Ye Fei was badly wounded and surrounded on all sides. Escaping would be harder than climbing to heaven.
If he still recklessly indulged in a moment of sharp-tongued defiance now, he would be a fool.
"Come to your senses?"
Liu Yihong gave a sinister smile.
"If I tell you, will you let me go?"
Ye Fei looked at Liu Yihong with hopeful eyes.
"Rest assured. As long as you tell me, I guarantee I won't kill you myself."
Liu Yihong nodded solemnly.
"All right, I'll tell you."
"The one who killed your brother was my senior sect brother."
Ye Fei gritted his teeth, as though making a momentous decision, before finally speaking.
At this answer, Liu Yihong's brows drew together. "Your senior sect brother? Who?"
"Li Zaitian, an Outer Sect Elder of the Free and Easy Gate."
Ye Fei sighed and spoke with obvious reluctance.
"You dare toy with me? You're courting death!"
"Since you've already guessed a few things, there's all the more reason not to let you live."
"Kill him!"
To Ye Fei's surprise, Liu Yihong not only disbelieved his answer but flew into a rage and immediately ordered an attack.
"Didn't you say you wouldn't kill me if I told you?"
Alarm surged through Ye Fei, and he hurriedly shouted.
"I said I wouldn't do it myself. I never said I wouldn't let them do it."
"Besides, I don't believe a word you said."
"Attack."
Liu Yihong snorted coldly and waved at the black-clad men, ordering them to strike.
Just then, however, the earth suddenly began to tremble.
Clouds of dust billowed through the woods around them.
Then came overlapping beast roars, drawing ever closer.
"What's going on?"
Liu Yihong froze for a moment and peered around him.
He discovered more than a hundred Demon Beasts charging toward them from all sides.
The dust was being kicked up by those Demon Beasts.
As the Demon Beasts drew closer and closer, Liu Yihong turned a puzzled gaze on Ye Fei.
He refused to believe these Demon Beasts would come here for no reason.
But his own men certainly hadn't done this. The only possibility was Ye Fei.
Suddenly, Liu Yihong seemed to realize something. His eyes widened, and his expression twisted viciously.
"You killed my brother?"
"Otherwise, how did his Beast-Luring Incense end up in your hands?"
Liu Yihong quickly pieced together the reason and began searching the surroundings, seemingly looking for the Beast-Luring Incense.
"I didn't kill him, but everything he owned is in my hands."
Ye Fei smiled calmly.
Watching the Demon Beasts draw closer, he couldn't help feeling relieved.
Then he moved his feet aside and reached down with his left hand, taking a short stick of incense, barely an inch long, from a small hole beneath his feet.
This was precisely the incense he had taken from Liu Yishan.
Back then, Liu Yishan had used it to lure the Azurewave Kun Wolf.
Earlier, when Ye Fei had stood up and discarded his sword, he had secretly lit this stick of incense.
"Kill him! Kill him..."
At the sight of the short stick of incense, Liu Yihong's eyes turned bloodshot. He looked crazed, roaring incessantly.
Hearing Liu Yihong's order, the black-clad men surrounding Ye Fei no longer hesitated. They brandished their Magic Treasures and attacked him.
They completely ignored the Demon Beasts closing in around them.
"Too late!"
Enduring his injuries, Ye Fei raised his right hand, snatched up the sword from the ground, and pushed off with his toes, leaping into the air.
"Golden Rainbow Piercing the Sun!"
As Ye Fei slashed with his sword, he spun sharply through a full circle in midair.
A ring of sword qi shot outward in every direction.
Although his strike carried astonishing momentum, its power had diminished greatly with its expanded range.
The black-clad men had slightly lower cultivation than he did, but they showed no fear. A simple block with their Magic Treasures stopped Ye Fei's attack.
This was exactly the result Ye Fei wanted.
Taking advantage of the brief moment when the black-clad men were blocking, Ye Fei unleashed Mistlike Step repeatedly the instant he landed.
In the blink of an eye, he swept past one of the black-clad men, broke through their encirclement, and ran toward the approaching beasts.
"A bunch of useless fools."
Seeing Ye Fei escape so easily, Liu Yihong flew into a rage.
Disregarding his injuries, he pushed off with his toes and shot forward, chasing Ye Fei.
By now, the beasts were less than a hundred feet from Ye Fei.
Smelling the distinctive scent of the Beast-Luring Incense in Ye Fei's hand, the Demon Beasts charged at him together, their eyes bloodred.
"Don't come after me. Go after him."
With a light flick of his left finger, Ye Fei sent the Beast-Luring Incense flying toward Liu Yihong behind him.
At the same time, he unleashed Mistlike Step once more and plunged straight into the herd.
He was swallowed up by the beasts in an instant, and then all trace of his aura vanished. Clearly, he had been trampled to death.
"Damn it!"
Seeing this, Liu Yihong cursed angrily. He had already understood Ye Fei's intention.
Knowing escape was impossible, Ye Fei had chosen this suicidal method to drag Liu Yihong down with him.
Now that he knew Ye Fei's intention, how could Liu Yihong let his treacherous scheme succeed?
Rather than catch the flying Beast-Luring Incense, he let it sail toward the black-clad men behind him.
He forcibly halted, swiftly summoned his Black Disc magical artifact, and powered it with true qi, rising high into the air and flying into the distance.
Liu Yihong performed this sequence in one fluid motion, without the slightest hesitation, neatly evading the charging Demon Beasts.
Although Liu Yihong escaped, the black-clad men behind him were not so lucky. More than a hundred Demon Beasts surrounded them.
There were quite a few black-clad men, but the Demon Beasts were even more numerous. With all of them attacking at once, the men simply couldn't hold them off.
After slaying more than thirty Demon Beasts, they could hold out no longer and were wiped out by the remaining beasts.
By then, the Beast-Luring Incense had burned away. With no target left, the Demon Beasts roared for a while before returning the way they had come.
Meanwhile, Liu Yihong had already fled dozens of li away.
He waited a quarter of an hour. Only after seeing the dust settle at the site of the incident did he ride his Black Disc back.
Even though he belonged to the demonic path, he couldn't help shuddering at the sight before him.
All fifteen black-clad men he had brought were dead.
The Demon Beasts had torn their bodies to pieces, leaving them scattered across the ground in a gruesome mess.
Ignoring the black-clad men's corpses, Liu Yihong used his divine sense to search for Ye Fei's Storage Pouch.
Yet even after searching three times in succession, he found neither Ye Fei's Storage Pouch nor even his corpse.
"Could the Demon Beasts have eaten him?"
Liu Yihong's brows knitted tightly. This was the only possibility he could think of.
He could hardly be blamed for thinking so. In Ye Fei's situation at the time, escape had been impossible.
Had Liu Yihong not possessed a flying Magic Treasure, he too would have died on the spot.
"A bunch of useless fools!"
Glancing once more at the black-clad men's corpses, Liu Yihong snorted coldly.
Then, with a thought, he took out a Jade Plaque.
Forming a hand seal with his right hand, he spoke softly to the Jade Plaque. "Elder Li, Ye Fei has been eliminated. The Yinluo Banner has yet to be found. Continue your mission."
After putting away the Jade Plaque, Liu Yihong stood where he was and muttered.
"It seems I can't spare a single Demon Beast within a hundred li. Ye Fei's Storage Pouch might be inside one of their bellies."
A short while later, Liu Yihong summoned the Black Disc again and rode it into the distance.
About the time it took an incense stick to burn after Liu Yihong left, something happened.
A speck of dust suddenly rose from the corpse of a Demon Beast.
The speck rapidly grew at a speed visible to the naked eye, becoming a Bronze Short Sword in the blink of an eye.
When the Bronze Short Sword reached roughly two inches in length, a streak of gray light flew out of it.
Ye Fei, who had vanished earlier, landed steadily on the ground.
"Finally safe."
Ye Fei let out a long breath and looked at the corpses strewn across the ground.
"Many thanks to all of you."
Ye Fei chuckled and repeatedly swept his wide sleeve, putting away the Demon Beast corpses one after another.
After collecting all the Demon Beast corpses here, Ye Fei turned to look in the direction Liu Yihong had left.
After a moment's thought, Ye Fei entered the Azure Dragon Sword again and set off in pursuit.
Before you continue