One After Another

After sending Little Huo flying, two legs suddenly sprang out from behind the shield and planted themselves on the ground.

When the shield had come flying at them, an entire person had curled up behind it.

No wonder the impact had been so fierce. Even after the opposing force of the bullets had lessened it, the shield had still sent Little Huo flying, leaving him dead or alive, no one knew.

Above the shield, a man exposed half his face and shot Cai Shanjun a lightning-quick glance.

That man was Meng Daizong.

Not one of the leaders sent to hunt down Cai Shanjun was a coward afraid of death.

They feared only that they would have no opportunity.

Killing Cai Shanjun was a fine chance to soar straight into the clouds.

Thus, when Meng Daizong sent those ninjas out, he did not simply make them charge ahead while he hid.

When the ninjas charged, he had already set off himself.

His weapon was a shield hidden behind a car. Shaped like an iron wok, it was dull black, without a glint, and quite heavy.

The ninjas entered the woods, located the target's general position, and drew attention.

Meng Daizong took the opportunity to circle around and slip into the woods by another route.

Now he had finally come face-to-face with the target at close range.

The excited expression on the half of Meng Daizong's face that showed was enough to make one think he had at least twenty or thirty stirring, self-satisfied speeches to deliver.

Cai Shanjun, you finally fell into my hands!

You rebel, you failed to recognize the times, and now death is at your door!

Cai, I'll take your head and use it to secure my future fame and fortune!

But he did not actually say a word.

At the very moment he poked his head out, took that glance, and showed that expression.

His body suddenly charged forward again.

The focus of Cai Shanjun's gaze shifted abruptly.

After all, Cai Shanjun's hand was still gripping the flute. The part of him that could move most readily, and was most likely to be faster than Meng Daizong, was his gaze.

His gaze did not fall on a person, but on the donkey.

Hee-haw!!!!

The long-eared, short-shouldered donkey that loved to bray suddenly reared up and kicked Meng Daizong's shield with its front hooves.

It was only a donkey.

But the bray it let out as it kicked, and the sense of power erupting beneath its hooves.

Were nothing like a donkey's. It was more like a magnificent wild horse standing over eight feet tall.

Its hooves seemed as big as the mouths of bowls, and the force of its kick felt capable of smashing an ox's skull!

Meng Daizong was kicked more than a meter backward, the fallen leaves beneath his feet crushed to pieces and the soil sinking under him.

The arts Cai Shanjun had originally cultivated were military arts, and among them, the art of command was the most crucial.

With Chu Tianshu suppressing the poison for him and the Rainbow Cloud Flute alleviating its effects, he had recovered part of his cultivation.

With Mind Power sent through his gaze alone, he could unleash the donkey's potential and make it deliver such a blow.

Unfortunately, after that kick, all four of the donkey's legs buckled, and its head swayed.

As though it had pulled a millstone for three days and three nights straight and was about to collapse unconscious.

With a shing, Meng Daizong drew a saber from behind his shield.

Earlier, to close in on a sharpshooter like Little Huo while keeping his body tucked away, he had focused entirely on the shield and had not held his saber.

Now that the donkey had blocked him, it had instead brought out his saber-and-shield stance.

Even another blow from his shield would surely kill the donkey, let alone his saber.

But the moment he drew his saber, the hairs on the back of his neck suddenly stood on end. He turned at the fastest speed of his life and thrust his shield out.

Boom!!!

Chu Tianshu's bare palm slammed into the shield with a low, deep report.

The brute force of Dragon Coils Around the Body and the penetrating force of Palm Thunder were combined in that single palm strike.

Meng Daizong gave his left forearm a slight shake and dispelled the penetrating force, but the brute force left his wrist faintly numb.

Even more startling, at the instant the two collided, he saw the ninja corpses scattered all over the ground behind Chu Tianshu.

There was only one primary target: Cai Shanjun.

As long as Cai Shanjun was killed, it did not matter even if every ninja was lost.

But these ninjas had died a little too quickly!

Meng Daizong's speed while sneaking in should have been about the same as the ninjas'.

Since slipping in here, he had launched only two attacks. Given his skill, that had taken basically no more than two blinks of an eye.

In that little time, the ninjas had nearly all died?

Had they died the moment they arrived?!

Meng Daizong was shocked and furious, but his body did not slow. His chest and abdomen expanded and contracted almost instinctively.

His internal organs generated force, and his shield withdrew and thrust out again, ramming toward Chu Tianshu.

Chu Tianshu reached out to block, but the moment his palm touched the shield, it tilted to the side. A flash of saber light threaded in from below at an angle, stabbing toward his chest and abdomen.

Chu Tianshu's eyebrows shot up, and he drew back.

Against this man, he had no confidence he could control the other's blade.

When the saber light failed to reach its target, it vanished abruptly behind the looming black shield, which came charging at him again.

Meng Daizong advanced in a crouch, the black shield and white saber flowing through his hands like art.

The moment the shield struck, the saber followed.

When the saber missed, the shield was already in place to cover him.

Chu Tianshu retreated again and again, finding he could not spot the slightest opening.

He had to block the shield, but as soon as he did, he had to dodge the saber in the next instant.

Black and white alternated so quickly that it was like a two-colored spinning top flashing wildly before his eyes, a heart-stopping sight.

"Taiji from Chenjiagou?"

Chu Tianshu had heard Zhong Jinqiu speak of it.

The Taiji Fist of Chenjiagou carried the imagery of both the battlefield and farmers. The battlefield portion had evolved into the methods of saber-and-shield soldiers.

Both men had cultivated to the level of Eating Makes an Immortal, and both used Taiji Fist.

Yet the killing intent in this man's fighting style was far stronger than Zhong Jinqiu's.

A prolonged defense was bound to fail. If he kept retreating, he would lose all his edge.

He had to counterattack!

Chu Tianshu clenched his teeth, grunted heavily through his nose, and let out a gurgle from his belly.

The sound was not particularly forceful. After all, it came only from his internal organs.

But just as that sound rang out.

Chu Tianshu's feet sank straight into the ground without him deliberately lifting or stamping them.

It was as though everything around him had suddenly become a little more fragile and insubstantial.

His four limbs were actually exerting force in unison, but the movement of his feet was so slight it could be disregarded.

So as his ankles sank, both palms had already thrust out with the utmost force.

The air in front of him shook with a bang.

Only then came the tremendous crash of his palms colliding with the shield.

Boom-clang!!!!

It was nothing like the muffled sound from before, but a sharp, cracking explosion.

Meng Daizong's shield had already collided with his opponent many times, and he had not expected the force of this blow to far exceed his estimate.

A stabbing pain shot through his left arm, nearly making him lose his grip on the shield, and his whole body seemed about to go flying.

Palm Thunder was originally a method that used the internal organs as a starting point to mobilize the whole body, finally transmitting the force outward.

Chu Tianshu's earlier combination of hardness and softness meant that his limbs also struck and exerted force while his internal organs generated power, the two forces surging out together.

But his present method diverted Palm Thunder's force at the stage when it reached his own muscles.

The stimulation of Palm Thunder acted on the acupoints within his own body.

He used the physical constitution of Dragon Coils Around the Body to bear it, then unleashed it.

This method resembled the Ghost Gate Reverse Stimulation Needle, but it was achieved purely through the principles of fist arts. His control over his body was on a completely different level from what it had been before.

It took effect faster, had a greater effect, and had fewer side effects!

With that palm strike, Chu Tianshu wanted nothing more than to smash the shield apart, or at least knock it back into Meng Daizong and shatter his chest.

But at that moment, Meng Daizong also displayed the skill at the very heart of Taiji Fist: "startled by lightning, responding to the slightest touch."

The Chen Family Taiji Fist's understanding of hardness and softness demanded a pursuit of absolute sensitivity.

Even to the stimulus of lightning, one had to react instantly.

Exaggerated as the saying was, one had to speak of one hundred and twenty parts to achieve three.

A fist practitioner had to hold such an extreme and exaggerated ideal in mind before his body could barely attain three parts of the effect.

The instant the shield was knocked back toward him.

Meng Daizong shifted his center of gravity backward with the force, pressing it all into his right foot, which sank into the ground.

Then his body spun with the greatest effort of his life.

Using his right foot as a pivot, he flung the shield in his left hand, still bearing that immense force, backward and outward, and flung the saber in his right hand forward and outward.

In his earlier saber-and-shield techniques, his weapons had stayed close against his body.

At this moment, however, he sent them as far from his body as possible.

A sweeping spin at the very limit, at extreme speed.

He could even hear his right ankle, the pivot of his body, dislocate, and the sinews and muscles in his leg strain during the rapid spin.

But in exchange, it gave him a slash at maximum speed, aimed at Chu Tianshu.

The corner of Chu Tianshu's left eye seemed already filled with silvery-white saber light.

He had only enough time to catch a glimpse of that flash out of the corner of his eye.

But his arms were already extended in front of him. Compared with his head, his left arm was actually closer to the slash.

Chu Tianshu's left arm jerked up as though a needle had pricked a nerve, and his upright forearm moved to block.

The silver light arrived!

Golden light burst forth!

The part of the blade near the guard struck Chu Tianshu's arm.

Chu Tianshu's left sleeve burst apart in an instant, revealing a golden gleam on his forearm.

From his wrist to a point near his elbow, his arm was wrapped in cord.

Meng Daizong's level of skill was actually inferior to Chu Tianshu's.

He had only been able to force Chu Tianshu back repeatedly because of the advantage his weapons gave him.

But who said Chu Tianshu had no weapon on him?!

It was a protective cord woven by a special method from iron wire, copper wire, even a little gold wire, and the sinews of fine mountain grass.

One long cord wrapped around one arm, and it bore many knots, leaving many lumps of copper and iron along the arm.

The ancients had tied knots in cords to keep records, using the knots as writing, with special methods of weaving representing different characters.

The Wu Clan Stronghold carefully made such knotted cords into ritual implements. One cord was one spell.

Chu Tianshu's force reached his entire body, and it reached this copper-cord ritual implement as well.

The moment the blade struck the knots, a ringing vibration sounded.

The entire blade shattered like a piece of ice into more than a dozen irregular iron fragments.

Chu Tianshu tilted his head, his gaze remarkably calm. Only a few strands of hair at his temple were severed by the fragments.

Meng Daizong lost the balance provided by his long saber, and his right foot had also reached its limit. His whole body toppled sideways.

He rolled rapidly across the ground like a great wooden stake.

"Chu Tianshu!!"

A long roar came from the other side of the woods.

A heavily armored warrior with fiery-cloud ear guards was racing over, dragging his saber, while another figure was dozens of paces ahead of him.

Zhong Jinqiu and Old Yu had only just dealt with their opponents, and neither had managed to stop the faster figure in time.

Adjutant Zhou's roar was meant to seize the advantage before he arrived.

As long as Chu Tianshu reacted, Xu Youjiang would be able to reach that spot, and Meng Daizong would not die.

In today's battle, things had developed to this point.

They were no longer just trying to protect a special envoy; they also had to save one of the experts on their side.

Sure enough, Chu Tianshu turned to look.

Meng Daizong rolled to a tree and came to a stop, but did not move.

While he was rolling, a thick silver needle had appeared in the back of his head.

It had stabbed straight in, piercing his brain!