Chapter 141: Give Them a Taste of Their Own Medicine (Now Available—Please Support It with Your First Subscription!)

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Once outside the school gates, Wang Jiaxu glanced left and right. There were several old alleyways, but no one in sight. Shi Tiexin had already gone far ahead. Wang Jiaxu tilted his head and listened carefully, then once again broke into a smile that said, “You’ll never escape my grasp!” He took off running into one of the old alleys.

The moment he entered the alley, where the sunlight barely reached and the shadows lay thick, Wang Jiaxu suddenly felt that the place looked familiar.

Wasn’t this the very spot where he had ambushed Shi Tiexin last time?

His heart gave a jolt. Before he could react, the space around him began to crackle and turn glasslike. A boundary, resembling something between crystal glass and frosted glass, suddenly spread outward and enveloped the surroundings, enclosing a circle more than twenty meters in diameter. The glassy boundary separated inside from outside. Within it, the walls, roads, and old alley remained exactly as they were in reality, yet at the same time possessed the dual qualities of reality and illusion.

A secret realm!

Someone had opened a secret realm around him!

Wang Jiaxu was startled. When he turned around again, he saw a tall figure leaning against the wall at the mouth of the alley, arms folded across his chest.

It was Shi Tiexin.

“I was just wondering who would come looking for me. You were the most likely candidate. Sure enough, fate has treated me well and actually sent you here.” Shi Tiexin’s voice sounded like the breath of the Grim Reaper. “Are you planning to use the same trick again?”

Shi Tiexin lowered his head, his face hidden entirely in shadow. The lighting of Grim-Grief Mode had come into play once more, frightening Wang Jiaxu into retreating two steps.

The old alley was dimly lit, and everything beneath Shi Tiexin’s hairline was swallowed by darkness. Within that darkness, a pair of demonic eyes fixed themselves on Wang Jiaxu.

“He Chong is a good-for-nothing. He doesn’t have a mind complicated enough for this. The idea of ganging up on me may have occurred to him, but you were the one who chose the location. And the idea of making me incur a debt was certainly yours as well.”

It was not a question, but a statement of fact. Wang Jiaxu was He Chong’s chief strategist and number-one lackey, a truth acknowledged by the entire school. There was no room for denial.

Wang Jiaxu’s lips twitched several times, but in the end he said nothing. Denial would probably be useless. He merely glanced from side to side, searching for some way to escape alive.

Shi Tiexin looked up at the old alley. “Come to think of it, you chose this place rather cleverly.”

Earthwork Fortress Space City was an old city, and the Shepherd Plains District was one of its more backward districts. The Affiliated School was an old industrial park to begin with, so there were still a few places nearby beyond the reach of surveillance cameras. And the law, more often than not, operated only within the range of those cameras.

Last time, more than ten people had taken turns opening secret realms against Shi Tiexin, several of them blocking him at once. It was clearly illegal.

Although after a secret realm shattered, most injuries suffered within it could heal, with many of the lighter wounds vanishing entirely, the pain endured during the assault did not lessen. Nor would the physical strength and vital essence one had expended be restored.

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At that time, Shi Tiexin’s basic fist technique had not yet reached the profound level, nor had he activated the Ruthless attribute. His destructive power could not compare with the short man’s Ancient-Style Fist Technique. Without the ability to kill his opponents instantly, he had naturally been unable to break through their encirclement, and in the end they had worn him down until every last ounce of his strength was gone.

Shi Tiexin still remembered with perfect clarity how He Chong, the last one to appear, had acted so arrogantly, tormenting him in every way because he knew Shi Tiexin had no strength left to resist. Today, Shi Tiexin truly wanted to open a secret realm in full view of the public, when He Chong could not cheat, and return every bit of the pain he had suffered that day.

But he could not. For the sake of his strategy, he still had to endure.

Wang Jiaxu, however, did not fall within the scope of that restraint.

The only person Shi Tiexin had to worry about was He Chong’s father. And no matter what, He Chong’s father would never make a major issue of things for Wang Jiaxu. After all, Wang Jiaxu’s background was only marginally better than Shi Tiexin’s. If he had not clung desperately to He Chong’s leg, he would not have found even a chance to raise his voice—not even at a wretched school like this one.

Therefore—

“So today, I’ll let you experience for yourself what kind of blessed ground you chose back then.”

Shi Tiexin lowered his arms and thrust out his chest, straightening to his full height as he advanced on Wang Jiaxu like a demon.

“Don’t! Don’t do this! I—I didn’t come here to deal with you. I only… I only…”

Wang Jiaxu’s eyes darted about. He had already lost his nerve while hiding behind He Chong. Now that he was alone in this dim old alley, facing an enraged Shi Tiexin, he was even more terrified.

He did possess a certain degree of vital essence cultivation, but combat prowess was not determined by vital essence cultivation alone.

“You only what? Go on, tell me. Let’s see whether your cultivation in the Rhetoric Arts can shake my will again!”

Even while crossing between world-lines, even while unconscious, Shi Tiexin had remembered clearly every word Wang Jiaxu had spoken. Wang Jiaxu was mediocre in most respects, but as an intelligent man, he knew exactly where his strengths lay. He had devoted nearly all his energy to cultivating the Rhetoric Arts.

The higher one’s cultivation in the Rhetoric Arts, the better one became at encouraging, beguiling, or swaying others. If the person being beguiled had low attainment in the Rhetoric Arts, an unstable will, or no support from the Discernment attribute, they could easily lose their fighting spirit or have their thoughts altered. It was a discipline capable of defeating an enemy without leaving a trace.

But using the Rhetoric Arts to beguile others was neither omnipotent nor flawless.

“I imagine you still remember what you said back then.” Shi Tiexin looked at Wang Jiaxu. The thought-energy of the Rhetoric Arts surged through his mind, and he suddenly spoke with ringing force.

“You said I wanted to become one of the upper class? You were right. I have struggled all this time precisely to become one of the upper class!”

Wang Jiaxu froze, and then a look of panic suddenly flashed across his face.

That was right. Nothing in this world came without a price or consequences—not even words that could kill without leaving a visible wound. Manipulating others with thought-energy was convenient, but if someone broke through it, or turned it back upon the caster…

Wang Jiaxu struggled to resist. “Impossible! What makes you think you can become upper class? You—”

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Shi Tiexin took one step forward. “The supplementary cultivation manuals you had to kneel and act like a dog to obtain—I’ve used them, and plenty of them!”

Wang Jiaxu’s expression changed.

Shi Tiexin took another step forward. “The nourishing essence foods you had to sell your dignity to obtain—I’ve eaten them, and plenty of them!”

Wang Jiaxu’s face turned pale.

Shi Tiexin took a third step. “Profound fist technique, guidance from renowned masters—I have all of that!”

Wang Jiaxu’s face spasmed. Clutching his head, he cried out in anguish, “Impossible! This is impossible! You’re lying! It can’t be true!”

“Impossible? Are you blind, you cur? I have crossed the plaza by sheer strength through a sea of people. My qualification test shone in every direction. Every word I have spoken is the absolute truth!”

Shi Tiexin had already advanced to within arm’s reach. Looking down at Wang Jiaxu, he thundered, “Now tell me again—what makes me unworthy of becoming upper class? What gives a rat like you, who kneels and begs merely to survive, the right to look down on me?”

“You—you—I—ahhh!”

Wang Jiaxu clutched his head. His eyes instantly flooded with blood, turning scarlet, and he could no longer suppress his agonized roar.

Hmph. To kill the body, destroy the heart.

You wanted to destroy my spirit, ruin my future, and bury my fate. Then I will show you no mercy either. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth!

Today, I will first crush your thought-energy in the Rhetoric Arts, and then—

With a sharp crack, Shi Tiexin clenched his fist.

Beneath that iron fist, nothing remained but Wang Jiaxu, hunched on the ground, clutching his head, crying out in pain and trembling uncontrollably.

If one meant to kill both body and spirit, naturally, one had to see it through to the end.