Martial Arts Master

In a split second, Talin had seemingly transformed from the Witch King into a monster that had crawled out from the depths of death. A blood-curdling undead, decaying yet powerful.

Since curses weren’t effective, he had chosen to use Art of the Undying to increase his close-quarter combat abilities.

Once he turns into this undying form, his physique toughens and his vitality becomes unfathomable. He no longer fears normal attacks and gains enormous strength and ridiculous speed. His body also contains a potent poison. Ghosts and gods begin following him.

The only shortcoming of this evil art is that it has after-effects, even if deactivated in time. The user’s body become like a corpse, his status near death. If he uses it too many times, surpassing the limits, his vitality will gradually disperse and his flesh will decay. Around twenty days later, he will die an agonizing death.

If he hadn’t encountered this special situation, Talin wouldn’t have even considered using the Art of the Undying. But right now, he didn’t have the luxury to worry about that.

Thump! Pushing his heel into the ground, he stopped sliding back and pounced at Lou Cheng ferociously. His aquamarine eyes gleamed, emitting a terrible aura. His hands were open and grabbing. It was twisted and hideous.

At the same time, insects crawled out from the bodies of Ta Gu’s family and subordinates and swarmed at Smith, Dwayne, Cheng An, Jian Dan, and the others, a multi-colored army.

Full on flesh and blood, they had increased in size. They were covered in a brutal and insane light, as if no longer products of nature.

Looking at the dense, strange, and colorful army of insects and snakes, Smith shuddered and his hair stood on end.

With one hand he shot spider-silk, swinging around with the help of the remaining trees. With the other, he weaved and tossed down webs, trapping waves of insects which were disposed of by his teammates.

After going back-and-forth twice, he felt a chill at his neck. Something furry was closing in.

At that moment, the horrified Smith felt his body turn cold, as though he could already foresee his terrible, hideous death.

I hope my spider genes can combat this monster’s poison.

Just as that thought surfaced, a swish broke through the air. The tingling sensation was gone.

Instinctively, Smith turned to look. He saw a strange spider with thin, dense hair. Its abdomen was cracked apart, from which streamed a green liquid. It was falling rapidly with the broken silk thread at its back. At the same time, Thoughtless Blade, Jian Dan, retracted her right hand and pushed out, shooting shapeless vacuum knives one after another at the worm swarm.

That spider copied my combat style by covertly swinging around and ambushing, thought Smith, thank goodness Jian got my back. Smith’s heart returned from his throat to its original spot. For a moment, he forgot who was copying who.

Collecting himself and heightening his alert, he began swinging around again to assist the battle.

Jian Dan couldn’t release tens and hundreds of shapeless vacuum knives at once. Against the countless insects, it simply was not enough. She opened her tactical backpack, took out a grenade, and tossed it forward.

By doing so, she could take care of large waves snakes and insects without needing to aim, as long as she got the general direction right.

On the other side, Dwayne had expanded his muscles, turning into a two-meter tall giant. His dark skin had cloud-like patterns, silver light springing inside.

He held a flamethrower in his toylike hand, spitting scarlet flames at the swarming insects. Sometimes, the flames were electricified and bounced from target to target, paralyzing the insects.

As a soldier known for his strength, his tactical backpack was the size of a person, containing all kinds of weapons to deal with different situations.

Shadow Hunter, Cheng An’s supernatural ability wasn’t suited for multiple-target attacks, so he hung back on the sidelines with a rocket launcher on his shoulder, regularly blasting the areas where snakes and insects clustered. The sound of explosions rose and fell.

But even with their coordination and firepower, the swarm of insects didn’t falter or decrease in amount. Some mutated insects even crawled from the ground and attacked them from below, pushing them further back.

Talin’s goal was to distract Lou Cheng by attacking his team and forcing him to protect them, giving him the chance to escape.

There wasn’t any data showing that Lou Cheng was a cruel or merciless person.

Bam! Talin pounced at Lou Cheng, reaching out with both hands, as though he was challenging him to a close-quarter showdown of brute force.

Talin trusted that his opponent, who had a simple and violent combat style, wouldn’t turn down the challenge.

Then, he’d give him the “surprise.”

If the “surprise” worked and Lou Cheng was distracted to protect his comrades, he could successfully retreat and might even kill some of them off.

Right as they were about to clash, Lou Cheng suddenly turned at his waist and flashed to the side. A frigid wind swept up by his movements lowered the temperature of the surrounding heat waves by ten or so degrees.

Bam! Bam! Bam!

As Lou Cheng used his footwork, white mist permeated the air, and frost gathered in a huge radius around him. Soon, frigid wind roared and dense snow fell. A small blizzard came to life in the semi-tropical rainforest.

Under the cover of the blizzard, Lou Cheng’s three orbiting fireballs were vaguely visible. He kept on the move around his opponent, preventing Talin from accurately pinning down his location, not to mention hitting him.

The second style of Ice Sect, Mesmerizing Steps!

Whoosh!

The whistling wind blew forth. The vacant ground that had been plowed by the bombardment cooled, turning icy.

Insects and snakes were cold-blooded animals that couldn’t adjust their body temperatures. In such an environment, their blood turned cold and they began to freeze. On the other hand, as warm-blooded animals, Smith and the others merely felt a chill and weren’t very affected.

Whoooo!

Frigid wind entered their bodies as ice and snow accumulated. The smaller insects froze to death by the dozens. The ones that survived retreated like an ebbing tide, giving Smith and the others a chance to catch their breath.

Lou Cheng could effectively deal with the swarm of insects with either ice or flame, but he chose the former instead of an inferno, since the latter would have hurt his team members.

Seeing this, Talin knew he had messed up. He shouldn’t have tried to do both things at once; the effects of one had negated the other.

He turned and made a dash for the edge of the blizzard. It seemed like he was going to go deeper into the jungle and make a run for it.

Bam!

As though blustering against a wall of air, the frigid wind cracked a pile of frost apart. From that, Lou Cheng sprang out, sticking to the back of Talin like a parasite. He threw a dense, purple-flame Burst Fist at Talin’s waist.

At that moment, as though he had been expecting it, Talin stopped.

It was as though his body had lost their bones, or he had turned into a giant snake, twisting around forcefully and creepily. His palm opened and pressed onto Lou Cheng’s fist.

At the center of his palm, green, blue, red, and black poisonous fang-like blisters formed.

His escape was a set-up for a counterattack!

Fighting back was preparation for a better escape.

Lou Cheng’s pupils shrunk, and his Qi and blood flowed in reverse. He bent his knees.

With Force Concentration, he pulled his right fist back, avoiding contact with Talin’s poisonous fangs.

Not disheartened, the pale green in Talin’s eyes grew thicker. He opened his mouth and spat out a hoary mist.

The mist immediately condensed and formed into the shape of a human head. The eyes on the blurry face were vicious. The head opened its mouth, jumping and biting at Lou Cheng with lightning speed.

This was the surprise prepared by Talin, the secret art of the branch of the Witch King, Hitouban!

It was made using a living person experiencing wildly fluctuating emotions. He stored it in his body by imbuing the victim’s head into the mist. Once he spat it out, he could remote control it and kill the enemy from a distance. Plus, it comes and goes like the wind, gathers and disperses at one’s will, and was immune to many types of damage.

However, flame, ice, and high intensity light can still counter it. Therefore, Talin didn’t use it right away, but waited for this moment when they were less than a meter apart.

At this distance, no one could dodge the Hitouban. Even if one escaped death, they would be gravely wounded.

Right as Hitouban appeared, Lou Cheng’s Dan force erupted. He sprang back and quickly retreated. However, the head that had formed from mist was even faster. In a breath’s time, it approached him.

A lump of dazzling white appeared. One of Lou Cheng’s three fireballs that had not yet been launched moved before him.

His retreat was to buy time for this.

Boom!

Hitouban landed on the dazzling white light. On that spot, it was as though a sun appeared, casting brilliant light around it.

The hoary mist distorted and struggled, then dispersed rapidly. With the shockwave from the explosion, Talin leapt backwards and straightened his body. He went for the edge of the blizzard at full speed.

This was the chance to escape he had been waiting for.

Talin released three more Hitoubans, using them to occupy the lanes of conflict and cutting off the pursuing attackers.

The blizzard quickly thinned. Trees came into sight.

Just as he stepped into the tree-cover, before he could even rejoice he heard a low, solemn curse being uttered.

“Formation!”

Lou Cheng’s clothes were in tatters, and flames streamed down his body. Forming a seal with his hands, he condensed and solidified the air at the last second, binding Talin.

If not for Talin’s focus on escaping, Lou Cheng wouldn’t have found himself in such an advantageous position.

Of course, it would have been a different story if Talin chose to fight to the death.

Swish, swish! Scorching red and faint blue flew out and blasted at Talin, who was trying to wriggle free with his Undying Body.

Swish, swish, swish! Lou Cheng’s fingers moved consecutively, dishing out waves of pellucid sword air that took on the intercepting Hitoubans.

Though the sword’s glow didn’t pierce them, it caused layers of ice to form around them, freezing them in place. The heads fell onto the ground, temporarily unable to move. Once the sword glow actually landed, the mist condensed and shattered to pieces, dispersing at once.

Boom, boom!

A loud explosion erupted and dark clouds rose as scorching red and faint blue landed on Talin.

As the light from the flames dimmed, Lou Cheng closed in on him. He launched an invasive bout of attacks, like raging fire, at his opponent’s hoary body that already seemed to be cracking.