Martial Arts: My talent multiplier increased

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The three on the left in the front row, seven zhang away from Fang Yuan, are trapped in a space of about four zhang by three zhang by the wall of fire. Two of them are in the early stage of Bone Refinement and are struggling. Their Qi and blood are fluctuating erratically—the temperature of the fire is interfering with the circulation of their meridians. The one in the middle stage of Bone Refinement has stabilized. His Qi and blood have formed a thin protective aura on his body surface—incomplete and unable to last long, but enough to insulate him from the heat for a short time.

Three on the right in the front row, ten feet away from Fang Yuan. All are in the early stage of Bone Refinement. They have no qi shields. One of them is rapidly losing its qi and blood signal—it's on fire.

Six people were in the back row, about fifteen zhang away from Fang Yuan. They were crammed into the alley entrance. Three walls of fire blocked their way. Their retreat route was also set ablaze—Tie Meng had also laid a layer of broken wood and dry grass outside the alley entrance, and a branch of the fuse passed through there.

Fang Yuan's brain completed the priority process in half a breath.

Shoot the one closest first.

Three on the left in the front row. Seven zhang (approximately 10 meters).

Fang Yuan pushed off with the sole of his foot in the narrow gap. The Eightfold Stance Technique precisely distributed the power of his lower limbs to the gastrocnemius and soleus muscles of his right leg. His body was propelled forward.

The distance between the narrow gap and the wall of fire was three feet. Fang Yuan's body accelerated within this three-foot gap.

The feeling of passing through a wall of fire—Fang Yuan's eight-fold stance training had brought his Qi and blood to their limit. The temperature on the surface of his skin soared to the point where his pores would burst during that half-breath of passing through the wall of fire. But his Qi and blood foundation, strengthened by four times his physical constitution, absorbed the heat within the next heartbeat cycle.

When Fang Yuan emerged from the other side of the wall of fire, a section of the left sleeve of his short brown shirt was charred.

He ignored his sleeves.

Front row, left side. Three heretical practitioners.

The closest one—early stage of Bone Refinement—was less than two zhang away from Fang Yuan. The man had his back to Fang Yuan, his palms firmly planted on the ground, emitting a piercing howl. Blisters had formed on his back—from the splattered flames of fish oil.

Fang Yuan's right fist stretched out in the firelight.

Three punches.

The first strike hit the front of the neck. To be precise—the side of the thyroid cartilage. Fang Yuan's eight-fold stance training allowed him to precisely control the angle of his punch, ensuring that the strike's penetration path perfectly avoided the cervical spine, cutting in from the side.

The intent of the fist is not to strike forward, but to twist inward.

The triple-layered force created a vortex-like oscillating area within the evil cultivator's neck tissue. The center of the vortex precisely covered the intersection of the carotid and vertebral arteries.

The blood vessel wall ruptured under the triple shock.

The evil cultivator's howls abruptly ceased. His body fell forward, face first.

Fang Yuan's left foot landed on his back the same moment he fell. Using the momentum, his body sprang up.

the second.

Early stage of bone refining. One and a half feet away.

The heretical cultivator had already turned around. His dark red eyes, illuminated by the firelight, were fixed on Fang Yuan's direction. His reaction was two breaths faster than the first. Ten dark red fingernails sprang from his fingertips—not grown out, but hardened keratinous deposits induced by some kind of evil cultivation technique.

The fingernail stabbed towards Fang Yuan's face.

Fang Yuan's head turned three inches to the right.

Three inches.

Ten fingernails grazed past Fang Yuan's left ear. One of them scraped the auricle, leaving a shallow cut. Blood seeped from the wound faster than normal—his bone structure was four times stronger than normal, causing the capillaries around the wound to have an extremely strong compensatory reaction after the injury.

Fang Yuan's right fist did not hit his head.

He was hit in the chest.

The Tanzhong acupoint.

The triple punch's intent enters from the surface of the sternum, passes through the sternum, passes through the pericardium, and then explodes upon impact with the heart muscle.

The evil cultivator froze for a moment. His eyes widened. In that instant, his dark red pupils suddenly expanded—turning into a murky grayish-red.

The heart stopped.

Fang Yuan didn't wait for him to fall. His body had already moved sideways.

The third.

The middle stage of bone refining.

There is an air shield.

This heretical cultivator was the strongest of the three on the left in the front row. His reaction pattern was completely different from the first two—the first two struggled and howled after being surrounded by fire. This one didn't. He maintained a fighting stance from beginning to end, his back against the alley wall, his palms protectively held in front of him, and an aura covering his entire upper body.

Fang Yuan's triple punch struck the qi shield.

The first layer—a ring of ripples appeared on the surface of the air shield. The ripples spread outwards from the point of contact with the fist.

A second layer was added. The ripples deepened. The thickness of the air shield was compressed from about half an inch to less than two-tenths of an inch.

The third level.

The air shield shattered.

The shattering didn't occur as a complete collapse. It started from the point of contact between the fist and the shield—creating a hole. The edges of the hole cracked outwards. Within a fraction of a breath, the cracks covered the entire protective shield.

Fang Yuan's fist pierced through the shattered protective barrier and struck the evil cultivator squarely on the forehead.

The residual power of the triple punch flowed into the frontal bone, bounced twice on the inner wall of the skull, and on the third bounce to the inner side of the occipital bone at the back of the head—Fang Yuan's eight-fold stance training made a precise correction to the direction of the energy at this angle—the power was not evenly distributed, but concentrated on the inner third of the occipital bone.

Spiderweb-like cracks appeared on the inner wall of the occipital bone.

The heretic's body went limp. The way it went limp was strange—first his knees bent, then his waist collapsed, and finally his head tilted back. His whole body was like a tower whose foundation had been removed, collapsing section by section from the bottom up.

Three.

Forty breaths.

Fang Yuan's right fist hovered above the third corpse. Dark red mist seeped from the pores of the three corpses simultaneously. Six tentacles wrapped around Fang Yuan's palm.

A panel pops up.

"Foreign essence blood energy detected. Absorb?"

Yes.

"Absorption complete. Temporary boost points +3. Current temporary boost points: 8."

Fang Yuan flicked his right hand. The icy sensation in his palm seeped through his fingers. His fourfold bone strength crushed the chill within two heartbeat cycles.

The fire is still burning.

The fish oil still had about 45 minutes left to burn. However, the fire had passed its peak from its initial intense phase and was beginning to transition into a more sustained phase. The temperature was dropping—from over 600 degrees Celsius to around 400 degrees Celsius.

enough.

Fang Yuan's doubled divine soul perception swept towards the right side of the front row.

Three signals.

One is already extinguished—the one that was on fire. Its vital energy signals have returned to zero. It died from spontaneous combustion.

Two remain.

Two early-stage Bone Refinement cultivators were huddled in a recessed doorway in the alley wall. The stone frame of the doorway shielded them from most of the heat radiation. However, their condition was extremely poor—their Qi and blood were fluctuating erratically, and the rhythm of their meridian circulation was erratic. The temperature of their skin was at least thirty degrees Celsius higher than normal.

Fang Yuan's body passed through the gap in the central fire wall.

This time, the fire wall was thinner than before—some of the fish oil had been used up. The heat from the crossing also decreased accordingly. Fang Yuan's right sleeve of his short brown robe was not on this time, but the charred section of the left sleeve had rolled up an inch.

Fang Yuan landed in front of the doorway.

The moment the two evil cultivators saw him, the dark red in their eyes suddenly lit up.

It wasn't the will to fight. It was fear.

Fang Yuan's appearance in the firelight—he couldn't see it himself. But he could deduce it from the reflections in the pupils of the two evil cultivators. Half of his gray-blue short brown shirt was burned. Blood was still seeping from a shallow cut above his left ear. The light on his face was extremely uneven—the fire shone up from below. Half of his face was bright orange-red, and the other half was blackened by the alley wall.

The two heretical practitioners did not resist.

It's not that I don't want to. It's that there's no time.