Chapter 312: Terrible News and Murder Plot (2/2)
”You? How can you keep pace with me?” Zhou Bao shot a look at Jiang Xiao. Pursuant to the letter, his father was really seriously ill. Moreover, based on the date in the letter, more than two months had passed since this letter was sent out.
Given that the Zhou's didn't have any Level Seven experts other than Zhou Bao, nor could they command any Level Seven expert to deliver the message, this letter could only be passed to Zhou Bao's hand through the primitive horse-riding delivery. In fact, in this world with no telephone or email, it would take three or four months to communicate a message between the northwest and the Central Plains. But this time, the letter was delayed for just two months, which was somewhat beyond Zhou Bao's expectation.
No wonder this messenger fainted instantly when he arrived here. He fainted due to tiredness.
That was why Zhou Bao decided to take off immediately. Otherwise, maybe when he got to Yunzhou, the corpse of Old Zhou would already stink.
Since this point could occur to Zhou Bao, Jiang Xiao and the fellows could also consider it. Therefore, when they saw Zhou Bao turn into a jet of gold light and disappear from the air, they merely heaved a sigh.
Meanwhile, on the other side, Nie Wushang and his fellows had been keeping track of Zhou Bao after they had returned to their place. Catching a sight of the gold light shooting toward the sky from Zhou Bao's yard, a trace of glee flitted across Nie Wushang's eyes. He took out a small cyan block looking like a wooden plate from his sleeve, which, with a sudden squeeze, was crushed into ashes, and then vanished in the wind.
Zhou Bao was hurriedly flying to the southeast with his Gang Qi covering his body. His speed was amazing, as if a gold meteor was streaking across the sky.
At this speed, even if he flew straight to his home in Yunzhou, it would take nearly 16 hours, almost half a day. And that still depended on whether his stamina could allow him to keep flying like this!
Fortunately, Zhou Bao's Internal Qi was pretty adequate, and his Gang Qi was also of a higher grade. Therefore, after flying for six or eight hours consecutively, he still didn't feel a bit tired.
Halfway through his flight, he suddenly felt something was wrong. His speed seemed to grow slower, and in the blink of an eye, the whole world went all grey and misty.
”What?” Zhou Bao was startled. But before he could react, a chilling wisp of the killing intent stole over him from behind.
”Crap!” Subconsciously, he tried to launch the Three Realms Division. But to his surprise, the surrounding air was stagnant, as if being locked in by some invisible force. Even with his strength, it would be really hard to mobilize the space.
Previously when he launched the Three Realms Division, the surrounding space would become as fragile as a piece of paper, but now it was as solid as a wall. Although he might be able to mobilize this wall if he employed more strength, sadly, he didn't have time to make it happen.
Launching the Three Realms Division would only cost a second, but after all, this would delay him for a second.
Exactly at this time, that wisp of killing intent had invaded and instantly punctured his Gang Qi, his Nine Dragons Heavenly Kylin Gang!
The Poison Cold Shield was launched at this second. A layer of faint cyan light enveloped Zhou Bao, shielding him from that murderous intent, which finally allowed Zhou Bao to have some leeway to react.
”Now that the Three Realms Division is constrained ... I'll simply give it up for the moment.”
That killing intent penetrated through the Poison Cold Shield and hit Zhou Bao. However, he was not badly injured. He just got a shallow cut in the waist, where a sense of numbness was spreading out. But soon, it was replaced by the cooling Qi of the Poison Cold Shield.
The Poison Cold Shield wasn't completely able to block out this killing intent, but it was sufficiently capable of absorbing all the poison contained in it.
In the meantime, Zhou Bao also caught a clear sight of the man who had launched this attack against him.
He was a black-robed masked man with a pitch-dark dagger!
But he only got a glimpse of him. After that, the black-clothed man suddenly disappeared together with his black dagger, just like Zhou Bao launching his Three Realms Division.
”This is a trap!”
All of this happened in a split second, from the emergence of that black-clothed man, to the launch of the Poison Cold Shield, and then to Zhou Bao getting injured and that man disappearing. When Zhou Bao steadied his figure, his Gang Qi covered all parts of him once again, that black-clothed man was already gone. The environment was a vast expanse of whiteness, putting Zhou Bao under the impression that he was caught in the Yin and Yang Dust Formation.
Of course, this was not the Yin and Yang Dust Formation!
”Interesting. Seems that someone wants to set me up and murder me!” Suspending in the air, Zhou Bao looked around, and an extremely freezing smile flashed across his face. He jerked his body and was ready to descend, but unexpectedly, a whiff of vigorous Sword Qi appeared out of thin air and even condensed into a shadow of a sword at his foot, thrusting directly at him.
”Go to hell!” Zhou Bao waved his hand, and the Golden-Scaled Cudgel appeared in it, which gave a fierce pound downwards.
”Bump!” The Sword Qi which already took shape was smashed into pieces by this pounding.
However, smashing the Sword Qi did not mean the trouble was over. On the contrary, it seemed that his move, this pounding, was so fierce that numerous whiffs of Sword Qi were produced after that one strike. All the Sword Qi tightly surrounded him, piercing at him together from all directions.
”Break!” Zhou Bao let out a low bark. The Golden-Scaled Cudgel in his hand swept out, making the movement of sweeping in all directions. This strike was incomparably harsh, which crushed all the thousands of jets of Sword Qi that were coming from all directions.
However, after being smashed into pieces, that broken Sword Qi combined once again, and even produced more of them out of nowhere, attacking straightforwardly at Zhou Bao.
The cudgel in Zhou Bao's froze for a second, but this time, he didn't strike as brutally as he did previously. Instead, he used the cudgel to protect his body, warding off all the surrounding Sword Qi.
”That Sword Qi is launched according to my movements. The more violent I move, the stronger that Sword Qi will be!”
As he kept all of the Sword Qi away from him, Zhou Bao said to himself in his head.
Compared to the Sword Qi that caught him off guard at the beginning, this Sword Qi emerged out of the void and was much easier to deal with, because except for some of them that were very powerful, the rest couldn't even break through his Protective Gang Qi.
”Don't move fiercely. I just need to crumble this powerful Sword Qi. No need to care too much!”
After one round of attack, Zhou Bao got a hang of the working principle and the function of the surrounding sword formation. Thus, he started to strike in a more prudent way.
He was now caught up in a well-prepared trap. Although he had absolute faith in himself, he still needed to be necessarily cautious. After all, this happened too fast, so he couldn't immediately start a massive killing spree. He needed to observe the situation first. He needed time.
After the seemingly endless attack of Sword Qi, Zhou Bao finally spotted the dirty trick in this trap. Among this Sword Qi that looked unable to break his Gang Qi, occasionally there were one or two jets of sharp Gang Qi that was more than enough to break his Gang Qi, his Poison Cold Shield, and even his body. By far, only this insidious Gang Qi was the true trump card of this formation.
”Though interesting enough, we might as well not continue to play the same boring trick anymore. Just reveal yourself!” yelled Zhou Bao. He quickly flung up his Golden-Scaled Cudgel to attack the place under his feet and simply formed a clearing there. He rapidly plunged toward the ground, but within the blurring formation, he couldn't see where the ground was. Nevertheless, it was sufficient for him to know that he was falling downwards. He was originally flying at the height of no more than 10,000 feet. Now in the process of descending, if he considered the height and his falling speed together, it was easy for him to predicate when he would land on the ground.
However, the man who had set up this trap could never allow him to do what he wanted so easily.
Just when Zhou Bao started falling, that familiar killing intent appeared once more.
”Hmph!” sneered Zhou Bao. He threw a dozen gold flames at it, reserving almost no time for the other side to take a break.
With a swish, that figure vanished in the air. That Sword Qi, after being crumbled, also disappeared without a trace.
”Hiding the head but showing the tail. That's not brave at all!” Missing the strike, Zhou Bao felt very angry and cursed in an undertone. He suddenly accelerated the movement of his Golden-Scaled Cudgel to completely shield his body with the moving shadows of the cudgel and began falling down more rapidly.
This time the opponent didn't seem to impede him. Apart from the flowing Sword Qi appearing frequently around him, Zhou Bao didn't notice anything abnormal.
Another round of violent attacks didn't surface until the moment Zhou Bao stepped onto the sold ground. This time, it was not only Sword Qi attacking, but also three Flying Swords blended amongst it!
The three Flying Swords were giving off peerlessly sharp Sword Qi. They forced the Golden-Scaled Cudgel in Zhou Bao's hand to deal with them, while the rest of the Sword Qi headed directly for Zhou Bao himself.
”Still not revealing yourself?”
Zhou Bao had unleashed his fire in the fight. Now, he could not consider anything else. With a flash of the golden light shining on the backside of his head, Zhou Bao initiated the Golden Flame Mirror. After which, a straight beam of golden light flew right at the three Flying Swords to shroud them.
The Level of these three Flying Swords was pretty high, but they were no better than a celestial device at the Mysterious Level. Thus, how could they contend against a Pure Yang Celestial Device like the Golden Flame Mirror?
The instant the three Flying Swords touched on the Golden Flame Mirror, three shrilling hootings sounded, and then they disappeared into nowhere.
The Golden Flame Mirror was blazing, covering Zhou Bao in its golden light. Three Green Lotuses were floating around Zhou Bao, which took hold of every jet of the attacking Sword Qi. Sharp and numerous as the Sword Qi was, none of them were able to hurt Zhou Bao.
Meanwhile, Zhou Bao grabbed the incantation in one hand, and a forbidding light flashed through his eyes. ”This is just a sword formation. Do you really believe this thing can trap me inside?”
Clusters of lotus-shaped golden flame were shooting out from the Golden Flame Mirror in all directions. Along with the squirting of these lotus-shaped flames, the white surroundings also began to change color.
A wave of sizzling noise spread into Zhou Bao's ear, which just like grilling meat over fierce fire. The space of the formation was torrenting violently as if being stimulated to a great extent.
”Sun Colored Glaze Flame? Damn! How can he have collected the Sun Colored Glaze Flame?”
At the sight of those clusters of golden light ejecting from the Golden Flame Mirror, a deep voice came down, but it turned out to be someone who couldn't stifle their shock and let out a queer bawl.
”Got you!” Although Zhou Bao set out his Golden Flame Mirror, his spiritual mind was as sharp as usual. Once the voice came out, he immediately identified the opponent's location and lengthened his Golden-Scaled Cudgel to give a hard pound at the source of that sound.