Book 4, Chapter 178: Practicing The Other Form

Chen Chuan thought that this was a good condition, but not because of the compensation offered. Training resources were important, but it wasn’t as if he couldn’t get them from other places.

What he cared more about in this negotiation was that Long Xiang was willing to fight against him.

His second self had returned to the starting point again, and he needed strong opponents to make him grow. The issue was that strong opponents weren’t that easy to come by.

Based on what Yao Zhiyi told him and what Chen Chuan noticed himself, martial arts masters stored their energy for training and fights to the death. They seldom took part in unnecessary fights.

When martial arts masters fought, true victory was hard to come by, so unless there was a serious conflict, fighting to solve the problem was usually their last resort.

Long Xiang likely offered to fight him because his faction asked him to do it and because the municipal government had offered to compensate him for it.

“Alright, then,” Chen Chuan agreed while meeting Long Xiang’s gaze squarely.

Long Xiang’s cold face turned a lot more amiable after that, but he became serious again a moment later. “The public road isn’t the right place to fight. Why don’t we head further outside?”

Chen Chuan was fine with that. They left the public road and headed into the wilderness.

The area around the public road was quite spacious. Since there were often people trying to bypass the checkpoints to enter Central City, there were originally tons of patrol cars beyond the security barrier.

Today, though, not a single patrol car was in sight. Even the armed bandits in the wilderness seemed to have vanished. While there were some airships high above the sky patrolling the area, they were quite far away.

One airship flew right above their heads. It was around three kilometers above ground. This distance couldn’t be considered a safe zone yet, but all parties in Central City needed to know what happened, and they were at the outer edge of the Fu-Mu Entity’s domain, so the domain signals were really weak. They needed an airship to send the signals. That’s why no matter how dangerous it was, they had to park above their heads.

After Chen Chuan and Long Xiang were two kilometers away from the road, they exchanged looks, nodded, and went in opposite directions. Once they had walked around one hundred meters away, they stood still across from each other. Since they were just going to spar, neither of them intended to use their weapons.

Long Xiang unbuttoned his shirt and combed his hair. His black eyes shone, and his entire body glowed faintly. The light soon turned an aquamarine color and moved in a manner resembling flames. The sand around him started being pushed away in waves.

Chen Chuan was still dressed in the Resolution Department’s uniform, but his body began to glow faintly as well. In a moment, the light turned into thick golden-white smoke that curled up. The tiny stones around him started levitating.

The airship above captured this scene and relayed it to Central City. Both the Department of Administrative Affairs and the municipal government were watching it with bated breath. They needed to know just how dangerous Chen Chuan was.

The Union and Linacrox Union were also watching closely, including Pulabacarl. He, too, was streaming the fight with the help of White Bird District’s domain.

Chen Chuan and Long Xiang were in a standoff. They had yet to attack each other, but their biofields started expanding. Soon, the edges touched, and cracks showed up.

Many of the people who had never seen martial arts masters fight before were shocked, though those who knew some things were surprised as well. Chen Chuan had only become a martial arts master recently, but when their biofields touched, his biofield proved to be more stable and occupied a larger space.

The messenger from the Union was in Pulabacarl’s airship. When he saw this, he bowed to the martial arts master with a hand over his heart. “Does that mean that Lead Investigator Chen is stronger?”

“Biofields are the manifestation of a person’s foundation. If we evaluate their strength solely based on this, then Lead Investigator Chen is stronger. But biofields can be expanded and activated at will, though you’d need to burn your life force for that. Sometimes, in order to get the initiative and the upper hand, a martial arts master will intentionally expand their biofield. So, based on this alone, I can’t tell just who is stronger. I will only know that once they start fighting.

“From what I see, Lead Investigator Chen has a solid foundation, but Mr. Long has no intention of deciding the victor based on this. If nothing goes wrong, he will be the first to attack.”

Their biofields clashed for a while, and Chen Chuan got an obvious advantage. His biofield started pressing forward.

When Long Xiang saw that his biofield was being forced back and more cracks appeared on it while being pushed back, he didn’t insist on it and charged forward.

As his body filled up with an offensive refined force, their biofields cracked and shattered. Long Xiang ran forward like a meteor burning with blue light. Shockwaves appeared behind him, along with a trail of smoke.

Even though this was merely a charge, it had astonishing momentum, and all those who could see what was going on were shocked.

Chen Chuan’s gaze remained calm. Without unnecessary movements, he shifted a foot forward, tilted forward a bit, lowered his center of gravity, and made a loose fist with one hand.

Right when Long Xiang arrived in front of him and looked like he was about to ram into him, Chen Chuan clenched his other hand tightly, twisted his waist, and threw a punch forward. It shot past Long Xiang’s fist toward him. It reached Long Xiang before Long Xiang’s fist could touch Chen Chuan.

Long Xiang’s heart skipped a beat. He hadn’t expected Chen Chuan to be so fast, so he could only turn his body slightly to the side while trying to block it with his other hand. Chen Chuan could tell that Long Xiang hadn’t used his full strength in his charge but left behind room to adapt. That was why he had time to make adjustments now.

However, to Long Xiang’s surprise, the punch was unexpectedly powerful and steady. Even though he managed to block it with his arm, he didn’t budge it in the slightest. The fist slammed into his cheek, and the golden-white light crashed into the aquamarine flames.

It was as if time had stopped for a moment. Long Xiang’s body and the aquamarine flames vanished in an instant. At the same time, a huge mushroom cloud of smoke exploded hundreds of meters upwards, and finally, they heard a rumbling sound.

The video feed of all those watching trembled violently, as if the recording equipment had shattered and twisted. Then, they saw black spots. The golden-white light was present as well, while the aquamarine flames were nowhere to be found.

This was due to the two martial arts masters’ biofields spilling outward so much that they interfered with regular domain signals. If it weren’t for the airship using a domain signal amplifier, the footage would have become a blurry mess a long time ago, and no one outside would have been able to see anything.

Since the municipal government’s interests were going to be affected by this fight, they wanted to know what was happening. They ordered their subordinates to adjust the signal, but the effects weren’t good. It was only when the interference weakened a bit that they were able to see below. The sight on the ground shocked them.

Chen Chuan was standing completely fine, while Long Xiang was nowhere to be seen. It seemed like he was on the back foot. Their faces turned pale because of this.

After blasting Long Xiang away with the punch, Chen Chuan cast a glance at the smoke in the distance, but didn’t chase after his opponent to continue beating him up.

This wasn’t a fight to the death. Besides, Long Xiang had been polite, so there was no need to go that far.

Besides, Chen Chuan wanted to see what Long Xiang would do after witnessing his speed and strength. How would he counterattack?

Long Xiang laughed boisterously and seemingly arrogantly in the smoke, but Chen Chuan knew that this was just a prelude to him speaking.

Just as he expected, Long Xiang’s unique, deep voice traveled over right after. “In the old era, when royally appointed warriors reached the Fourth Limit, most of them were given a noble rank to increase their prestige. In the former national religion, they did something else. They walked down different paths based on their potential, so once they reached the Fourth Limit, according to the paths they took, they were given a name associated with one of the legendary divine beings. These names were linked to the gods of the mountains, rivers, sun, moon, or other parts of nature.

“I’m walking down the path of the other form. Back then, my path was known as the Path of the River God, and we took upon the form of the Divine Scaled Dragon.”

As he spoke, Chen Chuan saw Long Xiang slowly growing taller until he was more than four meters tall.

As the dust around him was pushed away by his biofield again, Long Xiang showed up before his eyes. His shirt had burst apart, and only his protective gear was still wrapped tightly around his body.

His entire body had grown larger. His limbs were thick, and he appeared tall and powerfully built. There were lumps resembling scales on his muscles, but they were hidden under his skin.

His face hadn’t changed much, but Chen Chuan could see horns curling backward from the top of his head, though he didn’t look strange. Instead, due to the light drifting around him and his strong body, he appeared awe-inspiring.

He trained his eyes on Chen Chuan and slammed his fists together.

Clang!

It sounded as if he had slammed metal against metal. Long Xiang chuckled again, and it sounded like thunder rumbling. “I heard that if I continue down this path, I might actually become a scaled dragon. Lead Investigator Chen, you haven’t chosen your path yet, have you? Please be careful. I don’t have a good temper while I’m like this, so there are times when I am unable to control myself.”

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