Chapter 245 - 243: Dragon! Dragon! Dragon

Across the pitch-black sea, two shooting stars, one chasing the other, sped forward.

The one in front was Luo Sheng. With one hand plunged into the water, his scorching flames instantly boiled the sea, turning it into steam that propelled his speedboat forward.

The one behind was Yang Shen, wreathed in golden flames, his feet treading on spinning wheels of fire.

The distance between them was steadily closing, but Luo Sheng would always try to interfere. The closer Yang Shen got, the stronger the interference became, forcing him to fall back again. For a moment, they were locked in a stalemate.

Luo Sheng’s expression remained as arrogant as ever, but inside, he was growing annoyed.

He wasn’t afraid of Yang Shen. No matter how much strength Yang Shen was hiding, Luo Sheng was confident he was no match for him.

What he feared was being caught by the grandmasters from Harmony Island. He knew for a fact there were experts at the Tongshu Realm on the island—one for each of the three great powers.

If those people crossed the sea after him, they could catch him in an instant, and he would be utterly powerless to resist.

’At the very least... at the very least, I have to reach the sea where that Dragon is. Only that terrifying Dragon can stop a Tongshu Realm powerhouse.’

At this thought, Luo Sheng’s short hair transformed into a riot of fiery colors, and his aura surged violently.

He had always publicly claimed that he had merely learned some fire-based Martial Arts, but in reality, this was his Fist Intent—the most important part of his hidden strength.

Luo Sheng’s gaze toward Yang Shen grew increasingly hostile. He deliberately let Yang Shen get a little closer and shouted, "You’re just in the Middle Stage of Innate! How much longer can you last?"

Yang Shen sneered inwardly. ’Of course I have the confidence to chase you. My Escape Technique only uses Qi Sea Spiritual Power, and I have so much of it, it’ll blow your mind!’

’If I even pause for a second, you can call me a quitter!’

"What’s wrong? Getting scared? Stop and fight me!"

Luo Sheng said coldly, "I haven’t done anything to you, have I? Why do you keep chasing me relentlessly?"

"I didn’t do anything to you at the recycling station either, but didn’t you still come at me with intent to kill? Officer Luo, how much longer can *you* last?"

With that, Luo Sheng shot out several more fireballs, but Yang Shen blocked them all.

Using flames to vaporize seawater consumed far more energy than an Escape Technique. It was still uncertain who would tire out first.

The two continued like this, leaving Harmony Island more than a hundred li behind them. As far as the eye could see, there was nothing but open water.

However, the speedboat’s reckless, full-throttle acceleration finally led to severe consequences. The rear engine had long since overheated, and with the additional heat from Luo Sheng, it exploded with a BOOM!

The speedboat lost its balance, its bow lifting into the air. Then, due to air resistance, it slammed vertically down onto Luo Sheng’s back.

The change in momentum made it look as if he was hurtling toward Yang Shen!

’An opportunity!’

Yang Shen’s black Curse Engraving immediately transformed into a massive, two-meter-long Tiger-Headed Saber, which he swung sideways with unparalleled might.

He was going to cut both Luo Sheng and the boat in two with a single strike!

Luo Sheng, his hands cloaked in flames and reinforced with True Gang, clasped them together and miraculously caught the Tiger-Headed Saber. The black Curse Engraving was instantly melted, losing its sharpness, but the sheer force of the blow still caused the speedboat on his back to disintegrate.

The blow hadn’t sliced the boat apart—it had smashed it to pieces!

Luo Sheng was sent skipping across the water like a stone, leaving a series of splashes in his wake as he flew over a hundred meters!

The power of that strike shocked him.

’Something’s not right! Just two months ago, this Yang Shen seemed like he had just entered the Innate Realm. How did his Power increase so much!’

Luo Sheng stabilized himself mid-skip and, instead of stopping, used the momentum to accelerate.

Martial Artists couldn’t stand still when fighting on water; it had to be a mobile battle.

During the chase, he had realized he couldn’t shake Yang Shen. The kid had wheels on his feet and his speed was unnatural. He had to be killed here!

’Fortunately, I’m not far from the Dragon’s waters. Maybe that big guy will come looking for me on its own...’

Yang Shen didn’t know Luo Sheng’s plan. He simply carved arcs across the sea, clashing with Luo Sheng again and again.

The nature of a mobile battle greatly reduced the frequency of their exchanges. They had to cover a long distance before finding an opportunity to strike.

From a bird’s-eye view, the two shooting stars on the pitch-black sea looked like a double helix, constantly intersecting and weaving around each other.

But low frequency didn’t mean low danger.

Whether it was Luo Sheng’s extreme heat or Yang Shen’s inextinguishable flames, both were incredibly dangerous. Every clash carried the risk of a fatal blow.

Fortunately, Yang Shen was always a little better prepared.

During another high-speed exchange, Luo Sheng suddenly swung his right hand, raising a wall of fire in an attempt to obscure Yang Shen’s vision for a sneak attack.

The scorching temperature caused countless plumes of steam to erupt, and the seawater churned and shot skyward as if a naval mine had detonated on the surface.

However, Yang Shen didn’t evade at all. He charged straight through, twisting the black spear in his right hand and carving a graceful arc through the air.

Martial Arts: Wind Return!

This spear thrust! It parted the waves! It severed the surf!

A violent gale shot out from the spear tip, instantly dispelling the mist and flames. Yang Shen executed a flash-step into a Sudden Stop, the fiery point of his spear looming ever closer in Luo Sheng’s reflection.

’All that specialized training I kept hidden was for this very moment!’

"What!!"

Luo Sheng, an elite among Mid-stage True Gang cultivators who had mastered Fist Intent, ducked his head sharply as the spear tip shot forth like a shower of pear blossoms in a storm.

In his panic, Luo Sheng could only twist and dodge convulsively, retreating across the water in a pathetic state.

Driven to desperation, Luo Sheng suddenly opened his mouth. A jet of flame, as solid as a laser beam, shot out and swept violently across.

Yang Shen ducked, and the spear in his hand was sliced in two as if it were made of tofu.

’Holy crap!’ Yang Shen thought. ’Your hidden trump card is just as nasty!’

’He’s a human laser cannon!’

Then he vanished from the surface of the water.

Water Element Escape!

It wasn’t a real laser, after all, but a concentrated flame. It couldn’t burn through the entire sea!

Before Luo Sheng could react, Yang Shen appeared behind him, leaping from the water in a way that defied physics. The splash was uncannily small, and he made no sound at all.

"Don’t even think about it!"

Luo Sheng immediately threw up a sheet of flame, but Yang Shen once again used Wind Return.

This spear thrust... parted the fire! It severed the heat!

Wind Return was a counter-technique Yang Shen had specifically chosen. It was just too effective, and Luo Sheng was seething with rage!

His own flames couldn’t get near Yang Shen, yet he had to deal with Yang Shen’s flames with his full attention.

Despite his superior raw power, he was fighting timidly, unable to gain a stable footing on the water.

Yang Shen was like a slippery fish, constantly harassing him on his spinning wheels, striking and then immediately retreating. With each perilous exchange, Luo Sheng’s rhythm grew more chaotic.

One of them could use Water Element Escape to dive beneath the surface and look for openings, while the other—Luo Sheng—would have his speed plummet the moment he entered the water, reducing his strength to a mere thirty percent.

As for the ability of True Gang Realm experts to levitate, Huo Jun had commented on it long ago: unless you were facing a completely non-threatening opponent, like a corpse, floating in the air was tantamount to crippling yourself.

A Martial Artist of the same realm could reach that paltry height of a few dozen meters with a single leap.

What made Luo Sheng’s situation unique was... in order to hide his strength, he hadn’t reported it after secretly Breaking Realm into the True Gang Realm. He had only recently faked his breakthrough, which meant he was not yet proficient in using his True Gang.

In the world of Martial Arts, if you spend too long pretending to be a pig to prey on a tiger, you start to act a bit like a pig.

The advantage remained firmly in Yang Shen’s hands. He felt it was only a matter of time before he killed Luo Sheng.

...if there were no outside interference.

As Yang Shen dived into the water for the sixth time, searching for an angle at incredible speed, he suddenly looked down and saw the seabed move.

No! It wasn’t the seabed moving. It was a body of unimaginable size, rapidly rising toward the surface.

’Holy shit!’

Yang Shen immediately guessed it was a colossal Sea Beast. ’Could our fight have drawn something out to hunt?’

He shot back out of the water at once. Although he was better at fighting on water than most Martial Artists, he had no intention of wrestling with a colossal Sea Beast.

Yang Shen burst out of the water and retreated dozens of meters in a flash. Luo Sheng was stunned for a moment, unsure of what his opponent was planning.

But when he looked down and saw the increasingly terrifying shadow, he realized what was happening.

The next moment, his face twisted into an expression of pure, unadulterated madness.

"HAHAHAHA! It looks like I win after all! Yang Shen!!"

The next instant, the entire sea began to boil.

Billions of tons of water surged upward, forming a mountain of seawater on the surface.

The first thing to appear was a dragon claw so massive it made Yang Shen’s brain lag.

A single one of its talons was over ten meters long. The claw rose from the sea, palm up, with Luo Sheng standing right on its fingertip, being lifted higher and higher...

Following it was a body as majestic as a city wall, each scale several square meters in size. The savage bone spurs on its spine were like towering ancient trees.

Three indescribable dragon heads emerged from the sea and rose high into the air, each one as massive as a residential building.

Its powerful horns pierced the sky, while its whiskers drooped down like tendrils from the netherworld.

A bizarre, terrifying... utterly ghastly Three-headed Dragon.

With only the upper half of its body above the water, it had already blotted out the sky and the moon, filling every inch of Yang Shen’s vision.

The sense of colossal scale was so overwhelming it felt like the heavens themselves were about to burst!

’That old man from the Xi Race wasn’t kidding? It’s really a thousand meters long?!!’

To hesitate for even a second would have been insane. In fact, the moment Luo Sheng was lifted by the dragon’s claw, Yang Shen had already burst away, retreating at his absolute maximum speed.

’I have to run without any hesitation! I have to burn my Qi and Blood Value to survive!’

’Shit! Cyan Blue really has Dragons! It really is that Three-headed Dragon!’

To his horror, however, even after fleeing for several kilometers, he felt a powerful restrictive force envelop him, and he was uncontrollably held in place.

’This Dragon has True Gang?’

’Then what the hell am I supposed to do?!’

But surrender was absolutely out of the question. Yang Shen’s eyes filled with ferocity...

’Let’s see if you’re more fire-resistant than the River of Calamity and Pestilence!’

He stopped struggling, allowing the strange Gang Qi to pull him backward, waiting only for the right moment to strike...

At this moment, Luo Sheng’s arrogance reached its peak. He stood in the palm of the Three-headed Dragon like an ultimate victor, watching as Yang Shen was dragged back, closer and closer.

He couldn’t suppress the smirk spreading across his face.

In his understanding, this Three-headed Dragon, while in the sea, could even fight against a Guiyuan Realm expert, and it was still growing rapidly.

If it weren’t so powerful, so captivating, he would never have made the decision to completely turn to the other side of life.

Luo Sheng stuck his hands in his pockets and said to Yang Shen, "Well? Jianghuai’s Champion Scholar? Do you have any last words?"

Yang Shen couldn’t be bothered to respond, his mind solely focused on how to burn a Dragon to death...

’This Dragon is too massive. If my attack isn’t fatal, even its slightest struggle could shatter the heavens and the earth.’

’So I have to aim for a vital spot...’

’That’s right, the Bee Control Technique! The Dragonification Experiment! This Dragon and Long Jiu might share some common trait!’

’But the distance is too great. The Dragon’s body is nearly a thousand meters long, far beyond the range of my Magic... To be safe, I have to wait until its head is close enough...’

His Desperate Edge Life Chart compelled him to search for a sliver of hope, even in a situation like this...

A low rumbling sound of displaced air came from above. It was the sound a colossal object makes just by moving, its sheer volume having a massive effect on air pressure.

The three dragon heads lowered themselves. Yang Shen found it hard to describe the feeling of being watched by "heads the size of residential buildings."

The salty, fishy stench of the sea washed over him, as if three skyscrapers had been shoved in his face. The Dragon’s eyes alone were several meters in diameter...

As those terrifying draconic eyes stared at him, Yang Shen felt his very blood flow seize up.

The three heads of the Giant Dragon all descended, observing Yang Shen from three different directions. Just as they were getting closer and Yang Shen couldn’t resist the urge to act...

Suddenly... a voice as deep as a collapsing mountain boomed from the left head.

"Huh... Shen?"

Yang Shen’s brain crashed...

Then, the terrifying dragon head on the right also spoke.

"...It really is... Shen."

The crazed smile on Luo Sheng’s face... suddenly vanished.