Nangong Yuexia was right now in the middle of her escape. She was holding tightly onto the large leg of the brown bear from their position in a large expanse of grass, her teeth biting nervously into her cherry-red lips. Under her palms on the brown bear, a devastating wound could be seen! The muscles and flesh around this bone-deep wound were slowly pulsating as if it was trying to regenerate the missing chunk!
The brown bear had a dispirited look on its face. Aside from the wound on its right leg, the rest of the bear's body had injuries all over, sprinkling the grass and ground with drops of blood.
Right next to Nangong Yuexia's foot was the loveable-looking white ferret. Like the bear, the ferret was heavily injured with one part of its fur gone. Ice was the only thing keeping the wound in stasis as it tried to use its soulforce to heal its wounds.
Nangong Yuexia had blood on her person as well, but the majority of it belonged to the brown bear. There was a relatively deep wound on both her waist and right shoulder, but not enough to be debilitating. Also on her left shoulder was another wound where blood was still flowing down from.
"Clack, clack…."
The close sounds of footsteps caused Nangong Yuexia's face to pale. Whipping her head towards the source, she looked to where a shadow was just coming into view with a look of dread.
Li Yuchun was moving slowly towards her with a small smile on his face. His robes were a little messy-looking, but he himself was unharmed. His right hand was still holding onto the black sword from before with droplets of blood still hanging on the tip.
"I admit, I'm a little astonished at how far you managed to run, but I've no interest in playing this game of cat-and-mouse anymore. I'll let you die a quick death…"
He brandished his sword as he spoke. Cutting at the air, a beam of black light emerged from the blade and flew a hundred meters away to strike at Nangong Yuexia!
"Gr…."
The brown bear looked flustered. Trying its best to force its soulforce to cooperate with it, the bear was trying its hardest to ignore the wounds it had. From its soulbond with Yue Feng, it could tell that Yue Feng wasn't too far away. They just needed to hold out for just a little longer and help would soon be here!
But the attack coming at Nangong Yuexia was quick, and in no time at all it was already coming very close to where they were!
"Bang…."
The spatial attack sent by Li Yuchun came to a stop just fifty meters away from Nangong Yuexia. Something had crashed into it and reduced the attack into a wisp of black energy to quickly fade away into the atmosphere!
'Now now….frightening a young miss like this so badly is an act far too unbecoming of a man…"
A faint voice spoke from behind Nangong Yuexia, prompting her to turn her head. Right behind her was a young man in white who quickly stepped past her to stand in front and shield her from Li Yuchun.
This young man had a straight back and a tall figure. His hair was fair and his face handsome. Held in his hand was a single black folding fan that made him look all the more gentlemanly.
Who else could this be but Zheng Kai?!
"Zheng Kai?!"
Li Yuchun realized as soon as his attack was defeated. The expression on his face seemed to change slightly for the worse at his entrance. It wasn't a too drastic of a change where he was afraid of Zheng Kai, but he did look at the very least surprised enough to see him here that he called out his name.
Zheng Kai was a little surprised as well at being called out like that. He looked closely at Li Yuchun for a moment to see just who this person was before finally breaking out in a smile.
"I know who you are, you're brother Li from the house of Li in the Westward River Province, aren't you? So you've come to this place as well."
These two people knew each other!
That wasn't all that strange though. It was totally normal for youngsters of the same generation to know someone else from one of the Five Families. The two had seen each other many times before, but it didn't seem like they liked each other very much.
The current head of the Li had only one son, and that son is Li Yuchun, a youngster who was a little older than Zheng Kai but was weaker than the eldest brother of Zheng Kai, Zheng Cheng. Still, he had plenty of cousins—one of which was a Soul King who was a little older than Zheng Cheng was. So in terms of generational hierarchy, the house of Li was slightly beneath that of the Zheng, but that was only on the surface. The reality of things was slightly different…..
Not only was Li Yuchun just a little bit older than Zheng Kai, he was also a space-type soul cultivator, though that didn't mean the two were particularly friendly with one another. The two were rivals since their first meeting, and their last meeting had been just three years ago.
"Don't poke your nose where it doesn't belong!" Li Yuchun sneered at the smiling Zheng Kai.
His sword became a blur for a moment as he sent another spatial attack at Zheng Kai. This spatial attack wasn't really meant to do damage onto Zheng Kai, but to go beyond him and hopefully hit Nangong Yuexia behind him.
"Whoosh!"
Zheng Kai flourished the fan in his hand, a spatial attack of his own coming out to strike at the one incoming. Like before, the two attacks struck each other and was canceled out to become just wisps of black energy.
The fan Zheng Kai used wasn't something he used to just make himself look nice. It was a very powerful space-type soul armament.
"It's hard to have a chance like this to save a maiden, how could I just the chance slip away?" Zheng Kai smiled calmly at Li Yuchun. "Now that I'm here, I can't just simply stand aside and let this pretty little miss be killed by you. I'm sure you're doing all of this to reduce the amount of competitors for the Extreme King Pills and not for revenge of some kind, so let's call it quits here. Do you really think a Mid-stage Soul Exalt like her is going to be a threat for a Late-stage Soul Exalt like you?"
Li Yuchun sent a glowering glare at Zheng Kai. "I said….don't poke your nose where it doesn't belong!" He spat one word at a time.
Zheng Kai closed his eyes, the smile finally dropping form his lips. He took in a deep breath and sent a cold glare in return at Li Yuchun, "If you're going to be like this, then so be it. Shall we fight then?"
He turned back to look at Nangong Yuexia, "Shouldn't you be running away now, young miss?"
"Ah?"
Not expecting to be spoken to, Nangong Yuexia looked strangely at Zheng Kai, "I….you…."
Zheng Kai held his palm up to stop her, "No need to mince words. Just go. I'll worry if you stick around."
That's when it really hit Nangong Yuexia with what was going on.
This stranger was truly trying to save her! Her large eyes blinked once in uncertainty before she bit her lips. She scooped the ferret into her arms and whispered something into the ears of the brown bear. Right in front of his own eyes, Zheng Kai watched as the bear turned into a miniature-sized version of its older self before the girl took it into her arms.
With both animals in her hands, she stood up and bowed to Zheng Kai. "Thank you."
Then without hesitation, she turned away and ran off.
When she was just a hundred meters away, a second figure popped out just twenty meters behind her to lash out with a sword strike onto her—it was Li Yuchun!
"Clang!!"
His sword struck Zheng Kai's fan mid-stroke. Zheng Kai had moved in between the two before Li Yuchun could fully attack Nangong Yuexia!
"I don't get this chance everyday to save a maiden. How could you possibly try to stop me from being successful?"
Zheng Kai smiled. He pushed outwards with his right arm, forcing the longsword in Li Yuchun's hand away before he lashed out with a left punch at Li Yuchun's face!