Han Xuhan understood very well that despite his momentary advantage over Shen Kai, he had zero chance of killing him successfully.

Just by observing Shen Kai's skillful movement while he had been caught off guard by the gravitational detonation of his shoes, Xuhan gathered a rough idea of how much more agile Shen Kai was compared to himself.

The comparison was laughable.

During their exchange of moves just now, Han Xuhan had attacked indiscriminately, his actions smoothly flowing one after one. But this was the credit of his planning while he had been begging for his life and buying time. He had envisioned and planned each movement multiple times mentally while blabbering back then.

Yet Shen Kai had managed to fend off all of his attacks. Although those attacks were feints, Shen Kai controlled his balance, analyzed the trajectory of each knife, and managed to shield his vital organs, all while recovering from the sudden blast of the exploding shoe.

Xuhan knew his limits well. He had to take things up another notch or this move would be the end of him, even though it looked like he was about to kill Shen Kai; that much he was certain of.

Shen Kai staggered toward the raised axes helplessly. His eyes showed a trace of hopelessness and fear. But his speed suddenly increased as soon as he came within the range of the axes.

One of the two axes swung down at an awkward angle, but Shen Kai's body twisted in an inconceivable manner and spun in the middle of the move unpredictably, avoiding the blade of the axe narrowly.

Then he vanished into thin air.

Dumbfounded, Xuhan finished his swing and looked at the space Shen Kai had just disappeared.

How did a cultivator at the sixth layer of the physique transformation realm teleport? That was absolutely impossible. Even soul reformation realm cultivators didn't have such abilities, as far as he had learned.

Sadly, there was no spectator here to cheer for them and analyze every move like experts, unlike those xianxia stories he used to love. He had no idea how a cultivator could use teleportation spells in the first realm of cultivation. Some shouts from expert spectators would have been a great assistance.

Unless...that was an illusion technique. Xuhan was fairly familiar with supernatural abilities commonly seen in cultivation novels due to his obsession with them in his past life.

Cheats and super overpowered techniques were not sold in the streets. It was uncommon enough to see freaks like Mu Ran in one lifetime. Shen Kai had to have used a shady trick to avoid his perception.

But since his axe had missed, where did Shen Kai go after casting the illusion? Han Xuhan could only assume the worst.

It was high time to begin the next series of attacks.

Han Xuhan immediately stimulated the qi he had imbued in the knives he had thrown at Shen Kai just a couple of seconds ago.

After bouncing off Shen Kai, the knives had fallen around their playground. After being stimulated by Xuhan's qi, the knives did their job by exploding one after one!

Had his control over his qi been as smooth as Mu Ran, he could have made them explode mid-air while hitting Shen Kai. But Xuhan didn't mind this either. The fallen and seemingly useless knives were excellent ambush weapons in plain sight.

Boom! BOOM!

From the smoke, dirt, and surge of force produced by the explosions, Shen Kai rolled out from behind Xuhan, barely two steps away from slicing Xuhan's neck off.

"Cough...cough...Agh!"

Han Xuhan had been affected by the explosion almost as severely as Shen Kai, but he was willing to accept the damage in order to preserve his own life temporarily.

Immediately, he rolled up from the ground and saw Shen Kai sprinting toward him with superhuman speed, dagger raised, already about to cut him down in the next second.

Gasping in fear, Xuhan lifted up his arms in a furious swinging posture. After all, he still had the axes with him...except, in mid-swing, the handle of the axe left his grip and flew inches above Shen Kai's head, making him dodge.

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Both Xuhan and Shen Kai stared at the bleak sky lit by moonlight and tracked the axe flying off into the dense woods. It disappeared into a bush dozens of yards away.

"Oops, slipped my hand," Xuhan muttered nervously. Then he saw the furious expression on Shen Kai's face and added as an afterthought, "sorry for the fright."

Shen Kai felt like he hadn't just heard a righteous cultivator apologize but an abyssal devil mutter abhorrent scriptures. He had never felt so humiliated and violated in his eighteen years of life. This was...this was...he failed to come up with any appropriate word to describe his emotions right now.

"I'm going to skin you."

Completely ignoring his original intentions and his superior's orders, Shen Kai really went for the kill this time.

Shen Kai's body vanished from where he had been standing and reappeared behind Xuhan within the span of half a second. Even in his most enraged state, he wasn't stupid enough to initiate a direct attack on a cultivator who had so many tricks up his sleeve. Xuhan's reflexes were not even fast enough for him to react this time.

But Xuhan expected this to happen. So his counter move didn't have anything to do with dodging the upcoming strike, no matter which direction it would come from, no matter how fast.

Hardly had Shen Kai's body vanished from his sight when Han Xuhan shouted a one-word order.

"Attack!"

Shen Kai had just drawn his dagger back in order to strike as hard as possible at Xuhan's chest. But halfway through his strike, his superior senses perceived an object flying toward his back very fast.

Shen Kai's heart shook. Mu Ran was back?!

So fast?

Han Xuhan was using himself as a bait to lure him into action so that Mu Ran could ambush him from the dark?

Shen Kai twisted in the air like a weightless, floating leaf and avoided the object thrown at his back. From the corner of his eyes, he caught a glimpse of the object...

It was one of those axes that had 'slipped out' of Han Xuhan's hand.

So that blunder had been intentional!

Shen Kai couldn't even get angry anymore. He had reached the limit of his anger and all that was left in his mind was simple stupefaction.

A trace of fear was born in his heart as the rushing axe whipped past his right ear. Even while facing other demonic cultivators from his sect, Shen Kai had never experienced such sordid moves. Despite his superior cultivation, he had been forced to retreat to save his own neck repeatedly in this battle, not to mention that each of his own moves seemed to set him up and bring him a further disadvantage.

Was this kid really a weak cultivator at the second layer of the physique transformation realm? It felt like he was being toyed with!

Rolling in the air, Shen Kai smoothly landed on the ground and stared at the direction from where the attack had come. To his surprise, the person who attacked him wasn't visible to his enhanced eyes. The woods were full of dark, shadowy areas. The moon could not light all of it.

Shen Kai couldn't locate any sign of life ahead of him even using a special technique that took a toll on his spirit.

Shen Kai grew even more unsettled. This was not Mu Ran. Whoever had attacked him, they were an anonymous third party whose power level was unknown to him.

There was only one strategy left for Shen Kai to try. Calming his boiling nerves, Shen Kai turned toward Xuhan and decided to subdue him at the cost of fatal injuries and take him hostage to threaten the other party.

But hardly had he turned on his heels when he felt the aura of somebody at the fifth layer of the physique transformation realm behind him, hidden within the woods.

Shen Kai felt relieved knowing that the unknown third party wasn't that powerful. But then he immediately froze...

Because the aura had suddenly jumped up.

It was now at the seventh layer of the physique transformation realm, one layer above him.

Shen Kai gritted his teeth and mentally got ready to receive some serious injuries. He no longer wanted to keep on fighting. Mu Ran might actually come back for real if this continued.

But then, the aura became even stronger than before...

It was at the ninth layer of the physique transformation realm now.

Shen Kai suddenly missed his sect full of insidious demonic cultivators. That life had been so simple and peaceful.

While he was contemplating whether to beg for mercy, a confused voice came from another direction.

"Guys, why are you all still here? Eh? What's going on?"

Mu Ran finally returned from the other side of the 'trap'. Without any hesitation, Shen Kai reached into his pockets and crushed a jade talisman. To the surprise of everyone present, a red light enveloped his body out of empty air.

Shen Kai turned toward Xuhan and spoke his last words.

"We'll meet again, kid. Better prepare yourself for a surprise!"

It didn't take a genius to understand that he was using an escape method unknown to them. Fortunately, Han Xuhan recovered fast enough to gift the evil youth with some precious advice.

"In the meanwhile, you should totally take some anger management courses from your daddy! He clearly didn't beat the immorality out of you when you were developing!"

"...FUCK YOUUU!"

Those inadvertently became Shen Kai's last words as his body vanished into thin air alongside the red light. This time, Xuhan realized that it probably was real teleportation.

It must have const a precious life-saving treasure!

He suddenly felt that Shen Kai's penultimate proclamation had seemed a bit too convincing, as if Shen Kai was confident of the fact that they'd meet again.

A chill ran down Xuhan's spine. This world was too scary for a naive, pure youth like him.