Now that the Sky Shattering Clouds had finished compressing its fourth movement, along with his completed Lone Peak Kill, Ye Chen had more or less reached his limit in sword arts. He knew that he would not make any more breakthroughs in a short time. However, it was already enough. No one knew better than him how horrifyingly powerful these two sword movements were.
If the Lone Peak Kill were a fatal attack, then the Sky Shattering Clouds would be a brutal, unstoppable, fearless attack that could shake the world.
Shoo!
Since he had already reached his goals, there was no point for him to stay in the sky anymore. He extended his body, turning into a blue light and shot out of the clouds, landing on the ground.
After resting for the night in the Snake Island, Ye Chen left the next morning. As for Wang Snake, who wanted to join the competition, had not come out of the Wang family forbidden area yet. However, as a matter of fact, even if he had come out on time, he would not be allowed to join the competitions for the Hidden Dragon Rank. It was a family rule of the Wangs since centuries.
The location of the Hidden Dragon Rank competitions was in one ancient city between three huge nations. It was indeed called the Hidden Dragon Ancient City. According to the legend, in the ancient era, there was a dragon fountain with earth qi under the city which might disappear anytime. It had ensured the destiny of the ancient city.
There were one million miles between him and the city, and if he used all of his strength to rush, it would only take him twenty days to get there. However, traveling at high speed for a long period time was way different from traveling just for a short while. Even if he had great medicine that could replenish his zhen qi instantly, Ye Chen's meridians would not be able to handle the high-intensity zhen qi circulation, and he would most likely be ruined by it. Therefore, for trips more than one thousand miles long, Clasping Yuan Realm warriors would normally not use their full speed to travel. They would use mostly one-thirds or half their speed to travel and also take some breaks in between to make sure that their meridians had enough time to rest and to stay in the prime condition of their bodies.
Leaving the Star Region Lake, Ye Chen traveled past the north region of the Black Dragon Empire. The weather there was extra cold, the mountains and the lakes had been covered in ice and frost. The wind blowing against his face was no different from ice blades, making huge noise when hitting Ye Chen's protective zhen qi layer.
"Chief, don't worry, I am just going to take a walk. I will be right back." There was a small village in this endless ice mountains. Outside of the village, a teenager who looked like he was around eighteen waved goodbye to the village chief.
The village chief was an elder with white hair. Although his voice was not loud and the wind was blowing heavily, his voice seemed to be able to ignore physics and travel right into the teenager's ears, "Ku'er, you said you are just going for a walk, then why did you steal so many of my soul stones last night?"
The teenager rubbed his head, laughed a bit and said, "Busted! Actually, I was going to find a closed-up place to train, and I cannot do it without the soul stones! Alright, I have a lot of ideas right now, I have to find a place to train as soon as possible before the ideas run away."
In that extremely cold weather, the teenager had only worn a normal looking short outfit. His body flashed, completely disappearing in that gray colored mad wind.
Few hundred miles away.
The teenager laughed joyfully, "Silly old man, who would go train now?! I, Tuo Baku, am going to join the competitions of the Hidden Dragon Rank. I will go see those powerful young warriors of the South Rudra Region and then I will go travel the true spirit continent and see the young warriors of the world. Anyway, I will never come back!"
AWHOOO!
There were a lot of demonic beasts in the cold mountains. A top rank 6 beast - Two Headed Ice Demon Bear - had jumped out of the snow ground and attacked towards the teenager.
The teenager did not seem to plan to avoid. Or to be more precise, he just stood there and let that Two Headed Ice Demon Bear jump onto his body.
Ting!
The teenager was still standing without any movement. However, that beast seemed to have hit a steel-like mountain, blood spilling everywhere.
"To the side, I don't have time to play with you." He twisted his hand and grabbed the claws of the beast as he casually threw it to the side. The beast had landed only God knew where.
Outside of the village gate…
A middle-aged man who wore beast leather coat seemed to be quite frustrated. He said, "Chief, this little brat is definitely heading for the competitions of the Hidden Dragon Rank. Are you really letting him go?"
The chief touched his beard and said with a smile, "Young men should always have some ambitions. Even if he did not want to go out, I would try to kick him out."
"Then why didn't you let him out before?"
"He was neither old nor powerful enough. Plus, he got a bit too proud and arrogant lately. It is the right time for him to go face some difficulties now."
The cold wind was still blowing like blades in the air.
Ten days had passed, but Ye Chen had still not made it to the border of the Black Dragon Empire.
"Although there are not many cities in the north, the quality of the warriors is still pretty high. It seems that the extreme cold weather is indeed challenging, especially when your cultivation is not that powerful yet." Standing on an ice mountain, Ye Chen stood still with his hands on his back while he was resting.
In the distance, a human figure ran towards him at an extremely fast speed.
"Eh? He seems to be almost my age, also at Late Clasping Yuan Realm. He would be a good opponent… he should be able to handle one punch of mine."
The teenager who was called Tuo Baku did not decrease his speed at all. He ran towards Ye Chen with a speed that was faster than that of sound as he yelled, "Take my punch!"
Ye Chen had already noticed him long ago, but he thought he was just passing by. He did not expect that he was actually being targeted by him.
Crack!
The peak of the mountain had been crushed by that horrifying fist pressure. The snow slides were everywhere, which was extremely horrifying. Ye Chen stepped on a falling rock as he stared at that teenager in shorts.
Hundred meters!
Fifty meters!
Ten meters!
Right then, Tuo Baku realized that Ye Chen was getting closer and closer. However, the next second, he was already somehow being punched. His body could not help but fly backward.
"That's weird. How did he manage to punch me?" Tuo Baku was shocked.
"Take another punch of mine!"
Tuo Baku did not believe what had happened. He stabilized his body and then jumped at Ye Chen with an even faster speed. He threw out another punch and the air kept exploding.
Ye Chen flicked his eyebrows, "Such powerful fist art! Its power should even be more powerful than Wang Heng. And that physical defense was incredible, he looked like nothing had happened after taking that punch."
Boom!
Tuo Baku was hit once again. His top exploded, showing his horrifying looking muscles, which were like rocks or even steel.
"I see. You are messing with my sense of space."
Tuo Baku spit on the floor and laughed, throwing out the third punch. He was confident that it would hit Ye Chen this time and blow him away.
"Very sharp instinct, but too bad. Nothing will change even if you figured it out." Ye Chen smiled lightly. The tip of his foot touched the rock that was falling at a fast speed, then he appeared ten meters in front of Tuo Baku. His right fist had been thrown out in a not-so-fast-but-not-so-slow manner, seeming very casual.
Chin!
The steel-like muscles shone with a blue-black light. Tuo Baku was hit again in the chest, and his whole body was blown away into that falling snow mountain, disappearing completely.
The mountain then exploded, as Tuo Baku shot out without a wound, looking like nothing had happened.
Ye Chen said, "Okay, if you just want to exchange a couple of attacks, then the result is pretty clear. If you want to continue, then I cannot guarantee your life."
As he spoke, he purposely let out a little bit of sword intent.
Tuo Baku said, "You are a sword artist. F***. So I don't even have the ability to push you to use all of your power. Da**, so scarily powerful!"
Ye Chen said, "It is very likely that you will win if it was other people. It is just unfortunate that you had run into me."
"Indeed. I can never seem to be able to hit you. Oh! You are heading for the Hidden Dragon Rank competitions, right? Me too! You want to go together? It is so boring traveling alone." Tuo Baku could not handle being alone at all, but somehow he was stuck in that far out village for more than a decade. He had no idea how he made it through.
Ye Chen glanced at Tuo Baku, "Nah, I don't think I will make it in time to the Hidden Dragon Ancient City if I am traveling with you." This guy is too much trouble. I cannot guarantee that he will not try to pick a fight with other people and waste time.
Leaving Tuo Baku no chance, Ye Chen extended his body and shot out into the distance.
Tuo Baku scratched his head, feeling a bit speechless.
"Eh, there is another Late Clasping Yuan Realm warrior over there. It is just that the warrior seems to be a bit older."
Inside a mountain that was on the edge of the mountain group.
Murong Qingcheng in purple was sitting on a cushion with her feet tugged under her body. Her hair was like waterfall, her beautiful eyes shut at the moment. Her slim curved body was like a jade sculpture, sitting still.
Whoooooo!
A vague black qi flow was vibrating in the air. With its appearance, the ground would sink a few inches at a time. Looking over at the top of her head, a straight tunnel had led all the way to the ground. It was not hard to guess that she started practicing on the ground which was the peak of the mountain, and as the time went by, her body sank with the ground all the way to the middle of the mountain.
A long time had passed when a fake shadow of a black flower petal appeared on top of her head, becoming more and more clear and real with time. When it was only one step from becoming a real flower petal, it disappeared completely and was absorbed into her body. The speed of her zhen qi circulation increased, as an extremely mysterious zhen qi map appeared in her body. It looked like an ancient painting or a flower pattern, which was dyed black by her zhen qi. It had perfectly matched with the zhen qi tornado inside her body.
The second the zhen qi mapping was completed, the peak of the mountain was crushed by that horrifying invisible power and turned into a flat ground. Being amongst the falling rocks, there was not a single object within the ten-meter radius around her. All those huge rocks had been easily shattered way before they could get near her.
"I have reached the tenth level of the Sky Demon Great Art… The Sky Demon Flower has indeed lived up to its reputation." Slowly let out a chunk of impure qi, Murong Qingchen looked at her surroundings, not seeming to be surprised.
After she had said her goodbyes with Ye Chen in the Martial City, she had gone back to the Sky Demon Martial School for some preparations, then headed to the mountain groups right after, searching for the Sky Demon Flowers.
It was extremely rare in this whole true spirit continent. And normally, there would always be a Sky Demon Snake guarding the flower. Luckily, it was just as Qi Shaofeng had said, the Sky Demon Snake had fought with someone really powerful and suffered from the thunders. It was either badly injured or died. So, after spending more than two months of time, Murong Qingcheng had finally found the Sky Demon Flower in one of the cold lakes.
The effect of the flower was extremely powerful, and it was just impossible to swallow it all together at once. Murong Qingcheng had just consumed one flower only petal before. After a few months of closed-up training, her top rank Earth Realm martial art - the Sky Demon Great Art had reached straight to the tenth level from the eighth level, which was a drastic power increase.
If she took the whole flower, it was very likely that she could reach the fourteenth level. As for its highest level - the fifteenth level - it should not be that easy. But of course, Murong Qingcheng did not want the Sky Demon Flower for its medicinal effect, but more for its meaning. The meaning of the flower was tightly related to the Sky Demon Great Art. That is why it was so easy for her to make such a huge breakthrough and also reach the Late Clasping Yuan Realm from the peak-level Mid Clasping Yuan Realm. Her power had increased to twice her previous level in a flash.
"There is only one and a half month to go before the Hidden Dragon Rank competitions. I will not be able to make it just on foot. I have to go pick a top rank 6 flying beast from the Sky Demon Martial School." Her body flashed, and with her purple robes flying in the sky, her body turned into a fragile bubble and disappeared the next second.