Quickly conquer the martial arts world, and let your fists dominate the heavens!

Chapter 23 The Serpent Peeks Out, the Old Cat Draws His Bow! (Third update, please read and vote)
Zhao Yuting glanced to the side and saw a middle-aged man with broad eyes and large ears, about fifty years old, wearing a coarse cotton coat, standing next to him.

He was like an ordinary person, attracting no attention from anyone.

"Master, what brings you here?" Zhao Yuting hurriedly tried to bow, but the middle-aged man nudged him and gave him a look, telling him to keep quiet.

"I'm worried about you two. This matter is not simple." The two quietly retreated to the back, and Huo Diange lowered his voice and said.

He didn't want to appear in public, because he knew that Miyagi Nagaharu, Chiba Shiro, and Huo Dongge were all juniors.

Given his age, even someone of his generation could be a formidable opponent for the Japanese.

It will be even harder to handle then.

To put it bluntly, it's rare to see top-level masters dueling in a martial arts arena.

Nowadays, if anyone challenges grandmasters like Li Shuwen and Sun Lutang, it's always their disciples or grand-disciples who take action; they themselves would never get involved.

This is already a generally accepted rule.

"You mean Chen Zhan used the Gong family's Sixty-Four Hands technique?" Zhao Yuting was more concerned about this statement.

The Bagua lineage reveres Dong Haichuan as its patriarch, and Dong Haichuan had two outstanding disciples, "Skinny Yin" and "Glasses Cheng".

Both men inherited the essence of Dong Haichuan's Bagua (Eight Trigrams) style, making them equally brilliant and their martial arts skills difficult to distinguish.

But they took different paths.

"Shou Yin" refers to Yin Fu, who entered the palace as an official and became a lackey of the Qing court. He rose to the rank of fourth-grade commander of the Imperial Guards. Until the end of the Qing Dynasty and its collapse, he clashed with the Boxers on several occasions. He eventually resigned and returned to his hometown, where he passed away the following year.

Meanwhile, Cheng Tinghua, nicknamed "Glasses Cheng," embarked on the path of resistance, joining the Boxer Rebellion to save the country and its people, killing Qing soldiers and foreigners.

The two brothers, who were both disciples, turned against each other and fought each other on several occasions.

After the Eight-Nation Alliance invaded China, Cheng Tinghua, armed with a Bagua sword, roamed the streets and alleys, killing any lone foreign soldiers he encountered, turning the capital upside down, and earning the admiration of everyone in the martial arts world.

He ultimately died under the pursuit and interception of more than a dozen foreign guns.

It is said that there is more to this story than meets the eye; Cheng's whereabouts were betrayed, otherwise, with his Bagua footwork, he would never have been surrounded.

But decades have passed, and it's impossible to verify.

However, because Cheng Tinghua died, although his lineage left behind successors and martial arts, it was not recognized by Dong Haichuan, so it was not appropriate for them to claim themselves as the true lineage of Bagua.

Yin Fu's lineage happened to take in the exceptionally talented Gong Baotian when he was young. At that time, Dong Haichuan was still alive, and he accepted the disciple on behalf of his master, gaining Dong Haichuan's approval.

Therefore, Gong Baotian's lineage of Bagua School has developed to the point where it has firmly established itself as the authentic Bagua School.

The Bagua Sect allowed Gong Baotian to grow very powerful. The Bagua Sixty-Four Hands technique was kept secret and passed down for decades, becoming a secret technique of the Gong family. Basically, no one in the martial arts world uses it anymore.

That's why Huo Diange was so surprised by Chen Zhan's use of it.

This story isn't exactly a secret; although decades have passed, all the sects with a tradition of passing down the tradition know about it.

Because Chen Zhan could not possibly be a disciple of Gong Baotian, otherwise he would not have called himself a Tai Chi disciple.

Bagua and Taiji have no friendship, only enmity!
"Let's see, this kid has quite a background."

Huo Diange thought for a moment, then said something else, his gaze following the sound to the stage.

The two were now locked in a fierce battle. Chiba Shiro had sustained minor injuries, but seemed to have a bloodlust, and his attacks became increasingly ruthless.

The change in hand shape from sword to knife, just one change in hand shape, completely altered the person's aura.

Previously, when he was using the sword-shaped hand strike, Chiba Shiro was still compassionate and focused on getting close to Chen Zhan in an instant, attempting to disarm him with his bare hands. His attacks were all about grappling and not about killing, embodying the philosophy of "not killing, but winning by not being killed."

Having been hit by Chen Zhan and suffering a minor injury, he immediately switched from sword to saber, his demeanor changing drastically.

From a compassionate sage to a ruthless demon, his blade gleamed with deadly precision, each strike fatal, relentless until a head was severed. Chen Zhan discerned the change in his opponent's aura and techniques, recognizing these as the two core principles of the New Yin Style.

Swords that bring life and knives that kill!

Sword-style grappling, subduing without causing death.

Disciples newly entering the Shinkage-ryu school must begin their training with sword techniques, prioritizing non-killing and aiming to avoid being killed.

However, it is not that Shinkage is merciful and unwilling to kill. On the contrary, after mastering the Living Sword, he cultivates the Killing Blade, and his style changes drastically. Everything is aimed at killing the opponent, and the blade draws blood and kills.

This style shift can catch opponents off guard when facing them.

Chen Zhan felt the pressure immediately. A hand chop slid across his neck, and the sharpness of his fingertips nearly cut him.

"Excellent swordsmanship!" Chen Zhan couldn't help but exclaim.

The sudden change of attack caught me off guard, and I still feel a chill on my neck.

Chiba Shiro shook his head in disappointment. He was just a hair's breadth away from slicing Chen Zhan's trachea. He couldn't use a weapon to halve Chen Zhan's strength, since most of Shinkage-ryu's martial arts were based on swords.

However, he also had a good understanding of Chinese martial arts, and knew that Baguazhang's skills were also applied to swords, so this duel was fair.

Chiba Haku used this sharp switching technique, with various sword techniques of the Shinkage-ryu style, to counter Chen Zhan's Bagua Sixty-Four Hands, and for a time he was not at a disadvantage.

He switched from a single palm strike to a double palm strike, spun around, and then struck out with his palm, sending it flying horizontally through the air.

Chiba Shiro had used this move several times before and didn't care. He blocked with his arm and was already preparing to thrust his rear hand straight into his waist and abdomen from below.

This is the "Tengu Shou" of the Shinkage-ryu school, a two-sword style where the right hand blocks and the left hand switches to a single sword to take the life.

The key is to hide; when the celestial dog eats the moon, danger lurks silently.

Chen Zhan seemed oblivious, not noticing the opponent's two-sword style under his arm. He pushed the opponent's arm with a palm, while the Tengu Slash under his body cut into his abdomen.

This hidden attack was silent and stealthy, lacking any power whatsoever, and was extremely well concealed.

But its power is definitely not small. Chiba Shiro has been drawing his sword and slashing at waterfalls since he was a child, and it has long been ingrained in his bones.

He was very confident that even if Chen Zhan had mastered the internal energy to open up his lower abdomen, this knife would still pierce through his intestines and go right through his abdomen.

Just as Chen Zhan's palms touched Qianye Bai's right arm, he suddenly loosened his grip and changed his palms into a clasp!

With his fingers gripping the inside of Chiba Shiro's wrist, his arm rotates counterclockwise like "winding silk," a technique that combines the power of Xingyi Bagua.

Chiba Shiro suddenly felt his arm being wrapped by a giant python, and his hand was being twisted until it bled. The intense pain shot into his brain, but it also made him more alert.

"An arm for your life!"

He instantly made up his mind to trade injury for life. Ignoring the bruises on his right arm, he suddenly reached out with his left arm and slashed at Chen Zhan's thin gray robe.

The next moment will be the moment when the intestines are ruptured and the internal organs are crushed to pieces by the hidden force!
An exclamation arose from below: "This...ah!"

The extremely dangerous scene made Huo Dongge's heart ache, and he even forgot the pain of his broken leg.

But Chiba Shiro's left arm shot out a foot, already tearing his outer garment; then, with another thrust, he stabbed fiercely.
It could only pierce the outer edge of the long robe, cutting a layer of skin along the edge of Chen Zhan's abdomen, but there was no blood!
Chiba Shiro was puzzled and tried to stab him again, but to no avail!
Looking up, I was so shocked I couldn't speak.

Chen Zhan's movements were strange. He twisted his right arm with both hands, but his body was bent over, like an old cat with a snake reaching out to bite its belly. In an instant, his back vertebrae were drawn out like a bow, forming a terrifying arc.

At this moment, Chen Zhan is the old cat, and Qianye Bai is the spirit snake!

With a quick bend of the waist and a hunch of the back, the snake stretched out its body, yet it couldn't bite even a fraction of an inch!
Chiba Shiro's last thought before his arm was snapped was, "What the hell is this move? Is the person in front of me a cat demon in human form?!"

(End of this chapter)