“Big brother! Are you finished yet?! I’ve said it wasn’t me!” The howls of Bai Yunfei reverberated throughout the forests.

Twenty minutes pa.s.sed since the chase started. The two of them had already arrived in the valley and blazed into the forest for several more minutes, but that only showed how h.e.l.lbent the scorpion was on chasing Bai Yunfei.

“f.u.c.king h.e.l.l! If you keep chasing me, then I’ll start to get really angry!” He had had enough. Swapping out for several strength-increasing accessories, Bai Yunfei swapped from escape mode into battle mode. The continuous chase from start to finish only served to anger him–he wasn’t some sort of person you could slap this way and that without resistance!

Hopping over at treetop, Bai Yunfei prepared to whirl around to retaliate when suddenly; a stinging pain spiked through his head. Following that sting, Bai Yunfei felt his legs grow weak as if threatening to fall down from the tree he was on.

“Wha–s.h.i.+t! I’m poisoned!” Bai Yunfei screamed silently to himself when he realized the reason for his predicament. That poison he thought he managed to escape from back in the cave, it finally started to show its true effects now!

“Skreee!”

The scorpion had been waiting for this moment for a very long time now. Two blades of wind materialized straight away to slam into Bai Yunfei before he could move. Struggling as hard as he could, Bai Yunfei barely managed to dodge the wind so that they instead slammed into the tree branch he was on. But with his footing gone, Bai Yunfei soon fell to the ground afterwards.

Unwilling to give him the chance to respond, the two wings on its back started to beat rapidly. With a swing of its tail, the stinger flew straight for Bai Yunfei as if it was a bat ready to strike into a ball.

Another pleased cry erupted from the scorpion when Bai Yunfei flew off into the nearby grove after a successful strike. Just as it prepared itself to give chase, a sudden splas.h.i.+ng sound entered its ears. Something fell into the water.

Dazed by this unexpected sound, the scorpion hurried after Bai Yunfei only to realize that its prey had fallen off over a precipice to splash into the river underneath it. By the time the scorpion reached the precipice, Bai Yunfei had already been rushed away by the river and away from the scorpion.

He’s trying to escape by using the river!

This was what the scorpion thought.

But the next words that came out from Bai Yunfei’s mouth nearly forced the scorpion to fall out from the sky.

“Save me! I can’t swimmm!”

Watching Bai Yunfei be swept away by the stream, the scorpion could only really stand there in silent shock. With a screeching sound, it turned away and left.

For a Middle-grade Soul Sprite, being dropped into the water wasn’t really a danger, even if they couldn’t swim. And being poisoned so that they weren’t able to move their bodies as efficiently wouldn’t be life-threatening either.

But if both conditions were to be met, then there was another story to be told altogether.

Bai Yunfei felt so sour that he wanted to die almost. It took an extraordinarily large amount of strength to take down the scorpion, but then the treasure had been taken by someone else! Then he was taken down from the stage just like that after such a hard attempt to escape–if he knew about this beforehand, Bai Yunfei would’ve utterly crippled the scorpion.

It was too late for such thoughts however. Several mouthfuls of water and leaves had already been swallowed before Bai Yunfei could take advantage of a brief moment of clarity to circulate his soulforce into his limbs to try and find something to grab onto. It was to his glee that a st.u.r.dy tree branch could be felt. It wasn’t enough to stay afloat on, but it’d be enough to give him enough time to flush out the poison in his system and escape from the river.

The sounds of water cras.h.i.+ng down over itself knocked Bai Yunfei’s plan out of the water however. The sight that greeted his eyes when he lifted his head forced all of the blood in his face to drain away. “f.u.c.k!!!!” He cried out in agony. “Why do I have such bad luck!?”

Just several hundred meters ahead of him was a tremendous waterfall!

His head looked up towards the sky to mutter a quick prayer, “Dear G.o.d, I was wrong! I shouldn’t have blamed you for my sense of direction! But…do you really have to screw with me like this….”

The closer and closer he got to the edge of the waterfall, the more frantic Bai Yunfei got. Trying as hard as he could to devise of a way to save his life, the splas.h.i.+ng sound of something else falling into the water caught his attention. Turning his head, he could see the scrawny figure of a person swimming towards him like a fish.

Joy seized Bai Yunfei’s heart. There was a person to save him! Flailing around with all his strength, Bai Yunfei tried to reach the other person.

This new person had quite the swimming ability. In just a mere ten seconds, he reached where Bai Yunfei was and grabbed onto his arm before turning around to swim to sh.o.r.e.

With just a hundred meters to go before the point of no return, Bai Yunfei had been saved. Beating his chest as hard as he could to expel the water in him, Bai Yunfei tilted his head weakly towards his savior.

What greeted his eyes was a dark-skinned, long-haired young male around his age. Draped in a simple cotton robe, a single rattan rope was tied from a nearby tree trunk to his waist.

“Th-cough-thank you. I’d be in deep waters if not for you.” Bai Yunfei coughed out his thanks to his savior.

“Haha, don’t mention it, I was just pa.s.sing by. It’s only natural to help someone in need. How’d you fall in the water?” The youngster cracked a smile as he wrung water from his clothes.

“I er….careless, you know….just being careless….” Bai Yunfei laughed awkwardly.

Choosing not to pursue the question, the youngster stood up. “I’m Shao Ling, what’s your name, big brother?”

“Bai Yunfei.”

“Gotcha. Why don’t we head back to my house and get you some dry clothes, you’ll fee–”

“Careful!”

In the midst of Shao Ling’s speech, Bai Yunfei let out a cry before diving towards Shao Ling to tackle him to the ground.

At the same time of his cry, a multicolored tiger erupted from the thickets to the left of Shao Ling. There was no premonition to its pounce other than the growl a split-second beforehand. Shao Ling had only enough time to turn his head to see the b.l.o.o.d.y jaws of the tiger come at him. The grisly stench of blood and gore was abundant in its smell. All the tiger needed to do was to clamp down with its jaws and Shao Ling would be a head short of a body.

White greeted his eyes. All it was he could do to just close his eyes.

“Bang!”

A cracking sound greeted his ears following the painful growl of a tiger. Opening his eyes just a crack, he could see Bai Yunfei with his fist held back and the retreating figure of a tiger back into the forest.

“You okay there?”

Bai Yunfei asked with slight concern.

“Ah? Oh! Ye-yea, thank you brother Bai….”

“Haha, don’t worry about it, we’re even now!” Bai Yunfei waved his hand with a smile. He had been given enough time earlier to completely neutralize the poison so that movement wouldn’t be a challenge.

For several minutes, Shao Ling stared wide-eyed at Bai Yunfei in silence. “Big brother Bai….you…you beat off that tiger? Bu-but…even that’s a little to–”

“A little too what? I’ve learned how to fight, fighting a wild beast like that isn’t a problem.” Bai Yunfei shrugged it off with a smile. Looking at the thicket, he continued to say, “Aren’t we going back to your home? Let’s go then. I’ve used up a lot of energy today, I need a rest!”

“O-ooh. Got it, we’ll go now then. Big brother Bai, this way….”
As Shao Ling led Bai Yunfei back to his village, another unforeseen event was currently happening in the middle of the valley….