Thousand-Army Defying

Then Li Hai started with the first martial art in his skill list, Five Animals Qigong, and selected them one after another, as if calling roll.

Beast Intent Demon ClawSavage Bull FistIron Fan Palm...

When Li Hai selected Warrior Elephant-Throwing Technique, a method devoted to training physical strength and power, the system sent another notification:

The maximum number of techniques for fusion has been reached (12).

After seeing the message, Li Hai said nothing. He immediately stopped selecting and began fusing the techniques.

In an instant, the twelve techniques on his personal panel blurred, transforming into twelve clusters of light that merged together.

After only a moment, Five Animals Qigong, Beast Intent Demon Claw, Savage Bull Fist... and the other techniques, all twelve in total, vanished without a trace.

In their place was a brand-new technique called Demon Ape Giant Elephant Technique.

"Demon Ape Giant Elephant..."

Li Hai's eyes gleamed. "Let's see what mysteries you hold."

At his low murmur, all the information about Demon Ape Giant Elephant Technique suddenly surged into his mind.

Boom—

A vast flood of complex information swiftly streamed through Li Hai's thoughts.

In an instant, he had completely mastered and understood every aspect of the technique.

In short, this martial art, which had nine levels in all, combined most of the fundamental traits of the ten martial arts that had gone into it.

For example, it increased overall physique, deepened the transformation of the hands, intensified the toxicity of his hands, improved his body's defenses, and sharpened his beastly senses... and so on.

Moreover, the technique took all these traits to an even higher level.

Those who reached this level could maintain their bodies at their peak for three centuries, right up until their final moments, when their vitality would fade and their minds collapse.

According to Demon Ape Giant Elephant Technique, this level was called the Demon Ape Body.

A body, in the literal sense, was a powerful physique born through transformation to bear and bring forth all the effects of a formidable technique.

The process was as follows: when a martial artist trained a martial art deep into the body, a series of subtle changes—closely attuned to that technique—would arise from the tiniest parts of them.

Once these changes appeared, they would spread outward, transforming the body layer by layer. Eventually, quantitative change would give rise to qualitative change, and the martial artist's entire body would undergo a radical transformation, inside and out, from head to toe.

Thus, one could reach a martial realm above the Steel Sinew Iron Bone Realm: Thousand-Army Defying.

As the name suggested, once a martial artist reached this realm, they could become a true one-man army on the battlefield.

They would possess tremendous strength, measured in the tens of thousands of pounds, speed that surpassed sound, and terrifying defenses to match.

Blades and bullets were nothing to them. Even if an army encircled them and pounded them with heavy artillery, it still could not inflict effective harm on a Thousand-Army Rank martial artist. Instead, they would be slaughtered at will, powerless to fight back.

"Good! Badass! Powerful!"

Thrilled, Li Hai drove Demon Ape Giant Elephant Technique from its zeroth level straight to its final, ninth level in one go.

Boom!

Li Hai's body abruptly swelled, growing even more inhuman in appearance than before, though he had already been powerfully built.

At the same time, countless dark spots appeared on his formerly smooth scalp. Each sprouted a thick, coarse strand of hair, which grew until it reached his waist.

Now, at a glance, Li Hai looked like an entirely different person. The bald, browless man with his cold, sinister face had become a wild figure with bushy brows and a mane of unruly hair.

Besides these changes, Li Hai's teeth and fingernails had grown longer, sharp and keen as a beast's fangs and claws. The wild aura that surrounded him grew all the more intense and turbulent.

Finally, even Li Hai's skin, once as white as jade and frost, had changed. It had turned dark and lustrous like ancient bronze, its rough, tough texture like scales beneath armor.

And beneath his skin lay great swathes of indistinct, blood-red patterns.

In a word, after mastering Demon Ape Giant Elephant Technique, Li Hai no longer looked human at all.

After adjusting his internal organs, meridians, bones, and every other aspect of his body, the inhuman-looking Li Hai suddenly opened his eyes and swept his gaze in every direction.

Whoosh—

Had anyone been there, they would have felt as if a bolt of thunder had split through the dark void above, lighting the ruined training ground below in a flash of dazzling white.

The white light that blanketed the ground lasted half a breath, then vanished as Li Hai blinked.

This was Eyes Like Thunder-Light, one of the defining traits of a Thousand-Army Rank martial artist.

It did not mean light literally shone from his eyes. Rather, it was a wondrous phenomenon caused by Li Hai's extraordinary spiritual power.

Then Li Hai bared his teeth and abruptly exhaled a stream of gray-white breath.

"Whoo~"

The breath was like a heavy arrow. The moment it appeared, it shot several yards forward and snapped a slender tree stump, half a foot thick and jutting from the ground, clean in two.

This was Breath-Arrow Exhalation. Like Eyes Like Thunder-Light, it was another trait of a Thousand-Army Rank martial artist.

It was simply a manifestation of the unmatched strength of a martial artist's lungs and internal organs at this level.

After Li Hai exhaled the foul air from his body, he opened his personal interface with a thought. Its information had already changed several times.

Master Name: Li Hai

Level and Rank: Orthodox Martial Arts → Thousand-Army Defying; Bloodline Divine Ability → Mid Grade; Ghost Path → Fierce Soul; Esoteric Arts → Focusing Spirit and Wandering

Owned Skills: Demon Ape Giant Elephant TechniqueBlood Soaked Sinking HeartGhost Body Soul Remains<Evil Spirit Earth Yin Absorption Method (Incomplete)>Evil Sha Yin DescentResentful Sha Yang ExtinguishingMoon Marrow Refining TechniqueGhost and Monster SeekingYin-Yang EyesQi Observation TechniqueHigh-Order Primordial Breath Yang Refining MethodLife-Cutting Essence-Trimming TechniqueHeavenly Scorching Yang-Drawing Technique<Supreme Origin Spirit-Suppressing Talisman (Incomplete)>Golden Ridge Yin Gathering<Southern Border Zou Clan Poison Manual (Incomplete)>Angry Flood Dragon WhipDelicate Ghostly FingersRed Dust Yin Gathering Method (Incomplete)

Trait Attributes: [Soul Strengthening Lv. 3][Finger Claw Lv. 3][Berserk Lv. 2][Wildness Lv. 3][Ghost Body Lv. 2][Ghostly Image Lv. 2][Twin Sha Lv. 2][Iron Body Lv. 3][Stone Heart Lv. 3][Spiritual Inspiration Lv. 2][Yang Absorption Lv. 2][Focusing Spirit Lv. 2][Dharma Power Lv. 2][Yin Absorption Lv. 1][Breath Concealment Lv. 1][Toxicity Lv. 3][Physical Strength Lv. 3][Fury Lv. 2][Skill Lv. 1][Demon Finger Lv. 2][Evil Intent Lv. 2]

Stronger Fragment: None

Looking at the rows of skills and traits on his panel, Li Hai couldn't help bursting into laughter.

"Hahahaha! I'm... so damn powerful now!"

After his long laugh, Li Hai tilted his head toward the dark tunnel overhead and said softly, "My business here is done. Time to return to the surface."

With that, he circulated his dense, powerful Demon Ape True Energy into the pair of Bamboo-Joint Steel Whips clenched in his hands, activating one of their innate divine properties.