After unleashing that move, Captain Qian's face had turned deathly pale, but a strange exhilaration welled up in his chest. Yet before he could celebrate, the two enemy cultivators surged up in grief and fury, each unleashing a desperate killing move at Lei Dong's Zhang-surnamed teammate. He was the team's only other Foundation Establishment Late Stage Cultivator besides Captain Qian, at the ninth layer of Foundation Establishment. Caught off guard, he was struck by the enemy captain's massive seal and crushed, shield and all, into a pulp.
Captain Qian's expression turned ghastly. Victory had been within reach, yet a moment's carelessness had cost them a teammate—a cultivator at the ninth layer of Foundation Establishment, no less. After joining forces to kill one of their foes, the two enemy cultivators exchanged a low cry. "We're going all out. Move!"
By then, there was no room to turn things around. A desperate escape might not work, but staying here meant certain death. Knowing they were in grave danger, the two didn't flee in any direction through the air. Instead, they burst into streaks of light and plunged straight underwater. Perhaps they had planned it all along: as they fought and fled, they had drawn to within a dozen zhang of the sea's surface. Once they accelerated with all their might, they vanished beneath the waves in the blink of an eye. Even Lei Dong couldn't catch them unless he was willing to enter the water himself. Everyone knew that the larger the waters, the more likely they were to conceal unpredictable dangers and enormous creatures. Those who went out to sea rarely ventured underwater, for there were simply too many unknown dangers.
Captain Qian was seething with rage over Old Zhang's death. Just as he was about to chase after them, Lei