Mutation

The Maka student who caught the oak leaf struggled with hesitation for a moment. Glancing at Douma's resolute expression, he swiftly retreated with the leaf, followed by several companions. However, quite a few Maka students on the scene chose to remain behind, eyeing Guan Xinyin, Luo Kaiyuan, and the others with vigilance. Douma did not urge them to leave again, only letting out a sigh. Seeing the group depart, Chen Chuan stayed where he was without moving. He didn't care about the oak leaf, and with Douma standing in the way, he couldn't stop them anyway. Guan Xinyin and Luo Kaiyuan did not move either, keeping their eyes fixed on Douma and the remaining Maka students. Chen Chuan did not step forward to attack proactively. If these people, including Douma, were willing to stand at an impasse here, there was no need to rush into action. The longer time dragged on, the more reinforcements would arrive. It was the Maka side that ought to be anxious. Once the fleeing students had gotten far enough and sped off on motorbikes, Douma finally waited no longer. He spread his arms outward like a bird spreading its wings. Along with the rhythmic opening of his hands, the muscles across his body surged, their sheen rippling as though water were flowing across them. His fingers in particular twitched gently, as if plucking at some tangible strings. Both his breathing and movements were accompanied by a peculiar rhythm, as though he were playing music with his body. At that moment, Guan Xinyin and Luo Kaiyuan suddenly experienced a wave of discomfort. As Douma moved his limbs, every pulse of his expanding muscles fell precisely into the intervals between their breaths. The key to a fighter releasing jin lay in breathing. By precisely locking onto the transitions between their breaths, it meant he could launch an attack in that very window. This involuntarily made them want to evade and adjust, yet no matter how they altered their rhythm, Douma's movements captured it with pinpoint accuracy. Instead, their breathing grew more and more disordered, and a suffocating tightness welled up in their chests and abdomens. Douma did not look at them; his gaze remained fixed entirely on Chen Chuan ahead. A major feature of karmic pulse study was sensing the enemy's changes to guide and control them. The blood flow, breathing rhythm, and even the direction of force transmission in every person present fell within the perception of his mutated tissue. It was equivalent to his opponents being completely transparent to him, allowing him to allocate his techniques and power rationally to command the flow of battle. At times, if the disparity between the two sides was large enough, he wouldn't even need to strike; the opponent would injure themselves simply from the disruption of their breathing rhythm. Yet Chen Chuan was an exception. Although Douma had tried to sway Chen Chuan's breathing rhythm just now, Chen Chuan was unmoved, maintaining his original breathing undisturbed. This imposed a burden on Douma instead—like trying to pinch and pull a thread drawn on paper: he could see it clearly, yet could never pinch it up. By this time, due to the initial gunshots and subsequent fighting, no pedestrians remained on the street. It was deserted from end to end, with only these few people standing there. Inside the buildings on both sides of the street, however, people were peering cautiously through cracks in curtains and doors, watching the commotion outside. Seeing that he could not control Chen Chuan, Douma knew he could not let things drag on. This place was only a ten-minute drive from the city center. The constabulary had certainly received word by now and would be mobilizing personnel, and teachers from Wuyi Academy might arrive at any moment. He didn't have much time left. If possible, he didn't want to be captured either. He had to deal with the person blocking his way as quickly as possible. And so he walked toward Chen Chuan, deciding to settle matters with fists and feet. Seeing him approach, Chen Chuan did not back down. Striding forward, he met him head-on. As the two drew close, Chen Chuan launched the first attack, whipping a kick toward his opponent. This kick was exceptionally fast—even in Douma's eyes, it posed a sufficient threat. Douma dipped low to evade, his body already coiled to lunge forward in a counterattack, but he instantly realized it was a trajectory-shifting kick. He promptly turned sideways and raised an arm to block upward, immediately feeling a tremendous force surge in from Chen Chuan's leg. Though he had blocked the strike, he felt that jin continuously penetrating inward, as if someone were relentlessly shoving him. Pitted against it, he was temporarily unable to make any other move. After pinning him in place with that kick, Chen Chuan stepped forward as his foot touched down, reaching out to clamp onto Douma's raised forearm. Under normal circumstances, this would lead into a grappling throw or lock, but Chen Chuan didn't do that. Instead, his fingers snapped shut! The curtain-tearing jin of Orthodox Sanshou wasn't limited to the face; a tear from five fingers was enough to rip apart flesh and blood. Yet the moment he exerted force, he felt the muscles on Douma's arm tense up, turning slick and resilient like a tire suddenly pumped full of air, and Chen Chuan's fingers were actually bounced outward. Immediately after, he saw Douma's other hand shoot out, fingers pressed together as they stabbed toward his chest like a striking viper, shockingly fast. Seeing it was too late to block, Chen Chuan angled his body slightly, channeled jin through his frame, and rammed right into the blow. Sensing something amiss, Douma snapped open his stabbing fingers into a palm, bracing outward to halt Chen Chuan's forward momentum. His other hand slapped aside Chen Chuan's hand, which was trying to grab him once more, and seized the fabric over Chen Chuan's chest, preparing to exert force to disrupt his center of gravity. But Chen Chuan kicked at his ankle from below, forcing Douma to lift his foot immediately. With that dodge, the power above could no longer be discharged. Seeing Chen Chuan reach out again to seize his fingers, and having experienced the jin in Chen Chuan's grip earlier, Douma knew that any part without muscle or mutated tissue support would surely be shredded if caught. He hastily released his grip and retreated. As he pulled back, Chen Chuan pressed forward without pause, his hands arcing directly toward Douma's ears. Douma ducked and withdrew. Employing what seemed to be a specialized technique, he slid back two full paces in an instant. With elbows tucked inward and knees bent, his entire body compressed like a spring, only to abruptly release, unleashing a spiraling, drilling jin diagonally upward. Chen Chuan turned sideways, meeting it with a wing-arm block. It was their first direct clash since the bout began—a dull, heavy thud sounded, like two massive solid objects crashing together. Yet the outcome of this collision was that Chen Chuan stood rooted in place, while Douma was sent stumbling back several steps. This sight filled the watching Maka students with utter disbelief. Douma was a formidable young instructor at their academy—otherwise, he wouldn't have been chosen to lead the delegation. How could he be forced back in a head-on clash with a Wuyi student? They could not accept this result in any way, feeling that something must have gone wrong. The stark reality clashing with their emotional bias threw them into a contradictory state of anxiety and dread. Guan Xinyin and Luo Kaiyuan didn't harbor such complex thoughts. They had personally felt or witnessed Douma's prowess just moments ago, yet Chen Chuan had forcibly driven the man back. Amidst their shock, an unbidden wave of admiration welled up inside them. Chen Chuan watched the retreating Douma, knowing that he hadn't truly won that exchange. A large patch of his Second Self's shoulder had turned blurry and translucent, whereas Douma had merely used his retreat to diffuse the force and was completely unharmed. The only difference was that on the surface of this clash, Chen Chuan had held the upper hand. Still, from that exchange, he had gained a clear reading. In terms of pure strength, he might still fall short of this instructor who had reached the Second Limit, but his own reaction speed and agility should be no slower, perhaps even superior. In that case, he could fully exploit his superior reaction speed to meet attack with attack, proactively trading blow for blow. With that, he straightened up and continued forward. In the eyes of the onlookers, as he actively bore down on Douma, an undeniable aura of pressure radiated from him. Seeing Chen Chuan emerge completely unscathed, Douma showed a look of shock and suspicion, along with a trace of awe. *Talent...?* he thought to himself. It wasn't just their final clash. In the brief flurry of their exchanges, jin had been applied almost continuously. By all rights, for an ordinary fighter at the First Limit, just exerting that much jin would have caused their body to give out first. This was also why someone at the First Limit could never defeat a Second Limit fighter: setting aside the comprehensive enhancement in physical attributes, the sheer frequency at which the two could deploy jin operated on entirely different tiers. Yet Chen Chuan seemed to defy this rule completely. The only explanation was that he possessed talent far beyond ordinary mortals. Douma felt a bitter pang. Such a talent could be found in a mere branch academy of Wuyi in the Republic of Great Shun, yet searching their entire nation, they seemed unable to produce anyone like him. After taking two steps, Chen Chuan suddenly accelerated forward, throwing a punch. Douma saw it clearly and withdrew slightly to keep his distance, while simultaneously lashing a kick toward Chen Chuan's head. But Chen Chuan disregarded it entirely, allowing the kick to strike him as he pressed forward relentlessly, driving his rear fist hard into Douma's chest. Douma's chest tightened, his breath catching. Knowing things looked grim, he frantically parried and slapped away with both hands, continuously deflecting Chen Chuan's follow-up barrage of punches, elbows, and knee strikes, all while being forced back step after step. Over on the other side, Nali, who was locked in combat with Zhuang Zhi, took a punch to force his opponent back. Stealing a glance over his shoulder, he caught sight of Douma being suppressed. He felt both anxious and bewildered. Why wasn't Teacher Douma using his signature Maka karmic pulse fist, resorting instead to fighting techniques leaning toward Great Shun's style? Wasn't that abandoning his own strengths? Douma was, in truth, helpless. If he could have used it, he would have done so already. He could sense the aura on Chen Chuan, the flow of his blood, and even the intensity of each strike, yet the power and speed Chen Chuan actually displayed were entirely different, making it impossible to form an accurate judgment. Douma felt miserable as well. Over twenty to thirty years of training, he had grown accustomed to coordinating his release of jin with his sensory perception to control opponents. Now, facing someone whose felt cues pointed to one thing while his actual performance showed another, Douma's mind knew what to do, but his body would instinctively execute what it deemed a "rational" response. This forced him to constantly monitor and correct his ingrained habits while executing techniques, lagging behind by a beat each time—which was fatal. To make matters worse, even if Chen Chuan's strength fell short of his, the gap wasn't significant, while his reaction time and speed seemed even faster than Douma's. Even though Douma hadn't expended much stamina and hadn't suffered any injuries yet, on the battlefield, he appeared to be the one being thoroughly suppressed. At this point, he realized he might not be able to escape. But his students did not deserve such an end. He had to buy them a chance to break free. Perhaps there was only one thing left to do—he would shoulder all the guilt and consequences himself. With this thought, a resolute gleam flared in his eyes. After choosing to clash hard with Chen Chuan once more, he used the force of the impact to retreat a considerable distance. Drawing in a deep breath, he crossed his hands before him, and the muscles across his body suddenly began to writhe. In mere moments, blue veins surfaced across his skin like the delicate veining of a leaf. At the same time, his body turned red and searing hot, radiating an ominous sense of danger.