Encountering Bandits

Lin Feng had been chatting and laughing with Delia when, in that instant, he felt every hair on his body stand on end. His heart leaped into his throat.

"Danger!"

Lin Feng shouted and lunged toward Delia.

Thwack!

The arrow, moving at extreme speed like a bolt of lightning, shot into Lin Feng's left arm from behind. It had missed his heart by less than five centimeters.

Having just escaped death by a hair's breadth, Lin Feng endured the excruciating pain in his left arm and pulled Delia down into the grass. He warily looked behind them.

"A wind-element magic archer. Based on the two magical effects, Extreme Speed and Precision, added to that single arrow, this wind-element magic archer has reached at least the level of a fifth-rank mage." Doehring Cowart's voice sounded in Lin Feng's mind.

Hearing Doehring Cowart's warning, Lin Feng cursed himself inwardly. With Delia by his side, he had actually forgotten that, according to the original novel, there were many bandits near the entrance to the Magical Beast Mountain Range. Even Lin Feng in the original story had nearly been pierced by a sneak-attack arrow the first time he went there to train. At the same time, Lin Feng was secretly glad he had waited until he was a sixth-rank mage and fifth-rank warrior before coming to train in the Magical Beast Mountain Range. If he had come as he had in the novel, as a fifth-rank mage and fourth-rank warrior, then even if that arrow hadn't hit him, Delia would probably have died beneath it.

The thought of that terrible outcome sent a chill through Lin Feng. Since arriving in this world, he had never once faced a threat to his life.

So the world of Coiling Dragon is dangerous, with deadly threats lurking everywhere. The great Tomato hadn't been joking.

Though these thoughts raced through his mind, Lin Feng had already learned his lesson and wasn't about to let down his guard.

"Hand over all your valuables, and I'll spare your lives." A cold voice rang out. A dozen figures in green burst from the distant woods. Each held a bow and had a short blade hanging at his waist. They stared coldly at Lin Feng and Delia as they steadily approached.

But the person who had spoken remained hidden.

The lines are almost identical. These must be the same bandits who rob Lin Feng five years later in the original novel. Though Lin Feng suspected as much, he had no intention of handing over their belongings. He wasn't foolish enough to believe the bandits' words. The moment he showed himself, they would probably put an arrow through his head.

"Fire!" The cold voice rang out again. The hidden wind-element magic archer was clearly decisive. When Lin Feng and Delia didn't surrender, he immediately ordered his men to shoot.

"Whoosh!" "Whoosh!" "Whoosh!" "Whoosh!"

Without warning, the dozen men loosed their arrows all at once. More than a dozen shafts sped toward them, and Lin Feng, still holding Delia, immediately dodged.

Lin Feng cast the wind-element support spell Extreme Speed and dodged with graceful ease. As for Beibei, Lin Feng didn't bother to look after him. As a transmigrator, Lin Feng knew just how absurdly tough the God-Eater Rat Beibei's defense was. Though Beibei was still an infant, ordinary arrows like these couldn't pierce his hide.

"You two might as well come out peacefully." The cold voice came from the distant woods, while the dozen archers shouted triumphantly. A wind-element magic archer needed not only powerful magic but enough strength to wield such a powerful bow.

Wind-element magic archers were terrifying at long-range combat.

A flash of killing intent crossed Lin Feng's eyes as he looked at the dozen archers in the distance as if they were already dead.

"Thud!" "Thud!" "Thud!" "Thud!" Without warning, the earth trembled. Earth Spikes burst from the ground beneath the dozen archers, their sharp points glinting yellow as they pierced the men's thighs and abdomens. Blood poured across the ground, and screams rang out.

The fifth-rank Earth Element spell, Earth Spike Array!

"Ah!" The screams rose one after another.

Dozens of Earth Spikes burst from the ground. The sharp spikes, more than a meter tall, could pierce a person through in an instant. The dense forest of spikes struck like a sudden disaster, plunging the dozen archers into a living hell of agony.

"Chief, help—help me!" one archer cried out in agony as an Earth Spike pierced him from the groin upward.

"Ah! Ah!" An archer whose thigh had been pierced fell to the ground, screaming in pain.

Four of the dozen archers died on the spot, and nearly ten more were badly wounded. The group had lost almost all its fighting ability.

"A mage of the Earth Element!" The archer chief, still hidden in the woods, was shocked. He had relied on ambushes to rob countless people outside the Magical Beast Mountain Range, ambushing those who left or entered it and amassing a considerable fortune.

"Delia, stay down and don't move."

Lin Feng whispered in Delia's ear, then sprang abruptly to his feet. At the same time, his lips moved, and wind-element magical energy surged, instantly condensing into a spear.

The spear was made entirely of wind-element magical energy. Its pale-blue form seemed almost unreal, but the magical power coursing through it at extreme speed left no doubt about its might.

"A fifth-rank Wind Roar! He must be at least a fifth-rank mage in both the Earth and Wind Elements. Run!"

The bandit chief judged Lin Feng's strength the moment he saw him cast Wind Roar. Without the slightest hesitation, he turned and fled.

"Trying to run? Hmph!" A cruel smile tugged at Lin Feng's lips. For the first time, he felt murderous toward someone.

Lin Feng had always loved the part of Coiling Dragon that described his training in the Magical Beast Mountain Range. He knew how dangerous the place was, and understood that showing mercy to an enemy was only cruelty to himself.

"Go!"

As the word left his mouth, Wind Roar—imbued with Extreme Speed and Precision—shot after the fleeing bandit chief even faster than the arrow the chief had fired earlier.

Wind-element magic excelled at speed, and this was a fifth-rank Wind Roar enhanced by Extreme Speed. A hundred meters vanished in the blink of an eye. The bandit chief felt a chill in his back and instinctively threw the longbow in his hands behind him.

But how could a mere bow stop a fifth-rank Wind Roar? With a wet smack, the powerful spell pierced the bandit chief's head, spraying blood and brain matter.

The bandit chief's forward motion abruptly stopped. He struggled to turn his head, disbelief written across his face.

"Sixth-rank... mage..."

After forcing out the words, the light in the bandit chief's eyes gradually faded. Then he fell to the ground with a thud.

Once he had killed the bandit chief, Lin Feng paid him no further attention. He slowly walked over to the dozen bandits he had badly wounded with his Earth Spike Array, then opened the pack on his back and took out a Flat Blade.

"Great mage, spare our lives! We're willing to give you all the valuables we have!"

Seeing Lin Feng take out a weapon, the dozen bandits, now incapable of fighting back, stared at him in terror and begged loudly for their lives.

"Spare you?" Lin Feng gave a cold laugh. "If I weren't stronger than you, you'd have killed me by now!"

"My lord..." One of the bandits had barely gotten the words out when his head flew from his shoulders. Lin Feng felt no pity for a gang that had ambushed and killed who knew how many travelers. He swung his blade, and in a few seconds, he had cut down the rest.