"Boom!!"
From amidst the roaring winds of the tornado came a powerful gleam of red light. Penetrating the shades of green, the red light manifested into a terrifying bonfire to seemingly burn away the tornado and be devoured by the giant red dragon.
Bai Yunfei was seemingly fine from within the flames, or at least on a physical level. On the mental level, Bai Yunfei wanted nothing more but to vent his anger to the heavens.
What in the f*cking world was going on here?!
"Do the Qin like blowing themselves up?! Does life have little meaning to them?! They can die if they really wanted, but f*ck off trying to drag me into your sh*t!!"
Complaint after complaint poured out from Bai Yunfei faster than his mind could think of them. The two Qin brothers had already caused more than enough trouble than he expected and were becoming more of a problem than he'd like.
The circumstances behind the deaths of the two already made Bai Yunfei feel like he was in the middle of a dark plot of some kind, but he hadn't even the time to properly think about it since trouble was coming one after another.
Like it was now!
The deaths of the two brothers were followed by the arrival of yet another person. A Late-stage Soul King this time!!
And Bai Yunfei had a feeling he wouldn't be able to 'reason' with this one either…
"Xiao Qi! Take Xinyun a little farther away! Be sure to protect her!"
Bai Yunfei commanded Xiao Qi, but the bird was already doing so while he was in the middle of giving the orders.
The space a kilometer away from Bai Yunfei opened up to reveal a figure in dark-green light to step out from it!
The appearance of the figure was followed by an even more powerful blanket of soulforce. It felt so heavy that Bai Yunfei felt like he was being pressed down by an entire mountain even despite his soulforce working overtime to counteract the effects.
It was the head of the Qin that had appeared in front of Bai Yunfei. The father of Qin Shouhao and Qin Shoufeng, and a wood-type Late-stage Soul King, Qin Long!!
No words were even given when the man appeared. All he did was swipe his hand to launch an attack on Bai Yunfei!
"Die!!!"
All the anger Qin Long was feeling over the deaths of his sons were contained in that one attack. He was well and truly furious at Bai Yunfei!
Bai Yunfei narrowed his eyes. Some soulsense had encroached into the flames Bai Yunfei had created to lock him in place, and he could even see some parts of the flame revealing a dark-green light here and there!
Splotches of dark green continued to grow all around Bai Yunfei. Like leaves, they numbered over the thousands before Qin Long crooked his fingers to send them swirling all around Bai Yunfei. Like a tempest, they flew with a devastatingly sharp edge to slice apart the flames and Bai Yunfei!
In less than a second, all that was left was a dark-green tempest of leaves and Bai Yunfei at its center!
"Boom!!!!"
The leaves centered in onto Bai Yunfei for one devastating explosion. Streams of elemental wood billowed everywhere and left behind countless cracks on the ground so that it looked like a natural disaster had taken place there.
……
"This…this is the head of the Qin! The head of the Qin is here!"
"His timing is a little late, both his sons are already dead!"
"See how he's not giving Bai Yunfei the chance to explain himself, you think he's just going to kill him straight away?"
"Cut the crap, his sons were killed. You think he'd sit down and have a nice chat with Bai Yunfei? Unless the lord-mayor comes, there's nothing stopping lord Qin from killing Bai Yunfei…no one can live under the same skies like the one that killed their son! And Bai Yunfei killed two of his sons!"
"This is too terrifying…that's the attack of a Late-stage Soul King? Let's step back a bit or else we'll die if we get hit by one of their attacks!"
"Bai Yunfei killed two Late-stage Soul Exalt and is still completely unharmed. How's he going to fare against Qin Long? Won't he just die straight away?"
"Surely you're joking? You think he's like you? That Bai Yunfei is a Mid-stage Soul King! How could he die that easily?"
"Seems inevitable that the two will fight. The lord-mayor will definitely come forward to investigate this. I just wonder how things would be if not for what happened earlier…"
"That Bai Yunfei might be the best of his generation, but he's unlucky to go up against the Late-stage Soul King, Qin Long."
"Yeah, but he's a disciple of the Crafting School, he should have more than enough soul armaments. I wonder if he can hold off until the Tianhun School arrives…"
"Don't forget he has that class seven soulbeast with him. I heard Qin Long's soulbeast partner was killed in battle a long time ago. Winning against a soulbeast and soul cultivator by himself won't be too easy."
"But…it doesn't look like Bai Yunfei's soulbeast is planning to help him! What's going on in this fight!?"
"……"
Everyone was moving back. They were afraid of being caught in the crossfire now that Qin Long was attacking.
Very few people thought Bai Yunfei had even a chance of winning against Qin Long. Most of them thought that the best chance Bai Yunfei had was to just stall for time and wait for the Tianhun School to 'mediate'.
And at this moment, several streaks of light were flying out from Swallow City towards where Qin Long and Bai Yunfei were.
……
The dark-green light that had been surrounding Bai Yunfei was for the most part gone now. All that was left was a one-meter large barrier of orange light protecting Bai Yunfei from within. When the green light was gone, the barrier flickered momentarily before disappearing to reveal Bai Yunfei.
"He's fine! Bai Yunfei isn't hurt at all!!"
"That was a super strong attack and he managed to block it? That's crazy!"
"That floating item next to him is the rumored high-heaven tier soul armament of his! It can attack and defend, create a barrier, and transform into a super-large object to crush his enemies! What a powerful soul armament!"
Tall and proud, Bai Yunfei stood there to face off against Qin Long. To the side, Tang Xinyun gave a sigh of relief at the sight of an uninjured Bai Yunfei.
Though Bai Yunfei had managed to shut the attack down completely, Bai Yunfei didn't look at all well since…Qin Long's second attack was already incoming!
Qin Long was swiping out with his right hand again, but this time he was stirring the energy around him. The intensity of the energy doubled, but they didn't form blades of energy to strike down Bai Yunfei. Instead, the only change that took place was in…the earth!!
Everywhere underneath Bai Yunfei's feet, the ground started to light up with green light. Dark-green beams of light shot forth from the ground with the thickness of his arm to stab at Bai Yunfei!
Numerous and concentrated onto Bai Yunfei, the dark-green needles were practically homing in on Bai Yunfei to entangle him!
It wasn't elemental wood that was attacking him, but the plants of the earth! Qin Long had somehow managed to grow and command nature itself to make Bai Yunfei as its foe!
A metallic sheen covered the surface of each of the vines so that one would have the feeling even a chopping utensil would not be enough to sever the vines.
There had been so many vines that had sprouted from the ground to reach into the skies. They formed a viney canopy overhead like a network of vines to enshrine Bai Yunfei underneath!
Everything had happened in the one second Bai Yunfei's barrier dropped and left him unprotected. One second was all it took to go from being protected to ensnared!
……
The dark-green web continued to grow overhead as Bai Yunfei stood there. It was starting to close in when he finally made up his mind to fight!
And all at once, his body started to explode with power!
A powerful enemy was up ahead, and he hadn't the luxury to go if he wanted to or to even have a proper 'discussion'.
The only thing left to do was fight!