A Pyrrhic Victory

Lin Yi drew a deep breath. Blood-gold Divine Markings lit up beneath his skin layer by layer, while the phantom of a Savage Bull solidified behind him as if real. A weight of one hundred and twenty thousand jin pressed heavily into every inch of his bones and muscles.

Biao stood half a step to his side, gripping his broad-backed saber horizontally. The muscles in both arms bulged as though cast from iron, veins crawling from the backs of his hands all the way up his forearms.

"Brother Biao, I'll go first. Look for an opening." Before Lin Yi had even finished speaking, he had already charged out.

His spear led the way, its tip tearing through the air with a shrill whistle as it stabbed straight at the Inkshadow Leopard's face!

The Inkshadow Leopard sensed the tremendous force bearing down on it head-on, and its dark green vertical pupils abruptly contracted.

It stopped concealing itself. Fine black Divine Markings, thin as ink lines, surfaced across its body, first appearing on its limbs before spreading from its shoulders to the tips of its claws.

An eerie, cold green glow also rose in those dark green eyes, swallowing the entirety of its pupils like two ghost flames hanging in the darkness.

Lin Yi's spear struck.

At the instant the spear tip came within half a foot of the Inkshadow Leopard's forehead, the beast's figure suddenly vanished from where it stood.

The spear plunged directly into the rock where the Inkshadow Leopard had just been. Stone shards exploded outward, blasting a bowl-sized crater into the blue-gray surface, cracks spreading in all directions like a spiderweb.

Lin Yi's pupils shrank sharply.

"Watch out—behind you!" Biao's furious roar exploded from the side.

Lin Yi had no time to turn around. He could already feel the air behind his back being torn apart.

A cold, razor-sharp pressure of wind was piercing directly toward the center of his back, so fast that even the instinctive rise of his hairs could not keep up.

Without the slightest hesitation, he gripped the spear shaft with both hands and used the recoil from the spear embedded in the rock to violently twist around—the spear swept horizontally behind him!

Clang!

The claw tips smashed viciously into the middle of the spear shaft. The crisp sound of metal striking metal shook Lin Yi's eardrums until they rang.

The pitch-black claws left three deep grooves in the hardwood spear shaft, hard as metal.

Crack! Crunch.

That hardwood spear, which had accompanied him in hunting the Savage Bull King and pinning an entire pack of Earth Gnawers to death, finally reached its limit beneath the Inkshadow Leopard's claw.

The shaft burst apart along those three grooves, breaking into several fragments that scattered across the ground.

Yet the force of the Inkshadow Leopard's claw had not dissipated. The remaining power struck directly against Lin Yi's chest!

"Puh—!"

Lin Yi was sent flying, his back slamming viciously into a tree thick enough for two people to wrap their arms around.

The trunk shuddered violently, and leaves rained down in torrents. He had no time to stop himself; after crashing through that tree, he slammed into a second one before barely coming to a halt, sliding down the trunk and dropping to one knee.

A mouthful of blood sprayed from his lips, bright red and glaring against the muddy ground.

The suffocating pain in his chest felt as if someone had jammed a red-hot iron plate between his ribs. Every breath came with a needle-pricking pain.

The hand Lin Yi braced against the ground trembled slightly, but he did not fall.

He raised his left arm and roughly wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, then lifted his head and stared fixedly at that ink-black figure.

"Fuck... that speed... was too damn sinister."

He cursed between coughs, his voice hoarse like sandpaper scraping over iron.

The instant Biao saw Lin Yi get sent flying, every tactic and coordination plan was thrown to the back of his mind.

He no longer waited for any opening. With a furious roar, he swung up his broad-backed saber and chopped down hard, the blade carrying the force of eighty-five thousand jin as it cleaved toward the Inkshadow Leopard's head!

But the Inkshadow Leopard was more than a level faster than him.

The moment Biao's blade fell, the Inkshadow Leopard's figure had already dispersed from its spot like black smoke.

The next second, it appeared to Biao's left, its claws sweeping horizontally for his head!

Biao had no time to block with his saber. Relying only on battle instincts honed over many years, he raised his left arm to shield his head.

Crack!

A bone-breaking snap that made teeth ache exploded through the air.

Biao's thick left forearm, like an iron pillar, bent outward at a grotesque angle. The sound of shattered bone was so clear that Lin Yi's heart violently clenched.

Biao was flung sideways, his body turning half a circle in midair before smashing heavily onto the rocky ground more than a zhang away.

"Brother Biao!"

Lin Yi surged forward, ignoring the agony in his chest. He shot out like an arrow and reached Biao at the very instant he crashed down, scooping him up with both hands.

But at the instant he bent down to catch Biao, the air behind his head was torn apart once more.

The Inkshadow Leopard's second attack had arrived! It pounced from the side, its claws aimed straight at the center of Lin Yi's back.

This time, it was no longer testing him. It intended to kill with one strike.

Lin Yi had no time to block, no time to evade.

He did not even turn his head. One arm blasted fiercely behind him, his clenched fist carrying all the power of the Savage Bull Diagram as one hundred and twenty thousand jin of vitality and blood exploded at his knuckles!

Boom!

At the instant fist and claw collided, the air was compressed into a visible ring of shockwave. Loose stones and fallen leaves on the ground were blasted outward.

The Inkshadow Leopard's claw was hammered back by that punch, and its entire body slid backward several zhang from the recoil.

After landing, the Inkshadow Leopard bent its limbs slightly to steady itself. Its dark green vertical pupils stared at Lin Yi, and the rise and fall of its chest was visibly more hurried than before.

A streak of dark blood seeped from the corner of its mouth. That punch had jolted it into suffering internal injuries.

Lin Yi's left fist, meanwhile, was already a mangled mass of blood and flesh, and he could clearly feel three finger bones shattered.

Yet he did not look at his own hand. Instead, he lowered his head and quickly examined Biao's condition.

Biao's left arm was twisted at an unnatural angle, clearly a comminuted fracture.

A deep claw mark ran across one side of his forehead, flesh split and curled back as blood poured from the wound and covered half his face. His breathing was shallow and rapid, and he had completely fallen unconscious.

The Inkshadow Leopard was panting as well.

Those ghostly green eyes remained locked on Lin Yi. The light in its pupils had dimmed somewhat, and the black Divine Markings on its body were slowly losing their brilliance.

After having its full-force strike blocked, its explosive power had clearly dropped by a considerable degree.

Lin Yi gently placed Biao on the ground behind him and straightened up.

He drew a deep breath and swallowed back the second mouthful of blood churning up in his chest. He could not show the slightest sign of weakness, or the Inkshadow Leopard would pounce without hesitation.

He bared his teeth in a grin full of bloody froth. "Beast... are you already done after just those two moves?"

The Inkshadow Leopard's ears flattened backward, and a low hiss rumbled from its throat.

Its limbs were trembling almost imperceptibly. The expenditure of that maximum burst state could not be sustained for long in the end.

Lin Yi did not rush to attack either.

In his mind, that ink-black diagram of Divine Markings was completing the closure of its final outline.

From the moment the Inkshadow Leopard activated its divine ability, his Super Brain had begun recording it—the direction of the markings across its limbs, the order in which they lit up.

Every last detail had been etched into the depths of his mind, stroke by stroke.

At that moment, the tip of the final fine line met its starting point, and the entire diagram of Divine Markings became complete.

"Fuck your mother—!"

Lin Yi moved!

His feet kicked off the ground, scattering stones. Like a Savage Bull utterly enraged, he charged head-on at the Inkshadow Leopard amid a violent surge of blood-gold light and the Savage Bull phantom!

The Inkshadow Leopard instinctively tried to evade again, but this time, its speed had clearly fallen by an entire level!

The ink-black Divine Markings had dimmed further, and the muscles in its limbs trembled slightly after repeatedly erupting with force. In the instant it dodged, there was a sliver of sluggishness.

Lin Yi seized that sliver!

He lunged sideways and grabbed the Inkshadow Leopard's thick, long black tail with both hands!

"Get the hell over here!"

One hundred and twenty thousand jin of tremendous power erupted! The Inkshadow Leopard's body was violently swung off the ground like a black meteor hammer.

Gritting his teeth, Lin Yi turned and slammed that massive beast ruthlessly into the ground!

Boom!

Stone shards flew as a shallow crater was smashed into the earth. The Inkshadow Leopard let out a short, shrill cry, its limbs clawing wildly through the air.

Lin Yi did not stop! His arms exerted force again, swinging the Inkshadow Leopard up from the crater in the opposite direction and smashing it down onto the ground on the other side!

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Four times in all! Every strike carried the strength of his entire body, and every strike carved another fresh crack into the ground.

The Inkshadow Leopard's bones gave off a string of teeth-aching cracks beneath the impacts. Blood continuously poured from its mouth, spraying over the flying stones and dirt.

After the fourth slam, the Inkshadow Leopard's tail was finally torn clean off at the root by Lin Yi's brute force!

A length of black tailbone still attached to fur remained clenched in Lin Yi's hand, while the Inkshadow Leopard's body crashed into the crater. It lay limp all over, its limbs twisted and sprawled out, with only its chest still rising faintly.

Panting heavily, Lin Yi casually tossed the severed tail onto the ground.

He stepped into the crater and directly straddled the Inkshadow Leopard's back!

He raised his right fist high. The flesh over its surface was mangled, and the excruciating pain from his shattered finger bones stabbed madly through his nerves every time he clenched it.

But he did not care.

The first punch landed, caving in one side of the Inkshadow Leopard's skull.

The second punch shattered its cheekbone.

The third punch sent dark blood mixed with bone fragments splashing across Lin Yi's face.

He hammered down punch after punch, cursing with every blow. "Fuck! Sneak attack! You motherfucker! Sneak attack! I'll fucking! Make you! Sneak attack!"

Only after half the Inkshadow Leopard's skull had completely caved in, and those dark green eyes had utterly lost all light, did Lin Yi stop punching.

His hand dropped to his side, fingertips still trembling uncontrollably. Nearly all the flesh on his fist had split and peeled back, revealing the ghastly white bone beneath.

He fell backward and lay flat on the edge of the crater.

Lin Yi lay there, his chest heaving violently. With every breath, he could hear the wheezing in his lungs like a bellows being worked.

The fractures in his chest, the shattered bones in his left fist, and the countless scrapes and bruises across his body seemed to have agreed to flare up all at once, causing waves of darkness to wash over his vision from the pain.

But he smiled.

Bloody froth dripped from the corner of his mouth. Grinning at the sky, he muttered indistinctly, "Fuck, I won."

He turned his head to look at the unconscious Biao not far away, then at the black corpse in the crater that had completely stopped moving.

The ink-black Divine Markings were fading inch by inch from the Inkshadow Leopard's body.

Lin Yi lowered his arm and closed his eyes. He wanted to lie there and rest a little longer.

Just a little while.