The Favored Son of Heaven

Qin Fen seized dominance in one move. He didn’t go chasing after Butcher. He had ample confidence is this attack of his.

Butcher slowly left the support of the large tree. The dent his back left on the tree was especially conspicuous. He gently shook his two arms, which felt as if they had been stabbed by a thousand needles. The power of the Raging Berserker Tide was like a cloud of locusts. It rushed into his skin and entered his muscles, where it bashed around violently. The power swallowed all the way up to his elbows in an instant.

He infused six-star meteor level power into his arms, quickly dispelling the vile damage caused by the Raging Berserker Tide.

The canteen was incomparably quiet. Several drill instructors, who were used to unexpected situations occurring on the battlefield, were forced to re-evaluate Qin Fen.

How could a four-star warrior defeat a five-star meteor level expert? Qin Fen had actually won this fight! He had been gone for a mere few days, and the might of his ultimate move had actually grown so explosively? He also had that technique of evasion. What in the world was that technique? It was like the Dragon Guard, yet it was also like the Guardian Deity Dance. Could he be fusing two different sets of movement techniques?

The drill instructors looked at each other in dismay. This kid was a four-star martial artist who just graduated from high school. His fundamentals should be insufficient. It should be absolutely impossible for him to fuse and create his own martial arts.

The several drill instructors couldn’t help but turn their attention back on Butcher. They were searching for the possibility that Butcher had thrown the fight, hence creating this outcome to the fight.

However, the drill instructors were disappointed. Butcher was in the middle of giving Qin Fen a thumbs up! Butcher, who was the coldest and most bloodthirsty out of all of them on the battlefield, very rarely praised someone, be it on or off the battlefield. He was also known to be far stricter on the people he taught, yet today he gestured a sign of praise.

Butcher returned in front of Qin Fen. “Not bad, kid. Is that weird movement technique of a new ultimate skill of yours? It’s very powerful! Unfortunately, it has some shortcomings.”

Shortcomings? Qin Fen’s eyes lit up. What he lacked was other people pointing out shortcomings. This way he could use these pointers to make corresponding improvements and adjustments.

“Such a combination attack can only be used as a trump card, and you must do your best not to reveal this to others. Otherwise, this move that you painstakingly researched and allows you to fight those above your level will have its might be greatly reduced.”

Butcher’s summary received the approval of all the other drill instructors. Qin Fen very much agreed with his opinion as well. Trump cards needed to be concealed. They would lose their meaning of existence if everyone under the heavens knew about them.

“How did it feel to kill people?”

Butcher suddenly changed the subject, and Qin Fen couldn’t help but be stunned. He contemplated for a moment before responding, “The life of a person is very frail.”

“Do you like the feeling of killing?”

“I don’t.” Qin Fen shook his head over and over.

“Then how are you overcoming these emotions of dislike?”

Qin Fen’s gaze immediately turned cold. The cruel scene in the abandoned building quickly flashed in his mind. Hints of cold killing intent exuded from his bones. “I don’t look at them as people. I’m just eliminating disease is all.”

“Good!” Butcher shouted loudly. He raised his thumb up high in a thumbs up. His eyes were filled with a pleased expression. “I don’t want to nurture a crazy murderer who loves to kill. Your answer is an extremely good one. At the same time, you have ample awareness and calmness. Your strength and wisdom both pass the test. You can learn my Heart Excising Hand.”

The Heart Excising Hand was one of Butcher’s ultimate skills for killing people.

After just seeing it once, Qin Fen deeply understood the terror of its power.

Just by possessing this sort of skill, Butcher was a highly efficient killing machine even without using any weapons.

Qin Fen had gone through deep contemplation after the first experience of attempting to surround and annihilate Sajad. If Qin Fen had possessed the Heart Excising Hand skill back then, he would have been able to complete the mission on the first try. He wouldn’t have needed to snipe him later on at the concert.

In an enclosed room.

Butcher raised his right hand at Qin Fen. “You will probably feel a bit of pain the first time you train in the Heart Excising Hand. So you need to be mentally prepared. Right now I will execute the move in slow motion and let you see clearly just what in the world is the Heart Excising Hand.”

Qin Fen raised his mental concentration to twelve, and the muscles beneath Butcher’s skin began to slowly squirm. It was as if there were over a thousand insects entangled beneath Butcher’s skin. The bones of his hand twisted and locked, letting out the sound of bones clashing without end. The sound of it alone was able to make one’s scalp go numb.

Butcher’s eyes flashed with excitement. “See it yet? It’s purely muscle control. Compress the muscle, and continue compressing them! This step must be taken before using true energy, which shouldn’t have any relationship at all. Then….”

The blue veins on Butcher’s palm began to move. This was a transformation spurred by true energy. Worm-like veins tightly bound the compressed muscle one by one, engaging in a second round of compression.

Qin Fen finally understood now. He understood why Butcher had long ago said that the Heart Excising Hand was a transformation technique that first harms the user before killing an enemy.

This sort of method of compressing muscles, bones and joints possessed the marvels of different methods leading to the same result with the Origin Compressing Art. It was just that the Origin Compressing Art pressurized true energy. One only needed to implant the true energy compressing device into one’s body, as well as a regulator device with extremely high precision, and one wouldn’t feel pain at all with the entire process.

This sort of external compression was done without any aid of technology! It completely relied on a person’s sole body. It was like being pressed by a thousand-pound rock, forcefully compressing the bones. The transformation of the flesh wasn’t comfortable at all.

“Now that you know the theory, I’m going to explain the circumstances required to execute this skill.” Butcher’s palm restored to that of a normal person’s. “It isn’t as easy as it looks to control the muscles of the body. Talent is needed for this. If this weren’t the case, then Squad Leader Hao and the others wouldn’t have found it impossible to use the Heart Excising Hand all the way to this day….”

The other drill instructors, who sat to the side, could only nod. Everyone had good relationships with each other. They would often exchange all sorts of ultimate skills, but these ultimate skills really required talent.

The Heart Excising Hand was one of them.

Such a skill possessed extremely high requirements for one’s muscular control. Not any average Joe Schmoe could learn it. Muscles can be stretched taut when exerting force, but it was a totally different realm to do compress muscle to the point of changing shape. This was like how some people could control the movements of their ears and how others couldn’t control their ears at all.

Before the drill instructors could finish nodding their heads, the room rang with the sounds of bones popping.

Under these circumstances where Butcher had yet to guide Qin Fen in how to engage in the transformation, Qin Fen copied Butcher’s actions. His hand slowly changed shape, and the muscles around the bones of his palm slowly wriggled.

Butcher didn’t say anything, and the other drill instructors were all stupefied just by watching.

The same voice rang in everyone’s minds. “This fellow really is Qin Zhan’s little brother! The older brother is peerless and breathtaking, and the little brother is in no way lacking. Wait, that’s wrong! The kid may even be more freakish than his older brother!”

Qin Fen’s expression was just as rich ass the others’. He furtively glanced at Butcher as he diligently trained in the Heart Excising Hand. He admired secretly from his heart. This is way more than just a bit of pain. This level of pain was the same as placing one’s hands under the tires of a car, then having the car crush them, right? No! The sensation of being crushed by a car lasts only a second, this pain is the same as being crushed over and over again.

Twenty-one minutes passed, and Qin Fen completed the final stage of the Heart Excising Hand. He was much slower than Butcher, who could complete it instantaneously. It wasn’t even a matter of seconds.

Twenty-one minutes of torture. Even with his strong endurance, Qin Fen’s forehead was covered with glistening sweat. It was the sweat of pain!

The drill instructors’ shock was greater than Qin Fen’s pain. They originally thought that Qin Fen would get near the completed form of the Heart Excising Hand, which was already quite amazing enough. They never thought that Qin Fen could actually iron out all the dozen or so mistakes he made to become the perfect form of the Heart Excising Hand.

Butcher’s shock was greater than everyone else’s. He had researched and developed this ultimate skill for an entire year before completing it, yet it was copied by a child in an instant.

He didn’t know whether to be proud to have such a great apprentice or to be frustrated by the fact that a year’s worth of blood, sweat, and tears had been instantly copied by someone else.

Qin Fen dispersed the Heart Excising Hand. He shook his wrist over and over without end. His five fingers clenched and spread apart. The pain had truly been far too much!

“Great. Excellent.” Butcher clapped his hand gently. “Then all I need to do is demonstrate how to use this technique to kill.”

Butcher arrived before two sandbags that hung from the ceiling. He raised an arm quite casually, walked past a sandbag, and a metal ball the size of a human heart appeared in his hands.

It was only until he was five steps away from the sandbag did the sandbag make a puffing sound. Gold colored sand slowly and endlessly flowed out from it.

Butcher pointed at the remaining sandbag. “There’s a metal ball inside this one too. Get it out from there.”

Qin Fen lacked the ability to be like Butcher, able to idly talk and instantly complete the Heart Excising Hand as he walked. Qin Fen had to stand in place to form the Heart Excising Hand.

This time it took him merely seven minutes, and Qin Fen walked toward the sandbag with the completed Heart Excising Hand.

Bam…

Golden sand flowed out from within, and Qin Fen held a metal ball within his hand as he pulled his hand out from the sandbag.

“Take some time to reflect and think about it.”

Butcher patted Qin Fen on the shoulder, and the drill instructors left the room together.

Qin Fen sat quietly on the ground. He raised his head to look at the two sandbags, which continued to have sand flow out of them.

The move was the same, the Heart Excising Hand, but why was there such a big difference when excising the hearts? Qin Fen propped his chin up with one hand and smiled. He faintly said, “It looks like the true completed state of the Heart Excising Hand doesn’t lie in its formation but rather when one reaches the stage of being able to steal an opponent’s heart without making a sound nor causing even a drop of blood to come out.”

Qin Fen spent his entire afternoon in silence in the secret room. He had tried a few experiments with the open sandbags, and his results were getting much better than before. However, he was still incapable of executing the skill as perfectly as Butcher.

“What remains should be purely skill and proficiency.” Qin Fen faced the two sandbags, which were riddled with holes, and spoke to himself. “I’ll ask Butcher to teach me some more tomorrow. I should be able to get it perfect for reals when that happens.”

As he pushed open the door and walked out, his cellphone rang out in a series of text message notifications. A dozen texts came before the cellphone quieted.

It was only now that Qin Fen discovered something about the training room he was just it. It was built with special materials that blocked off all communications.

“Hurry up and come back, Old Qin!”

“Hurry up, Old Qin! Dragon Hall is about to be annihilated!”

“Hurry up, man! This time it isn’t a sect-challenge. It’s a sect-annihilation! We’re really screwed if that happens!”

“Hurry up! Any slower, and you will need to reapply for a sect.”

Sect-challenge? Sect-annihilation? Qin Fen looked at the texts and suddenly realized that he really didn’t know as much as he thought about the Sky Battle Net.