Stealing The Heavens
chapter-45

The ‘Exorcism Crossbow of Red Flame’ was a secret weapon for Scouting Officers of the Great Yan Dynasty. It was not a magical weapon, yet possessed an incredible power, which was no any weaker than a magical weapon. An ordinary pure steel bolt shot from this crossbow could impale three layers of heavy armor from a mile away. It was an extremely powerful weapon. Together with a specially made ‘Explosive Bolt of Red Flame’, the damage it could deal was no different from a missile fired from a fighter jet in Wu Qi’s knowledge.

With a blink of red light, the arrow had penetrated the girl’s chest.

When a beast warrior was in the middle of merging souls, that was the weakest point of time for both the human and the beast. No matter how powerful the soul beast or warrior was, they were communicating in pure soul form during the process. Therefore, if they suffered even the slightest bit of damage, their soul would disintegrate. Besides that, once the soul was out of the body, no matter it was the soul beast or warrior, there was no way for them to control their body. So, even a three years old kid with a pair of scissors could easily kill a peak Xiantian warrior.

The bolt that could impale three layers of heavy armor tore through the girl’s breast, ripping a big hole in her chest. When the Explosive Bolt of Red Flame fell onto the ground, the explosive runes carved on it immediately exploded due to the vibration. At the same time, it ignited the Fire Soul Crystal that was used to make the arrow.

Following a loud bang, a bright shining red light covered an area of nearly a hundred feet. The girl’s body and soul, together with giant serpent’s soul, were shattered and destroyed. As for the human head-sized white pearl, it was sent flying high up into the sky by the massive explosion. The barbarian leaders and the few hundred barbarians who were standing nearby got themselves drawn into the explosion. In an instant, they were blown into pieces.

The waves of the explosion swept across a nearly one thousand foot area, sending a few thousand barbarians tumbling, crashing, and pushing into their own men. The explosion had turned these barbarians upside down. Before these barbarians could react, an even heavier blow was on its way.

Following the rapid muffled twangs, a shower of bolts poured down after being released from over eight hundred three bolts and nine bolts crossbows. Some of these bolts had Explosive Talismans, given by Yan Bugui, attached to them. The sandy beach immediately exploded with fire sparks as the sounds of Explosive Talismans igniting filled the air above the entire sandy beach.

The power of Explosive Talisman was not as great as the Explosive Arrow of Red Flame, which was made with Fire Crystals. But, it could still deal an incredible amount of damage. With every explosion of these talismans, there would be dozens of barbarians devoured by the fierce flames. Half of them would be instantly killed by the explosion, and the other half would be seriously wounded.

The rain of arrows didn’t seem to stop as over three thousand barbarians on the sandy beach were killed by the explosion of those talismans, and another three thousand were badly injured. As for the remaining four thousand barbarians, more than half of them were wounded by ordinary arrows. However, all the arrows were stained with deadly poison, so those barbarians who were wounded by them would eventually die as their bodies turned black.

"Attack!" Yan Bugui let out a long scream. In an instant, a greenish figure appeared behind him. It was the shadowy figure of the Wind Breaking Wolf. With the appearance of the beast soul, his speed and strength increased immediately as he turned into a green shadow. With his sword flashing, he thrust himself into the crowd of barbarians.

Dozens of vigorous Scouting Officers let out screams at the same time. All of them had a greenish light appear behind their backs. The greenish light was the same shadowy figure of Wind Breaking Wolves. They followed closely behind Yan Bugui and charged into the crowd of barbarians. A green light flashed and wolves howled, making it look like a pack of hungry wolves were charging at their prey.

Lu Chengfeng trembled when he saw that. He stared at the sky and breathed out a long sigh, full of jealousy, "Dear heavens, all the Scouting Officers are beast warriors! The legend is true! How much wealth is required to cultivate so many demon beasts?"

Wu Qi followed closely behind Yan Bugui and dashed out from where he was hiding. With a loud laugh, he said, "How much wealth? Why does this matter? You don’t have much money, master!"

Wu Qi said this and then laughed, drawing out his sword. His eyes were bright as he dashed toward the slowly dropping milky white pearl. He had set his eyes on this precious item long ago. It was the product of three thousand eight hundred years of the gathering of natural essence energy and water elemental energy by the Innate Water Serpent.

"Should anyone attempt to snatch this from me, I will show them no mercy!" Wu Qi’s eyes turned green, and a strong killing intent erupted from his body. It was so strong that it almost became visible to the naked eye.

With a metallic clanking sound, Lu Chengfeng drew his soft longsword out, running after Wu Qi while laughing out loud at the same time. He could tell what Wu Qi’s target was. Therefore he had immediately drawn out his sword and stood on guard behind Wu Qi. Zhang Wu and Hu Wei had their crossbows gripped tightly, standing beside Lu Chengfeng and keenly watching those warriors who came after them.

The frenzied roar of a beast resounded among the barbarians, who had suffered heavy casualties. All kinds of colorful bright lights were blinking around as over thirty barbarian beast warriors, who all had the same wild beast figure behind them, charged out while cursing loudly. They immediately ran head to head against Yu Bugui and a few other Scouting Officers. The loud sounds of weapons and bodies slamming made anyone who heard them feel pain in their ears. Both groups had unleashed their full strength and the strongest skills. In just the first round of fighting, fifteen barbarians and nine Scouting Officers had been sent flying by their opponents while bleeding everywhere.

Yan Bugui roared out crazily, "Follow me and charge! I will handsomely reward those who perform deeds of merit. Those who avoid the fight or are slow to respond, I’ll have all of your family members killed!"

Liu Suifeng and Lu Quyuan immediately shouted out in shrill voices, "Charge! Charge! Charge! Attack!"

The atmosphere quickly became wild. Hearing Yan Bugui’s promise of handsome reward or the threat of death, all of these warriors began to charge forward with their full strength. While running, these warriors quickly reloaded their crossbows. Before they had reached the barbarians, these warriors had fired another two rounds of bolts, killing another few hundred barbarian fighters, including seven barbarian beast warriors.

When these barbarians had their worship ritual, they had their people lining up too close to each other. Therefore, when they were attacked by torrents of crossbow bolts, their casualties were huge. However, there were still nearly three thousand barbarians who could fight, although all of them were lightly wounded. They had begun to group up and form a defensive line on the path towards a cliff.

After waiting for these barbarians to form their defensive line, Yan Bugui stopped running and took out his Exorcism Crossbow of Red Flame, hastily loading it with once again. When he did that, he simply shouted out, "This is the last Explosive Bolt of Red Flame! Brothers, charge!"

The bowstring released, and a beam of red light shot out and fell behind the barbarian’s defensive line. Those packed barbarians, who were holding their position in front of the cliff, had once again been devoured by a fierce flame. This time, nearly sixty percent of the barbarian fighters were turned into chunks of meat by the explosion. Yan Bugui put his crossbow back in his magical storage bag, then he drew out his sword and thrust it toward the huge cave at the foot of the mountain.

Ear-splitting sounds came from above them. On a cliff, a hundred feet above the ground, a few hundred barbarian teenagers were popping their heads out from the caves. These teenagers had not yet reached adulthood, but they already possessed enough strength to pull the bow strings made from tree veins, shooting out the poisonous arrows that Wu Qi had seen before.

The green light enshrouding Yan Bugui and the other Scouting Officers started to flicker. Then, a powerful airflow suddenly shot out from beneath their feet, giving them a sudden increase in speed so they could sprint into the cave underneath the cliff. The few dozen warriors following behind them didn’t pay enough attention to the incoming arrows. They were quickly hit by these deadly arrows, all of them decaying into blackish chunks of meat in a few seconds.

But these warriors’ charging speed was really fast too. In just a few leaps and dashes, they had jumped into the surviving barbarians and started the cruel fight again. Those barbarian teenagers standing on top of the cliff dared not to reshoot any arrows. They could only stare blankly at the battlefield below.

Within this short moment of hesitation, the ferocious Yan Bugui and his men had reached the top of the cliff. With the green light on his back blinking rapidly, Yan Bugui swung his sword and jumped into the middle of these barbarian teenagers. The slaughter had begun. With each swing of his sword, there would be a few feet of sword light emitting from the tip of Yan Bugui’s sword. These young barbarians could never defend themselves from the attack of an elite Scouting Officer. In the time it took to take a few breaths, all these few hundred young barbarians had been killed.

Wu Qi was dashing forward. Within a few seconds, he had come to stand beside the completely mashed corpse of the giant serpent.

Wu Qi extended his hand forward in mid-air and unleashed his Hand of Web. The invisible whirlpool of air had pulled the serpent pearl into Wu Qi’s palm. Wu Qi had his five fingers pressed and squeezed on the human head size serpent pearl, continuously injecting his innate energy into it. When the serpent pearl was infused with human energy, it immediately shrank from the size of human head to a size that allowed Wu Qi to grip it with his palm.

At this moment, the milky white serpent pearl had shrunk and concentrated into something that looked like a sapphire, glowing and emitting a charming watery ripple endlessly. After sensing the massive amount of water elemental energy contained within the serpent pearl, Wu Qi couldn’t help himself and let out a loud laugh. After that, he immediately tucked it into a secret pocket on his chest.

A heat wave hit Wu Qi from behind. Lord Flame was waving his bloody palms and striking toward Wu Qi’s back.

"Little bastard, a natural treasure like this is not something that you can dare to put your hands on! Give it to me, now!"

Lord Flame’s eyes were glowing green. Although Lord Flame was cultivating fire elemental skill and couldn’t use it, he still could use it to exchange for some other treasures that were beneficial to him! According to Lord Flame’s estimation, this Innate Water Serpent pearl was worth at least one hundred times more than all that he had in the magical storage bag which had been stolen.

Following the sound of a sword swinging, Lu Chengfeng struck out with his long sword. The sword was carrying a greenish light and thrusting toward Lord Flame’s back at an extremely fast speed.

Lord Flame waved his palm back, unleashing a fierce flame which seemed to touch the sky. Lu Chengfeng’s soft sword instantly turned red hot, bending towards the ground like soft snake skin. A well-made razor sharp weapon had been turned into scrap metal in an instant while the cloth on Lu Chengfeng’s chest had caught on fire. He quickly fell back, but he didn’t forget to take out three narrow needles and, with a wave of his hand, he threw them towards Lord Flame’s heart, waist, and tailbone at the same time.

Zhang Hu and Hu Wei were both following closely behind Lu Chengfeng. They too wanted to help Wu Qi get this serpent pearl. Although Lord Flame’s attack was sudden, they quickly responded to it, both raising up their nine bolt crossbow and shooting out eighteen bolts toward Lord Flame.

Lord Flame was extremely angry. He roared out, "Good, good, you have now given me the opportunity to kill all of you!"

Grabbing toward the serpent pearl on Wu Qi’s hand, Lord Flame waved his left sleeve and unleashed a twenty-feet long fire snake toward Zhang Hu and Hu Wei.

The eighteen bolts, which were made from pure steel, were melted by the fire snakes and turned into liquid. The fire snakes continued thrusting toward Zhang Hu and Hu Wei, forcing them to roll continuously on the ground. Eventually, they were able to dodge the attack of fire snakes. Both fire snakes fell onto the ground. They were so hot that they simply melted the sand, turning it into molten glass.

Lord Flame burst out in a victorious laugh, his fingertips almost touching the serpent pearl held by Wu Qi.

Suddenly, a strange smile appeared on Wu Qi’s face. A bright blue light blinked in his palm as he quickly tucked the serpent pearl into Lord Flame’s palm.