Volume 3 – The Place Where My Heart Feels At Peace, Chapter 56: Hunting Expedition
Song Zining looked up straight at the origin lamp hanging beneath the roof of the tent. The glaring light seemed to have no effect on his eyes at all. A tiny, stubborn figure seemed to appear within its bright yellow halo. It was Qianye.
After leaving the Yellow Spring Training Cramp, Song Zining never saw Qianye again. He didn’t think that the next time he heard of Lin Qianye would be from Red Scorpion’s casualty report!
Back then Song Zining hadn’t returned to his family for long, and he was also embroiled in the treacherous dispute of successors at that moment. He was too busy looking out for himself at that moment and only had the spare energy to inquire about the past more than half a year later. However, he discovered that the iron curtains behind the scenes were as thick as an eternal night that would never see the light of dawn.
However, it was during this time Song Zining saw the person beside Qiqi. Even though his height and body shape was already completely different, even if his countenance and temperament were only somewhat similar, he felt as if Qianye was standing right in front of him.
Still, something wasn’t quite right.
The ancient secret art Song Zining practiced could peer right into the essence of all things. The portrait he drew were calculations to deduce Qianye’s true appearance after his makeup was removed, and the appearance after he grew up. However, he had obtained a specious conclusion instead. Of all the connection between these two person, half of it conclusively proved that they were the same person, but the other half also conclusively proved that they were not the same person.
Last night, Song Zining’s personal subordinate had delivered him that person’s background data. Qian Xiaoye, also known as Qianye was born in South Jiang Hundred Market Province. His parents were commoners who worked as peddlers, and they had arrived at the Evernight Continent twelve years ago. Both of them were killed during an assault on a human settlement, and Qianye was adopted by a military officer and a hunter in succession. Later on, he joined the hunter’s guild and was recruited by the Yin Family during a mission announcement.
All of these data seemed reasonable, fair, and perfectly clean. However, in Song Zining’s eyes it was so reasonable that it was abnormal.
The sun was almost up. In the upper continents, the four seasons rotated in succession with clearly defined moments of day and night. A hint of sunrise was already showing from a peak at the horizon. Song Zining, who hadn’t slept for the entire night, walked out of his tent and stretched his body. He could see that Ye Mulan was sleeping with her clothes on in the tent next door. Even her hair was a little disheveled. It was obvious that she had tired herself quite badly last night.
Song Zining wore a mysterious smile on his face when she saw her. However, there was no smile in his eyes at all.
At a different direction, beastial roars and a man’s roar that was even louder than a beast’s occasionally resounded from the forest.
Right now Wei Potian was roaring as loudly as dry thunder as he battled against a Steel Armored Brown Bear. This was a big fellow of at least thousands kilograms of weight. Not even a rank five Fighter could take a single slap from this beast head on. Right now Wei Potian’s body was enveloped in yellow light as he wielded Thousand Mountains and clashed in close quarters against this rank seven brown bear.
Bits of dazzling light would flash from his fist every time he punched. His punches were as heavy as mountains, beating down on the thick skinned brown bear so hard that it roared madly in response. Wei Potian himself felt blood rushing to his head as he suddenly let out a roar and pounced towards the bear. He gripped the bear’s head with a pair of steely arms and tightened harder and harder.
The brown bear struggled at its deathbed, slapping and scratching at Wei Potian’s body with all his might. Thousand Mountains’ light flickered under the attack, and the Wei Family’s refined battle armor were cut apart layer after layer as well. In the end, many deep and shallow bloody wounds were left on Wei Potian’s body!
There were rank seven experts among the Wei Family bodyguards, but they had no choice but to stand at the perimeter and watch the battle. They felt as anxious as if they were on fire, but they didn’t dare to aid Wei Potian recklessly. Previously, they had already suffered a tongue lashing for trying to interfere, and now the one man and one beast’s battle had reached a critical point. They absolute didn’t dare to distract Wei Potian from his battle. This was the Wei Family son’s heroic battle.
Wei Potian let out let out an earthshaking roar, and his hands tightened twice around the brown bear’s neck. Its neck broke under his arms, and finally the ferocious beast slowly collapsed to the ground.
Wei Potian relinquished his grip and felt impossibly satisfied on the inside. He let out a few dumb laughs and was just about to take a pose to display the masculine might of an empire middle ranking officer when he accidentally pulled his wounds and felt pain shooting all over his body! He couldn’t help but let out a piteous cry!
The bodyguards hurriedly rushed forwards and lay Wei Potian on the ground. The medics gave him treatment, and the water feeders fed him water. It was a busy mess. When Thousand Mountains faded the son of Wei began screaming like he had walked into a slaughterhouse. The wounds weren’t severe, but they were sufficiently painful that he suffered terribly even though his skin was as thick as the brown bear’s.
After this battle, Wei Potian would have to rest for at least a day or two. The Wei Family had just surfed their way into third place, and after this battle their ranking would definitely fall off by a lot. However, this wasn’t something that he needed to pay attention to at the moment.
By now, Qiqi had also entered the rank six zone already. No matter how negligent she was with her duties, she was still a bit faster than Song Zining. Her teammates complemented each other well, and her supplies were ample. It was a composition that was good at displaying strength during the late stages. Therefore, there were still plenty of people who thought well of Qiqi’s chances behind the scenes.
And so, a day passed just like that.
Speaking of which, Zhao Junhong’s feelings was unexpectedly the worst out of all hunting teams despite leading way ahead in points.
By now A’Jiang was already unconscious inside the camp. After he struggled his way back into the camp, he had collapsed instantly the second he relaxed.
While there were people who were well versed in battlefield first aid among Zhao Junhong’s bodyguards, they didn’t have any good ways to deal with Qianye’s special composite toxin. The general use antidote had temporarily preserved A’Jiang’s life, but it wasn’t possible to complete clean his body of toxin and restore his strength in a day or two. They were lacking the professional tools necessary for the treatment on the battlefield too.
Zhao Junhong frowned and asked after listening to the report, “So he cannot participate in the hunting later?”
“Yes, he must be sent back immediately. If he cannot be treated properly in three days, his life will be in danger.”
Zhao Junhong’s face grew darker and darker. He nodded and said, “Take him back to the base and return immediately. Arrange someone in the base to deliver him to Duke Wei’s side house. He will be cured once he’s sent there.”
His bodyguard responded in acknowledgement and went to arrange the matter.
Zhao Junhong exhaled deeply, but his feelings were exceptionally horrid. With A’Jiang gone, not only this meant that his hunting team would permanently lose a manpower in his team, the bodyguard responsible for delivering A’Jiang back to the base would take a minimum of two days to return. The efficiency of his hunting would fall off again during this two days.
Zhao Junhong wasn’t worried about the other aristocratic families. In his eyes, Song Zining and Yin Qiqi were the only ones worth paying attention too. He had not paid heed to either Nangong Wanyun or Kong Yanian.
The reason for this was because he couldn’t see through Song Zining at all, and the strength of the Song household bodyguards sent to aid him could be said to be overqualified for someone of Song Zining’s ranking within his family. Meanwhile, Yin Qiqi’s individual martial strength had improved at a tremendous rate for the past two years, and since she was participating in the successor exam, her hunting team was all made up of direct line of descent. She was not like he or Song Zining. While they possessed personal subordinates among the family bodyguards they brought with them, not all of them were on their side. This little bit of difference might cause a problem during the final stage where it was a free-for-all.
However, right now the situation was only slightly worrisome since it would probably be difficult to gain too big of a point lead with their current circumstances. Right now it was way too early to say that someone might threaten the Zhao household’s position.
Although it was deep in the night, gunshots and the sounds of explosions still occasionally rang within Profound Heaven Mountain Range. Plenty of people—especially the landowning household members operating at the outskirts—were hurrying to harvest as many prey as they could. There was a finite number of prey beneath rank five, and a huge majority of them were expected be harvested fully in just a few days time. When that happened, they would have to risk entering the high rank zone where no one could say for sure what they might encounter. Therefore, the results of the first few days became exceptionally important.
Right now Qianye was lying on top of a large tree branch and chewing at a leaf. He was looking up at the giant, round moon that had taken up a small part of the night sky. It was said that there was a world on the moon too, but it was unknown who exactly had actually been there before.
Right now, Qianye’s heart was still burning with unrelenting flames. It had never subsided, and he couldn’t even sleep in peace until this flame had been extinguished. He was thinking about ways to deal with Zhao Junhong, outlining many methods before refuting them all. Even if Zhao Junhong had temporarily lost two of its subordinates, he still possessed top class strength. He wasn’t someone whom he could resist alone.
Qianye closed his eyes and worked hard to feel the night wind of the Qin Continent that was completely different from Evernight Continent’s. It was slightly warm and filled with the clear and vast smell or grass and trees. Occasionally, the stench of wild beasts were mingled in the air, a reminder to all people that this lively world wasn’t as harmless as it seemed.
He slowly recalled his findings bit by bit after tracking and observing Zhao Junhong for more than half a day. Suddenly, a detail that he nearly missed appeared to him and cut across the proverbial night sky like lightning!
Qianye immediately jumped to his feet and began travelling swiftly under the night sky, observing the surrounding terrain. His movements were as quick as a ghost, and a single leap took him a dozen or so meters away in an instant. He passed through the forest like a ghost. This way, Qianye used only a single night’s time to tread through all the areas that other people might take three or four days to cover on foot.
In the early morning, Zhao Junhong woke up from his dreams, washed himself, and ate breakfast before starting yet a new day of hunting.
Qianye was sitting amidst a pile of rubble at the mountain peak, overlooking the entire valley from above. Almost a thousand meters away, Zhao Junhong’s group was slowly walking towards his direction. His bodyguards were spread out far apart with ten meters of distance between each other. They were walking forwards along the valley. This place was the nest of a group of earth dragons, and they were worth a lot of points.
Qianye withdrew all of his aura and had even clad himself in camouflage. He looked no different from the other rocks in the pile of rubble at all if someone were to look over from afar.
Suddenly, a roar that was like a thunderclap shattered the silence of the valley, followed by rumblings on the ground. A rank seven earth dragon rushed out of its nest and pounced straight at Zhao Junhong while leading several rank five and six earth dragons behind him. This type of earth dragon was shaped like lizards, but was several hundred times bigger than the original. Its body was over a dozen or so meters long. Its movements were as swift as the wind, and its strength was formidable. The scale covering its body was also incredibly tough.
Zhao Junhong calmly raised his guns and half crouched on the ground. It was only when the earth dragon had entered a hundred meters of radius that the muzzle abruptly flashed with silver light!
The earth dragon suddenly let out a pained cry. Its upper jaw had almost been completely blown away by a single shot! The intense pain triggered its wild impulse as it continued to charge madly towards Zhao Junhong. However, the silver gun shot twice more in a row, opening a hole each at its forehead and its back!
Qianye calculated Zhao Junhong’s shooting range, speed and origin power strength inwardly. As expected, that terrifyingly powerful silver gun was a fully automatic origin gun.
By now, the bodyguards were also shooting at the earth dragons. The smaller earth dragons were shot repeatedly. Two rank five earth dragons had collapsed on the spot, but the rank six or seven earth dragons had incredible vitality. They turned tail and ran without ever slowing down at all.
Zhao Junhong’s face was a little pale after he had opened fire three times in a row. In just a moment of inhalation, that rank seven earth dragon on the verge of death had already escaped more than a hundred meters away. That was beyond Zhao Junhong’s absolute shooting range already, and so he broke after the beast. With his swift movements, it wouldn’t take too long before he caught up with it.
However, Zhao Junhong had just taken his first steps when he suddenly heard a rumble from afar that sounded like a thunder in summer! It was the timber of Eagleshot!
In Zhao Junhong’s vision, a dark red light traveled with impossible speed from almost a thousand meters away to hit the sides of the escaping earth dragon, destroying the remaining half of its head!