When Huo Tingxiao returned to the underground arena, Fu Xingchen and Duan Yang were whispering to each other with solemn expressions.
Seeing him return, Fu Xingchen raised an eyebrow at him and swept his gaze toward the opposite spectator area. Duan Yang pointed directly with his hand, saying with utmost gravity: “Over there in the second row, Huo Cheng!”
Huo Tingxiao sat down beside him and said, “I see him.”
“What is he doing here!” Duan Yang wore a look of disgust, crinkling his nose.
Huo Cheng was Huo Tingxiao’s half-brother. Externally, Huo Cheng was referred to as the younger brother, but the two were actually the same age—in fact, looking closer into it, Huo Cheng was two months older than Huo Tingxiao. This revealed that their father had committed marital infidelity and kept it completely airtight. It wasn’t until Huo Tingxiao turned ten, when his mother Shen Qiuyun passed away from illness and his father brought the stepmother into the household despite his grandfather’s fierce opposition, that he learned of Huo Cheng’s existence.
Huo Tingxiao could not forgive his father’s deception, nor would he acknowledge his stepmother or so-called brother. Yet his father stubbornly persisted, going so far as to move out of the old Huo estate for it.
The matter had caused quite a storm in the city back then. To make matters worse, Huo Cheng even transferred into Huo Tingxiao’s school, loitering right beneath his nose every day. Whenever they crossed paths, he would affectionately call out “Ge” one time after another, practically eager to let the entire school know he was Huo Tingxiao’s brother.
During that period, Huo Tingxiao was thoroughly disgusted to the point of falling gravely ill.
As his friends, Duan Yang and Fu Xingchen naturally shared his enmity, never giving Huo Cheng a good look.
Huo Cheng was not deeply involved in the Huo family’s main enterprises, merely holding a nominal title as COO at an affiliated tech company. Instead of showing up at the company, he preferred lingering in the circles of wealthy second-generation heirs, eating, drinking, and idling away his time with a group of playboys all day.
That day was no exception. Seated beside Huo Cheng were several young men draped in streetwear, chatting and laughing while waiting for the match to begin.
“Have you seen him since returning?” Fu Xingchen asked.
“No.”
“I heard he’s on pretty good terms with the manager of this club,” Fu Xingchen raised an eyebrow. “Do you think he came today for the match, or for you?”
Huo Tingxiao remained silent in thought, looking over at the opposite spectator area once again.
As if sensing his gaze, Huo Cheng looked over as well. Seeing Huo Tingxiao, he showed no surprise whatsoever, instead flashing a smile and waving a hand toward this side.
Duan Yang despised his smiling demeanor the most. “You can tell at a glance he’s up to no good!”
Slapping his thigh abruptly, he looked at Fu Xingchen, “Do you think he’ll go and snitch on me to my dad? If my dad finds out I came to a place like this… I’m dead, totally dead!”
Fu Xingchen ruffled his hair: “With Tingxiao and me backing you up, what are you afraid of? If you’re scared, don’t come.”
Duan Yang shot him a glare, then turned to shake Huo Tingxiao’s arm: “Ge, you’ve got to cover for me!”
Huo Tingxiao smiled faintly: “If you’re scared, head back.”
Duan Yang: “…”
The lights over the spectator area gradually dimmed, and several high-powered searchlights flickered on with a sharp snap to illuminate the wire cage. Amidst a wave of cheers and whistles, that night’s match officially commenced.
The cage door swung open, and Lin Xun stepped onto the floor barefoot, still dressed in a black athletic short-sleeved shirt and shorts.
Noticing the bandages wrapped around his left hand, Duan Yang let out a soft “Huh?”: “He still has to fight even with injuries?”
Fu Xingchen said: “As long as you’re not dead, you fight.”
The cruel rules caused Duan Yang to go silent for a moment, only to be driven to swear by the opponent Lin Xun was about to face.
—A remarkably tall, muscular man stepped onto the mat, stripped to the waist.
The opening in the cage was about the height of an ordinary door, yet this man actually had to duck his head to pass through it.
“Holy shit, he’s gotta be over two meters tall…” Duan Yang looked at the man, then looked at Lin Xun. Standing at 182 cm, Lin Xun barely reached the guy’s chest!
Most importantly, the man possessed a frame of dense, knotty muscle; judging by those thick, bulging biceps alone… Duan Yang felt he could be crushed to death under a single arm.
“H-How do you even fight this! It’s way too unfair!”
Before Duan Yang’s outburst of indignation could even land, Lin Xun had already raised a leg to kick at his opponent’s lower body.
He fought aggressively, putting all his power into this single kick.
Yet the opponent didn’t budge an inch.
Instead, as if merely being lightly scratched, the opponent lowered his head and flashed a chilling smile at Lin Xun. Raising his massive hand, he swung a heavy fist toward Lin Xun’s head.
Lin Xun darted aside to dodge, circling to the opponent’s side to land a rapid sequence of kicks—none of which dealt any real pain or caused any damage.
If this went on, he was afraid he would collapse from exhaustion before his opponent even finished warming up.
Lin Xun knew full well that agility was his only advantage. Seizing on this, he darted, twisted, and skirted around, relentlessly circling behind and to the flanks of his opponent, focusing his strikes on vulnerable spots like the knees, lower back, armpits, and groin.
The crowd in the stands lost their patience, someone roaring, “What are you doing! Move! Attack!”
“Why isn’t there any blood yet?! Is this a circus?!”
…
The tall man seemed to run out of patience as well, unwilling to be tapped by punches here and kicked there any longer. He swung a heavy fist, which Lin Xun ducked past, but his other hand followed right behind. Catching Lin Xun by the collar, he lifted him entirely off the ground.
With another swing of his fist, he aimed straight for Lin Xun’s temple!
Lin Xun jerked his head back desperately to dodge the fatal blow, but the knuckles still grazed his forehead. His vision went black. In a split second, his back slammed into the cage wire, and he crashed heavily to the ground.
Shaking his head, he had just scrambled up when another kick landed squarely on his chest and stomach.
He flew back a distance, slamming into the chain-link fence once more.
Overwhelming pain rushed in, yet it stimulated him back to full alertness. As the overlapping shadows before his eyes cleared up, Lin Xun gritted his teeth and pulled himself up using the wire mesh.
“Beat him to death! Kill him!”
Wild shouts erupted from the stands, loud enough to puncture eardrums.
Some were cheering for him, while others were wishing for his death.
Lin Xun cared for none of it; he simply did not want to let a certain person see his weakness and pathetic state ever again.
He wiped the blood running down his temple. A drop of sweat trickled over the wound, stinging sharply, yet a spark of excitement glinted in his dark, bright eyes.
Unwinding the bandage from his left hand while darting to dodge the giant’s strikes, Lin Xun seized the right opening. Taking a short running start, he actually grabbed the wire netting to leap upward, delivering a flying kick that slammed straight into the giant’s face, contorting it sideways.
The kick carried immense power, leaving the opponent dazed and disoriented.
Taking advantage of the momentum, Lin Xun drove a heavy punch straight into his lower abdomen.
Infuriated, the man grabbed Lin Xun’s back collar, attempting to repeat his previous tactic of hoisting him up to beat him. But Lin Xun locked his legs in a reverse scissor grip around the man’s neck and twisted with force; his entire body spun half a turn in midair, landing reverse-mounted right on the giant’s neck.
Considering his opponent’s weight and height vastly exceeded his weight class, executing this reverse-countering twist demanded extreme core strength. Yet Lin Xun pulled it off with crisp, lethal precision, granting his opponent no room to breathe. He wrapped the bandage tightly around the man’s neck and pulled with all his might!
The opponent’s face flushed a deep crimson, veins bulging across his forehead, his eyes wide and bulging. He swayed left and right trying to shake Lin Xun off, but suffocation robbed him of his balance.
With a heavy thud, his knees hit the ground, nearly smashing through the floorboards.
Lin Xun rolled off him with the momentum, delivering a spin kick that struck the man’s head directly. Blood mixed with dislodged teeth flew through the air, and with another heavy bang, the tall man crashed face-first onto the ground, knocked out cold.
The entire counterattack process took less than two minutes.
“Holy shit! So cool! That was fucking awesome!”
Duan Yang bounced up in excitement, wishing he could charge over to the edge of the cage to throw flowers and shower money inside just like the rest of the crowd.
Fu Xingchen pressed him back down into his seat, telling him to keep a low profile.
Finding him a buzzkill, Duan Yang turned to pester Huo Tingxiao instead: “Did you see how impressive that scissor kick was just now?! That leg, that waist, tsk tsk tsk! So fierce!”
Huo Tingxiao rested his chin on one hand, gazing into the ring without chiming in.
Five or six staff members entered the ring, joining forces to drag the unconscious man away. Meanwhile, Lin Xun stood off to the side, his gaze cautiously sweeping across the spectator area, seemingly searching for something.
Blood from his temple trickled past his eye socket, leaving a daunting streak of red down one side of his cheek.
Paired with the wild ferocity of the fight that hadn’t completely dissipated, a chill crept up Duan Yang’s back when his gaze swept over: “…He’s really pretty fierce.”
“Is he?” Huo Tingxiao suddenly spoke up.
“Isn’t he?”
Looking at Lin Xun again, he was still staring toward their side, but in the next second, he reined in every bit of his aggressiveness. He raised a hand to smooth out his messy long hair, lowered his head to tidy his clothes, and even straightened his back a bit.
Duan Yang: ?
Huo Tingxiao offered another evaluation: “Pretty docile.”
Duan Yang: ??
At this moment, Fu Xingchen remarked faintly: “Tonight’s match isn’t quite right.”
“Huh?” Duan Yang pulled back a bit of his attention.
Fu Xingchen tapped the electronic display by his hand: “The match schedule has changed.”
The club arranged ten matches every evening. To facilitate betting for the audience, each seat in the spectator section was equipped with a tablet-sized fixed electronic display, allowing attendees to check all scheduled matches and their corresponding odds in advance.
However, that night’s match schedule had all been changed to pending.
“Must be a system bug,” Duan Yang said after refreshing it a few times. The schedule for the next match popped up, causing him to utter a soft gasp: “Why is Lin Xun in it again? It wasn’t like this when I checked earlier.”
In the second match, facing an opponent in the same weight class, Lin Xun won by KO.
Just when everyone thought that was it, staff members entered holding iron chains and locked Lin Xun’s left foot amidst a chorus of whistles.
After winning the third match, Lin Xun’s right foot was locked up as well.
Seeing this, Duan Yang began to curse.
At this moment, the electronic display released the rest of the match schedule—Lin Xun’s name was actually listed for every single match.
A gauntlet match!
The audience on site erupted into a frenzy, cheering fanatically, with some even chanting in unison: “All at once! All at once!!”
“Isn’t this deliberately trying to drive him to death?!” Duan Yang clicked his tongue in shock.
Fu Xingchen looked past him at Huo Tingxiao: “The club is refusing to let him go?”
With an expression as heavy as water, Huo Tingxiao answered: “The condition was that he finish tonight’s matches.”
Fu Xingchen understood. The club’s sudden shift in the match plan was simply to squeeze as much value out of him as possible and turn a massive profit before letting him go; naturally, they would push it to be as sensational as possible.
“Holy shit!” Duan Yang suddenly cursed, hurriedly urging the two of them to look at the electronic display.
The match schedule refreshed once more—it really was five men going at him all at once!
The rest of the crowd quickly noticed as well, erupting into wave after wave of even louder shouts and cheers, bringing the entire venue near to a boiling point.
By contrast, Lin Xun’s reaction inside the cage could be considered calm.
Standing barefoot beside a small puddle of blood, he watched as five men—some fat, some thin, some tall, some short—walked up to him one after another, forming a semi-circle around him. He silently tightened his grip on the dagger in his hand; this was the first time that night he was permitted to use a weapon.
As if they had agreed in advance, all five rushed forward together.
Lin Xun was best at using his legs, but with the iron chains locking him, his movements were restricted. The group had a clear division of labor: some were responsible for flanking him from the left and right, while others circled behind to mount sneak attacks. If Lin Xun wanted to win, he had to settle it quickly. However, the opposition deliberately sought to exhaust him, striking a blow here and a hit there like teasing a dog—not enough to inflict severe injury, but more than enough to make him suffer.
Trapped within the encirclement, Lin Xun found it difficult to defend entirely.
Taking a kick to his abdomen, he barely managed to stabilize his posture amid the clanking of iron chains, only to have the back of his knee kicked without warning.
He slammed down onto one knee, raising his arm to block a punch while simultaneously gripping his dagger to stab backward. With a wail of pain, the man who had ambushed him collapsed to the ground, clutching his bleeding thigh.
Blood sprayed all over Lin Xun’s face.
Sweat mixed with blood, staining his light gray hair a subtle pink as it hung damp and slightly curled over his forehead. Beneath his messy locks, a pair of bloodshot eyes radiated a chilling, terrifying coldness.
This sight intimidated his opponents so much that, for a moment, no one dared to draw near again.
Lin Xun stood up, casting a distracted glance toward the spectator stands.
Only to find that Huo Tingxiao was no longer in his seat, he was walking toward the exit without turning back.
Leaving just like that?
Lin Xun’s chest tightened. Before he could process any more emotion, the wind of an enemy punch arrived.
He took a solid blow, crashing face-down into the blood and filth with a heavy thud.