There was a loud boom. A leaning building split in half in an explosion. A ton of snow burst out at the fracture. Following another blast, two shadows lunged out and fought in mid-air.
Lin Sheng used his arms as swords, attacking and defending as quick as he could. But cuts and bruises began to show up on his body.
His attacks were too simple, relying on his beginner-level sword skills. Even the large library of memories in his mind lacked a powerful combat technique that suited him. It did not matter whether it was the Night Lord of the Steel Lord, they all relied more on their bloodline magic skills as their killer moves. And this was what Lin Sheng lacked.
It looked as if he and his opponent were evenly matched. But he knew he was on the defenssive.
A cloud of snow burst out in mid-air and transformed into a giant white eagle. It flapped its wings, crying as it swooped down.
When Lin Sheng heard the ear-piercing shrill, a pair of eight-meter-wide eagle claw had gripped and slammed him to the ground.
The mighty impact sent snow up in the air, buildings on both sides of the street broke up and collapsed with rising clouds of dust.
The red-haired woman swung her long sword. Snowflakes solidified and formed a slender staircase of ice in the air down to the earth. She walked down the icy stairway.
Lin Sheng was lying in the snow pit, covered with blood, and coughing.
The blow had exhausted every bit of his dark energy and holy light. He was now holding himself up by relying on the Rock Dragon blood. It did not matter which one. Be it dark energy, holy light, or Rock Dragon blood, each was as fragile as the other before the snowflakes. They were no match in power, speed and defense for the enemy; as breakable as a piece of paper.
It was as if the enemy had dad been crippled him.
“I should’ve performed better with my current strength,” Lin Sheng thought to himself, feeling weird. “Something must have gone wrong and impaired my power.”
He stared at the red-haired woman approaching. But he was not afraid; to him, death was all in a day’s work.
“I can still put up a fight.” Lin Sheng struggled to hold himself up.
“Armor of Dawn!”
A white beam of light descended from the top of his head and shrouded his body. At that moment, Lin Sheng recovered half of his holy power, and his injuries healed by half.
A divine skill like Armor of Dawn was scarce, especially when Lin Sheng needed holy power the most. This was a skill with great price-to-performance ratio.
“This is the right way of using Armor of Dawn!” Regaining his strength, Lin Sheng bounced back and fled.
The red-haired woman raised her long sword, and a small, hazy circular array burst out above her head. It spun with a flow of symbols and characters. In the center was a golden chain that swam like a snake. As if something bound for a long time was breaking free.
“Soul Annihilation!”
As the red-haired woman howled, a dot of blue light burst out from the disc above her head and disappeared into the clouds.
A chill washed down his guts. Lin Sheng felt as if some natural enemy was watching him, ready to pounce on and ate him alive. His gut feeling told him to run. So he turned and ran.
He was only a Six Winger and beaten by the boss in the dream was matter of course. There was no shame in running away. After all, no one was looking.
Without wasting more time, Lin Sheng planted his feet on the ground, cracking the pavement under his feet as he propelled himself away like an arrow. In a blink of an eye, he had run hundreds of meters, pulling away from the woman. He looked back; the woman was nowhere to be seen. He thought he was out of danger.
But Lin Sheng had a bad feeling. So he kept running. This time even faster.
The powerful defenses of the Rock Dragon blood allowed him to run like a Tyrannosaurus—forceful and brutal, leveraging the rebound force to spring himself forward.
In just a few beats, Lin Sheng had made out a thousand meters, leaving the woman far behind beyond his line of sight.
Just when Lin Sheng thought he could breathe a sigh of relief, a spinning dark cloud formed out of thin air in the clear sky. A giant snow-white eagle claw appeared. Semi-transparent, 30-meter-across, covering an area as large as two blocks of street, the claw swooped down at once like a giant pillar.
The descending claw destroyed a large area of buildings around Lin Sheng, sending waves of violent tremor spreading out in all directions on the ground.
The eagle’s claw sank into the ground, stamping a black claw print on the ruins of the city.
The giant eagle claws started fading. After it vanished, it left behind a 20-meter-deep pit on the spot. Looking down the pit, there was nothing but darkness.
Suddenly, something fell from the sky. It looked like something that had been blown up into the air by the force of impact. It was a broken hand with dark-yellow dragon scales. It dropped on the edge of the pit, landing on a piece of rock covered in soil.
…..
…..
In the basement.
Lin Sheng opened his eyes, feeling upset.
“I’m sure my strength has increased and stabilized at Six Wing level. Why was it still felt the same as before?” He died instantly earlier. When the eagle’s claw fell, the massive icy energy of stagnation slowed down the revolving speed of his internal energy by half.
In that circumstance and with the little holy power left, he had only the Rock Dragon blood to hang on to. It was a wonder a hand was still left.
“That guy is tough to beat.” Lin Sheng squinted, letting reality to sink in.
“Unlike the Night Lord and the Steel Lord, who were basically suiciding, reacting passively, and not resisting at all, this guy is different.”
Lin Sheng could sense the woman’s fervent fighting spirit. She had attacked him with the sword as soon as she saw him. With no intention to talk, she was a rare aggressive monster, and powerful at that. Especially at the last moment, her power had surged several folds.
“I need time to think it through.” Lin Sheng’s eyes flickered. Time was on his side, he would use it to his advantage.
But he would not use those soul powers that he had just absorbed for now. He would keep them, and wait until he wore out and killed the woman by attrition, he would then summon her. Besides, this would also solve the problem of failing to summon because of insufficient soul power.
He wanted to summon more helpers. He figured that even if he could raise his Rock Dragon blood by a bit to 60%, it would make no difference in his combat capability. He might as well summon a commander-class elite.
“I need some rest. Then go back to the university tomorrow and see if I could take in more elites.”
