Chapter Seventeen: The Soul-Chasing Wolf (Monday Recommendation Requested)

Kou Li had strengthened his hearing to the point that, if he concentrated, he could pick up sounds within a five-mile radius. Yet before the noise arose, there hadn’t been the slightest sign—no hint, no warning. The newcomer had traversed the distance without making the faintest sound. Was this a man or a ghost?

Kou Li whipped around. Thirty feet away stood the scar-faced man he’d encountered once before.

“So you really don’t recognize me, outsider.” The voice was cold and grim, belonging not to the man but to the Soul-Chasing Wolf. “Then you must also be unaware that the dockhand you killed that day was my own brother.”

“Very good. The way you stabbed him to death—I’ll repay it a hundredfold. I’ll break your bones, inch by inch, open gashes all over your body, and drag you to soak in the sea every day. Do you know, near the shore, there are flesh-eating maggots that especially love…”

The threat was delivered with chilling seriousness—a promise, not a boast. If he failed, these tortures would be his fate.

Sixty feet away, a waterway led out to the sea, and there was only one boat—just one.

Kou Li drew a deep breath and spat out a wad of thick, black blood. Inside him, a furious burning flared up—a sensation he’d known before, the desperate howl of muscles and bone about to fail.

All his pores snapped shut in an instant.

The Soul-Chasing Wolf was notoriously cold and taciturn in the Water Dragon Gang, except when facing an enemy. Then he would describe, in detail, how he would torment his foe. Most adversaries would lose their nerve, their hearts pounding, their minds unsteady—for he always did what he threatened.

Strike the enemy’s courage first, and their fists lose a third of their strength. That made his work all the easier.

Following Kou Li’s gaze, the Soul-Chasing Wolf sneered. “Thinking of grabbing the boat and escaping? All the waterways of Southern Yue are under our surveillance. Don’t you know, among our Water Dragon Gang, we’re even fiercer in the water than on land?”

Kou Li strained to recall that feeling from before—when he first locked his pores, his energy had gathered in his lower abdomen, then burst forth a hundredfold. That explosive force was what he desperately needed now.

His body was in no condition to endure another prolonged fight—he had just one, perhaps two exchanges to determine the outcome, and his opponent was far more skilled.

Luo Yanzong had said that when one’s martial arts reached a certain level, the “four extremities”—tongue, teeth, nails, and hair—would all change.

But those changes didn’t always show physically. The ability to walk soundlessly, to move as if floating on water, was also a sign.

The Soul-Chasing Wolf—if he did not become a demon, how could he chase souls?

Kou Li focused with absolute intensity, his thoughts wound as one, every subtle sense fully engaged. He drew in breath, his ten toes gripping the earth, his belly seeming to press against his spine. With this energy, he tightened his kidneys, raised his perineum, compressed his dantian, gathering and squeezing the last of his strength.

Forcing his senses to their limit, visions formed before his eyes—eddies of energy swirling above the stream, merging into one.

His five toes dug into the ground, knees slightly bent, body sinking, crown lifted, neck straight, his head and perineum aligned, nose tip and navel in a vertical line. He poised to pounce, the ferocity of a tiger incarnate.

“A dead tiger—what waves can it stir?”

A sudden gust of wind, and Kou Li punched without thinking—body and mind as one, inner and outer strength united, twisting with explosive force, like a steel rod sweeping through the air.

But for the first time, his Tiger Fist, which had never missed, struck empty air. At the same moment, a gust swept toward his lower abdomen, a chill as if from the underworld.

Instinct propelled Kou Li into a spinning dodge, body arched, hands clawed—his reflexes impossibly sharp.

This was why his opponent had said Kou Li could unleash the power and ferocity of the tiger with a beginner’s Tiger Fist—he wasn’t relying on experience, but letting the beast’s nature guide his body.

The Soul-Chasing Wolf’s eyes gleamed green as he clawed and slashed, his arm as soft as dough, recoiling and snapping forward—a strike aimed at the perineum.

With that one blow, Kou Li’s consciousness split in two. One was the “Tiger’s Will,” driving his hips and waist to lunge—killing or dying for the fight. The other was his human will, screaming to retreat—quickly, desperately—if he didn’t, his “brothers below” would be lost forever!

The perineum, below the dantian and between the bones, was a vital, deadly point. Though Kou Li didn’t know the exact poison of this strike, common sense shrieked in his mind: that place must never be hit.

So, in a heartbeat of indecision, he rolled away, barely dodging the attack. But inside, rage threatened to drown him.

The tiger’s ferocity depended on pure, unyielding yang energy. Now, with his spirit broken, the “Tiger’s Will” ebbed away like the tide.

Like a heartbroken wife who, catching her husband in betrayal, leaves with resolute finality.

No wonder the Water Dragon Gang’s “Four Tigers and Eight Wolves” were the terror of the south—not only were their fists brutal, their experience was peerless: lunge, claw, then snap—three moves to break an enemy.

Without the “Tiger’s Will,” Kou Li’s martial arts were only at the beginner’s level—enough for ordinary thugs, but no match for a Wolf leader of the Water Dragon Gang.

The Soul-Chasing Wolf was like a true predator, body rippling, claws slashing, always targeting the vitals. In just three moves, he trapped Kou Li’s elbow. Kou Li desperately countered with a Tiger Fist, the force fierce.

But the wolf’s hand-knife barely touched and withdrew, body instantly retreating. The punch hit nothing, and at the same time, Kou Li’s left forearm went numb and limp—he had no feeling there at all.

“How could this be?” Kou Li’s eyes narrowed at his useless arm in disbelief. A single touch, and it was as if it were broken.

“Surprised? That’s the ruthlessness of the Nine-Segment Blade—cutting tendons and breaking veins. Your arm isn’t just useless now—it’s finished, forever.”

But the Soul-Chasing Wolf did not press the attack. Instead, he circled Kou Li, wolf-like in his hunting, waiting to exhaust his prey before striking the fatal blow.

Delaying now only benefited him—with the Water Dragon Gang’s men already approaching.

What true martial artist would stoop to such means? Yet he took pride in it.

“Three breaks with the blade—upper, mid, and lower. Wrist, elbow, shoulder; throat, stomach, kidney; foot, knee, thigh. Once, I severed a man’s intestines—he crawled for a day and a night, but in the end, his guts tangled around his kidneys and stomach, tightening, tightening…” He laughed, a chilling sound. “He died, strangled by his own entrails…”

It was energy—a kind unlike the obvious or hidden kinds.

Was it severing the muscle fibers, or breaking the tendons and bones, or, most terrifying, severing the reflex nerves?

Kou Li’s face remained impassive, but inside he was ice-cold, mind racing. In this situation, retreat meant death, but advancing… meant death as well. Reality was nothing like a game; he’d spawned in the world and immediately met a boss—no time to fight lesser foes and prepare.

No chance for a reversal. Even that one move required five breaths to prepare—enough time for his foe to kill him a dozen times over.

“What now? No way up, no way down. Do you want to die? I won’t let you die so easily. I had only one brother, and you killed him. However much I loved him, you’ll know how much I hate you for it!”

Kou Li moved—summoning all his strength, he dashed for the water, aiming for that lone boat.

“Fool!” The Soul-Chasing Wolf sneered, exposing his back and leaving himself open. He had seen countless fools try the same. If he used the Soul-Destroying Palm now, Kou Li would die for sure.

But he wanted Kou Li alive—in agony. Only then could he ease the pain in his own heart.

The evil wolf struck—clawing, slashing, blade-hand to the belly—Blade Severance: break the stomach!

He would destroy half his stomach first.

His blade-hand stabbed toward Kou Li’s back—but unexpectedly, Kou Li did not retreat. Instead, he hurled himself forward, crashing in with the force of a tiger climbing the mountain.

A sickening crack—three fingers broken outright. The Soul-Chasing Wolf’s eyes bulged; without hesitation, he twisted and clawed at Kou Li’s eyes.

“I knew you wouldn’t bear to kill me,” Kou Li said with a weak but triumphant laugh. On his right hand, a tiny glint of cold, crystalline light flashed. He tapped, just a light touch.

The Soul-Chasing Wolf’s body went rigid, life snuffed out in an instant. He collapsed to the ground.

In the blazing summer heat, a frost began to form over the corpse.

Even in death, the look on his face was one of utter disbelief.

“You miscalculated one thing. A man who’s resolved to transcend life and death—how could he fear death itself?”

The Water Dragon Gang’s “Four Tigers and Eight Wolves,” the infamous Soul-Chasing Wolf.

Wu Scarface, the Soul-Chasing Wolf—dead!