The Radiant Dragon
"Let's go! Quick!"
Ignoring the weight of the meal in his stomach, Xie Xie's eyes flashed with alarm at the sound of the familiar, anguished cry. He broke into a run, shoving his way through the growing crowd, with Yao Xuan, Gu Yue, and Tang Wulin close on his heels.
"You—you can't do this! This is my livelihood! You can't!"
The desperate wail was unmistakably Uncle Li's, punctuated by the harsh, crashing sound of shattering pottery.
Hearing that cry, a cold dread gripped Xie Xie's heart. Since his mother's death, Uncle Li had been one of the few remaining anchors to a gentler past. He redoubled his efforts, elbowing through the ring of onlookers.
The scene before them was one of wanton destruction. The rectangular stove outside the braised beef shop lay overturned. Dozens of clay pots were smashed on the ground, their precious contents—rich broth, tender beef—mingled with sharp pottery shards into a soggy, heartbreaking ruin.
A hot wave of anger surged in Xie Xie's chest. But when his eyes found Uncle Li, that anger turned into a white-hot fury.
Uncle Li was sprawled on the ground by the shop entrance. A trickle of blood seeped from the corner of his mouth. One eye was swollen shut, his cheek bruised and puffy. His expression was a raw wound of grief, despair, and impotent rage.
Looming over him were four hulking men. The leader was a bald giant, easily over two meters tall, with a bullish neck and a face etched with cruelty. Despite the winter chill, he wore only a thin shirt, his thick arms bare and tattooed—a coiling blue dragon on the left, a prowling white tiger on the right. He radiated the predatory aura of the underworld.
Behind him stood three equally imposing thugs, armed with thick wooden clubs, their faces set in scowls of casual violence.
"Hey, Old Li! A smart man knows when to bow!" the bald man—Guanglong—barked, his voice a gravelly sneer. "On this street, nobody says no to Guanglong's protection fee! You keep making excuses, you think I'm some beggar coming 'round for scraps?"
He leaned down, his shadow swallowing the cowering shopkeeper. "Let me make this clear. The only reason this place isn't already a pile of kindling is 'cause your beef ain't half bad. But this is your last chance. No money? Every time you open this door, I'll come back and smash it. Every. Single. Time."
Guanglong's eyes glinted with a cold, reptilian malice. The crowd of onlookers had swelled, but a fearful silence held them. No one dared to speak up.
"Brother Guanglong, it's not that I don't want to pay! I can't!" Uncle Li pleaded, his voice cracking. "My wife... she's gravely ill. Every coin I earn from dawn to dusk goes to her medicine. I have nothing left! Please, I'm begging you, don't take this from me! If you do, she'll die! I'll kowtow to you, please, just let me be!"
With a pained groan, Uncle Li struggled to his knees before the thug, tears cutting tracks through the grime on his face.
"Let you be? And make me, Guanglong, a laughingstock?" The bald man spat. "Your sob story means nothing to me. My patience is gone! No money? Then get lost! Smash it!"
He jerked his head. The three club-wielding brutes stepped forward with grim efficiency, raising their weapons to reduce the small shop to splinters.
"You animals! I'll fight you!"
Seeing the last remnants of his life's work about to be destroyed, a wild, final desperation seized Uncle Li. He lunged forward from his knees, hands clawing toward Guanglong.
"Fight me?" Guanglong threw his head back and laughed, a harsh, ugly sound. "You forget, old man. I'm a Soul Master!"
With a contemptuous flick of his leg, he kicked Uncle Li squarely in the chest. The frail shopkeeper was lifted off his feet, flew backwards, and slammed into a wooden support beam with a sickening thud before crumpling to the ground, a fresh trickle of blood staining his lips.
"See that? That's what happens to those who defy me! Now, the rest of you, scram!" Guanglong roared, his gaze sweeping the terrified crowd.
"You bastard! How dare you hurt Uncle Li! I'll kill you!"
It was at that moment that Yao Xuan and the other three finally broke through the front of the crowd. Taking in the scene, Xie Xie saw red. A raw, guttural roar tore from his throat. Tang Wulin immediately rushed to Uncle Li's side, gently helping the moaning man to sit up.
"Kill me? You? A little brat in a school uniform?" Guanglong's laughter boomed again, genuine amusement in his cruel eyes. "That's the funniest thing I've heard all year!"
"You'll regret those words! Die!"
Xie Xie's voice dropped to an icy whisper. Soul power ignited within him. Motes of yellow light shimmered around his body as the Light Dragon Dagger materialized in his grasp. In the next instant, his form blurred into a streak of motion as he shot toward Guanglong, dagger aimed for the man's throat.
"A Soul Master? So am I, kid!"
Guanglong's sneer didn't falter. Gray light erupted around him. Two soul rings—one dull white, one muddy yellow—rose from his feet.
As his martial soul activated, his body underwent a grotesque transformation. His skin took on the dull, pitted hue of aged iron, becoming thick and coarse. Bony, iron-gray scales erupted over his knuckles, elbows, and shoulders. His muscles bulged violently, straining against his clothes, and his aura swelled into something brutish and oppressive.
A Great Soul Master! And his martial soul—an Ironclad Dragon, an earth-attribute subspecies renowned for monstrous defense and strength.
Xie Xie's eyes narrowed, his earlier rage cooling into focused calculation. Facing a defense-oriented Great Soul Master several levels above him was no joke. He activated his second soul ring without hesitation.
"Light Dragon Storm!"
The yellow ring blazed. Xie Xie's body became a spinning vortex of lethal motion. The Light Dragon Dagger whirled around him, its tip becoming the heart of a bladed hurricane that shrieked toward Guanglong, aiming to find a gap in his iron hide.
Clang! Clang-clang-clang!
A rapid-fire series of metallic shrieks filled the air as the dagger struck Guanglong's upraised forearms again and again, throwing off bright sparks. The thug merely stood his ground, a contemptuous grin spreading across his face.
"Hahaha! Are you trying to tickle me?"
Guanglong's first soul skill, Ironclad Body, had rendered his skin as tough as forged steel. Combined with his inherent dragon-subspecies resilience and higher soul power, Xie Xie's swift, sharp attacks—hampered by his full stomach and the disadvantage of an agility type against a pure defender—simply could not penetrate.
Xie Xie disengaged, flipping backwards to land lightly a few meters away, his chest heaving slightly. His eyes were wide with a mixture of fury and stunned realization.
"How... how is this possible?!"
The thug's mocking laughter echoed in the suddenly quiet street. The situation had turned dire. Xie Xie's fastest, strongest attacks had failed to even scratch the enemy. The hope that had flickered in Uncle Li's eyes began to dim once more.
It was then that a calm, steady hand came to rest on Xie Xie's shoulder, halting his instinctive lunge forward.
"Stand down, Xie Xie," Yao Xuan's voice was quiet, yet it cut through the tension like a knife. "You're not suited for this kind of fight."
He stepped forward, placing himself between his friend and the hulking Soul Master. His gaze, when it lifted to meet Guanglong's, held no fear, no rage—only a deep, unsettling tranquility.
"You've had your fun," Yao Xuan stated, his voice carrying to every corner of the silent street. "Now, you will pay for what you've broken, and you will apologize to this man. Then you will leave, and you will not return."
Guanglong's laughter died in his throat. He looked at this new boy, even younger and slimmer than the last, and felt not amusement, but a sudden, inexplicable prickle at the base of his spine. The air around the boy seemed... heavier.
"Another brave little hero?" Guanglong growled, recovering his bravado. "Fine. I'll break you first, then finish wrecking this dump."
He lowered his head like a bull, his iron-scaled fists clenching. "Let's see how your pretty face looks after meeting my Ironclad Dragon Fist!"
He charged. The ground seemed to tremble under his weight. It was a straightforward, brutish attack, meant to overwhelm and crush.
Yao Xuan didn't move to dodge. He didn't summon his martial soul. He simply stood there, watching the mountain of angry flesh and iron bear down on him.
Just as Guanglong's massive fist was about to connect with Yao Xuan's head, Yao Xuan's right hand moved.
It was not a blur. It was a motion so precise, so efficient, it seemed almost slow. His open palm came up and met the oncoming fist.
CRACK.
The sound was not of impact, but of something hard and dense shattering under immense, focused pressure.
Guanglong's forward momentum stopped dead. His expression of triumphant fury froze, then twisted into a mask of pure, uncomprehending agony. A sickening crunch emanated from his fist, now engulfed by Yao Xuan's palm. The iron-gray scales there were spiderwebbed with fine cracks.
Yao Xuan hadn't pushed back. He had simply stopped the force, and in doing so, absorbed and negated it completely, leaving the thug's own power to rebound into his bones.
With a slight twist of his wrist, Yao Xuan applied gentle, inexorable pressure. Guanglong, the two-meter-tall Great Soul Master, cried out in pain and was forced to one knee, his broken fist still trapped, his face pale with shock.
The three other thugs stared, their clubs hanging forgotten at their sides. The crowd gasped.
Yao Xuan looked down at the kneeling man, his golden eyes now glowing with a faint, ancient light. The aura around him shifted subtly—not explosive, but deep and immeasurably vast, like the silent weight of a sleeping continent.
"You were saying?" Yao Xuan asked, his voice still quiet, but now it carried the resonance of distant thunder.