novelraw Chapter 107: Winds and Waves Rise on the Dragon Scale River
Chapter 107: Winds and Waves Rise on the Dragon Scale River
The fisherman's account was clear and detailed, but Li Qiuchen was still somewhat puzzled.
"I follow your story well enough, but how do you know that raft has anything to do with the Old Blind One?"
The fisherman let out a sigh and said, "Look at those two children, sir, covered in chicken feathers with red silk tied around their heads. Isn't that a direct provocation against the Bai family? Who else could harbor such a deep and bitter hatred for them besides the Old Blind One?"
Chicken feathers counted as provoking the Bai family?
Apart from the Bai family, were there no other birds in the world capable of cultivating into spirits?
Over on Xu Qing's side, someone had also gotten the full story. Bai Ke, who had been tending the fire, immediately went red-eyed. He stripped off his outer clothes, launched himself into the river in one clean dive, and swam toward the drifting raft.
"What are you doing! Get back here!"
Xu Qing shouted, then suddenly realized every eye in the group had turned to him. His mind moved in an instant and he changed course, calling out, "Come back and get a rope first!"
He still had to maintain his image.
The words had barely left his mouth when something changed on the river.A whirlpool appeared out of nowhere and pulled Bai Ke, who had only made it halfway, straight down beneath the surface.
Hu Caiyi's tail shot straight up behind her back. "There's demon qi!"
Coming from her mouth... well, nobody could claim more authority on the subject.
Li Qiuchen rose to his feet and moved the two girls behind him, then focused his gaze and looked down into the water.
In the murky current beneath the surface, a creature several zhang in length had coiled tightly around Bai Ke's ankle and was dragging him toward the riverbed.
But Bai Ke was no helpless weakling. He flicked his wrist and produced a small knife from his sleeve, driving it hard into the creature below him.
He hadn't brought his iron sword along. Though it might not have made much difference even if he had, that didn't mean he went around without any useful weapon at hand.
The blade plunged in. Blood burst out. The creature flinched away in pain, and Bai Ke thrashed his arms and legs in a frantic dog paddle until he finally broke the surface.
On the bank, Xu Qing had already summoned a palm-sized earth-yellow shield, its rim set with a full ring of black jade pearls. It was clearly no ordinary spirit tool.
Young Master Liu, standing nearby, said nothing. He simply raised the fishing rod in his hand and gave it a light flick toward the raft. The slender line transformed in an instant into willow branches that stretched dozens of zhang through the air and wound themselves around the drifting raft in the middle of the river.
"Heh heh heh heh..."
A gust of black wind suddenly coiled across the sky, and a strange, rasping laugh poured into everyone's ears.
"The grudge between the Li family of the Dragon Scale River and the Bai family of the Vast Sea, do you half-grown little children really intend to involve yourselves?"
At those words, every face in the group changed.
Whatever else might be said, just the sheer pressure of the thing made it plain that its cultivation was well beyond the Qi Refining realm.
Shrouded in that black wind, even Li Qiuchen could make out nothing of what lay within.
The fishing rod in Young Master Liu's hand trembled several times, but in the end the willow branches failed to pull taut.
Xu Qing's gaze flickered. He had been about to say something bold to bolster the group's spirits, but faced with a creature this strange and sinister, the words wouldn't come.
It was Bai Ke, who had hauled himself onto the raft through sheer effort, who struggled upright and jabbed a finger at the sky, shouting in fury, "If you've got the nerve, go settle your score with the Bai family directly! What kind of ability does it take to torment two children?"
"The Bai family?"
The creature concealed in the black wind gave a cold laugh and said, "I heard the Bai family has been wiped out!"
Bai Ke sneered and said, "So you only dared show your face again after you heard that, is that right?"
"Go to hell!"
That one line seemed to pierce straight through the creature's composure. The black wind surged and blotted out the sky. The river churned into crashing waves, and the raft was overturned in an instant.
Young Master Liu snapped the fishing rod taut. Xu Qing hurled the shield in his hand forward and bellowed, "Demon! How dare you run wild within the borders of Yun County!"
The shield flew up into the air and expanded to three chi across in a heartbeat. Dozens of black jade pearls blazed with a pale green light... but it was useless. In that roiling black wind, there was no physical form to be found.
"Heh heh heh, since you won't be warned off, you can all stay here and be blood fodder!"
The creature within the black wind paid no attention whatsoever to the shield spirit tool spinning wildly through the air. It drove the river water forward in a sweeping surge toward the bank.
"Run!"
Xu Qing recalled the shield to his hand and formed it into a wall in front of himself and Young Master Liu, then turned and shouted back at the other students.
Some of the students had already come to their senses and bolted. Others stood frozen where they were, unable to move.
A senior female student who had also reached the Qi Refining realm tore the veil from her face and shaped it into a barrier, trying to help Xu Qing hold back the water.
But all of this resistance was meaningless. A wave several zhang high came crashing down on the bank, and everyone was swallowed by the water in an instant.
The moment Xu Qing had produced the shield, Li Qiuchen had already sensed that something was wrong.
Using an earth-attribute spirit tool to go head-to-head with a water demon, how was that ever going to work?
Though to be fair, none of them were seasoned warriors, and none of them had expected to find themselves in a situation like this. Making mistakes in a panic, the mind going blank, these were perfectly normal things.
Seeing how badly things were going, he scooped up one girl in each arm and turned to run.
He had only taken a few steps when a terrifying roar of rushing water sounded from behind him. The river surged forward and swept all three of them up in an instant.
If it had been nothing more than the current he could have managed. Li Qiuchen planted his feet and drove roots down through his soles into the earth, holding firm. But at that very moment a chill crept up through his chest, as though something had fixed its gaze on him.
Li Qiuchen turned, and saw the dark shape that had earlier tried to drag Bai Ke to the bottom, now riding the current and charging straight at him, its great mouth open wide, every tooth a jagged spike.
Both his hands and feet were occupied and he couldn't move. The jaws were nearly upon him.
"Glug glug glug..."
Tang Xiaoxue tried to say something, but the moment she opened her mouth she swallowed a bellyful of water.
Li Qiuchen gave a small nod and raised his hand to let her go.
Tang Xiaoxue was immediately swept several zhang away by the current. She reached back and pulled out her small pickaxe, drove it into the riverbed with every ounce of strength she had, and pinned her slight body in place.
Li Qiuchen turned back. The gaping maw was almost upon him now, though its target wasn't him but Hu Caiyi in his arms.
Oh? That's what you're after?
Whatever you do, don't tell fishermen that fox blood makes excellent bait. They will absolutely go and try it.
Even as he made the mental aside, he reached over with his free hand, clenched it into a fist, and drove it straight into that gaping maw.
Then the five fingers snapped open and the true qi within him detonated.
Burning Blood Heart-Crushing Palm!
There was a muffled, wet crack. A stench of blood burst outward through the water in a dark mist. The creature, several zhang long, went rigid and froze where it was.
With Li Qiuchen's current level of strength, driving a technique that carried a stacking power effect, in a situation where he had acted with full intent against a target completely unaware, was enough to kill any enemy at the Qi Refining realm in a single strike.
That was the sheer dominance of ancient cultivation techniques.
Unless, of course, one's opponent was also operating outside the rules.
As the floodwater that had surged onto the bank slowly receded, it revealed the creature dangling from his fist. It was a great black fish spirit, its body more than three zhang in length.
[NEXT CHAPTER]