Mortal Fist

When he sparred with Vados, he had been like an insignificant pellet, casually sent flying and blasted through one mountain after another—but before the dust had even settled, Qi Heng would already be dragging his battered body back, roaring as he charged in again.

The flames in his eyes grew fiercer every time.

On countless late nights, Champa would be sleeping groggily when energy fluctuations startled him awake. Through the temple windows, he would see Qi Heng floating alone in the cold void, punching into the darkness over and over again.

There was no opponent—only dead silence and the sound of his own breathing.

His knuckles split open, scabbed over, then split again. Dark red beads of blood drifted through the vacuum, freezing into tiny crystals.

He seemed not to feel pain at all, repeating every movement as he desperately pushed himself to the limit, until he collapsed from exhaustion.

Those images—those silent, crazed figures filled with stubborn resolve—now flashed rapidly before Champa's tightly shut eyes, finally overlapping with the Qi Heng standing at the edge of the crater today, his entire body wreathed in deep blue aura, his gaze cold as a stellar core.

Today, all the nearly self-destructive effort he had poured in, all the blood and sweat he had shed in silence, had condensed into this one punch capable of knocking a god down to earth.

Champa lay at the bottom of the crater he had created, feeling his strength slowly drain from his shattered divine body.

A complex, almost comforting bitterness quietly washed over the waves of agony.

Champa slowly opened his heavy eyelids, his vision shifting from blurry to clear.

He lay flat on his back at the bottom of the enormous crater, surrounded by cracked, scorched earth and rising smoke. The air was thick with the acrid stench of energy burns.

With difficulty, he turned his neck, his bones giving a faint crack, then pulled his lips into a bitter, self-mocking smile.

"You brat..." His voice was hoarse, as though it had been squeezed from a parched throat.

He propped up his upper body with an elbow, each movement slow and heavy, every one making the pain throughout his body convulse.

He raised his other hand and vigorously rubbed his nearly numb shoulder—the burning pain still lingered there, and purple bruising faintly surfaced beneath the skin.

"When did you... become this strong?"

Qi Heng stood at the edge of the crater, his figure tall and silent amid the dust and haze.

His combat suit was torn in several places, exposing the solid muscle beneath. A few small wounds seeped faint golden motes of light—the sign of divine energy repairing his body on its own.

He did not answer immediately. He merely watched quietly as Champa struggled to rise, the shattered sky and drifting dust reflected in his deep eyes.

After a moment of silence, Qi Heng finally spoke in a low voice. "Lady Vados's training was very effective."

"Bullshit!" Champa suddenly spat. Purple bloody froth mixed with dirt splattered across the scorched ground, leaving several dark marks.

He gritted his teeth and forced himself upright on trembling legs. His knees buckled several times before he straightened them by force, finally managing to stand steadily, though he still swayed.

He lifted his head as blood and sweat slid from his temples, winding down along the wrinkles of his face.

"Vados's training was indeed effective... but getting to this point was thanks to your own will." He panted, his chest heaving violently, every breath carrying a searing pain.

He stared at Qi Heng, the expression on his face as complicated as storm clouds—anger faded first, shock flashed through, and in the end, all that remained was an indescribable pride. That pride was deep and burning, nearly breaking through his exhausted features.

"Twenty years ago..." Champa's voice was low and raspy, like sandpaper scraping against stone.

He raised a hand and pointed into the distance—toward the temple, now only a blurred outline beneath the shattered sky.

"When I brought you back from that remote planet in Universe 7, I knew you were different. There was fire in your eyes... the kind of fire that would never admit defeat, even in death."

He paused, a rough sound coming from his throat, halfway between a laugh and a sigh.

"But I truly never imagined... that you would become what you are now."

His gaze swept over the surroundings—the massive crater more than a thousand meters wide, earth and stones still trickling down from its rim; the distant mountains flattened by the shockwave; the lingering energy ripples in the sky, flowing like auroras.

"To this extent..."

Qi Heng remained silent.

The hand hanging at his side slowly clenched, his knuckles turning white.

The wind swept through his sweat-dampened black hair, revealing eyes that were calm yet churning with hidden currents.

Champa let out a long sigh, filled with both exhaustion and relief.

He closed his eyes, and the purple power of destruction surging around him slowly dissipated—the violent, trembling energy peeled away like a receding tide, turning into countless tiny motes of light that drifted through the scorching air.

As his power withdrew, his body seemed to shrink by a size as well. No longer was he the imposing God of Destruction who made an entire universe tremble; he was merely an old man covered in wounds, his face heavy with weariness.

"I lost." When Champa spoke those three words, his voice was soft, so soft that the wind nearly swallowed it.

Yet every word was calm and accepting.

For a God of Destruction, admitting defeat was almost impossible.

The pride of a God of Destruction was carved into the depths of their divinity. It was the cornerstone supporting divine authority, and it allowed no bowing before any existence—whether mortals, Supreme Kais, or even Gods of Destruction from other universes.

But now, Champa felt no humiliation.

His pride had not shattered. Instead, it found its place within another emotion—because the one who had defeated him was not an enemy, nor a challenger, but a warrior he had personally picked up from the dust and painstakingly shaped over twenty years.

It was a strange kind of glory.

Like a gardener seeing a sapling he had planted grow into a towering tree, like a craftsman witnessing the ordinary iron he forged become an unparalleled divine weapon.

"It wasn't just the training."

A cool female voice suddenly rang out, breaking the silence over the ruins.

Vados—the Angel of Universe 6—had somehow quietly appeared at the edge of the enormous crater.

She held an angelic staff inlaid with crystals, its tip lightly touching the ground and sending out rings of pale blue ripples.

Her long, galaxy-like hair drifted soundlessly, every strand shimmering with faint light.

Her face bore her signature almost-smiling expression, the corners of her lips slightly raised in just the right way.

"Qi Heng's base combat power increased several hundredfold over twenty years," Vados said in an even, clear voice. Every word was like polished jade, yet they carried immense weight as they fell upon the scorched earth. "But what truly allowed him to defeat you was the judgment and composure he displayed in battle."

She tilted her head slightly and turned her gaze toward Champa. A nearly imperceptible hint of teasing flashed through her azure eyes. "Lord Champa, your emotional fluctuations are far too intense—when you are angry, your power goes out of control; when you are impatient, you leave yourself full of openings. In a true life-or-death battle, that is a fatal weakness."

Champa's face stiffened at once.

He opened his mouth as if to argue, but swallowed the words before they came out—he knew Vados was right.

During the battle just now, he had indeed exposed weaknesses several times because of his emotions.

In the end, he could only roar in embarrassed irritation, "Stop talking nonsense! Hurry up and restore the battlefield! Look what it's turned into!"

Vados let out a soft laugh, clear as tinkling wind chimes yet carrying a faintly distant quality.

She said no more and merely gave her staff a light tap.

The instant its tip touched the ground, pale blue radiance rippled outward like water, swiftly spreading across the entire ruin.

The cracked earth began to heal, the overturned scorched soil smoothed itself flat once more, and the destroyed mountains rebuilt themselves as though a recording were playing in reverse. Even the dust and lingering energy fragments in the air were gently purified and dispersed.