Chapter 78: Compared To Me, You’re Considered An Evil Cultivator?
Before Xuan Qing could make a move, the Old Man of the Farm took advantage of the instant the Heaven-Reaching Dharma Master appeared to divert everyone’s attention and once again concealed his figure.
By the time everyone noticed, someone had already let out a miserable cry.
The one who let out the cry was Liang Zhi Che, but he wasn’t injured. He cried out because Liang Zhi Zhou, who was closest to him and always watching out for his safety, reacted a step ahead of everyone the moment the Old Man of the Farm appeared, reaching out to push Liang Zhi Che away.
And the price paid was one arm.
“Tsk.”
After a dissatisfied click of the tongue, the Old Man of the Farm returned to the darkness.
Xuan Qing was anxious in his heart, yet he was utterly helpless.
Because the moment the Gluttonous Ghost’s Heaven-Reaching Dharma Master appeared, he struck Jiang Ce with a blow of unknown severity, then charged toward this side. Xuan Qing had no choice but to engage him in combat.
Xuan Qing clearly felt that the opponent’s strength was inferior to his own, but duels between Heaven-Reaching Dharma Masters were not as simple and crude as those of Jianghu sorcerers.
Heaven-Reaching Dharma Masters not only had many techniques but also extremely tenacious vitality, and their endurance went without saying. Unless the strength gap was overwhelming, under the endless barrage of various sorceries, even if one side was slightly weaker in raw power, it wasn’t so easy to determine a winner.
Moreover, the opponent’s goal didn’t seem to be defeating Xuan Qing, but only to ensure Xuan Qing couldn’t attend to the situation over there, so he favored entanglement and delaying time.
In other words, the key to this battle lay in the Jianghu sorcerer’s battlefield.
But the situation on the other side was not optimistic. Although the people Xuan Qing brought were the cream of the crop among the younger generation of gatekeepers, they lacked experience. Coupled with the previous round of consumption, they had no way to deal with the Old Man of the Farm.
Gongyang Dan and Lu Xing were already injured, Liang Zhi Zhou had his arm severed and lost his fighting capability, Liang Zhi Che, whose mentality was still immature, couldn’t accept it for the moment, with all sorts of emotions surging in his heart, leaving him frozen in place at a loss.
And Jiang Ce was nowhere to be seen, let alone anything else.
All the pressure fell on Qin Shen Bo, who was also injured.
But as a martial cultivator, he specialized in close-combat techniques that tempered the body. The sorceries he mastered were almost all for amplifying his own strength or destructive offensive skills, like a heavily armored warrior who could tank and fight but was too cumbersome, not to mention scouting enemies.
Yet the Old Man of the Farm was precisely extremely agile, suddenly popping out for a slash, then vanishing before Qin Shen Bo could counter, just like a mosquito buzzing around after the lights were turned off—you knew it was right there, but you couldn’t see or touch it, and if you weren’t careful, you’d get bitten, which was infuriating.
Qin Shen Bo’s strength had nowhere to go, so he could only stay vigilant around him, using protective energy enhanced by sorcery to hard block.
But his protective energy’s defensive power was far inferior to Jiang Ce’s somewhat unorthodox Golden Bell Shield. Although with highly focused attention and full preparation, he managed to barely block the Old Man of the Farm’s sneak attacks targeting different people each time, the price was substantial damage to the body.
After several rounds, Qin Shen Bo’s body was covered in knife marks and bruises. Though not fatal, each time the protective energy’s solidity weakened by a fraction.
“Stop his bleeding!” Qin Shen Bo blocked another slash for Lu Xing and roared at Liang Zhi Che.
But Liang Zhi Che was staring woodenly at Liang Zhi Zhou’s severed arm in a daze, while Liang Zhi Zhou had already passed out, his skin deathly pale, clearly from excessive blood loss.
Hearing Qin Shen Bo’s voice, he finally snapped awake, wiping tears while tearing his clothes to bind Liang Zhi Zhou’s upper arm to stop the bleeding, then carefully wrapping the severed arm, gently shaking Liang Zhi Zhou like a lost child.
“Brother?”
During this time, knife flashes nearly slashed his neck several times, but they were all blocked by Qin Shen Bo.
Qin Shen Bo watched Liang Zhi Che, who seemed like a different person, and sighed inwardly.
“Refined Gold Art!”
He didn’t know how many times he had cast the Refined Gold Art already; only this sorcery could give him the strongest defensive power.
But he was naturally suited to offense as defense, defense wasn’t his style, so how frustrated he felt right now, probably only he knew.
This instance of the Refined Gold Art was even weaker, shattering after blocking just two flashes of knife light.
But the knife flashes remained sharp, each slash so tricky and dangerous.
Qin Shen Bo looked toward Xuan Qing, where the two Heaven-Reaching Dharma Masters were entangled, dao swords humming, fist seals fierce, yet no result emerged. If it were usual, as a martial fanatic, he would definitely want to watch closely.
But not now; the responsibility on his shoulders wouldn’t allow him the slightest distraction.
As defense became increasingly strenuous, he realized that passive defense alone couldn’t achieve anything.
Because he was constantly being worn down, while the opponent’s attack power showed no reduction. Under such erosion, there would eventually come a time when he couldn’t hold.
Thinking of this, Qin Shen Bo made a bold decision.
He deliberately exposed a flaw, luring the knife flash toward himself.
Just as the knife flash was about to slash his neck, he slightly sidestepped, twisting away the fatal strike, letting the dagger split along his collarbone into his body.
But this was exactly the result Qin Shen Bo wanted.
Seeing the strike fail, the Old Man of the Farm tried to retreat, but he was surprised to find he couldn’t pull out his dagger!
The moment the dagger split into his left shoulder, Qin Shen Bo cast stone skin technique, making his muscles as tough as rock, firmly jamming the dagger.
Then, enduring the heart-piercing pain, Qin Shen Bo swung his right fist with full power, the fist wind carrying a tiger’s roar.
“Tiger Roar Fist!”
Protective energy manifested a ferocious tiger ready to devour, far more vivid and wild than the tiger Liang Zhi Zhou had summoned with Confucian poetry beast technique, smashing straight at the Old Man of the Farm’s face.
But the latter reacted swiftly too, abandoning the dagger at the critical moment to dodge the fatal blow, twisting his body in a way beyond comprehension, taking the punch with his left arm, and flying backward.
In abandoning pawn to save king, though the Old Man of the Farm was injured, it wasn’t fatal; at the cost of one arm, he attempted to vanish into the darkness again.
Qin Shen Bo’s strike missed, his eyes nearly splitting in rage. He knew the same trick wouldn’t work twice; he probably had no more chance to kill the opponent.
But in his frustration, the Old Man of the Farm, who had half vanished, reappeared, his face full of terror.
Qin Shen Bo was stunned, then saw that at some point, a pair of hands protruded from the rock wall a distance from the ground, hugging the opponent tightly from behind.
Then, the rock wall beside the Old Man of the Farm’s head began to melt, magma spreading over him, scorching white smoke, and in almost an instant, the smell of roasted meat emanated from his body.
Jiang Ce’s twisted face emerged from the rock wall beside the Old Man of the Farm’s head. Wrapped in magma, he looked like a demon crawling out of hell, startling Qin Shen Bo into instinctively stepping back half a pace, his back chilling.
If Jiang Ce didn’t have half his body buried in the earth, Qin Shen Bo might have been even more horrified to discover that on his back hung a dark purple scalding oil pot!
The Old Man of the Farm’s mouth gaped open, spewing white smoke but emitting no sound, not even a pained scream, because the moment he was locked, he felt an intense burning inside, his vocal cords long scorched, and his entire body was gradually turning to ash from organs outward.
Jiang Ce’s face was pale, clearly badly injured from the previous sneak attack, but he still leaned to the other’s ear, whispering like a devil:
“Compared to me, you bastard count as an evil cultivator too?”
That’s it for now, continuations depending on situation, probably pretty doomed, lying flat lol
