Chapter 225 - Hei vs. Feng Chen
With Long Tian's victory, the quarter-finals of the tournament also ended. The four semi-finalists had been decided: Feng Chen, Hei, Long Tian, and Lian.
“Today's matches end here. We look forward to seeing you tomorrow for the semifinals that will decide the two finalists who will compete for the final and first place."
Song Yazhu proclaimed the end of that day. As the tournament progressed, the number of matches would decrease, which also meant that the overall duration of the daily event decreased. While it was a shame for the spectators, who would have liked to see more fights, they could do nothing about it.
After all, it was a knockout tournament and not a scoring one as it had been for the preliminary rounds. Nevertheless, considering the fighters' quality, it was appropriate to proceed in this way. Otherwise, a serious injury would have decreed one’s own defeat in the tournament.
By doing so, the fighters had the opportunity to have a full day to heal themselves and regain their strength and prepare the battle plan for the next fight. Furthermore, the direct elimination forced the participants to use all their power rather than using a force-saving strategy to aim for the highest number of wins.
Quality instead of quantity. This was the essence of the tournament and the main reason behind the knockout.
*
Hei and Lian's room
At the time, Hei was conscious again, although in pain. Mia and Lilian were still healing his body, barely taking a break from time to time to regain their strength. In the meantime, while he was being medicated, Hei was examining the record of the fight between Feng Chen and He Fen.
'Feng Chen's strong point is his flames and his analytical and planning skills. The core of his attack patterns is his sword. If I can block it, I can gain the advantage in close combat. After all, the Spider Style and the Snake Style managed to overwhelm even Hu Jie. Feng Chen is not superior to Hu Jie in that aspect. So if I can disarm him, I can get the upper hand.’
Hei was constantly watching the record for clues to help him design an effective battle plan. Then again, Feng Chen was a completely different opponent from Hu Jie. The techniques he used today could be useless the next day or not very effective. After all, considering his analytical skills, it was safe to assume that Feng Chen would be well prepared to counter Hei's techniques.
'Against Hu Jie, I practically revealed almost all my techniques, especially those with the Poison Law. So, I cannot hope to catch Feng Chen off guard based on my usual battle style; I have to come up with an alternative, or I'll end up losing this fight.'
Hei possessed two Laws: the Poison Law and the Darkness Law.
The Poison Law came from his bloodline and was the one he mostly used. It was also the one at which he was most adept, given the passive and active enhancement resulting from the bloodline over the law itself.
On the other hand, the Darkness Law was the one he had inherently awakened when he reached the sixth stage of the spirit apprentice rank. Usually, Hei used it as a support or diversion since it had lower attack power than the Poison Law due to his poison-type bloodline.
'I don't know pure offensive techniques of the Darkness Law. But even if I knew them, they wouldn't be on the same level as Feng Chen's flames. Therefore, I must give the decisive blow with the Poison Law. But to do that, I have to get close, and I doubt I can do it unscathed. At the very least, I must be able to withstand Feng Chen's flames for an extended period. At least the time to weaken him and then close the fight.'
Close to Hei, Lian was contemplating about her match as well. Her opponent was Long Tian, one of the Imperial Princes and one of the likely victors. If Hei had reduced himself in that state to beat Hu Jie, she too would have to have the same resolution if she wanted to beat Long Tian.
The two, who were the only ones left in the tournament from their group, spent the day in silence, preparing for the semifinals. Ye and Xing sat next to them without disturbing them: they knew it was essential for Hei and Lian to be well prepared and wanted them to reach their peak conditions for their matches.
In addition to them, the group's four support martial artists stayed all night to heal Hei's wounds. As a result, they spent the night without sleep, but they could be considered satisfied with their work at dawn.
“How's your back? How do you feel it?" Lilian asked in a hoarse voice. She had deep dark circles, and her eyes were red from lack of sleep.
"It’s okay. I don't feel any discomfort." Hei said while he bent his back in multiple directions to see the intensity of movement he could do without feeling pain.
"Good. It means that the treatment was successful. But remember: you aren’t 100% healed. What we did was force the spine bones together. You will need time for them to bond naturally. So, you must avoid extreme movements with your back, or you could end up in worse conditions than you were in before." Lilian warned in a serious voice.
"I understand. I'll be careful," Hei answered as he finished examining his condition. He then told his companions who were with him, “It's time. Let’s go."
*
“Welcome, everyone. Today is the day of the semi-finals of the tournament. The first fight of the day will see Hei vs. Feng Chen. I ask the two fighters to go on stage." Song Yazhu quickly started the day, announcing the first of two matches.
Hearing their names, Hei and Feng Chen stepped forward without hesitation. The two advanced down the corridor that led them to the fighting stage side by side. However, there was one unusual thing: Hei was walking on all fours instead of walking upright.
Seeing this, the onlookers immediately thought that Hei's wound didn't completely heal. And as a result, their hopes of witnessing an even match dwindled. After all, Hei had fought mostly upright.
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For this reason, although they had seen Hei's run on all fours before, viewers didn't think he had the same chance of winning as before. After all, running on all fours limited Hei in attack patterns as he couldn’t use his arms, which was his main source of attacks.
"Is your back not healed yet?" Feng Chen asked as he observed Hei. However, Hei didn’t answer but just looked intently into his opponent’s eyes without revealing anything.
"Let the fight begin!" Song Yazhu started the fight right after Hei and Feng Chen took their position on the battle stage.
Whoosh!
As soon as Song Yazhu gave the go-ahead, Feng Chen sprinted forward, activating his spirit power instantly. His sword was still inside its scabbard, but Feng Chen's hands were on the hilt of the sword, ready to pull it out.
"Flaming Iai!"
The sword was swiftly removed from its scabbard, releasing fiery red flames and slashed horizontally against Hei.
Slash!
Despite Feng Chen's sprint and drawing speed, his sword only cut through the air. Hei had dodged the attack with a quick lateral movement using his four limbs to move.
Peng!
At the same moment he moved, Hei pulled his spear from his space ring and, in a fluid motion, his hair took hold of the weapon to direct it at Feng Chen. But Feng Chen had followed Hei's movements with his eyes and parried Hei's attack, deflecting the purple spear away from him.
Whoosh!
As soon as he deflected the spear, Feng Chen sprinted sideways away from Hei's hair and then readjusted his trajectory towards where Hei was.
'Hei is capable of handling multiple strands of hair at the same time. So even though his hair is currently holding the spear, I must be careful not to get trapped. From what I've seen, the most dangerous part is the end of her hair. Therefore, the closer I get, the less I will have to fear your hair. And with your arms busy moving your body, I don't have to worry about your superiority in close combat.'
Slash!
The flaming sword rose high to descend to the ground violently. However, exactly as before, the sword cut through the air rather than meet its target. Nonetheless, Feng Chen had already foreseen it.
Whoosh!
As Hei moved to dodge the sword, Feng Chen abruptly stopped the movement of his sword and moved in the same direction as Hei, planting himself right in front of the latter.
'Since I can’t use my hands, do you want to aim for a close combat match to minimize the danger of my hair?' Hei thought as his eyes met those of his opponent. Soon after, he moved once more, recalling his spear through his hair. However, Feng Chen was still following him.
Peng!
The recalled spear attacked Feng Chen from behind, who deflected it once more using his sword without taking his eyes off Hei and staying as close to him as possible.
'If that's how you want to do it, then so be it.'
As soon as Hei realized that he couldn’t shake Feng Chen off with his current speed, he decided to use the full power of Spider Run, Four Legged Mode, maximizing his speed.
'As I thought. This is his true speed. Even with my movement technique, I am unable to keep up with him. But I wonder how long you can run at such a pace.'
'Four-legged mode is faster than Two-legged mode, but it's also the one that consumes the most energy, especially if I decide to go all out. I have to speed up the plan.'
Peng!
As if it were another limb, Hei's hair pounced on Feng Chen, holding the spear. The latter had stopped running and stood still, holding the sword with both hands and assuming a defensive posture. With mastery, he parried the spear hit without being moved.
Hei didn’t worry about his attack’s failure but called the spear as he continued to move around Feng Chen to disorient him. Once again, he shot the spear toward his opponents, but the weapon met the sword's metallic resistance.
'Even though I can't follow your speed of movement with my body, you aren’t so fast that I cannot follow you with my eyes. Also, since your only source of attacks is your hair, your attack speed is slower than your movement speed, not to mention that you can only attack one point at a time. Lastly, just in case, I erected a layer of small flames and dispersed the heat around me. Thus, as soon as your spear enters my range, I can feel the temperature change and understand its direction even without following it with my eyes.'
'It quickly nullified my advantage. This means that it is time to move on to the next phase of the plan. Your analytical skills will backfire.'
As soon as Hei saw that his opponent hadn’t been confused by his speed, he decided to change his approach slightly. He would always run around Feng Chen, swinging his hair that held his spear back and forth. However, this time, he added another element to the equation.
'Again? I thought he would change- ' As Feng Chen was preparing to parry again, the locks of hair holding the spear twisted unexpectedly, causing the weapon to change direction.
Stab!
The spear's tip approached threateningly toward Feng Chen, who, although surprised, reacted quickly and dodged by rotating his body. But the attack wasn’t over yet: the spear, in fact, changed direction once again, attempting to hit him again.
Peng!
The sword and spear collided. The first pushed back the second that didn’t give up and returned to the charge soon after.
'I understand. As long as his hair controls the spear, he can change direction and point of impact multiple times, attacking me relentlessly. If so, I need to eliminate this threat right away. By doing so, I will have the upper hand.'
Hei's hair was incredibly insidious: it could give the weapon as much momentum and power as the arms of another martial artist. The difference, however, was that it wasn’t limited in its movements; it could practically bend the spear in any angle and direction in ways the human body couldn’t. But Feng Chen immediately formulated a plan to fight back.
He waited for another series of attacks, parrying them with his sword, before dashing forward. If he wanted to eliminate the hair threat, he couldn't stay on the defensive forever.
"Fire Law, Glowing Blade."
Feng Chen activated one of his Fire Law techniques. Instead of igniting the flames on the sword as it had done previously, this time, the heat passed into the blade of the sword, which began to glow.
Slash!
The red-hot blade dropped down to the hair that held the spear. Since Feng Chen had suddenly sprinted forward, Hei's spear was too far away to block the sword. However, Hei didn’t despair and activated the technique he had prepared for this occasion.
"Darkness Law, Dark Mass."
A pitch-black substance rose from the hair and landed on the spot where the glowing blade was about to strike. Subsequently, more black threads rose from that substance and began to cover the blade of the sword.
'Darkness Law?! His bloodline is of the poison type, meaning this is the Law he has inherently awakened. However, in front of my flames, his darkness is weaker. I just have to burn it until it disappears.'
Stab!
As Feng Chen was about to increase the spirit power in his sword to get rid of the black substance, the purple spear came at full speed from behind. However, Feng Chen had already taken into account a possible counterattack.
"Explosive Fire Fist."
Boom!
Feng Chen waited for the spear to be right behind him before throwing his back to the ground. Then he punched his left fist on the spear shaft that slid over him. At the moment of contact, there was a slight burst of flame that threw the spear forward, separating it from the grip of the hair.
Step! Step!
"Footsteps?"
Feng Chen heard footsteps approaching. While he was getting up, he saw Hei running towards him, holding his spear.
"Now I understand. From the beginning, his target wasn’t me but my sword." Feng Chen commented bitterly, finally realizing that he had moved according to his opponent’s plan.
Hei had beaten him in his forte: his analytic skill. And all because he hadn't imagined that Hei would be willing to put himself at a disadvantage against him, Feng Chen, one of the Best Generation. Ironically, the confidence in his strength and techniques had prevented Feng Chen from going further and thinking outside the box.