Chapter 192: War: Killing without Fighting
The man closed his eyes as if waiting for the impact, but the blackish arrow could barely penetrate a little of his bone before it was stopped.
"Huh, was I scared for nothing?" the bald man doubted as his veins popped in anger. He opened his eyes to see the arrow melting towards him.
"What's this..." he thought. However, the moment he opened his eyes, a scalding heat slowly burned his skin.
Even a war veteran like himself felt pain that he couldn't bear.
Ahhh!
He roared in pain. The more time passed, the hotter the arrow became, penetrating his bone effortlessly as it burned his internal organs.
The bald man wanted to stop the flame with his wind Qi; however, the moment he did, the flame became even hotter and stronger.
"This... this is demonic Qi?" the old man muttered with widened eyes.
"Welp, took you long enough to figure it out," Lu Zhen sneered as he disappeared from his position.
"Damn," the man gritted his teeth as he took out his sword from his waist and blocked Lu Zhen's attack with the sword.
Lu Zhen frowned when he sensed the strength of the old man, who was blocking his sword almost effortlessly. However, a sly smile crept up on his face.
"Let's play some game, old man," he said before disappearing, blending into the shadows.
"You know this trick is useless against me," the man chuckled as he tapped into his mental energy. However, the moment he did, he frowned with astonishment.
"He isn't even in the range of my sixth sense..."
However, before he could think further, the sheer heat emanating from his chest made him vomit blood as his internal organs started to burn.
Cough! Cough!
The man wanted to remove the arrow; however, another arrow came at him, now aiming directly for his head, which made him helpless.
He gritted his teeth as he could only dodge the arrows.
"Now this is fun..." Lu Zhen thought as he shot an arrowless bow again, and an arrow appeared once more, shooting at the bald man who wanted to take out his arrow again.
However, after releasing five or so shots, Lu Zhen frowned.
"I am running out of demonic Qi," he thought. Although previously he had plenty of demonic Qi, it was pretty much all used when he faced those giant eyes at the bottom of the river.
Lu Zhen had meditated a little to gain more demonic Qi; however, the time wasn't nearly enough for him to gather much of it, which is the reason he was running out of demonic Qi so quickly.
His eyes flashed with a ruthless glint as he looked at the man who was again trying to remove the searing-hot arrow from his chest while expecting another arrow.
Rustle!
"There," the bald man thought as he was about to dodge right; however, suddenly his survival instinct screamed as he looked back to see Lu Zhen up close with a smile on his face.
"Hello there."
The bald man blackflipped before he turned around and started to laugh.
"As expected of a brat..." He was about to make a move as his hands came forward; however, the moment it did....
Shin!
His hand was cut in two as his blood splattered, showing very thin needles coated in blood-red.
"This..." his eyes widened as he looked around, and everywhere there were many thin strings that even he couldn't see if he never looked carefully.
"Did you think I am some naive person..." Lu Zhen's sneering voice reverberated in the surroundings again as he shot another arrow at him.
The man was helpless as he could only defend against the arrows with gritted teeth.
Slash!
The searing-hot arrow penetrated his right arm bone, emitting a burning pain that made the man cry in agony.
"This little bastard..." the man thought as his mind swirled with thoughts of escaping his predicament. Although he might not be as talented as Lu Zhen, or even as strong, he had one thing: experience.
The bald man closed his eyes as another arrow came straight at him. However, he remained unmoving, and at the point of contact with him, he dodged slightly to the right, narrowly avoiding the arrow.
"Idiot..." Lu Zhen muttered as he wanted to take another shot; however, his demonic Qi was completely drained now.
"Damn it, my demonic Qi depleting so fast was a little bit off the calculation."
While Lu Zhen could directly fight the old man, he simply didn't want to. This wasn't a game; this was real life. Given the option to fight the opponent from a distance, saving his life, why would he mindlessly confront the man in close combat where unexpected variables could occur? This would be simply stupid for Lu Zhen.
He grabbed one of the ordinary bows and started to shoot at him with normal arrows, although the damage would be minimal. Lu Zhen could at least drain the man's Qi. After all, the man was a sitting duck right now.
Time passed as the man dodged the arrows. However, most of the time, they hit him. Occasionally, he would dodge one in fifty arrows. Even when the arrows landed on him, they were deflected by his force field, as the power wasn't enough to penetrate it.
"Damn it, I will run out of wind Qi soon like this," the man gnashed his teeth in anger as he looked at the arrows that were continuously arriving.
However, he had a small smile on his face.
"The backup should arrive... eh..."
His world spun around as his vision rotated 360 degrees before he saw his headless body and a cold, handsome youth with long black hair and red eyes staring coldly at him.
"Emotionless," his eyes widened.
Thus!
His head fell to the ground with a sickening thud, with open eyes full of horror.
"Welp, my job is done here..." Lu Zhen stretched his body; however, he had a thoughtful expression on his face.
"Might as well loot it." He looked at the headless body on the floor as blood gushed like a fountain. Lu Zhen could even see the internal organs of the man from the beheaded part.
Ignoring this gruesome sight, he searched the blood-soaked body of the man and could only find a pouch containing several mid-grade Qi stones.
"Tsk, I was expecting more..." Although excitement still reflected in his eyes, he cursed the corpse of the man before kicking the headless body, destroying it.
Then he lit a fire and burned the man's corpse; however, Lu Zhen frowned as the bones and organs of the man were too hard to burn.
"Oh, I guess I need some war credits anyway," Lu Zhen thought as he dragged the mangled body of the man while carrying the head with another one back to the fortress.
....
"Do you think young master would be alright?" Lu Wi said with some worry in her tone.
"How would I know?" Li Jiao said helplessly as she looked at the girl while internally shaking her head.
"Young hearts are fickle." Although Lu Wi might be considered an adult in a normal human understanding, they are martial artists who have more vitality than an ordinary person by several times.
Their period of youth was naturally longer and more, from a third-stage martial artist's perspective, she was still considerably younger.
"So, is young master fine or not?" Lu Wi started to worry about Lu Zhen as she began biting her own nails.
The poor girl didn't even realize that she had already fallen for his charm.
Suddenly, there was an exclamation in the camp, and Lu Wi instantly dashed outside with lit eyes.
"Sigh, love..." Li Jiao shook her head. Although Lu Zhen was handsome and his recent achievements were truly terrifying, to say the least, she didn't truly love him. In this cruel world, she believed that there was no such thing, and even if there was, she wanted to stay away as much as possible.
Love makes you blind!
Li Jiao had experienced true hardship, unlike these greenhorn people. Sure, they too practised martial arts, and they were stronger than her.
However, being born as an ordinary girl and entering the Lu family to become an external elder was a difficult feat that was at least hundreds of times harder for her than the four others who were basically fed resources since they were babies and if they had a little bit of talent were nurtured heavily.
While she had to fight with countless others like her to get the resources that she wanted however Li Jiao didn't blame the Lu family after all this was the way the world worked.