"Aha, you're really nimble on your feet!" the old man appeared behind the blood-red palm and snorted
half-surprised and half-angry at his opponent.
He frowned and measured up the young man in front of him.
Suddenly, the palm whooshed by Austin's head with a gale of vital energy force savage in its attack.
Austin had no time to lose.
He quickly summoned the sword of vital energy and in a heartbeat, a sizzling sound buzzed.
The vital energy sword with searing flames ready to lick his opponent was in his hand. Austin charged
at the blood-red palm with all his energy.
"Bang!"
The mighty sword of the vital energy collided with the scathing blood-red palm. They wrangled with
blazing energy, hungry for triumph.
'Aah!' Austin winced. He felt a sharp stabbing vital energy force striking at him and his redoubtable
sword.
Bang!
Before Austin could blink or realize a thing, one third of the blade of his sword was crushed, and the
flames burning on the remaining blade flickered fighting the pressure for a few more seconds before
dying down.
Under the impact, Austin staggered a few meters back and had no time to even pause to look at the old
man. His chest burnt with the thumping blood as if it was about to explode.
But as Austin reeled from the attack, the power of the blood-red palm began to diminish. Sparkling
clusters of the golden flames burst on the palm.
The old man was shocked. Still, with his presence of mind, he straight away collected his vital energy
force into the palm to extinguish the flames.
Austin on the other hand, gazed at the remaining two third blade of the vital energy sword, and
seriously started to consider his next move.
When the old man had attacked, Austin realized his miscalculation. No, of course, the old man's
cultivation base wasn't just at Sky Realm, but a level higher. He was an Imperial Realm cultivator!
With a round of sparring between them, Austin knew in all honesty that he was no match for his
opponent when it came to the strength of the vital energy force.
While Austin was recovering from the blow the old man had dealt him, the old man too was shaking his
head in disbelief.
This just wasn't what he thought Austin was capable of. He had never expected the young man to be
able to put up such strong a fight and escape unscathed. Rather than getting wounded in the process,
all Austin did in the end, was step back by a few steps!
"Not bad at all young man! But all this is useless. You will die today!" the old man shouted in anger.
Austin didn't care to react. Quietly, he summoned his vital energy and injected it into his sword. In just a
few seconds, the sword was invigorated back to its original length and its golden flames burnt higher
than before.
And then, the same vital energy sword appeared in his left palm as well.
Austin raised both his swords slowly, leaving a trail of blaze behind. The two pointed rays of fire pointed
at the old man in menace.
"Ha! This is no threat at all! These are just two swords transformed by your vital energy. They are likely
to shatter in a minute."
The old man sneered at Austin. He didn't seem to care. Although, a look at the swords' flames had him
in dread. They flared in fury and a power so strong that despite the old man being of the Imperial
Realm, his palm had almost been burnt by them!
The old man felt challenged in every way. Enraged, he wanted to see Austin meet his end in utter
devastation.
With his powers stoked, raging vital energy force began to flow from his body that pumped the blood in
his arm violently. The old man grabbed his throbbing palm and gave it a tight squeeze. Instantly, an
ominous serrated knife jutted out from his end that sliced the air with whooshing sounds.
This time, the old man's vital energy force was far much stronger than before.
He moved his palm just an inch and the blood-red serrated knife came down for Austin's head at a
lighting speed.
The old man showed no mercy. As the serrated knife rushed towards Austin, the old man sent out a
hurricane of dazzling energy. With his vast experience in combat, the old man knew when to apply
which strategy best.
An attack like this from an Imperial Realm cultivator was far from the ordinary. It was like an
elephantine snake slithering around Austin, trying to crush him under its body.
Sensing the massive pressure engulfing him, Austin decided to try every other trick in the book.
He then launched all the vital energy pulsating in his body, extracted from every corner and place. It
gushed out from his belly, i.e. mostly, from the golden ball there. Then it coursed through his pounding
arm fueling the swords with an overpowering intensity.
Buzz, buzz...
The mad blaze of the swords produced a buzzing sound, which crawled under one's skin.
This was the first time ever that Austin had got the sword of the vital energy to blow into such a
formidable weapon.
Austin, looking into the eyes of his opponent, an Imperial Realm cultivator, knew the challenge that was
in front of him.
"Clang!"
In a split second, looking for the other's moment of distraction, the combatants lashed the swords and
the knife at each other. The two vital energy swords collided with the blood-red serrated knife hard in
mid-air, sending across tremors all around.
The wave of shocks went on as the vital energy weapons tried to pierce each other leading to
demolition.
The deadbeat air stifled all the spectators as they could feel the tremors exerting pressure on them.
"Crack!" Right under the feet of someone in the audience, a deep crack appeared that went on for
meters around the arena. All present began to panic as the crack showed no sign of stopping and had
now widened to a meter.
It felt the sky and the earth were both getting torn apart by force. Some Earth Realm cultivators who
stood close to Austin and the old man flew away under the impact of the strong vital energy force.
Hurled into the air, they only dropped on the ground after a couple of minutes.
Austin's arm suffered from the outpouring of the massive blood and energy. Under the great strain, his
arm went completely numb and then right from his shoulder a lightning of pain started to tear the arm
from the inside. Austin panted under the pain and reeled back.
When he looked down, Austin saw to his dismay that both his vital energy swords were damaged
beyond repair as they now bore a twisted shape. Their flames though were still alive but now darker to
a degree that one felt sick to look at them.
But thank heavens, he didn't get injured from the blood-red serrated knife.
"Wow!"
An exclamation came from the audience as they saw the modest size of the man in front of them.
Everyone was shocked.
Though the old man had been successful in making Austin suffer a setback, everyone thought it was
incredible that he had blocked the attack of Elder Zhou, and not been injured after the two rounds of
sparring.
People from the Thunder Sect were fully aware of the powers and competence of Elder Zhou. Among
the Elders, his wasn't particularly impressive, rather it was relatively low.
And yet, put him in front of the ordinary disciples of the Thunder Sect, Elder Zhou could crush them like
a flimsy twig in his fist.
And anyhow, for any sect In the South Continent of the Prime Martial World, the Imperial Realm was
considered an incredibly high cultivation level.
"Hehe! Young man, you are capable! I see that now though I didn't half-expect to have met such a
powerful cultivator like you in the wilderness!
It seems I underestimated you.
But don't get carried away.
I told you that I would kill you today!"
Mirth danced in Elder Zhou's eyes though his staunch face stayed straight as he said this. Elder Zhou
took a deep breath in and started to collect his energy and blood with a renewed aim. This time, a
gigantic shadow of a hundred feet high started to cover the arena in darkness.
A short moment later, a number of lightning bolts wrapped around the blood-red shadow that came
from Elder Zhou's hands. They slithered like snakes and crackled with brilliant light.
"Lightning Blood Demon!" Elder Zhou roared out the name to announce his most powerful skill.
Cries of surprise and excitement began to spread all around as a buzz of conversation rose in the
crowd.
"Elder Zhou is using his best skill to fight this nondescript man!"
"Hmph! He might be a nobody but you can't deny that the young man is powerful too. But then I wonder
if he'd be able to survive Elder Zhou's killing move. After all, Elder Zhou has killed many Imperial Realm
cultivators with this skill..." Austin could overhear all this. Nothing was hidden from him.
Undaunted but far more shrewd, Austin glared at the huge blood-red shadow behind the old man
waiting to launch his attack.
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