"Boom!"
A booming crash rang out as a hulking figure, towering like a demon god, plunged through the bandits and slammed onto the deck.
The newcomer was a young man in his early thirties. He was bald, with a centipede-like scar slashing across his face.
He dragged a fearsome Nine-Ring Broadsword behind him with one hand. The nine steel rings on its spine clanged with every step, ringing out like a death knell.
The blade weighed at least a hundred pounds, yet in his hands it seemed light as a feather.
What was even more terrifying was the aura around him.
His scorching, savage pressure bore down on the Gu Family guards until they could barely breathe.
"His blood and qi are spilling out... Half a step from Bright Force!"
Zhao Si's heart sank to the bottom. The bald young man was none other than the infamous Young Master of the Black Dragon Water Bandits!
"Quit your theatrics! I'll take you on!"
A Gu Family guard, eyes bloodshot, roared and thrust forward with his Ironwood Javelin. He charged in and drove its tip straight at the Young Master of Water Bandits' heart.
A cruel grin tugged at the young master's lips. He neither dodged nor retreated.
Only when the javelin's tip was less than half a foot from his chest did he suddenly swing his right arm in a wide arc.
"Whoosh—!"
The Nine-Ring Broadsword became a dazzling streak of snowy white, ripping through the air with a sonic boom that stabbed at the ears.
"Crack! Splurt!"
There was not the slightest pause. The guard and his unyielding Ironwood Javelin were cleaved diagonally in two, from left shoulder to right hip, as easily as tofu.
A storm of blood and gore burst across the deck. Warm organs splattered everywhere.
"Form ranks! Fire! Fire now!" Zhao Si roared, his eyes nearly bulging from their sockets.
But it was too late. The water bandits had already charged into the guards like tigers among a flock of sheep. The two sides were locked in a savage melee, and the Western firearms had lost all their advantage.
"Die!"
Zhao Si gritted his teeth and drove the blood and qi of the Late Force Refining Realm to its limit. Gripping his Ghost Head Broadsword with both hands, he leapt into the air and brought it crashing down toward the Young Master of Water Bandits' head with a mighty "Cleave Mount Hua."
"You think you've got the strength for that?"
The young master sneered and flicked his blade upward with one hand.
"Clang—!!"
The blades collided, sparks flying. Zhao Si felt as if lightning had struck both his arms. His palms split open, blood flowing freely, and his Ghost Head Broadsword nearly flew from his grasp.
Before Zhao Si could even catch his breath, the young master slid forward and closed in.
His second move was a shoulder check.
"Thud!" The young master's shoulder crashed into Zhao Si's chest like a heavy hammer.
His third move was a backhanded strike.
The hundred-plus-pound Nine-Ring Broadsword swept through the air with a violent gust and slammed into Zhao Si's ribs.
"Pfft—!"
Zhao Si spat out a great mouthful of blood mixed with bits of his organs. He slammed into the iron door of the cabin and slid slowly to the deck, unable to get back up.
In fewer than three moves, the head guard of the Late Force Refining Realm had been soundly defeated!
"Brother Zhao!"
Witnessing the scene, the Gu Family guards' morale crumbled in an instant.
The Black Dragon Water Bandits grinned cruelly and swung their bloodied butcher's blades, tearing through the Gu Family's once-impenetrable line and reaping lives from the deck like a farmer cutting wheat.
The defense line had completely collapsed.
Hou San had already run out of throwing knives. A slash had opened his thigh, and he sat collapsed on the blood-soaked deck. Chen Er was even worse, his face drained of color as the short blade in his hand trembled like a leaf in the wind.
Two Black Dragon Water Bandit leaders advanced with cruel grins, their bloodstained Fish Bone Blades raised high. The reek of blood rolled off them as they prepared to cleave the pair in half!
"It's over..." Hou San shut his eyes in despair.
At that very moment—
A sturdy figure darted out of the cabin.
Lu Zhen held a solid iron-banded staff as thick as a duck egg. It was a crowbar he had torn from a discarded winch, weighing a good seventy or eighty pounds. He pointed it diagonally at the ground with one arm, river water still dripping from its tip.
"Where'd this brat come from? You're asking to die!"
The two bandit leaders, both in the Mid Force Refining Realm, saw someone blocking their way and sneered. They attacked from either side, their Fish Bone Blades sweeping up icy arcs toward Lu Zhen's neck and ribs.
Lu Zhen neither dodged nor flinched. His eyes were cold.
He planted his feet with a sudden stomp. The Coiling Dragon Stake!
"Boom!"
The thick tendons along his spine roared awake like an enraged dragon, snapping in a rapid burst. The surging blood and qi of the Late Force Refining Realm fused perfectly with his heaven-defying Copper Skin Iron Bone physique.
A terrifying force of twelve hundred pounds in one arm surged through his waist and hips and flooded into both arms!
Lu Zhen gripped the staff with both hands, twisted at the waist, and swept it out without a hint of flourish, unleashing a devastating, unstoppable force!
"Wooo—BAM!!!"
A shrill, ear-piercing sonic boom erupted from the air!
The iron staff crashed into both Fish Bone Blades.
With a ringing clang and a spray of sparks, the two finely forged steel blades snapped in half as if they were made of paper. Shards of metal flew through the air!
The cruel grins had not yet faded from the bandit leaders' faces when terror filled their eyes.
But the iron staff's momentum was unstoppable. Fueled by inhuman strength, it slammed into the left leader's chest.
"Thud!"
It was like a heavy hammer crushing a ripe watermelon.
The leader's breastbone caved in completely. His chest burst open beneath the blow, and his organs and shattered bones shot out through his back.
His body flew sideways like a rag doll, crashing into four or five bandits behind him and breaking their bones and tendons before they all tumbled into the river!
The leader on the right was so terrified that his heart nearly stopped. He had just started to retreat when Lu Zhen rolled his wrist and thrust the iron staff upward like a striking serpent.
"Crack!"
The tip of the staff struck the leader squarely beneath the chin.
The tremendous force of the blow crushed his jaw and cervical vertebrae together. His head folded backward in a grotesque bend until it rested against his back. He died on the spot!
Blood and brains spattered across the deck, a horrifying sight.
Hou San and Chen Er, who had been waiting in despair for death, gaped at him as if he were a monster.
Zhao Si, sprawled beside the cabin door, stared wide-eyed in utter disbelief.
One swing had blown two Mid Force Refining Realm bandits apart?!
What kind of brutal, overbearing, inhuman strength was this? Could a mere martial arts student who had only just reached the threshold of the Mid Force Refining Realm really do that?!
But this was only the beginning.
"Come on!"
Lu Zhen's voice cracked like thunder as he strode forward.
There were no complicated moves, just pure speed and strength!
Twelve hundred pounds of force, paired with the Iron Wire Fist's flawless mechanics, made every blow land with crushing weight!
"Thud!"
The staff smashed down on a bandit's head, crushing his skull and shoulder into a bloody pulp.
"Crack!"
The iron staff swept sideways, brutally snapping the spines of three bandits. Their mangled bodies writhed in despair on the deck.
Lu Zhen moved like an ancient tyrannosaur cloaked in human skin, swinging in great arcs as he strode forward with the wind at his heels.
The eighty-pound iron-banded staff was as light as a blade of grass in his hands, whirling so swiftly that no gaps showed.
A graze meant injury; a touch meant death!
Any bandit who came within three feet of him, no matter what weapon he carried, was smashed aside at the first touch—either dead or crippled!
The Black Dragon Water Bandits, who had been charging forward like a knife through bamboo, were completely stunned.
They had spent years spilling blood on the river. What fearsome opponents hadn't they faced?
But a monster like the one before them, a killer who crushed his enemies with nothing but an unreasonable, terrifying strength, was beyond anything they had ever heard of!
Zhao Si and the surviving Gu Family guards stared, stunned, as hot blood surged back through their veins.
There stood Lu Zhen alone, with his iron staff, holding the largest breach in the ship's railing.
Bodies piled beneath his feet like a small hill. Crimson river water gushed through the drainage holes in the deck.
By himself, he had stopped the water bandits' wolfish charge in its tracks, pinning them to the edge of the deck so they could not advance an inch!
"You pack of useless fools! Get out of my way!"
Seeing his men slaughtered like pigs and dogs, the Young Master of Water Bandits flew into a rage.
With a thunderous shout, the savage blood and qi of his Half-Step Bright Force Realm surged around him like a tangible force as he shoved aside the underlings in his way.
"Brat, you're dead!"
The young master's eyes burned red. He swung the hundred-plus-pound Nine-Ring Broadsword in a half-circle through the air, its nine copper rings rattling out a deathly, demonic melody!
At the same moment, two dark figures flashed out of the thick fog like ghosts.
They were two Late Force Refining Realm assassins hidden by the Shen Family!
They had recognized Lu Zhen as a dangerous, unpredictable threat. The instant the young master attacked from the front, they struck from either side, aiming straight for Lu Zhen's ribs and legs.
Three-sided assault, with death closing in at his throat!
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