Concept Severance Cut Off the True God Nana for Half a Second! (Two Chapters in One)

Days passed, and Ancient Martial Arts became the class Ye Zhiqiu and Dong Qianqiu looked forward to most each week.

It wasn't because Nana was beautiful. All right, her looks were part of it, but more importantly, this teacher really knew her stuff.

After the sparring in their first class, Ye Zhiqiu clearly felt his scattered fighting experience begin to take systematic shape. Stance, footwork, power generation, shifts in his center of gravity—every class corrected movements he had previously taken for granted.

The same was true for Dong Qianqiu. Her physical capabilities already stood head and shoulders above those of her peers, and her coordination and explosive strength were excellent. All she lacked was someone who could bring those advantages together, and Nana happened to be that person.

At the end of their second week of Ancient Martial Arts classes, Nana walked past Ye Zhiqiu and paused.

"After school, you and Qianqiu come wait for me behind the Gymnasium."

With that, she left without explaining why.

Ye Zhiqiu glanced at Dong Qianqiu beside him, who happened to be looking his way. Their eyes met. Neither spoke, but both nodded.

After school, the two arrived behind the Gymnasium on time.

Nana was already there. She had changed into a lighter black tracksuit, with her silvery-white French braid tied a little tighter than during class. She held two bottles of water.

"You two have a much stronger foundation than the others in your class." Nana handed them the water, her tone as casual as if she were commenting on the nice weather, and continued:

"But two classes a week aren't enough. If you want to develop real skills, you'll need extra training after school."

"Are you saying you're giving us special tutoring, teacher?" Ye Zhiqiu took the water, unscrewed the cap, and drank a mouthful before asking.

"If that's how you want to understand it, sure."

Dong Qianqiu stood beside him, her eyes lighting up, but said nothing.

With a teacher like this guiding her, she would definitely be able to surpass that idiot Ye Zhiqiu sooner.

Nana glanced at her and said, "Come here after school every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I'll teach you some things we don't cover in class."

"Your foundations from class aren't solid yet. Teaching you too much would only confuse you. Train for a month first, and we'll see how things go."

From that day on, the little training ground behind the Gymnasium became the three of them's regular meeting place after school every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.

The first two weeks didn't really involve anything new. They still worked on stances, footwork, and power generation, but the intensity and precision were on an entirely different level from their classes.

Nana made Ye Zhiqiu and Dong Qianqiu hold their stances for a full hour without swaying, then immediately follow up with twenty sets of footwork drills. Every set required proper form, steady rhythm, and controlled breathing.

After finishing her first session, Dong Qianqiu collapsed onto the ground. Stray hairs stuck to her face with sweat, and she panted for ages before saying, "Teacher... what did you used to do? This is way too much training..."

Nana shook her head. "I don't know either."

Ye Zhiqiu glanced at her. You were the sovereign of the soul beasts, the Silver Dragon King.

Two weeks later, Dong Qianqiu could clearly feel her stance becoming steadier and her footwork lighter. When generating power, she no longer relied entirely on brute force, and had begun using the strength of her waist and hips.

Ye Zhiqiu's improvement was even more obvious. Although he had been a novelist in his previous life, he had read plenty of material on fighting to write action scenes, so he wasn't unfamiliar with some of the basic concepts.

This was his first systematic exposure to Nana's teachings, but he understood them much faster than others. Sometimes, after Nana demonstrated once, he could break down most of the movement. That was another benefit of having strong spiritual power.

Nana was also surprised by Ye Zhiqiu's growth. His learning ability was even stronger than Xuan Yu's. She had never met a child like him before.

Dong Qianqiu said, "Could you stop learning everything so fast? You're making me look stupid."

"You can learn fast too. I'm just faster than you."

"Why does everything you say make me want to hit you?"

"Because I'm telling the truth."

Fuming, Dong Qianqiu threw her water bottle at him. Ye Zhiqiu laughed and dodged it.

A month later, Nana began teaching more advanced material: how to keep their center of gravity stable while moving, how to concentrate their entire body's strength at a single point the instant they struck, and how to predict an opponent's attack direction from their shoulder movements before they made their move.

These things were far more complicated than simple stances and footwork. Even Ye Zhiqiu began needing repeated practice to master them.

Although Dong Qianqiu learned a little slower than he did, her physical advantages began to show at this stage. Her reaction speed and coordination really were far beyond those of her peers. Some movements took Ye Zhiqiu three to five attempts to get a feel for, while she could get them right in two.

Ye Zhiqiu knew this was probably the foundation of a hundred-thousand-year soul beast in human form at work. Even with her memories lost, her body's instincts remained.

Another month passed, and Nana upgraded their training from pure technique drills to combat practice.

The rules were simple: she attacked, and the two of them defended.

Nana's attacks weren't fast or powerful, but they came from tricky angles with ever-changing rhythms. Every strike landed at precisely the moment the two of them found hardest to handle.

The first time Ye Zhiqiu sparred with Nana, he lasted less than ten seconds before she struck his shoulder.

Dong Qianqiu fared a little worse. On her first attempt, she lasted only five seconds before Nana caught her wrist and threw her off balance with a simple guiding tug.

But every time she was knocked down, she got back up and continued without a word, her eyes filled with nothing but determination.

Only she knew that training like this was the only way she could keep up with that idiot.

Nana made no particular comment about it. After each bout, she simply pointed out what they had done right and wrong, then told them to try again.

And so it went, three times a week, without fail, come thunder or lightning.

By the third month, Ye Zhiqiu could already last nearly a minute against Nana.

Dong Qianqiu could hold on for about forty seconds too.

"You're improving quite quickly." After one bout, Nana offered a rare word of praise.

In her eyes, these two children were already making excellent progress.

Dong Qianqiu was panting, but the corners of her mouth were harder to keep down than an AK's muzzle.

Leaning against the wall, Ye Zhiqiu smiled too. "That's because you're a good teacher."

"Enough flattery." Nana glanced at him, then paused and said, "Next time, try using soul power."

In the fourth month, their training advanced again, combining soul power with Ancient Martial Arts.

Nana required Ye Zhiqiu and Dong Qianqiu to use both soul power and Ancient Martial Arts techniques in combat, rather than relying purely on their bodies as before.

Paired with Ancient Martial Arts footwork, Dong Qianqiu's Ice Spear became more agile. Thrusts, sweeps, rising strikes, precise jabs—the rhythm of every attack differed from before, tighter and harder to predict.

Ye Zhiqiu's Absolute Blade gained an even greater advantage through this training. His bladework had never followed any fixed patterns, and incorporating Ancient Martial Arts techniques made it even more free-flowing.

Over those four months, the two of them also grew closer, becoming much more intimate than before, though that was as far as it went.

Ye Zhiqiu's soul power also reached level 25, while Dong Qianqiu's reached level 24.

It was Wednesday again. By the time the two arrived, Nana was already standing in the center of the training ground.

She wore a white tracksuit, her silvery-white French braid tied tighter than usual. Her sleeves were rolled halfway up her forearms, revealing wrists so pale they were almost translucent.

"We'll try a different approach today." Nana watched them approach and said gently, "Before, you always faced me together. Today, you'll take turns."

Dong Qianqiu blinked. "Take turns? Who goes first?"

"Ye Zhiqiu."

Ye Zhiqiu set his schoolbag on the bench at the edge of the training ground, loosened his wrists and neck, and walked to the center to take his stance.

Dong Qianqiu retreated to the sidelines, leaning against the wall with her arms crossed, her eyes fixed unblinkingly on the center of the training ground.

"Use your martial soul," Nana said.

Ye Zhiqiu didn't ask any questions. He turned his right hand over, and the Absolute Blade emerged from his palm, its long white blade hovering silently.

At the same time, a yellow soul ring and a Purple Soul Ring rose from beneath his feet.

Nana stood about three meters across from him, her arms hanging naturally at her sides. She summoned no weapon and made no obvious preparations.

But Ye Zhiqiu knew that although her stance seemed full of openings, none of them were actually openings he could exploit.

"Come on," Nana said.

Ye Zhiqiu didn't stand on ceremony. He stepped forward.

He moved fast, sweeping the Absolute Blade diagonally upward straight toward Nana's right shoulder.

The blade made almost no sound as it sliced through the air. Only a faint white gleam flashed past.

Nana turned slightly aside, avoiding the blade's path. At the same time, her right hand rose from below, her fingertips darting toward Ye Zhiqiu's wrist.

Ye Zhiqiu was ready. With a turn of his wrist, the Absolute Blade changed direction in midair, its rising slash becoming a horizontal cut toward Nana's waist.

Nana didn't meet it head-on. She withdrew a short half-step, just enough for the blade to pass an inch in front of her.

Then her left hand reached in from the side and pressed down on the spine of Ye Zhiqiu's blade.

Ye Zhiqiu felt a force that wasn't particularly strong but was extraordinarily precise press against the Absolute Blade's spine. It came from a tricky angle, catching him at exactly the point where exerting strength was most awkward, forcibly diverting his blade half an inch.

He immediately pulled his blade back and retreated, opening up two steps of distance and readjusting his center of gravity.

Dong Qianqiu watched from the sidelines without looking away.

Their exchanges weren't particularly fast, but every move was clean and decisive, without a single unnecessary motion.

After watching for four months, she could already understand most of the details.

Ye Zhiqiu steadied his breathing and pressed forward again.

This time, he avoided complicated variations and launched a more direct series of attacks instead. Every slash targeted Nana's shoulders, elbows, or wrists, fast and tightly timed, each striking in the gaps when she might counterattack.

Nana neutralized every attack with ease.

Her hands stayed within a very small area in front of her. Her movements were slight, but every parry was perfectly placed, wasting not a trace of strength.

Ye Zhiqiu's mind raced.

This isn't getting me anywhere. Time to take a gamble!

He stepped forward again, thrusting the Absolute Blade straight at Nana's chest.

The speed and angle of this strike were entirely ordinary. It looked like a simple probing attack.

Nana turned aside and brought her right hand toward the flat of his blade, intending to divert it as she had before.

Just as her palm was about to touch the Absolute Blade, Ye Zhiqiu planted his feet, forcibly halting his forward momentum. Then he turned his right hand over. Instead of continuing its thrust, the Absolute Blade dipped, its tip pointing down as it traced an extremely short arc through the air.

But that strike wasn't aimed at Nana's body.

It slashed at a small patch of air beside Nana.

At the same time, his first soul ring flashed.

Concept Severance!

As his blade descended, even Ye Zhiqiu wasn't sure he could cut anything.

He had made this strike simply to gamble and see what happened.

Nana's reactions were too fast. In four months, he had never truly managed to touch her. No matter what angle, rhythm, or variation he used, she always neutralized it at the last instant with the smallest possible movement.

Concept Severance was currently his only soul skill that "ignored the rules." It didn't contest speed, strength, or technique. All that mattered was "whether he could cut that connection."

He was betting that Nana wasn't prepared for it.

After all, he had never used a soul skill against Nana in four months of sparring. Every time, he had fought purely with his body and Ancient Martial Arts techniques.

Only when Nana said, "Use your martial soul," today had he summoned the Absolute Blade and his soul rings for the first time during their sparring.

And Concept Severance was the Absolute Blade's first soul skill.

The instant Ye Zhiqiu's blade swept through the air beside Nana, he felt no resistance at all, as though he had cut into empty space.

He didn't know whether he had hit anything, because it had happened too quickly.

So quickly that he almost thought he had imagined it.

But Nana's body paused.

It was truly brief, lasting only about half a breath.

Her right hand had been about to strike the Absolute Blade's spine, but the movement suddenly stopped for an instant midway. It was as though something had severed the connection sustaining that motion, depriving it of further commands.

Then, in the next instant, her hand resumed moving, continuing toward the blade's spine and diverting Ye Zhiqiu's strike half an inch.

Ye Zhiqiu used that guiding force to retreat two steps, putting distance between them and steadying his stance again.

He noticed that Nana didn't pursue him.

That wasn't normal.

In all their previous bouts, no matter how quickly he retreated, Nana would press forward again in the next second. Her rhythm never broke.

But this time, she stood where she was and looked down at her right hand.

Her face was filled with surprise.

Soon, Nana withdrew her gaze and looked at Ye Zhiqiu again, saying:

"What happened with that strike just now?"

Ye Zhiqiu hesitated. He wasn't actually sure whether he had hit anything, since it had been so brief, so he said, "I'm not really sure either... I felt like I hit something, but it was too brief."

Nana fell silent for a while, then slowly nodded.

"You did hit me. For about half a second."

Hearing that, Ye Zhiqiu froze.

Half a second?

Concept Severance was the first soul skill he had obtained when he awakened at seven. Its effect was to sever a target's connections to their martial soul, soul power, and bodily control for three seconds.

This was his first time using the soul skill against Nana, and it had actually worked???

He was only level 25 right now, while Nana—even with her memories lost and most of her power sealed—was the Silver Dragon King herself!

According to the original story's setting, Gu Yuena at her full strength stood at the peak of the First-Level God rank, and could reach the God King realm using the Dragon God's Heart.

Even during Ultimate Douluo, with her memories lost and her strength suppressed by the plane, she remained firmly at the peak of the True God rank, around level 119.

What did the peak of the True God rank mean?

In the Douluo Continent's level system, Level 100 was god level, and Level 110 was True God.

And Nana's soul power level was around Level 119.

He, Ye Zhiqiu, was seven years old and level 22.

Level 22 against Level 119.

A difference of nearly a hundred levels.

Yet his first soul skill could affect an existence at that level for half a second?

Ye Zhiqiu stood where he was, his mind racing through several possibilities. Then he feigned ignorance and asked, "Teacher, do you... know how strong you are?"

Nana thought briefly before saying:

"I'm not too sure either, but I can destroy a battleship."