Chapter 296: Ballistas

Seeing his sword meet resistance, the enemy cried out in shock before bringing back his sword once more to slash at Jian Chen.

Jian Chen’s sword disappeared again in a flicker of movement, allowing the other person could only hear the sounds of a sword being rapidly thrust at him. Despite the earth blocking his vision, with his strength, it was not too influential on his fighting ability.

In a flash, Jian Chen and the man had exchanged several blows before taking advantage of the man’s opening to thrust his sword forward with lightning speed toward his throat.

The sword was far too fast, and in an instant it was already right in front of the man’s eyes. The strong amount of Sword Qi flicking off the tip of the sword was already starting to bite into his throat.

The man cried out startled, but with his strong strength, right on the verge of his own death, he quickly brought his Saint Weapon back. Bringing it across his neck to protect it, he simultaneously kicked Jian Chen back.

The Light Wind Sword stabbed into the man’s sword and left a deep dent in it while Jian Chen’s left hand smashed against the man’s leg with a fierce amount of Saint Force.

“Kacha!”

The sounds of bones breaking could be heard as the man’s leg instantly fractured. Straight away, the force of the blow sent the man flying backward away from Jian Chen.

Jian Chen took the opportunity to leap out of the earthen enclosure and stared at his attacker. He noticed that the man was a brown robed middle aged man with a relatively small build but had fierce eyes. He had a long beard and a sword that was almost as long as he was tall.

Jian Chen stared coldly at the man, “At what time does an Earth Saint Master have to attack someone from behind as a sneak attack?”

Hearing this, the middle aged man snorted, “Hmph, don’t be so righteous. This is a survival of the fittest, whomever gets the final victory is the winner, damned be how he does it.” The man stared at Jian Chen and spoke, “Kid, you don’t look that old, but your strength is unbelievable. So young, yet already an Earth Saint Master!”

“Thank you for your praise.” Jian Chen smiled, “Now do you wish to hand over your tokens, or shall I take them from you?”

“How impudent for you to want to take my tokens. Let’s see if you have the strength to do so.” The man snorted before waving his sword in preparation to fight once more. At the same time, a large amount of earth attributed Saint Force began to condense over his body like armor, giving him a much stronger form of defense.

Jian Chen’s sword was unbelievably fast. In a moment, a single sword strike could be seen in various angles, each shadow image was incredibly hard to differentiate from fake to real.

Right now under Jian Chen’s attacks, the middle aged man barely had any time to breathe. Desperately retreating backward, his body was filled with sword cuts as his earth attributed Saint Force armor had almost been destroyed He would not be able to last any longer.

The man was dumbstruck now. He didn’t think that Jian Chen would be this strong even though he was an Earth Saint Master. Despite them being at the same level of strength, he wasn’t able to fight against him at all, especially against Jian Chen’s sword. The sword was almost far too fast for him to react against, and the amount of mirror images from the sword already left him in a daze.

Knowing that he was outmatched, he gave up his will to fight. Leaping away from background, he melted into the ground out of sight as a means to escape.

This strange move of the man had caused Jian Chen to be stunned. Seeing just how the man disappeared from sight into the ground, Jian Chen had been astonished, this was the very first time he had seen such an escape method.

The man’s escape technique didn’t render him completely intangible. With every single movement he took, a small pile of dirt could be seen rising up. Anyone with sharp enough eyes would be able to detect it.

Smirking slightly, Jian Chen leaped thirty meters forward into the air and then brought down his shining Light Wind Sword onto a small packet of dirt with lightning speed.

“Pch!”

As the sword slammed into the ground, a large fountain of blood sprayed into the air. Jian Chen’s Sword Qi had somehow pierced into the middle aged man.

The man didn’t have time to be shocked. Trying to move faster to escape now, he learned from his mistakes and dove deeper into the ground where it would be impossible to detect him.

While Jian Chen was unable to fly in the air, he could at the very least hover in the skies for a small amount of time at the cost of a large amount of Saint Force. Floating thirty meters in the air, his cold eyes stared down at the ground looking for any possible direction the man may have escaped in. With the man diving deep underground, it was impossible for Jian Chen to detect him.

A split second later, a small patch of grass shook slightly. With a start, Jian Chen immediately stabbed downward with no hesitation as the Sword Qi from his sword began to cover the area.

The Sword Qi flooded the area like water in a bucket and began to slash apart the entire area.

“You bastard, don’t be too excessive!” The man cried out as he leaped out from the ground with blood all over his body.

Descending to the ground, Jian Chen charged at the man without another word. The middle aged man had launched a sneak attack on him earlier, and if it weren’t for the fact that the man wasn’t that strong, then his blade would have killed Jian Chen and left him a lifeless being.

Furthermore, the middle aged man was an Earth Saint Master who had been acting with prudence. With over ten months gone, this man must have collected plenty of tokens, which was what Jian Chen wanted.

“F*ck, you bastard, I’ll remember this day! I’ll return this favor back to you a hundredfold!” The man swore angrily. Without hesitation, he dove back down underground and out of sight.

“Where do you think you’re going!” Jian Chen spoke. With some difficulty, he forced the man out from underground once more with his sword.

Jian Chen’s sword danced in his hand as a strong amount of Sword Qi flew toward the man to strike him.

Dirt flew into the air as a spurt of blood shot out from underground. While the man was using this underground technique to escape, he couldn’t go too deep and his movements were still visible. It was so noticeable for Jian Chen that he was able to land such a blow.

Once again, the man was forced up from the ground. Without a single chance to catch his breath, Jian Chen’s Sword Qi instantly shrouded the area where the middle aged man stood.

The man tried to brace himself for the worst, but with his heavy injuries, he was extremely slow. Now that he wasn’t as nimble as before, he could only defend against two sword strikes before ultimately getting a third sword strike through his shoulder.

Stifling a pain filled shout, his face twitched erratically in response to the injury. At that moment, the fourth strike came at him.

With panic, the man dodged to the side, causing the sword to pass by his neck without a problem. However, before the man could react, the sword shifted toward his neck and slashed it.

“Pch!”

Another pillar of blood shot into the air as the man’s head was cut, causing blood to fly everywhere.

Taking the Space Belt from the man, Jian Chen counted a grand total of four hundred tokens. Other than that, there were also a single Purple Card, three Class 4 Monster Cores, and several hundred purple coins. This was an extremely bountiful harvest! After collecting everything, Jian Chen left the area.

Sauntering about the plains, Jian Chen continued to collect tokens on his journey, but things weren’t as profitable as they were when he had taken the tokens from the short man last time. After three days of traveling, Jian Chen had amassed around five hundred tokens. Although he had came across countless of competitors, all of their tokens had already been taken by someone and they had been left with only the bare essentials to live.

Three days later, Jian Chen had crossed the plains only to arrive at a vast grassland. Each blade of grass was roughly half as tall as a person, making anything below the waist hard to see.

In the grass, there were countless of hidden vipers. There were even some vipers around a meter wide with poison so potent, they could kill a Great Saint Master in four hours.

They were by nature very secretive, concealed in the grass without moving, they wouldn’t even emit a single sound. With the support of the grass, no one would be able to detect that these vipers were there. Occasionally, Jian Chen’s leg would feel a small nip, but it was inherently useless. The Thousand Immunity he had rendered him immune to the venom.

At this moment, a sharp stinging sound could be heard whistling through the air. Jian Chen’s eyes narrowed coldly as the Light Wind Sword appeared to block the incoming strike.

“Clang!”

A strong shock could be felt running through Jian Chen’s arm as it went numb. Glancing at what struck him, he could see a single black crossbolt made of pure steel forged in a unique way to make it even harder.

“Whoosh!”

Another whistling sound could be heard a single arm sized crossbolt flew out from the grass and toward Jian Chen.

Jian Chen’s Light Wind Sword danced in the air as it struck against the crossbolt, causing yet another vibration to travel up Jian Chen’s arm and numb it.

After blocking the crossbolt, Jian Chen leaped into the air and flew across the tip of the grass in the direction the crossbolts were shot from.

During that time, the crossbolts continued to fire at Jian Chen. Jian Chen would dodge each shot without blocking a single one. On the way, there had been a total of ten crossbolts that Jian Chen was forced to knock away and twenty crossbolts he had dodged successfully.

Quickly, Jian Chen arrived at where the crossbolts were being shot at only to see three ballistas hidden within the grass while five middle aged men continued to scramble about to refill the ballistas with ammunition.

Jian Chen had seen these types of ballistas before in Wake City–these were quite high quality. The force a ballista could shoot out a crossbolt at was quite strong and could penetrate through several Class 2 Magical Beasts with a single shot. These were even capable of killing a Class 4 Magical Beast and even a Great Saint Master wouldn’t be able to knock aside a crossbolt shot from one of these.

However, what Jian Chen couldn’t imagine was how these men managed to bring these contraptions into this place.