Chapter 1032: Intuition
Zhang Shan naturally couldn’t bother with such a minor pain, his eyes fixed entirely on Qiao Jiajin’s hands and feet.
Because Qiao Jiajin was too agile, Zhang Shan couldn’t predict which limb the next strike would come from. All he could do was protect his jaw and keep scanning his opponent up and down.
Qiao Jiajin slowly shuffled forward. By now, the two were within striking distance of each other, yet neither threw the first punch.
The no-rules deathmatch made both of them exceptionally cautious.
The one who threw the first punch could gain an advantage, but it would also create an opening.
Qiao Jiajin twitched his right fist first. Zhang Shan’s head immediately tilted half an inch to the right.
Zhang Shan feigned a leg lift. Qiao Jiajin instantly retreated half a step.
Even with feints, the opponent dodged them. If they actually committed to an attack, the risk of being countered was too great.
Yet they kept closing the distance step by step. In just a few seconds, their hands were almost touching.
Zhang Shan’s eyes turned cold. He flicked his left fist. Qiao Jiajin, thinking the attack was coming, raised his right arm to block—exactly what Zhang Shan had been waiting for.
Seizing the opening exposed by Qiao Jiajin’s ribs, Zhang Shan lifted his leg and kicked.
Qiao Jiajin reacted swiftly. Realizing the left fist was a feint, he immediately dropped his right hand and pressed down on Zhang Shan’s sweeping leg. But as soon as he touched it, he sensed something was off—Zhang Shan’s left whip kick was extremely light, almost without force.
Clearly, Zhang Shan’s offense wasn’t over. The left leg was just another feint. Sure enough, the next second, Zhang Shan swapped legs, planting his left foot back down using the momentum from Qiao Jiajin’s push, then immediately switched to a right-leg roundhouse kick.
In the blink of an eye, everything happened in a flash. But Qiao Jiajin knew he was about to eat that roundhouse kick. His weight was all on the right side, bracing against Zhang Shan’s left leg, leaving him no way to intercept the strike from the right.
If his body took a whip kick from Zhang Shan like this… would he still be able to continue fighting?
It turned out that this fight depended not only on technique, but also on intuition.
Qiao Jiajin’s mind went blank for an instant. His knee instinctively lifted—though he kicked late, he curled it up high, catching Zhang Shan’s leg at the knee joint. The two were locked in a standstill for half a second, neither able to advance an inch.
A moment later, they both lowered their legs simultaneously, threw jabs at the same time, and blocked each other’s attacks.
Qiao Jiajin knew that Zhang Shan had a longer reach; opportunities to close the distance were scarce. So he didn’t retreat. After blocking the jab, he pressed in as close as possible, then swung several hooks at Zhang Shan’s face.
Zhang Shan didn’t give an inch, either. He blocked the hooks he could and took the ones he couldn’t, then fired back his own hooks whenever he found an opening. But Qiao Jiajin was exceptionally nimble. At this close range, he gradually abandoned blocking and relied entirely on dodging.
Seeing Qiao Jiajin almost burrowing into his chest—where the next strike would be impossible to avoid or block—Zhang Shan reached out and grabbed the hair at the back of Qiao Jiajin’s head, yanked it down, and drove his knee upward.
Qiao Jiajin knew that if his nose took that knee, he’d lose combat capability in seconds. So he immediately crossed his arms, bracing down hard against Zhang Shan’s thigh.
Zhang Shan drove his knee up twice more, but couldn’t break Qiao Jiajin’s defense. So he reversed his tactic—pulling Qiao Jiajin’s hair back with force to expose his face, then leaning his own upper body backward, preparing to smash his forehead into Qiao Jiajin’s nose.
Qiao Jiajin marveled at Zhang Shan’s freakish brute strength; he couldn’t break free in time. As Zhang Shan’s headshot came crashing down, he turned his fist into a palm and pushed upward from below, catching Zhang Shan’s chin.
A loud crack rang out. Zhang Shan let go, stumbling back several steps, dazed.
Qiao Jiajin didn’t pause. He took a few running steps, stomped hard off the ground, and leaped into the air, executing the “Heart-Piercing Elbow” from Bajiquan, aimed straight at Zhang Shan’s unprotected chest.
He wouldn’t even dare use this move in a street fight—it could cause shock or even death.
But Zhang Shan, even as he retreated with his eyes closed, seemed to sense something through pure intuition. Mid-retreat, he pulled his arm up in front of his chest, blocking the elbow strike just in time, albeit clumsily. The impact sent him toppling backward, but he immediately rolled and got back up.
That’s when Qiao Jiajin remembered…
Back when they were teammates with Zhang Shan in the “Earth Tiger” game, they had watched Fighting Girl use that same “Heart-Piercing Elbow.”
So he had learned how to use it—and Zhang Shan had learned how to block it.
Qiao Jiajin silently acknowledged that Zhang Shan’s ability to rely on intuition in the nick of time made him a truly troublesome opponent.
Only a little over a minute had passed in their exchange, but both were already panting. They stood apart, neither making another move.
In a battle like this, where every nerve had to be strung tight, a single careless mistake could lead to death. The extreme mental tension, combined with exchanges far more intense than ordinary fights, had left them needing a breather.
Yet it was precisely through these brief exchanges that Qiao Jiajin spotted the issue.
Most of Zhang Shan’s combat knowledge came from the military. Though superior to the vast majority of ordinary people, his practical fighting ability was inferior to Qiao Jiajin’s, who either fought in boxing matches or brawled on the streets every day.
Even if Zhang Shan’s mind contained countless combat techniques, he still had to process them through brief conscious thought before executing them. Qiao Jiajin, on the other hand—though his body had lost its prime condition—still retained his instincts. Many actions would come out subconsciously, potentially saving his life.
Zhang Shan, for his part, had also settled on his tactics.
Something was clearly wrong with Qiao Jiajin. His current body had lost a lot of power. Though he was still agile and possessed a wealth of fighting knowledge, he just felt weak.
The best way to beat him, then, was to grab hold of him. Against overwhelming strength, even the best technique was hard to deploy. If he could break one of Qiao Jiajin’s arms or legs, the match would be as good as won.
Qiao Jiajin took a few deep breaths, then bounced on the spot a couple of times, apparently ready for the next round of combat.
“Ruffian,” Zhang Shan said, “this time, it’s my turn.”
“Good. Please enlighten me.”
Zhang Shan raised his arms and started walking forward with large strides.
Qiao Jiajin knew that getting hit even once could spell defeat for him with his current body. So he could only retreat, matching Zhang Shan’s pace.
But after a few steps, he sensed danger. This wasn’t a ring; if he was backed into a corner, there would be nowhere left to retreat. So he planted his feet and stopped moving, letting Zhang Shan approach step by step.