"Who's there?!"
Lian Yi hadn't expected an attack from below. Caught off guard, she was bound by flaming chains and slammed hard into the ground.
Lian Yi noticed that she was on the roof of an upscale residential complex, facing Wanhe Residential Complex across the way, with a clear view of Ji Sen's home.
As she lay on the ground, a shadow approached and loomed over her.
Lian Yi looked up and saw the Red King holding a takeaway bowl of Lanzhou Beef Noodles, slurping away.
Calamity had good taste. The noodles were delicious.
The three of them had tracked Calamity without a moment's rest, then watched Ji Sen's home through binoculars without taking their eyes off it. They hadn't even had time to eat.
Now that things were finally over and Lian Yi had fled, the Red King at last had time for some noodles.
Unfortunately, they had gone soggy and clumped together.
Mind Master and Mighty Warrior stood on either side of him like a pair of guardian generals, each holding a bowl of noodles as well.
The Red King crouched in front of Lian Yi, his expression cold.
"Talk. What just happened?"
The three of them hadn't chosen a good vantage point and couldn't see clearly what had happened inside Ji Sen's home.
Then Lian Yi had conveniently escaped through the window, constantly looking back. She looked guilty as hell, clearly no good, and unlikely to be on Calamity's side. They wouldn't have to worry about her turning around and informing Calamity, so they had grabbed her to find out what had happened.
Lian Yi's heart sank. Whoever this was, he meant trouble. Was this what Chu Xiaoyao had meant when she said Lian Yi couldn't escape?
Who was he? He looked even less like a decent person than I did. Chu Xiaoyao's Dao Protector?
In the Cultivation World, elders worried that gifted youngsters might die before their time, but also feared that interfering in their development would stunt their growth through excessive help. They would therefore choose to protect them in secret. Elders serving in this capacity were called Dao Protectors.
Chu Xiaoyao was a mere mortal, yet she had a Dao Protector of this caliber?
Things were getting more and more interesting. Still...
"You think this can hold me?" Lian Yi raised her head, mockery filling her eyes. Thick, viscous water rippled across her skin, and she slipped free with ease, openly challenging the Red King.
"So you don't intend to cooperate." The Red King's gaze sharpened, his authority imposing even without anger. The temperature soared, space warped, and red sun qi surged.
Seeing the Red King make his move, Mind Master and Mighty Warrior hurried into a corner in fright. They poked their heads out to watch, eating their noodles as they did.
"Don't block the whole view. Leave me some room." Mighty Warrior stood in front of Mind Master like a solid wall. Only after considerable pushing did he reluctantly make some space.
"Stop pushing me. I almost spilled my broth."
Slurp, slurp...
Rings of black flame suddenly appeared beneath Lian Yi's feet. They rapidly rose into wildly dancing fire snakes, licking at her clothes before weaving together into a net that enveloped her.
Lian Yi drew a flexible sword from her waist. Wrapped around her waist, it had been impossible to recognize as a weapon, making it useful at critical moments.
The flexible sword was incomparably sharp. It could easily cleave through a sky full of fire, let alone this little cage of flames.
Lian Yi danced with her sword like a peerless ballerina. Her toes lightly touched the ground as she bent and spun with exquisite grace, the flaming cage shattering wherever her sword tip passed.
The Red King raised an eyebrow. Her performance had slightly exceeded his expectations. "You've got some skill, then."
Lian Yi transformed into a white snake as thick as a bucket, gleaming beneath the moonlight, sacred as light itself.
The white snake coiled up like a spring, then shot forward as fast as lightning. In the blink of an eye, she was before the Red King, her enormous maw open to swallow him whole and digest him completely.
Her mastery of the Transformation Technique was extraordinary. She could even replicate the abilities of whatever she became. This white snake was a descendant of the White Snake slain by Emperor Gaozu of Han. Anything inside her belly would dissolve into putrid liquid within fifteen minutes.
Lian Yi wasn't one to take a loss lying down. She hadn't forgotten how the Red King's ambush had sent her crashing ignominiously to the ground.
"A Cultivator proficient in the Transformation Technique, then."
The Red King delivered his cold assessment. Pitch-black flames appeared out of thin air, scattered like starlight, deeper than darkness and full of menace.
The white snake's scales were impervious to water, fire, and blades. Even missiles couldn't penetrate her defenses.
Lian Yi had paid the black flames no mind, but when they landed on her scales, it was like fire falling onto a pile of dry grass. They spread rapidly, engulfing her entire body in an instant.
"Aah-what is this?!"
The pitch-black flames burned through her internal organs. Her insides felt like boiling water, bubbling everywhere and searing her from within.
The white snake writhed and rolled on the ground, roaring in agony. Her vitality faded, and she seemed on the verge of death.
Just as Mind Master and Mighty Warrior thought the fight was over and emerged to congratulate the Red King, a shadow burst from the white snake's body and lunged at him.
Mind Master got a clear look at the shadow. It had a long, slender body and imposing horns. It was a flood dragon!
The white snake had shed her skin and become a flood dragon!
She was a poison flood dragon. Even a Foundation Establishment expert with an innate body would die instantly upon contact with her venom!
The poison flood dragon sank her teeth into the Red King's shoulder!
She had him!
"My lord!"
"Lord Red King!"
Mind Master and Mighty Warrior were caught completely off guard by this turn of events. Their noodles fell to the ground, spilling everywhere.
It wasn't that they cared so much about the Red King. Mainly, if he lost, they would be the next two to suffer.
A sinister monster like Lian Yi, with her endless transformations, was definitely beyond their ability to handle.
Unease rose within Lian Yi. She was extremely sensitive to emotional changes, yet the Red King's emotions hadn't fluctuated once from beginning to end.
He was just like that Chu Xiaoyao, looking down from on high, treating everyone else as beneath him!
How arrogant.
Strange. Why didn't it feel like I'd bitten into anything?
"Is this all you can do?" The Red King turned to look at his bitten shoulder, allowing the venom to spread throughout his body. He met the flood dragon's eyes with such icy indifference that Lian Yi wondered which of them was the cold-blooded creature.
"Another outfit ruined."
Of course the Red King was arrogant. With the previous generation of Seven Kings gone, his seniority in the organization was second only to the Professor's.
Before meeting a freak like Calamity, back when all the previous generation of Seven Kings were still around, he had once considered himself the strongest among them. He regarded everyone with contempt and acknowledged no one's superiority.
Only after meeting Calamity had he reined in his arrogance.
But he only reined it in before Calamity.
Every inch of the Red King's skin split apart and burned. His clothes instantly turned to ash as endless waves of flame churned and surged, transforming him into a body of fire. Blazing heat radiated from him, brimming with yang energy that drove all evil away.
The venom coursing through his body was reduced to ash as well.
He had only brought one change of clothes this time. It looked like he would have to buy another.
"I rather liked this outfit."
Lian Yi's scalp prickled. She felt she had provoked an opponent she should never have crossed.
The body of flame spread along the flood dragon's head. Before she could even scream, the merciless fire swallowed her.
The Red King frowned. Something about the way she burned felt wrong.
The flames withdrew into the Red King's body, revealing not a flood dragon, but an empty shell.
"My lord, what's this?"
Mind Master and Mighty Warrior could tell the fight really was over this time, but they hadn't understood what had happened.
The Red King scoffed. "Cultivators certainly have plenty of ways to run away."
The flood dragon had shed her skin again and escaped.
After Lian Yi left, a deathly silence settled over the room. Zhou You was the first to break it.
"What did you mean, 'You think you can get away?'"
"Huh? Don't you think that sounded cool?" Chu Xiaoyao thought that line had been incredibly cool. She had sounded even more imposing than Lian Yi.
If there was anything to improve, perhaps she could have struck a cooler pose. For instance, the corners of her mouth had curved up too far. Maybe she could lower them another two degrees?
"Don't you think that Lian Yi was putting on way too much of a mysterious act?"
Zhou You nodded. Mysterious and inscrutable would have been more accurate, but calling it an act wasn't exactly wrong either.
"When someone puts on that mysterious act, you have to hit back with an even more impressive attitude. Never mind what happens afterward. Bluff them first." Chu Xiaoyao tucked both hands against her chest and explained with perfect confidence, looking thoroughly experienced.
More than anything, Chu Xiaoyao hated people acting cryptic in front of her and pretending to be unfathomable.
Zhou You wholeheartedly agreed with Chu Xiaoyao. He didn't like Lian Yi either.
So he had helped buy Lian Yi a few things.
Before you continue