Chapter 230 — You Cheated

Wei Zhao did not get out of the car. He sat where he was, quietly watching the movements all around him.

"Wei Zhao, get out." A man climbed down from the van and stood not far in front of Wei Zhao's car. It was Black Panther, exactly as Wei Zhao had guessed.

"Peak late Yellow Rank?" Wei Zhao frowned. The ability to see another person's true rank was one of his cheat-like gifts, but Black Panther's sudden leap from a man of no real strength to the peak of the late Yellow Rank still left him deeply puzzled.

He would have liked to observe a while longer, but Tang Zhi was still up in that unfinished building. Wei Zhao had no choice but to get out. Black Panther had to be dealt with quickly, or Tang Zhi might be in danger.

"Wei Zhao, bet you didn't expect this, did you? That I'd slip out of the police's hands?" Black Panther looked at Wei Zhao the way one looks at a lamb trussed up for slaughter, his eyes brimming with bloodlust.

"No, I didn't." Wei Zhao nodded. "But there are a few things you won't have expected either."

"What do you mean?" Black Panther blinked.

"The truth is, I'm a skilled hand at the early Yellow Rank!" As the words left Wei Zhao's mouth, his whole aura surged forth, his power suppressed to the early Yellow Rank.

"Hm?" Black Panther was briefly taken aback, but then he burst out laughing, full of mockery... Before he became a peak late Yellow Rank fighter, he had never known how strong Wei Zhao truly was; he had merely assumed Wei Zhao was a cut above an ordinary man. Now, unexpectedly, he had learned that Wei Zhao was a Yellow Rank fighter too!

But in Black Panther's eyes, the early Yellow Rank now meant nothing at all. He possessed the peak of the late Yellow Rank, and early Yellow Rank strength looked to him as feeble as a grown man looks at a newborn infant.

"What are you laughing at?" Wei Zhao asked mildly. "Have you never heard how the martial world ranks strength? Heaven, Earth, Mystic, Yellow—Yellow may be the lowest, but it is already enough to run rampant through the city. The early Yellow Rank is the equal of a special forces soldier."

"Haha, of course I know." Black Panther nearly choked laughing at Wei Zhao's words. With strength like yours, you're still showing off in front of me? You think you're something?

"Since you know it, what are you still standing there for? Waiting for a skilled hand of the early Yellow Rank like me to send you to the Western Paradise?" Wei Zhao said carelessly.

"Ha!" Black Panther laughed again, a brilliant laugh. He truly did not know what arrogance meant. An early Yellow Rank, and already this conceited? "Fine, then let me see for myself just how formidable this early Yellow Rank expert of yours really is!"

Wei Zhao's manner today was thoroughly abnormal, utterly unlike his usual way of handling things. Had Black Panther understood Wei Zhao's nature, he would surely have sensed that something was off. The Wei Zhao who was never one for showing off had today turned conceited and boastful...

But Black Panther did not know that, so he simply thought Wei Zhao was a megalomaniac.

"Come on." Wei Zhao looked at Black Panther with disdain. "I'll show you what early Yellow Rank strength looks like!"

Wei Zhao struck a posture of utter contempt.

Faced with such scorn, Black Panther gave a cold smile, as though he had written Wei Zhao off as an ignorant fool. His body shifted slightly, and he abruptly drove a punch at Wei Zhao.

Wei Zhao smiled faintly and threw a punch of his own to meet Black Panther's fist.

Black Panther laughed inwardly at Wei Zhao's stupidity. With that little bit of strength, you dare take a punch from my peak late Yellow Rank power head-on? A mid Yellow Rank punch alone is enough to badly wound an early Yellow Rank, let alone one from a peak late Yellow Rank fighter like me!

With full force, a single punch could have blasted this early Yellow Rank Wei Zhao to death, but that was not what Black Panther wanted. According to Zhong Yongliang's instructions, Wei Zhao was to be badly wounded first, then dragged upstairs to watch Zou Ruoming and Tang Zhi and die in agony.

So, to avoid killing Wei Zhao outright, Black Panther used only mid Yellow Rank strength. Badly wounding Wei Zhao would be enough.

"Bang!" The two fists slammed together with a muffled thud.

"You... you're not early Yellow Rank..." Incredulity filled Black Panther's eyes. Before he could say another word, his whole body was sent flying backward, crashing heavily to the ground.

Wei Zhao did not wait for Black Panther to land. He flashed forward, planted a foot on Black Panther's chest, and a series of cracks rang out as ribs snapped...

Wei Zhao stomped down hard a few more times. Black Panther's eyes rolled back and he blacked out. Before losing consciousness, he groaned in agony, "You... you tricked me..."

Wei Zhao curled his lip. "My master always said a proper killer stops at nothing."

In Wei Zhao's eyes, there was no such thing as jianghu rules. So long as the goal was achieved, anything went. Talking about rules with a killer was pure nonsense. If Wei Zhao had revealed from the start that he was at the same late-stage Yellow Rank peak as Black Panther, Black Panther would certainly not have been so careless, nor would he have thrown his punch with only mid-stage Yellow Rank strength.

Though Wei Zhao was well versed in the arts of assassination and had the Xuanyuan Dragon-Taming Art to aid him, defeating Black Panther was not impossible, only a matter of time. But the key problem was that Wei Zhao did not have that much time!

Tang Zhi was right upstairs. How could Wei Zhao afford to be tangled up with Black Panther for long? So Wei Zhao simply played a trick, and to his surprise the idiot Black Panther actually fell for it. This intellect... honestly, it was almost enough to make Wei Zhao worry.

Such trickery was a little beneath contempt, but Wei Zhao had been raised from childhood under the influence of his master and Old Man Wei, two even more shameless specimens, and he had long since stopped caring about such things.

Wei Zhao glanced at Black Panther, then turned and walked toward Zhong Yongliang's Audi. If Zhong Yongliang and Zou Ruoming had not both known about this affair, Wei Zhao would not have minded sending Black Panther off on a little trip through time.

But since Zhong Yongliang and Zou Ruoming could not be dealt with just yet, Wei Zhao could not kill Black Panther either. Even so, Black Panther was already a cripple, and Wei Zhao would just count it as a favor to that little tigress Qiu Lingshan.

Wei Zhao opened the Audi door, hauled Zhong Yongliang over to the unfinished building, dumped him on the ground first, then gave a slight flicker of movement and leaped up to the second floor.

Like a Spider-Man, Wei Zhao hooked both hands into the gaps between the bricks on the outer wall of the unfinished building and searched room by room through the windows for any sign of Tang Zhi...

When Wei Zhao saw one empty room where Tang Zhi lay unharmed, his heart instantly eased. In truth, while he had been fighting Black Panther earlier, his ears had been fixed on the goings-on over here at the unfinished building. Hearing no unusual sounds, he knew Zou Ruoming had probably not made his move yet, which was why Wei Zhao had felt at ease to play around with Black Panther for a while.