The crossbow bolts broke through the air as they fired toward him, their might not much inferior compared to the Stone Rending Bow. “Dang Dang Dang Dang.” They pierced the iron armor and stabbed into Li Qingshan’s body. Li Qingshan’s figure immediately froze.
Xiong Xiangwu smirked coldly: “Are you fit to fight a battle with me with just by yourself. I’m already letting you off easy with this death!” He’d spent quite a bit of effort before he managed to procure those dozen crossbows. He’d also spent a great amount of time to train those crossbowmen. They were the Black Wind Camp’s true trump card.
He did the greatest of evils and the other influences in Suncheer City saw him as a thorn in their sides. He wouldn’t even be able to fall asleep without some safeguards. When those strong crossbows mounted an ambush, even a first grade master would have trouble escaping from death.
“And then?” The Li Qingshan who should have definitely died suddenly lifted his head and asked this. The crossbow bolts were nailed into the iron armor but couldn’t penetrate through to his muscles. But he was also drenched in cold sweat. If he didn’t have this iron armor to protect his body and dispel the bolts’ power, his “Bull Demon Skin Refining” would definitely not have blocked the violent shots from the strong crossbows. Even so, he only survived after spending his efforts. Strong bows and powerful crossbows were truly a killing master’s divine weapons.
“Protect the crossbowmen, fire again!” The second boss issued his order in a loud voice. The bandits rushed up while the crossbowmen hurried to reload their bolts. The crossbows were strong and easy to use, but their speed was far from bows, hence it was easy to be injured using them. However, such an order could make them display their greatest lethality as it commanded a group of mountain brigands just like a trained army.
“Sweep Across a Thousand Soldiers!” How would Li Qingshan willingly be a sitting duck. He identified the place with the greatest amount of bandits and operated the Tyrant Spear Art, charging forward like a chariot. The might of the spear surged on, drawing a dozen bandits inside just like a black dragon swallowing its preys. When the time came to spit them back out, they had directly become a dozen dead corpses.
How could they block him with just those few men.
A crossbowmen hadn’t had time yet to pull the string open that his chest had been pierced through by the great spear. The body around a hundred pounds was lifted up and sent flying, crashing into another crossbowman in the distance.
Li Qingshan and his spear merged into one as he charged left and dashed right amidst the crowd of men. There was only attacking and no defending. Swords spears and halberds fell on his body but immediately bounced on his armor, not injuring him a single hair, while his great spear pierced through chests and broke skulls each time it waved, leaving no injured behind, only the dead.
In a short moment he’d already killed several dozen bandits, and half the crossbowmen had also been killed. He stood among the group of brigands, more than ten bolts nailed into his armor, soaked in fresh blood from head to toes. A fright strong enough to break their guts sprung unbidden inside the bandits.
A bandit wanted to sneak attack him behind his back. Li Qingshan turned his head around, red light flashing inside his eyes. Before he had time to act, that bandit’s face suddenly became ashen, actually scared into death.
Xiong Xiangwu watched with a raging heartache. His foundations would still be greatly damaged even if he won this time. The other bosses also had ugly expressions. The height of this Li Qingshan’s martial arts could be said to surpa.s.s their imagination.
The second boss said: “Bosses don’t worry. This Li Qingshan wields a great spear and wears an iron armor, he looks invulnerable and his power boundless. But he needs to carry a weight of several hundred pounds, he can’t possibly last long no matter how high his martial arts. There’s no harm in waiting until he gets tired before acting. The loss of subordinates can be recruited back.”
There was little of what great war of three days and three nights when it came to a contest between masters. There were even very few such contest that lasted longer than the time of a cup of tea, because weapons were vicious and battles dangerous. A single careless move would be a death sentence. Martial artists had to burst out with their strength and will in the s.p.a.ce of a moment, overwhelming the enemy in a burst of energy.
Xiong Xiangwu made the decision. He thought that even himself wouldn’t last long after pulling the Stone Rending Bow several dozen times and rushing into melee with such weapon and equipment. A man would only be trampled down once his stamina ran out, even if his skills were vast as the sky. This was the frightfulness of war. A horde of ants biting an elephant to death wasn’t a mere saying.
But how could they imagine that Li Qingshan not only didn’t manifest any exhaustion, he became more valiant as the fight went on instead. The gourd of spiritual wine he drank down had stunning medicinal effects indeed as it combusted inside his body like a raging flame. His strength continued to gush out, and the Tyrant Spear danced like a blur in his hands. The spear followed the man’s movements and killed to his heart’s content, soaking him in blood from head to toes. The he cultivated wasn’t something common martial arts could compare to either. What men most praised about a bull wasn’t its strength, but usually its endurance.
Sweat ran on the second boss’ forehead as he saw the bandits almost defeated, dying more and more, their corpses piling onto the ground: “What’s happening?”
The snow became stronger, the snowflakes big as goose feathers. They fell onto the earth and covered a thousand mountains.
They fell on Li Qingshan, but were immediately swept out by the ferocious wind of the spear. A bandit was p.r.i.c.ked up and sent flying, falling onto the ground, dyeing a patch of snowy land into a patch of blood red. There wasn’t a single shred of ferocious aura left on the remaining bandits as they retreated back in panic. Li Qingshan stilled the great spear in his hands: “What a great snow!”
Xiong Xiangwu ordered decisively: “Begin!” He flew down together with the other bosses. The bandits’ morale immediately soared up.
The seventh boss smashed his hammer1 downward as it whistled through the air. It had already created a hurricane of astonishing might before it even collided down, shocking men’s guts and livers. He was born with great strength and could kill tigers and bears.
The second boss said: “Don’t face him head on!”
“All the better if you come!”
Li Qingshan used a “Tyrant Lifting a Cauldron” move, the Tyrant Spear oppressively propping upwards
A huge “Clang” echoed as spear and hammer collided. The hammer flew back and smashed on the seventh boss’ head, his brain bursting out.
Taking this opportunity, the fourth boss’ three-segmented baton2whipped at Li Qingshan’s hips, the fifth boss chopped powerfully at Li Qingshan’s back with a ghost-headed saber, while the second boss concealed himself among their momentum, insidiously pointing at the unguarded back of Li Qingshan’s head with an iron-ribbed fan3.
But the most dangerous was still Xiong Xiangwu’s palm clutching towards his face.
Even if Li Qingshan could withstand those attacks thanks to his iron armor and the Bull Demon Skin Refining, the strength of their charge would still make him suffer incomparable pain, and then his body would stiffen. He could be fooled at the slightest carelessness.
He finally understood why even an old hand of the martial world like Liu Hong had changed his expression when he heard him talk about leveling the Black Wind Camp. He’d refused to believe that the danger within was so unimaginably great.
“Bull Demon Ground Stamp!” He was suddenly hit by an idea. All of the true qi poured into his right foot as it stamped heavily into the ground. It triggered a small earthquake inside a radius of ten feet. The ground’s surface cracked and sank down, the shockwaves rolling in every direction.
Martial arts paid special attention to drawing strength from the ground, rooting your foot down. No one could leave the soil under their feet as long as they hadn’t cultivated to a divine immortal who could command the wind and soar with the clouds. The several bosses’ hands attacked like the wind, but their feet were stepped tightly on the ground.
Their figures immediately became unbalanced when Li Qingshan stamped his foot down. They felt shockwaves a.s.sault them following alongside their feet, their heads spinning dizzy until they wanted to vomit blood. Their offensives also became messy and powerless when they fell on Li Qingshan’s body, not showing any result. There was only Xiong Xiangwu with the highest martial arts among them who could preserve the strength of his clutching palm.
Li Qingshan laughed out loud and retreated back, dodging Xiong Xiangwu’s claws to his face. He knocked violently into the fourth boss behind his back, while his spear stabbed straight at Xiong Xiangwu’s chest at the same time.
The fourth boss screamed miserably, the bones of his whole body fracturing into pieces as he flew back out. Xiong Xiangwu pulled his palm back and twisted his body, temporarily avoiding Li Qingshan’s dragon-like spear.
The fifth boss had the weakest martial arts and he hadn’t come back to his senses yet at this time. Li Qingshan let go of the spear and stretched his hand out to grab his skull, then threw it to the ground. With a “Peng,” white and red all flowed out just like a broken watermelon. He recovered the Tyrant Spear with a backhand and held it horizontally in front of his body, displaying the posture of the “Tyrannical Barrier.”
He’d broken the Black Wind Camp offensive in the blink of an eye, and even killed four bosses. Third-grade masters were like young children in front of him, so weak they couldn’t withstand a single blow.
The rest of the bandits stood dumbfounded as if they had been struck by a paralysis spell. They hadn’t thought that their own mountain camp was actually so fragile, fragile just like the villages they had devastated.
The snow fell increasingly stronger. The snowy ground was dyed blood red by the flowing blood, then once again covered and frozen by the great snow, congealing into a desperate sight mixing red and white.
The pledge to level the Black Wind Camp was being achieved bit by bit!
1. Chinese hammer/mace, with usually a rounded blunt head instead of f.l.a.n.g.ed or protruding heads like occidental maces and hammers.