The bloody and utterly unexpected sight stunned the other Ten Directions Cultist.
This was the exact opportunity Zou Feng had been waiting for!
His Toad Stance had long been Gathering Strength. Seizing the moment while his opponent was dazed, Zou Feng’s legs suddenly exploded with power.
Amidst a thunderous crack, he shot out like an arrow.
The man frantically threw a punch to meet Zou Feng’s powerful palm strike.
As Lotus flowers bloomed, ripples of Inner Qi erupted from the point of impact between their fist and palm.
A horrifying crack of breaking bone followed immediately after.
His Refined Skill in the Black Tortoise Sea-Suppressing Force made his Inner Qi nearly as dense as a Seventh Grade Martial Artist’s.
Coupled with the Burial Flower Seal from his Five Poison Fire Lotus Skill, shattering the arms of an Eighth Grade Martial Artist was no difficult task.
And with the bones in his arms shattered, the Ten Directions Cultist’s defenses naturally collapsed.
Zou Feng’s Palm Technique didn’t stop. He landed seven or eight more strikes before brushing past the man.
The man stood frozen in place, his face a mask of terror.
’The gruesome death of my companion is still seared into my mind. Now I’ve been hit by those palms, too. Doesn’t that mean...’
Just as he feared, in the next moment, he saw the places where he’d been struck suddenly begin to swell as if being pumped full of air.
All the Ten Directions Cultist could do was let out incessant, terrified screams.
"BANG! BANG! BANG—"
The large, swollen lumps exploded one after another, quickly reducing the man to a pile of bloody mush.
In truth, even Zou Feng himself was a little surprised he could counter-kill two Eighth Grade Ten Directions Cultists so decisively.
To be fair, ever since succeeding in his Fusion Skill and mastering three Cultivation Skills to the Realm of Refining Fire, he had never truly gone all out.
Even assassinating Su Changqing of the Celestial Essence Sword Sect had only been a small test of his abilities. After all, Su Changqing was already half-dead at the time, ravaged by the side effects of his own skills.
Now, after this successful counter-attack, Zou Feng had a much clearer understanding of his own strength.
Simply put, killing Eighth Grade opponents was now like child’s play for him.
He even had a decent chance of taking down a Seventh Grade opponent.
’But the Celestial Essence Sword Sect and the Ten Directions Sect sent two Sixth Grade masters, not to mention several Seventh Grade ones. I shouldn’t get ahead of myself. I need to keep running as far as I can.’
Without a moment’s hesitation, Zou Feng immediately started running again.
He didn’t have time to deal with the bodies, but Zou Feng hadn’t forgotten to snatch the treasure the Ten Directions Cultist had just picked up.
It was a small, quaintly-styled vial, only a finger tall.
But now was not the time to examine it closely.
There was a reason for Zou Feng’s sudden greed for the Immortal Treasure.
If a Seventh Grade expert pursued him later, he could throw the vial to create a distraction.
Of course, the most important thing was that the Ten Directions Cultist had practically delivered the treasure right to his doorstep. How could he refuse?
As for those Mystical Inference Skills that he couldn’t yet comprehend...
First, he was certain that these Inference Skills had significant limitations.
Otherwise, the Celestial Essence Sword Sect and the Ten Directions Sect wouldn’t just be showing up now.
They would have snatched the treasure directly from Chen Jingsheng and Zhu Qiming long ago.
Besides, when the Immortal Treasure opened, more than ten items had burst out. Surely they couldn’t track every single one, could they?
After running for a long time, Zou Feng reached the bank of the East River and decisively jumped into the water.
He was clearly choosing to travel underwater again.
It was the best way to cover his tracks at the moment.
After walking along the riverbed for a while, Zou Feng began to check the List of Gods.
The names of Zhu Qiming, Wei Lingyun, and He Qingzhi were gone.
Zou Feng wasn’t surprised. Both Zhu Qiming and Wei Lingyun had let greed overcome their fear, trying to enter the "Immortal Mansion" which was basically just a mirage like the Sea Market Morning Building.
As for He Qingzhi, under the influence of "Laziness," he likely hadn’t been motivated enough to flee and was easily caught.
It was normal for the Ten Directions Sect not to let anyone present at the scene get away.
He just didn’t know if the disciples of the Celestial Essence Sword Sect had also participated in the hunt.
’Logically, silencing witnesses should be completely unnecessary for the Sword Sect.’
’After all, if the Celestial Essence Sword Sect obtained the Immortal Treasure, who would dare try to steal it from them?’
’For a Major Sect, this kind of opportunity is probably just a nice-to-have, not a must-have.’
’Otherwise, they wouldn’t have sent only one Gang Qi Realm disciple.’
’But since Zhu Qiming and the other two are dead, Chen Jingsheng probably didn’t make it either...’
But there was nothing to be done about it. Chen Jingsheng’s obsession ran too deep, and he had sacrificed too much.
In order to win the competition, he had fanatically practiced an Evil Skill to forcibly raise himself to the Seventh Grade Realm, but it had left him with a massive hidden danger.
If he couldn’t obtain the Immortal Treasure and find a way to resolve this hidden issue, it wasn’t a matter of whether he could continue to break through to higher realms; his body would soon be overwhelmed and collapse completely.
The only remaining question was whether Wang Xingjian had managed to escape.
Like him, Wang Xingjian had decisively chosen to flee from the very beginning. His chances of getting away should have been quite high.
After swimming out of the East River, Zou Feng hid in the shantytown for a while before changing back into his original clothes and heading for the Dragon Gate Boat as if nothing had happened.
Zhu Qiming and the others had met their end. As for the two groups there, even without a disguise, no one would have recognized him.
So, as long as Wang Xingjian wasn’t captured alive and interrogated, there was no risk of his identity being exposed.
Back at the Dragon Gate Boat, Zou Feng nonchalantly walked into the pharmacy.
In the pharmacy’s front hall, Wang Xingjian was already sitting there, looking as if he’d been waiting for him.
Seeing this, Zou Feng breathed a quiet sigh of relief. Since Wang Xingjian hadn’t been caught, neither the Celestial Essence Sword Sect nor the Ten Directions Sect would know his identity.
Another reason he was so sure was that no new names had appeared on the List of Gods.
"Worthy Brother!" Seeing Zou Feng return, Wang Xingjian was both surprised and overjoyed, and he immediately stood up.
But he didn’t say much more, wary of prying ears.
"Brother Wang, you’re here? Let’s talk inside!" Zou Feng continued to act as if nothing was wrong, gesturing for Wang Xingjian to enter the back room.
Once they were in the back room, Wang Xingjian lowered his voice. "The Hall Master... I’m afraid he’s likely dead..."
"There was nothing we could do. We couldn’t talk him out of it." Zou Feng sighed. "By the way, Brother Wang, are you sure you weren’t followed?"
Wang Xingjian nodded. "My Luck was pretty good. None of the treasures that flew out landed in the direction I was fleeing, so no one chased me from start to finish."
That was indeed the case. Zou Feng had seen it too.
"But, although the Hall Master has probably met his end, if they find out his identity and start to suspect that the two of us, being close to him, might have also been there..." This was precisely why Wang Xingjian had come here to wait for Zou Feng immediately after escaping.
If he felt it was no longer safe to stay, he planned to persuade Zou Feng to run away with him.
But Zou Feng said, "It won’t come to that. We don’t have any treasures on us now. There’s no reason for them to go out of their way to cause trouble for us."
"Besides, the Celestial Essence Sword Sect and the Ten Directions Sect both managed to grab a few treasures. Their top priority now will definitely be to keep fighting each other over them. There’s really no need to investigate who we are."
"There’s no real benefit to silencing us!"
In fact, Wang Xingjian could have figured this all out himself, but Chen Jingsheng’s death had hit him hard, leaving him in a state of panic.
After listening to Zou Feng, he calmed down considerably.
"You’re right. I was just about to suggest we run away together, but now that I think about it, with the Southern Prince rebelling and chaos on the horizon, it’s not like anywhere else is safe either..." Wang Xingjian lamented.
Zou Feng nodded. "That may be true, but we still need to be on our guard. The Celestial Essence Sword Sect shouldn’t be a problem, but the Ten Directions Sect might still come after us like mad dogs."
After discussing it for a while longer, Wang Xingjian finally felt more at ease and took his leave from the pharmacy.
Afterwards, Zou Feng went about his business as usual. In short, he had to pretend nothing had happened.
But when he was called to spar with Bian Yixia that evening, she noticed something was off.
"What’s wrong? Something on your mind today?"
After the spar, Zou Feng was sure he hadn’t shown any obvious emotion, but Bian Yixia had still sensed something was amiss.
He could only say that the woman had incredible intuition.
Knowing she wouldn’t believe a direct denial, Zou Feng made something up. "Miss, your perception is as sharp as ever. Actually... a few days ago, I was invited to the Furong Pavilion and met the courtesan, Liu Xian’Er..."
Bian Yixia rolled her eyes. "Huh? You’re pining over some brothel girl?"
"Er, Liu Xian’Er is still a Pure Official..."
"A hooker is a hooker, ’Pure Official’ or not. You have great Talent in the Martial Dao, don’t let this kind of nonsense affect your state of mind!" By the end, her tone was filled with disappointment, as if scolding someone for not living up to their potential.
Zou Feng seized the opportunity to agree. "Miss is right. It was just a moment of foolishness on my part."
"By the way, have you heard? Sun Kai, the Dragon Head of the Mountain and River Association, has issued me a challenge," Bian Yixia said, changing the subject.
The Mountain and River Association had been clashing with the Black Flood Dragon Gang recently, and the fighting was escalating.
But Zou Feng had been so focused on the competition for the Immortal Treasure that he had made all sorts of excuses to avoid getting involved.
’It seems this gang war has reached a fever pitch, huh?’
It had actually come down to a one-on-one duel between the leaders of the two gangs.
However, with Deng Guangxin, the Gang Leader of the Black Flood Dragon Gang, absent, the de facto leader was indeed Bian Yixia, not Vice Gang Leader Xiang Kang.
That was why the Dragon Head of the Mountain and River Association had challenged Bian Yixia.
"A challenge?"
"Yes. Not a friendly spar, but a duel to the death!" Bian Yixia said this in an understated tone.
This proved she was extremely confident about the fight.
"Miss, do you have..."
Before Zou Feng could finish, Bian Yixia waved her hand dismissively. "Don’t say those sappy things. Sun Kai is just banking on the fact that he reached Seventh Grade a few years before I did."
"I admit he’s got some skill, but for him to challenge me this time is no different from committing suicide!"