It was approaching 4am on June 8, 2022 when the peaceful quiet of a suburban Brisbane morning was pierced by the crackle of nine rapid-fire gunshots followed by the screech of a getaway car.

Inside the house targeted by the attack slept 10 people including two children, one aged eight and one just six months old. Among the adults was a 23-year-old professional heavyweight called Justis Huni.

At the time he was a little-known but emerging figure on the Australian sports scene but within hours he and his family would find themselves at the centre of one of the biggest news stories in the country.

"I still remember it well," Huni told the Ring. "It was like, gunshots fired at my house then all of a sudden I had police and TV crews at the front of my house all morning. But I had sparring that morning.

"I just looked straight past the news crews and just went to sparring. Got my sparring done and then came back home to so much news and reporters at the house."

While many others would have put their life on hold after such a traumatic event, Huni felt he could ill afford to miss a step given his next fight was days away. He was 5-0 at the time, with four inside the distance, but injury problems had kept him out of action for a year. A showdown with fellow-undefeated Queensland heavyweight Joseph Gooddall was just days away and there was no way Huni would let a hail of bullets affect his preparation.

"You get your house shot at and you're going to be a little bit shocked," he had told news crews that day. "But after it happened, we still went to training, we still got the sparring done. My focus is still on Wednesday."

If the incident affected him mentally, it did not show on the night as Huni won the 10-rounder so clearly that one judge scored it 100-90. Victory also brought with it the WBO Oriental heavyweight title which, although lightly regarded, would be the first step on his quick rise up the WBO rankings.

And it was Huni's No.1 position with them which made him such an attractive candidate to face Fabio Wardley this Saturday, once his original opponent, Jarrell Miller, had withdrawn through injury. Much has been made of the hostile atmosphere which will likely await him at Portman Road on Saturday night but having handled an apparent attempt on his life in the past, there is not much that fazes him now.

"The timing of the shooting was crazy because I had the Goodall fight five days later," he says. "I think if I could get through that, I'm sure I can handle what's going to come at me on June 7th.

"Everything is all character building and everything has got me to where I am today and to be able to get me past obstacles that are about to come up like June 7th. Everything in my life has happened for a reason.

"It was scary of course, I was living in the house and my whole family was in the house that night. It was a scare but I think I was so zoned in and focused on the fight it did not affect me. I kind of just overlooked it.

"Now that I think back at it, it was a big deal, but at the time I was so focused on my job at hand that I kind of just brushed it away and just kept moving forward. I won that fight and there was so much security and stuff at the fight because obviously they thought it was connected to me.

"I don't know… It just shows what the mind can do when you're locked in on something so bad. You just kind of forget about it."

Nobody was ever arrested for the shooting and Huni never looked back. In the three years that followed, Huni has improved to 12-0 (7) and knows victory against Wardley on Saturday night could well land him a world title shot in his very next outing.

After flying over for the launch press conference at Portman Road in the middle of May, Huni and his team decided to set up shop in England instead of heading back home for the end camp. For the last few weeks they have done their training at the Sharpstyle Boxing Gym in Blackpool. And, for someone used to the sun, sea and sand of Brisbane, they might have felt like inauspicious surroundings from which to prepare for the most important fight of your life so far.

"It's a kind of interesting place," says Huni of Blackpool. "It's a bit different to the Gold Coast.

"I haven't had a chance to look around and go down to the water yet but from what I've seen it seems quiet here and that's how I like it. It's a lot better than when I was in London for a few days - that was too busy for me, too much traffic.

"But there’s not nearly as much traffic in Blackpool so I've liked it. We've managed to get the sparring we need from a few local boys who have come down to help me out. I've got all the training that I've needed.

"I've done all the hard work I've needed to do. I'm just going to go in there and do my job... do what I've done for the last 20 years since I started in this sport."

And as history has shown us, it will take an awful lot to stop him.