Lin Songmei, Yan Mingqing, and Wang Taigang could only use one word to describe Han Youhong’s moveset and memory: freakish.

Chaining together a series of moves that seemed straight out of a video game, Youhong ended off his short combo with a new matrix of lacerations on the ground. With flashing crescent slashes, blades appearing from more angles than what seemed possible, and a perpetual haze that obscured the opponent’s vision, Songmei was again... feeling like it was a little unfair.

“I’m not going to detail every single one of my moves,” Youhong shrugged, giving a light wave, “That’d just take too long, because I think by now I’m somewhere into the forties in terms of number of moves.”

Doing some stretches, Youhong went on to explain that “I’ll just show you all the most important moves. The ones that were iterated upon for my own self-made moves.”

Closing his eyes, Youhong’s body flickered, appearing in a new position a short distance from his original distance. “So this is one of my most foundational techniques. When choosing to cultivate the Yin-Blessed Crescent Moon Art, Flickering Phase Change. From its name, it’s pretty easy to tell what type of technique it is. It’s just a short range teleport. Because it bends through space though, it’s got a monster Qi usage rate.”

Snapping his fingers and appearing in different places every time, Youhong shrugged, “What makes it usable, I guess, though, is that the more times I chain it, the less Qi it takes. That, along with my naturally large amount of Qi reserves makes it a technique worth cultivating upon.”

So... What Songmei gathered was that Youhong could just... teleport. Very fair. Very, very fair. Totally.

She was just over here shooting little arrows!! Tink, tink, hear that? That was the sound of her arrows bouncing off of literally everything!

“Because of the unpredictability that the teleport provides, when I combine it with my body enhancement technique, my attack style becomes one of the harder ones to anticipate and react to.” Youhong articulated, swinging his blades around. “My body enhancement technique, Lunar Grace, although not as broken as Mingqing’s or Taigang’s, is still pretty good. There isn’t much of a strength enhancement, but because of that, there’s a gargantuan speed enhancement.”

Flitting around the training area, Youhong was fast enough to the point that an onlooker might think they were seeing things or having a hallucinatory episode. Almost being afterimages, Songmei thought maybe they could be called after-mushrooms or something.

“Alright, now for my main fighting techniques, there’s just Descent of the Full Moon, Crescent Slash, Allure of the Night, and Midnight’s End.” Youhong listed, pausing his chain of teleports, his hair coming to a blowing stop—like a true movie protagonist if Songmei had to say so herself. “I’ll just demonstrate them one by one, since it's harder to describe it using words than just showing you all.”

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

Taking a deep breath, Youhong first teleported once, appearing in the air this time, his legs bent, chainblades crossed in front of him. As his hands infused Qi into his blades, Youhong let out a sharp exhale as an array of Qi slices began to appear in front of him, all silvery-white with a touch of yellow.

Each slash adding to the next, the array was completed in what barely felt like a second, becoming a seamless white moon in front of Youhong, one that was then blasted forward, leaving a circle of scars in the ground before him.

Another teleport later, Youhong then twirled his chainblades around him, letting out a storm of long Qi slashes that flew forward in the shape of crescents, smashing, then disappearing against the far wall.

Appearing again in a different area, Youhong threw his blades forward, curling their arcs with his Qi to wrap around an invisible target a decent distance away. Yanking the chain back towards himself, the blades then shot back to him, dragging the poor... air with them, before he caught the blades and teleported away again.

Now in the center of the training area, Youhong channeled an ungodly amount of Qi into his blades, slashing in them in an X-shape before using the momentum to throw himself into some-sort of body twist or somersault to then bring the blades together and throw them both down in a straight line, sinking firm into the ground.

A little breathless after the demonstration, the six-pointed star Qi star that remained after the last attack dissipated into small star-like sparkles as Mingqing, Songmei, and Taigang all let out some claps.

“To give some explanation now,” Youhong gasped for breath, supporting himself on his knees as his chainblades sat in the ground, “I did them in the order that I first listed them, so first it was Descent of the Full Moon. This and the last one, Midnight’s End, are both different finishers. Descent of the Full Moon usually works better against non-humanoid, larger things, while Midnight’s End is definitely one against Humans. All of my attacks are infused with my Qi, that’s why for the most part they seem like energy blasts and actually stay in the air for a while.”

Youhong, needing to pull his blades out of the ground, explained, “Descent of the Full Moon, when completed in the air, looks like a... a full moon. I don’t know why I just said that, but after it gets blasted forward, it then expands, and the slashes separate again.”

Storing his ornate chainblades away, Youhong’s hands were then filled once more with lychee jelly as he walked back over. “Crescent slash is a ranged attack. It’s also an instant activation attack unlike the finishers that I can just keep using until I burn through all my Qi if need be. Allure of the Night, on the other hand, is a ranged attack that just pulls my opponent in. Any questions?”

Songmei was just... impressed. If her jaw wasn’t connected to her with ligaments and tendons, songmei was sure that her jaw would’ve been on the ground by now.

“How... Did you lose against One-Technique-Taigang?” Mingqing asked, her eyebrows raised as bewilderment seeped into her question.

With both Taigang and Youhong choking and coughing after Mingqing stabbed them both, Songmei looked away, covering her mouth with her hand and letting out a quiet “Ohhh... damn...”

Taigang, out of the two of them though, recovered faster, shaking his head, having nothing to say. “It’s true, as of now, I really do only have one unique technique, my Sun’s Blessing. Well, that, along with a body enhancement technique.”

“Well, for me...” Youhong sighed, taking a seat, “My techniques, though they are really flashy and seem to cover all the bases, have a weakness against pure brute force, which happens to be what Taigang has. His sheer amount of Qi in his punches just blasts through my techniques, so there isn’t too much I can do against him. Anyway, just because of that, I’ll choose you to go now, Mingqing.”