Martial Arts: My talent multiplier increased

He was currently positioned to the right rear of the four Blackrock City scions, about four zhang away from the outermost one—the short one at the far left.

Four zhang. The distance of a two-step sprint.

Fang Yuan adjusted his breathing to the lowest frequency. His heart rate dropped below sixty. Under the control of the fourfold standing meditation, all the muscles in his body entered an extremely contradictory state—every fiber was relaxed to the extreme, but could complete a full-force contraction at any moment within a fraction of a breath.

and so on.

The crashing sound from the bottom of the valley lasted for three breaths.

The fourth breath.

The scarred leader threw a heavy punch. The big man blocked it with his iron arm guards, and the impact slammed his back against the rock wall, sending rocks raining down.

This was the biggest commotion. All four eyes were focused on the head-on clash. The shorter man's body instinctively leaned forward an inch due to the shock of his teammate's punch.

Fang Yuan made his move.

No running start. From a standstill to top speed, two steps.

The precise force exertion under the control of four times the standing posture allowed him to start without any premonition of muscle contraction. The sound of his feet grinding against the ground was drowned out by the echo of the rock wall.

The shorter man didn't react until Fang Yuan was within two feet of him. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end, and his body began to spin—

That's too late.

Fang Yuan's right fist had already arrived.

The first move of the Overlapping Wave Fist. The fist is placed directly on the back of the short man's neck, at the Dazhui acupoint.

There's no martial intent involved. It's unnecessary.

The combined power of four times the standing meditation technique and the full burst of energy from the mid-stage of the Bone Refining Realm, along with the double superposition of physical penetrating force, poured into the fist. The first wave shattered the defense of the superficial muscle group in the neck, and the second wave directly penetrated into the spinal nerve plexus.

The short man's limbs simultaneously lost signal.

His eyes were still open, his pupils focused straight ahead. His mouth was half-open, as if he were about to shout something.

But I couldn't shout it out.

His body went limp. Knees hit the ground first, then shoulders, and finally his head. He slammed onto the gravel with a dull thud.

From the moment Fang Yuan started to the moment the short man fell to the ground, less than a breath and a half had passed.

The remaining three Blackrock City disciples reacted almost simultaneously. Scarface turned his head sharply, his pupils contracting to their limit the instant he saw Fang Yuan.

But his reaction was a beat too slow.

Because the big man moved.

The moment the breach was torn open, the burly man, already covered in blood, lashed out like an enraged bull, launching a furious counterattack. His iron arm guards slammed into the ribs of the nearest Blackrock City disciple.

"Crack!"

A fracture. Extremely crisp, extremely dry.

The man screamed and rolled to his side, clutching his right ribs with both hands, and spun twice on the ground.

Four against one instantly became two against one.

Fang Yuan did not linger in the fight.

After throwing that punch, he didn't pause, didn't look back at the fallen short man, and didn't make eye contact with the remaining three. The force of his right foot pushing off the ground was converted into a horizontal displacement towards the rock wall as he pulled back his fist.

Three steps. Step over the fallen short man, step over the scattered pebbles, and touch the first protrusion at the base of the rock face with your toes.

Climbing.

The four-times-perfect stance training displayed breathtaking precision in that instant. Fang Yuan's ten fingers were like ten iron hooks, each precisely embedded in a crevice the size of a fingertip in the rock face. The support point his toes found on the protrusion was no more than two inches wide, yet his control of his center of gravity allowed his body to move in the vertical plane with the nimbleness of a gecko.

In a single breath, he rose ten feet.

Two breaths. Two zhang (approximately 6.6 meters).

The sounds of metal clashing and muffled groans came from beneath him. The burly man was entangled with the remaining two Blackrock City disciples. Scarface was roaring something, his throat filled with a ferocious, tearing sound. Fang Yuan's spiritual sense caught Scarface's gaze momentarily fixed on the rock wall—on him.

Three breaths. Three and a half zhang.

The scent of the jade vine was so strong it made his nostrils burn. Fang Yuan gripped the edge of the crack with his left hand, his body dangling from the four-zhang-high rock face. His right hand drew a short knife from his waist.

The vines were right in front of me.

Emerald green stems extend from the depths of the cracks, their surfaces covered with a nearly transparent membrane. The leaves refract a flowing turquoise luster under the cool light of the dome, while the roots are embedded in the grayish-white sand in the rock crevices, the sand itself tinged with pale green.

Fang Yuan's knife cut in close to the base of the root.

The short knife was extremely sharp. But the roots were more resilient than expected. The first cut only severed two-thirds of the way. Fang Yuan twisted his wrist, changed the angle, and pulled horizontally along the fiber grain—

"laugh."

broken.

The moment the vine detached from the rock wall, a trace of spiritual energy seeped out from the break and entered Fang Yuan's right palm, which was holding the knife.

It's cold.

It wasn't the warming effect of a medicinal liquid entering the stomach. It was a refreshing coolness that penetrated to the bone. It spread upwards from the palm along the meridians, past the wrist and elbow joints, and dissipated at the shoulder.

But even in that short stretch of transmission, the smoothness of the three meridians in Fang Yuan's arm improved by at least 20% after the coolness swept over them.

Fang Yuan's breathing paused slightly.

The medicinal effects of this stuff far exceeded his estimation when he read the book.

He gathered the jade vine with his left hand and stuffed it into a sealed leather bag close to his body. He pressed the wax seal on the bag's opening with his thumb, sealing it tightly.

Below the rock wall.

The sounds of battle changed dramatically in the few breaths he took to climb.

The burly man seized the opening Fang Yuan had torn open and fought the scarred man head-on for two moves, trading blows and bending the scarred man's left arm at an unnatural angle. But he himself was also in bad shape—the old wound on his right shoulder reopened, and blood gushed out again from under the half-dried scab, soaking the sleeve of his right arm.

The remaining uninjured Blackrock City youth dragged his companion, whose ribs had been fractured by the burly man, back toward the valley entrance.

Scarface, clutching his limp left arm, stared at Fang Yuan as he jumped down from the rock face.

His gaze lingered on Fang Yuan's face for a couple of moments. It was etched into his very being.

Then he spat out a mouthful of blood and turned around.

Three able-bodied men dragged the half-crippled one, and the four of them retreated from the valley floor. As they passed the valley entrance, Fang Qi and Fang Zheng blocked their way on either side, but made no move. The other side showed no intention of fighting, simply dragging the man away.

Scarface turned back one last time as he took his final step out of the valley.

This time, he didn't look at Fang Yuan, but at the short man who hadn't gotten up yet.

The shorter man had regained some sensation. He clawed at the rubble a few times, then shakily pushed himself up from the ground. His neck was crooked—the tremors from his Dazhui acupoint hadn't subsided, and he couldn't rely on precise control of his lower body for the time being.

He staggered and ran after his teammates out of the valley.

The footsteps faded into the distance.

The valley floor was quiet.

Fang Yuan landed on the ground, his knees slightly bent to cushion the impact. The sealed leather bag was pressed against his chest, and he could feel the faint coolness emanating from the vine inside through his clothes.

The burly man, leaning on his knees and bent over, gasped for breath. His breathing was as rough as an ox plowing the field. With each breath, a trickle of blood gushed from the wound on his right shoulder.

He raised his head.

Fang Yuan stood three steps away, his short sword already sheathed at his waist, his face expressionless.

The burly man's eyes rolled over Fang Yuan's entire body, from head to toe, and from toe to head.

Sixteen or seventeen years old. His body hadn't fully developed yet. He was wearing a gray-blue short-sleeved shirt and looked clean and tidy, not like someone who had just ambushed a Bone Refining Realm cultivator.

But that punch just now—

The burly man instinctively recoiled. He hadn't taken the punch, but he'd witnessed the short man's descent. A breath and a half. From lively and energetic to limp and lifeless. No fancy moves, no external bursts of energy. Just one punch, a blow to the back of the neck, and he was gone.

He had been in the mercenary world for five years and had seen at least eighty to a hundred skilled fighters. He could count those who could achieve this level of cleanliness on one hand.

"You—" The big man opened his mouth.