Fang Yu knew full well what this menacing display meant.
A mass brawl, or to be precise, a dozen men ganging up to beat him alone.
What in the world was the meaning of this?
Confusion flickered across Fang Yu's face as he stared at the impassive Uncle Li, waiting for an explanation.
Yet for a long moment, Uncle Li did not utter a single word, merely stepping slowly back to stand behind the line of bodyguards.
"Uncle Li, what on earth is going on here?" Fang Yu asked again.
He paid Fang Yu no heed, only spitting out two ice-cold words from between his teeth.
"Attack."
No sooner had the words left Uncle Li's mouth than the bodyguards swarmed forward, fists raised, each driving a brutal blow toward Fang Yu.
At the sight of their advance, Fang Yu laughed instead of flying into a rage. Watching the first fist hurtle toward the bridge of his nose, he shot his right hand out, his palm morphing into a vice-like claw that locked tight around the man's wrist. With a swift over-the-shoulder throw, he sent the man crashing to the ground, face-first in the dirt.
Repeating the same ruthless efficiency, Fang Yu had no patience for drawn-out scuffles. His strikes were lightning-fast and unforgiving, his palms and fists cutting a swathe through the crowd. With every blow he landed, another man crumpled to the ground.
Mere minutes later, the ground was strewn with bodies. Those dozen bodyguards had been soundly thrashed by Fang Yu in the blink of an eye, each left writhing and howling in pain.
"Uncle Li, it's your turn now." Fang Yu rubbed the bridge of his nose, staring straight at the man before him. Even as he stepped forward, however, a single nagging thought circled in his mind.
Uncle Li was clearly well on in years. What if he struck too hard, and injured the old man?
Still, the man had dared to order a gang attack on him. He could not afford to look weak; he had to teach the old man a lesson.
Uncle Li let out a cold hmph. He watched Fang Yu approach, and said not a word, his hands clasped behind his back, his bearing utterly calm and unruffled.
For all his outward composure, a flicker of astonishment stirred in Uncle Li's chest. He had taken the young man before him for nothing more than a simple country boy, but the ruthless precision of his strikes just now had proven he was anything but ordinary.
No wonder the master had sent men all that way to fetch this boy.
Whoosh!
Uncle Li's gaze sharpened to a razor's edge, another cold snort escaping him. The moment Fang Yu stepped within a meter of him, he snapped a vicious kick toward Fang Yu's abdomen.
The sudden kick came as no surprise to Fang Yu. He drove his fist forward in a brutal, explosive strike, slamming it hard into the oncoming foot.
A figure went flying backward, staggering to a halt—none other than Uncle Li.
A searing numbness shot up his leg; that seemingly unremarkable punch from Fang Yu had nearly fractured his bone. Cold sweat beaded across Uncle Li's forehead, yet he gritted his teeth and held his ground, not letting a flicker of pain show.
At the sight of the old man's disheveled, flustered state, no trace of triumph crossed Fang Yu's face. He had not put his full strength into that punch, yet any ordinary man struck by it would have been left crippled, his bones and tendons shattered beyond repair.
This Uncle Li is a true master. Fang Yu thought to himself, impressed.
"Uncle Li, why did you set this ambush for me?" Fang Yu smiled, his expression soft and utterly harmless, like that of a lamb.
Yet at the sight of that gentle smile, Uncle Li could not suppress a cold shiver down his spine. The man was unnervingly, terrifyingly calm. Any ordinary man, set upon without provocation like this, would have flown into a blind, seething rage. Yet this boy stood there, utterly unruffled, as if the entire ordeal had been nothing more than a trivial inconvenience. He was in deep, unescapable trouble this time.