Chapter 4896 — The Difference Between Xuan Sheng and Yuan Ying

The woman's dreaming was all very well, but alas, she had barely slipped a few steps away before Chang Laiting caught on. He bellowed at once, "Stop right there! Ni Caiyue, you're welcome to leave, but hand the thing over first—otherwise don't blame me for getting unpleasant!"

"Ah!" Ni Caiyue was frightened stiff on the spot. In her panic she hurriedly froze in her tracks, her feet desperately straining to inch farther away, yet wanting to run and not daring to—she could only stand there, at a complete loss.

Wei Zhao looked at her and was struck speechless. This Ni Caiyue truly had no mind of her own; she acted like someone who had never seen the world at all, with not a shred of jianghu experience.

One casual sentence from the other side and she was too scared to move—how the hell had she ever expected to make her way out here? He genuinely wondered how she had survived in the Eastern Continent, where competition was so vicious.

"That's enough, isn't it? She's already this pitiful and you're still robbing her—she's your dao companion, after all, isn't she?" Wei Zhao spoke up.

"Boy, don't you know that meddling in other people's business gets people killed? I was originally going to spare your little life, but now—well, I've changed my mind. Ni Caiyue won't cooperate precisely because she hasn't seen blood yet. You'll do nicely to make an example of." Chang Laiting's voice was thick with killing intent.

The words had barely landed when his figure flickered and he struck at Wei Zhao without the slightest hesitation. A long pitch-black sword had appeared in his hand at some unknown moment, and without a word he raised it and loosed a sword aura.

Wang Xinyan and the others felt their eyelids twitch. This sword aura was not merely powerful—more importantly, three hues of green, yellow, and red swirled across it. In other words, this single sword aura contained three kinds of attribute true qi at once. This was a most rare expert of the three-spirit Xuan Sheng stage!

No wonder this fellow could be ranked alongside Wang Dianxing; no wonder he could be numbered among the Four Young Masters of the Yuan Ying. To be able to fuse three attribute spiritual roots into one at the moment of breaking through to Xuan Sheng—that was no feat for an ordinary man. He really did have some skill.

Wang Xinyan, Huang Xiaotao, and Lu Xiaozhong exchanged a glance and, without prior agreement, all edged back a little. A three-spirit Xuan Sheng expert was indeed far stronger than others of the same rank—but his target was Wei Zhao. There was truly nothing to worry about.

Even Wei Zhao before his breakthrough would never have fallen into a disadvantage against an opponent like this, much less the Wei Zhao of now, already an expert of the early Xuan Sheng stage. They did not know, of course, that Wei Zhao possessed an unprecedented composite of eight spiritual roots. But that earlier scene, when a casual strike of his rivaled a lightning tribulation, was still fresh in their memories.

Once he got serious, Wei Zhao could effortlessly kill this Yuan Ying Fourth Young Master, now advanced to Xuan Sheng, in a single move—of that, everyone was utterly certain!

What surprised Wang Xinyan and the others somewhat, however, was that Wei Zhao seemed to have no intention of finishing Chang Laiting off in one move. Instead, he turned a step to the side and calmly let the sword aura pass him by.

"Yo! Quick on your feet, aren't you!" Chang Laiting was slightly taken aback. Ever since he learned Wei Zhao was from the Northern Isle, he had ceased to regard the man as existing at all. Even if the other was likewise a newly promoted expert of the early Xuan Sheng stage, before him he was no more than an ant that could not withstand a single blow—not worth mentioning in the least.

But he had not expected the other to dodge so easily. That sword aura just now had been loosed offhand, true, but it had after all fused three spiritual root attributes; in both speed and power it was no small thing. An ordinary expert of the same rank could never have evaded it.

"You flatter me." Wei Zhao smiled faintly, as though nothing were the matter, showing not the slightest inclination to fly into a rage and strike back. Instead he simply watched Chang Laiting at his leisure.

"Hmph, a piece of trash from the Northern Isle whose only trick is being a little faster on his feet than ordinary folk, and he actually puts on airs? Absolutely laughable. Today I'll open your eyes for you—show you what speed of movement really means!" Chang Laiting was seized with fury at the sight, and shot a cold glare at Ni Caiyue beside him. "Don't even think about slipping away while you can. You know my speed. You'll regret it past all remedy—so stay put!"

"Ah! I... I..." Ni Caiyue waved her hands in frantic denial, then actually sat right down on the spot, the very picture of one who would absolutely, positively never dare wander off. It was enough to make a person laugh and cry at once.

"Knowing your place is a good thing. If you don't, this Northern Isle trash here is what you'll come to!" With that, Chang Laiting's figure abruptly swayed and became a blur of afterimage, shooting straight for Wei Zhao.

"This fellow's not just for show after all—he really is fast!" Lu Xiaozhong curled his lip at the sight. He might have no patience for any so-called Yuan Ying Fourth Young Master, but the speed Chang Laiting displayed at this moment was indeed far above his own—that much had to be admitted.

In the blink of an eye, Chang Laiting had already covered a distance of several dozen zhang and arrived before Wei Zhao. He raised the black sword high in one hand and brought it down on his head. Never mind the power of it—that opening stance alone was brimming with domineering force.

"Now let's see you run!" Chang Laiting sneered without end. Wei Zhao stood rooted to the spot, not moving in the slightest; in his eyes this was simply too slow a reaction—the man couldn't run now even if he wanted to.

Before the words had died away, the black sword had already come down to the crown of Wei Zhao's head, still swirling with the three hues of green, yellow, and red. Only this time it was different from before: this was no sword aura loosed through the air, but the solid black sword itself.

A moment ago, with several dozen zhang between them, there had still been a chance to dodge the airborne sword aura. But now the black sword was right above his head—there was no evading it. At least in Chang Laiting's eyes, a mere piece of Northern Isle trash certainly could not escape.

Wei Zhao's heart stirred slightly. Green stood for the wood element, yellow for metal, red for fire—this fellow had the three spiritual root attributes of wood, metal, and fire. For three kinds of attribute true qi to appear within a single move at the same time was, in times past, well-nigh impossible.

Before the Xuan Sheng stage, even a peerless expert at Yuan Ying great perfection could, in the vast majority of cases, cultivate only single-attribute martial techniques. Wood was wood, metal was metal, fire was fire; there was no fusing the true qi of three attributes into one.

For the various attribute spiritual roots mutually repelled one another, and the true qi of the various attributes naturally suffered the same problem. The moment one forced them together, one would not even need an enemy to act—one would likely lose control of one's own true qi and suffer the backlash first.

Wei Zhao's Five Elements Killing Qi was a rare exception. That came from the techniques of the Five-Poison Flood Dragon, and moreover the true qi of the five attributes generated and overcame one another in an endless cycle, which naturally did away with the problem of true qi repulsion.