First Blood

Inside the building.

The fierce battle between man and flood dragon had reached a fever pitch. Clinging to the principle of striking a snake seven inches from its head, Fang Yi repeatedly attacked the creature's weak point: its heart.

Though it had evolved into a flood dragon, it was still far from being a true dragon.

After exchanging blows, the Black-lined Flood Dragon had begun to feel deeply threatened and pressured. The human before it was simply too outrageous.

It had encountered plenty of Advanced War Generals, but none had been as troublesome and difficult to deal with as him.

It knew full well that it couldn't do anything to him. His terrifying movement technique left it powerless.

"Hiss—!"

The Black-lined Flood Dragon let out a serpentine roar, then immediately charged into one of the many holes in the building's middle floors.

It wanted to reach the underground and escape as quickly as possible.

"Trying to run? You really think I don't know the building's layout—or what's underground?" Fang Yi's brows furrowed at the sight. Then he suddenly pushed off with both legs and shot forward at top speed.

He also controlled his shield to disrupt the creature first.

When he had approached the building earlier,

Fang Yi had already used his Double Pupil Eyes to analyze and observe everything nearby. Naturally, he had discovered the underground tunnel.

As one pursued and the other fled,

several figures suddenly appeared in the world revealed by his Double Pupil Eyes.

"Hm? Someone's coming..."

Fang Yi darted between floors and glanced sideways in one direction. He saw five figures hurrying toward the area.

"Another Martial Artist squad? Were they drawn here by the noise of the fight?"

Fang Yi took note of them while continuing his pursuit of the lord-class monster.

His shield kept disrupting the flood dragon, driving it into a frenzy. Fang Yi seized the opportunity, grabbed its body, and sprinted along its scales.

At last, he reached one of its eyes.

The instant man and flood dragon met eyes, Fang Yi's Double Pupil Eyes shuddered, unleashing a mental attack and an ocular technique!

The Black-lined Flood Dragon, rushing at full speed, suddenly stopped. The tremendous inertia from its coiling charge sent its head and body hurtling off to the side.

"Boom! Boom! Boom—!"

Between the building's second and third floors, a flood dragon's head burst out, instantly shaking loose the surrounding stone walls and rubble.

The Black-lined Flood Dragon was now hanging out its tongue, caught in the ocular technique.

Fang Yi emerged through an opening nearby.

"This Black-lined Flood Dragon is high-ranked. A mental attack can't kill it outright, and it'll break free before long...but that's enough time for me to kill it."

Fang Yi called his shield back, then immediately went to the area around its heart. After analyzing it from every angle, he could clearly see the heart's exact location.

"Found it."

He took a deep breath and prepared to strike with all his strength.

"Whoosh—!"

Suddenly,

a large armor-piercing round came flying at him!

The instant it was fired, Fang Yi spotted it through his Double Pupil Eyes.

"Bang—!"

The armor-piercing round punched through the flood dragon's scales, but didn't penetrate far enough to injure its insides. The damage wasn't too severe.

Fang Yi had already dodged out of the way.

Far away, the Goshawk Squad's sniper frowned as he braced his rifle. He had never expected the other man to dodge his shot!

"Damn it...how did that guy react so fast?!"

Beside the flood dragon, Fang Yi abruptly turned and looked straight at the sniper. Through his analysis, he saw the double-headed goshawk emblem on the man's chest. He was clearly a squad member.

When the sniper saw that Fang Yi had pinpointed his position,

a bead of sweat had already run down his forehead.

"Looks like I'm pretty lucky. I actually ran into some bandits."

Fang Yi had gone on countless wilderness missions, but this was the first time he'd been robbed. No sooner had he said this than

a huge horde of monsters charged toward them!

There were nearly a hundred of them, including quite a few Beast-General-Rank monsters. The building's collapse had crushed some earlier, but many had survived.

Now they were all gathering to save their leader.

And from what Fang Yi could see, some of them seemed to have been driven here by people.

"This squad has five members, and each one has a double-headed goshawk emblem on their chest...The other four are closing in too. Do they think they can use the monster horde to take me out?"

Fang Yi tilted his head slightly and used the analytical power of his Double Pupil Eyes to pinpoint the other four.

Meanwhile,

the sniper kept firing, suppressing Fang Yi's position while covering his teammates as they made their way closer.

Fang Yi dodged the bullets and dealt with the monsters closing in around him.

His shield darted back and forth, knocking away every monster that tried to approach. As Fang Yi dodged the bullets, he weaved through the horde with movement as uncanny as a miracle.

He used the monsters as shields while closing in on his enemies, ready to take them out with his fists.

In this extreme environment,

Fang Yi suddenly felt his instinct for dodging and shifting his body grow more and more refined.

"Bang—!"

Another armor-piercing round came at him. This time, Fang Yi instinctively used the monsters around him for cover. The round pierced straight through the lower half of a Beast-General-Rank monster, while Fang Yi had already dodged to another spot.

This dodge felt far better than the ones before.

The instant he saw a threat nearby, his body instinctively made the most precise, perfect evasion.

Fang Yi's pupils suddenly contracted, surprise appearing on his face.

"My movement technique has reached Perfect Level. I've completely mastered it!"

He had spent many earlier battles hovering at the threshold. Now he had truly stepped across it.

He had genuinely reached Perfect Level.

With his improved movement technique and his Double Pupil Eyes analyzing his enemies' attacks and force-output paths, Fang Yi was completely at ease amid the horde's assault.

The sight was so shocking that the sniper was left dumbfounded.

His pupils shook as he tried to aim and catch Fang Yi in his sights, but he couldn't do it.

"No, no way! What kind of movement technique is that? He's making perfect use of the monsters and the environment around him, and he's moving so fast. There's no chance to line up a hit—no opening at all...Just how advanced is this guy's movement technique?!"

Then,

Fang Yi kept killing the monsters nearby and deliberately headed toward the closest member of the Goshawk Squad.

The man was a red-haired, white-skinned foreigner holding a broadsword, pressed up against a corner. He was waiting for information from his teammates, ready to set an ambush.

But the next moment,

"Bang—!"

An arm suddenly punched through the wall and clamped around his head.

"What?!"

The Martial Artist was stunned. He stared in disbelief at the arm that had appeared out of nowhere, then felt an immense force bearing down on him.

The arm yanked his entire body out through the wall.

"Boom!"

The man's body slammed hard against the ground. The Goshawk Squad member felt the world spin around him, then a wave of pain surged through his skull.

Through his blurry eyes, he saw an Asian man with yellowish skin staring straight at him. The man immediately cried out,

"Don't kill me! Please, don't kill me! I was wrong! Spare my life..."

Before he could finish,

there came a crack as bones broke.

Fang Yi punched him in the throat without holding back, using Triple Hidden Force.

"First one..."

Fang Yi said as he tossed the corpse toward the monsters chasing him, leaving them to dispose of it.

Then he hurried toward the next person as quickly as possible.

Though this was Fang Yi's first time killing a person—his first time taking the life of another Martial Artist—his mental state didn't fluctuate much.

After all, he was getting revenge.

And killing people...

wasn't much different from killing monsters.

Perhaps because he had killed so many monsters and witnessed so many bloody scenes, Fang Yi's psychological threshold was high.

He felt no physical revulsion.

In the distance,

the sniper watched the whole thing unfold. When he saw Fang Yi approach his teammate, he had been pleased, thinking the man could seize the opportunity to strike.

But he hadn't expected Fang Yi to know where his teammate was.

He had yanked him through the wall, slammed him hard against the ground, and crushed his throat.

"Damn it! Boss, he seems to know where you all are!"