The delinquents looked at one another.

First, they looked at Aiyuan Dahe. The muscular man could only clutch his chest with one hand and groan, his backside still stuck to the pavement, his face twisted in pain.

Then they sized up Lin Cun'an.

Holding the wooden sword pointed down, Lin Cun'an turned and lightly traced an invisible line behind himself with its tip.

“Here.”

Lin Cun'an said to Siyuan Liangxiang, “Stay behind this line. They won’t get past it.”

Siyuan Liangxiang held her hands nervously against her chest. There were twice as many delinquents as last time. She wanted to say she’d help Lin Cun'an fight them, but he simply turned away without a care, then slashed the wooden sword through the air with a crisp sweep.

“Come on! I’ll wipe the floor with every last one of you!”

“Gulp.”

The yellow-haired leader swallowed hard.

He was a member of the school’s Karate Club too, but Aiyuan Dahe was still far stronger than him.

This kid had taken Aiyuan Dahe down with a single strike, leaving him in this half-paralyzed state. If he went up against him, he’d end up in even worse shape…

And this kid… He was just plain eerie. He looked like he couldn’t hurt a fly, so how had he unleashed such tremendous strength in an instant?!

The yellow-haired boy felt a chill run through him. His legs were even trembling a little, but he gritted his teeth and swung his hand hard.

“Brothers! Two fists can’t beat four hands! Get in there and surround him! He can’t take all of us down!”

“Yeah!”

The lackeys let out a rousing yell.

Whenever a crowd gathers, it’s easy to get carried away and lose the ability to think straight.

Three men can make a tiger.

And there were more than ten of them here!

When they charged at Lin Cun'an as one surging mass, the sight alone was pretty intimidating.

At least, that was how it looked to Siyuan Liangxiang.

First she saw Lin Cun'an’s slender back. Then, beyond him, came the onrush of the delinquent gang.

Just looking at the difference in their builds, it seemed like that crowd of scumbags could crush him to pieces in an instant.

But then—

The sword rose.

One strike was all it took.

The capped delinquent nearest to Lin Cun'an took a hit to the cheek from the wooden sword. His mouth split at the corner, and he spat blood with two wet little “pfft”s. A few white things were mixed in with the bright red blood… teeth!

On the other side, a fat guy tried to take advantage of the capped delinquent distracting Lin Cun'an and sneak in an attack. But before he could bring down the baseball bat in his hands—

“Break!”

Lin Cun'an had already pulled his sword back. Its tip pressed right against the fat guy’s chin, and he shot upward like a lump of spoiled meat being tossed aside. He flew two meters into the air before crashing onto the asphalt.

As fast as lightning, Lin Cun'an brought the sword to his waist while the fat guy was still in the air and took a drawing stance. His gaze sharpened. In the space of a heartbeat, he drew and slashed the wooden blade across three men’s waists. The repeated thuds sounded like bones cracking, and their faces twisted with pain.

Two fists can’t beat four hands?

That’s only because two fists aren’t fast enough—or strong enough.

Miyajima Sakura, captain of the Kendo Club, could see at a glance that her junior was on a completely different level from this gang of delinquents.

He was a sword prodigy the likes of whom appeared only once in a decade! At… what was he, sixteen? Seventeen? At that age, he already carried the faint shadow of a “master.” How beautiful was his sword? Like a swimming dragon, like a startled swan taking flight!

Miyajima Sakura was already an expert in kendo. Naturally, she cared more about the mastery of swordsmanship than the others did. Her eye was sharper, and her pursuit of the art more single-minded.

Her excited lips trembled without pause.

Strong… So, so strong… Amazing… This swordsmanship, this strength…

She stared at Lin Cun'an, her eyes shining.

She was going to have this man!

In just a few exchanges, the entire delinquent gang had fallen beneath Lin Cun'an’s wooden sword.

And Lin Cun'an hadn’t taken a single step back!

No one… had managed to break through his sword’s reach!

Lin Cun'an looked down over the fallen delinquents—all of them except one: the yellow-haired leader.

He wasn’t lying on the ground, crying in pain. Instead… the moment he saw things going south, he’d already turned to make a run for it.

He was now about twenty or thirty paces away from Lin Cun'an.

He was running in a panic, but as long as the green hills remained, there’d be no shortage of firewood. One day, he’d make that punk suffer!

The yellow-haired boy gritted his teeth. After this defeat, he was already planning to lie low and bide his time until next time.

But before he could work out any details—

A scream of “Aaaah!” caught his attention.

It was Aiyuan Dahe.

He couldn’t help looking back. Lin Cun'an had walked over and struck Aiyuan Dahe on the shoulder with his sword. The blow could probably shatter his shoulder blade, and Aiyuan Dahe’s venomous glare suggested it had.

“One,” Lin Cun'an said. Then he cheerfully tapped Aiyuan Dahe’s other shoulder with the wooden sword and said with a bright smile, “As everyone knows, people have two shoulders… Get up, or I’ll smash the second one!”

He suddenly barked an order. Aiyuan Dahe, who’d fallen from the pain, scrambled to his feet—only for another strike to come down the moment he’d straightened up.

Aiyuan Dahe screamed and fell again.

“I said I’d hit you if you didn’t get up. I didn’t say I wouldn’t hit you if you did.” Lin Cun'an spoke coolly. Then he brought the sword down vertically, striking a spot two inches below the space between Aiyuan Dahe’s thighs. “This time I hit your shoulder. If I catch you bothering Liangxiang again, I’ll hit somewhere else!”

“……” Aiyuan Dahe didn’t say a word. He only trembled.

“Get up,” Lin Cun'an said again.

Aiyuan Dahe looked lost. All he could manage was a couple of pained groans.

“It’s your shoulder and ribs that are broken, not your legs! Get crawling, or I’ll sink your corpse in Tokyo Bay,” Lin Cun'an said.

At that, Aiyuan Dahe hurriedly tried to get up. But with both arms broken, he had no strength to support himself and landed on his backside again. Just as Lin Cun'an had said, he crawled a few steps before finally forcing himself to his feet and running for his life.

As Aiyuan Dahe ran off, Lin Cun'an turned his gaze toward…

The yellow-haired boy jumped in alarm. Still, he had distance on his side. He was just about to bolt—

when he heard a shout from behind him:

“Hundred-Pace Flying Sword!”

The wooden sword shot straight toward him.

Before the yellow-haired boy could even lift a leg, the sword slammed into his back with a thud. The mere wooden sword sent him flying several meters before he hit the ground.

After landing, he felt a pain in his back that nearly took his life. But his instinct to survive still drove him to his feet, and he kept running with an unsteady gait.

“You’d better remember that too.” The voice behind him was quiet and cold. The yellow-haired boy nearly crumpled to the ground, but somehow managed to stay on his feet. He didn’t dare look back.

Lin Cun'an stepped over the delinquents who couldn’t get up and walked back to stand in front of Siyuan Liangxiang.

Siyuan Liangxiang pressed both hands to her chest, but even so, she could hear her heart pounding.

Her eyes met Lin Cun'an’s, and her face flushed a deep red.

“X-Xiao Lin…” Siyuan Liangxiang had just started to say something—

when Lin Cun'an turned the wooden sword around, laid it across his palms, and held it out to Miyajima Sakura.

“Thanks for lending me your sword, Miyajima-senpai,” he said.