For a moment, bursts of cold laughter rang out in the room, thick with the smell of medicine.
They looked at one another, seemingly already picturing Su Chen beaten beyond recognition by Tang Hao tomorrow morning, writhing on the ground like a maggot and begging for mercy.
Even Tang San, lying on the bed, was so excited that he temporarily forgot the pain in his body.
His mind had already begun imagining how he would repay Su Chen tenfold, a hundredfold, for the humiliation he had suffered today.
Meanwhile, at Listening Rain Pavilion.
In midair, the black giant hammer, crashing down with the might of a Hundred Thousand Year Soul Ring, collided with that pale hand.
But the scene they had imagined—Su Chen being smashed to death—never came. Tang Hao's face, hidden beneath his hood, first stiffened.
Then he stared fixedly downward.
Before his eyes, the Clear Sky True Body, weighing tens of thousands of pounds and imbued with the terrifying power of a Hundred Thousand Year Soul Ring...
had been caught lightly by that bare hand!
Su Chen stood on the balcony, and not a single crack had appeared in the tiles beneath his feet.
He had merely raised five fingers and casually curled them around the enormous, pitch-black hammerhead.
The Clear Sky Hammer, hailed as the strongest under heaven and said to be indestructible, was like a plastic toy that had lost all its weight in Su Chen's hand. It came to a dead stop in midair.
It couldn't advance even a fraction farther!
"This... How is this possible?"
Tang Hao finally couldn't hold back. His voice had gone completely hoarse.
He frantically urged the Soul Power within him, but it was useless all the same.
No matter how desperately he tugged or pressed down, the Clear Sky Hammer held in Su Chen's grasp didn't budge!
"So this is the strongest Tool Spirit under heaven that you're so proud of?"
At the same time, Su Chen raised his head and quietly regarded Tang Hao in the air.
"Too light."
"It's practically a lump of scrap iron that hasn't even been properly forged."
Hearing Su Chen's merciless mockery, Tang Hao instantly flew into a rage.
Scrap iron?!
He was the mighty Clear Sky Douluo, the peerless brute who had once smashed the previous Pope of Spirit Hall with a single blow—and someone had just called his Martial Soul scrap iron!
"I'll kill you!"
Tang Hao went completely berserk.
He suddenly released one hand from the hammer's handle. At once, the nine dazzling Soul Rings beneath his feet began to seethe violently!
Yellow, yellow, purple, purple, black, black, black, black!
Except for the final red Soul Ring—the hundred-thousand-year one—the first eight rings all burst into brilliant light at that instant!
"Great Sumeru Hammer!"
"Ring Detonation!"
With blood-red eyes, Tang Hao unhesitatingly unleashed the Clear Sky Sect's most overbearing secret technique.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Amid a series of thunderous explosions, all eight Soul Rings burst apart beneath his feet!
In an instant, terrifying Soul Power poured into the Clear Sky Hammer like floodwaters bursting through a dam.
Humm!
After absorbing the force of the eight exploding Soul Rings, the pitch-black hammer turned red.
The air around its head was crushed by that force, splitting into visible black rifts in space!
"Die!!!"
This time, Tang Hao, having detonated his rings, grabbed the handle again and brought the hammer crashing down at Su Chen!
The power of this blow was so great that it didn't matter if the target was a person.
Even a mountain standing in its way would be smashed to dust in an instant!
Yet facing this world-shattering strike, Su Chen below simply yawned in boredom.
Not only did he make no attempt to dodge, he let go of the hand gripping the hammerhead.
Then, right before Tang Hao's disbelieving eyes, he clasped his hands behind his back, thrust out his chest, and let the Clear Sky Hammer land squarely against it!
Clang!!!
A deafening crash erupted over the rear courtyard, but what happened next plunged Tang Hao into the most despairing moment of his life.
The Clear Sky Hammer, infused with the power of Ring Detonation, rebounded violently the instant it struck Su Chen's chest, sending its force straight back into Tang Hao's arms.
"Pfft!"
Tang Hao's palms split open, and blood sprayed everywhere.
As for the Clear Sky Hammer he had wielded for decades, it flew right out of his grasp, blasted far away.
A bone-chilling crack rang out from both his arms. The force of the rebound had snapped them clean in two!
"Ah!"
Tang Hao screamed. Like a kite with its string cut, he plummeted from the air and crashed onto the balcony floor.
But he couldn't spare a thought for the agony in his arms. He stared at Su Chen as if he were a monster.
The white-robed young man who had taken his strongest strike was calmly patting nonexistent dust from his chest.
His skin, pale as jade, didn't even bear the faintest white mark.
"Th-this is impossible..."
He had withstood the Great Sumeru Hammer's Ring Detonation without a scratch?
He hadn't even used his Martial Soul or Soul Power???
What kind of monster was this? No human could possibly have a body like that!
"So that's it?"
Su Chen looked down at Tang Hao sprawled on the ground and shook his head in disappointment.
"I thought the strongest Tool Spirit under heaven might at least give me an itch. It seems I expected far too much from you frogs in a well."
Hearing those words, Tang Hao's heart went completely cold.
He finally understood what kind of terrifying being his proud son had provoked.
And the things Su Chen had said onstage that day might not have been stories at all!
They were real.
"Wh-who are you...?"
Tang Hao swallowed, then finally managed to stammer out the question.
But Su Chen didn't answer. He slowly raised his foot and planted it on Tang Hao's chest.
"I said it this afternoon: forget you—even if the gods descended from the heavens, they'd have to keep their heads down around me."
As he spoke, Su Chen pressed down slightly with his foot, making Tang Hao cough up mouthful after mouthful of blood.
"Your son likes throwing his weight around, and you like showing up in the middle of the night to smash up someone's place."
"Excellent."
"Tomorrow's storytelling session could use a prop to warm up the crowd. I think your bones will do nicely."
After that, Su Chen couldn't be bothered to look at Tang Hao, who lay there like a dead dog.
With a casual wave, he kicked Tang Hao into a corner of the room like a piece of trash, then turned and went back inside.
The night passed without incident.
The next morning.
As the first rays of dawn broke through the clouds and fell upon the streets of Heavenly Dou Imperial City,
the entire city had already plunged into a frenzy unlike anything it had ever seen!
The entire main street where Listening Rain Pavilion stood was packed tight from early morning.
Countless commoners, Spirit Masters, and even nobles who usually held themselves above everyone else surged toward the pavilion's entrance like a rising tide.
The events of the previous day had already sprouted wings and spread across the entire continent.
The single-handed subjugation of Poison Douluo, the mysterious body-tempering method that required no Soul Power, and the vast, astonishing worlds of Perfect World and Shrouding the Heavens.
All of it had ignited everyone's curiosity.
The first-floor hall of Listening Rain Pavilion was already packed to capacity.
Even the aisles and stairs were jammed with listeners who had paid a fortune for standing-room tickets.
And among the seemingly noisy crowd lurked one deeply hidden, unfathomable aura after another.
In a secluded corner on the left side of the hall,
two figures cloaked in voluminous black robes sat quietly.
One carried a faint aura of frigid ghostly energy, while the other bore a delicate scent of chrysanthemums.
They were none other than the Martial Soul Hall Elders who had rushed here overnight from Spirit City: Gui Mei and Yue Guan!
The two discreetly observed their surroundings, their eyes fixed on the raised platform at the front.
Beside a redwood table on the right side of the hall,
a burly old man, built like an iron tower, sat alone, drinking tea.
Though he wore nothing to display his status, whenever his eyes opened and closed, faint blue lightning flickered within them, carrying an unmistakably overbearing force.
He was none other than Yu Yuanzhen, Sect Master of the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan!
And they weren't the only ones.
In the most luxurious private room on the second floor, Heaven Dou Crown Prince Xue Qinghe had arrived early. His fingers tapped lightly on the table as he sat with an impassive expression.
Even deep within the crowd, a woman wearing a bamboo hat and a sea-blue robe leaned quietly against a pillar.
Her presence was so faint that the press of people around her seemed to part on its own, as though she had merged with the world itself.
The various great factions, the top experts rarely seen in ordinary times—
at that moment, all had gathered in this little teahouse because of one storyteller!
"Move! All of you, get out of the way!"
Just then, an especially arrogant shout rang out from beyond the entrance.
The crowd was shoved aside roughly, and several disheveled yet haughty figures strode into Listening Rain Pavilion.
They were Yu Xiaogang, Flender, Zhao Wuji, and Tang San, covered in bandages from head to toe and carried on Zhao Wuji's back!
Dugu Bo, his face dark, walked alongside them.
Though the group limped as they walked, and Tang San was wrapped up like a rice dumpling,
they couldn't hide the arrogance on their faces.
"Hmph, where's that storyteller? Why hasn't he come out yet?"
After entering, Zhao Wuji first set Tang San down on a chair. Then he scanned the hall and bellowed in his booming voice.
"Wasn't he so cocky yesterday? Didn't he say he didn't even care about Titled Douluo?"
Yu Xiaogang stood with his hands behind his back and coldly glanced at the platform.
He was certain Tang Hao had gone there in person last night. Su Chen's cultivation had surely been crippled by now; perhaps he was trembling on his knees backstage, too afraid to show his face.
"Teacher, is he scared and hiding somewhere because he doesn't dare face us?"
Leaning back in his chair, Tang San couldn't help asking.
He had come today to see with his own eyes as that lofty storyteller crawled on the ground like a dog, kowtowing and apologizing to him!
"Don't worry, Little San. He won't get away."
Flender pushed up his glasses and sneered. "With so many people here today, if he acts like a turtle and hides in his shell, there won't be anywhere left for him in Heavenly Dou Imperial City."
Just as the Shrek group mocked Su Chen without restraint, imagining the miserable fate that awaited him,
"Smack!"
A sharp crack suddenly rang out from the front of the hall—the sound of the storyteller's Gavel striking.
The sound wasn't loud, yet it seemed to hold a kind of magic, instantly suppressing all the noise and chatter in the hall.
In the blink of an eye, Listening Rain Pavilion fell so silent that one could hear a pin drop.
The sneers on Yu Xiaogang and the others' faces froze. They turned their heads almost instinctively.
A pale, slender hand slowly drew back the curtain on the raised platform.
Then a young man in a snow-white robe, a folding fan tucked at his waist and not a speck of dust on him, calmly walked up to the storyteller's table as if strolling through a courtyard.
It was Su Chen!
He wasn't missing a limb, his face wasn't bruised and swollen, and he wasn't trembling in terror as they had imagined.
He stood there perfectly fine, without even a tear in his clothes!
"Th-this is impossible?!"
The instant Tang San saw Su Chen walk out unharmed,
his pupils contracted sharply. He nearly leapt right out of his chair, only to pull at his wounds and suck in a sharp breath from the pain.
Yu Xiaogang and Zhao Wuji stared as if they'd seen a ghost, their eyes almost popping out of their heads.
What was going on?
Had His Excellency Clear Sky not come last night?
Or had the boy gotten wind of it beforehand and managed to escape?
That was absolutely impossible! How could anyone targeted by a peak Titled Douluo be standing here without a scratch?
Ignoring the Shrek group's horrified expressions, as though they had just swallowed a dead fly,
Su Chen slowly opened his folding fan on the platform. His gaze swept calmly over the hidden experts in the hall before finally settling on Tang San and the others below.
He smiled slightly.
"Before continuing the tale of Perfect World and the legend of Little One, Shi Hao,"
Su Chen's voice echoed through Listening Rain Pavilion, unhurried and steady.
"Today, I'd like to show everyone an interesting little thing first."
After he finished speaking, Su Chen lightly closed the folding fan in his hand, then spoke calmly toward the backstage:
"Bring him out."
As his voice fell, everyone in the hall turned to look at the passage beside the elevated platform.
Tang San, Yu Xiaogang, and the others sitting in their chairs were sneering nonstop.
In their eyes, the Storyteller was probably just putting on a show, planning to bring out some rare treasure he'd conned someone out of yesterday and offer it as a bargaining chip to apologize.
After all, His Excellency Clear Sky had personally made his move last night. No matter how capable this kid was, all he could do now was wag his tail and beg.
But soon, two Listening Rain Pavilion servants came out from backstage, each carrying a tattered burlap sack smeared with dark-red bloodstains.
Then they flung their hands upward and hurled the heavy sacks onto the open ground in front of the platform, as if they were throwing out garbage.
Bang!
The sacks hit the ground with a muffled thud that made everyone's teeth ache, then fell open.
A burly man with disheveled hair, his whole body smeared with blood and dust, rolled out like a lump of mud.
Both his arms were broken at horribly twisted angles. Pale shards of bone even pierced through his skin, exposed to the air. He lay limp on the ground, barely breathing.
Beside him, a black iron hammer rolled out as well.
But the hammer was covered in fine, spiderweb-like cracks, dull and lusterless, like a piece of scrap iron anyone could find.
The hall fell silent for a moment.
Everyone stared at the wretched beggar, completely at a loss as to why Su Chen had thrown such a crippled man out before them.
Tang San, sitting in his chair, had been puzzled too.
But as his gaze traveled up from the black iron hammer covered in cracks and finally settled on the man's face beneath his tangled hair—
The sneer on Tang San's face froze instantly!
"Dad... Father?!"
Before you continue