The setting moon rose. The sea gradually receded toward the silver sands, where a few figures busied themselves quickly.

Qin Fen held a can of beer, sitting casually on the soft beach. One hand braced behind him against the sand. Gusts of sea breeze gently stirred his increasingly long black hair across his forehead.

Xue Tian was meticulously wiping a Iai-giri sword he seemed to have procured from nowhere. The frigid blade reflected the moonlight, enhancing its edge, which was sharper than any man’s. His hand moved slowly, inch by inch, along the steel, synchronized with the rhythm of the rising and falling tide.

Ji Zhen Xuanyi secretly watched his master, Qin Fen, with profound admiration. In the sparring session held not long ago, everyone except Xue Tian, Lin Ling, Chen Feiyu, and Du Peng had been defeated in a single move.

Splash.

A sudden spray of water erupted from the calm sea surface. The Little Dragon King, Yang Lie, shot out like a submerged serpent, letting loose a long cry that shook off large quantities of seawater before plunging back into the ocean, sending massive plumes scattering.

As if in response to Yang Lie’s roar, a small patch of the sea abruptly split in two. A powerful sword energy sliced through the water from beneath the depths, carrying the imposing force of a blade cleaving the heavens. Brooks also leaped clear of the water, emitting a clear, ringing cry of his own.

Nine slender columns of water burst forth on the surface. Caesar emerged, hands clasped behind his back like an emperor breaking through the waves. His shout was in no way inferior to the previous two.

Ji Zhen Xuanyi’s eyes sparkled with envy as he watched one young martial artist after another break free from the sea. Judging by their distance from the shore, Caesar had started the furthest out, naturally indicating a superior level of strength.

Du Peng broke the waves, his face ashen and grim, saying nothing. Though this emergence from the water didn't definitively declare who was the strongest fighter among them, it clearly revealed the foundation of each individual’s power.

The Great Emperor Caesar, Heaven-Splitter Brooks, Little Dragon Yang Lie, and Solomon—these four young warriors were all further from the coast than Du Peng.

Xing Wuyi glanced at Du Peng floating on the sea and sighed softly. The younger brother of Young Master Du was an immense pressure upon him. Rumors suggested Du Peng had trained the most ferociously these past few days; to call it a life-or-death struggle wouldn't be an exaggeration.

Qin Fen’s medicine. Young Master Du’s achievements. Xing Wuyi wiped the water from his face, tilted his head back to gaze at the stars overhead, shook it slightly, and said nothing more.

At this moment, Xing Wuyi needed no words, and Du Peng needed no consolation. Excessive comfort, like harsh criticism, could push a person over the edge.

Du Peng was the last to reach the shore. It was impossible to distinguish on his cheek whether the moisture was seawater or tears. Only the continuous, violent heaving of his chest betrayed his inner turmoil.

Having inherited the legacy of his genius older brother and obtained a rare spiritual medicine, he still could not surpass the other young warriors of his generation. A profound sense of defeat slowly swelled within his chest, and his clenched fists unknowingly ground the sand and pebbles into dust.

The young warriors reached the shore but did not immediately settle into meditation. Instead, they grabbed cans of beer from a box beside Qin Fen, popped them open, and drank leisurely, showing no sign of preparing to leave.

Qin Fen looked at the box beside him, then at the few young warriors taking beers. He said calmly, "Five coins each. Settle up later."

Yang Lie swung the beer in his hand and tutted, "Expensive. Qin Fen, if you went into commerce, you’d certainly be a tycoon."

The other young fighters nodded in agreement. Soon, another person reached into the box and took a can. Lin Liqiang took the lead, raising his beer high. "To the fate that brought us together—cheers!"

"To the fate that brought us together—cheers!"

A dozen hearty voices echoed across the beach. The metal cans clinked together, and white foam spurted from the rims.

The beer was downed in one swallow. They placed the empty cans back into the box and immediately opened a second round.

Xue Tian raised his beer and shouted loudly, "To our dreams—cheers!"

"Dreams—cheers!"

The moonlight, the beach, the ocean, and friendship. This scene ignited the fiery passion within the young men. They banged their cans wildly, roaring in excitement, and sent another can down their throats.

Qin Fen gazed at the group of open, laughing faces, a faint warmth appearing on his own. If he looked back on this scene ten years later, wouldn’t it still be this captivating?

Ji Zhen Xuanyi watched Qin Fen curiously. Why hadn't everyone left yet? They all seemed to be waiting for something. This very anticipation only intensified their shared enthusiasm.

Could it be Hades, the Little King of the Underworld? A flash of insight struck Ji Zhen Xuanyi, and his expression grew even more astonished. Tonight was the decisive battle between Hades and his master? Yes, it had to be. To witness the battle of the peak generation from that era would be a great fortune in life. No wonder their spirits were so high.

Shhh. Shhh.

Under the dark night sky, new figures appeared on the sand. Hades, the Little King of the Underworld, wore a purple martial arts uniform today. His jade-like features held an added luster, and confidence slowly radiated from within him, instantly bestowing an indescribable composure upon anyone who looked at him.

The sea breeze whipped Hades’ uniform, making it rustle. He stood there, saying nothing, making no move, as if he were a tourist admiring the seaside night view.

Not far away, the young police officers, who had kept their distance until now, swallowed nervously. Yu Xiao whispered to the person beside him, "Why aren't they fighting yet?"

"Oh, they’ll fight. Of course, they will," Xue Tian blew across his blade, feeling the faint vibration return through the steel, and smiled indifferently. "They’re all waiting for someone. Waiting for the same person. Ah? He’s here."

Xue Tian’s eyebrows twitched slightly as he looked toward the deep expanse of the sea sky.

The sky? Ji Zhen Xuanyi paused. Was someone flying in to watch the fight?

"This is..."

He stared blankly at the man and woman floating high in the sky, observing the crowd on the beach. The man, looking to be in his early forties, had his arm lightly looped around the girl’s waist.

Wukong Shu (Martial Arts of Sky Walking). A state of complete qualitative change in martial arts, according to legend. If the transformation from 'Blood Renewal' to 'True Innate' and then to a Nine-Star Warrior involved massive qualitative shifts, then the Wukong Shu practitioner represented an even deeper alteration.

"Qin Fen."

Song Jia’s eyes, like autumn water, shimmered with a delicate pathos. Her hands were clasped together; her lips squeezed out a sweet, bitter smile.

Qin Fen set down the empty beer can he had finished. With a burst of Zhenqi, he vibrated the alcohol out through his pores. The 'Blood Renewal and True Innate' stage greatly surpassed his previous level of bodily purification. Even the slightest impurity in his blood could be instantly detected and swiftly expelled.

"Old Qin~~" Xue Tian called out deliberately loudly, "Fight well in front of your future father-in-law!"

"No problem."

"Hmph."

"Qin Fen, you can only lose to me!"

"Qin Fen, the one who beats you will be me. Don’t lose here."

The dozen or so young men were certainly not intoxicated by the small amount of beer, but they held an unyielding sense of pride. They knew of the words spoken by the Qilin, yet none of them challenged Qin Fen because of Song Jia.

It wasn't that they feared losing the fight; it was that they felt Qin Fen was right. If Qin Fen were seriously injured someday and temporarily unable to accept challenges, and someone tried to take advantage by challenging him, Yang Lie and the others would not hesitate to strike those opportunists down first.

Stance. The young men had their own positions. They chose to stand with Qin Fen, even if it meant facing Song Wendong, the rumored Qilin.

"Indeed, you have achieved new progress. Very good. Excellent."

Hades’ handsome face held a faint smile, and he nodded repeatedly, displaying the measured praise of an elder watching a junior improve.

Qin Fen’s gaze swept over Hades: "You too have made progress. Thank you." Thank you? Hades paused for a fraction of a second, but his smile quickly masked the brief hesitation. He was extremely sharp; Qin Fen's 'thank you' implied that after defeating him, the swarm of young warriors would stop buzzing around him like flies, allowing him to live a more comfortable life.

"I am not someone easily defeated," Hades declared, proudly lifting his chin. "You should indeed be grateful for having this opportunity."

"Talking nonsense is pointless. Let's start the fight," Qin Fen said.

Qin Fen clenched his fists. The Dragon-Elephant Prajna Art's Zhenqi surged through his body, causing his bones to crackle audibly as he naturally shook himself. He drew a breath of Dantian air up to his throat and let out a long roar towards the sky.

This roar was not fleeting; it seemed endless. An unparalleled aura erupted from Qin Fen along with the sound. The sand within the area centered on him vibrated gently, shaken by the vastness of his shout.

The tide, which had been receding, seemed to retreat even further in response to this single cry.

Drawing power from the dramatic ebb tide, Qin Fen’s aura surged up another level. Even before the battle formally began, he stood like a divine figure, his punches and kicks imbued with an inexpressible weight.

Song Jia’s expression shifted subtly. In three months, Qin Fen’s strength had advanced to such a degree; his entire being now radiated an inherent, massive presence—an aura suggesting he was about to sweep across the world.

After a brief shock, a confident smile touched Song Jia’s lips. Seeing Qin Fen’s strength and bearing now, she felt certain he wouldn't lose even to Hades, the Little King of the Underworld.

"Don't smile yet," Song Zhenting’s voice murmured near Jia’s ear. "Watch Hades make his first move."

Qin Fen’s world-splitting, wave-breaking roar made the heart of the Six-Star pinnacle expert Ji Zhen Xuanyi tighten inexplicably; he watched Qin Fen with wide-eyed astonishment and admiration. The roar caused the twenty-odd young police officers’ ears to ring painfully, leaving their heads buzzing and hazy.

Hades’ eyes gained a few more degrees of a smile, but no other reaction of surprise or distress showed. He waited until Qin Fen’s roar reached its peak after half a minute, then suddenly stepped forward.

One step. Hades’ entire demeanor shifted. His smiling face turned cold as iron. His skin and muscles tightened simultaneously, as if scalding metal had met an extreme chill and instantly solidified. Dots of starlight flickered across various points on his skin—the unique sheen that appeared only when Shining Stars technique was pushed to the eleven-star limit.

"Qin Fen, is a Heavenly Pride something you can simply marry?"

Hades let out an arrogant laugh, then fell silent, causing the surrounding temperature to drop another degree.

As he sealed his lips, Hades thrust one leg into the sand, sinking his body like a compressed spring before suddenly thrusting his chest out, shooting forward like an arrow across the sand. Where his toe touched, it left another slight dimple. In the blink of an eye, the distance of a hundred meters was erased by his movement speed, which surpassed even a drawn bow.

Tui Jue (Leg Absolute)—a peerless leg technique created by the White Tiger. Applied to movement, it was as fast as lightning. The sand disturbed by Hades' initial foot impact had barely settled when he was already before Qin Fen. Hades struck with a [Tui Jue] attack, appearing before Qin Fen like a thunderbolt, less than two meters away. The muscles of his palm writhed like blades, thrusting out in what was clearly a Butcher’s Heart-Plucking Hand, aimed directly at Qin Fen’s throat.

This strike was devoid of complex variations; it was a sudden ambush, like an ancient general charging across a thousand miles of battlefield to take the enemy commander’s head. Hades’ palm thrust was aimed squarely at Qin Fen’s throat.

The unique explosive power of the White Tiger’s Tui Jue meant the impact force was naturally extraordinary. This charge was so fast that even in Ji Zhen Xuanyi’s eyes, it left a series of afterimages, his brain unable to register any reaction.

What drew the most praise was Hades’ footwork. Such a powerful movement created not boundless, tyrannical storms, but rather, all his aura was contained, forming a great blade around him. This killing intent violently tore through the aura Qin Fen had elevated with his shout, instantly manifesting Hades’ martial path: the Way of Slaughter, smashing gods and killing devils. As his palm (ci, stabbed) out with the Heart-Plucking Hand, the air hissed repeatedly, and the fine hairs on one's body felt like cold arrows being shot forth.

Hades' palm strike seemed capable of decapitating Qin Fen without even truly touching his neck. The "hissing" sound of displaced air alone felt enough to pierce Qin Fen into a sieve.

Fierce.

Song Jia sucked a mouthful of icy sea air into her lungs. Hades was even more ferocious than the rumors suggested. Even outstanding figures from the previous generation, at Hades' age, likely couldn't withstand this fatal palm strike.

Song Zhenting was less surprised than Song Jia. He watched the decisive battle on the sand with great interest.

Facing the killing-god, demon-slaying thrust from Hades, Qin Fen finally reacted.

The roar cut off. Qin Fen pressed his waist and stance slightly, retracting his neck sharply backward. His waist and abdomen suddenly pivoted half a chi to the right, perfectly evading the earth-splitting thrust. Simultaneously, his shoulder twitched, and his right hand shot out like a flicking knife; the muscles of his five fingers had already tensed. It was also the Butcher’s Heart-Plucking Hand, appearing like a venomous snake striking Hades’ ribs—a counterattack.

Qin Fen's retaliation was not the rigid, dominant attack of the past, but rather the killing martial path identical to Hades’ own. However, this killing path held an added layer of insidious malice.

If one observed carefully, this strike was so sinister it bordered on the vulgar. He held a hidden follow-up: if the ribs were missed, he could use his body's turn to snake toward Hades' vulnerable posterior.

No matter how perfectly one practiced the Golden Absolute body protection technique, it was hard to believe one could train the spot used for excretion—that incredibly soft area. Even if trained, that location was far more difficult to strengthen than other parts of the body.

The Buttocks-Plucking Hand. This infamous move, attributed to the King of Vulgarity, had been used once by Qin Fen during a dream battle with him.

Qin Fen did not open with the heavy martial arts; instead, he employed the same path of slaughter as Hades, infused with an extreme level of vulgarity. This caused all the martial artists present to freeze momentarily.

Even Song Zhenting, the martial arts master suspended in the air, couldn't help but raise an eyebrow, his gaze tinged with surprise. Qin Fen’s sudden shift in fighting style felt utterly natural, as if this had always been his method. Furthermore, it carried an ineffable vulgarity. How could this person fuse such disparate martial ways?

Martial ways were not merely pre-built highways for practitioners to follow. When a martial artist reached a crossroads in their path, they usually required the guidance of a specific discipline.

Some geniuses could explore paths of their own making, but even the greatest genius could not simultaneously explore more than three distinct martial paths.

As Hades launched his palm strike, his entire mental state reached a level rarely achieved; the blood in his body boiled with chilling killing intent, and every cell was eager to take Qin Fen’s life. Unless he killed the Qin Fen before him, even victory would fail to quell the murderous intent in his heart, which would surely become a future impediment to his martial advancement.

However, this intense killing intent at that moment became a powerful propellant for him to unleash his full strength.

In the battle against Death’s Harbinger, Hades had advanced another step on his martial path, but for him, it wasn't enough, as that fight hadn't pushed him into the Twelve-Star realm.

The pressure from Death’s Harbinger was far from sufficient. He also needed a breakthrough, to advance to the Twelve-Star level and shout out to the martial artists of the world: Hades, the Little King of the Underworld, was the foremost young expert of this age. Shangguan Legend was no longer qualified to share fame with him.

He needed to break through, to become the second miracle after the rumored Azure Dragon.

The legend of each generation could only belong to one. If Shangguan became the miracle, what was he?

Qin Fen executed the vulgar King’s move, the Monkey King Plucks the Chrysanthemum. Its speed was like a shooting star across the moon. His five fingers shot out and pressed, as if intending to tear apart time and space itself.

Even a strong Eleven-Star warrior would be severely wounded, if not killed outright, by this strike. An ordinary Eleven-Star warrior would perish instantly, one hundred percent.

Hades’ eyes held only excitement, devoid of fear or surprise. At this critical juncture, he didn't have time to marvel at Qin Fen’s familiar path of slaughter. He didn't even bother to dodge. His other hand shot out like a rocket fired from the earth, or perhaps like a mantis after the oriole—his sharp five fingers formed a Crane Hand, pecking directly at Qin Fen’s attacking wrist.

In the blink of an eye, Hades’ five fingers morphed into a crane’s beak, attempting to pierce the belly of the venomous snake with its sharp rostrum.

"A fine Tiger-Crane Duplex, learning the superior fist technique! He hasn’t forgotten these ancient fist styles, which could be bought for mere pennies, integrating them all into his own Dao. Hades certainly has substance."

At the hair's breadth of impact, Qin Fen inwardly praised Hades. His arm shifted rapidly in response. His entire arm became soft, seemingly boneless. His five fingers separated suddenly, like a venomous snake coiling around the crane's leg, simultaneously opening to show its fangs, biting toward the crane's wrist—aiming straight for Hades’ Crane Hand wrist.

The Phoenix’s ultimate skill: Snake Bite Sword.