You decided to break through the encirclement, but the world did not revolve around you. Whether you could succeed still depended on how fiercely the enemy blocked your path!
Unfortunately, the one blocking you was a Demonized Captain: its strength and physique rivaled those of a Martial Master enhanced by Force Qi. Its movements alone were somewhat clumsy, yet its combat power remained at the Martial Master level.
Figures crowded all around. Looking beyond the village, two or three hundred Demonized Soldiers stood expressionlessly in a defensive line. If you tried to break out, they would surely stop and attack you within moments, and then the Demonized Captain that had been watching you like a hawk would catch up from behind...
Caught between two attacks, death was all but certain!
When you looked toward the other battlefields, nearly every martial artist faced demonized enemies stronger than themselves. The chance of others breaking free, causing chaos, and creating favorable conditions for you was close to zero.
Then all that remained was a fight to the death.
You let out a long roar and drew the Zhanming Saber that had accompanied you for more than thirty years. Over the past thirty years, this saber had actually been reforged several times. A faint blue sheen spread across its edge—it was the color of your Force Qi, dyed into the blade through all these years, turning the saber into your color.
You were fifty-seven this year, with Martial Cultivation at the peak of First-Rate. This was precisely the age to charge ahead. Deep-blue Force Qi surged like roaring tides. In only a few exchanges, you used the Combat Techniques paired with the Flowing River Technique to wield force with finesse, and with four ounces deflecting a thousand pounds, you forcibly drove the Demonized Captain back several steps.
But the first burst of vigor was followed by decline, and the third by exhaustion. After such an excessive output of Force Qi, your meridians and flesh could no longer bear the strain. After barely a dozen exchanges, the Demonized Captain jabbed with its war spear. The force traveled through your blade into your arm, then straight into your body. Your organs were injured, and a mouthful of blood surged into your throat.
Had those First-Rate martial artists whose organs had not been strengthened taken the field, their insides would likely have already shattered into a lump of rotten meat. They would have fallen dead, without even a trace of breath left.
Yet you still had the strength to fight. Deep-blue Force Qi, like seawater, gently wrapped around your internal organs. It was like a suit of visceral armor worn inside your body, protecting them while slowly repairing them.
Slash after slash, screams joined into one unbroken chorus around you. There were more than twelve hundred people in this village, but the overwhelming majority were ordinary people. Only a little over a hundred had reached the Second-Rate level or above. The demon army only needed to dispatch two or three hundred soldiers to suppress them completely!
And aside from those outside the village forming the encirclement, nearly three hundred Demonized Soldiers were not standing idle. They had begun slaughtering the thousand or so civilians.
Once the civilians had been washed clean in blood, those three hundred Demonized Soldiers would join the slaughter of the martial artists. It would be the deepest abyss within an already desperate situation!
At the Grandmaster battlefield not far away, Xu Yinkong had already had an arm torn off and was being tasted in the Blood Demon's mouth. It toyed with him like a cat playing with a mouse, intending to play its prey to death bit by bit.
On the razor's edge between life and death, you felt something circulating within your body. At that moment, you were dazed, mechanically blocking the Demonized Captain's attacks, coughing blood, and repeating the cycle.
Countless blood vessels burst, and everything before your eyes turned crimson. Your mind was muddled beyond measure, yet streams of warmth arose in your abdomen and limbs!
Boom! A barrier shattered. You took a step back and dodged the Demonized Captain's strike, then discovered in astonishment that the Force Qi within your body had begun circulating through a Heavenly Cycle on its own, endlessly generating a tiny yet unceasing stream!
You broke through in battle and became a Martial Master!
You were overjoyed, but your suddenly increased strength did not rob you of reason. You glanced at the demons, then turned and ran.
And not just any run. You used Force Qi to forcibly stabilize your injuries, while also using it to stimulate your life potential, "igniting" yourself and entering a state of eruption.
"Stimulating the body to secrete adrenaline?"
Yun Shou felt that this should be the method.
Throughout the process of martial training, a martial artist's control over their body gradually improved—especially for someone like him, whose total time spent practicing martial arts exceeded a hundred years.
Long spears and arrows struck your body. The flame of your life flickered like the last ember of a dying candle. When you ignored all hidden injuries and forcibly tore through a defensive line to break out, you heard Xu Yinkong scream behind you.
But the scream abruptly stopped. You did not dare turn back and waste time. You ran wildly, fleeing far away.
In the central region of Fenglan Village, the Blood Demon withdrew its sharp claw, and Xu Yinkong's headless corpse fell to the ground. It looked with interest in the direction of your escape, yet did not care.
Only an old bug had slipped away, a tiny ant it could crush flat with a casual pinch. It was perfect—you could go announce their arrival and spread panic into the wandering dogs' nest of the old humans!
Three days later, you collapsed to the ground with only one breath left. Martial artists from Purple Star Village found you and brought you back. It took half a month of care before you escaped danger, and a full month before you awoke.
The village physician could not help praising you. "Old sir, what a sturdy body you have. You actually survived this."
After waking, you told them what had happened. Purple Star Village's leader sighed and said that they were now preparing to relocate deeper into the forest in stages.
Simply put, once the villages deepest in the forest had established new settlements and their populations gradually moved over, those in the second-deepest areas would slowly relocate to the villages left behind in the deepest regions.
As for those unfortunate villages near the outskirts, they had to shoulder the most basic responsibility: watching for and resisting the demon army.
In Year 7 of the Ancient Dynasty, you finally regained the ability to move normally. Though your Martial Cultivation had not been crippled, the damage to your vitality caused by that breakout and pursuit half a year ago was countless times worse than when you fell into the water at twelve!
Therefore, you dared to say that you were absolutely the weakest Martial Master in the world!
Yun Shou said, "Damn, why do you sound a little proud?"
Speaking of which, Purple Star Village's resident Grandmaster was an old acquaintance of yours. Decades ago, when you were sixteen, you participated in that Young Talents Grand Competition. At the time, Meteor Sect's representative—a Martial Master—had been responsible for maintaining order during the competition.
When you were twenty-three, you heard that Martial Master had become a Grandmaster. You never expected that now, when you were nearly sixty, you would meet again in this village.
This Grandmaster's surname was Li and his given name Tianbing. Li Tianbing, an eighty-six-year-old Grandmaster. For a Grandmaster with a lifespan of one hundred and fifty years, this age could not yet be considered old.
You reminisced with Li Tianbing. After the Alien Demons descended, everyone had few acquaintances left. Being able to meet an old acquaintance with whom you had crossed paths decades ago was a kind of fortune for both you and him.
A trace of nostalgia for the past surfaced in him. Despair -1. You had come to know a Grandmaster-level old acquaintance, and could also learn more about the Demon Slaying Alliance.
In Year 9 of the Ancient Dynasty, on your sixtieth birthday, you had already moved twice deeper into the Demon Extermination Forest. Yet the demon army still drew ever closer, and two more villages had been trampled into ruin over these years.
In Year 10 of the Ancient Dynasty, you, several other martial artists, and some young martial artists with considerable Talent Aptitude followed Li Tianbing to the Demon Slaying Alliance's "headquarters."
They said a major matter was to be discussed, one requiring the joint participation of the Grandmasters of every village, and even high-level combatants such as Martial Masters.
Before you continue