Chapter 3520 — Playing Them Back and Forth

Kang Zhaoming was struck dumb. He had never expected his pill-fire bomb to blow up Little Eleven, and when he saw her upper body tear free and go flying, he was frightened out of his wits.

True, it was the Five-Shas Dragon that had killed Little Eleven, but he supposed he counted as an accomplice—the pill-fire bomb had been his to throw! When they got back, would Ancestor Xuanchen blame him? What on earth was he to do?

"Bang!"

Little Eleven's two legs came down on Kang Zhaoming's head and nearly knocked him senseless. What now? Little Eleven was certainly done for, but how were they supposed to deal with the Five-Shas Dragon?

Kang Zhaoming was beginning to regret it. Wasn't he just asking for it? What had possessed him to have Zhong Yongliang suppress the beast for no reason at all? He should have just let Wei Zhao and the Five-Shas Dragon run their laps! Now look at the mess: not only was Little Eleven dead, but the Five-Shas Dragon clearly would not let the matter drop.

"Oh heavens above!" Kang Zhaoming scrambled to his feet and took to his heels. After killing Little Eleven, the Five-Shas Dragon did not go after Han Jingyi at all—it turned and came running straight at Kang Zhaoming!

Fortunately, Wei Zhao had not ordered the Five-Shas Dragon to finish Kang Zhaoming off on schedule. Killing Little Eleven was about the limit Ancestor Xuanchen could stomach, but if Kang Zhaoming died too, the Ancestor would likely fly into a rage outright.

Wei Zhao had no wish to upset the plan to open the Cloud-Tier Island, so he left Kang Zhaoming alone for the time being.

And so Wei Zhao had it easy. For the time that followed, it was simply the Five-Shas Dragon chasing Kang Zhaoming and Zhong Yongliang—now after Kang Zhaoming, now after Zhong Yongliang. Just as one of them was about to be caught, it would switch targets, letting them catch their breath before resuming the pursuit in turn.

Gradually Kang Zhaoming and Zhong Yongliang came to understand: the Five-Shas Dragon was toying with them for sport! But was the beast really that clever?

"Hey, Five-Shas Dragon, could you give it a rest? I really can't take much more!" Two days of this, and Kang Zhaoming was thoroughly wrung out. The Five-Shas Dragon would not attack anyone else—it had to keep chasing him all over the place!

Of course, whenever his strength gave out, the Five-Shas Dragon's target became Zhong Yongliang; and when Zhong Yongliang flagged, it switched back to Kang Zhaoming. Round and round it went, leaving him absolutely no way out.

The other trial participants had seen this clearly enough, and were only too glad to stay out of it. They all withdrew to one side and hid themselves, refusing to get involved—standing aloof, as though it had nothing to do with them.

The Five-Shas Dragon was only playing with them anyway, and no one was going to die. Why should they step forward and play the hero? And even if they wanted to, playing the hero required strength—and they simply did not have the strength for it.

The Five-Shas Dragon had hide like leather and flesh like stone. It was now a single step from comprehending the Heavenly Dao, on the verge of cultivating into a spirit. What hope did human cultivators like them have of matching a spirit beast like that?

Besides, had they not seen it before? Wei Zhao was a figure of what immense power—and what had come of it? Even at the peak grand-completion of the late Heaven Tier, Wei Zhao had done no more than leave the Five-Shas Dragon with a small scratch. Even if they all joined forces in a siege, they would probably exhaust themselves into idiots without dealing the beast any real harm!

Kang Zhaoming had been running for a day and a night. He had barely recovered a bit of strength when the Five-Shas Dragon came after him again. He was on the verge of going mad, and he cursed furiously: "Five-Shas Dragon, you motherless mule!"

"Roar—" The Five-Shas Dragon understood him. It quickened its pace, seized Kang Zhaoming in one claw, and said to him, "Then I'll turn you into a mule first!"

With that, the Five-Shas Dragon swung its foreleg in a wide arc, and with a "whoosh" it smashed Kang Zhaoming down into the earth—exactly as it had done with Little Eleven.

Kang Zhaoming had assumed that once the Five-Shas Dragon flung him down, he need only play dead and it would leave him be for a while. But to his surprise, no sooner had he sunk into the soil than he heard thunderous footfalls behind him!

The sound was so tremendous it could only be the Five-Shas Dragon's tread! Kang Zhaoming went pale with fright. He was no Little Eleven—he could still muster his physical strength and true qi, and the earth here was fairly loose. With one heave he burst up out of the soil, and lifting his head, saw the Five-Shas Dragon already looming before him, a claw raised to strike!

Kang Zhaoming jumped in alarm and hurriedly quickened his pace, stumbling and scrambling aside to dodge—but the Five-Shas Dragon seemed to have no intention of letting him go, and kept up the pursuit at full speed behind him!

There was nothing Kang Zhaoming could do. He laughed bitterly to himself again and again. This Five-Shas Dragon was not only highly intelligent, it could understand human speech—and speak it too! Which meant that all those plans he and Zhong Yongliang had made earlier, the Five-Shas Dragon had heard every word of them!

No wonder the beast ignored everyone else and went after the two of them alone!

At last Kang Zhaoming's strength gave out. He dropped to his knees, gasping like a dog at the point of death—and the Five-Shas Dragon came to a halt before him as well. It looked at him, did not attack, and instead ran off toward Zhong Yongliang!

Zhong Yongliang was sitting on the ground with Zhang Naipao at that moment, recovering his physical strength and true qi. Like Kang Zhaoming, he had to rely on a high-grade pill such as the Qi-Returning Pill to restore himself; in the wilds of the Five Shas, this five-shas qi could not be cultivated.

Zhang Naipao, by contrast, was absorbing the five-shas qi to cultivate. The trouble was that although he could absorb this demonic qi, his cultivation speed was far too slow—after all this time, he had not even set foot on the Yellow Tier!

He had even thought of finding a few people and using the Bee-Stealing Art to absorb their true qi—but the Bee-Stealing Art could only be used at the Mystic Tier, and it had side effects: one could not absorb endlessly, and each absorption required enough time to dissolve it.

Only at the Heaven Tier could one recklessly absorb others' true qi! That was far inferior to the Southern Dark Art! Of course, purely in terms of the Heaven Tier, the two were roughly equal in power and effect.

So even if Zhang Naipao did go looking for people to drain of strength and true qi, he would have to wait until the Mystic Tier. Right now he could barely manage the Yellow Tier, and the Cloud-Tier Island plan was already upon them.

At this rate, Zhang Naipao was surely going to miss out, and that left him somewhat dejected! After all, back at the Yellow Tier, he had gone through untold hardships to advance to the Mystic Tier!

He had no jade-pendant space like Wei Zhao, nor any heaven-defying cultivation formula like the Xuanyuan Dragon-Taming Art. Once his strength was gone, all his advantages were gone with it, and he was little better than a廢人 a useless man.

When he might rise again was anyone's guess! (Another chapter a little later; it should be done around one o'clock.) RS

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