In the dark forest, Li Qiming raced along the winding mountain path!
With Minor Accomplishment in Swallow Skimming Grass beneath his feet, he pushed his speed to the limit and burst forward with all his might!
He didn't hesitate for a moment. All he wanted was to escape this dangerous valley!
"These people are far too powerful. It's too dangerous to stay here!"
Li Qiming's expression was resolute. His strength was insignificant, and he couldn't do anything here anyway.
"You're pretty fast..." A cold voice suddenly sounded from behind him.
It was Shadow Blade, who had caught up!
Li Qiming was terrified. A sense of danger rose behind him, and he hurriedly turned around, drawing the Seven Taels steel saber at his waist and throwing up a desperate defense!
He had spent seven taels of silver to buy the steel saber from the Blacksmith Hall of the Martial Hall, so he had named it Seven Taels.
In the darkness, Shadow Blade's masked figure pressed close like a ghost. The two crescent-shaped daggers in his hands collided with the steel saber in Li Qiming's, sparking twice!
"Hmph." Shadow Blade sneered and applied a little force.
The next moment, the Seven Taels steel saber in Li Qiming's hands shattered, breaking into several pieces!
Li Qiming's heart sank.
This saber was far too poorly made!
No, it was the other guy's blades that were far too well made!
They weren't even in the same league!
"It's over," Shadow Blade said coldly, as if stating an indisputable fact.
His opponent's saber was broken, his cultivation was lower, and he had no weapon. How could he possibly fight back?
Shadow Blade had no habit of wasting time. He raised a hand to kill Li Qiming.
Whoosh—
Li Qiming hurled the broken saber straight at Shadow Blade's face like a concealed weapon!
Shadow Blade paused and raised a dagger to knock it aside.
A cheap trick like that could never hurt him.
But in the instant it took to deflect the blade, Li Qiming seized his chance, spun around without the slightest hesitation, and sprinted down the mountain!
Run!
The moment they had clashed, the Blood Refining Perfection blood qi in Shadow Blade's body had nearly shaken Li Qiming into spitting blood!
He was no match for him at all!
"Heh. You're only wasting your effort!" Watching Li Qiming race down the mountain, Shadow Blade frowned slightly and shook his head in disdain.
He was an assassin trained by the Demon Sect from childhood, and an outstanding one at that.
Trying to outrun an assassin? Trying to beat him in a short-distance burst?
When he was young, there had been a hundred assassin candidates like him. Now, the other ninety-nine were dead.
They had died beneath his blades.
He had stood out thanks, on one hand, to Blade Dao Talent rarely seen in a hundred years! On the other hand, he had a unique understanding of movement techniques!
As Li Qiming's figure was about to vanish into the darkness, Shadow Blade suddenly moved.
Boom!
The ground cracked beneath his feet. Shadow Blade's body shot forward like a ghost, and he raced after Li Qiming along the winding mountain path!
Li Qiming glanced back. He saw Shadow Blade moving across the winding trail as if it were flat ground!
At the sharp right-angle turns, Shadow Blade's body didn't slow down or pause in the slightest! With a simple leap, his legs twisted his body around and sent him straight after Li Qiming!
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Explosions rang out beneath Shadow Blade's feet! It was as if he had some kind of thruster strapped to them!
The explosive power of his legs simply ignored the laws of inertia. No bend in the path could slow him down by even a fraction!
In fact, Shadow Blade was accelerating on the straightaways!
"How is this possible?!" Li Qiming had never imagined that such a terrifying movement technique could exist!
The path ran along the edge of a ten-thousand-zhang cliff! If he fell, he'd be smashed to pieces!
Boom!
In the blink of an eye, Shadow Blade caught up and slashed at his back.
At the critical moment, Li Qiming drew on a wisp of Flood Dragon Bloodline power in his dantian!
Boom!
His speed abruptly doubled, and he barely dodged the deadly slash!
"I can't beat him on the bends. If I want to survive, I can only run in a straight line!" Li Qiming knew his strengths and weaknesses well!
Swallow Skimming Grass worked best in a straight line. On a winding mountain path, he couldn't use it to its full potential!
He turned aside, abandoning his attempt to flee farther down the mountain, and dashed into the secluded forest on the nearby mountainside!
Trees blocked the way in the dense forest, but there had to be gaps where he could run in a straight line!
Thorny brambles tore at him, ripping his robe to shreds and leaving his skin raw and bloody!
His entire body burned with pain!
But Li Qiming couldn't afford to care about any of that!
Head down, run!
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Shadow Blade clung to Li Qiming like a bone-deep curse, chasing so close that he was almost on top of him!
The two figures pushed themselves to their limits in the dense forest!
"Heh. I don't believe you can keep this up much longer!" Sweat beaded on Shadow Blade's forehead, but he was still confident!
His movement technique might have seemed to defy reason, but it placed an astonishing strain on every part of his body!
He couldn't possibly maintain this kind of top speed for long.
But he was at the peak of the Blood Refining Realm. How could he lose to a piece of trash in the middle stage of the Blood Refining Realm?!
Half an hour passed in the blink of an eye.
Shadow Blade's face was deathly pale, and he couldn't help panting.
By now, the brambles in the forest had left him covered in scratches, too.
Without Gang Qi from the Bone Refining Realm to protect him, he was still just flesh and blood.
The confidence Shadow Blade had shown earlier gradually vanished, leaving him looking thoroughly wretched.
His stamina and blood qi were nearing their limits, too!
Shadow Blade had never imagined that one day he would be competing with someone in a long-distance race.
His training since childhood had always been about landing a single, fatal strike!
He was an exceptionally skilled assassin.
He was born for this: patience, ambush, and assassination.
He had never failed to complete a mission he accepted.
But...
As he watched Li Qiming just one zhang ahead, Shadow Blade couldn't help feeling dazed.
Why could this guy run so much?!
Whenever Shadow Blade felt his opponent was about to run out of stamina and blood qi, the brat somehow managed to keep going.
After it happened several times,
Shadow Blade even began to think about giving up.
But whenever that thought arose, Li Qiming's speed would gradually slacken, as if Shadow Blade only had to hold on a little longer to catch him for good!
Soon,
Shadow Blade stopped. He braced both hands on his knees, drenched in sweat, and finally realized that something was wrong!
There was something wrong with this kid!
It was as if he were deliberately stringing Shadow Blade along!
How could someone in the middle stage of the Blood Refining Realm keep going for so long?
He was at the peak of the Blood Refining Realm and had already reached his physical limits. What gave this guy the right to endure more than him?!
Just then,
Li Qiming, who had been fleeing in a sorry state the whole time, slowly stopped.
He braced his hands on his knees too, gasping for breath.
Compared with Shadow Blade, he was in even worse shape!
His gray robe had been shredded into strips by the brambles, and his body was covered in bloody scratches, his skin raw and torn!
Sweat poured into his wounds, stinging like salt.
His whole body hurt so much he was cramping.
He really had reached his limit.
If not for the wisp of Flood Dragon Bloodline in his body, which had been helping him recover his stamina and blood qi, he would have died beneath the other man's blades long ago!
Li Qiming turned to look at Shadow Blade. The weakness, fear, and helplessness in his eyes were gone!
"I just want to live. Why are you chasing me?!"
"Why are you forcing me?"
As he spoke, Li Qiming slowly straightened up.
Under Shadow Blade's horrified gaze,
Li Qiming's aura steadily rose. The wounds across his body healed completely, and a great deal of sweat evaporated from his skin.
His stamina and blood qi instantly returned to their peak.
"Die!"
Li Qiming suddenly charged forward instead of retreating, lunging straight at Shadow Blade!
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