"Maybe we're quite lucky."
Soryuin Shion looked at Mutou Judai who had gotten serious on the stage and Nikaido Ren who was getting up from the ground in a very sorry state, slowly narrowing her eyes:
"Mutou Judai's previous Kengan matches, officially recorded, were only two, plus one match against Kiryu, for a total of three. This current match is the fourth!"
"In the first match against Himuro Ryo, Mutou Judai finished his opponent with one punch."
"In the second match against Meguro, according to intelligence, it seems Mutou Judai simply relied on his own strength without using much technique to defeat that Meguro..."
Saying this, Soryuin Shion's gaze turned to Kiryu Setsuna, who also looked over at this moment.
He continued:
"Speaking of which, I also find it mysterious that I lost to him..."
Kiryu Setsuna's only memory of his Kengan match with Mutou Judai was that loud sound—then when he opened his eyes again, he was already lying on a hospital bed in Korakuen's medical room.
Although Kiryu Setsuna didn't care much about victories and defeats unrelated to Ohma afterward, he had still lost, so he was somewhat curious about exactly how he lost.
So he had asked Soryuin Shion about it then.
And Soryuin Shion had answered him like this...
—You were knocked unconscious by his punch!
Kiryu Setsuna asked around.
All the spectators at the time said the same thing, and judging from his own memory, Kiryu Setsuna also felt he might really have been knocked unconscious by Mutou Judai's punch.
But he still instinctively couldn't believe it...
And today.
—He could finally witness it from a third-party perspective!
With such thoughts, Kiryu Setsuna focused his gaze on the stage.
After making eye contact with Kiryu Setsuna, Soryuin Shion's gaze remained on the fighting stage, afraid of missing any exciting details.
But her mouth wasn't idle. While watching the fighting stage, she was also telling Kiryu Setsuna some things.
"Kengan is a very complex type of fighting competition—not a performance, but one that truly determines life and death."
"So fighters who come to participate in such competitions use various tricks, both openly and secretly, and besides these tricks, they at least have some expertise in fighting or combat."
In other words...
"Whether it's one-punch knockouts or overwhelming with force... what he's shown so far probably isn't Mutou Judai's real ability!"
"Either Mutou Judai has strength even greater than what he's currently displaying, or..."
Soryuin Shion looked at the stage with an expressionless face and stated her speculation:
"—He's probably finally about to get serious and start using the fighting techniques he's good at!"
...
Those below the stage were all watching the excitement without caring about the consequences, while on stage, Nikaido Ren felt his head still somewhat dizzy from being slapped by Mutou Judai and his ears still ringing, gradually calming down.
—The opponent's strength is so powerful!
Although he still couldn't understand why Qilong's sonic boom was ineffective against Mutou Judai, this point no longer mattered—just now after the sonic boom, when he got close to his opponent, before he could even start the rapid hypnosis, the opponent's hand was already on his face!
And the opponent's force was so great!
Just one slap, yet it hit him so hard he still hadn't recovered.
If the opponent's fist hit him... the consequences would be unthinkable!
But Qilong was ineffective against him...
Thinking of this, Nikaido Ren spread his feet and assumed a stance.
Tenrō-ken had an established lineage. Although this martial art's history wasn't that long, it had proven itself decades ago.
If such a martial art only had Qilong as one technique, it would naturally have declined long ago.
So now Nikaido Ren abandoned using Qilong, planning to use other stances to deal with Mutou Judai, and try not to let himself be hit by the opponent's fist...
Nikaido Ren's calm thinking ended there.
In the next instant, a huge roaring sound spread throughout the underground space.
Bang!
A heavy and powerful sound directly exploded.
Then at the moment this sound reached its peak, Nikaido Ren saw that Mutou Judai had somehow already appeared in front of him.
And his fist was already drawn back to his waist, assuming a straight punch stance—
So fast!
Before Nikaido Ren could think about what Mutou Judai was trying to do.
A crisp sound directly connected seamlessly with the previous heavy roaring!
This sound was all too familiar to Nikaido Ren!
—Wasn't this the sonic boom sound needed for Qilong's first step!
Since Nikaido Ren had practiced Qilong for years, such sonic boom sounds couldn't stun him.
Although he thought about many things in an instant and was surprised that Mutou Judai had learned Qilong just from seeing him use it once.
But his body instinctively reacted.
—Using Qilong against him is ultimately too naive of you, Mutou Judai!
Nikaido Ren's hands became claws, scratching from two angles toward the leftmost and rightmost corners of Mutou Judai's chin.
Then...
There was no then.
According to Nikaido Ren's thinking, after the sonic boom should come hypnosis.
But in reality, he only heard the sonic boom sound for an instant, and his hand movements only just began changing techniques instinctively—
Mutou Judai's fist was faster than the subsequent sound, directly landing on his face!
Bang!
Nikaido Ren was directly blasted from the stage into mid-air, flying off the stage on the spot!
"This..."
Nikaido Ren's defeat was already decided.
Now he was bleeding from all seven orifices, his life or death unknown.
However, after instinctively having the medical team go over, compared to joy over victory, Soryuin Shion was more immersed in Mutou Judai's recent attack.
It felt like Mutou Judai should have been the same as when defeating Kiryu Setsuna, using extremely fast speed to rush over, then defeating Nikaido Ren with one punch—but facing that attack so fast she couldn't even react to whether he had punched, Soryuin Shion felt there seemed to be something she couldn't understand.
Okami Sakura was about the same.
She could tell Mutou Judai had definitely used some technique, but the time was too short, everything happened too fast, even she couldn't grasp the mystery within.
Only Kiryu Setsuna widened his eyes at this moment.
Because he saw—
He personally witnessed Mutou Judai's movements, which is why he was surprised!
He was different from Okami Sakura and Soryuin Shion. He had a technique called Fallen Demon, though it was questionable whether it should be considered a technique.
The principle was the life flashing before one's eyes when humans were near death—in simpler terms, bullet time!
Most people should have this ability.
But some people could only activate it just before death, while Kiryu Setsuna could activate this state when feeling threatened, even without very strong threats.
So after feeling Mutou Judai's aura mixing Hanma's presence with Conqueror's Haki, Kiryu Setsuna had activated Fallen Demon at that time!
So he saw everything clearly!
"Amazing!"
Even he, who was only interested in Ohma, couldn't help but exclaim.
Okami Sakura and Soryuin Shion beside him, and even Soryuin Akemi, who was somewhat unable to adapt to the cruelty of such underground fighting and was basically seeing real Kengan for the first time, all cast curious glances toward Kiryu Setsuna.
Looking at the man slowly walking down from the stage, Kiryu Setsuna spoke:
"First, stepping on the ground multiple times in an instant... dozens of times... no, that should be stepping on the ground dozens of times in an instant and adding all the force from those dozens of ground strikes to his own movement method!"
That was a movement method more brutal, more direct, and more absolute than his Koei Style: Blink!
Then...
Kiryu Setsuna said three words that made Okami Sakura, Soryuin Shion, and Soryuin Akemi's pupils contract slightly.
"—Sonic Punch!"
"Since I remembered the sonic boom sound from that Nikaido Ren's Qilong just now, I can be completely certain of one thing—that was a Sonic Punch! The technique Mutou Judai just used to defeat his opponent was a Sonic Punch!"
...