While Xu Ziling's hands were going numb from the shock, Kou Zhong tossed his broken saber away, snatched the spear, and then with a loud shout he turned the spear into millions of light and shadow enveloping Ren Shaoming, using the ‘sweeping a thousand-army' stance.
Even if this Society Leader of Tieqi Hui thought until he cracked his brains, he would never understand why after receiving such a heavy blow, contrary to his expectation, Kou Zhong was able to counterattack dauntlessly with such power that was even stronger than before.
Inevitably Ren Shaoming's imposing manner was somewhat impeded; without any other choice he was forced to spin around. Unexpectedly he entered into Kou Zhong's spear shadows, his meteor hammers moved fast toward Kou Zhong's spearhead.
As a result Kou Zhong was unable to unleash the full potential of his spear technique. Holding the spear right in the middle, he used both the spearhead and the butt of the spear to parry the swift and fierce meteor hammers left and right.
The two combatants moved very fast. A midst the raging meteor hammers shadow, the spear shadows, two human shadows were weaving in and out like rabbit escaping from the falcon. It could easily be seen that they were both fighting with everything they had in a life and death battle.
Xu Ziling soared high toward the top of Ren Shaoming's head. He could clearly see that Kou Zhong was already like an arrow at the end of its flight. Not daring to hesitate, he tossed away the thought of escaping from within his brain. With a cold shout both of his hands clawed down on the top of Ren Zhaoming's skull.
By this time the several hundred people watching felt as if they were suffocating, hence nobody even thought about shouting and cheering. The arena was so quiet that it felt unreal.
‘Dang!'
The spear in Kou Zhong's hands snapped into two pieces, while blood spurted wildly from his mouth; fortunately just before the meteor hammers touched his body, he managed to slip away like a fish, so that Ren Shaoming, who was absolutely sure that his hammer would hit Kou Zhong, had to see the hammer hit empty air instead.
Only then did Ren Shaoming lower his body in a horse stance, while raising his two hammers to meet Xu Ziling's palms overhead.
‘Bang! Bang!'
Xu Ziling's entire body was jolted by the collision and he was thrown up toward the empty air bathed in bright moonlight.
Kou Zhong was thrown away for more than three zhang, so that the spectators were forced to back off some more.
Before his footstep was even steadied, he already leaped up to the sky with outstretched arms, while exerting his entire strength to catch Xu Ziling's body, which was thrown into the air. "Xiao Ling, run!” he shouted.
Ren Shaoming let out a long laugh. He also shot half way up before suddenly turned direction midair toward the two boys.
Xu Ziling reached backhandedly to grab Kou Zhong's collar, pulling him along as they ascended two more zhang upwards before tossing Kou Zhong outward.
Everybody thought that knowing their defeat was decided, the two boys wanted to escape. They all jeered and shouted insult to the two boys as well as cheering for their leader.
The surrounding net expanded outwards, taking the shape of a kitten playing with a mouse. They wanted to see how Ren Shaoming was going to toy with the two boys.
Ren Shaoming started later, but he arrived sooner. When he was about a zhang away from the boys, he casually put his pair of meteor hammers behind his back first before reaching out to grab the two boys' back.
The most unexpected thing happened.
Suddenly, right in the middle of an empty air, Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling separated, and paused for a split second.
Ren Shaoming could not help but was greatly amazed, because he knew that it would be very difficult for him to stop midair and exert any strength, yet the opponents seemed to be able to hold their body still midair and borrow the reaction force to bounce back. While he was shocked out of his wits by this strange happening unfolding before his very eyes, like powerful arrows the two boys shot back toward him.
Everybody on the ground was also shouting in shock, yet nobody was able to stop whatever it was from happening.
At this point Ren Shaoming's true qi had been depleted; he was no longer able to change his move to resist the enemy. On the other hand, the opponent was still able to go all-out; therefore, compared to before, the situation this time was vastly different.
‘Bang! Bang!'
Ren Shaoming took Kou Zhong's punch and Xu Ziling's palm strike, respectively. While he was going to borrow the reaction force to withdraw, suddenly his neck was wrapped by a flexible whip, which coiled forward from behind him, cutting off his escape route.
And then there was a sharp pain at the top of his head, because Xu Ziling's finger jabbed his tianling acupoint, a vital acupoint at the top of the head.
‘Bang!'
Sucking in another mouthful of qi, Kou Zhong spun around; just before casting his whip away, he kicked the pit of Ren Shaoming's stomach. Ren Shaoming's breastbones shattered, blood spurted out wildly from his mouth.
By the time Fa Nan, Chang Zhen, Cui Jixiu and the others recovered from their shock and rushed over, the two boys already borrowed the impact force against Ren Shaoming to soar upward again. Their toes bounced on the fishing line, like big birds they soared toward another fishing line about eight zhang away.
‘Crash!'
Ren Shaoming's lifeless body crashed heavily on the ground.
By the time Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling crawled up the bank of the Great River, they had already left Jiujiang about ten li behind.
This moment the sky has not brightened yet, but the two of them were extremely exhausted. They could only crouch on a mud mound on the shore, unable to move a single step.
Gasping for breath, Kou Zhong groaned, "Finally we got rid of that Ren guy. Ay! He was really formidable, I am afraid Fengshi Han would not be able to kill him; yet … Ouch!”
With difficulty Xu Ziling raised his head to give him a glance before burying his face in the mud again. Straining hard, he said, "You don't know how ridiculous your battered and exhausted look right now. Is it painful?”
Still gasping for breath, Kou Zhong said, "As long as I am not laughing, it is still bearable. I just did not expect that under the circumstances, we were able to stab that dragon to death. Ha! Aiyo!”
After resting for half a day, Kou Zhong went on, "Since we are heading to Luoyang anyway, we might as well slaughter Yuwen Huagu along the way to avenge Niang.”
Xu Ziling sighed and said, "You must never feel so pleased as to lose your sense of measure. This time we could kill Ren Shaoming, we relied on a little bit of good luck as well. It could be that because he had done so much injustice that he was finally strung through and filled with evil. Besides, although Yuwen Huagu's fate is not so good that he suffered setback, he still has the Yuwen Clan's support behind him. Plus Yuwen Shang is a grandmaster whose martial art cultivation enjoys equal fame with the ‘Heavenly Saber' Song Que. Zhong Shao, you'd better concentrate on your effort to strive for the world!”
After a short silence Kou Zhong said in a heavy voice, "But how could I see you braving the danger alone?”
Xu Ziling said, "Let's wait until we find the ‘Duke Yang Treasure' before doing anything! Huh? A ship is coming our way!”
A medium sized sailboat appeared from the bend downstream, coming fast at their direction.
Kou Zhong strained his neck to look, "Did you see that?” he said happily, "The ship is flying the Song Clan banner; must be Song Yuzhi coming to find us.”
Xu Ziling responded heavily, "Before recovering our strength, it's not a good idea to meet with anyone.”
Kou Zhong nodded his agreement. Together with Xu Ziling he crawled into a pile of rocks, resolutely suppressing his inclination and waited quietly while the ship came and went.
By daybreak, relying on their fantastic skill of complementary true qi, they managed to restore about eighty, ninety-percent of strength. After bathing in the river, although their clothes were still worn-out, it did not adversely affect their natural poise and shapely appearance.
After picking up some wild fruits to allay their hunger, they unleashed their shenfa to rush toward the river bent where Xiang Yushan was waiting per their earlier agreement.
As they run over the top of a hill, a beautiful scenery all around appeared before their eyes, so that they stopped to enjoy it.
White clouds floating slowly in the sky, the rushing water of Yangtze River was seen down below to their left, the water looked so clear and sparkling, the unbroken chain of peaks on the opposite bank reflecting the sunlight, while to their right was a wide-open space. A small village adorned the scenery, with thousands of pathways crisscrossed the plain, lined by thick, bluish-green mountains. In this quiet world, the only sound was the surging water and roaring torrents of the River.
A heroic feeling welled up in Kou Zhong's heart, like the incessantly surging water of the Great River. Suddenly he shouted at the top of his lungs, "Kou Zhong is here!”
His voice echoed on both sides of the riverbank, it sounded like a low rumble of distant thunder.
Xu Ziling also felt his chest broadened. Since the muddleheaded ruler was killed and they escaped from Jiangdu, this was the first time that he felt this kind of ‘wide sea and open sky, which will enable me to soar high' feeling.
Kou Zhong slowly breathed out the heavy feeling pressing his breast, letting his blood boiled with heroic emotion and powerful passion. He said word-by-word, "Starting from today, there will be no one under the heavens dare to despise us, two brothers. Whoever dares to do so will ultimately pay a painful price.”
Xu Ziling's mood was also unusually good; he laughed and said, "It is still too early to say. We were relying on our joint power plus meticulous planning in advance before we were able to get rid of Ren Shaoming. Next time someone is going to deal with us, they would definitely be wary of us [orig. ‘he who comes is surely ill-intentioned, those well-meaning will not come' (idiom)], so that it will be more difficult for us to deal with them.”
Kou Zhong stretched out and said, "What I fear the most right now is that no one will come as a sacrificial offering for us to temper ourselves. Hey! What are you looking at?”
Xu Ziling turned his head to look at the direction of Jiujiang city. "Didn't you see the rising dust?” he asked, "It could be the pursuing troops.”
Kou Zhong shrieked and took the lead to dash down the hill.