Kill!

The icy arrowhead grazed Li Bufan's ribs, tearing his clothes and trailing scraps of fabric and a streak of searing pain! The shadow of death engulfed him in an instant, making his scalp prickle and his heart nearly stop!

Without a moment's hesitation—not even enough time to see where the arrow had come from—his instinct to survive and the powerful reflexes of a warrior at Perfection of Skin Refining drove his body to move before he could think!

"Move!" Li Bufan growled. Blood and vigor erupted through his body as he kicked off the ground, driving the Spirit Monkey Three Leaps to its limit! Like a startled ape, he stopped fleeing in a straight line. He shot toward the denser woods behind him along an erratic path, veering left and right without warning!

Whoosh! Whoosh!

The instant he moved, two more arrows tore through the air. One slammed into the snow where he had just stood. The other skimmed past the afterimage left by his rapid movement and buried itself in a distant tree trunk, its fletching trembling violently!

In the space of a single breath, Li Bufan had covered nearly twenty paces! He was moving far faster than he ever had in practice!

Yet that all-out burst sent his blood and vigor churning, and a tearing ache spread through his leg muscles. He was fleeing for his life, surpassing himself under the pressure of death! But beneath that crushing pressure, Heaven Rewards Diligence began working furiously once more. The insights from hundreds upon hundreds of repetitions of the Spirit Monkey Three Leaps, every subtle understanding of how his blood and vigor flowed and his muscles exerted force with each step, were seized by an invisible hand and fused into one!

Boom!

A more nimble, more explosive strength surged from his legs! His body suddenly felt lighter, and his understanding and control of the footwork rose an entire level! His leaps became smoother and more natural, his use of leverage more skillful, and his speed climbed again. Every step carried greater explosive force, making his figure ever harder to predict as he darted through the forest!

Spirit Monkey Three Leaps advanced to Minor Mastery! (1/2000)

At the same time, the breakthrough in his footwork set his blood and vigor flowing in a way that faintly trembled and strengthened the muscles throughout his body. The effect fell far short of a dedicated Muscle Tempering technique, but it made the blood and vigor he had cultivated to Perfection of Skin Refining a touch more robust. His strength and agility both increased. Blood and vigor surged through him, leaving him trembling slightly—a natural reaction to the breakthrough.

Good! Li Bufan was startled and delighted. He had never expected a breakthrough at the edge of death! But he dared not pause. Using his newly improved footwork, he flickered behind the dense trees in a few strides, found a massive boulder for cover, and crouched behind it. He panted hard, trying to calm his boiling blood and vigor and his racing heart.

Calm down! I have to stay calm! Li Bufan forced his racing mind to analyze what had happened. He swiftly reviewed those three perilous arrows.

The first arrow had come closest and posed the greatest danger, but it had been fired while he was completely unprepared, and he had dodged it by luck. The next two had been fired from farther away while he was already moving. The attacker's aim had clearly been lacking, and both had missed.

His Archery... doesn't seem particularly impressive, Li Bufan thought, his eyes flickering. If he were an expert archer, the best time would have been while I was watching the Tiger Bear. Or he could have taken more time to aim when I stepped out of cover to handle the prey. But I wasn't hit. He only fired when I approached it. Was he waiting for me to lower my guard? Or had he only just arrived?

And the force of those arrows... Li Bufan recalled the sounds they had made cutting through the air and how deep they had sunk into the snow and tree trunk. They didn't seem much stronger than arrows I shoot with a full draw. He's probably using a standard hunting bow, not some more powerful spirit weapon or precious bow.

If his cultivation were far above mine, the instructor said a warrior at the peak of Muscle Tempering would have the strength of several hundred, nearly a thousand pounds. That doesn't mean he can strike with a thousand pounds of force—it means he can lift a stone weighing several hundred, nearly a thousand pounds. If he were in the Tendon Tempering Realm, or even the Bone Tempering Realm, his speed, strength, and reactions would be far beyond mine. I probably couldn't have dodged his first arrow, much less three in a row. Besides, a warrior like that might not even care about an ordinary Tiger Bear. Even if he did, he could simply show himself and take it. Would I dare resist?

His thoughts gradually cleared. Li Bufan judged that whoever had fired from the shadows was likely at a similar level to him—perhaps also at Perfection of Skin Refining, or in the early stages of Muscle Tempering. His Archery was ordinary, roughly on par with the archers among the Lin Manor guards. Most likely, he was another warrior hunting in the mountains. Having stumbled upon two creatures locked in a struggle, he wanted to play the fisherman who profited from their fight—and was even willing to kill for the spoils!

You want to steal what's mine? Li Bufan's gaze turned icy, killing intent spreading through him. The Tiger Bear was vital nourishment for his next step along the martial path, an opportunity he had risked his life to wait for. How could he let anyone else covet it? Since the other man had struck to kill, there was nothing left to discuss!

The struggle for martial advancement and resources meant living on a knife's edge! If you wanted to kill someone and seize his treasure, you had to be ready for him to kill you instead!

The enemy had been hidden while he had been exposed; a prolonged standoff would have put him at a disadvantage. But now he had slipped into the dense woods, and his attacker had lost the chance to kill him at once. The tide had begun to turn!

Li Bufan took a deep breath and adjusted himself to peak condition, straining his hearing and sight as he listened for movement in the distance. He also kneaded his leg muscles a few times to keep them ready. The wind and snow, the rustle of dead branches... he tried to pick out anything unusual hidden among the sounds.

Sure enough, a moment later, an exceedingly faint crunch of cautious footsteps in the snow drifted from somewhere to Li Bufan's right. The other man had evidently seen him kill the Tiger Bear in the woods and was wary of his bow. He was trying to creep closer for a fight at close quarters, or change position to find a new, better-hidden angle to shoot from.

I can't wait any longer! A cold glint flashed in Li Bufan's eyes. The other man had a bow; delaying would only give him another opening. Besides, Li Bufan had no idea how experienced his opponent was in the mountains. He himself was a novice—a graduate student in the modern world only a few months ago, someone who had scarcely seen bloodshed. He had to close the distance and force a melee! His Mighty Ox Fist had reached perfection. He was confident he could crush an opponent of the same level up close; with the Spirit Monkey Three Leaps, he might even hold his own against someone newly advanced to Muscle Tempering!

His mind made up, he suddenly leaned out from behind the boulder and fired an arrow toward the general direction of the sound, swift as lightning! The shot was not meant to hit. It was meant to suppress and probe!

Whoosh!

The arrow vanished into a distant thicket.

The crunch of footsteps stopped abruptly. The other man had clearly been startled and immediately hidden himself.

Now!

Li Bufan sprang out like a hunting leopard. Instead of charging in a straight line, he used trees and rocks to change direction again and again, driving the Spirit Monkey Three Leaps at its newly attained Minor Mastery. He rushed toward his opponent so fast that afterimages trailed behind him!

"You're courting death!" An angry, startled shout came from ahead. The man clearly had not expected Li Bufan to be bold enough to charge him.

Whoosh! Whoosh!

Two more arrows came flying in haste, but against Li Bufan's unpredictable footwork at Minor Mastery, both missed. They did not even slow his charge!

With Li Bufan going all out, he crossed the dozens of meters between them in barely two breaths! He could now see a panicked figure behind a large tree ahead, dressed in a gray leather coat and holding a longbow. The man was fumbling to nock another arrow!

"Get out here!" Li Bufan roared, his voice shaking the woods. With one final leap, he pounced like a tiger upon its prey, clearing the last gap between them. His right hand clenched into a fist as blood and vigor surged through him. The perfected force of the Mighty Ox Fist gathered in an instant, and he drove a punch at the man behind the tree with unstoppable momentum!

Seeing that his arrows had failed and Li Bufan was already upon him, the gray-clad hunter blanched in horror. The wind from the punch nearly suffocated him. He hastily threw aside his longbow and crossed his arms to block, trying to take the blow head-on. His feet stumbled beneath him; Li Bufan's reckless charge and astonishing speed through the woods had plainly caught him off guard.

Thud!

Fist met flesh with a dull impact!

The punch sent the gray-clad man staggering, and he fell to the ground.

Though this was Li Bufan's first time trying to kill a person, he did not panic. After landing the punch, he swiftly drew the hunting knife at his waist and stabbed straight down.

His opponent had fallen, but the instinct to survive drove him backward. Li Bufan's thrust, aimed at his body, went awry, yet the blade still plunged deep into his left leg. Rip! Hot blood sprayed from the gray-clad man's leg.

Hot blood splashed across the snow, its glaring red stark against the icy white. A few warm drops even struck the back of Li Bufan's hand and his cheek. Around the knife handle, he felt a warmth and stickiness unlike anything he had known before—the feel of a living body, pulsing with life, utterly different from cutting up prey.

His stomach lurched. A wave of nausea and physical revulsion surged into his throat, nearly making him retch—he had stabbed a living person! Someone who could think, fear, and struggle, a fellow human being! The morality and respect for law built over more than twenty years in his previous life sounded a shrill alarm, causing the slightest hesitation in his movements.

"Urgh!" The gray-clad man's pained groan and his face, twisted grotesquely by agony, only sharpened the shock.

Yet that discomfort, born of a civilized world, lasted only an instant!

The gray-clad man's eyes flashed with vicious intent. Ignoring the agony in his leg, he clawed for the short knife at the back of his waist while his left hand scooped up a fistful of snow and mud to fling at Li Bufan's face. At that instant, the terror of life and death overwhelmed every trace of weakness!

Don't hesitate! It's him or me! The words exploded through Li Bufan's mind like thunder, crushing that last shred of discomfort!

Li Bufan's pupils contracted sharply as he forced every stray thought away. He had no intention of lunging in to finish the man with his knife. The move toward his waist was too dangerous. At close range, any hidden weapon could prove fatal. His perfected Mighty Ox Fist was powerful, but flesh and blood could hardly withstand a blade.

In a flash, his course was clear!

Without hesitation, he released the handle of the hunting knife still buried in the man's leg. Pulling it free would waste time and might let the man catch his arm! Using the motion to propel himself away, he shifted his footwork. The Spirit Monkey Three Leaps at Minor Mastery came fully to life as he retreated two steps, light and swift as a startled ape, opening a little distance between them!

The whole movement flowed like clouds and running water, without a trace of delay! Even as he retreated, he raised the hunting bow still gripped in his left hand. At some point, his right hand had drawn a feathered arrow from his quiver! Nock, draw, aim! Muscle memory forged through countless tedious repetitions surpassed the speed of thought and took over perfectly!

The bowstring reached a full draw. Under the reflected light of the snow, the cold arrowhead gleamed with deadly chill, fixed on the gray-clad man a few paces away as he grasped the knife at his waist!

The gray-clad man had only just drawn his knife when the savage grin on his face—a mixture of pain, malice, and the belief that his prey was green—froze. He looked up to find the cold arrowhead aimed straight between his brows from impossibly close range! The boy holding the bow had eyes as cold and sharp as stone. Not a trace remained of that fleeting panic and revulsion. His arm held steady as a mountain, and the poised arrow radiated a killing intent so resolute it chilled him to the bone!

"No...!" Disbelief and utter despair finally burst into the gray-clad man's eyes! He had misjudged everything! This was no fledgling who had never seen bloodshed! His terrifyingly calm response and ruthless, decisive change of tactics marked him as a born killer! He wanted to block or roll away, but his mangled leg and the movement he had just made to draw his knife left him no time to evade!

Whoosh!

The bowstring thrummed, low and deadly!

At such close range, there was no chance of missing! The feathered arrow drove precisely between the gray-clad man's brows, leaving only a short length of fletching trembling outside.

Every movement stopped. Horror, despair, resentment, and the plea that had just begun to form on his face all froze. His body jerked once, then went utterly limp and fell heavily onto the snow. His knife slipped from his hand with a clang and rolled aside. Warm blood welled from the wound, staining the snow beneath him red.

Li Bufan remained in his firing stance, panting hard, white breath bursting from his mouth into the cold air. His heart hammered like a drum, and adrenaline still surged through him.

He stared at the body as its warmth rapidly faded. The sight and smell struck him far harder than stabbing the man had. But he forced down his roiling emotions and swept his gaze around the corpse to make sure no threat remained, casting an especially wary glance at the knife on the ground.

Only after a dozen or so breaths did he slowly lower his bow, though his fingers still gripped an arrow and his guard did not ease. He approached slowly, kicked the knife away first, then crouched and felt for a pulse at the man's neck.

There was no doubt. The man was dead.

Only then did Li Bufan truly relax. He dropped onto the snow beside the body, overcome by a profound sense of exhaustion—not just physical fatigue, but the immense shock to his mind. He looked at the blood on his hands, then at the corpse. Emotions too tangled to name churned in his chest: lingering fear, relief, disgust, and a trace of unfamiliarity with the cold, decisive person he had just become.

Was this the law of this world? Kill or be killed?

He took several deep breaths of icy air and forced himself to focus. This was no time for reflection. He quickly got to his feet and began clearing the scene, moving as fast as he could. He pulled the arrow from the corpse's brow and the hunting knife from its leg, wiped the blood off in the snow, and put them away. Searching the gray-clad man, he found some copper coins and food, along with a wooden tag marked "Wu" and "Ershijiu."

Wu Ershijiu! Li Bufan thought. Wu? I think there's a Wu Family in Huaiyuan County. This man's dressed like a guard, but judging by his age and the quality of his equipment, he's probably no new recruit. He must be closer to a household guard, a rank above the new guards at Lin Manor.

Li Bufan examined the gray-clad man's knife and bow. Both were engraved with the character for Wu.

Li Bufan rose swiftly. Wu Ershijiu? A household guard? Thoughts flashed through his mind. If this man was number twenty-nine, that meant there were twenty-eight before him. If he had simply come into the mountains to hunt beasts, as Li Bufan had, that would be one thing. But if this was like the Lin Family's Winter Hunt, matters would be harder to handle.

With that in mind, he glanced at the corpse on the ground. After a moment's hesitation, he laboriously dragged it behind a thicket, along with the bow, knife, and token bearing Wu Family marks, then covered them roughly with snow. At least the body could not be found too easily and bring him more trouble.

Once that was done, he dared not linger. Delay could bring disaster, and the smell of blood would soon draw predators from the forest. He had to return to the site of the fight at once and deal with the more valuable spoils—the tiger and the black bear.