Guangzhi's flames surged.
The wolf lowered his body, the twin blades of Red Tides burning so brightly that the air around them warped. Then his entire body suddenly blurred into fire.
I barely had time to move.
BOOM!
A streak of crimson shot across the clearing.
I twisted aside as Guangzhi tore past me, his glaive spinning in front of him like a burning wheel. I felt the heat scorch my cheek as he passed, but before I could turn, the flames suddenly vanished from my side.
He was already behind me.
I spun around.
Too late.
Guangzhi swung.
CLANG!
I caught the blade with the Willow Staff, but the force drove me sideways. He immediately reversed the glaive and struck with the opposite blade, forcing me to duck before sweeping my staff upward into his ribs.
BAM!
He grunted and staggered, but instead of retreating he planted the glaive into the ground and vaulted over me.
I looked up.
His body flipped through the air, flames trailing behind him.
The glaive came down.
I crossed my staff over my head.
BOOM!
The impact drove me into the earth.
Guangzhi rebounded from the strike and came down again.
I rolled away.
BOOOM!
The ground exploded where I had been.
He landed, spun once and immediately swung the glaive horizontally.
I jumped.
The blade passed beneath my feet.
Guangzhi followed with another sweep from the opposite direction.
I twisted in midair and narrowly avoided it before landing on the shaft of his weapon for an instant.
I pushed off.
My fist struck his jaw.
BAM!
His head snapped sideways.
He smiled.
Then he threw Red Tides.
My eyes widened as the flaming glaive spun toward me.
I stepped aside.
The weapon passed my shoulder, carving a burning line through the trees before curving around in the air.
It's coming back.
I turned.
Guangzhi was already waiting.
The glaive returned straight into his hand.
He caught it without looking.
Then he charged again.
I met him.
Our weapons collided repeatedly as we tore through the burning clearing, his glaive moving in spirals while I slipped between the blades and answered with short strikes whenever an opening appeared.
He was fast enough that every exchange became a test of instinct, and every time I thought I had found his rhythm, he changed the angle of his weapon and forced me to adapt again.
Then he crouched.
The flames around his body suddenly compressed.
My instincts screamed.
I moved.
Guangzhi became a streak of fire.
BOOOOOOM!
The Flame Dash tore past me.
I twisted away from the first charge, but he immediately turned and came back.
Another blazing streak.
I jumped over him.
He passed beneath me, planted the glaive into the ground and used it as a pole to launch himself upward.
I looked up.
Guangzhi was already descending.
I raised my staff.
BOOM!
The impact shook my arms.
The earth cracked beneath us.
Before I could counter, he struck again.
BOOM!
And again.
BOOM!
The final slam released a wave of fire that tore outward across the ground.
I jumped backward, barely clearing it.
My breathing had become heavier.
Guangzhi landed several meters away.
The flames around him were different now.
They were no longer simply coating his weapon.
They were inside him.
His fur was burning without being consumed. Crimson fire poured from his body, curling around his limbs and shoulders as if his very blood had turned into flame.
He slowly raised his head.
A strange grin spread across his face.
Then his body ignited completely.
For an instant, I couldn't even see the wolf anymore.
Only a humanoid silhouette made from fire remained.
My grip tightened around the Willow Staff.
This is getting ridiculous.
Guangzhi roared and charged.
I met him.
STRIKE STRIKE STRIKE!!
The next exchange was faster than anything before it.
His flaming glaive swept toward my neck.
"Not Bad Brat!! hahahaha..." he started laughing as he was growing strong???
'Fuck...!!'
I struggled as he is much faster and flames more hot.
He spun but I stepped inside.
My staff struck his ribs.
CRACK~!!
He twisted with the impact.
The glaive came around.
I blocked.
The force sent sparks flying.
We moved through the flames without either of us giving ground.
Then Guangzhi's body suddenly disappeared.
Again?!
I turned.
A streak of fire was already coming toward me.
I crossed my arms.
BOOOOOOM!
The Flame Dash hit me directly.
My body flew backward.
I crashed through a tree and landed hard against a rock.
guAH!!~ Air left my chest.
I tried to rise.
A shadow appeared above me.
'bad!!...'
BOOM!
I dodge roll that shit,
The blade smashed into the ground.
I followed immediately with a kick upward.
Striking his jaw, making him stagger back.
I scrambled to my feet.
Blood was running from my nose.
Guangzhi adjusted his jaw...
Then laughed.
"Hahaha!"
The flames around him grew brighter.
I stared at him.
He's enjoying this.
That grin wasn't madness.
It was the expression of someone who had finally found an opponent worth burning himself against.
I tightened my fist around the Willow Staff.
Then Guangzhi attacked again.
I blocked the first strike.
The second caught my shoulder.
The third grazed my ribs.
and by the fourth he forced me backward.
He didn't stop.
His glaive spun continuously, the twin blades carving flaming arcs around him as his body moved with the weapon.
I couldn't retreat anymore. The forest behind me was already burning.
So I went forward.
I slipped past the first blade.
Then the second.
I drove my shoulder into his chest.
BOOM!
His flames crawled across my arms.
My skin burned.
Neither of us moved.
Then Guangzhi's eyes widened.
The flames around his body suddenly exploded.
WHOOOOOOOM!
I was thrown backward.
The Willow Staff slipped from my hand.
I landed hard.
Before I could recover, Guangzhi was already coming.
A burning blur.
The Flame Dash.
I tried to move.
Too slow!!
BOOOOOOOOOOM!
The impact swallowed me.
Flames erupted across the clearing.
Guangzhi stopped several meters away and slowly lowered his glaive.
The fire continued burning where I had fallen.
He watched.
Waiting.
Then his grin faded slightly.
There was no movement.
No breath.
Nothing.
"...Human?"
Only flames answered him.
Guangzhi stared for several seconds.
Then he slowly turned his back,
"Disappointing...."
The fight was over.
Or so he thought.
Deep inside the inferno, my consciousness flickered.
Everything hurt.
My chest felt like it had been crushed.
My skin was burning.
My lungs struggled to draw breath.
I couldn't move.
I couldn't even feel my hands.
So this is... death?
My vision blurred.
The flames surrounding me became distant.
For a moment, I remembered nothing.
Then something echoed inside my mind.
Not the System. but,
A voice.
Like a chanting sutra
'The body is the mountain.'
My fingers moved.
'The fist is merely the falling boulder.'
I felt the Qi inside my body.
It wasn't moving through my arm.
It was moving through me.
Every part of me connected.
The mountain wasn't the fist.
The mountain was the whole body.
My eyes opened.
The flames surrounding me suddenly changed.
They no longer felt like something I needed to escape.
They were something I had to withstand.
Something I had to understand.
Qi surged through my body into my Fists as they hardened.
BOOOOOOM!
The flames exploded outward.
Guangzhi stopped.
His ears twitched.
Slowly, he turned around.
"Ho?"
A figure stood inside the burning crater.
I stepped forward.
My body was scorched.
My clothes were torn.
Smoke rose from my shoulders.
But my right fist...
...was glowing.
The redness slowly faded.
The fire disappeared from my skin.
What remained was a dull bronze coating covering my fist and forearm.
Stone.
Not literally.
Something harder and deeper.
DING!!
[FIRST ECHO: MOUNTAIN BODY RESOUNANCE REALIZED!!]
[BLOODLINE ART: ROCK SOLID (UNLOCKED)]
I looked at my hand.
Then at Guangzhi.
My breathing was ragged.
My throat was burned raw.
Yet somehow, I still managed to grin.
"Oi..."
My voice came out broken.
I wiped the blood from my mouth.
"We ain't done yet."
Guangzhi stared at me.
For one heartbeat, neither of us moved.
Then his grin returned.
Wider and Wild.
"Hao!"
His voice almost became a roar.
"That's how I like it!"
The flames around his body erupted.
His entire figure became fire once more.
Then,
BOOOOOOM!
Guangzhi instantly Flame Dashed.
I raised my bronze covered fist.
And this time...
I stepped toward him.
CLAAANG!!