48: Chapter 48 Ten-Second KO! An Earthquake in the Fighting World

The moment the referee's whistle pierced the cheers, the electronic timer at the top of the octagon suddenly froze at '00:10'. The bright red numbers looked like an unhealed scar under the lights, forming a jarring contrast with the green data on the screen showing '170 million online'—from the moment Li Meng lunged with 'Mad Lion Heart-Bite' to being sent flying by the 'Mountain-Leaning Strike', the entire process had taken only ten seconds.

The staff at the technical desk were the first to notice something unusual. The tournament director's coffee cup shattered as it trembled, and as the brown liquid flooded the keyboard, the slow-motion System was playing the tenth-second frame at 0.1x speed: at the instant Chen Wu's shoulder made contact with Li Meng's chest, the shockwave formed by the cyan-gold 'Qi' flow drew seven ripples in the air. Each ripple precisely bypassed the boy's vital points, acting only on the meridian nodes where toxins had accumulated.

'This isn't a KO... it's a precision strike.' The white-haired chief referee pushed up his reading glasses, his fingers repeatedly dragging the progress bar on the touchscreen. 'In ten seconds, there were three shifts in force, seven instances of force neutralization, and nine redirections of the "Qi" flow... such technique has never been seen in the history of combat sports.'

In the medical tunnel, Li Meng's test report was refreshing. The attending physician stared at the toxin metabolism curve on the screen—genetic residues that originally required 72 hours to be excreted had their metabolic rate increased by 3000% after the impact of the ten-second 'Mountain-Leaning Strike'. The antibodies formed by the peace lock and the cyan-gold 'Qi' flow were proliferating at a geometric rate. 'This overturns all toxicological understanding,' he shouted into the walkie-talkie. 'Prepare for an emergency press conference; this could rewrite the history of gene therapy!'

An emergency meeting of the Global Fighting League was held on an encrypted channel. Chief referees from thirty-seven countries watched the slow-motion video of the ten-second KO simultaneously. The president of the Japan Karate Association slammed his fist on the conference table, his kimono sleeve sweeping over sake that spilled onto the 'Proposed Amendments to Fighting Rules': 'We must incorporate the use of "Qi" into the official rules! Otherwise, we are all just fake fighting!'

The servers of the live-streaming platform completely crashed at that moment. The simultaneous shares from 170 million viewers caused the term 'Ten-Second KO' to spread like a virus. Among the top fifty trending topics on a social media platform, forty-nine were related to this match. The only unrelated topic, 'Grey Shadow Gene Technology', was surging with 200,000 searches per second.

In a luxury hospital room in Las Vegas, the heavyweight boxing king Tyson, who had once created the 'Twenty-Second KO Myth', smashed his TV remote. The screen was replaying Chen Wu's 'Mountain-Leaning Strike'. The cyan-gold 'Qi' flow in the slow-motion footage reminded him of his own 'Devastating Right Hook' during his Peak, yet it possessed an incomprehensible level of control—it could both destroy an opponent's defense and safeguard their life force.

'This is true power.' The old boxing king's finger traced Chen Wu's shoulder on the screen, where the cyan-gold mark looked like a breathing medal. 'My fists back then could shatter skulls, but they couldn't cure my Parkinson's.' He suddenly shouted at his caregiver, 'Contact my manager, I'm going to China! I want to take him as my master!'

On the caregiver's tablet, the odds from combat sports betting companies were jumping wildly. The original 1:100 odds for 'Chen Wu Ten-Second KO' had now become 1:1 odds for 'Traditional Martial Arts Revival'. Backend data showed that over 5 million fight fans worldwide were canceling their MMA memberships and instead signing up for traditional martial arts training classes.

A London underground fight club suddenly fell into chaos. Gang bosses who had bet on Li Meng to win overturned their gambling tables, and dark green banknotes flew through the neon shadows. However, no one noticed the Grey Shadow agents behind the surveillance cameras destroying data—the 'Qi' flow technique demonstrated by Chen Wu proved that their twenty-year direction of genetic modification was wrong.

'Terminate "Project Mad Lion".' In the encrypted channel of the dark web, the Grey Shadow leader's command carried an unusual tremor. 'All Genetic Warriors are to withdraw immediately; initiate the "Scavenger" program.' But he didn't know that this command had already been intercepted by the Bureau of Abnormal Incident Management. Lin Xue's team was using Chen Wu's 'Qi' flow encryption technology to reverse-track their server location.

In the press conference hall of the Shanghai Gymnasium, cameras and microphones were aimed at the temporary seats. When the technicians played the heat map of the ten-second KO, the reporters in the room gasped—the energy field formed by Chen Wu's 'Qi' flow at the moment of contact perfectly avoided Li Meng's heart, kidneys, and other vital organs, only unleashing its power in the muscle groups where toxins had gathered, like a precision surgical instrument.

'Does this mean that traditional martial arts have already surpassed modern fighting?' When the New York Times reporter stood up, his microphone cord was tangled in a mess. 'Does the fighting world need to establish a new evaluation System?'

Chen Wu's answer spread across the globe through the microphone: 'It's not about surpassing; it's about Fusion. What was KO'd in ten seconds wasn't Li Meng, but our prejudice against the Martial Dao.'

In the middle of the night, an alarm suddenly rang at the Martial Arts Museum. It wasn't a theft; rather, the bronze statue donated by Grandpa Wang was glowing. The seal script for 'Combining Hardness and Softness' on the base projected the complete manual of Baji Fist, resonating with the Tang Dynasty 'Wujing Zongyao' in the collection. The illustrated figures in the ancient book actually began to perform the movements of the 'Mountain-Leaning Strike'.

The curator tremblingly dialed the Cultural Relics Bureau: 'Send experts quickly! The martial arts artifacts here... have come to life!' Surveillance footage showed all exhibits vibrating slightly; from bronze swords of the Spring and Autumn period to boxing gloves from the Republican era, cyan-gold patterns identical to Chen Wu's 'Qi' flow emerged on their surfaces.

In the hospital's intensive care unit, Li Meng's fingers were unconsciously gesturing. The red string of the peace lock was wrapped around the IV tube, forming a peculiar Taiji knot. The nurse discovered that as long as this knot didn't unravel, the curves on the ECG monitor would become exceptionally stable. When Chen Wu released a 'Qi' flow through the glass wall, the boy suddenly opened his eyes and accurately spoke the words Chen Wu hadn't yet said: 'Will you teach me "Cloud Hands" tomorrow?'

The registration Systems of global fighting schools collectively paralyzed. An eight-year-old British boy sent an email to Chen Wu in broken Chinese: 'I want to learn Kung Fu that can protect my mother without hurting people.' The Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu champion announced his retirement to instead study the 'Cross-Strike' of Baji Fist. Even the UFC lightweight champion put on a Taiji uniform during a live stream, clumsily imitating the starting posture of the 'Mountain-Leaning Strike'.

Zhang Tao's interrogation room suddenly plunged into darkness. When the backup power kicked in, surveillance footage showed him slamming his head against the wall, repeatedly muttering: 'Ten seconds... impossible...' But he didn't notice that dark green liquid was seeping from under his fingernails—Grey Shadow had added chronic poison to his drinking water to silence him, but the 'Qi' flow antibodies that Chen Wu had the special forces team inject beforehand were causing the toxins to be expelled in a painful manner.

On the large screen of the Bureau of Abnormal Incident Management, the world map was covered with cyan-gold light spots. Each spot represented a 'Qi' flow Awakening event: a middle school student in Tokyo used 'Qi' to catch a falling cat; a firefighter in Paris relied on 'Qi' to open a path through a fire; in the slums of Rio de Janeiro, children were practicing the footwork of the 'Mountain-Leaning Strike' with tree branches.

'This is what Grey Shadow fears most.' Lin Xue pointed at the dense light spots on the South American continent. 'It's not Chen Wu's ten-second KO, but that ordinary people are starting to believe they have "Qi" within their bodies.' She pulled up the latest satellite imagery; the Grey Shadow base hidden in the Amazon rainforest was self-destructing. In the dust of the mushroom cloud, cyan-gold powder identical to that from the bronze statue was drifting.

In the early morning training hall, Chen Wu's 'Qi' flow left new marks on the wooden dummy. Ten indentations of varying depths formed the complete character for 'Wu' (Martial). The deepest stroke corresponded exactly to the exertion point of the 'Mountain-Leaning Strike', and the condensed cyan-gold energy within it caused the wooden dummy to emit a faint hum.

Lin Mo rushed in holding his phone. On the screen was the latest ranking in the fighting world: after Chen Wu's name, it was labeled as 'Unranked', with a note saying 'After the ten-second KO, the existing rating System has become invalid.' Even more startlingly, searches for 'Baji Fist Coach' had surpassed 'MMA Tutorials', becoming the number one sports-related term.

'Grandpa Wang said this is an old rule from a hundred years ago.' The boy handed over a thread-bound book. The yellowed pages recorded competition rules from the Republican era. 'A true master doesn't just break records; he creates a new path for those who follow.'

Chen Wu's gaze fell on the last page of the rules, where there was a blurry annotation: 'In the path of martial arts, ten seconds can determine victory, but ten years are hard to comprehend life and death.' He suddenly remembered Li Meng's question in the ambulance and took out his phone to compose a text: 'See you in the ward at 10:00 AM. I'll teach you the correct way to exert force in "Cloud Hands".'

When the 'sent successfully' notification popped up, the electronic screen in the training hall suddenly lit up. The replay of the global live stream was looping the moment of the ten-second KO. The number of online viewers stabilized at 180 million, and the discussion in the comments had shifted from 'how to KO' to 'how to save people with "Qi"'.

The editor-in-chief of a certain fighting magazine posted a new issue cover on social media: the silhouettes of Chen Wu and Li Meng overlapped in the octagon, with the cyan-gold 'Mountain' character mark in the background. The title was written in large gold-stamped letters—"After Ten Seconds: Fighting is Dead, the Martial Dao is Reborn".

Chen Wu put down his phone and sank his shoulder toward the wooden dummy once more. This time, the release of force from the 'Mountain-Leaning Strike' didn't carry even a hint of wind. The cyan-gold 'Qi' flow seeped into the interior of the wood like a thin mist, repairing the cracks left a hundred years ago. He knew the shock of the ten-second KO would eventually pass, but the changes triggered by it were only just beginning—when people no longer pursued the speed of knocking down an opponent but instead explored the power to protect life, the earthquake in the fighting world would truly give birth to a brand-new continent.

On the windowsill of the hospital ward, Li Meng's peace lock shimmered in the morning light. The Taiji knot tied with red string turned with the wind, drawing the cyan-gold 'Qi' flow into the IV tube and stirring small vortices in the medicine. The boy's fingers moved gently with the vortices, unconsciously tracing the trajectory of 'Cloud Hands', as if previewing the upcoming lesson.

And on the phone screens of 180 million viewers worldwide, the slow-motion footage of the ten-second KO continued to loop. However, more and more people began to notice that the end of that three-meter flight path was not the end point of failure, but the starting point of a new life—just like this earthquake in the fighting world, cyan-gold light was shining through the cracks that had split open.

In this light, there were unwritten rules, unawakened 'Qi', and countless ten-second moments waiting to be rewritten.