Child of Destiny

...…

Shin, Arthur and Leonard only waited for a minute before they were able to see the three opponents rushing towards them from a distance. And naturally, the opposing three were able to see them too.

"Heh! Three kids at the peak of the Core Formation Stage wanted to stop us? Do they have some death wish?" said a lean guy in the opposing group.

"Don't underestimate them. For the record, each of those guys were strong enough to battle an Eternal Opening Stage expert. So, I suggest you take more caution when dealing against them," said by the leading guy who had an eyepatch covering his left eye. This guy was also the leader of the group who were observing Shin and Arthur earlier.

Hearing that, the other guy who had a very bulky and muscular body, looked at the trio in front of them with a quite interested expression on his face.

Meanwhile, the leading guy said. "We are in a hurry, so we are going to take care of them separately. Mario, go deal with that young master of the Springfield Family. Marcus, that kid with crimson hair is yours," while looking at the lean and muscular guys respectively.

Hearing his order, the other two guys nodded their heads and immediately accelerated forward, planning to show these kids what they were capable of.

...

On the other hand, the trio on the other side had a different plan.

Shin squinted eyes to observe their incoming opponents before saying to his brothers. "These guys seemed to be at the higher rankings. They are not ordinary Eternal Opening Stage experts; we should be little careful at dealing with them."

Then he flicked his wrist a little before saying to the two. "We can't risk fighting them one-on-one yet, so let's go fight them as a group first to see how strong they are. If we somehow got the upper hand, we are going to continue fighting like that."

"But if we are forced to fight each of them individually, just make sure to use all of your cards to beat them."

And that was the time when they saw the opposing group suddenly accelerated forward and rushed towards them with a great speed.

"Go!" Seeing that, Shin immediately signaled the two to start moving. And the moment Arthur and Leonard heard that, both of them immediately started moving and executed their respective movement techniques.

Leonard stomped on the ground very powerful, launching himself forward. And every time his feet landed back on the ground, he kept on stomping in the same manner which left a bunch of footprints behind him.

Bang! Bang!

'Blood Sutra: Devil's Footprints'

At the same time, Arthur swayed his body left and right for a moment before sprinting forward. His body seemed to be as light as a feather during his dash. And alongside it, a golden trail of light followed after him as he ran in curving moments.

'Imperial Tactics: Dragon Dance'

Swoosh!

Meanwhile, Shin took a deep breath as he waited for the two to reach a certain distance before making his move.

While waiting, he first lightly jumped up and down on his spot as if he was bouncing on the ground. And when he saw that the two already reached the optimal distance that he wanted, he quickly kicked the ground as soon as possible to launch himself forward.

During his sprint, he left a bunch of afterimages behind that stayed for a moment before dissipating like a ghost.

'Yin-Yang Arts: Astral Steps'

Swoosh!

In the meantime, the opposing side was suddenly taken aback at the strange movement techniques that the trio had used. And since they were moving very fast to meet those three, it only took an instant for their sides to collide.

The first one to make his move was Leonard. He took advantage of his opponents' surprised state to catch them even off-guard.

He put a lot of strength on his left foot before kicking the ground with it to launch himself even faster while leaping in forward. And on this charge, he planned to attack Mario since he seemed to be weak against head-on physical attacks due to his lean body built.

Thinking about that, Leonard gathered a bunch of Internal Qi on his left leg while spinning midair before throwing a very strong back kick at his target.

Bang!

But he failed to hit Mario with that kick since Marcus suddenly appeared on his path, blocking his kick with an arm.

Seeing that, Leonard knitted his eyebrows for a moment before pushing his opponent with a little tap of his foot. And after that, he flipped in the air while falling back on the ground.

But before his feet could even touch the ground, Mario suddenly appeared on his side while thrusting a dagger towards him.

"It is payback time!" said Mario while grinning evilly during his attack. But that grin was immediately wiped away from his face when he suddenly heard Arthur's voice from the side.

"Well, I am not sure about that," Arthur came rushing forward while thrusting his spear at Mario. And when the latter saw that, he immediately abandoned the idea of attacking Leonard and just swung his dagger sideways to deflect the incoming spear.

Clang!

Ta-ta!

With that, Leonard safely landed back on the ground. But on the very next moment, both Arthur and him were suddenly frozen in place due to unknown pressure that was preventing them from moving their bodies.

At the same time, Mario and Marcus jumped away from the two while wearing an evil grin on their faces.

Alongside that, the guy who seemed to be the leader of the trio came rushing at Arthur and Leonard while throwing a powerful punch that was reinforced by his Internal Qi. And when he finally swung his fist forward, a beam of energy wave flew towards the duo with a powerful momentum.

But instead of panicking, both Arthur and Leonard looked at the incoming energy wave very calmly. They didn't have to concern themselves with this attack since they had a full trust on Shin that he could take care of it.

Instead, both of them locked their gazes at the other two guys who were looking at them with evil grins on their lips. They were more concerned about these guys' next moves than the incoming energy wave in front of them.

Swoosh!

And Shin didn't disappoint them, he accelerated his sprint and brushed past the two while leaping forward.

At the same time, he gathered a lot of Internal Qi on his sword while looking at the incoming energy wave with squinting eyes. And when the Qi accumulation reached its peak, he slightly pulled his sword backwards while tightly gripping it.

He waited for a moment to let the incoming energy wave to almost arrive on his front before throwing a powerful horizontal slash on it.

'Yin-Yang Swordsmanship: Yang Sword – Sun Splitter'

Shing!

The energy wave was immediately split in half when Shin swung his sword on it. But he was not done yet, because he pulled his sword backwards for another time while absorbing the residual energies that lingered in the air due to his previous strike.

'Advance Yin-Yang Arts: Yin-Yang Absorption'

Then he took a deep breath before trusting his sword forward while releasing the accumulated powers that he gathered.

Swoosh!

BOOM!

And with those actions, a powerful energy wave was sent flying toward the leader of the opposing trio. And from the looks of it, this energy wave was seemingly the same as the energy wave that the leader had sent earlier.

'Yin-Yang Swordsmanship: Yang Sword – True Counter'

Seeing that, the opposing trio was slightly taken aback by Shin's swordsmanship. And due to that, Mario and Marcus forgot to do their next move since they didn't expect this kind of attack to come from a kid who was still in the Core Formation Stage.

 And at this point of time, they had to other choice but to believe what their leader had said earlier to not underestimate these kids.

Meanwhile, the leader seemed to be already expecting his kind of prowess from Shin. After all, he already had a slight idea of Shin's current sword attainment since he watched his battle previously.

Given that, he pulled his right arm backwards and made a fist with his hand while gathering a bunch of Internal Qi in it. He then waited for the incoming energy wave to arrive in front of him before throwing a powerful punch that obliterated that energy wave.

BOOM!

When the residuals of the energies completely dissipated and cleared his line of sight, he saw the trio of the opposing side already gone back to their battle formation.

"Tch!" he clicked his tongue when he saw this. He was completely unsatisfied with his teammates' carelessness.

They were supposedly needed to end this fight as soon as possible so that they could case after the others. But since they underestimated these three regardless of his warnings, they now forced to make some slight adjustments on their plans.

Mario and Marcus were fully aware of this, so they immediately got in position to surround the trio while releasing their respective Natural Forces (Higher form of Internal Qi). This time, they no longer have a plan to play around with these three young monsters. They wanted to end this for as fast as they could before their leader decided to kill them.

...…