127. Shock

Ma Lianliang shot the steward a furious glare and barked, “Hmph! Since when have I needed you to teach me how to act?” He then turned his attention back to Qi Fei and Tong He.

Li Yuanwai lowered his voice and muttered, “What an ignorant fool. I truly cannot tell whether that old man is genuinely senile or merely pretending to be foolish so he can make one last show before he dies.”

Others offered a different opinion. “Look at how utterly unafraid the old man is. Nothing will happen to him. You people are worrying over nothing.”

As the murmurs swelled around them, the healthy flush vanished from Ma Lianliang’s face, replaced by a dark, grim pallor.

Regardless of what had happened since his arrival in Cloudmount City, Ma Lianliang had grown up in the Ma family surrounded by flattery. People had always praised him and fawned over him. No one had ever dared curse him indirectly, much less openly insult him. Apart from his elder brother, not a single outsider had ever dared even show him the slightest disrespect.

Thus, when he saw Tong He’s attitude, the veins on his forehead began to throb with rage. Inwardly, he vowed that once he captured these two men, he would subject them to every one of the Ma family’s most brutal tortures. Otherwise, he would be unworthy of having acted as the leading figure of Cloudmount City.

On the surface, however, he forced down his anger and pretended not to care.

“Hmph. My friends, I think you deliberately chose my birthday banquet to cause trouble. In that case, do not blame me for setting aside my status and bullying those younger than me. Hmph! I am about to take you into custody, so do not accuse me, Ma, of bullying others.”

“Heh heh.”

Tong He merely gave a cold laugh, as though he could not sense the fury behind Ma Lianliang’s words.

Everyone’s hearts stirred. The old man could still laugh at a time like this?

Tong He pointed toward the brawny man and said, “Good disciple, why don’t you help your master deal with this annoying fly? Shouldn’t you be the one to go? If he truly wishes to exchange blows, then you might as well test your skills against him. Remember, you must drive away every one of these lunatics, inside and out, above and below. Only then will you demonstrate your true ability.”

Qi Fei sighed. “Old man, you are a truly shameless master. You are not planning to make me do it again, are you?”

He looked like a young disciple who was constantly ordered by his master to perform the roughest chores. After grumbling under his breath, he nevertheless rose to his feet, pointed at Ma Lianliang, and shouted, “You old bastard! The fact that my master and I came to eat a meal at your place is an honor of the highest order. Yet you actually brought people here and dared to treat us like this? Come on, then! I will teach you what proper hospitality means!”

His words nearly twisted Ma Lianliang’s nose sideways with rage.

He was clearly the one who had provoked the situation, yet he had shamelessly turned the blame on others and accused them of refusing to let him off the hook. Anyone faced with such brazen sophistry would have been furious. And Ma Lianliang was a vicious, vindictive man who was anything but magnanimous.

The moment he heard Qi Fei’s words, Ma Lianliang’s expression darkened completely. Even the onlookers could sense the fury concealed beneath his gloomy face.

With a sweep of his hand, Ma Lianliang said bitterly, “In all these years, no one has ever dared speak to me, Ma Lianliang, in such a manner. You are the first. But soon, you will pay the proper price for those words.”

He seemed unwilling to take action himself on this occasion. After casting two glances at the dozens of followers standing below him, he asked coldly, “Who among you can step forward and kill this wretch for me?”

“Elder Ma, I may be of little talent, but allow me to add another gift to your birthday celebration.”

As soon as he finished speaking, a brawny man in his thirties stepped out from the ranks of the several dozen Connate experts. After cupping his fists toward Ma Lianliang, he turned to Qi Fei with a smile.

“Brother, do not accuse me of relying on numbers to bully you. It is simply that everything you have done today has shown utter disrespect toward our family head.”

After speaking, the burly man paused. His expression shifted as he looked at Qi Fei.

“You may make the first move.”

Although no martial aura could be detected from Qi Fei, everyone could infer that a young man who dared to cause trouble here must possess some kind of support. Had he stirred up trouble elsewhere, he might perhaps have been able to show off for a while. But dozens of Connate experts were present today. Even if the young man possessed extraordinary talent, his cultivation could not possibly be very high at his age. And even a powerful figure ranked on the Golden Divine Dragon List would likely suffer greatly here, if he escaped with his life at all.

Yet Qi Fei seemed like a猛虎 released from its cage. When he saw the brawny man step forward, he looked him up and down several times, then simply raised his middle finger.

His provocative gaze, the finger swaying from side to side, and his faint mutter made his meaning unmistakable.

“You’re not good enough.”

There was no denying that Qi Fei’s casually waving middle finger, combined with the disdainful look on his face, was extraordinarily insulting.

When the middle-aged man had first stepped forward, his expression had remained calm. Even when he spoke, he had seemed utterly composed. But the instant Qi Fei made that gesture and adopted that expression, the man exploded with rage.

“Brat, it seems you do not even know how the word ‘death’ is written!”

Without waiting for Qi Fei to respond, he sprang forward, both palms trembling as he struck toward Qi Fei.

His palms were not trembling because he was too weak to raise his hands. Rather, they shook because he had infused them with an enormous amount of true essence, pushing his body close to its limit. Hidden within the trembling movements were numerous follow-up variations.

Clearly enraged by Qi Fei’s provocation, he had launched his attack with a martial technique from the very beginning.

In Qi Fei’s eyes, however, the man’s twin palm strikes possessed little power. If he wished, Qi Fei had several methods of killing him on the spot with a single move.

Judging from the force and momentum of the attack, the middle-aged man’s martial technique was, at most, of superior star grade. Compared with the several heaven-defying methods Qi Fei possessed, the man’s two palms were hardly worth mentioning.

Still, Qi Fei had no intention of revealing his true strength before Ma Lianliang made a move.

As the attack approached, Qi Fei merely employed one of the postures from the Tendon-Transformation stage of Body Tempering and evaded the man’s twin palms by the narrowest margin. Then, with a palm strike that appeared light and completely devoid of technique, he casually slapped the man at the acupoint beneath his shoulder.

The strike contained no apparent force. It was an utterly ordinary push.

Yet that single palm strike caused the Connate expert’s body to halt involuntarily. A moment later, the middle-aged man raised his arm with great difficulty and pointed at Qi Fei.

“What… what kind of demonic art is this?”

He had barely uttered the first word when he suddenly seemed to have been drained of all his strength. His body went limp, and he collapsed feebly to the ground.

The bizarre scene left everyone frozen in place. For a long while, not a single person could utter a word.

Qi Fei’s move was beyond the understanding of almost everyone present. In that fleeting exchange, he had not revealed the slightest trace of martial aura. Even the palm he had landed on the middle-aged man looked more like a friendly pat than an attack.

It had not resembled any attack a martial artist should possess, yet it had somehow injured the man without leaving any visible sign of force.

Such a mysterious ability was utterly unheard of, and so astonishing that no one could believe what they had just witnessed.