24: Chapter 24 Lu Chuan

Lu Chuan's legendary battle took place three months ago.

During the internal assessment at City No. 1 High School, in the finals, Lu Chuan faced five opponents of the same rank.

It was not a gauntlet match; it was one against five.

The assessment rules at City No. 1 High School were different from Nanjiang No. 7 High School—internal assessments allowed for a "challenge system," where any student could challenge a classmate ranked higher than themselves; if the challenge succeeded, the rankings were swapped.

Lu Chuan's rank was number one in the entire school.

That day, there wasn't just one challenger; there were five.

Five A-rank Awakened joined forces to challenge him simultaneously.

The rules allowed it.

Because the teachers at City No. 1 High School knew very well that on a real battlefield, the Void Race would not fight you one-on-one.

Shen Ye watched the entire process of that battle from the recording sent by Su Wanqing.

The recording was unedited, from a fixed camera, from beginning to end.

The image quality was very high; it was the original version archived in the City No. 1 High School library.

Su Wanqing wrote a sentence in the file's notes: "This was the battle where he fought most seriously."

In all subsequent simulation matches, he never used his full strength.

To see the real Lu Chuan, one had to watch this one.

Shen Ye clicked on the recording.

In the frame, Lu Chuan stood in the center of the largest battle platform at City No. 1 High School.

Wearing his dark blue school uniform, his hands hung naturally at his sides, with no unnecessary posture.

Opposite him, the five challengers were arranged in five directions, forming a semi-encirclement.

Shen Ye had seen these five people in Su Wanqing's files—two fire-type, one ice-type, one metal-type, one earth-type.

The configuration was very comprehensive.

Fire-type for main offense, ice-type for control, metal-type for precision kills, earth-type for defense.

The five people were ranked second to sixth in the school; individually, none of them were Lu Chuan's match, but working together, they could theoretically cover all of Lu Chuan's weaknesses.

Theoretically.

The recording timestamp jumped.

The referee raised a hand and announced the start.

The five people simultaneously deployed their Kingdom Projection.

Flame Plains, Glacial Rift, City of Gold and Iron, Granite Fortress—four Kingdom Projection deployed at the edge of the battle platform, surrounding Lu Chuan in the center.

Kin poured out from the projection.

Fire Elementals, Frost Giant, Golden Armored Warriors, Rock Giant, densely packed.

Shen Ye roughly counted; the five of them combined had summoned over a thousand kin.

Lu Chuan deployed his Iron-Blooded Battlefield.

In the frame, the central area of the battle platform was stained with a blood-colored hue.

It was not the scorching red of magma, but the rust color of cooling iron, like blood seeping into soil.

Dark red patterns emerged on the ground, spreading from under Lu Chuan's feet and covering the entire encirclement.

Blood War Aura.

Undead crawled out from the blood-colored earth.

Skeleton Warrior appeared first.

Their skeletons were still draped with broken pieces of war armor, and their bone blades were of varying lengths, stained with dark red rust.

They didn't crawl out one or two at a time; they surged out in waves.

The number of the first wave of Skeleton Warrior already exceeded the total sum of the challengers' kin.

Then came the Undead Knight.

Skeletal warhorses leaped from the ground, ghost-green flames burning in their eye sockets.

The knights sat upright on the horses, their halberds raised horizontally, the tips gleaming with cold light.

The number of Undead Knight was not large, but each one carried a sense of oppression.

Finally, the Stitched Giant.

The ground bulged, a huge palm extended from the soil, followed by another.

The Stitched Giant climbed out from underground, its body covered in thick stitches.

The threads were dark red, like congealed blood.

The giant had no weapons; its body was its weapon.

The Undead army surged toward the enemies in five directions like a tide.

Shen Ye pressed pause.

The image froze at the moment the undead group surged toward the Fire Elemental array.

He zoomed in on the frame, carefully observing the charge formation of the Skeleton Warrior.

They didn't just rush in a swarm.

The charge of the Skeleton Warrior had distinct echelons.

The first wave was light-armored skeletons wielding bone blades; they were fast, their formation was loose, and their purpose was not to kill, but to disrupt the Fire Elemental formation.

The second wave was heavy-armored skeletons with bone shields; they were slow, their formation was dense, and they followed up after the first wave disrupted the enemy formation, using a shield wall to compress the Fire Elementals' activity space.

The third wave was mixed skeletons, half with blades and half with shields, responsible for harvesting the Fire Elementals compressed into the corners.

Shen Ye rewound the recording a few seconds and watched it again.

It was indeed not a swarm.

The timing, charge direction, and formation density of each wave of Skeleton Warrior were different.

The interval between the first and second wave was extremely short, so short that the challengers couldn't adjust their formation in time.

The interval between the second and third wave was slightly longer, just enough to plunge the compressed Fire Elementals into despair.

This was not the autonomous behavior of the undead.

Undead did not have this kind of tactical literacy.

It was Lu Chuan who was commanding.

Shen Ye continued playing the recording.

The Fire Elemental array began to loosen under the first wave of the Undead Sea's impact.

Flame jets burned the light-armored skeletons in the front, but after the skeletons fell apart, they reassembled in a moment, climbed up from the ground, and continued the charge.

The Fire Elementals continuously spewed flames, consuming spiritual power extremely quickly, but the rate at which the skeletons fell and the rate at which they stood up were almost equal.

The Undead Knight flanked from the wings.

The skeletal warhorses were extremely fast, sprinting back and forth on both sides of the Fire Elemental array, and every swing of the halberd swept down a row.

The Frost Giant tried to intercept the Undead Knight, but the Undead Knight did not engage the Frost Giant head-on—when the Frost Giant swung its fist, the skeletal warhorse retreated; when the Frost Giant retracted its fist, the skeletal warhorse charged.

The goal of the Undead Knight was not to kill the Frost Giant, but to contain it.

Shen Ye noticed a detail.

The rhythm of the Undead Knight's containment was synchronized with the charge rhythm of the Skeleton Warrior.

Whenever the Skeleton Warrior launched a wave of charges, the Undead Knight applied maximum pressure on the Frost Giant, forcing it to be unable to support the Fire Elementals.

Whenever the Skeleton Warrior reorganized its formation, the Undead Knight retreated to catch its breath.

Two different types of undead troops cooperated like an army.

The Stitched Giant appeared last.

Its target was the Golden Armored Warriors and the Rock Giant.

The flying swords of the Golden Armored Warriors hacked at the Stitched Giant, cutting deep wounds.

The stitches at the edges of the wounds automatically tightened, pulling the wounds closed.

The Rock Giant's fist smashed into the chest of the Stitched Giant, leaving an indentation.

The stitches tightened again, and the indentation returned to its original state.

The Stitched Giant did not fight back; it just stood there, using its huge body to block the Golden Armored Warriors and the Rock Giant, making them unable to support the Fire Elementals submerged by the Undead Sea.

Shen Ye pressed pause again.

He stared at the Stitched Giant on the screen.

The giant's positioning was very precise—it was exactly stuck on the only path between the Golden Armored Warriors and the Fire Elementals, and it also blocked the support route of the Rock Giant.

One giant, blocking reinforcements from two directions.

This was not a coincidence.

Lu Chuan had already calculated the positions of the five opponents before the battle started, calculated the best blocking point for the Stitched Giant, calculated the charge echelons of the Undead Sea, and calculated the containment rhythm of the Undead Knight.

One against five was not a manifestation of courage, but the result of calculation.

The recording continued.

The Fire Elementals collapsed first.

The Undead Sea submerged the Fire Elemental array, and one by one, the Fire Elementals had their cores shattered under the siege of the undead group, turning into light spots and dissipating.

The fire-type challenger's Kingdom Projection trembled violently, then collapsed.

Lu Chuan did not pursue the fire-type challenger himself.

The Undead Sea turned toward the Frost Giant.

Having lost the cover of the Fire Elementals, the Frost Giant was caught in a pincer attack by the Undead Knight and the Skeleton Warrior.

The Undead Knight no longer used guerrilla tactics but charged head-on; the skeletal warhorse slammed into the Frost Giant's leg, and the halberd pierced into the giant's knee.

The moment the Frost Giant knelt, the Undead Sea surged up, and the bone blades slashed at the same spot.

The Frost Giant's core was shattered.

The ice-type challenger's Kingdom Projection collapsed.

The Golden Armored Warriors and the Rock Giant had been dragged by the Stitched Giant for too long.

When the Undead Sea turned toward them, the two challengers' spiritual power had already bottomed out.

The Golden Armored Warriors' flying swords were no longer sharp, and the Rock Giant's fists were no longer powerful.

The Undead Sea submerged everything.

At the end of the recording, Lu Chuan stood in the center of the blood-colored battlefield, with the Undead army lined up around him.

All five challengers' Kingdom Projection had collapsed, and not a single kin survived.

There was no joy of victory on Lu Chuan's face, nor the arrogance of trampling on the weak.

He just calmly retracted his Kingdom Projection, nodded to the five challengers, and then turned to walk off the battle platform.

The recording ended.

Shen Ye sat in the darkness, the light from the screen shining on his face.

He rewound the recording to the beginning and watched it again.

Then he rewound it and watched it again.

After three times, he found a detail that was not marked in Su Wanqing's file.

The transfer pattern of the core undead had been thoroughly analyzed by Su Wanqing.

Every few seconds, Lu Chuan's divine sense would briefly focus on a certain undead; that undead was the command core.

The core undead itself did not participate in the attack, just stood in place.

Su Wanqing marked the transfer frequency of the core undead, the duration of the divine sense focus, and the extent to which the coordination efficiency of the undead group dropped after the core undead was destroyed.

But what Shen Ye noticed was not the transfer pattern of the core undead.

What he noticed was a micro-action of Lu Chuan before the core undead transferred.

Every instant before the core undead was about to transfer, Lu Chuan's eyes would have a very brief shift—not looking at the battlefield, but at his own hand.

His right hand would slightly clench, and then release.

The moment it clenched, the core undead completed the transfer.

Shen Ye played this moment back repeatedly.

The recording definition was very high, and he could see Lu Chuan's hand movements clearly.

Clench, release.

Transfer complete.

He compared this discovery with the transfer frequency of the core undead.

The transfer frequency was slower in an advantageous situation and faster in a disadvantageous one.

In this one-against-five battle, Lu Chuan had the advantage throughout, and the transfer frequency was always kept at a slower rhythm.

But even so, he would still clench his right hand before every transfer.

It was not an inevitable reaction of divine sense focusing.

It was a habit.

Shen Ye leaned back in his chair, staring at Lu Chuan's clenched right hand on the screen.

A habit that perhaps even he himself was not aware of.

In a situation of absolute advantage, with no opponents capable of threatening the core undead, he would still subconsciously clench his right hand.

This was not a tactical necessity; it was muscle memory.

Just like Jin Lin would slightly adjust the angle of his grip on the sword before every strike, Mu Sheng would lightly touch the ground with the tip of the vine before weaving a vine net, and Elder Quan would clasp his palms together and then slowly separate them before deploying the Spiral Water Curtain.

The habits of kin and the habits of gods were essentially the same—things engraved into instinct through countless repetitions, which would automatically emerge even when not needed.

Shen Ye froze the recording on the frame where Lu Chuan's right hand clenched.

In the frame, Lu Chuan's eyes were not looking at his hand; he might not have realized he was doing this action at all.

But this action was clearly recorded by the archived recording of the City No. 1 High School library, dug out frame by frame by Su Wanqing, and captured by Shen Ye during repeated viewings.

The instant before the core undead transferred, Lu Chuan would clench his right hand.

Shen Ye closed the recording and sent a message to Su Wanqing: "Before Lu Chuan's core undead transfers, is there a fixed body movement?"

Su Wanqing's reply was quick.

"You found it?"

I went through seven recordings and indeed noticed a detail.

He in the core undead transfer before, right hand will subconsciously clench.

It's not always as obvious—he's more relaxed in an advantageous game, so the clench is small; his divine sense is tight in a disadvantageous game, so the clench is large.

But it's there every time.

"How did you find it?"

"Watched the recording a few times."

"A few times?"

"Three times."

Su Wanqing replied after a while.

"I spent several nights digging through it."

You saw it after only three times?

Shen Ye did not explain.

It wasn't that he was more attentive than Su Wanqing.

It was because he had developed a habit during Qin Shu's projection training—observing every detail of the enemy, not just divine sense fluctuations, tactical choices, and kin configuration, but also breathing rhythm, eye shifts, and finger movements.

Qin Shu had said that what determines life and death on the battlefield is often things that the opponents themselves are not aware of.

Lu Chuan's right-hand clench was exactly that kind of thing.

"Don't write this discovery into the file."

Shen Ye replied.

"Why?"

"If I meet him in the finals, I will use this detail."

The contents of the file might be seen by the Zheng family.

Zheng Chuan's family had people in the association, and Lu Chuan's file might leak out.

What is written in the file is intelligence that everyone can know.

What is not written in is the real trump card.

Su Wanqing was silent for a while.

"You're right."

I encrypted the file, but if people from the association are determined, they will always find a way to see it.

Lu Chuan's right hand clenching—I will delete this from the file.

"No need to delete it."

You never wrote it in to begin with.

Su Wanqing sent back a smiley face.

Shen Ye put down the communicator.

The night outside the window was deep.

The dormitory was very quiet; Liu Yang's snoring sounded from the upper bunk, occasionally turning over, causing the bed frame to creak.

Shen Ye leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes.

Lu Chuan.

Iron-Blooded Battlefield, Undead.

The Undead Sea under the cover of the Blood War Aura, the core undead transferring every few seconds, and the right hand clenching before every transfer.

This habit Lu Chuan himself might not even know; in an absolute advantage one-against-five battle, he would still clench his right hand.

It was not nervousness; it was instinct.

In countless simulation trainings and actual combat assessments, he had repeatedly practiced the transfer of the core undead, practiced until he no longer needed to think about it, practiced until his right hand would automatically clench.

Just like Jin Lin's Deflection Sword.

When Jin Lin first faced a Void Tribe Scout in a Simulated Rift, that unloading strike wasn't taught by Shen Ye; it was practiced by Jin Lin himself countless times in front of the sword stele.

Lu Chuan's core undead transfer was likely also something he had groped out himself through countless trainings.

Shen Ye opened his eyes.

Among the opponents in the City-level Competition, Zheng Chuan was the one who jumped the highest, Gu Changming was the one with the hardest defense, and Lu Chuan was the strongest.

Lu Chuan, like him, was an S-rank, fighting while carrying the expectations of predecessors.

Su Wanqing said that Lu Chuan asked her to tell Shen Ye—he hoped to meet Shen Ye in the finals.

Not the "Double S Meeting" hyped by the media, but really wanting to see how far the fourth S-rank from Nanjiang No. 7 High School could go.

What Shen Ye wanted to see was the same as Lu Chuan.

He wanted to see, when his Succubus Perception Net covered the entire battle platform, when the Abyss of the Night locked onto the moment Lu Chuan's right hand clenched, when Jin Lin's flying sword pierced into the core undead's chest the split second before it transferred—whether Lu Chuan's Undead Sea could still surge like a tide.

He wanted to see, when Lu Chuan discovered that his unconscious little habit had been captured and precisely utilized on the battlefield, what kind of expression this S-rank, who stood at the top of all Awakened in the city, would show.

Not malice.

It was respect.

Winning with all one's might is the greatest respect for Lu Chuan.

Just like Qin Shu used projection training to push Shen Ye to the limit, just like Principal Zhou Wenyin handed Gu Yan's broken sword to Shen Ye, just like Fang Zhen, Gu Yan, and He Man used their endings to tell Shen Ye—the S-rank battlefield is never a performance.

Shen Ye stood up and walked to the window.

The moonlight shone on the playground, gray and white.

There were still a few lights on in the dormitory building in the distance.

In the Kingdom, Jin Lin practiced sword at the sword stele.

The little golden dragon wandered on his shoulder; before every strike, he would slightly adjust the angle of his grip on the sword.

Mu Sheng wove a vine net beside the spirit field, the tip of the vine lightly touching the ground, sensing the humidity and spiritual energy concentration of the soil, and only then began to weave.

Elder Quan sat cross-legged by the spirit spring; before deploying the Spiral Water Curtain, he would first clasp his palms together and then slowly separate them, as if feeling the breathing of the water.

Everyone had their own habits.

Lu Chuan had them, and Shen Ye's kin also had them.

Habits are things engraved into instinct through countless repetitions, and they are the Achilles' heel on the battlefield.

Shen Ye closed the curtains.

There was one week left until the City-level Competition started.

One week in the outside world, fourteen years in the Kingdom.

Fourteen years later, Lu Chuan would clench his right hand on the battle platform of the finals.

And Shen Ye would have Jin Lin's flying sword waiting at the landing point of the core undead's transfer before he clenched it.

This was his greatest respect for Lu Chuan.