“Where did he go?”

Qiu Yang was still shaking his left hand as he tried to neutralize the aftermath of Nie Tian’s Rage Punch. His eyebrows furrowed as he stared at the location where Nie Tian had been a moment ago.

“Escape magic!” One of the middle Greater Heaven stage experts exclaimed with a grim expression. “This Hua Tian kid is indeed beyond ordinary. He must have relied on this escape magic to escape from the Hunters’ blockade repeatedly. Only a profound escape magic can allow its caster to advance his potential and escape to a distant location at the price of suffering serious physical injuries.”

Qiu Yang gave a cold harrumph and said, “Even still, he’s only at the middle Heaven stage. Using that escape magic would mean immediate and serious damage to his body! Escape magics are not flawless. I believe that he is in a terrible condition at this moment. Let’s spread out, and each of us go in a separate direction. If we do this, we’ll definitely find him in no time!

“As long as we can find him, considering his current condition, I believe his battle prowess won’t even allow him to fight back!

“Furthermore, since he’s only at the middle Heaven stage, I doubt he’ll be able to cast that bizarre escape magic again. We find him, and then he’ll be a dead man!”

The three middle Greater Heaven stage experts also had a certain knowledge of escape magics, and they shared the same view with Qiu Yang. Therefore, they rapidly spread out and sped off in four different directions according to Qiu Yang’s proposal.

...

In a corner of the desert, Nie Tian appeared and collapsed by a sand dune.

Not only did it require a substantial amount of star power to cast a long-range Starshift, but it also caused a serious backlash to his physical body.

Every time he had used a long-range Starshift to escape from his enemies, he had sustained heavy injuries.

However, compared to the few times he had cast a long-range Starshift before, the backlash he had suffered this time seemed to be much milder and lighter.

After a brief pondering, he realized that since he had recently spent plenty of time refining his body under the joint action of his flesh power and wood power, his physical body had become increasingly tough and resilient.

This was why the trauma on his body wasn’t so terrible after he cast the long-range Starshift this time.

He slowly sat up straight as he began to summon his wood power from his spiritual sea and use it to heal his fleshy injuries.

By doing this, he was also waiting for his seven Heaven Eyes to fly to his side.

“Xue Long...” Eyes narrowed, he thought to himself, as he seemed to be a bit worried about him.

However, he understood that if he hadn’t escaped, Xue Long would have wanted to protect him, and thus been distracted and trapped deeper in that place.

Only when he left would Xue Long stop worrying about him and get to make the best decision between fighting and leaving.

By escaping using a long-range Starshift, Nie Tian actually gave Xue Long an opportunity to make choices. Considering Xue Long’s battle prowess, perhaps he wouldn’t be able to fight Shi Hui and those four experts single-handedly. However, if he was bent on escaping from them, Nie Tian believed that Shi Hui and the others wouldn’t have any effective way to stop him.

“Damn it!” Nie Tian cursed. “Talk about bad luck!”

Shi Hui and his men had come along so soon after Li Langfeng had left.

If Li Langfeng had been there, he would have single-handedly put Shi Hui in a lot of trouble.

Xue Long, who was also at the late Greater Heaven stage probably wouldn’t be under as much pressure if he were to handle the other four, including Qiu Yang.

Nie Tian himself would have been able to launch sneak attacks when opportunities presented themselves, and given Shui Hui and his men a lesson that they would have remembered for the rest of their lives.

As he pondered the matter, he took out pieces of spirit beast meat and started eating, hoping to heal his trauma as soon as possible with the help of the spirit beast meat and his wood power.

At that moment, he was struck by a feeling that the green aura that had been lying dormant within his heart suddenly began to emanate glorious light.

He was shocked into a daze before soon snapping back to reality and examining himself carefully.

He saw with great clarity that countless detailed lines and patterns had appeared within the numerous crystal-like bloodline chains inside the green aura.

By magnifying the finger-sized green aura, Nie Tian could see a large amount of sparkling bloodline chains that were as fine as hairs within it, which were slithering around like puny spirit snakes made of green crystals.

At that moment, new bloodline chains kept appearing within the green aura, as it seemed to be growing.

The newborn bloodline chains contained countless rays of bright light, as if they carried the profound truths of life.

All of a sudden, a vague message was born within those newborn bloodline chains, and almost simultaneously, the message was branded in the depths of Nie Tian’s soul.

“Bloodline talent: Life Stealth!” After being branded onto Nie Tian’s soul, the originally vague message suddenly became clear in an inexplicable way.

He didn’t even need to learn it with focused attention and he was able to comprehend the profound truths of Life Stealth. Not only did he master its casting method, but he also understood when and how to use it.

Subconsciously, he cast his newly awakened bloodline talent, Life Stealth, according to its method.

FIZZ! FIZZ!

Misty, bright green spots flew out of the green aura in his heart and almost instantly filled every single one of his internal organs.

In the next moment, the vigorous life energy was silenced, and all signs of life on him disappeared completely.

Even though he was still a living person, sitting by the sand dune, he didn’t release the slightest aura of a living being.

He examined himself with rapt attention, and discovered that at this moment, his aura was no different from that of a rock, a handful of dirt, or a pile of sand, which could be seen everywhere.

Not a single fluctuation of flesh and blood, or even a single movement of spiritual energy, could be found on him.

Nie Tian’s eyes suddenly lit up. “Life Stealth! All my life force has been cloaked, as if I’ve become a rock or some sand!”

After briefly going through the newly-obtained bloodline talent in his mind, he managed to master its quintessence, and understood how to make the best use of it.

Qi warriors with cultivation bases lower than the Worldly realm hadn’t transcended their psychic power into soul power. Therefore, the only way they could detect movement in their surroundings was through tracing signs of life.

If he cast Life Stealth and then found a place to hide himself, even if those Greater Heaven stage Qi warriors were standing right next to him, they wouldn’t be able to sense a thing.

Like right now, even if Qiu Yang and the other Greater Heaven stage Qi warriors were all scanning this region using their psychic awareness while standing within meters of Nie Tian, they wouldn’t be able to sense any sign of him.

Therefore, firstly, Life Stealth could be used to hide himself from pursuers, and thus escape from the pursuit of powerful experts when he was seriously injured.

Secondly, it was also a perfect sneak attack magic!

When he cast Life Stealth and snuck up on his enemy, the other party wouldn’t notice a thing.

“A fantastic sneak attack magic...” As a series of thoughts rapidly flashed across his mind, an interesting idea suddenly entered his mind.

Upon the thought of it, he decided to carry it out. Therefore, he sprung to his feet, canceled Life Stealth, and dashed off in the direction he had come from.

He made some arrangements along the way.

Moments later, he returned and dug out a hole in the sandy ground right next to the sand dune.

Afterward, he ripped off a piece of his garment that had a bloodstain on it and left it right beside the hole in the sandy ground. Then, he jumped into the hole and buried himself in it.

He had also written a line of very small words on the piece of bloodstained cloth.

Then, he lay there and waited patiently.

About fifteen minutes later...

Under the night sky, Shang Zhi, one of the four former guest elders of the Blood Skull, was running at a high speed in the vast desert.

His nose flared as he caught a whiff of fresh blood.

Without any delay, he sped off in the direction of the bloody smell. Before long, he saw a few drops of fresh blood on the ice-cold sandy ground.

He stopped and looked down at the blood, which hadn’t dried up yet, before saying with a smirk, “It seems that I’m pretty lucky for having come in the right direction.”

With these words, he dashed off again.

After that, he discovered blood drops in two other spots along his way.

Shang Zhi was increasingly convinced that the direction he was going was the direction Nie Tian had escaped in.

It wasn’t very long before Shang Zhi came to the sand dune. As soon as he did, he caught sight of the piece of bloodstained cloth lying beside the sand dune, and he also noticed that there seemed to be a line of words on the cloth, which seemed to be from someone’s garment.

“Hmm?!” A curious expression appeared on Shang Zhi’s face. Since it was the middle of the night and he was standing quite a distance away, he couldn’t obtain a clear view of the words.

Therefore, he stepped forward and crouched down to grab the piece of bloodstained cloth.

During this whole time, Shang Zhi had unleashed his psychic awareness to cover a large area around him, and he had used his secret magics to search for signs of Nie Tian’s life aura.

However, he hadn’t discovered a single fluctuation of life aura, nor had he sensed any condensing or releasing of spiritual power.

He reached out with one hand and grabbed the bloodstained cloth from Nie Tian’s garment. Only after he held it close did he see what was written on it: You’re a dead man already.

Shang Zhi was dumbstruck.

Just as he was thinking why anyone would leave such a line of words on the bloodstained cloth, fluctuations of a violent and fierce life aura suddenly rushed out from underneath the sandy ground where he was crouching.

The moment he sensed the explosive life aura, he realized that he was in a very dangerous situation.

However, since the two of them were too close to each other, and he was caught off guard, he couldn’t possibly defend himself in an effective way.

In the next moment, he experienced an unbearable pain in his waist.

He looked down and saw that a burning broadsword had already pierced into his abdomen.

At the same time, sand shot up into the air as Nie Tian shot up from under the ground and bombarded his chest with his fist.

BANG!

Shang Zhi was sent flying into the air. Meanwhile, fiercely burning flame power rushed out from within the broadsword and ravaged his internal organs.

By the time he went past the highest point and began to fall, he had a feeling that he was plummeting to the ice-cold abyss of death.

That was when he finally understood the meaning of that line of words.

--- You’re a dead man already.