Chapter 447: Peekaboo

Shang Xia After breaking through to the Four Constellation Realm, Shang Xia gave up on finding a movement technique as he could fly with his extermination origins.

He also learned that there were differences in speed among Martial Extermination Realm experts.

From what he knew, other than special flying techniques that could increase one’s speed, the main factor that affected it was the type of extermination origin one refined and their actual cultivation base.

It was perfectly normal to use one’s cultivation base to estimate their speed, but it became a problem when Shang Xia was the one in question. He managed to refine 4 extermination origins to enter the Four Constellation Realm, but his cultivation base obviously couldn’t be regarded to be at the fourth layer at the moment.

Regardless, the speed at which he flew was reasonably fast.

He had seen Martial Extermination Realm experts flying through the air before. As such, he understood how quickly he flew. Experts in the first or second layer of the Martial Extermination Realm could only eat his dust if he were to compare his flying speed to theirs.

If he gave it his all, Shang Xia felt that he would be able to outrun even a third layer Martial Extermination Realm expert.

However, he discovered that he wouldn’t be able to sustain his flight for a long time if he flew at a speed much faster than ordinary cultivators.

The faster he flew, the shorter he could sustain his flight.

His low endurance was probably due to the fact that he hadn’t refined any of his 4 extermination origins completely.

One could argue that he was comparable to a first layer Martial Extermination Realm cultivator.

While Shang Xia made his way through the Ji Continent, he didn’t know that his movements had already been noticed.

He might have been keeping a low profile ever since entering the Ji Continent, but the multicolored lights that flickered under his feet eventually caught someone’s attention.

Back when Kou Chongxue blew a hole in the White Deer Paradise, their prestige in the Azure Origin World took a huge hit. Their reputation was one matter, but the world origin Kou Chongxue drained actually damaged their foundations. The deaths of Wei Zhongwen and the others only served to weaken them even further. They had no choice but to rein themselves in slightly.

Unlike the White Deer Paradise, the three great families of the Ji Continent didn’t suffer as much. They feasted on the White Deer Paradise’s misery and quickly increased their strength.

The ‘Giant Deer’ Liu Family and the Zhang Family of the ‘Yi City’ managed to gain the most benefits during the chaos.

That was because their territories were located closest to the border of the Thousand Leaf Mountain Rage. After Kou Chongxue wreaked havoc in the White Deer Paradise, they called back the cultivators under their command bordering the Thousand Leaf Mountain Range.

The Liu and Zhang Families feasted on the remains. Eventually, the Liu Family took over a small portion of the land on the west while the Zhang Family took over a small portion of land on the east.

It wasn’t hard to guess what the White Deer Paradise’s intention was to give up control over the region near the Thousand Leaf Mountain Range. Even though the Liu and Zhang Families knew that the White Deer Paradise wanted them to form a buffer layer between the You Continent and themselves, they couldn’t resist the temptation of more territories and resources.

Since they understood the White Deer Paradise’s intention, they took their own precautions.

After splitting the territory, the two families quickly gathered a bunch of experts to cross the Thousand Leaf Mountain Range to keep tabs on the Tongyou Institution.

Initially, they sent an assortment of cultivators over with the exception of Martial Extermination Realm experts. However, following the institution’s victory in the battlefield between the two worlds and the revelation of Ji Wenlong’s breakthrough, they sent a Martial Extermination Realm expert each to guard the border.

Shang Xia didn’t know of the exact situation in the Ji Continent, and he obviously wasn’t expecting any Martial Extermination Realm experts to be near the border where he was.

When he entered the territory of the Ji Continent, he was discovered by the lower-level experts of the two families. With several secret transmissions, the 2 Martial Extermination Realm experts received the news.

“Hmph, a newly advanced Martial Extermination Realm cultivator. He has guts for trying to intrude on our territory.” Liu Chuanyi, the Martial Extermination Realm from the Liu Family who was stationed to guard the border, snorted in contempt.

As those who had seen Shang Xia were not in the Martial Extermination Realm, they were unable to track him down no matter how fast they could run. They could only watch as the streak of light disappeared from their view.

Shang Xia had been extremely confident in his ability to hide his presence. However, he didn’t expect there to be scouts hiding around the Thousand Leaf Mountain Range and the border of the Ji Continent! Naturally, he didn’t think that danger was rapidly closing in on him.

“Hm… According to the reports from our disciples, the Martial Extermination Realm expert from the You Continent is pretty weird. His speed varies a lot while flying and his extermination origin seems to flicker unsteadily. It would change from time to time and none of them are certain of his actual cultivation level.” Zhang Luoxing, the Martial Extermination Realm expert from the Zhang Family, muttered. A deep frown made its way onto his face. “Do you think he’s bait sent by the Ji Continent?”

Liu Chuanyi sneered in response, “Not even the disciples of our families know that we’re here, much less those from the You Continent. Anyway, won’t we know if he’s bait if we check it out ourselves?”

Liu Chuanyi was clearly confident that they would be able to take down the intruder easily.

After thinking for a second, Zhang Luoxing realized that Liu Chuanyi made sense. The possibility of it being a trap was slim to none. Moreover, they were currently in the Ji Continent. So what if they ran into a trap?!

Nodding in agreement, Zhang Luoxing grinned, “Alright, we’ll go meet that Martial Extermination Realm cultivator from the You Continent!”

As Shang Xia was heading south the whole way, Shang Xia estimated that Winter would have arrived by the time he met up with Shang Pei in the Taihang Mountains.

.

While making his merry way to the Taihang Mountains while convinced that he was hiding his tracks well, Shang Xia was rudely awakened when he sensed two strong auras ten miles away. By the time he reacted, the two of them were flying his way.

There was no way they were looking for him for a friendly chat.

The moment he detected them, his first instinct was to run. However, he decided on another approach and quickly suppressed his extermination origin with everything he could muster. ?He made it as dull as possible and lowered his speed the best he could. When he was done, he used his divine perception to lock on to the two of them. He discovered that they had stopped three miles away from him. They were probably waiting to see how he would react.”

The distance was definitely in range of a Martial Extermination Realm expert’s divine perception, and the two of them were basically announcing their arrival.

Shang Xia seemed to have gotten the message as he started to hide his aura while heading in the same direction. Naturally, he did it such that the two of them would still be able to detect him.

“Haha! He’s just a newbie who entered the Martial Extermination Realm. He thinks he can hide his aura from us! Looks like he’s not going to know what hit him.”

“That’s right! This is a great opportunity to take him down!”

Zhang Luoxing and Liu Chuanyi chuckled to each other. They seemed to have concluded that Shang Xia was of no threat to them.

Circulating their inner qi rapidly, the two of them rushed towards Shang Xia with a renewed vigor. They pincered him and true to their expectation, Shang Xia revealed a shocked expression the moment they appeared. He seemed to exert himself as he flew faster in an attempt to get away.

The ‘weakling’ from the You Continent before them revealed an anxious look as he ran away desperately. They would never expect that Shang Xia was merely flying at 30 percent of his maximum speed.

“Hah!” Looking at Shang Xia, the two of them were too lazy to mock him. They thought that they would be able to enjoy a good battle before taking him down. From the looks of it, it was going to be an easier battle than they thought. The excitement they had started to die down and Zhang Luoxing grunted with annoyance, “Since you’re already here, you can remain here forever.”

Even though Zhang Luoxing was a bit weaker than Liu Chuanyi, he was the first to make his move.

He sent a simple palm strike towards Shang Xia and the space around the young cultivator started to solidify.

As he tried his best to break through the spatial restriction, a giant palm condensed from frosty qi appeared in his way. It flew at him without any intention of slowing down.

𝐟𝕣𝕖𝐞𝐰𝕖𝚋𝐧𝗼𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝗰𝐨𝐦

Shang Xia’s first reaction was to evade the icy palm. Unfortunately, the space around him had been greatly restricted by Zhang Luoxing. Even though it wasn’t something that could trap him forever, Zhang Luoxing felt that it was enough to force him to take on his attack head-on.

At the crucial moment, Shang Xia fumbled slightly before revealing his Scarlet Star Spear. He provided all the resources required to both repair and increase the grade of his spear a long time ago. His Scarlet Star Spear had reached the rank of a high-grade weapon, and Shang Xia was using it for the first time in battle!

However, he unleashed his sixth move instead of a more powerful one when faced with the giant palm in front of him. His Flow Recompensation Spear shot straight at the threat coming his way.

Even though he was facing two Martial Extermination Realm experts, Shang Xia was merely using his rank three technique to fight the two of them. Moreover, he only used the sixth of his nine moves.

It came as no surprise. Shang Xia’s spear slammed into the icy palm and he was forced to retreat tens of feet.

Zhang Luoxing didn’t intend to seriously injure Shang Xia with his previous attack as he only wanted to stop Shang Xia from running away.

Who would have thought that his attack was so damn effective? Not only did he manage to stop Shang Xia from escaping, he even managed to force Shang Xia to use his spear art. From the looks of it, the Martial Extermination Realm expert from the You Continent who was standing before them hadn’t developed his rank four martial arts!

The excitement that had died earlier reignited in Zhang Luoxing’s heart and it came back even stronger. It seemed like the possibility of them slaying a Martial Extermination Realm expert was much higher than they had thought!