this brat had actually blocked it?

"Kid, so you're a ranked martial artist too. Some skill. Too bad—even a Ninth Rank peak might not stop my flying knives. This ends here!"

Murderous intent flared in Liu San's eyes. His hands moved in rapid succession, and in an instant, three more streaks of cold light shot out in a triangular formation, targeting Ye Yun's upper, middle, and lower body! The angles were vicious, sealing off all room to dodge! The flying knives tore through the air, letting out sharp, piercing shrieks!

The shadow of death loomed instantly! Ye Yun felt like a tiny boat in a raging storm, on the verge of being torn apart. He gritted his teeth, his focus sharper than ever before. Deep in his soul, something seemed to burn, to cry out!

In his vision, the speed of the flying knives seemed to slow, just a fraction! He twisted his body desperately, his blade dancing into a protective barrier around his vitals!

"Clang! Ssssh! Clang!"

One knife was deflected, another grazed past his ribs, and the last was barely knocked aside by the flat of his blade, embedding itself an inch deep into the tree trunk behind him!

His first life-or-death struggle left Ye Yun's vision swimming with black spots from sheer exhaustion. Liu San's flying knives were terrifying! Strength, speed, technique—all pushed to their limits!

If not for his soul fusion granting him perception far beyond ordinary men, and his breakthrough to Ninth Rank martial artist, he'd already be a corpse on the ground!

"Tch, tough bastard." Liu San was growing impatient. He didn't want to drag this out any longer. Reaching back, he palmed two more Flying Feather Knives, grinning savagely as he closed in. "Next one sends you off!"

Watching Liu San's relentless advance, feeling the icy killing intent radiating from him, Ye Yun's pressure skyrocketed. His mind raced. A head-on fight was unwinnable! He had to win by surprise! A thought flashed through his mind like lightning!

Just as Liu San's wrist twitched, about to unleash a fatal strike, Ye Yun suddenly whipped his head toward a patch of shadow behind Liu San's flank and screamed with all his might: "Sixth Brother! Now!!"

"Sixth Brother?" Liu San's every hair stood on end! He'd been on guard for pursuers all along, and Ye Yun's desperate, joy-filled shout was too real! Could there really be an ambush? Almost instinctively, he twisted his head toward where Ye Yun was looking, shock and suspicion warring on his face!

Now!

In that thousandth of a second when Liu San's mind was thrown into chaos by that shout of "Sixth Brother," leaving a fatal gap in his defense! Deep within Ye Yun, the dormant will—made unnaturally resilient by the fusion of souls through transmigration—collided with a fragment of instinct from the original owner's memories, a blurry but bone-deep reflex, and erupted in resonance!

"Mountain-Crushing—Rending Silk!"

A roar from the depths of his soul exploded in his mind! He hadn't meant to shout it; it was driven by the power that burst forth in that instant!

Ye Yun forgot his exhausted arms, forgot all the constraints of technique! Every shred of his will, every ounce of his fury, every survival instinct he had, poured into the ordinary regulation waist-sword in his hand!

Using his body as an axis, guiding Essence Qi with intent, the blade followed his movement, carrying the absolute resolve to split mountains and tear the sky, as it slashed down toward Liu San's wide-open neck!

There was no dazzling light, no earth-shaking roar.

Only a razor-sharp, nearly invisible blade Qi, condensed to its utmost, suddenly erupted from the tip of the blade!

It tore through the air, emitting a faint but soul-chilling "ssssssss" sound, like tough silk being ripped apart in an instant!

This blade Qi moved faster than the eye could track, crossing the short distance between them in a flash!

Liu San had just turned his head back, seeing the shadowed spot empty, thinking "Damn! Tricked!" when a primal, unprecedented terror flooded him from head to toe!

He spun back in horror, only to see Ye Yun's descending blade, and... that invisible edge—too fast to describe, too sharp to freeze his very soul!

"Blade... Blade Qi Projection?! Im...pos..." Liu San's thoughts couldn't even finish forming the shock before that invisible Rending Silk blade Qi sliced through his neck like a hot knife through butter, with no resistance at all!

Time seemed to freeze in that moment.

The shock, fear, and disbelief on Liu San's face instantly locked in place. The life in his eyes dimmed like a candle snuffed by a gale.

His mouth opened, as if to say something, but only a faint "ah..." escaped. A hair-thin line of blood slowly appeared on his neck.

The next moment, his head, still wearing that horrified expression, slowly separated from his body. With a dull "thud," it rolled onto the ground carpeted with pine needles.

The headless corpse swayed, then blood gushed from the severed neck like a fountain, staining the yellowed pine needles and damp soil beneath. The thick, metallic smell of blood spread instantly.

Deep in the Pine Forest, a dead silence fell. Only the gurgle of flowing blood and Ye Yun's own ragged, bellows-like breathing cut through the stillness, harsh and grating.

Ye Yun stood frozen in place, still holding the pose of his slashing strike.

The waist-sword in his hand—its blade made of ordinary ironwood—seemed to have barely withstood the sudden burst of power, trembling incessantly. Ye Yun gripped it tightly to steady the blade.

He stared blankly at Liu San's head on the ground. Those eyes, wide open even in death, filled with incomprehension and utter terror, seemed to be fixed on him still.

What had just happened in that instant?

That sharp, tearing sensation... what was it?

Rending Silk... Mountain-Crushing Saber Technique?

Deep in the original owner's memories, there was a vague shadow of his grandfather practicing saber techniques... but that seemed like just an extension of basic forms?

Blade Qi Projection... That word Liu San had screamed before dying exploded in Ye Yun's mind like a thunderclap!

A middle-ranked martial artist?! He, a mere Ninth Rank nobody who had just sensed Essence Qi, had actually, in a life-or-death moment, unleashed Blade Qi Projection—a skill only middle-ranked martial artists of Sixth Rank and above could master?!

Absurd! Shocking! Ecstasy! And... deep fear!

Where did this power come from? Was it a mutation from the soul fusion? An unknown side effect of transmigration? Or a secret buried deep in this body's bloodline?

Ye Yun shuddered violently, snapping out of the shock of that power. A massive sense of crisis drenched him like ice water, chilling him to the bone!

He couldn't stay here! That earth-shattering slash must never be discovered by anyone!

Otherwise, what awaited him wasn't glory, but endless trouble, suspicion, and even... death! His identity as an orphan of the Ye Family was already sensitive enough. Exposing this unbelievable power would be nothing short of courting death!

He forced himself to endure the overwhelming exhaustion and the hollow, stabbing emptiness deep in his soul, compelling himself to stay calm. His mind raced, planning how to clean up the aftermath.