[Action: Body Forging] [Status: Extreme pressure! Vital energy restructuring!] [Current progress: 97%...98%...99%...]
After jumping wildly, the progress bar at the edge of Jiang Yue's vision stuck fast at ninety-nine percent.
Jiang Yue lay on the Alloy deck, slick with sweat and blood, his chest heaving.
Ordinary high-pressure blows had reached the limit of what his body could withstand and convert.
Just a little more.
He needed one final, overwhelming blow to shatter that invisible barrier.
Jiang Yue braced his hands against the cold floor.
His left ribs were badly swollen, his organs ached, and every muscle fiber in his body screamed as if it were tearing apart.
For any normal person, moving even a finger would have been impossible.
But Jiang Yue did not stop.
The teeth-grating sound of bones rubbing together rose from a corner of the silent square.
Under the horrified stares of the recruits, and before Shen Qing's suddenly narrowing eyes, that thin, blood-soaked figure swayed and slowly straightened once more.
Jiang Yue offered no provocation, no arrogant taunt.
He simply raised his arms and dragged his slightly spasming left leg into position. Once again, he set the rigid, textbook Gate Sealing stance squarely before Shen Qing.
Shen Qing's breathing grew ragged.
He looked into Jiang Yue's eyes, which held not a trace of fear, only absolute focus, and felt a flicker of anger.
"You're still going to stand?"
Shen Qing's voice was hoarse, his eyes bloodshot.
The martial fanatic in him felt a hint of respect for such single-minded resolve. The best way to show it was to strike without holding anything back.
"I'm putting all my Blood Energy into this last punch. You still have time to dodge!"
Shen Qing lowered his waist and planted his feet.
Hum!
The Blood Energy that had begun to ebb through his body was forcibly drawn together and compressed in an instant.
The faint red glow around his right arm suddenly intensified, sending a wave of heat rippling through the air.
"Armor-Piercing Awl!"
He blurred forward, his right fist spinning like a heavy drill. With a piercing sonic boom, it drove straight at Jiang Yue's right shoulder!
That punch drained every last bit of Shen Qing's strength.
The point of red light swelled rapidly in Jiang Yue's vision. He did not close his eyes or retreat. He even pushed his right shoulder an inch forward to meet the deadly fist.
Thud! Crack! The heavy impact and sharp snap of bone rang out together.
Jiang Yue's right shoulder caved in. The violent, spiraling Hidden Power tore through his flesh without resistance and plunged deep into his bones.
The force hurled Jiang Yue through the air. He flew more than ten meters like a rag doll and slammed into the railing at the edge of the square. Then he rolled to the ground and lay still.
His vision plunged into darkness.
His brain's protective mechanisms began forcibly shutting off his pain Nerves.
But in the final second before consciousness slipped away, the progress bar stuck at ninety-nine percent gave a crisp crack, like breaking ice.
[Extreme external pressure applied! Threshold broken!] [Accumulated essence fully restructured! Skin Membrane transformed!] [Action: Body Forging] [Status: Trait unlocked!] [Current trait: Tough Skin (White)] [Description: Forged by a thousand blows, the skin develops a resilient membrane.] [The microscopic structure of your Skin Membrane has compacted, greatly increasing its resilience. Resistance to blunt impacts and Blood Energy shocks has increased. Each time you endure a heavy blow or actively practice the Body Forging Technique, your Skin Membrane absorbs and converts Blood Energy and other energy more efficiently.]
It worked.
Lying in a pool of blood, Jiang Yue could not move so much as his little finger. With his right shoulder fractured and his organs displaced, even breathing filled his mouth with the taste of blood.
Jiang Yue could clearly feel the violent Hidden Power left by Shen Qing's punch inside him. It should have kept tearing through his body and destroying his vitality.
But now the newly formed, invisible, densely woven Skin Membrane was breaking down and absorbing the scattered Hidden Power with remarkable efficiency.
That improved conversion meant that from now on, every blow he took and every session of stance training would yield far greater gains than his peers could hope for.
"I concede."
Jiang Yue forced the two words from his throat with his last trace of strength. Then he let go of consciousness and passed out.
In the square,
Shen Qing's knees buckled after that final punch, and he dropped to one knee on the deck.
He gulped down air, his body drenched in sweat.
He stared at Jiang Yue, fallen in the distance. He was the one left standing. The fight had been a one-sided rout.
Yet a chill and a sense of defeat he could not put into words rose in Shen Qing's heart.
He felt like a hammer that had knocked the hardest impurities out of a stubborn lump of iron ore.
"Monster..." Shen Qing murmured.
On the raised platform,
Instructor One-Eye watched it all coldly.
Across the square, the Combat Sparring matches had devolved into brutal brawls.
The instructor took a deep breath, channeled a surge of Blood Energy into his throat, and barked with a voice like Thunder Sound:
"Everyone, stop!"
The sound shook the entire square. Pain stabbed through the eardrums of the blood-crazed recruits, and they froze at once.
Dozens of spherical Medical Puppets glided silently into the square. Their mechanical arms extended with precision, scanning and carrying away the badly injured recruits one by one.
The instructor's gaze passed over the crowd and settled on Jiang Yue as a Medical Puppet carried him away.
He tapped at the military data slate in his hand, removed Jiang Yue's name from the "mediocre expendables" category, and placed it in a separate file labeled "Subjects for Observation."
"Ruthless with others, even more ruthless with himself. If he survives, this blade might prove very sharp."
The instructor looked away, his cold voice carrying across the square:
"The sparring is over. Send the severely injured to the Medical Pods on the lower level. The Federation needs living soldiers. The Military will cover basic treatment."
"But remember! There are nine days until the first assessment!"
"Every day you spend lying in a Medical Pod is a day your martial arts stagnate. In nine days, if your bodies aren't strong enough, you'll be sent to the Mining Star to dig ore even if you're in wheelchairs!"
Late that night, in the recruit medical ward on Military Floating Land No. 17,
Rows of transparent Medical Pods lined the walls like honeycomb cells.
They were filled with cheap green basic recovery fluid.
The fluid could keep the wounded alive and speed bone healing, but patients had to endure the intense itching and stabbing pain of their muscles rebuilding.
Jiang Yue floated silently inside one of the pods.
A mechanical brace held his right shoulder in place, and a breathing mask covered his nose and mouth.
According to the Medical Puppet's initial assessment, even immersed in recovery fluid, his shattered shoulder and injured organs would need at least half a month to heal enough for him to walk.
Only nine days remained before the ten-day assessment that would decide his fate.
For an ordinary recruit, that was a death sentence.
With Jiang Yue completely unconscious, the panel took over his body's basic functions.
[Action: Sleep] activated.
[Current trait: Calm Spirit (White)].
Jiang Yue's brainwave activity dropped to its lowest level.
His heart rate slowed drastically, and his body redirected every bit of energy it would have spent keeping him awake toward physical recovery.
In deep sleep, his rate of cell division was forcibly doubled.
At the same time, the airflow beneath his breathing mask began to change subtly.
[Action: Breathing] activated.
[Current trait: Smooth Breath (White)].
[Action: Body Forging] passively activated.
[Current trait: Tough Skin (White)] engaged!
As his Skin Membrane drew healing energy into his body, the newly transformed [Tough Skin] precisely caught it when it reached the severe injuries in his right shoulder and left ribs.
The Skin Membrane locked in the restorative essence that would otherwise have gone to waste.
At the fractures, new tissue knitted together visibly. Guided by [Tough Skin], the torn muscle fibers grew back denser and thicker.
In the silent medical ward, only the ticking of instruments could be heard.
As time passed, the green liquid in the Medical Pod turned clear at an unnatural speed.
It was a sign that its active healing compounds had been completely drained.
Jiang Yue floated in the pod as a layer of dead skin began peeling away across his body.
The new skin exposed to the fluid was no longer pale and fragile. It held a faint blue-black sheen, like cold-forged steel.
In that short time, more than half his injuries had healed!
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