Chapter 82: Three Punches

The Blackwood mountain pass fell silent.

The only sound that remained was the nervous stamping of hooves against the rocky road. Even the howling mountain wind seemed to have died down, leaving an eerie stillness hanging over the gorge.

At the front of the ruined convoy, Vane slowly lowered his serrated saber.

The arrogance that had once filled his scarred face was gone. His expression twisted with disbelief and fear as he glanced between the lifeless body of his fallen subordinate and the towering figure standing calmly at the rear of the convoy.

His mind struggled to accept what his eyes had just witnessed.

One of his most trusted men was a Body-Refining cultivator in the Late Stage, skilled in combat and armed with a saber infused with mortal Qi.

Yet Arthur had killed him with a single punch.

He hadn’t even released an aura.

No flashy martial arts techniques. No complex elemental chants. No weapons.

Just overwhelming physical strength, so far beyond the ordinary that it seemed to belong to an entirely different level of existence.

"N-No..." Vane stammered, his gloved hand trembling around the reins. The leather strap slipped against his palm as he stared at Arthur in disbelief. "That’s... that’s impossible! He’s just a mortal... He doesn’t even have Qi circulating through his body!"

Fear had paralyzed the remaining bandits, but it didn’t last long. Soon, panic gave way to a mixture of rage and desperation. They couldn’t understand what they had just witnessed, yet their pride and instinct for survival refused to let them accept defeat without a fight.

"ROAR!"

With a series of furious battle cries, the three surviving raiders urged their horses forward. They abandoned the village guards and focused entirely on Arthur.

Their mounts charged from three different directions, their hooves pounding against the rocky road as the bandits attempted to surround the towering figure.

Whatever Arthur was, they would have to face him together.

Three Directions, One Target

One bandit charged straight at Arthur from the front, his horse’s iron-shod hooves striking the rocky road and sending sparks flying.

Another attacked from Arthur’s left, swinging his serrated saber in a wide, deadly arc aimed at the giant’s neck.

The third took a longer route through the thick fog, circling around to approach from behind. He waited for the perfect moment to strike, intending to drive his weapon into Arthur’s spine while the other two kept him occupied.

It was a classic pincer formation, a coordinated assault taught among elite bandit groups. The tactic was designed to overwhelm even a Martial Master who relied on conventional defensive techniques.

Arthur remained completely expressionless.

He didn’t raise his hands to defend himself or shift into a fighting stance. His face remained as still as black stone, without a trace of anger or excitement. Even his broad shoulders stayed relaxed as the three riders closed in from different directions.

To Arthur, they were hardly dangerous opponents.

They were simply slow-moving obstacles, charging toward him as though the outcome of the fight had already been decided.

A Step Beyond Ordinary Speed

Arthur moved.

His massive frame shifted with such incredible speed and precision that the distance between him and his attackers seemed to disappear in an instant. He didn’t bother dodging their strikes. To him, their attacks posed no real threat.

He simply moved faster than their weapons could follow.

BOOM!

Arthur’s fist shot forward.

The air around his knuckles compressed violently, producing a deafening shockwave that tore through the silence of the mountain pass. The sheer force of the punch struck the bandit charging from the front like a speeding freight train.

Before Arthur’s fist had even completed its movement, the bandit’s iron-plated chest armor caved inward, twisting into a crushed mass of metal.

The impact ripped him straight out of the saddle and sent him flying twenty feet through the air. His body disappeared over the edge of the road and plunged into the dark ravine below.

"Die—!" the second bandit roared from Arthur’s left, swinging his serrated saber with both hands toward the giant’s ribs.

Arthur barely turned.

A slight rotation of his torso was all it took.

His massive fist rose in a short, brutal arc.

BOOM!

Another thunderous shockwave erupted in the darkness, tearing through the thick fog and sending it spiraling outward in a ring of white mist.

The second bandit’s saber struck Arthur’s ribs.

But instead of cutting into his flesh, the blade shattered on impact, exploding into countless jagged fragments. The force rebounded through the bandit’s arms, breaking the bones in his forearms before his chest collapsed under the overwhelming impact.

The rider was thrown high into the air. His ruined weapon slipped from his grasp as his lifeless body disappeared into the fog, only to crash heavily onto the mountain road moments later.

The last attacker, who had circled around behind Arthur, finally reached his target.

With a savage snarl, he raised his saber in both hands. He poured the last of his mortal Qi into the weapon, preparing to deliver a desperate, full-force strike.

Then Arthur turned his head.

Their eyes met through the swirling mist.

For one agonizing moment, the bandit found himself staring directly into Arthur’s crimson-tinged eyes.

There was no anger in that gaze. No hatred. Not even the slightest hint of killing intent.

There was only an endless, terrifying emptiness—the cold, indifferent stare of a cosmic predator regarding something utterly insignificant.

The bandit’s blood seemed to freeze in his veins.

His muscles locked in place, and his raised arms refused to move.

Arthur stepped forward, his boot landing firmly on the stone road. Without hesitation, he drove his fist straight into the bandit’s chest.

CRACK-THUOM!

The impact sounded like lightning striking a dry oak tree. The sheer force of the blow lifted the rider clean out of his saddle and sent him hurtling backward through the air like a stone launched from a military catapult.

Three attacks. Three defeats.

The entire fight had lasted no more than three heartbeats.

Three veteran Qi Cultivators, who had slaughtered hundreds of ordinary people and slain countless rival combatants in mountain provinces, attacked Arthur from three different directions at the same time.

However,

they did not leave a single scratch on the young man.

One after another, the three bandits tumbled on the dirt road. Their broken weapons lay scattered on the road drenched in purple moonlight. Not a one of them moved. Blackish clots of blood seeped from their ragged bodies, soaking into the road.

The mountain gorge was plunged into chaos once again.

The horses that survived the fierce battle also reeled, their heads hanging andtrembling. They seemed to have encountered a devilish existence that surpassed their comprehension. Not far from the horses, the empty carriage creaked as a gust of cold wind swept through the ravine, carrying away the smell of blood and burning metal.

Garris stood rooted to the spot at the head of the caravan.

His lips trembled, and his unshaven face was frozen in disbelief as he gazed at Arthur’s back.

Garris was a veteran caravan master who had survived countless bandit attacks by the mountains. He had seen many things in his forty years of traversing dangerous passages. However, he had never seen warriors who could tear through opponents with such ease.

It was simply beyond logic and cultivation laws.

The ten guards posted around the merchant caravan also stared at Arthur’s back, their faces ashen.

Just a while ago, these guards still thought of themselves as ordinary people. Like all the other merchants, they believed the Red-Sash Mountain Bandits were peerless warriors that could not be opposed.

However, now three of the Red-Sash Mountain Bandits’ elite fighters lay on the ground, as if someone had snuffed out their lives with a mere breath.

Arthur slowly lowered his huge fist, and a deep breath of air escaped from his lips, sending the folds of black cloth on his broad chest into gentle motion.

He looked down at the fallen bandits, his face devoid of any expression. There was neither arrogance, satisfaction, nor the slightest bit of exertion.

In fact, he did not even appear to have battled three tough opponents.

It was just a bother on his way to the city of spires, a trifle that had to be gotten rid of.