A tier seven martial artist… things were becoming difficult.

“But don’t worry about it!” Xiang Ning evilly chuckled and the rest nodded. There was no way they could retreat now. Still, he didn’t tell them about the other party since he wasn’t sure about it himself. It was only a possibility.

He felt that the other party was no pushover. A mechanical spider wasn’t something that could be controlled from a long range. There was no way they would be weak if they could escape the sights of the Federation and enter the wilderness.

“Alright, everyone’s here now. Let’s move, this isn’t a good place to stay for long.” Gu Kun urged everyone to move, especially considering that the Seven Deadly Sins were hot on their tails.

Everyone agreed. Xiang Ning patted the Frost Wolf for it to kneel as he helped Yu Qian and Long Xiaoqi up. Since Yu Qian was a pure spiritual cultivator, her speed and stamina were nowhere as strong as the rest.

The girls were initially afraid, but Xiang Ning managed to convince them. Both of them rode the Frost Wolf and found that its fur was soft and smooth. They were enamored by it.

Chu Long saw the Frost Wolf and thought how cool it would be to ride one, too. His eyes were filled with longing as he gazed at Xiang Ning.

“Hey, what’re you thinking about?” Xiang Ning felt shivers traveling up his spine.

Chu Long laughed as he walked to Xiang Ning’s side and patted his shoulder. “I want to ride that wolf.” He felt that it wasn’t a harsh request, considering his relationship with Xiang Ning.

Xiang Ning smiled and Chu Long thought he would agree. “Don’t even think about it.” 

Chu Long's face dropped.

Yu Qian chuckled at the back of the Frost Wolf. “You’re so brazen! To think that you’d fight against us girls for this?”

Chu Long suddenly realized that they had misunderstood him. Gu Kun looked at him with disgust as he shook his head. “Wait! I’m not saying I want to ride it now! I just want to ride it sometime!”

Thus, five people and a single wolf ran past the forest toward their destination. A tier five martial artist could easily cover forty meters in a single second, while those with a movement-type technique could go even faster. But Chu Long’s speed wasn’t as fast as the rest. There were many obstacles in the forest, too, so they were cruising at a comfortable seventeen to eighteen kilometers per hour through the wilderness.

Luckily, there were some remnants of roads near the outskirts of the city so they still managed to travel smoothly. Still, the sky was growing dark and they needed to reach the Federation’s outpost soon and report back.

Behind them, six shadows gradually appeared. “Lan Quan, they—”

“Told you. That young man is not as simple as he looked.”

All six of them were observing Xiang Ning and the rest from a kilometer away. While the forest was quite dense, they could stand in broad daylight and observe them thanks to their technology.

“Lan Quan, the cultists are approaching. Should we hide?”

Lan Quan checked his radar and saw that it was true. “They’re fast. Throw something out to slow them down. Let the youngsters in front run further away.”

The rest nodded. Numerous egg-sized metallic orbs were ejected from the waists of their exoskeletons and buried underground.

“Alright, time to catch up.” All of them could run faster than Xiang Ning. They easily approached Xiang Ning and the rest as they jumped over obstacles as tall as six meters.

Five minutes later, nine shadows were running on the same path. It was the Seven Deadly Sins. Lord Vulture had already transformed back into his human form. He had to pay a heavy price every time to transform, and if it weren’t for that, the Seven Deadly Sins would have long slaughtered everyone in the Federation by forming groups of mutants.

It had taken him more than an hour to finally calm down and revert to his human form. He immediately chased after Xiang Ning’s tracks.

Suddenly, a metallic orb shot out from the ground. Lord Vulture instinctively smacked it with his hand as it shot out electricity.

Lord Vulture's fast action had prevented him from being shocked too badly; only his thigh was seared. The rest of the cultists weren’t as lucky when ten more orbs appeared and shocked them. At least half of them fell to the ground, twitching and paralyzed. They were all tier five cultists and could be considered the main force of the cult! The orbs must have stored an incredible amount of electricity if they could paralyze them!

Lord Vulture’s face was grim. He wanted to chase after Xiang Ning and disregard his men, but the mission came first. He suppressed his rage and waited for two hours before his men recovered. It was already dark by then, and not even he dared continue their journey during the night in the wilderness.

......

Xiang Ning and the rest arrived at the outpost half an hour before nightfall. It was a simple building with some rations and a water supply. There was some space to sleep, too.

In general, there was no signal in the wilderness, but the equipment in the outposts allowed them to communicate with the fortress. It also allowed them to send out distress calls if needed. Sometimes, commercial hunters would use the outposts as well.

Xiang Ning reported on their journey so far and received a reply thirty seconds later.

“The fortress is immediately launching an investigation,” he told the rest. They weren’t expecting to be extracted; the mission this time was too important, since the Seven Deadly Sins were also involved.

As for reinforcements, the stampede back at the fortress was showing signs of a resurgence. While the Federation might send in a tier seven martial artist to kill a tier seven mutant from the Seven Deadly Sins, it would be too risky. What if the Beast Kings took notice and surrounded the tier seven martial artist? And it was even more impossible for them to send someone from the Eight Pillars, like Uncle Zhao. That would only attract an even more fearsome presence from the deepest reaches of the wilderness.

But they had to change their plans. They had only expected tier four Beast Generals at most, but a tier six had appeared in the city instead. They didn’t know what they would encounter on the road ahead.

Lan Quan is such a bro