The Villain is Better than the Words.

Wang Xiaoer loved reading martial arts stories. Zhang San would occasionally read them when he had nothing to do. He noticed that the villains in those stories seemed to always die from talking too much.

Zhang San said, just kill if you want to kill, why waste so much time talking nonsense?

But the truth proved that those stories were only fiction, and reality was often the opposite. That's what Zhang San thought to himself today.

Leaping down from the sword hilt embedded in the roof, by now, the thick fog around him had nearly all dispersed.

Zhang San smiled at Hei Shanke, "Villains may prevail over big talkers, but Hei Shanke senior, I'm afraid today you will die due to your own carelessness. As an assassin, you openly stayed at the county office, abandoning secrecy for notoriety. If you don't die, who will?"

Each of Zhang San's words stabbed at the heart.

After rampaging through the underworld for over twenty years, Hei Shanke could no longer restrain himself. With a roar of rage he shouted, "Insolent brat, die!"

In his extreme anger, Hei Shanke leapt up with his heavy saber hacking down, its power and imposing manner astonishingly fierce!

Yet with just a sway of his body, Zhang San dodged the blow. He saw the ground give a loud rumble as the saber split it open with dozens of cracks.

As Zhang San evaded, he did not forget to taunt, "Senior, it seems despite being less than fifty, you really are getting on in years. No matter the righteous or sinister way, the martial world will always belong to the young. So today, I will be sure to relieve you of your worries, esteemed elder."

Zhang San's needling further provoked Hei Shanke's rage. Right now he no longer cared who his opponent was. With a sweep of his saber he attacked Zhang San once more.

But Zhang San kept evading while ceaselessly provoking him verbally.

The reason was simple. As a steady assassin, from the moment he kicked down the door to now with each sentence he spoke, none of Zhang San's actions were without purpose.

To win! But he must cut him!

Harboring this thought, Zhang San, who in his professional career had always relied on sneak attacks, poisons, traps and other such means, for the first time chose to directly confront a formidable foe!

Against top-ranked assassins like Hei Shanke, he didn't dare take any risks, there was no way he could kill him with his own skills.

One saber blow contained eighty percent of Hei Shanke's inner energy. Its power could slice any martial artist below upper stage directly in half.

Circulating all his strength, Zhang San raised his arm to meet the attack.

The saber sliced through his white clothes, chopping into the skin of his arm, causing countless sparks to spray out just like before.

Yet the result was still the same as last time!

The blade simply could not cut into his flesh and blood!

Impossible! Hei Shanke thought in alarmed fury.

After the previous exchange with Xiu Wangchou, his less than fifty percent powered "Saber Chop" could not break through. But now even eighty percent inner power had not budged him in the slightest!

It couldn't even break his skin?

I'm afraid even if I use full power, I can still only scratch him at most, Hei Shanke couldn't help thinking.

In contrast to Hei Shanke's shock and anger, Zhang San was overjoyed in his heart, as he recalled his master's words from back then...

"Xiao San, our righteous Iron Cloth Shirt is the hardest qi defense under heaven. Aside from that 'weak point', martial artists of the same stage simply cannot cut through it, even with famed blades and swords."

However, in his twenty years of only accepting assassinations below his own level, Zhang San had never truly fought top experts. And he had no interest whatsoever in finding a blademaster or swordsman to test his skills against. So this was really the first time Zhang San discovered that while he had always known his Iron Cloth Shirt was powerful, it was actually this powerful!

Master did not deceive me!

His confidence greatly boosted, Zhang San reached out to engage Hei Shanke in close quarters combat. Raising his black iron dagger, he slashed towards the scar on Hei Shanke's face!

Hei Shanke was also an experienced fighter. Noticing Zhang San's ordinary strike, his body twisted around to evade.

"As expected," Zhang San sighed inwardly, but was not surprised.

With just his mediocre stabbing skills and almost no actual combat experience, it was indeed very difficult to touch an experienced veteran like Hei Shanke.

But his dagger was laced with poison to make up for his inferior martial arts. For now, he still held the initiative in close range fighting. With his upper stage Iron Cloth Shirt, Zhang San could make countless mistakes, while Hei Shanke could not afford a single one.

The two exchanged several more moves, seemingly evenly matched.

Hei Shanke had joined the Dark Building thirty years ago and made a name for himself in the martial world for twenty years. His judgement was outstanding.

He could tell that while Zhang San's inner energy, martial arts, agility - everything - was at the upper stage, and could be considered a top expert among upper stage masters, in all their exchanges so far, Zhang San hadn't used a single decent technique. He was purely relying on his tough qi defense to block his strikes, while waiting for chances to counterattack.

This opponent didn't seem to have much combat experience or aggressive moves.

The more they fought, the clearer Hei Shanke understood his foe's abilities. He had practically concluded that combat experience and techniques were Zhang San's biggest weaknesses!

Next, as long as he could break through his sturdy qi defense, victory was at hand!

"But first, I must confirm whether he practices the Golden Bell Shield or the Iron Cloth Shirt," Hei Shanke muttered to himself.

Just as there were no perfect poisons in the world.

There were also no perfect qi defenses.

In Hei Shanke's knowledge, only the righteous sect's peerless Golden Bell Shield and Iron Cloth Shirt could block his Dark Building's black saber arts. However, the Dark Building's second organization "Dark Building" had always kept records on the weaknesses of those two martial arts.

Hei Shanke understood he had to identify which art Zhang San practiced before breaking through his defense.

In a flash, the two closed in on each other again.

This time, after repeatedly failing to hit his mark, Zhang San chose to counterattack, tightly gripping his dagger without making the first move, waiting for any openings Hei Shanke might reveal when attacking.

But it was precisely Zhang San's split-second decision here that gave the battle-hardened Hei Shanke the chance he was waiting for!

Everyone in the Dark Building knew Hei Shanke's black saber art ultimately trained the terrifying "Tiger Bite" as his killer move, able to instantly explode countless saber energies into the target's body with one chop. That had been the saber blow that ended Xiu Wangchou's life.

Yet now, Hei Shanke chose another supreme technique from his repertoire.

Dark Building's Black Saber, Singular Focus!

In an instant, he concentrated his inner force into razor-sharp saber energy fixed three inches from the blade's edge. The saber qi formed a singular line, unmatched in sharpness and speed like lightning!

This strike forfeited everything except two aspects - speed and sharpness!

But in a flash, Zhang San also noticed Hei Shanke was chopping precisely at his chest, the most solid point of his Iron Cloth Shirt. So he remained unperturbed, and slashed a dagger at Hei Shanke's left shoulder instead.

The saber edge cut across his chest.

The dagger sliced open his shoulder.

After the brief exchange, both men passed by each other's side, then turned around.

Zhang San looked at the blood drops on his dagger.

Hei Shanke gazed at the tiny wound on Zhang San's chest where his clothes had split open.

Both of their minds held the same sole thought. And it was the same thought.

I'm going to win!