The twin bronze fists struck with the moving heavy rush of a falling battlement.
Lu Chen didn’t try to force the forty-two-pound cleaver back into a guard.
To arrest a dropping blade at the apex of an upward swing and yank it downward within a tenth of a second would cause severe musculoskeletal trauma. Rotator cuff fibers would shred. The pectoralis major would detach from the collar bone. Upper-back bones would rotate out of posture.
Body smooth speed forbade self-mutilation.
Instead, Lu Chen shifted his torso two inches to the right.
He exhaled half a lungful of boiling air. He dropped his balance point directly into the dark rock beneath his boots.
BOOM-CLANGGG!
The third Corpse King’s right fist—a five-hundred-pound block of green rust-crusted bronze—grazed the left side of Lu Chen’s ribs.
