Chapter 46: Fall from Grace
Translator: Oneshotwonder Editor: Tehrn
The fight had enslaved Wang Tong's attention and demanded more devastating damages from the sword in his hand, and the sword answered the call. As Wang Tong's sword cut through the air, GN force burst out from the tip in a wild gale that swept across the gym, roaring like a charging beast. The GN force that lingered and danced on the sword's edge was sharper and pointier than the sword. This vicious attack would cause the “GN Dimensional Damage”, a higher form of damage that could shred anything into an unrecognizable form.
Conscious enslaved, Wang Tong had put Ma Xiaoru in great danger. He should have remembered that he had nearly fallen into the state of deranged the last time he had yielded a weapon: the rebar he had picked up in the cave on Norton. He also has forgotten about the promise he had made to himself later that night: to think thrice before picking up a weapon again. He had kept that promise throughout his TPA fights, but the unbearable anticipation of the fight, the wine, and Samantha's mesmerizing beauty had forced him to eat his words.
Ma Xiaoru did not flinch; she executed a steady but brisk half pirouette as Wang Tong's sword cut through the air in front of her forehead. The sword caught a few loose strands of Ma Xiaoru's dark hair that were tossed off into the air amidst the turn, but the hair flowed like water under the sharp edge.
The missed strike made Wang Tong lose his bearing momentarily and gave Ma Xiaoru a small window for a counterattack. She wrenched her sword over her head and twisted the hilt. The sword suddenly became a living thing, pulling her body to flex in the way that was beyond comprehension, all the while, she never lost that liquid-like fluidity in her movement. She had showcased the highest level of swordplay, the maximum synchronization of mind, body, and the sword. It required years of training, cultivation, and above all, intuition. While holding the sword high up in the air with both hands, Ma Xiaoru tapped into her dantian and channeled her GN force into the sword. She squeezed the hilt until her knuckles whitened, and then, she hacked at Wang Tong with full force.
Wang Tong registered at the corner of his eyes three perfectly shaped arcs streaking across the air toward his chest at lightning speed. He jerked his body and stepped to one side with an intentionally chaotic footstep, hoping to trick his opponent to miscalculate the distance. However, Ma Xiaoru had seen through his trick and followed immediately with a second strike precisely in Wang Tong's direction. The sudden change of direction twisted the sword into a slight curve. As it whirled through the air, it traced out another three deadly arcs flying toward Wang Tong.
The second attack caught Wang Tong off guard. While struggling to maintain balance, he quickly took two steps back. Before Wang Tong could steady himself, he found Ma Xiaoru's third attack was merely inches away from his face; he could even feel the coldness of the blade on the tip of his nose. It was too late.
Suddenly, he felt his body tensed up, a knot of fire exploded inside of his dantian, turning his blood into liquid iron. A burst of GN force violently zapped his brain and sapped reason and conscience stored within. All the while, his pupils shrunk but did not disappear like in the state of deranged; instead, it narrowed into a vertical slit, like that of a feral cat before it pounced at its prey.
When Wang Tong finally dodged the attack, no one could really make out just exactly what had happened. One moment he was set squarely in the path of Ma Xiaoru's strike, fumbling about as he tried to regain balance; a moment later, he was a few feet away from where he was standing, still in the exact same posture. It was as if he had folded the space and traveled from one end to the other without even moving a muscle.
With her target suddenly disappearing, Ma Xiaoru became defenseless and plunged forward. She felt Wang Tong's iron grip on her arm and a coldness quickly closing in on her neck. She gasped, it was the coldness of Wang Tong's sword.
Wang Tong finally regained control of his mind when the sword was less than an inch away from Ma Xiaoru's neck. He jerked his arm to a different direction, trying to divert the sword's trajectory, but it was difficult. The momentum carried Wang Tong forward until his face planted squarely into Ma Xiaoru's bosom. He tried best to avoid the soft cushions about his cheeks while trying to regain balance. He instinctively wrapped his arms around Ma Xiaoru like a drowning man hanging onto a piece of wood. In his firm grasp, he felt something round and cushy, with such curves that gave pleasure to his hands... It was Ma Xiaoru's rump.
Wang Tong was unruffled by the sudden assault of carnal desires and was determined to save himself from of this embarrassment. He tilted his body to the left slightly and felt the ground under his feet, with a solid foothold, he stomped the ground heavily and recovered his balance miraculously. Samantha and Hu Yangxuan raised their eyebrows in disbelief after witnessing Wang Tong's almost impossible save.
"Put me down. Now!" Wang Tong heard the soft voice of Ma Xiaoru from the nook of his arm.
"Ah... my bad, I got… I got… carried away," Wang Tong stuttered as he released Ma Xiaoru from his clutch. Ma Xiaoru lowered her head, letting the dark hairs tumble to the front to conceal the crimson cheeks. Wang Tong scratched his head and heaved an inaudible sigh of relieve. No one was harmed. "Lesson learned, never again fight with a woman," he told himself.
Hu Yangxuan's applauds were loud and abrupt, he smiled candidly. "Brother Wang, that was quite something! I knew you would steal my stage. I shouldn't have taken you here," as always, Hu Yangxuan uttered whatever was on his mind.
"Nah. Ma Xiaoru had been too easy on me from the beginning, and I had only gained the upper hand after I lost control of my power."
Wang Tong was impressed by Ma Xiaoru's methodical control of her power and made up his mind to improve his own. Wang Tong's fighting style was formed during the battles against the Zergs, in which controlling his power was irrelevant because every fight meant life or death and demanded Wang Tong to give all he got.
"Brother Wang is indeed a better fighter than me." The blush on Ma Xiaoru's cheeks did not fade the slightest; she lowered her eyes, avoiding Wang Tong's gaze. The situation indeed got pretty hairy back then. Should Wang Tong didn't stop the attack; she might have been in grave danger. She remembered the moment when Wang Tong strained his body to save her life—only a considerate gentlemen would have done that. She felt a sweet ache in her heart when she figured that Wang Tong's left leg must be in so much pain after that heavy stomp.
"Who cares about the outcome of the match. I am just happy that our secret weapon, Wang Tong, might have been our coup de grace! Haha!" Samantha's face bloomed like a flower, but no one had noticed Wang Tong was ogling her.
By the end of the day, everyone felt that they had a blast, except for Hu Yangxuan. It was not that he hadn't enjoyed himself, but because that he had failed to achieve his goal: to gain Ma Xiaoru's attention. If anything, this visit had only helped Wang Tong further his place in Ma Xiaoru's heart. While driving Wang Tong to his dormitory, Hu Yangxuan suddenly felt like that he was Wang Tong's chauffeur.
The only saving grace of the day was what the match had revealed to Hu Yangxuan. He finally came to terms with the fact that Wang Tong was a force to be reckoned with. Although Wang Tong's victory could be in part due to Ma Xiaoru's over-cautious for the sake of safety, he could feel the wild and ferocious power in Wang Tong. He reckoned that many moves executed by Wang Tong, such as the chaotic footwork, must have been inspired by the Zergs. Today's development, albeit not in his favor, didn't deter Hu Yangxuan the slightest. Instead, he felt excited to have an opponent that could challenge him. After all, his life in Ayrlarng had been getting boring very quickly.
"Oh dear! He is gone. Stop thinking about him already," Samantha teased at Ma Xiaoru. She had felt that there was something between Ma Xiaoru and Wang Tong that was never there before. She wondered if she was the only person who was surprised by it.
"No, I am not." Ma Xiaoru blushed.
"Then why did you let him win? " Samantha peered at Ma Xiaoru.
"I didn't. Yes, I did conserve my strength, but so did him."
"Not likely, he nearly lost control of his power. He nearly injured you for god's sake!" Samantha had a keen mind, but she was no METAL fighter, so some details of the fight had eluded her.
"Just trust me. First of all, I don't think that the sword is his preferred choice of weapon. I can tell he is not used to handling it, that's why he kept on using the awkward backhand strike. Secondly, for someone whose fighting style took form while fighting Zergs, I can hardly feel the sense of life and death in any of his advances. As for his true power, you can see it for yourself." Ma Xiaoru led Samantha to where Wang Tong had stomped his left foot to save his embarrassing fall.
Samantha bent down to examine the floor closely, everything looked normal. She touched the floor surface with the tip of her finger to see if it felt any different. The floor crumbled instantly into fine powders.
The two girl stood still, dragging out the silence; they were shocked speechlessly by what had happened.
"What the..." Ma Xiaoru muttered quietly.
"How many sols does it require to break this floor? I thought you told me that your gym floor was a special order, it was almost unbreakable."
"At least two hundred sols." Ma Xiaoru touched the powder on the ground, for a second, she imagined that she was touching Wang Tong's handsome and angular face, the same face that Samantha suddenly had the urge to bit off.
"What an a*shole! He really took me for an idiot!" Samantha gritted her teeth.