Dragon Canon

Before Dragonhawk had a chance to react, he saw the scholar raise the strange weapon in his hand, aim it at his Dragon Guard, and unleash a torrent of flying swords like a raging storm.

A massive shield immediately appeared in his hand as he positioned it in front of his Dragon Guard to block the onslaught of flying swords. However, Dragonhawk immediately noted that the force being exerted on his shield was unusually light. At best, it could only be described as the level of a novice who just entered the Avatar stage. However, the flying swords were all imbued with a layer of ice-cold energy, and its level of existence was exceptionally high, instantly coating him in a thin layer of frost.

Dragonhawk’s body grew slightly numb. Not only were his movements sluggish, but even his perception had slowed down by a third. Instantly, a sense of foreboding surged within him!

At that moment, the shadow in the moon continuously spilled out otherworldly fortune, which was then absorbed by the girl Yin Yang. Her eyes slowly opened, and Dragonhawk’s figure became reflected in her pupils!

Dragonhawk let out a panic-stricken scream—which cut off abruptly. A streak of bright red sword light had swept across his body instantly!

Yin Yang vanished after that. Dozens of wisps of otherworldly fortune were barely enough for her to strike once.

Last time, when the old ghost from the lost clan had crashed into the Great Realm, it had been pure bad luck on his part. Since her sentience was formed, she expended far less energy when fighting in the Great Realm.

Having slain Dragonhawk the very moment the battle began, Wei Yuan’s spirits soared. Grasping the Immaculate Pure Land and clicking the Crimson Night Slayer of Immortals into place, he joined hands with his scholarly Dragon Guard to launch a pincer attack on the remaining Dragon Guard.

For a time, the secret realm was filled with crisscrossing sword qi and the roar of gunfire. Wei Yuan alternated between close-quarters combat and unleashing powerful gunshots, creating a spectacular display of battle.

The scholarly Dragon Guard’s rotary machine gun roared, firing hundreds of flying swords at his opponents in an instant. He effortlessly absorbed the terrifying recoil.

Wei Yuan shouted and bellowed as he teamed up with the scholar to battle the opposing Dragon Guard for six whole hours straight. Finally, he was able to exhaust his opponent’s mystic energy and secure victory.

Wei Yuan himself had emptied dozens of guns, while the scholarly Dragon Guard had unleashed an untold number of flying swords. In the Great Realm, not only were there three Dao Foundation stage warriors, but several thousand ordinary mortals that he had mobilized to craft flying swords on the spot. Even so, they could only open fire at the enemy for a little over ten seconds every ke.

When the Dragon Guard finally collapsed in defiance, he likely bore several thousand tiny wounds across his body.

Wei Yuan’s smile was a bit awkward. It was fortunate that his master couldn’t enter the Hunter’s World. Otherwise, who knows how badly he would have been scolded?

With the Dragon Guard’s death, the secret realm finally vanished, and Wei Yuan returned to the outside world.

At the moment, the shamanist was sitting cross-legged with his eyes closed and wearing a composed expression, guarding the group of exhausted Dao Foundation stage cultivators behind him. As for Zhang Sheng, she was standing with her hands behind her back and gazing at the beautiful snowy mountains, completely ignoring the Avatar-stage shamanist.

Although she possessed no Dao energy, her every gesture exuded an unparalleled air of authority. She actually intimidated the shamanist so much that he dared not act rashly.

However, everything still depended on the battle within the Hunter’s World. As long as Zhang Sheng didn’t run away, the shamanist had no intention of making a move to test her. When by Dragonhawk’s side, acting on one’s own initiative was strictly forbidden.

Just then, Wei Yuan appeared out of thin air, and the shamanist caught sight of Dragonhawk and the Dragon Guard, both seemingly unconscious or even worse, dead. Without a word, he unleashed a saber light at Zhang Sheng before turning to flee!

The saber moved neither too fast nor too slow, forcing Wei Yuan to intercept it. By the time he did, the shamanist was already far away. A bloody glow boiled around him, and he was flying almost as fast as Dragonhawk had been earlier. He was clearly burning his own lifespan and essence blood.

Wei Yuan knew immediately he couldn’t catch up, so he let him go. However, he secretly committed the shamanist’s appearance and primordial spirit signature to memory.

This fellow had escaped from Wei Yuan twice in a row now. His instinct for danger was among the best of the best, and his speed of escape ranked among the highest of all Avatars. His ability to save his own life was truly impressive. The next time they met, Wei Yuan planned to strike without hesitation. Otherwise, he might be able to escape again.

Both Dragonhawk and the Dragon Guard were True Dragon descendants. After their defeat, their primordial spirits and souls had merged with the Great Realm and begun reincarnating. As for their physical bodies and blood qi, Wei Yuan could absorb them if he wanted to.

Wei Yuan pressed a hand to Dragonhawk’s chest. With a single thought, he drew in the Liao Avatar’s blood qi like a tidal wave. He used up what he could use immediately and stored the rest throughout his body.

In the blink of an eye, Dragonhawk had turned into a desiccated corpse. Wei Yuan gave his body a light tap and saw it crumble to dust.

Wei Yuan did the same thing to the Dragon Guard, draining him until he too became a desiccated corpse. However, the amount of blood qi he extracted from the Dragon Guard was far less; less than 20% of what he had obtained from Dragonhawk to be exact.

At this point, Wei Yuan realized that there was a clear distinction in strength between True Dragon descendants and Dragon Guards. As things stood, the girl Yin Yang was far, far ahead of everyone with no rivals in sight. However, the cost of mobilizing her was also extremely high. It had been a long time since Wei Yuan had seen any otherworldly fortune, and everything he had obtained had been fed to her. Despite this, he was still significantly in the red.

Next came Dragonhawk. Had he not encountered the girl Yin Yang, he would have been capable of hunting down Wei Yuan.

After that was Dragonhawk’s Dragon Guard. It remained to be seen whether its strength would decline after another reincarnation.

Finally, the scholar and Wei Yuan tied for last place. ℯ

In fact, this ranking could be further subdivided: Wei Yuan’s Immaculate Pure Land was further enhanced by the Crimson Night Slayer of Immortals, boasting power that far surpassed that of the scholar’s rotary flying-sword cannon. Thus, if they were to compare the strength of their true bodies alone, then Wei Yuan would be placed even lower, at the very bottom of the rankings.

This devouring among True Dragon descendants was truly unholy. The world rewarded a slayer for the slaying of an Avatar, but True Dragon descendants directly devoured each other’s body and souls, leaving nothing behind.

Wei Yuan had a feeling that, assuming the True Dragon did not belong to this world, then the world it came from must have been exceptionally bloody and evil.

As for those dozen or so Liao Dao Foundations that Dragonhawk had dragged along with him, they were truly unlucky. Wei Yuan dispatched them all one by one with his sword. Then, he collected every valuable item from their bodies.

He had to admit that Dragonhawk was seriously rich. For starters, he carried a whopping three spatial artifacts with him. Wei Yuan forcibly broke open two of them, revealing an assortment of elixirs and rare natural treasures worth at least a million taels in silver. There was also an armband, but it was so well-sealed that forcing it open would have destroyed it completely and caused its contents to vanish into thin air. Wei Yuan set it aside for the time being, intending to find an opportunity to unlock it in the future.

Back in the day, Xu Jingfeng’s father, the patriarch of the Ningxi branch, had diligently embezzled funds for decades. However, all he had pilfered amounted to no more than a fraction of the pocket change Dragonhawk carried with him.

Wei Yuan merely sorted through the items briefly, stuffing a couple choice ones into Dragonhawk’s unlocked spatial artifacts. As for those items he couldn’t fit no matter what he tried, he discarded them and quickly departed.

After traveling several hundred li, despite the fact there was still some time before nightfall, Wei Yuan found a nearby cave to hide in. There, he set up an array and began gradually removing the blood tracking mark from his body.

The blood tracking mark, weaved using resentment and karma, was extremely tenacious. It wasn’t until dawn was breaking that Wei Yuan finally managed to completely remove it. If Ji Liuli had been present, she might have set up an array that used the blood tracking mark to cast a counter-curse on the shamanist instead. Alas, Wei Yuan’s skill hadn’t yet reached that level.

Wei Yuan stretched his limbs. A small portion of the blood qi within him remained unabsorbed and had temporarily settled inside his body. Dragonhawk’s mystic body had been exceptionally robust and likely not much inferior even compared to the Great Warlock, Rock Heart. It had provided more than enough sustenance for Wei Yuan’s physical body.

Speaking of which, Wei Yuan’s physical body had fully recovered. All that remained was the painstaking process of gradually breaking down the blood qi, which would also allow him to raise his upper limit a little more.

Meanwhile, the spirituality of his Dao Foundation had once again been replenished, and the ocean of spirituality had fully taken form. The numerous sentient beings roaming his Dao Foundation were all reflected within it.

Thanks to Dragonhawk’s kind donation of his Avatar and soul, Wei Yuan had accumulated enough spirit qi. Now just a hair’s breadth away from the Avatar stage, all that remained to do was seeking the right opportunity to break through.

Having devoured two True Dragon descendants in succession, Wei Yuan’s cultivation had now caught up to Zhang Sheng and Ji Liuli. In fact, he should be a hair’s breadth stronger than Bao Yun in terms of cultivation level.

Devouring a fellow descendant was definitely the surest way to power, though Wei Yuan wondered if such an unholy method might harbor hidden dangers. But even if such a risk existed, Wei Yuan could not afford to worry about it. After all, even if he chose not to devour a fellow descendant, they would come knocking on his door themselves.

Logically speaking, Dragonhawk should have two True Dragon Treasures with him. After all, he had completed one hunt. Unfortunately, Wei Yuan found nothing. He didn’t know if they were inside that spatial artifact he hadn’t managed to unlock, or if Dragonhawk simply hadn’t brought them with him.

Unfortunately, everything belonging to a True Dragon descendant could only be devoured by another True Dragon descendant. Furthermore, Wei Yuan’s Dao of pillmaking wasn’t up to snuff. Otherwise, he could have refined all these blood qi into a furnace of pills boasting miraculous healing properties. It might even have been of some use to Zhang Sheng.

Having temporarily shaken off his pursuers, Wei Yuan began to devise a plan to escape.

Once the shamanist had fled, he would surely send word to his allies. Moreover, Dragonhawk was obviously a bigshot in the Liao. He might even have been some sort of young chieftain.

Wei Yuan felt that he was the natural bane of young chieftains. He had killed a minor one before he had attained his Dao Foundation, and now he had killed a major one in the Dao Foundation stage. That said, with so many Liao tribes, Golden Hordes, and even more young chieftains around, eliminating two of them wouldn’t affect the big picture.

After some careful thinking, Wei Yuan concluded that the Liao would set up multiple checkpoints along the route south and dispatch a powerful pursuit party into the snowy mountains to hunt him down.

Thus, the keys to his escape were speed and concealment, and his greatest vulnerability lay with Zhang Sheng.

After pondering carefully for a moment, while there was still some time before dawn, Wei Yuan quickly fashioned a frame resembling a pole, with a saddle-like seat in the center and a long nozzle attached to each side[1].

Wei Yuan spent a long time making adjustments after the initial setup. By the time he was finished, the day had already broken.

Wei Yuan moved the large boulder blocking the cave entrance and carried the newly made contraption outside. After sitting down on the front part of the seat, he told Zhang Sheng to sit behind him and bound the two of them securely together using his Dao energy.

“Careful now. We’re leaving.”

Wei Yuan shielded Zhang Sheng’s entire body with his Dao energy, then leaped into the air. Immediately, powerful jets of air surged from the two nozzles and propelled them toward the horizon at a roaring pace[2].

As Wei Yuan continuously increased his input of Dao energy, they moved faster and faster until they reached a speed of 500 li per ke, or 2,000 li per hour. This speed far surpassed that of an ordinary Avatar’s flight and was only slightly slower than the top speed demonstrated by Dragonhawk.

Wei Yuan maintained this speed as he flew westward. The Shaman realm lay to the west, and their defenses should be somewhat less stringent than those of the Liao realm. As they continued westward, they covered several thousand li in the blink of an eye.

Meanwhile, at the site where Dragonhawk had fallen, several figures descended from the sky.

In the center was a Liao woman. She had fine wrinkles at the corners of her eyes and wore intricate silver ornaments in her hair. She slowly crouched down, scooped up a handful of dirt from the ground, and sensed it carefully. Her aura suddenly became terrifying, and two streams of pale silver flame shot out of her eyes!

She stopped concealing herself, unleashing her aura without restraint. Soon, a figure emerged from the depths of the snow-capped mountains. This figure stood several zhang tall, with a lizard-like head and a long tail trailing behind it.

Every time it took a step, its long tail would lash out and strike the earth, causing it to split into countless cracks. It was clearly powerful.

The Liao woman’s eyes blazed with murderous intent as she demanded, “Who killed my son?”

Its six amber eyes fixed on the woman, its gaze brimming with brutality and malice, as it spoke in a tuneless voice, “You should, have asked whether you, can leave here alive.”

Its attitude took the woman completely by surprise. Staring at the monster, she said, “My son almost became your people’s master. Now that he’s dead, you won’t even help me?”

“Now that he’s dead, he never will be.”

1. If you don’t get it, it’s a motorcycle. ☜

2. Oh damn, it’s a flying motorcycle. ☜