The Battle Begins

Not long after leaving the city gates, several auras trailing behind Ling Li could no longer wait and closed in. Eight people formed an encirclement, cutting off all of Ling Li's escape routes.

The use of force was forbidden within the city—those were the rules. Violators would be blacklisted. The lord of Black Rock City was a Dou Spirit-level powerhouse, and no one wanted to provoke such trouble. Once outside the city, however, that rule naturally ceased to apply, and the city guards could not be bothered with matters beyond the walls.

"Boss, during this time, only this kid came out of the Mitel Auction House, and he matches Steward Wang's description! This kid bought a full three hundred Second Tier Magic Cores and a Profound Tier High-Grade Fighting Skill!" said a man dressed in tight black clothes, skinny as a monkey, standing beside a burly man nearly three meters tall.

As Skinny Monkey looked at Ling Li, a vicious grin hung from his lips, his eyes filled with greed and burning excitement. A single Second Tier Magic Core cost several thousand Gold Coins. Three hundred of them meant several hundred thousand Gold Coins, and with a Profound Tier High-Grade Fighting Skill included, it was nearly a million Gold Coins!

A Profound Tier Fighting Skill, and a high-grade one at that. Merely hearing its name was enough to stir the greed of countless people. After all, in this world, strength was everything!

"Skinny Monkey, I'll remember this great contribution of yours!" Mo Ji slapped Skinny Monkey's shoulder, making him stagger. Amid his greed and excitement, the scar running across half his face wriggled incessantly like a fleshy worm, looking savage and terrifying.

Looks like all those years of tribute hadn't gone to waste. It was still quite a sum altogether, but before a deal worth a million, it was all worth it! And with a Profound Tier High-Grade Fighting Skill, along with the Great Fighting Master cultivation he had only recently attained, just thinking about it was enough to make him excited!

"Kid, you're not weak, but before me, Mo Ji, you're still nothing. I won't waste words on pleasantries. Hand over all your valuables. When you're traveling outside, carrying so many things on you isn't safe," Mo Ji said with a sinister grin.

Among the eight, Mo Ji was the strongest. Ling Li could sense the aura around him but could not see through his cultivation. Clearly, Mo Ji was a Great Fighting Master, though his aura was not particularly stable. He had likely only recently advanced to the Great Fighting Master realm.

Of the other seven, only the youth called Skinny Monkey was somewhat weaker, possessing only Dou Zhe cultivation. The remaining six were all three- to five-star Fighting Masters.

Ling Li did not answer. He stared fixedly at Mo Ji, then flipped his hand, and Dark Night appeared in his grasp. The blade tilted slightly, reflecting the sunlight with incomparable sharpness.

The instant Ling Li fixed his gaze on him, Mo Ji actually felt his scalp tingle. Only after taking a deep breath did he force himself to speak. "Is that fire poker of yours supposed to be a weapon? Kid, accept your fate, and I'll give you a painless death. Resisting is not a good choice!"

"Men, don't capsize in a gutter. Get him!"

At Mo Ji's command, aside from Skinny Monkey and a youth holding a longbow, the other six drew their weapons and slowly closed in on Ling Li.

"How terrifying. Well-trained and fully prepared. Looks like this isn't your first time doing something like this," Ling Li murmured softly, a strange smile tugging at his lips.

"I wonder what kind of flowers your blood will bloom into?"

Ling Li narrowed his eyes, leaned forward, and rapidly gathered strength beneath his feet, plowing a shallow furrow into the ground. The next instant, his body shot forward like a cannonball, Dark Night flying straight for Mo Ji's throat.

Mo Ji and the others were startled to see Ling Li take the initiative to attack. The man carrying an enormous steel shield hurried toward Mo Ji and stepped in front of him.

"Venom!"

Seeing this, the viscous Dou Qi within Ling Li's body began to flow rapidly. Like a long serpent, it quickly coiled around Dark Night, and black Venom that seemed ready to drip formed along the cold gleam of the blade.

Before the man's shocked eyes, Ling Li used the force of his charge to twist slightly and slash diagonally through the giant shield. The cut was incomparably smooth, as sharp as a blade itself.

A cold flash swept past, and a head fell to the ground.

Only when blood burst from the man's neck like a fountain did everyone realize that the thing resembling a fire poker was actually an incomparably sharp blade!

At the very instant Ling Li killed the shield-bearing man, three piercing whistles sliced into his ears. Three arrows glowing green shot from a distant tree in a triangular formation, targeting his head, heart, and Dantian.

"Clang!"

"They even poisoned the arrowheads with Dou Qi. How terrifying." Ling Li casually knocked down the two lower arrows, then held his blade before his eyes to block the third.

"It would be troublesome if you hit me." Ling Li exerted slight force with his arm and flicked the arrow off the blade.

As soon as he finished speaking, Ling Li suddenly turned and charged toward the tree where the archer stood. The black mist radiating from Dark Night trailed through the air like a ribbon.

The young archer had not expected Ling Li to be so fast. Just as he was about to jump down from the branch, he felt the ground beneath him tremble. Black mist wrapped around the trunk and climbed upward, while the thick tree was effortlessly cut into several sections and slowly toppled over.

At that moment, a low voice sounded beside his ear. "Have you ever seen a flower bloom from blood?"

The next moment, the young archer's vision began to spin. The last sight that entered his eyes was a headless corpse spraying blood.

"Bastard!" Mo Ji roared, hurling the double-bladed axe in his hand toward Ling Li. It spun through the air, wreathed in dense, solid earth-yellow Dou Qi.

Before they had even properly fought, two men had already died. What kind of mess was this?

Ling Li did not dare be careless and leaped aside, borrowing the force beneath his feet to evade.

Releasing Dou Qi externally and solidifying Dou Qi were both abilities only Great Fighting Masters possessed. Ling Li had never truly witnessed them before, but judging from that heavy, powerful axe strike just now, their effects were certainly formidable.

"Oh, don't be in such a rush. Let me deal with the irrelevant people first." Without Mo Ji in his way, Ling Li once more rushed toward Mo Ji's remaining subordinates.

Ling Li usually appeared mild and amiable, but in battle, the bloody air and killing intent of a butcher blossomed from him. Combined with the strength he had just displayed, the others all felt some degree of fear when facing him. After exchanging a glance with Ling Li, Skinny Monkey even began to run.

And in battle, even the slightest mistake was fatal.

With his strange speed and the incomparably sharp Dark Night, these Fighting Master-level men were no match for Ling Li at all. Though Mo Ji, with the strength of a Great Fighting Master, posed some threat to Ling Li, he had no time to watch over everyone.

Relying on his speed advantage, Ling Li did not expend much effort before slaughtering the other seven, leaving only Mo Ji alive.

As though nothing had happened, Ling Li grabbed the collar of headless Skinny Monkey and wiped the blood from Dark Night on his clothes. The blood had not been absorbed by Dark Night.

Ling Li pulled his hands free from the collar, allowing the upper half of his black robe to hang naturally, secured around his waist by his belt. This revealed his somewhat lean yet muscular upper body. Ling Li had already grown accustomed to the smell of blood, but the sticky sensation of blood-soaked clothes clinging to his body was deeply unpleasant.

Ling Li raised Dark Night and pointed it at Mo Ji. "Then, the battle begins!"