Now, one might argue: why fight when you know nothing about their world? Fair question. But here was the thing: he'd seen the corpse. The original Lu Zhiheng's injuries weren't that impressive. Mostly physical trauma: broken bones and bruises, and stab wounds from what looked like a kitchen knife (not some enchanted blade or a legendary weapon, not even a dagger, just a kitchen knife). Nothing he couldn't handle.

  Lu Zhiheng would have ignored their enmity had it not been for the cold certainty in their eyes. But now that option was off the table; they were hell-bent on killing him.

  Sure, it was his fault for following them in the first place. But accepting fault? Who does that? Certainly not him. Besides, he was amnesiac. Mistakes didn't count when you couldn't remember who you were.

  So, he didn't mind throwing some hands.

  More importantly, the fact that they'd needed four people to kill Lu Zhiheng suggested the original owner was at least their equal, if not stronger. And if Lu Zhiheng had not possessed some world-shattering trump card, chances are, that these youths probably didn't have anything crazy up their sleeves either.

  At least, that's what he kept telling himself.

  Truth was, he just wanted to fight and beat them wholeheartedly.

  He didn't know why. Maybe it was some lingering instinct from the body he'd stolen—a subconscious grudge. Maybe it was because they kept talking about killing him as if he weren't even there, like he was already dead and just hadn't gotten it yet.

  But probably mostly because he just wanted to fight them to test the skill level of the inhabitants of the new world; he couldn’t comprehend the reason but ever since he was assimilated, he felt drawn, like he wanted and needed to fight them.

  Was it the excitement that took over? Or was it just stupidity due to memory loss? He wouldn’t care any less.

  That didn't mean he was reckless though. He stayed wary of hidden tricks, unexpected techniques, anything that might turn the tide. That's why he'd waited for the perfect opening, and taken down the first target swiftly.

  Seeing their comrade collapse unconscious after two clean strikes—delivered by someone who'd been on death's door moments ago—the remaining three froze.

  "Wha—what just happened? Did he just—"

  Before they could finish processing, Lu Zhiheng closed the distance.

  In just a few steps, he punched the girl in blue with his left fist on the chest, as she was closer and talking about some ‘why he not dead’ yeah, she was about to know.

  "You- you fuckin-"

  His left fist whistled through the air, blocked by her forearms. But the block was her undoing. As her guard rose, a slight gap opened between her arms. His right fist snapped forward like a piston, threading between and above her guard and crashing into her face.

  A jab along with a classic misdirection. Ironically, her training had worked against her; an untrained brawler would have flinched wildly. Her disciplined defense created the precise vulnerability he needed.

  Her stance left just enough of a gap between her hands for him to slip through.

  *Crack.*

  “Guh”

  She staggered backward, blood trickling from her nose and a split lip. A few teeth said their goodbyes and embarked on a journey to the forest floor. Dazed and unbalanced, she wobbled, unable to find her footing.

  He stood over her, breathing steady, heart hammering from awareness.

  'Another one down,' Lu Zhiheng thought, already calculating. 'One knocked out, one injured. The odds are better now.'

  He moved in to finish the girl in blue—

  "You demon! Get away from her!"

  By that time, the other two were fully alert. They didn't hesitate, attacking in unison. Just as he turned toward the shout, the girl launched a straight kick at his chin.

  He blocked it easily—

  —and took a solid punch to the gut from the boy who was holding the crystal sphere earlier.

  Oof.

  No, he did not cough up blood.

  ‘But, damn it hurt.’

  From that moment on, he shifted tactics. No more aggression. He dodged, weaved, and retreated.

  ‘Never get jumped.’

  A simple rule that everyone knew. Even more critical now, because their physiques were similar; the only differentiator would be skill.

  But skill requires composure and needs to be applied properly. And you also need to think properly in order to put your fighting skills to work; getting punched in the face by two people taking turns on you doesn’t seem like an ideal situation for such.

  "You piece of shit! Stop running and fight like a man!" the girl shrieked, hurling insults as she pursued. "You were winning just a moment ago, right? What happened? Come at me!"

  Lu Zhiheng ignored her blatant attempts to aggravate him.

  ‘God, she could probably kill someone with that shrill of a voice.’

  A kick came straight toward him, but this time he did not dodge; he had already done what he wanted to do, which was—retreating until the two divide. He had noticed that the girl was a bit faster than the boy, her footwork was slick and precise, so he kept dodging and circling the area until a gap was created; luckily it worked.

  He blocked the incoming left kick, then closed the distance instantly. Threw a right hook at her face—which she ducked.

  You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

  What she didn't duck was the left elbow that followed, slamming into her ear.

  *Thump.*

  She stumbled sideways, hand clutching the side of her head, probably hearing bells.

  But she recovered fast. Came back with a right kick—

  Lu Zhiheng caught her leg mid-strike and yanked, trying to throw her off balance.

  ‘It didn't work.’ He thought, as that brief moment of pause in-between the fight let him observe the surroundings.

  And in that brief window, he saw them: the crystal sphere boy and the blue-robed girl, both closing in fast.

  He hadn’t pulled that much distance from him anyway; and from the start of his fight with the fast girl, only a few heartbeats had passed, and apparently, somewhere along the middle the blue robe had also joined in.

  After the split second pause of awkwardness, he saw the fast girl; she hopped on her left leg, torso twisting to—

  An idea sparked.

  The girl, still on one leg, immediately jumped and spun; left leg high, counter-roundhouse kick aimed at his skull.

  Perfect form. Beautiful motion.

  But he’d already anticipated it.

  The moment her left foot left the ground, he shoved her with all his strength; launching her sideways, directly into the path of the crystal sphere boy. The timing was perfect, he had somehow managed it.

  She flew.

  Mid-spin, both legs off the ground, completely airborne—she crashed onto the boy in a tangle of limbs.

  Lu Zhiheng didn't wait.

  He pivoted toward the weakest link: the blue-robed girl.

  He didn’t hesitate.

  ‘Time for the deluxe combo.’

  He slipped past her wild punches, closing inside her guard. A rear-leg crescent kick snapped upward, connecting to her temple. And as she fell, he followed with a 360 right spinning elbow and a left hook—

  The hook didn't land clean, but hey, he wasn’t going to complain after a knockout.

  She crumpled and fell, like a bottle toppled over, unconscious before she even hit the ground.

  'Two down.'

  The remaining pair scrambled to their feet; their faces ashen as they saw another ally defeated. They were already exhausted from the earlier kill, and now he was dismantling them—stronger than before—with terrifying efficiency.

  What twisted logic was this?

  'Did he already awaken some power?’

  ‘Does he have another treasure?’

  ‘A healing artifact?’

  ‘Something that boosts strength?'

  Panic flooded their minds.

  "You monster!" the crystal sphere boy shouted, breathing hard. "How are you even alive with those injuries?” His eyes narrowed with suspicion. "I knew something was wrong when you came to us instead of running. You had a healing treasure as a trump card, didn't you?!”

  And Lu Zhiheng ignored whatever the boy said, or at least tried.

  A palm to the chest and a leg sweep later, now Lu Zhiheng was on the ground; but instead of getting up, he tried to use some jiu jitsu,

  ‘Bet they won’t see this coming.’

  *Thud.* *Crack.*

  But what he didn’t see coming was kicks to his ass and face; turns out using jiu jitsu when you have two targets is not the best decision.

  "Ha! You thought you could kill me that easily? Steal my things?" Lu Zhiheng babbled, buying time as he rolled away.

  "Not a chance! You should've given up when you had the opportunity—"

  He somehow got up and then closed in on them, dodging punches and kicks—duck, sidestep, give ground—until their eagerness tore the pair apart. He lured the faster girl a bit forward once again; her kicks hummed—side-kick, roundhouse, ax-kick—as orderly as drum beats, but each went wide by the width of a thumb while the boy struggled to keep pace.

  Sometimes getting hit, sometimes kicking, he used various styles ranging from martial arts to kickboxing, taekwondo, and boxing, until a jab connected to the chin of the fast girl, and she hit her head on the stone Lu Zhiheng was painstakingly trying to grab during the fight, he still couldn’t get it but at least she was put down. That alone was much helpful.

  Collapsed tangle. Completely Neutralised.

  ‘Heh, who said you can’t use dirt and stones in a fight? If only we were fighting on the concrete...’ He lamented as the forest’s grassy and dirt ground took a lot of options away.

  And the next moment, he got leg swept by the boy and fell down on his back. He was stunned for a second there, BUT!

  Now was finally the time to put the jiu jitsu to use, he kept lying down and used his legs to try to grab hi-

  *Thwack*

  Something struck the side of his head with the force of a sledgehammer.

  Pain—white-hot, blinding—exploded through his mind.

  His vision swam. The world swirled. Everything went haywire.

  The crystal sphere boy immediately moved in, aiming a stomp at his stomach—

  But Lu Zhiheng, dazed as he was, wasn't completely out of it. He donkey-rolled sideways, scrambled to his feet, and ran.

  A few seconds later, his vision cleared enough to look back.

  The knife boy—the first one he'd knocked out—was back on his feet. And he'd just kicked Lu Zhiheng's head like a soccer ball.

  'Crap, I am never using jiu-jitsu again!' Lu Zhiheng cursed in his mind as suddenly his head started to ache badly.

  Very badly.

  Lightning inside the skull.

  Darkness blossomed like flowers in springtime, then reversed into glaring white.

  Badump

  …

  Badump

  …

  His heartbeat swelled like surf.

  Suddenly the world slowed down or more accurately, his senses and thinking heightened to such a degree that everything else seemed slow, as he could still hear his own heartbeat, pounding like a war drum in his skull. And then, the dam broke.

  Everything flooded.

  The Memories of Lu Zhiheng.

  The knowledge of this world. The names of the kids. The life of Lu Zhiheng, every moment, every relationship, every fight.

  Memories surged, scents, every scrap of etiquette, all the endless afternoons of practice under the gingko trees. Years poured back in the span of two pulses.

  And with it came a splitting migraine that nearly dropped him to his knees. The migraine was a molten nail, but clarity spread under it like silk on water.

  Pa

  Shlick

  Blood sprayed out from his nose and eyes. Turns out that a sensory overload is, in fact, very harmful to the body.

  Hoooo...

  He breathed in slowly. Out slowly. Calmed himself.

  …

  ‘Seems like all you need for amnesia is just blunt force trauma straight to the head.’

  ‘Still no clue about my own past, eh— ‘, he was interrupted as he suddenly had to dodge a jab.

  He slipped and lurched backward.

  Then he looked at the two boys charging toward him.

  Only two seconds had passed in reality. To him, it felt like a decade.

  ‘Yeah, they won’t wait while I immerse in my power ups, huh?’

  They were only a few steps away. He should've been creating distance, buying time—

  But… they looked easy.

  Why?

  Because with the memories, came everything else: their fight patterns, their styles, their weak points. Lu Zhiheng had sparred with them hundreds of times. They'd been friends.

  If earlier he was like a pro gamer trying a new, difficult game...

  ...now it was like a pro gamer returning to the game that made him a pro.

  It felt easy.

  The air around him shifted.

  His eyes drooped slightly, no longer wide with panic. His face smoothed into calm focus. The uneasiness, the fatigue—gone. His breathing steadied. Confidence radiated from his stance.

  The kids noticed.

  But they had no choice. They had to fight.

  Lu Zhiheng closed in.

  Shi Mo—the knife boy—having lost his weapon in the chaos, slid to Lu Zhiheng's left, trying to flank him. While Ni Bai—the crystal sphere boy—came straight on.

  Lu Zhiheng weaved through Ni Bai's attacks like smoke.

  Then he struck: an oblique kick to Ni Bai's knee, followed immediately by a left hook to the head.

  *Crack.*

  The kick connected, damaging the knee and destroying his balance. But the point was that it bent Ni Bai’s left leg… sideways.

  ‘AAGH..!’

  ‘Uooh shit… did I break that? I hope not.’

  The move was unexpected, a technique Lu Zhiheng had saved for this exact moment. The effect was immediate and devastating; Ni Bai wouldn't be putting full weight on that leg again.

  As Ni Bai raised his guard against an anticipated left hook, the punch stopped mid-air. Lu Zhiheng took a step back with his arm also snapping backward, his elbow connecting sharply with the face of Shi Mo, who was attempting a blindside attack.

  Staggered, Shi Mo was helpless as Lu Zhiheng spun, grabbed his head, and in one brutal motion, drove a knee into his face.

  Crunch.

  Shi Mo's eyes rolled back.

  After taking another enemy, he sidestepped effortlessly as a figure blitzed past—Ni Bai, committing to a desperate, empty tackle.

  He missed.

  The boy had finally realized they couldn't win in a straight fight. His plan: if one person could grab Lu Zhiheng and hold him—lock him down—the others could swarm him.

  But he was too late.

  Shi Mo collapsed, unconscious.

  “Only one left,” Ni Bai heard as his thoughts went blank.