These bonded beasts included the "Storm Swallow," which sped through the sky and whipped up storm after storm—a wind-element avian-type bonded beast.
There was also the "Thunder Rat," small in body, astonishingly swift, and exceptionally adept at hiding—a lightning-element beast-type bonded beast.
There was even the "Mystic Ice Bug," which lay in a beastmaster's palm and brought freezing cold—a ice-water-element insect-type bonded beast!
The last was the "Ironclad Giant Shrimp," an ironclad-element bonded beast from the rivers and seas! Its body was clad in steel armor, practically impervious to blades and spears.
These seven bonded beasts came in every breed and attribute. Before them, Little Yellow Chick looked skinny and tiny, plainly something meant to be trampled upon!
At this moment, Li Tianming was surrounded on all sides, with fourteen opponents staring at him like wolves and tigers.
He wondered why they were still gazing so fervently at his chest when he had already used up the divine source in refinement.
"I understand." The moment he looked down, he knew. So they had mistaken the spirit core for a divine source.
Now this was interesting.
"Li Tianming, let me inform you: even if you have Princess Qing's jade pendant, this divine source belongs to Thunder Lord Manor. Therefore, Thunder Lord Manor has decided to let us juniors compete with you fairly. You have no objections, right?" Liu Qianyang watched him with blazing eyes.
"Of course I have no objections. The seven of you can come at me together." Li Tianming had returned today to fight, for dignity, and to take his mother away openly and honorably.
A siege? He feared nothing!
The geniuses of Thunder Lord Manor felt insulted. They were geniuses of Flame Capital's Thunder Lord Manor; toward someone of Li Tianming's background, they had nothing but contempt in their eyes.
"Pretty arrogant."
"Forget it. He had always been like this—talking big first, then slinking away with his tail between his legs."
"You said it yourself. We were just worrying that it would be hard to settle the order for a gauntlet battle. From now on, whoever gets the divine source wins." Zhang Zixuan announced loudly.
He did not want a gauntlet battle anyway, because he was no match for Li Tianming. He wanted to fish in troubled waters.
"What right do you have to speak? Has your scorpion's eye been healed?" Li Tianming mocked, making him flush red with embarrassment.
"Stop wasting words on him. Attack." Liu Qianyang had already entered a combat stance. He was the strongest of the seven, and he was determined to claim this divine source!
"Liu Qianyang, I only want to ask you this: does our agreement from a month ago still stand? If you lose to me, hand over the Yanhuang Order!" As Liu Qianyang and the Lightning Leopard charged toward him, Li Tianming asked with burning eyes.
"Of course. A man's word, once spoken, cannot be chased down by four horses. If you lose to me, hand over the divine source without dragging it out!" Liu Qianyang declared.
This was where he held an advantage over the other six. He possessed the Yanhuang Order Li Tianming desperately wanted, so Li Tianming would definitely target him specifically.
As long as Li Tianming foolishly came at him, the divine source would be his!
The moment he moved, the other six naturally rushed forward in a scramble.
They were all competitors. As the one taking the lead, Liu Qianyang might very well be intercepted by the others.
Li Tianming knew that the seven of them were not of one mind. That made them easy to deal with.
"First, I can't disturb Mother's afternoon nap."
"Then, I need to let more people see who exactly won the Yanhuang Academy Selection!"
"Lastly, I need Li Yanfeng to experience what it feels like when the Thunder Lord Manor geniuses he thinks so highly of are crushed beneath my feet!"
His goal had never changed: obtain the Yanhuang Order, swagger out of Lihuo City, and make Li Yanfeng personally see them off.
Three years had passed. Li Tianming no longer wanted to be a dog without a home.
Having set such a goal, the instant the seven of them surrounded and attacked him, Li Tianming unleashed Ghost Shadow Step and slipped directly out of the crowd.
He then leaped onto the rooftops and charged toward Windless Inn. This place was too far from Li Yanfeng, so Li Tianming wanted to fight atop Windless Inn, where they could see everything clearly.
"He wants to escape!"
"Chase him!"
One man and one chick were madly pursued by a combined total of seven beastmasters and seven types of bonded beasts.
Those bonded beasts were tremendously destructive. Take the Lightning Leopard, for instance—every rooftop struck by its claws shattered apart, and one building was even smashed into collapse.
Windless Inn was the tallest place nearby. Li Tianming ran from the first floor to the third, passed over Li Yanfeng and the others, and charged toward Windless Inn's roof!
"What is he trying to do?" The elders of Thunder Lord Manor were all baffled.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
All seven geniuses gave chase onto the roof. It was fairly spacious, like an arena battlefield. From here, the mountains looked small at a glance, and half of Lihuo City lay spread out beneath their eyes!
Naturally, the commotion atop Windless Inn was enough to draw even more people closer. They could even clearly see that it was Li Tianming fighting seven Thunder Lord Manor geniuses alone!
"This will do." Li Tianming clenched his left fist, and the power in his dark left arm surged beneath its wrappings.
In his right hand, he gripped the Bloodfire Dagger. Its edge was sharp and keen, with blood-colored flames faintly burning across it, vicious and cold-blooded.
His eyes burned with fury as he watched the seven opponents charge up one after another.
During the pursuit, they had restrained and even attacked one another. Liu Qianyang in particular had been blocked by three or four people.
As the strongest, he naturally drew the most attention. The other six could even defeat him first—it was permitted by the rules!
"In this game, the seven of them are all hunters, while I alone am the prey!"
"But is that really so?"
The Eternal Purgatory Beast Origin at the Seventh Layer of Beast Pulse Realm was absolutely more vast and powerful than ordinary Beast Essence at the Ninth Layer of Beast Pulse Realm.
Li Tianming felt this deeply already. His current strength had come infinitely close to his combat power from three years ago!
"Kill."
After evading several attacks, Li Tianming's gaze turned cold as he locked onto Zhang Zixuan first.
This youth who wanted to slice him into a thousand pieces was not taking the initiative to attack. He wanted to pick up the spoils.
Heh.
When his eyes met Li Tianming's, he must have felt fear.
Li Tianming stomped on the rooftop, sending countless roof tiles flying into the air.
Like a phantom, he instantly charged at Zhang Zixuan. With strength now comparable to the Ninth Layer of Beast Pulse Realm, dealing with Zhang Zixuan, who was only slightly stronger than Li Zifeng, held no suspense at all!
Whoosh!
"Zhang Zixuan, you're the first!" Li Tianming's fist howled forward. Zhang Zixuan was horrified, sweat pouring down his face!
He wanted to dodge and resist, but Li Tianming was already so fast that it filled him with despair. That single punch landed squarely on his face.
With a crack, his nasal bridge snapped. Li Tianming punched his nose crooked, and blood sprayed wildly!
The first scream rang out from the rooftop of Windless Inn.
The elders on the third floor first saw Zhang Zixuan plummet down with blood gushing from his nose. Then, a violent Little Yellow Chick shot forward like a streak of flame and pierced straight through the Blue-Tailed Venom Scorpion's armor.
Then Little Yellow Chick slapped the Blue-Tailed Venom Scorpion with one wing, sending the enormous creature flying away. It crashed to the ground and brought down several houses in succession.
"Xuan'er!" Zhang Zixuan's parents' expressions changed at once.
Zhang Chong caught his son directly. Seeing that his own son had practically been disfigured, Zhang Chong's fury blazed to the heavens.
He harbored ten thousand murderous intentions, but he did not dare to act.
Thunder Lord Manor had specifically reminded them that the juniors could handle the contest over the divine source themselves. If the elders intervened, it would be far too disrespectful toward Princess Qing.
"Hey, if your family is having a second child, don't give them such tacky names. Zixuan, Zihan, Ziqi—those names are everywhere. Why not call them Zhang Chunxia or Li Goudan instead?"
Li Tianming's voice drifted down from above, nearly making Zhang Chong cough up blood.
He had painstakingly racked his brains to come up with those elegant names!
That single attack directly set the tone for this battle. At this moment, Li Tianming had already left the people of half of Lihuo City unable to make sense of what they were seeing.
"Li Tianming killed a Thunder Lord Manor genius with one punch?" They could not clearly see whether he had actually been killed, but they had seen blood.
Such a sight made all of them widen their eyes, finding it utterly inconceivable.
Many people did not believe their eyes at all. They rubbed them again and again, only to find the scene unchanged.
However, this was only the beginning!
Now was the best chance to strike, because the remaining six had still not unified. Several were still blocking Liu Qianyang, preventing him from approaching Li Tianming.
Their infighting made Li Tianming laugh coldly.
Only one person had broken through the interception and rushed before Li Tianming. He probably had not even seen clearly that Zhang Zixuan had been smashed apart by Li Tianming's punch.
"Storm Swallow?" Li Tianming spotted this person's bonded beast.
Before the person had even arrived, a wild storm had already swept over. The gale carried countless shards of roof tiles like blades; once they struck a body, it would be no different from being sliced into a thousand pieces.
The rooftop of Windless Inn seemed about to be torn away entirely.
P.S. There would be five chapters in total today. Two chapters now, two at 18:00, and one at 20:00.
[Breaking News] At 20:00 tonight, Chapter 31 would come with a "question." The answer could be found within the first thirty chapters. The first four people to correctly answer it in the comments section (Jianghu) would each receive a 500-yuan reward. I would announce the winners in the comments section.
To ensure fairness, Madman could promise here: if there was any rigging, may heaven strike me with thunder and lightning.
Lastly, everybody, get hyped~
Note: There would be two chapters at 18:00~
Before you continue