After the Immortal Disappeared

Chapter 129: Chapter 130: Once Again...

In essence, this object was solidified Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi, capable of replenishing a Mage’s True Power. The Profound Crystal Hee Lingchuan produced was of high quality; as soon as the Mage circulated his energy, the Spiritual Qi within the crystal transformed into True Power and poured endlessly into his Dantian.

He felt like a reservoir being refilled, and he nodded quickly.

At that very moment, Lui Yao smashed through the back of a carriage with a powerful ram. The planks flew aside, and his vision instantly cleared.

From his vantage point, the entire scene on the slope unfolded before him.

’Those sons of bitches are still setting traps for me?’ Lui Yao roared, his gaze locking onto Hee Lingchuan, who was shouting commands.

’That little whelp, trying to play games with me, setting up endless obstacles? Does he really think I, Lui Yao, am some good-natured pushover?’

Powered by the Profound Crystal, the road began to freeze over much faster.

In the blink of an eye, the first layer was complete.

’Hmm, it looks very smooth.’ But Hee Lingchuan was still uneasy and told the Mage to reinforce it.

He had him reinforce it again.

And so, two more layers were laid down in succession.

In the morning light, the ice-covered road gleamed, shimmering brilliantly.

By the time he was done, the Mage was pale and swaying on his feet. Even with the Profound Crystal supplying energy, his own Spiritual Power was finite. He had never cast Magic so intensely before. After just a few dozen breaths, he was utterly spent. He felt mentally drained, as if he could lie down and sleep for three days and three nights.

Hee Lingchuan held out his hand to him. ”The rest of the Profound Crystal. Give it back to me.”

The returned Profound Crystal was two full sizes smaller.

Fuzzy Peach hauled the Mage onto a horse, ready to beat a hasty retreat with the others.

Unnoticed by anyone, behind the last line of the carriage barricade, Lui Yao suddenly stopped. He beckoned to a subordinate. ”Bring me the bow!”

An attendant immediately presented him with a bow.

Lui Yao summoned an archer, pointed at Hee Lingchuan, and ordered, ”Shoot that Hee Family brat dead! You know the one—the arrogant-looking bastard!”

Not daring to hesitate, the archer took out an arrow, nocked it, and aimed at Hee Lingchuan on the slope.

The bow’s design was more flamboyant and robust than a typical one. Its contours resembled a bat with outstretched wings, with the curve of the bow’s tips being particularly exaggerated. The bat’s ”head” was located on the grip, right where one would hold the bow and nock an arrow.

As the archer aimed, he found Hee Lingchuan’s figure blurring, making it impossible for him to get a precise lock on his position.

It was like trying to see something at the bottom of a lake through violently churning water.

’Primordial Power!’

The bow he was wielding was a true Magical Artifact, but his target’s Primordial Power was interfering with it, preventing it from working at maximum effect.

They were at a disadvantage, being common sellswords without the blessing of Primordial Power.

The archer tried twice more, but still couldn’t get a clear lock. Cold sweat beaded on his forehead.

Lui Yao glared at him from the side, hissing, ”What are you waiting for?” ’That brat is getting away.’

’There’s no getting out of this,’ the archer thought. He gritted his teeth and shouted, ”I offer a sacrifice of three years of my life!”

The words had barely left his lips when a sharp hook—it was impossible to tell if it was a claw or a fang—shot out from the bow’s grip and pierced his palm with lightning speed.

Yet the archer himself felt nothing. The strike didn’t affect the stability of his hand in the slightest. On the contrary, his spirits surged, and his vision suddenly sharpened.

The others all saw it too: a spectral image of a Ghost Eye had materialized just in front of the bow’s grip. It was deep red, with a vertical slit for a pupil and clearly visible bloodshot veins.

The pupil darted left and right, then snapped open, widening to its fullest extent like a cat’s eye in the dark.

And the archer, aiming through the Ghost Eye, could now see Hee Lingchuan’s back with perfect clarity!

With the effect at full power, all the distracting shimmers of light vanished. In the archer’s sights, there was only one thing: simple prey.

’Now!’

He aimed for the small of Hee Lingchuan’s back. With a SWISH, the fletched arrow was loosed.

The moment lasted only two short breaths before Hee Lingchuan’s figure blurred once more, the Primordial Power reasserting itself.

The bow’s special ability, it turned out, was to allow its user to briefly exploit a gap in the fluctuations of Primordial Power and deliver a fatal strike.

As soon as the arrow was released, the archer began gasping for air as if he’d just run a great distance without stopping. His previous composure was gone, replaced by a pale face and blue lips.

He had been a tall, thin man of about forty with a sallow complexion. To onlookers, the change in him was plain to see:

The wrinkles at the corners of his eyes had deepened, his eyes had grown cloudier, his chin seemed sharper, and his frame had thinned.

All in all, in the space of a few short breaths, the archer appeared to have aged three to five years.

This was the price for wielding the bow. A price Lui Yao was unwilling to pay himself, so he made others pay it for him.

The Ghost Eye before the bow vanished. Lui Yao snatched the weapon from the archer, handed it to a subordinate to be put away, and yelled, ”Smash through these damn carts!”

...

Just around the bend ahead lay safety, a temporary reprieve from the bandits’ ranged attacks.

Hee Lingchuan was about to spur his horse onward when the Broken Blade at his waist suddenly vibrated. Simultaneously, a chill crept up his spine, causing his heart to clench violently.

His sixth sense was screaming a warning:

’Something terrifying is hurtling toward me from behind, and it’s incredibly fast!’

With no time to think or even turn his head, Hee Lingchuan snatched the shield from his back and flung it behind him.

It was as if a firm, steady voice in his mind urged him:

’Jump!’

For reasons he couldn’t explain, Hee Lingchuan obeyed without a moment’s hesitation.

With a dull THUD, the light shield—painstakingly crafted from hundred-year-old mountain vines soaked in tung oil, then put through nine cycles of steaming and sun-drying—shattered into countless pieces on impact.

This was a shield that boasted both hardness and resilience. Forget shattering it in a single blow—even if you left it for someone to hack away at with a sword or an axe, it would take them a very long time to break through it.

And yet, it hadn’t stood a chance.

After shattering the shield, the object’s velocity barely slowed before it continued its forward rush.

Hee Lingchuan had just jumped from his horse, landing in a tumble, his momentum nearly sending him into a face-plant. Luckily, this body of his was incredibly agile. He stumbled forward several awkward steps, but he managed to stop himself on a large rock at the very edge of the cliff.

Before him was a bottomless abyss. ’That was close.’

’As for why I didn’t jump the other way—it was too dangerous. The other side was a flurry of hooves from the other mounts. If I had jumped there, I’d have been trampled into a cripple.’

Hee Lingchuan was still inwardly congratulating himself on his choice when the ground beneath his feet gave way—

’Son of a bitch, the big rock I landed on is loose.’

After standing there for years on end, weathered by sun and wind, the rock was solid in appearance only. How could it possibly withstand the powerful impact of a young man’s landing?

It promptly broke into four or five pieces, plummeting into the godforsaken abyss along with the one responsible for its demise!

”******” Hee Lingchuan screamed.

’Why is it always a cliff?!’

’Can’t my death be a little more original?’

’Is the only difference between me and this body’s original owner that he already fell off a cliff and died, while I’m just on my way down?’

But even as he was cursing his head off in free fall, he saw a white shadow flash over his horse’s back, and a spray of blood erupted from his mount’s neck!