Sparring Exchange

After their midday break, the group took the vehicles back to the covered sports ground.

The morning's spectacular martial arts demonstrations had left the soldiers eager to watch the afternoon's sparring matches.

Before the scheduled start, every seat in the venue was already taken. No one wanted to miss the exciting bouts that afternoon.

Chen Jue took his seat with the others. Once Commissar Yao finished his speech onstage, they got straight down to business, drawing lots to determine who would face whom in the ring.

Besides the eight invited martial artists, the participants included three combat instructors and a young soldier who had won the XX Regiment's combat tournament the previous year.

The twelve participants drew lots for six first-round bouts. Each winner would advance automatically to the next round until a final victor emerged.

Chen Jue drew a number from the box. Seeing that his first opponent was the Taekwondo black belt, he returned to his seat without any change in expression.

Master Xie, the Taekwondo black belt, looked rather unhappy when he discovered that he would be facing Chen Jue.

That ferocious punch from the morning had left a profound impression on him.

He had never expected to face an expert like Chen Jue in the very first round that afternoon. He must have picked the unluckiest possible day to leave home!

The tournament officially began. The first bout pitted the provincial sanda champion against one of the combat instructors.

Both practiced external martial arts that could be learned relatively quickly. They clashed head-on with fierce, forceful movements, trading solid blows for a while before the combat instructor secured a rear naked choke around his opponent's neck and won the bout.

Of course, everyone wore protective gear in the ring, so they were unlikely to suffer any serious injuries.

Even if someone did get hurt, there was no need to worry. Skilled military doctors from the regiment were stationed at the venue and could immediately treat any sprains or impact injuries that were not too severe.

Chen Jue watched from below the ring with great interest. He knew that the combat instructor's rear naked choke was a finishing technique from Jujutsu.

Once someone locked it around an opponent's neck from behind, the opponent could lose consciousness from suffocation within seconds. It was an extremely effective way to defeat someone in modern combat.

If Chen Jue had been the one in the ring, though, his monstrous strength would probably have let him break free with just a few struggles.

Several bouts passed like this, with the martial artists around him taking their turns in the ring. Even Master Li went up and scraped a win, earning cheers and applause from the audience.

When Chen Jue finally entered the ring for the last bout of the round, the crowd grew even louder!

Thunderous applause filled the venue, the enthusiasm seeming ready to burst through the covered sports ground's colored steel roof!

After entering the ring, Master Xie gave Chen Jue a Taekwondo salute, looking thoroughly uncertain. "Master Chen, please go easy on me when we start!"

"You're too kind, Master Xie. I'll be careful." Chen Jue winked at him, smiled faintly, and assumed the opening posture of the Eight Immortals Stance.

Coach Zou, who was serving as referee beside them, called out, "Begin!"

Master Xie struck first!

He sprang forward, covering two or three meters, then took a quick step and raised his knee. His left leg shot above his head before he brought it down at Chen Jue in a Front Axe Kick.

This was one of Taekwondo's better-known kicks, a fast, sudden attack that was difficult to defend against. Its swift, sharp execution could easily catch an opponent off guard.

But Chen Jue was clearly no ordinary person. With his agility already at 1.21, his reactions were extremely fast.

With a short shout of his own, he lunged forward and activated the Shaolin Body Conditioning Skill, his skin turning dark and bluish. He made no attempt to evade the force of the Front Axe Kick, letting the descending left leg slam into his shoulder with a dull thud!

Immediately afterward, Chen Jue used Fairy Maiden Plucks the Lotus from Boat Boxing. He reached out, seized the black belt around Master Xie's waist, and drove him downward with tremendous force. Before more than a thousand people, he slammed the black belt, who weighed close to two hundred pounds, straight into the ground.

In truth, Fairy Maiden Plucks the Lotus was one of Boat Boxing's nastier moves. It originally targeted the opponent's vulnerable groin, and against a man in particular, it could incapacitate him instantly.

But this was only a friendly sparring match, not a fight to the death. Chen Jue could hardly grab his opponent's crotch, so he seized the belt instead, intending to overpower him and pin him down.

Master Xie proved worthy of his Taekwondo black belt, however. Just before Chen Jue drove him into the ground, he whipped his right foot through the air, striking the left side of Chen Jue's head with a bang!

If an ordinary person had taken that side kick to the head, they would probably have been knocked out on the spot!

But Chen Jue had trained the Shaolin Body Conditioning Skill to an extremely advanced level. As he channeled his strength, the skin on his head also turned bluish, becoming as hard as though his head were made of bronze. He took the airborne side kick as if nothing had happened.

Master Xie, meanwhile, landed on his back and was left thoroughly dazed. He felt as though all his internal organs had been jolted, and his head spun. Only after a good while did he manage to struggle to his feet, breathing heavily.

"Master Chen, was that the legendary Iron Shirt?!" Master Xie looked incredulous. He knew perfectly well how powerful his kicks were.

Both his Front Axe Kick and his airborne side kick could snap wooden planks as thick as an arm, yet when they landed on Chen Jue, they seemed to vanish without a trace, producing no reaction whatsoever.

Instead, after delivering those kicks, his leg and foot hurt terribly, as though he had struck an iron plate.

The bluish tint that had spread over Chen Jue's entire body also closely resembled descriptions of Iron Shirt. Since Master Xie practiced Taekwondo and knew little about traditional Chinese martial arts, he had asked the question.

"Iron Shirt?"

"Something like that! It's a body-conditioning skill, anyway." Chen Jue smiled faintly without explaining further. He released his tension, and his skin returned to its strikingly fair, rosy complexion.

"I lost this bout! Thank you for holding back, Master Chen!" The Taekwondo black belt accepted his defeat wholeheartedly. He bowed to Chen Jue again, then hobbled out of the ring.

He intended to have one of the military doctors at the venue check whether he had suffered soft-tissue bruising in his leg or foot.

Their exchange had decided the bout in a single clash. Although it had been brief, the commotion they had caused was considerable.

Everyone had seen it clearly. Both men's movements were fierce and powerful, and the collisions of foot and leg against body and head had produced loud impacts. Chen Jue's seemingly steel-forged body, in particular, left the spectators exclaiming in disbelief.

Anyone who did not know better might have thought Chen Jue had mastered the Diamond-Indestructible Divine Skill from a martial arts novel!