"Oh my god! Did you see that? How did that kid, Tang San, just do that?"
"I couldn't make it out! His footwork was so fast, like a ghost!"
"And that move of his! He was so far away, yet he pulled the boss right over to him! What kind of Soul Skill is that? It's way too powerful!"
A large crowd had gathered around the training grounds of Notting Academy.
In the middle of the circle stood a small, black-haired boy with an unusually resolute gaze.
He was Tang San.
Several older students, all much bigger than him, lay sprawled at his feet, groaning and unable to get up.
Wang Sheng, the leader of the work-study students, was gazing at Tang San with such admiration that he looked ready to bow down and pledge himself to him on the spot.
"Xiao San—no, Brother San! You're incredible! What's that move called? Could you teach me?"
The other work-study students chimed in, too, their eyes filled with awe and envy as they looked at Tang San.
Not far away, a middle-aged man in fine clothes, though looking somewhat down on his luck, watched the scene.
"That's right, just like that... His coordination, his use of strength, his sense of timing... This boy is a true genius! If only his Martial Soul weren't the Trash Martial Soul, Blue Silver Grass, his future would be limitless!"
A storm was already raging in Yu Xiaogang's heart.
He had spent decades studying Martial Soul Theory and called himself the "Grandmaster." He had seen countless geniuses, but none like Tang San, who, at only six years old and without a single Soul Ring, had displayed such astonishing combat talent.
As Tang San basked in the crowd's praise and the Grandmaster's approving gaze, his small chest unconsciously puffed out a little farther.
He was proud to be a disciple of the Tang Sect.
Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track, Controlling Crane Capturing Dragon, Mysterious Jade Hand...
These were all supreme Tang Sect Secret Arts!
Even in this unfamiliar world, they could still let him shine brilliantly.
But just as he surveyed the crowd, basking in the glory of victory, his gaze was suddenly drawn to someone at the edge of the gathering.
That boy was another work-study student, about the same size as Tang San. His looks were utterly unremarkable, the sort of person who would disappear into a crowd.
But his eyes were strange.
While everyone else was gasping and cheering over Tang San's Tang Sect Secret Arts, this boy merely stood with his arms crossed, watching in silence, his face expressionless.
No, that wasn't right.
Tang San keenly realized that the boy wasn't expressionless.
His gaze was... like someone watching a monkey perform tricks at a circus?
Calm, indifferent, even tinged with disdain and... analysis?
The realization instinctively made Tang San uncomfortable.
It was the wariness of a genius encountering another "oddity," and the anger of having his sense of superiority, born of the Tang Sect's glory, offended.
Who was he?
The thought flashed through Tang San's mind.
He had been at Notting Academy for some time and knew most of the work-study students, but he couldn't recall anything about this boy.
Was his name... Qin Feng?
He was always alone, quiet, and easy to overlook.
An utterly ordinary nobody—what gave him the right to look at me like that?
Tang San snorted inwardly and pushed the irritation aside.
There was no need to bother with some nameless nobody.
Once he obtained his first Soul Ring and became a true Soul Master, the gap between him and these ordinary work-study students would become an uncrossable chasm.
Then, they would only be able to look up to him.
At that moment, the "nameless nobody," Qin Feng, was delighted.
"System, did you hear that? Those astonished voices! That adoring tone! It's practically a whole field of leeks, just waiting to be harvested!"
[ Ding! A high-density "astonishment" emotional field has been detected, but its source is not the host. Please intervene as soon as possible and redirect the source of astonishment to yourself to complete the mission! ]
The system's notification rang out right on cue.
"Don't rush, don't rush. You have to eat one bite at a time, and show off one step at a time."
Qin Feng reassured the system, but kept his eyes fixed on Tang San.
"See that, Brother Wolf?" He nudged Grey Wolf, who stood beside him looking impatient. "That's our target. Twin Martial Souls, heaven's chosen, future Sea God and Asura God."
Grey Wolf followed his gaze and curled his lip. "That little brat? He doesn't even look as big as Xiao Huihui. One punch and he'd probably cry for ages."
"Don't underestimate him," Qin Feng said with a smile. "Those moves he used just now would count as top-tier ancient martial arts in our world. But..."
"But what?" Grey Wolf perked up.
"But in my eyes, they're full of flaws!"
Qin Feng's voice brimmed with absolute confidence.
"His so-called 'Controlling Crane Capturing Dragon' is nothing more than using the flow of air to create a low-pressure zone and generate suction. But his technique is too crude. His energy-conversion rate is pitifully low. He's wasting ninety percent of his Soul Power."
"And that 'Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track' uses changes in footwork and rapid shifts in body weight to create visual afterimages and confuse an opponent. It sounds mysterious, but at its core, isn't it just exploiting the human eye's persistence-of-vision limitation? Work out his movement patterns and maximum turning angle, then toss him a few smoke bombs, and he'll be completely blinded on the spot!"
Grey Wolf listened, wide-eyed.
He didn't understand terms like "low-pressure zone" or "persistence of vision," but Qin Feng's ease in stripping away every mysterious phenomenon and explaining it through the most fundamental principles made him feel an inexplicable sense of familiarity and kinship.
That was the appeal of science!
"Then... what do we do now?"
Grey Wolf grew excited. He felt as if he had gone back to his days inventing things at Wolf Castle.
"What do we do?"
Qin Feng shifted his gaze from Tang San to a row of training equipment at the edge of the grounds.
The equipment consisted of stone locks and stone weights carved from rock. The lightest weighed seventy or eighty pounds, while the largest stone lock weighed a full hundred and fifty pounds. It was meant for the academy's strength-type Soul Master students.
At that moment, several older students were gathered around the hundred-and-fifty-pound stone lock, struggling with it.
"Hah!"
A muscular student whose Martial Soul was Savage Bull strained until his face was red and the veins stood out on his forehead. He barely managed to lift the stone lock half an inch off the ground before it clanged back down.
"No way, it's too heavy! You'd need to be at least level fifteen, with a Soul Ring and the strength of a Battle Soul Master, to lift it!"
"Yeah, we Soul Scholars don't stand a chance."
The people around them shook their heads.
Seeing this, Qin Feng smiled.
When you were sleepy, someone brought you a pillow.
Could there be a better stage than this?
He gave Grey Wolf a meaningful look. "Brother Wolf, bring over our 'tools of the trade.'"
Grey Wolf didn't understand, but he obediently ran back to the dormitory and brought out the hardwood stick and the irregularly shaped rock.
"Hey, Qin Feng! Why are you lugging around that junk?"
Wang Sheng had sharp eyes. He spotted what Qin Feng was doing and shouted.
At his shout, everyone's gaze, including Tang San's and Yu Xiaogang's, swiveled toward Qin Feng.
Unhurriedly, Qin Feng walked up to the enormous hundred-and-fifty-pound stone lock and placed the irregular rock about a foot away from it.
Then he inserted one end of the long hardwood stick through the stone lock's handle and rested the middle of the stick on the rock.
Once he had finished, he dusted off his hands and stood at the other end of the stick.
Everyone stared, bewildered.
"What's he... doing?"
"Putting on a show?"
"Isn't that stick going to snap?"
Tang San frowned, too. He couldn't make sense of what Qin Feng was doing.
What was this supposed to be? Some kind of strange ritual?
Yu Xiaogang had a feeling he had read a similar description in some old miscellany, but he couldn't quite remember.
Amid the crowd's puzzled, mocking, and baffled stares, Qin Feng lightly rested one hand on the end of the stick.
He barely seemed to exert any force. He simply lowered his body a little and slowly pressed down on the end of the stick with his own weight.
The next moment.
What happened next nearly made everyone's eyes pop out of their heads!
As the end of the stick sank, the enormous stone lock at the other end, weighing a full hundred and fifty pounds and too heavy even for the student with the Savage Bull Martial Soul to lift, was...
It was effortlessly levered upward!
Slowly, steadily, and without the slightest suspense, it rose off the ground!
An inch, two inches, half a foot...
The entire training ground fell silent.
Everyone stared, mouths agape, at the small figure casually pressing down on the stick with one hand.
H-how was this possible?!
Before you continue