Martial Peak

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Zhang Ding listened to the Madam from outside but he remained unmoved. He then said patronisingly, “Madam, Young Lady, please come out of the carriage, then we can talk details.”

“Do you really need to be so cruel?” The Madam cried in a frustrated voice when Zhang Ding didn’t comply. He surely had made plans to stomp out the root of the trouble.

“Madam,” Zhang Ding said sternly. “If you cooperate like a good child, we will be sure to minimise your suffering when we kill you. Otherwise, well, to put it simply, I’m embarrassed to say that I have admired you for a long time, but it’s such a pity that in those days I could never even dream of smelling your perfume. However, I think I can fulfil that little desire of mine right before I kill you.”

In the carriage, the Madam trembled, clenching her hands so tightly her fists turned pale.

She was imagining the evil deeds Zhang Ding could do to her, and what kind of fate would await her if so.

“This heartless and cruel bastard!” Cui Er said angrily.

Zhang Ding sneered, “Cui Er, I wonder if you can say the same thing when someone is digging up your clothes.”

The several surviving traitors laughed wildly, then someone added on, “Cui Er, wait for this elder brother to give you love.”

She turned white and shrank behind Yang Kai.

In the carriage, all three women were shivering, almost rocking the carriage.

“Madam, I will give you ten breaths of time to consider our proposal to exit the carriage. I promise I will give you a woman’s happiness and then bury you well,” Zhang Ding decided.

The Madam closed her eyes and tears started falling from her eyes. She grabbed the hands of her daughter in despair.

After a moment, she hardened her resolve and opened her eyes. She gave a miserable smile to her daughter to tell her that she made a decision.

It’s better than being abused by someone and living out a miserable fate.

Before she could act, she was stopped by Yang Kai. He comforted her, slowly shaking his head decisively.

The ten breaths of time quickly passed.

Zhang Ding’s impatient voice resounded from outside, “Seems like the Madam is willing to give this subordinate an opportunity of a lifetime. In that case, I can only be disrespectful.”

Zhang Ding lifted the curtain of the carriage and stepped inside.

As he set his foot on the first step of the carriage, a dirt-covered face appeared in his view, grinning and revealing two rows of pure white teeth.

Little Beggar! This was the face of the beggar he brought in a few days ago.

Zhang Ding was taken aback. He was so occupied with the thought of the Madam that he did not notice a fourth person in the carriage. He suddenly became frustrated at the thought of himself, an expert of the True Element Boundary, all shocked and startled by a little beggar.

When Zhang Ding moved to grab Yang Kai to throw him aside, he was met with five successive punches, lightning fast. Yang Kai did not even make the effort to try and dodge his grapple, instead retaliating with fists of fury.

What speed! Zhang Ding was astonished at Yang Kai’s speed, but when he looked at the group in the carriage again, he smirked contemptuously and exclaimed, “Courting death!”

He didn’t feel any destructive power from the Little Beggar’s punches. He thought that the opposite party had simply thrown his punches carelessly. Zhang Ding then aimed his punch at Yang Kai’s mouth and said wrathfully, “I am going to kill you.”

Zhang Ding’s several subordinates readied themselves for another fight as they heard their boss’ cry. They moved towards Yang Kai in an orderly fashion.

“Little Beggar!” Cui Er called out in alarm. She hadn’t even dreamed that Yang Kai would be a Master and was faking his appearance, with which he fooled Zhang Ding.

The echo of her voice hadn’t even settled down when Zhang Ding’s expression suddenly changed and pangs of pain covered his chest. He became pale, his eyes almost popping out from the overwhelming effect, causing him to look quite scary.

In the next instant, Zhang Ding seemingly exploded from his torso, blood splattering everywhere as Yang Kai’s burning hot Yang Qi entered his body.

Instantly, Zhang Ding’s impression of the fists changed. His courage was broken now, his body frozen with fright.

He hurriedly revolved the True Qi within his body to suppress the gashing wound on his chest.

The blood spurting from Zhang Ding’s chest made little thumping sounds as the area turned redder with it. He cried out pitifully while withdrawing from the carriage.

He was, after all, a True Element Boundary expert, and his True Qi defence couldn’t be easily broken by an average person. While he wasn’t sent flying by Yang Kai’s punches of the Burning Sun Blast, there was still residual effects of the skill that were untraceable and caused him to suffer heavy damage. Fortunately for him, it was not enough to take his life.

The viscera that separated from Zhang Ding’s chest also doused the three women. When Zhang Ding withdrew from shock, screams emerged from the carriage.

When Zhang Ding’s subordinates attacked Yang Kai, they could only see a mirage of him which quickly disappeared from vision. Their attacks failed.

He was able to use the step technique he trained with for almost a month in such a crucial moment.

The Old Demon came out of the Soul Breaking Awl while laughing maniacally, then he suddenly changed into a black fog, surprising the five martial artists. They were shortly engulfed in the fog, entangling them in a state of confusion.

“What ghostly thing is this?” One could be heard screaming from within the fog. Within a split second, after the words had left his mouth, Yang Kai suddenly appeared behind him, punching his upper body from the back.

The victim’s strength wasn’t particularly high, so when the energy of the Burning Sun’s Blast entered his body, he was not able to dissolve the influx of Yang Qi as his True Qi was not as abundant as Zhang Ding’s. He immediately turned red from the heat.

The Old Demon seized this chance to enter his body. Soon after, the Demon exited, the person passing out, falling to the ground and exploding into a bloody fog, all within a matter of a few seconds.

The Old Demon laughed strangely. He was after all a ten-thousand-year-old soul. Though his strength has dropped off largely, such a fearful laughter would still cause a person to shiver. With Yang Kai’s help and coordination, he could sweep away any obstacle.

His movement technique had caused Zhang Ding to lose all of his subordinates cruelly; they had all fallen and exploded into meat paste and fog.

When Zhang Ding had finally melted all of Yang Kai’s Yang Qi, he became crazy. He looked at Yang Kai and roared, still unable to process all that has happened so far, “Little Beggar you have been playing the role of a pig to eat the tiger!”

He thought that the beggar was only an average person, and at such a crucial moment, that Little Beggar became the biggest obstacle to his plan. After nearly succeeding only to fail at the very last moment, how could Zhang Ding remain calm? He was even badly hurt by Yang Kai, whose eyes and now turned scarlet. He looked at him, wishing all manner of harm and pain upon him, even thinking of drinking his blood and eating his flesh once he was dead.

(Rosy: What is with these cannibalism references)

Yang Kai, who was drenched in blood standing calmly replied in a light voice, “How much of your strength remains?”

If Zhang Ding was at his peak, Yang Kai would only be his match if he used the Star Mark. Otherwise, there would be no hope of victory. Unfortunately, the Star Mark takes too long to activate, so it wasn’t suitable in a fight where life or death is decided in an instant.

At this moment, Zhang Ding was not at his peak. He had already fought with Old Man Wu, meaning he was spent and already injured. A sneak attack by Yang Kai only worsened it. His chest was covered in blood, so it was obvious he didn’t have much strength remaining.

Yang Kai was fearless.

“I only have 20% of my strength left, but it’s more than enough to kill you,” Zhang Ding growled. The sword in his hand streaked towards Yang Kai like a single beam of light. Zhang Ding swore an oath to kill Yang Kai.

Before the sword could get near Yang Kai, the Old Demon’s creepy laughter leaked from the Soul Breaking Awl, followed by a blockade appearing out of nowhere to protect Yang Kai. It could not by destroyed by Zhang Ding at his present strength. He then called in surprise, “This is a divine weapon!”

He was also a person who had plenty of fighting experience, but he had never seen a Divine Treasure as strange as the Soul Breaking Awl before today. The treasure didn’t even need activation for it to create a shield. It also laughed sinisterly and continuously, making anyone tremble in fear.

This treasure was weird!

“This is a treasure which will take your life,” Yang Kai commented suddenly. His words were conveyed from behind Zhang Ding. Such an abrupt change in direction made his hairs stand as he realised how close Yang Kai was standing to him. [How did he warp behind me so suddenly?]

He looked carefully, but he could only see a fuzzy image of the Little Beggar flashing around him. It was only illusions, he thought.

He brandished his sword once again and stabs towards him, but it was in vain as he pierced nothing but air.

Yang Kai has again displayed his movement technique to dodge to the left side, then retaliating with his fist. Zhang Ding was unable to guard against such a surprise attack, and with his pitiful yell his arm ruptured audibly and he fell to the ground.

The fist from Yang Kai had struck his shoulder blade.

The Yuan Qi which invaded him was quite pure. This type of Yuan Qi couldn’t be possessed by a martial artist at the Qi Transforming Stage, and this staggered Zhang Ding further.

Although it had been only a few sessions of double cultivation with Su Yan, the remarkable effect of the Joyous Unification Art was already showing. His Yuan Qi has been tempered to an extraordinary degree. The purity of the Yuan Qi present in Yang Kai’s body had far surpassed his current boundary. All of this was due to the Joyous Unification Art.

The Old Demon seized the chance to take control of the Soul Breaking Awl and struck the sword in Zhang Ding’s hand.

Master and servant both attacked in coordination flawlessly and relentlessly. No chances were given to Zhang Ding to recover, and within five minutes Zhang Ding was covered in blood from head to toe.

With the turn of events, Zhang Ding was stupefied and ran out of strength to fight back. He knew that if he didn’t run, he would die here. But Yang Kai and the Old Demon did not give him any chance to run. They had already blocked all his escape routes thoroughly.

The Burning Sun’s Blast made Zhang Ding vomit fresh blood and he lost his concentration. Once again, the Old Demon saw the opportunity and took it, entering Zhang Ding’s body through the Soul Breaking Awl.

Similarly to his previously confused comrades, Zhang Ding showed a perplexed expression. Gradually, his eyes began to lose focus and he fell.

After that, the Old Demon suddenly reappeared whilst laughing wildly, changing into a black fog and vanishing into Yang Kai’s fingertips.

In this war, the Old Demon swallowed a lot of souls, which helped him recover greatly.

Yang Kai stood on the same spot gasping for breath. The fight drained him of Yuan Qi.

This time, he hadn’t used the Indomitable Will of the golden skeleton because the fight with Zhang Ding didn’t bring too much pressure nor a sense of crisis.

But Yang Kai realised that his strength at the moment was too low.

If Zhang Ding was not already injured, if his sneak attack didn’t go well and if not for his Dantian having stores of Yang liquid, he couldn’t have fought with an expert of that level in the manner that he did.

Only three moves of the Burning Sun’s Blast was needed to use up all the Yuan Qi present in an expert of the Qi Transformation Stage. If it was someone else in place of Yang Kai, that person would be a dry corpse now.

When he fought with Zhang Ding, he had used almost ten moves of the Burning Sun’s Blast on top of the collaboration of attacks between him and the Old Demon, both of which was needed to kill him. Such difficulty would be almost impossible to be overcome by someone else of the same Stage.

Yang Kai regained composure after a hefty amount of time, then slowly, he walked towards the carriage.

As the sound of footsteps drew nearer, the three women in the carriage became nervous and Cui Er asked in a shivering voice, “Is that you, Little Beggar?”

“Mhm,” Yang Kai sounded worn.

The curtains of the carriage drew and Cui Er’s pale cheeks came into view from behind. The Madam and the Young Lady also looked anxiously at him.

“What happened to them?” Cui Er asked, looking around.

“They’re dead.”

Cui Er covered her mouth immediately as she looked at Yang Kai in disbelief. The Madam and the Young Lady exhaled the breaths they held in surprise.

They thought that they were surely doomed and had never imagined that they would live through such a hopeless situation. The feeling of death just brushing past them weakened their bodies.

In processing what had happened thus far, the three women felt as if they had turned into jelly.

“You don’t need to come out of the carriage, I will look around for survivors,” Yang Kai urged. He then turned around towards the bonfire to seek for a living soul.