Chapter 4338 — Slapping Down a Nascent Soul

"She didn't die, as it happens—but you, I'm afraid, are not far from death yourself." A cold arc lifted the corner of Wei Zhao's mouth, and his eyes held a razor-sharp killing intent. Matters had come to this; not to strike a killing blow was no longer possible.

"Hm? Even at death's door, you're still talking big. Seems that saying really is true—a dying duck's bill stays stiff. The closer a duck like you gets to death, the stiffer its bill grows. Haha!" Cheng Qitian laughed with a face full of self-satisfaction.

It was a bit of a pity that he had only cornered Wei Zhao alone, but no real problem. This would let him vent his pent-up anger well enough, and as for that woman, they could have someone keep an eye on her later.

Moreover, after returning last time, Old Kong had told him that the reason this Ling Yi and that woman were formidable was precisely their extraordinary joint-attack technique. If the two could not coordinate with each other, they were merely ordinary early-stage Golden Core experts, not worth mentioning. He had not expected the pair to have separated on their own—which conveniently saved him a good deal of trouble.

"Whether it's big talk, you'll know in a moment." Wei Zhao's eyes flickered, and his figure abruptly shot toward the other man with such speed that even a peak early-stage Nascent Soul expert like Old Kong was caught somewhat off guard.

Cheng Qitian was instantly alarmed and hastily withdrew, retreating. In that instant, the terror on his face could not be concealed. For all his smug, arrogant, look-down-on-everyone manner, he had the lesson of last time to remember—and though he well knew the other's cultivation level was far beneath his own, he was still afraid, still frightened.

And as Cheng Qitian retreated in panic, Old Kong at his side instantly unleashed his full power. Before he had even arrived, the mighty true qi of a peak early-stage Nascent Soul expert had already poured out in a torrent, squarely blocking the way in front of Cheng Qitian and forming a thick, solid barrier of protection.

Wei Zhao's burst of force was sudden, but Old Kong had in fact long been prepared for it. In his view, Wei Zhao was alone, and since he could not use the powerful joint-attack technique, the man posed no threat to him whatsoever. The only sliver of a chance the fellow had lay entirely with Cheng Qitian.

So long as he protected Cheng Qitian from harm, the other man was a duck already cooked—no hope of flying away.

Seeing this, Cheng Qitian's heart settled. This was something he had arranged beforehand. He had told Old Kong that no matter what happened, his first reaction must be to safeguard his own safety. Even if this Wei Zhao were far stronger than he appeared, with only his own strength, it was absolutely impossible for him to break through the defenses of a peak early-stage Nascent Soul expert.

And so it was. The vast gulf in strength between the Nascent Soul stage and the Golden Core stage was not something so easily crossed, no matter how great the genius. An expert at Golden Core Great Perfection might just barely manage it—there was still that tiny sliver of possibility—but anyone below mid-stage Golden Core need not even think of it.

Yet in the next instant, the expression on Cheng Qitian's face froze abruptly—and as for Old Kong, he was even more unable to believe his own eyes.

The thirtieth stance of the Wild Fire Eight-Trigram Palm! This was the strongest martial technique Wei Zhao had mastered to date. He struck out without the slightest hesitation—and his target, from first to last, had never been Cheng Qitian. It was Old Kong!

Cheng Qitian was only late-stage Golden Core; Wei Zhao did not take such goods seriously at all. The only one present who could truly threaten him was Old Kong, that formidable peak early-stage Nascent Soul expert—and everything he had done had been to strangle this greatest threat as swiftly as possible!

Last time, he and Huang Xiaotao had launched a sudden ambush on Old Kong. This time Wei Zhao was alone, yet he still made the same choice—something Old Kong could never in a thousand years have anticipated.

On the surface, it had looked like an attack on Cheng Qitian; everything was so convincing, so perfectly natural. Old Kong had not hesitated for an instant before throwing all his strength into shielding Cheng Qitian—never imagining that it was nothing but a feint.

In that moment, because Old Kong had devoted all his attention to Cheng Qitian, he himself was virtually undefended; he had not even released his body-protecting true qi. One truly could not say whether to call him too straightforward, or simply too **.

Boom! Caught utterly off guard, the materialized Eight-Trigram Fire Palm struck Old Kong squarely in the chest—and that was not the end of it. Wei Zhao followed up at once with a maximally powered Wild Fire Thousand Legs, and before the eyes of all the many people on the dock, he beat Old Kong—a lofty peak early-stage Nascent Soul expert—so badly that the man had no power to fight back at all!

Watching helplessly as Old Kong was kicked flying, slammed hard onto the ground, spitting blood, his life or death unknown, everyone present drew a sharp, collective breath. When they looked at Wei Zhao again, their eyes had changed completely—as though they were looking at a monster.

Experts abounded among those present, and in that instant just now, many of them had also seen Wei Zhao's strength: roughly mid-stage Golden Core, by the look of it.

Yet it was this mid-stage Golden Core expert who, in full view of the crowd, had in a single exchange beaten Old Kong—a great peak early-stage Nascent Soul expert—into such a state. Everyone could not help but ask the same question: had this world gone mad?

Glancing at the bedraggled Old Kong on the ground, Wei Zhao judged that whether the man lived or died, at the very least he would not be able to recover his strength for several months. Even Wei Zhao himself was rather surprised. In his expectations, injuring the man in a single exchange would already have counted as a fine result; he had never thought he would cripple him outright. It had gone so smoothly it was almost hard to believe.

This could only be explained by two reasons: first, Wei Zhao's own strength was now far beyond what it had been; second, Old Kong, that peak early-stage Nascent Soul expert, was simply too straightforward—downright **...

"Ah!" A shriek suddenly erupted from the rear of the crowd, and then a panicked figure was seen fleeing the dock for dear life—it was none other than Cheng Qitian.

Recovering his face was secondary now. The only question this lofty young master of the Poison Eye Mercenary Corps had to consider at this moment was whether he could escape alive back to the Poison Eye Mercenary Corps headquarters!

If even Old Kong had proved so utterly vulnerable before the other man, then he—a late-stage Golden Core expert whose strength was far inferior—was trembling to his very core. If the other caught up with him, there could be only one outcome: death. No matter how formidable his father Cheng Haonan might be, it would be of no help whatsoever.

As for Old Kong, whose life or death was unknown, Cheng Qitian could not spare him a thought at all. With his own little life barely hanging on, who the hell had time to care whether a subordinate like that lived or died?

Watching Cheng Qitian's fleeing back, Wei Zhao gave a cold smile, but showed no intention of setting off in pursuit. It was not that he dared not kill this Cheng Qitian—it was simply that there was no need to push matters to the absolute extreme all at once.