The air in the Grand Arena didn't just vibrate; it felt as though the atmospheric pressure itself was undergoing a fundamental change in its governing laws ([PROTOCOL_REWRITE]).
Ten of the Inner Sect's most elite disciples, led by a bloodshot-eyed Fang Wei, charged toward Lu Chen. To the thousands of spectators in the stands, it was a blinding blur of white robes and high-level techniques—the Cloud-Splitting Kick, the Mist-Vortex Palm, and the Heavy-Rain Strike. It was a coordinated physical assault (Multi-Vector Attack) designed to crush any single opponent through sheer volume and overlapping force.
"AIDA," Lu Chen thought, his eyes tracking the micro-movements of their muscles with a clarity that made the world seem to crawl. "The incoming movements are messy. They're stepping on each other's toes (Collision Overlap). Analyze the weakest link in their group coordination."
[ ANALYSIS: THE_TEN_ATTACKERS_ARE_NOT_SYNCHRONIZED. ] AIDA'S voice echoed with a hint of electronic disdain. [ THEY_ARE_FIGHTING_FOR_ENERGY_SPACE (BANDWIDTH). FANG_WEI_IS_CONSUMING_80%_OF_THE_TOTAL_ENERGY_RESOURCES. THE_OTHERS_ARE_OPERATING_ON_RESIDUAL_FLOW (RESIDUE). ]
"Then let's cut their connection," Arthur whispered.
The Parallel Processing Defense
As the ten geniuses reached the strike zone, Lu Chen didn't move an inch. Instead, he channeled the collective breathing of Fatty Han and the six other "Trash" disciples standing in a circle behind him.
"Steady, Han," Lu Chen commanded, his voice calm amidst the roaring wind of the incoming attacks. "Don't push the energy out. Just let it flow through me. You are the external batteries (External Power Supply); I am the central processor."
The seven disciples gasped as their energy was pulled into a singular point—Lu Chen's back. To the crowd, a faint, translucent barrier of sapphire light shimmered into existence around the group, humming with a frequency that silenced the wind.
BOOM.
Ten high-level strikes hit the barrier simultaneously. The sound was like a massive hammer hitting a mountain of glass, but the barrier didn't shatter. It didn't even ripple.
"What?!" Fang Wei gasped, his fist rebounding off the sapphire light as if he'd struck a wall of solid diamond. "How can an Outer Sect trash block ten of us at once?"
"It's simple math, Fang Wei," Lu Chen said, his voice echoing with a strange resonance from within the barrier. "You are ten separate individuals fighting for space. We are eight nodes working as one (Parallel Processing). Your efficiency is dropping because you're all trying to be the hero. We're just trying to be a solid, singular wall."
With a flick of his fingers, Lu Chen reversed the flow. He didn't punch; he simply "released" the stored energy (Buffered Data) that the ten geniuses had just slammed into his shield.
The resulting shockwave sent all ten Inner Disciples flying backward. Some tumbled across the stone floor like broken dolls, while others barely kept their footing, their white robes scorched. The "Great Elites" looked like a disorganized, broken mess (Corrupted Data).
***
From the high balcony, Sect Leader Zhang's face was unreadable, his stone-cold expression finally cracking. His hand moved to the hilt of the sword at his waist—the Cloud-Piercer. It was a legendary weapon, said to contain the soul of a wind dragon captured a thousand years ago. In Arthur's eyes, however, the sword was glowing with a frantic, unstable light.
[ WARNING: UNSTABLE_ENERGY_SIGNATURE_DETECTED. ]
[ THE_SECT_LEADER'S_WEAPON_IS_LEAKING_HIGH-FREQUENCY_ENERGY. ]
[ CAUSE: IMPROPER_BONDING_LOGIC. THE_WEAPON_IS_REJECTING_THE_USER'S_INPUT. ]
"Interesting," Arthur thought, watching the sword rattle in its scabbard. "His sword has a hardware defect (A Bug)."
Sect Leader Zhang stood up, the pressure of his Stage 12 cultivation—the highest in the region (Root Admin Level)—nearly crushing the breath out of the thousands of disciples in the stands.
"Enough!" Zhang's voice was like a thunderclap that shook the foundations of the arena. "Lu Chen, your 'Network' is impressive. But a group of sheep led by a wolf is still just sheep. A true master does not rely on others. He relies on his own blade."
Zhang drew the Cloud-Piercer. The blade hummed with a high-pitched whine that made the ears of the weaker disciples bleed. The sword was beautiful, forged from celestial iron, but to Lu Chen, the "hum" was the sound of a cooling fan failing under high heat (Thermal Throttling).
"Sect Leader," Lu Chen said, stepping out from his circle of disciples, his hands empty. "That sword is beautiful, but it's fighting you. Every time you swing it, you lose 10% of your power to spiritual friction (Latency). It's an unstable, buggy piece of equipment."
The arena went deathly silent. Calling the Sect Leader's ancestral blade "buggy" was beyond heresy; it was a death wish.
"Arrogance!" Zhang roared. He leaped from the balcony, a streak of white light descending like a falling star. He didn't use a complex technique; he simply swung the Cloud-Piercer at Lu Chen's head with the full weight of his Stage 12 power.
***
[ ALERT: HIGH-VELOCITY_INPUT_DETECTED. ]
[ TIME_TO_IMPACT: 0.0004_SECONDS. ]
[ ACTION: 'OVERCLOCK_PERCEPTION'. ]
The world slowed to a crawl. Lu Chen watched as the Cloud-Piercer descended through the air. He could see the jagged lines of energy vibrating along the edge of the blade, flickering in and out of existence. It wasn't a clean, sharp cut; it was a vibrating mess of spiritual noise that wasted energy at every inch.
"AIDA, help me find the 'Undo' button on this thing," Arthur thought.
As the blade was inches from his face, Lu Chen didn't draw a weapon. He reached out with two fingers—infused with the peak Stage 10 energy of his perfected body—and tapped the side of the blade at a very specific point where the energy flow flickered the most.
Ting.
The sound was small, like a needle hitting a glass cup, but the result was catastrophic for the sword's internal energy flow. By tapping the "Harmonic Node" of the blade, Lu Chen introduced a massive wave of interference (Jitter).
The Cloud-Piercer didn't cut Lu Chen. Instead, the sword began to vibrate violently in Zhang's hand, the metal turning red-hot. The "Wind Dragon" spirit within the blade started to scream as its energy flow was suddenly redirected into a self-destructive loop (Infinite Recursion).
"What have you done?!" Zhang shouted, his arm shaking as he tried to stabilize the weapon.
"I told you, it's a buggy weapon," Lu Chen said, stepping closer, his face inches from the vibrating blade. "It has too much lag (Latency). You're trying to force it to be fast, but its internal structure is designed for a different era. It needs a complete rebuild (Refactoring)."
Lu Chen grabbed the flat of the blade with his bare hand. Normally, his fingers would have been sliced off, but because he had "crashed" the sword's cutting edge (Disabled the Driver), the blade was just a piece of hot, inert metal.
He twisted his wrist.
With a sound like a thousand mirrors shattering at once, the Cloud-Piercer—the pride of the Sect—snapped in half.
The spiritual energy trapped within the blade exploded outward in a blinding flash, but Lu Chen didn't let it dissipate into the air. He opened his palm and "captured" the shards of the dragon's soul, pulling the raw information into his own Dantian.
[ RESOURCE_ACQUIRED: 'WIND_DRAGON_CORE_DATA'. ]
[ INTEGRATING_NEW_SUBROUTINE... ]
[ NEW_CAPABILITY_UNLOCKED: 'HIGH-SPEED_EXECUTION'. ]
***
The Sect Leader stumbled back, staring at the broken hilt in his hand. He looked like a man who had just watched his entire life's work (Operating System) vanish in a blue screen of death.
"You... you broke it," Zhang whispered, his voice trembling. "The Cloud-Piercer... it is gone."
"It wasn't gone, Sect Leader. It was just inefficient," Lu Chen said, tossing the broken tip of the blade onto the stone floor with a metallic clang. "I'll take the pieces. I can fix them. In fact, I think I'll take most of the Sect's 'Legacy' weapons. They're all running on outdated, slow instructions (Old Arrays)."
Lu Chen turned to the Elders, who were now standing in their seats, frozen in fear.
"From today on," Lu Chen announced, his voice carrying to every corner of the mountain like a broadcast signal, "the Inner Sect is under new management. We are doing a complete system audit. Anyone with a flawed cultivation technique (Buggy) or a slow weapon (High-Latency) will report to the Trash Dwellings for a forced improvement (Mandatory Patching)."
He looked at the broken sword, then back at the Sect Leader, who was still in shock.
"Don't worry, Zhang. I'm not killing you. I'm just taking away your administrative power (Downgrading your permissions). You're no longer the one in charge (Root Admin). You're just a guest in my system until I finish rebuilding this place."