Romance of Dragons and Snakes

Chapter 173: The Abnormality of Having Strong Martial Arts Despite Having Many Girlfriends

When Wang Chao and Liu Qing had sparred, Wang Chao had ultimately used the Crocodile Ram in order to send his opponent flying, but it was not a fatal strike. Cao Yi had warned him beforehand, and Liu QIng was here to introduce himself through this spar as an inheritor of the Han school of Baguazhang.

The Han school of Baguazhang had elder Li upholding it at its very core. Wang Chao had received guidance from him during his time in Beijing many years ago. It was that chance meeting that gave Wang Chao a feeling of sensitivity towards Liu Qing.

A martial artist had to be careful in a competition. But when the time came for fight, one could not hold back. Kill until you are the last one standing and eliminate your opponents completely. Otherwise if the opponent were to survive and train hard to kill you, then you would be the ultimate loser.

If that had been the case just now, then Wang Chao would have used a far stronger move than the Crocodile Ram. If Liu Qing wasn’t crippled by that, then his internal organs would at the very least be grievously injured. A wound like that would hinder any martial artist’s path to improvement or make it extremely difficult at the very least.

The Crocodile Ram did not require much movement other than from the force of the waist and rib. Its usage was just to knock someone off-balance.

But something like a force push was different than from a ram. The leg would be used to move forward and combine that momentum into the strike like a stampeding cow. For an expert like Wang Chao, using this strike would break bones at the very least and rupture the organs.

But there was a difference between a ram and a force push and had their pros and cons. A ram did use much power and would only knock the opponent back onto their butts. It was easy to use and could be done in a flash though. With a touch as shallow as a dragonfly touching the water, the enemy would often time not even know what had hit them.

But a force push required momentum which meant that the time it took to release this power was slower.

One had small power but was very fast. The other had great power but was slow. In a competition or fight, it was up to circumstances to see which would be used.

Wang Chao had capitalized on Liu Qing’s mistake when he had used the “Golden Eagle Throwing Wolf” and failed to throw Wang Chao down. There had been ample time for Wang Chao to use a force push or even the Cutting Tail of the Crocodile without Liu Qing being able to dodge it.

Liu Qing was an expert as well and knew that Wang Chao had taken mercy on him, and that was why he spoke out about it. Knowing that Liu Qing was about to leave, Wang Chao had decided that he might as well speak the reason why to avoid any potential trouble that come back to bite him.

This was what it meant to make friends after making fight.

“You….” Just when Liu Qing was about to leave, he had heard Wang Chao mention elder Li’s name and had been stunned.

“Three years ago, elder Li had given me some pointers. That would make our spar today a comparison of notes between members of the same school.” Wang Chao looked at the remnants of the glass table on the ground, but there had been a wistful expression on his face.

“What? But your Baguazhang isn’t the same as my Han school Baguazhang.” Liu Qing had been incredulous, “Our Han school Baguazhang emphasizes grappling and tripping. Your Baguazhang emphasizes tearing, dividing the muscles, and diverting power away from the joints to somewhere else. Those two paths aren’t the same at all.

“Every martial arts have their own distinctive style, but even brothers from the same school of martial arts will often be taught something different from the same master. In the end, their fighting styles differ, but that is not anything strange. You are right however, my Baguazhang is not the same one elder Li teaches. Our philosophies run in parallel though.”

“That I can see!” Liu Qing picked the glass shards out from his body, “Your aura is similar to elder Li. I just didn’t think that your Baguazhang would be perfected since you became known for your Xingyiquan.”

“You flatter me.” Wang Chao waved his hands, “I wouldn’t be able to win against you with Baguazhang alone. In the end, I had to rely on the crocodile stance to win over you. In my eyes, you’ve inherited the genuine teachings of elder Li.”

“My martial arts was nonetheless beneath your own. My name is nowhere as famous as your own either. So me losing to you wouldn’t be as bad as losing to an unknown, and thus, there is no harm in losing. And since you were also taught by elder Li, then I have not yet lost face for elder Li for losing either.” Because of his loss today, Liu Qing had felt rather sad. But after listening to Wang Chao, he felt much better than before.

Wang Chao himself had admitted that he had learned from under elder Li. To have Liu Qing lose to him would not be a disgrace for the school, as this match would be considered to be a match between brothers of the same school in a display of skill. Wang Chao’s name was far beyond Liu Qing, so to so bullishly announce that he had defeated some unknown figure would be a bad thing to do for his reputation.

Like when Wang Chao won in his match against Zhang Wei, Zhang Wei had to kill himself despite not dying.

“But I’ve something to ask you still.” Liu Qing asked.

“What is it?”

“You fought with Duan Guochao before, correct? How was his martial arts? And how was ZHou Binglin, how strong did he become?” Duan Guochao and Zhou Binglin were both targets Liu Qing had wanted to challenge and fight. With one of them dead and the other crippled, Liu Qing had naturally wanted to ask the person who had caused both acts of his opinion.

“That’s enough, Liu Qing, you’ve got your fill.” Gao Jun hurriedly asked. As a guard for Beijing, he knew of Wang Chao’s circumstances to a decent degree. Whenever he fought, if the opponent did not die, then the opponent was crippled. Gao Jun had been afraid that Liu Qing might say something disagreeable and cause some trouble that would not be worth the trouble. “Master Wang, you haven’t eaten, have you? Why don’t we accompany you to eat. The higher ups might have instructed you to be our instructor, but if we are to be honest, I was slightly unaccepting of it before. But after seeing you just now, I have to admit you have the right to be our instructor.”

“Yes, yes.” From the side, Zhang Kai spoke up as well, “Why don’t we buy you a drink. Liu Qing, whatever it is you want to say, say it while we’re having a meal.”

Laughing, Liu Qing gave a smile that was filled with a light-hearted expression without the tint of the sadness from losing earlier. “My brothers are correct. Instructor Wang, since this is the first time we’ve met, why don’t we go drink with one another and talk. I’ll buy another coffee table for the one I destroyed.”

“That’ll do.” Wang Chao spoke. He could already grasp the inherent nature of Liu Qing and the carefree nature that seemed to accompany him. But there were times that Liu Qing was earnest. He would be discouraged by failure and reflect heavily on it, but he would not pay too much attention to it.

“Why don’t we head for the Heaven’s Foodery? The meals there are quite nice, and the drinks are delicious. We’ve eaten there plenty of times in the past. If we call a car, it’ll take half an hour to get there.”

The way the four soldiers worked had been rather extensive due to their popularity. In a short while, they had managed to procure the car of some leader or vice-principal. Driving down the road with a wisp of smoke trailing from behind, the car took some time before it finally arrived right in front of a rather luxurious looking restaurant in the nearby city.

After the six of them booked the best private room they had, Wang Chao ordered several dishes before looking around the place. This Heaven’s Foodery hadn’t been bad at all; they were seated within a private dining room on the eighth floor with french windows and glass walls. Brand new bamboo curtains were used to accentuate the place and gave the entire room the sweet scent of bamboo. The ground had carved a pattern within the bamboo floors, and by the side of the room was a single water attraction made and constructed with bamboo with goldfish to be seen swimming in it. Not long after, two young women dressed in Qipao walked into the room to await any orders.

“The local special of this area is the bamboo rat. I’ll order a plate and two bottles of ten year old Maotai. Feel free to order whatever it is you want.” Liu Qing then called out to one of the beautifully dressed women before looking to the shut-eyed Huo Ling’er who had her lips pursed together.

“This must be miss Huo Ling’er. Have I met you somewhere before? Take a look at the menu, perhaps you’ll find something you’ll like.” Liu Qing observed Huo Ling’er with furrowed eyebrows as if he was trying to recall something from his memories.

“Hehehe.” Huo Ling’er laughed gently. “Back during one of the racehorse drinking parties for the English royal family, I recall seeing senior colonel Liu holding hands with one of the princesses.”

“Cough cough….” At that, Liu Qing had almost spat out the mouthful of tea from his mouth. Wiping at his nose, Liu Qing let out two embarrassed coughs.

“Senior colonel Liu, I’ve heard about your popularity overseas. You’ve plenty of girlfriends; if it isn’t the daughter of the head of a financial group, then it’s the princess of a royal family. I’ve also heard that within the country, you’ve held quite the affairs with some of the ladies of the private corporations. Your martial arts might be decent, but you need to take care of your posture as well.” As she spoke, Huo Ling’er’s finger pointed here and there at the meals she wanted.

“Ling’er.” When Wang Chao saw how Huo Ling’er had been picking at the old details of Liu Qing and how embarrassed he was about it, he had to stop her, but Wang Chao had felt quite surprised at the news himself.

“Huo Ling’er seems to know plenty about Liu Qing and his affairs. But it’s rather irregular how his martial arts reached such a stage if he has engaged in so many things like that. Even I had to spend every moment of my previous five years carefully engaged with martial arts. In order to combine the fist and intention together to reach a stronger comprehension of martial arts, I could not afford to let my mind wander. Otherwise, I wouldn’t even be as strong as Huo Ling’er today.”

At these thoughts, Wang Chao couldn’t help but look to Liu Qing’s forehead, temples and face. There hadn’t been any negative signs that might occur due to his numerous acts in debauchery.

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