The deafening roar of the Central Arena complex washed over Yoriichi like a physical wave. The massive, coliseum-style stadium was packed to the absolute brim. Thousands of students, instructors, and academy staff filled the towering stone bleachers, their cheers shaking the very foundations of the Jia Nan Academy.
Down in the center, multiple massive stone rings hosted intense, high-speed battles as the Inner Academy Qualifying Tournament reached its boiling point.
However, on Ring Number Four, a strange, heavy silence had fallen.
The presiding referee, an older Da Dou Shi instructor, stood in the center of the empty ring, holding a glowing jade timepiece. He looked up toward the elevated judges' platform, where a panel of Core Elders sat with expressions ranging from boredom to sheer annoyance.
"It has been over ten minutes," the referee announced, his voice amplified by Dou Qi to echo across the specific sector. "Contestant Xiao Ning has failed to appear."
Up on the platform, an elder sighed deeply, shaking his head. "As expected. Since he did not participate in any of the preliminary elimination rounds due to his disciplinary circumstances, and now fails to appear for his seeded bracket match... he is officially terminated from the tournament."
The referee nodded, raising his hand to declare the default victory. "By the rules of the Jia Nan Academy, we will move to the next match. Contestant Su wins by forf—"
"Wait!"
A frantic, reedy voice violently cut through the official announcement.
Every eye turned toward the southern archway. Elder Kun, panting heavily and sweating profusely, was waving his hands wildly.
"Wait! Xiao Ning is here! He will fight!" Elder Kun shouted, his voice cracking under the pressure of interrupting an official academy proceeding.
The murmurs in the crowd instantly died down, replaced by a ripple of intense, bewildered curiosity. Hundreds of heads craned forward to look at the figure slowly descending the stone stairs beside the panting healer.
A collective gasp echoed through the stands.
It wasn't a triumphant return. Yoriichi looked absolutely terrifying, but not in the way of a powerful cultivator. From his neck to his wrists, his body was meticulously wrapped in pale-green medicinal bandages. His usually dense, perfectly sculpted musculature was completely hollowed out, leaving him looking frail and emaciated. His skin was deathly pale, and he walked with a slow, agonizingly measured gait, as if a strong gust of wind could shatter his bones.
Whispers immediately erupted like a swarm of locusts.
"By the heavens, is that really Xiao Ning?" a senior student muttered. "He looks like a walking corpse!"
"What a pathetic situation," another laughed cruelly. "He survived the Riverlands just to come here and get beaten to death? He can barely walk! This is a joke."
Before Yoriichi could even reach the edge of the arena, a blur of frosty silver and violet dropped from the VIP competitor's balcony above.
Xiao Yu landed perfectly on the stone path, her dense, terrifying Da Dou Shi aura passively flaring outward, instantly silencing the mockers within a fifty-foot radius. She sprinted toward Yoriichi, her pink-red eyes wide with a mixture of absolute relief and furious panic.
"Ning'er!" Xiao Yu cried, skidding to a halt right in front of him.
She looked at his bandaged, starved frame, her hands trembling as she reached out, afraid to touch him and cause him pain.
"Why did you come here?!" Xiao Yu demanded sternly, tears of worry pricking the corners of her eyes. "Are you insane? Look at your state! Go back to the pavilion and rest immediately!"
Yoriichi stopped his slow advance. He looked at his sister, his Transparent World vision effortlessly piercing her aura. He felt the vast, ocean-like depth of her liquid Dou Qi. She had not only stabilized her Da Dou Shi realm, but her foundation was thicker and purer than ever before.
A faint, deeply relieved sigh escaped his lips. The anxiety he had carried in the dark abyss for two months finally dissolved. She was safe, and she was incredibly strong.
"I have already cleared my preliminary bracket," Xiao Yu continued, her voice softening into a desperate plea. "I am securely in the Top 20! I don't even need to play the final rounds. I can just forfeit right now, and we can participate together next year. Please, Ning'er."
Just behind her, Tutor Ruo Lin and Gu Xun'er hurried down the steps. Xun'er remained quiet, her golden eyes carefully sweeping over his bandaged frame, analytically inspecting the severity of his physical state and the strange, heavy stillness residing within his aura. Tutor Ruo Lin stepped up beside Xiao Yu, her brow furrowed in professional disapproval.
"Xiao Ning, this is highly irregular," Ruo Lin stated, her tone strict. "Are you absolutely certain you are in a condition to stand in that ring?"
Yoriichi acknowledged the tutor with a brief, polite nod, but his gaze returned to his sister. His Dao Heart remained utterly immovable.
"Sister," Yoriichi spoke, his voice quiet, raspy, but carrying a weight that brooked absolutely no argument. "This is my battle. You cannot decide it for me."
Xiao Yu froze. She bit her lip hard, wanting to argue, wanting to physically drag him away. But she knew that tone. She knew the ancient, unbreakable resolve hidden behind those emotionless eyes. Defeated, she slowly stepped aside, her fists clenched tightly at her sides.
Up on the judges' platform, several elders cast furious, reprimanding glares at Elder Kun for allowing a patient in such a critical state to approach the ring. The elderly healer visibly cowered, hiding behind a stone pillar and furiously wiping his forehead with a handkerchief.
Ignoring the commotion, Yoriichi slowly stepped onto the elevated stone floor of Ring Number Four.
His opponent was already waiting. Contestant Su was a slim, handsome youth radiating the solid, sturdy aura of a 6-Star Dou Shi. He crossed his slender arms over his chest, looking Yoriichi up and down with a mixture of strange curiosity and blatant mockery.
"So, you are that man," Su smirked, shaking his head. "I heard rumors that you were a hidden monster. I thought this would be a tough fight, but looking at your state... I honestly just feel sorry for you."
The referee, seeing both contestants in the ring, raised his hand. "The match is officially started!"
Instead of immediately summoning his Dou Qi cloak or drawing a weapon, Su casually dropped his hands to his sides. He puffed out his broad chest, taking two leisurely steps forward until he was standing a mere arm's length from Yoriichi.
"Listen, Xiao Ning," Su said, his voice loud enough for the laughing crowd to hear. "As a benevolent senior, I'll give you a chance to save face. I'll give you one free hit. Come on. Don't hesitate. Use your full, weak powers on me."
It was the ultimate sign of disrespect. Su was banking entirely on his 6-Star Dou Shi physique to completely absorb whatever pathetic strike the emaciated boy could muster.
Yoriichi's expression remained a mask of flawless tranquility. He did not feel insulted. He simply calculated the optimal path to victory with minimal physical exertion.
Yoriichi slowly raised his right hand.
Because his physical vessel was starved and his meridians were as fragile as glass, he couldn't channel much Dou Qi for now. His movement was entirely devoid of kinetic explosion. To Su, and to the thousands of watching students, the palm strike looked laughably slow—like an exhausted old man weakly attempting to push a heavy door.
The crowd erupted into groans and laughter.
"What is that? A child throwing a tantrum?!" "He can barely lift his arm!"
Su smirked wider, bracing his chest, completely confident that the slow, weak palm wouldn't even leave a bruise.
Yoriichi's open palm gently, almost softly, connected with the center of Su's chest.
In that exact microsecond, Yoriichi closed his eyes. He channeled the raw, heavy, untamed Soul Power he had forcefully awakened in the deepest, darkest trenches of the Riverlands. He didn't aim to break bone or flesh; he visualized his willpower as a concussive hammer, striking directly at the essence of the boy's consciousness.
Thump.
There was no shockwave. There was no displaced air. There was no flash of Dou Qi.
But Su's smirk instantly vanished.
The opponent's eyes rolled backward, completely glazing over. The light of consciousness was violently, instantly pushed out of his physical vessel. He went entirely rigid, standing perfectly still like a petrified stone statue.
The laughter in the crowd died in the throats of the spectators.
Yoriichi did not waste a single millisecond admiring his handiwork. He knew the soul of a cultivator would snap back into the body rapidly.
Using his baseline martial arts, Yoriichi smoothly hooked his right boot behind Su's knee and delivered a sharp, precise kick to the joint.
With his consciousness temporarily severed, Su had no balance. He crashed heavily onto his back against the stone floor, completely listless.
Before the crowd could even blink, Yoriichi effortlessly dropped to the floor beside him. He slipped his right forearm under Su's chin, locking his hands together in a flawless, inescapable rear-naked chokehold. He pressed his frail but perfectly positioned body weight against the back of Su's neck, violently compressing the boy's carotid arteries.
Three seconds later, Su's soul snapped back into his body.
He woke up to a living nightmare. He couldn't breathe. His vision was swimming with black spots, and an immense, crushing pressure was clamped around his throat. He panicked, desperately flailing his thick arms, trying to summon his 6-Star Dou Qi to blast the boy off him.
But Yoriichi's anatomical leverage was absolute. By compressing the arteries, he was denying blood flow directly to the brain. Dou Qi required a conscious mind to activate, and Su's mind was rapidly suffocating.
"Surrender," Yoriichi whispered calmly into Su's ear, his voice devoid of any malice, only cold fact. "Or this will not be a good end for you."
Su thrashed wildly, his legs kicking against the stone floor. He tried to pry Yoriichi's arm away, but the technique was perfectly locked. Within ten seconds, Su's struggles grew incredibly weak. His face turned a deep, terrifying shade of purple, and his eyes began to roll back into his skull.
The referee, who had been completely stunned by the bizarre, sudden turn of events, finally snapped out of his stupor.
"Stop!" the referee roared, rushing forward and waving his hands frantically. "Stop, contestant Xiao Ning! You win this match! Do not break the rules!"
Yoriichi instantly released his grip. He smoothly rolled backward and stood up, his breathing slightly elevated from the physical exertion, but his posture as straight as a sword.
Su rolled onto his side, coughing violently, gasping for the sweet air as if he had just been pulled from the bottom of an ocean. He looked up at the emaciated, bandaged boy standing over him, his eyes wide with unadulterated, primal terror. He had absolutely no idea what had just happened. One second he was smirking, and the next, he was dying.
The entire Central Arena was plunged into an eerie, graveyard-like silence.
Up on the VIP platform, Deputy Headmaster Hu Gan leaned so far forward in his grand chair he nearly fell out of it.
"What... what technique was that?" an older judge stammered, rubbing his eyes in disbelief. "I sensed absolutely zero Dou Qi fluctuation! Did he use a hidden poison artifact?"
"No," another elder muttered, his brow furrowed in deep, profound confusion. "Poison takes time to circulate. That boy was instantly paralyzed. Was it... an illusion technique? A mental attack?"
Zhan Yue, standing near the back of the platform, crossed her arms. Her amethyst eyes gleamed with a mixture of profound shock and immense pride. 'He didn't just survive the abyss,' she realized, a thrill running down her spine. 'He forged an entirely new weapon in the dark.'
Down in the ring, Yoriichi casually adjusted his bandages, completely ignoring the terrified, awe-struck stares burning into his back. The "crippled" demon had returned.