On the monitor, He Xiaotian’s disciples were all rippling with muscle, and the female students were no exception.
They were practically miniature versions of X, and every punch they threw packed immense power.
They could casually shatter benches and dining tables made of solid wood.
In contrast, Tang En’s students lost all ability to fight the moment they were hit.
They were either coughing up mouthfuls of blood or lying on the ground screaming in agony.
In short, the fight was a complete rout.
vs. 50.
Yet the smaller group was beating them so badly they were sent retreating and crying for their mothers.
The whole thing only lasted about three minutes. And afterward, He Xiaotian’s students just calmly went back to eating. Never mind a bruise—they didn’t have a single scratch on them.
They were all human, all training at the same time.
’The only difference was their instructor, so how could the gap be this huge?!’
Roger rubbed his temples. If he remembered correctly, this bunch had only been training for three weeks.
Twenty-one days, and the results were outstanding!
It had transformed a group of teenage boys and girls into mini superhumans.
’Didn’t the files say our country’s martial arts are slow to yield results? Why are the people under X improving even faster than Tang En’s students? Could it be that what he said before wasn’t just him trying to fool me, but the actual truth?’
Roger decided he had to make time to go and observe them himself that afternoon.
’Sigh!’
’The Minister is gone, and all this damn paperwork has been dumped on me.’
’I can’t even be a hands-off boss because it involves classified information that no one else can handle for me.’
In a residential complex in Shanghai, Gao Chunpeng was taking a nap when his phone suddenly rang.
He groggily picked it up and saw it was a call from an unknown number.
"Hello? Who is this!"
"..."
The other end of the line was dead silent.
"Are you going to say something or not? If you don’t, I’m hanging up."
"..."
The other end was still silent. Gao Chunpeng muttered "Psycho," and hung up.
A moment later, the phone rang again.
Extremely annoyed, he snatched it up again. A glance at the screen confirmed it was the same number.
"What the hell is wrong with you? Making harassing phone calls in the middle of the day instead of sleeping?"
"Accident."
"Accident? What do you mean?"
"BEEP... BEEP... BEEP..."
"Hello! Hello!"
Gao Chunpeng stared at his phone, the call already disconnected, his brow deeply furrowed.
For some reason, he had a terrible feeling that something bad was about to happen to him.
At twelve-thirty, it was time to head to school.
He said goodbye to his parents and left the house.
About half an hour later, he arrived at the gate of Shanghai No. 1 Middle School.
Just then, a few of his close friends from class arrived at the same time.
They were just across the street from each other, so Gao Chunpeng decided to quicken his pace and join his friends.
Coincidentally, a pickup truck loaded with steel pipes emerged from the other end of the street.
A little girl suddenly darted out from the stream of pedestrians on the side of the road.
The driver instinctively yanked the steering wheel, crashing straight into a fire hydrant.
CLANG!
Thanks to inertia, the steel pipes loaded in the truck went flying in an instant.
Gao Chunpeng, who was crossing the street, had just reached the school gate when he saw his friends staring at him, their mouths agape in disbelief.
’What the hell?’
Gao Chunpeng turned his head, and a steel pipe filled his vision.
SQUELCH!
"AHHH—"
The driver, his head bleeding, stared in a stupor at Gao Chunpeng, who slowly collapsed to the ground with a steel pipe protruding from his eye socket.
The little girl stood helplessly in the middle of the road, still not understanding what had happened.
A stylishly dressed woman pushed through the crowd and rushed out.
She took the girl’s hand, immediately melted back into the flow of people, and disappeared.
"Quick, call 911!"
"What’s 911?"
The panicked friends’ minds had gone completely haywire.
Just then, a man in a security guard’s uniform walked out.
If He Xiaotian had been there, he would have uttered a single word—"Cousin!"
That afternoon, Vice Minister Roger of the Cleaners made a special trip to the Medical University.
THUMP! THUMP!
Before he even reached the athletic field where He Xiaotian was located, he could hear a continuous, thudding sound.
He quickened his pace, and a scene of fifty people sweating buckets came into view.
These people were standing barefoot on a copper plate. Every time they threw a punch at the Bronze Cauldron, they would follow it with a hard stomp.
The copper plate was speckled with bloodstains.
And that wasn’t all—their heads were also wrapped in blood-soaked bandages.
Roger winced at the sight.
’This is abuse, isn’t it?’
At the front of the field, the roughly 3.2-meter-tall He Xiaotian stood with his arms crossed, his face completely devoid of expression.
Three armed men patrolled among the trainees.
Their eyes swept across the group, as if they would immediately strike down anyone they caught slacking off.
"X!"
Roger called out, only to find that...
...apart from He Xiaotian turning to look at him, everyone else kept their eyes fixed forward, as if his shout had been a mere illusion.
It left Vice Minister Luo so dumbfounded he wondered whether he had actually shouted or just imagined it.
"Well, well! If it isn’t Minister Luo. When are my Spiritual Energy Crystals getting here? You all can’t go back on our deal."
He Xiaotian’s words left Roger completely speechless.
"We’re collecting them, we’re collecting them. You know it’s a controlled material. As soon as our minister returns, we’ll be sure to deliver them with our own hands," Roger said awkwardly. It was true that the Cleaners had dropped the ball on this.
"About the brawl, I..."
Before he could finish, He Xiaotian cut him off.
"I’ve already handled what needed to be handled. I won’t be accepting any punishment from you people. We agreed back then that everything would be up to me. What I say, goes."
"..."
Roger took one look at him and knew it was a lost cause.
’You’ve got the bigger fist, you’re the boss.’
"Isn’t your training a little... excessive? Can their bodies even take it? Don’t go and cripple them. You won’t be the one taking the fall if that happens."
"Relax. I wouldn’t be doing this if I wasn’t confident they could handle it. I have three months. If I don’t get a little ruthless, what am I supposed to deliver to you? Should I be like Teacher Tang and have them lift stone locks for fun? That’s too gentle. If you don’t squeeze people dry, you’ll never know how much potential is hidden inside them."
He Xiaotian waved a hand, the very picture of confidence.
"After three months, I guarantee I’ll hand over a troop of elites to you."
As he finished speaking, a set of hurried footsteps rang out.
A soldier carrying a rifle ran up, came to a stop, and saluted. "Mr. X, Gao Jie’s family called. They say his younger brother is dead."
?!
Three weeks of hellish training had long ago sharpened everyone’s hearing and eyesight.
While not on He Xiaotian’s monstrous level, their senses far surpassed those of ordinary people.
Moreover, Gao Jie was one of the top students among the fifty, and he heard every single word the soldier said.
But the movements in his hands didn’t falter; he continued to punch and stomp with the same methodical precision.
’Here, you don’t stop unless Master gives the order. Not even if the sky were falling.’
Tears began to stream unconsciously from his eyes.