Forty Millenniums of Cultivation, page 270
It was not until Li Yao slashed their spiritual shields to pieces that they realized that the prey was not fat, but fatal!
Twenty-one… Twenty-three… Twenty-seven…
Li Yao's kills continued to rise, whereas his combat efficiency was as stable as ever.
However, the number of the times he got killed was growing, too.
In less than ten seconds, he had been killed six times.
When other Orb Patrollers were killed and entered the protective state, most of them would flee from the place of chaos.
But Li Yao simply roamed around the edge of the battlefield. The moment the protective state was over, he would rejoin the battle with a roar.
Frowning, 'Sand' Sha Ziming watched it for a while and shook his head disapprovingly.
"Li Yao's attacks are absolutely amazing. In comparison, his defense is not very satisfactory. There were several deadly attacks that he could've avoided, but they hit him precisely.
"Besides, instead of escaping the battlefield as quickly as possible while he was in the protective state, he returned to battles again, which seems a little reckless to me. It is also inconsistent with his fighting style according to his files."
Iron God Yan Ba, on the other hand, was eyeing the light beams in appreciation. He smiled and said slowly, "He's doing it on purpose."
"On purpose?"
As a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator, Sha Tianqing immediately drew a lot of conclusions after being reminded by Yan Ba. His eyes were gleaming, too, as he asked, "Do you mean he has been perishing together with his opponents after accurate calculations just in order to increase his kills by as many as possible?"
"The rules we set up dictate that the five teams with the most kills after an hour will win. One's death count does not matter as long as it does not surpass ten.
"It means that being killed once and being killed nine times are exactly the same.
"Right now, so many Orb Patrollers have gathered in the center of the world fragment. Even a random slash might hit several people.
"Li Yao has thought that through, and even at the cost of his own 'lives', he will slaughter as many people as he can.
"He must be aware that, after everyone retreats to the edge of the world fragment and reunites with their respective teams, it will be extremely difficult for him to continue butchering as smoothly as right now!
"Therefore, it is quite a bargain to trade his own 'lives' for kills. The most favorable outcome will be that all the six members of a team are killed nine times in exchange for triple or even quadruple scores!"
Iron God Yan Ba nodded his head.
"That should be it. Li Yao has understood the most critical part of the competition precisely, which is how to barter one's deaths for more valuable things at the highest efficiency!
"Remarkable. He is indeed remarkable!
"If Yan Jun was the biggest hope for the mission to Ultimacy in our plan, this Vulture Li Yao is the biggest surprise that we didn't anticipate!
"Although he is just in the middle level of the Building Foundation Stage, a meticulous mind can be as useful as powerful personal strength in Ultimacy."
Sha Ziming interrupted him. "Old Yan, look, your 'biggest hope' and your 'biggest surprise' are confronting each other!"
Yan Ba raised his eyebrow.
"Huh?"
…
On two bizarre-shaped rocks in the center of Thousand Mountains Domain, where hot steam was still billowing up, Li Yao and Yan Jun, the best of all Orb Patrollers, were gazing at each other with a long distance in between.
After he killed two members of Team Thunder Soul momentarily, his on-fire performance finally attracted Yan Jun's attention.
Different from Li Yao who was armed to the teeth with a saber in his left hand and a sword in his right hand, there was nothing but a dagger in Yan Jun's hand, which was orbited by eight black, octagonal, iron blades with coldly-shining sharpness.
"Vulture Li Yao, I didn't know—"
The scar on Yan Jun's face resulted in the constant jerking of his facial muscles, making him look cruel and hideous.
His voice was like a frozen iron block, both cold and tough.
"There are too many things that you don't know. Let's just get down to it. Time is precious!"
He had been informed that Yan Jun had advanced into the peak of the Building Foundation Stage.
In the junior year of his high school, he had witnessed Fiend Blade Peng Hai, his senior brother, burning his soul and marching to the peak of the Building Foundation Stage.
The dreadful scene where spiritual energy was raging like a tsunami had been etched into the depths of his brain.
At that time, Cultivators had been gods in his eyes.
God of war! God of killing! God of destruction!
Peak of the Building Foundation Stage had been an unimaginable level for him. Fiend Blade Peng Hai could've turned him into minced meat with nothing but his hair easily.
But today, he had captured the attention of another Cultivator at the peak of the Building Foundation Stage, and he was even capable enough to fight him with his best!
It was indeed intriguing and intoxicating!
"BOOM!"
Li Yao rushed forward like a black shooting star, only to fly backwards half a second later, barging into multiple rocks.
Yan Jun sniffed, not even bothering to look at him.
Suddenly, his eyelids twitched, while a narrow, long, red line appeared below his cheek. A drop of blood had zigzagged to the corner of his mouth like an earthworm.
Li Yao jumped out of the broken stones. Spitting out a mouthful of black blood uncaringly, he grinned.
Yan Jun licked the blood stain on the corner of his mouth slowly. His expression suddenly turned livid.
The blue scar through his left eye was glittering, as if a dragon was dancing on the right side of his face.
"Shua!"
Yan Jun suddenly vanished into thin air, and in the next second, he had appeared behind Li Yao.
The brightness of his dagger cut Li Yao into pieces. But it was just Li Yao's gradually dispersing blurred shadow.
The real Li Yao had moved twenty meters away.
Before Li Yao was able to take a breath, the back of his head was prickling. He waved his saber and sword into a white, shining ball. Cracking noises echoed nonstop, while sparks danced to everywhere, as if his weapons were on fire.
Yan Jun's first appearance was a blurred shadow, too, just to make him relax.
In the meantime, the real Yan Jun had moved below him and locked onto him precisely!
Chapter 396: Success! |
The two of them collided heavily. A large cloud of dust immediately wreathed them. It was not due to the crash, but from both of them breaking the sonic barrier multiple times within 0.1 seconds!
After a moment, dozens of shadows flew out of the dust clouds, which were the blurred shadows of the two parties due to their astonishingly fast speed.
All the blurred shadows were fighting savagely in midair.
But Li Yao's real body was fleeing out of the battlefield as quickly as possible.
It was not until he was engaged with Yan Jun that he truly felt the dominance of the peak of Building Foundation Stage in person. Although his speed broke its limits time and time again, Yan Jun had blocked his every route of escape like an impregnable dragnet.
Li Yao had to do his best to breach through it!
BOOM! BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM!
Explosions rang out ahead of him all the time, as if multiple volcanoes were erupting, or the crystal bombs deployed previously had been detonated. They were nothing but the sword auras created by Yan Jun's dagger, yet they were already so formidable.
The eight octagonal iron blades circling Yan Jun, on the other hand, were even more dreadful. Manipulated by his telepathic thoughts, they reached Li Yao's next position from unimaginable curves at more than twice the speed of sound, even faster than bullets!
Faced with such a frightening enemy, Li Yao realized that the memory pieces which he'd absorbed over the past month were taking effect. He was like a veteran that had endured hundreds of bloody wars without getting killed. Dangers were all foreseen by him before they were able to deal any damage!
Just now, when everyone was fighting for the magical equipment, he was fighting aggressively and even trading his own life for others'.
But at this moment, he couldn't be more cowardly.
Now, he was running away with his hands covering his head; the next moment, he was crawling forward on all fours like a lizard. He narrowly escaped all the deadly attacks, as if he were an undying cockroach!
Yan Jun's sword aura had left scratches on his body which was all covered in blood now. The mustard suit had been dyed in red.
However, the spiritual shield would only break when suffering a 'fatal attack'. Li Yao's injuries were mostly superficial and did not affect his speed. In fact, he even looked for several opportunities to counterattack!
"Ting! Ting! Ting! Ting! Ting! Ting! Ting!"
Brilliant sparks burst out around Yan Jun. Three of his octagonal iron blades had been slashed into pieces by Li Yao!
Even his chest had been kicked heavily by Li Yao once!
Yan Jun sneered in derision. The broken blades did not fall to the ground. Instead, they sped up and passed by Li Yao quickly!
With a shiver, Li Yao managed to block Yan Jun's dagger attack with the chainsword in his right hand. But there was no way he could stop Yan Jun's fist from cutting-in. His stomach was punched so brutally that he felt that he had been hit by a falling star. Agony and paralysis grabbed him like an octopus, making him unable to control himself at all. He was blown hundreds of meters away and crushed into piles of rocks. The blood that he spat out dyed the surrounding smoke red.
"Shua! Shua! Shua!"
Almost ten streams of blood spurted out from Li Yao's body, which were the result of the sharp iron blades.
"CRACK! CRACK!"
The skin on Li Yao's hands was almost entirely torn to shreds. The flesh and blood were barely distinguishable. Yet, he was still gripping his chainsword and battle saber, unwilling to let them go.
But the constant, massive spiritual input and the intensity of the combat were apparently too much for the two pieces of mass-produced magical equipment.
The chainsword broke in the middle. The sawtooth dangled down like a dead snake.
In the meantime, the battle saber had cracked into pieces, its components flying everywhere.
Gritting his teeth, Li Yao tried to draw the battle axe from his back, only to find that he could hardly move his finger because of the excruciating pain.
Staring at him coldly, Yan Jun folded his dagger in his palm and walked toward him one step after another.
Li Yao smiled miserably. His left hand moved toward the battle axe on his back inch by inch, while he unsheathed a dagger from his waist awkwardly with an ever-trembling wrist.
They were only fifty meters apart.
The number of the black iron blades spinning around Yan Jun had increased to almost twenty. They were amazingly fast and enveloped in streaks of blackness, as if they were satellites orbiting a planet.
Yan Jun took another step forward, but then his pupils constricted violently. He immediately backed off like a ghost in the same posture.
It was not until he was more than a hundred meters away from Li Yao that he stared at Li Yao deeply and left, never to look back.
"Hu…"
Watching Yan Jun disappear behind the majestic rocks, Li Yao was greatly relieved, albeit not without dissatisfaction.
He was so close to victory!
Yan Jun was indeed a super elite raised up in the Occult Orbs. His instincts for noticing incoming dangers were really keen.
"Shua! Shua! Shua!"
Ding Lingdang, Hong Tong, Yan Yangtian, Ba Weiqi, and Leng Ziming crawled out from the crevices nearby.
Li Yao jumped out of the rocks. He breathed on his palms, rubbed his hands, and started repairing the seriously damaged chainsword and battle saber. The wounded, wretched appearance was entirely gone.
The spurting blood was also stopped as he wriggled his muscles.
The terrible body conditions where he could barely hold his dagger tight turned out to be just an act!
This place was Team Blue Bronze's rendezvous point as well as the location where they planned to ambush Yan Jun.
If Yan Jun had taken a few steps forward, within 47 meters of Li Yao, the rest of the team except Leng Ziming would've launch attacks immediately.
Even though he was at the peak of the Building Foundation Stage, there was no way that he could escape.
It was a pity that he somehow saw through it and simply left in advance.
"Ding Lingdang, these are your power knuckles; Shell, these two guns are for you. Sorry that there's no sniper rifle; there was only one of them in total. The competition was too fierce, so I didn't participate. But other than the two assault rifles, I snatched a third gun and dismantled it. After modification, the two guns should be able to achieve 60% of the precision and power of a sniper rifle.
"Dummy, this is your brain wave enhancer. Your mental power will be increased by at least 10% if you put it on your head.
"Captain, your physical strength is excellent. This battle axe is perfect for you. This dagger is for Yan Zi!"
While he was maintaining the two broken weapons, Li Yao distributed all his belongings.
Everyone was dazed to see that his hands were rolling up and down swiftly despite the injuries all over his body.
A moment later, 'Dummy' Ba Weiqi mumbled, "Just now in the communication channel, you said that you absorbed 68 memory fragments of the Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators, but I didn't quite believe it.
"Well, I do now.
"You are only in the middle level of the Building Foundation Stage. However, not only did you persist for so long under the bombardment of Yan Jun, a Cultivator at the peak of the Building Foundation Stage, you were even close to lure him into our trap…
"You are an undeniable monster!"
…
Five kilometers away, Yan Jun seemed to be roaming. Now and then, he would tread on the rocks lightly. Yet, his speed was astonishingly high.
'Vulture Li Yao, you've improved so much in only a few months. Even I failed to finish you quickly while trying my best. Interesting.
'It seems that there are indeed experts among the Orb Patrollers from the outside world.
'If I had walked forward another three steps, your teammates hiding in the crevices would've launched deadly attacks, wouldn't they?
'But although you'd been preparing to ambush me, you were all bare-handed, while I still had my dagger. You wouldn't have been able to take down me easily even if I fell into your trap!
'It was just that I didn't want to be delayed by you for too long. Don't ever presume that I was scared of you!'
At this very moment, Yan Jun heard a feeble cracking noise.
Stunned, Yan Jun lifted his dagger in disbelief, while his face suddenly turned extremely awful.
On his dagger, a crack that was even tinier than hair was spreading out like divaricating fungus.
Crack!
After a gentle swing, the dagger exploded into pieces. The only thing left in his hands was the hilt.
The scar on Yan Jun's fact twisted like a snake that had been shocked. A drop of cold sweat dripped off from his forehead, while he murmured, "What…
"When was my weapon damaged?
"Vulture Li Yao is best known as a refiner. Could it be that his knowledge regarding weapons is profound enough to let him wreck my weapon without me knowing it, even at the cost of his own weapons being broken?"
If so, other than the black iron blades surrounding him, he would've been bare-handed, too.
Under the attacks of four Orb Patrollers, including Ding Lingdang who was best at close combat as a body practitioner, chances were slim that he could run away!
Yan Jun squinted. The scar on his face trembled for a long time before it finally stopped. Taking a long breath, he put on a mysterious smile.
"Thankfully, this Vulture Li Yao is on our side.
"If there were such a formidable figure in the demon race, the trip to Ultimacy would be really perilous!"
In relief, Yan Jun threw away the shattered dagger casually. He slapped his hands, and sensing the spiritual waves nearby, he marched toward the spiritual waves which were the most intense with his hands behind his back.
Very soon, cries and screams echoed behind the rocks over there.
…
After Team Blue Bronze assembled and acquired abundant magical equipment, they didn't make any mistakes.
They were one of the fastest-regrouping Star Teams.
The six of them swept across the margin of Thousand Mountains Domain anticlockwise. None of the lone Orb Patrollers could withstand one blow from them.
When all the Star Teams had regrouped, their kills were already high in the rankings.
Later, they had a few fights with several other Star Teams, with more victories than failures.
When the one-hour final competition was over, the total kills of Team Blue Bronze surprisingly ranked the second among the nine teams, only below Team Thunder Soul led by Yan Jun.
In the meantime, Li Yao and Ding Lingdang, with 71 kills and 67 kills respectively, ranked the fourth and the sixth among all the Orb Patrollers, which made them the two most distinctive dark horses after the one-month special training.
Therefore, Team Blue Bronze had successfully distinguished itself from the top 10 Star Teams and won the qualification to be one of the five teams setting off to Ultimacy in the first echelon.
Chapter 397: Last Defense Line |
It was midnight, and the sky of the desert were extremely clear. The giant stars dangled down from the blue-black sky like countless glittering diamonds, giving the feeling that one could pluck them out of the sky if they stood up on their tiptoes.
Li Yao and Ding Lingdang walked to the depths of the desert, hand in hand.
Their palms were somewhat wet, indicating the anxiety on their mind.
