Chapter 1999 — With Utmost Difficulty
The Blossom Guardian · Page 2 of 2
"The fourth form? How is that possible? How can it be the fourth form?" The Earth-stage man in black had meant to counter with the third form again, only to discover that what Wei Zhao brought out proved to be the fourth. After all, each successive form consumed true qi at a geometric rate. In ordinary circumstances, when one's rank was not yet lofty, even a single unleashing of the mightiest form of a martial technique would drain a huge amount of the true qi from one's body!
Take the Earth-stage man in black himself: as an adept of the mid Earth-stage, he could unleash the fourth form perhaps ten times at most before he was worn through. As for Wei Zhao, an early Earth-stage hand, ten uses of the second form would already be the best he could manage—not to mention the third or fourth!
Thus the Earth-stage man in black looked on Wei Zhao's fourth form with great astonishment, unsure what the boy meant to do. Yet of one thing he could be certain: Wei Zhao intended a head-on clash!
Chagrined, the Earth-stage man in black likewise transformed the third form he had been about to use into the fourth, and sent it against Wei Zhao.
In fact, he had not wanted to waste any time on Wei Zhao; his goal was Xu Shilan. Even those words of his about fighting to the death had been spoken only to frighten Wei Zhao into saying something soft and backing away. He had never expected the opposite effect—this madman was prepared to fight to the death, heedless of his own life!
Bang! Seeing the icy mist on the man's left hand suddenly turn several degrees sharper, Wei Zhao's heart clenched. Still, he gritted his teeth and charged to meet it. Against an Earth-stage adept above his own rank, Wei Zhao had not the slightest certainty of victory. Had the man been merely one rank higher, Wei Zhao saw clearly, he could have settled him entirely with the Furious Flame Fist.
Had the Earth-stage man in black not mastered that fourth form of the Frigid Snowthorn, Wei Zhao could have defeated him with the third form of the Furious Flame Fist, for that third form was already infinitely close to another man's fourth. But as luck would have it, this Earth-stage man was two ranks above him, and had cultivated the fourth form of the Frigid Snowthorn besides. Wei Zhao could at best force a draw—and even that was with the utmost difficulty.
The thrill of killing in a single move, which he had enjoyed back in the Profound stage, had all but vanished, and that chafed Wei Zhao beyond measure. To have plummeted from the number one beneath the Earth stage to nearly the feeblest existence beneath the Heaven stage was enough to make him vomit blood.
The flames of the Furious Flame Fist smashed into the icy mist of the Frigid Snowthorn in a tremendous collision of energies, and Wei Zhao's body was once more sent flying backward. Of course, the Earth-stage man in black was not much better off either.
After all, the third form Wei Zhao had driven out was already infinitely close to the other's fourth. In such a head-on clash, Wei Zhao had already suffered internal injury—so how could the other man have come out unscathed?
The Earth-stage man in black was so furious he could have cursed his mother. Wei Zhao was clearly far weaker than he, yet he could somehow unleash a fourth-form martial technique just as well. This kind of head-on collision was a tactic that wounded both sides; in the end, whoever's true qi proved fiercer would hold the advantage, buying his enemy's ruin at the price of his own injury.
Naturally, Wei Zhao was not in good shape either. This blow had caused him far more harm than the last. He spat blood four or five times in succession, and his face turned deathly pale.