Chapter 157: Autumn Leaf Blade
"Have I become the hunted deer now?" Cao Wei wryly smiled.
What surprised him even more was that despite having such a strong hearing, he still couldn't catch the sound of Qing Chen's footsteps.
He was unable to figure out the boy's position, hampering his intent on making a last-ditch move because he couldn't even find the target.
As he gasped for breath, Cao Wei suddenly didn't feel like running away anymore.
He shouted to the woods, "Since you don't dare to come out, then I won't run either. The two of us can just stay here."
True to his words, he sat down by himself and began adjusting his breath on the spot.
Cao Wei was making a bet, a bet that the boy wouldn't let him — a C-level master — recover his physical strength and injuries uninterrupted.
Quietly, he let his arms hang by his sides, hands lightly digging into the soil. If the boy appeared to kill him at this time, he would launch a desperate counterattack.
But just moments after he sat down, a sharp weapon whizzed by from the forest.
He hastily ducked backwards; the sharp object whirled and buzzed in the air, barely missing the tip of his nose to stab into the ground behind him.
When Cao Wei looked back, there was a blade-like leaf almost halfway buried into the soil.
His heart staggered — it was the Autumn Leaf Blade!
The Knight's Autumn Leaf Blade!
But something didn't add up. The only ones capable of starting to use the Autumn Leaf Blade were Knights who had reached level B, so how could this boy who just became a Knight have the ability to use it?!
Could it be that the person currently targeting him was no longer the boy from just now, but a Knight who had been around for a long time?
Chen Jiazhang, Wang Xiaojiu, Li Shutong!?
Impossible, if it was really one of these three, they would have never wasted any time with him!
A sudden realization struck Cao Wei — he had met an outlier who was able to use the Autumn Leaf Blade right after becoming a Knight.
Before he could fully comprehend it, another Autumn Leaf Blade pierced through the air, forcing him to lurch to the side.
If he hadn't dodged in time, it would've probably split open his stomach by now.
Gritting his teeth, Cao Wei got up and dashed into the woods. The boy could kill him from the distance, so he couldn't continue to recuperate in place.
He was a much more troublesome opponent than Cao Wei had imagined!
Countdown 33:00:00.
In the forest, the hunt kept on silently proceeding. No one seemed to know about what was currently taking place, and no one seemed to care.
The sense of oppression grew more and more intense in the silence, like a tangible threat hovering on Cao Wei's back.
But the patience of this hunter far exceeded Cao Wei's expectation.
No matter how much blood he vomited, no matter how weak he made himself look, the boy seemed to have no plan on coming out to finish him.
Like a most experienced lone wolf, he remained covertly hiding in the darkness of the Forbidden Land, waiting for the prey to exhaust itself.
Countdown 30:00:00.
Cao Wei had been running from morning to night.
But no matter how long he ran, he couldn't get out of the Forbidden Land.
His internal injuries continued to worsen, and soon, even his C-level physique wouldn't be able to hold it anymore.
Cao Wei initially thought that as the chase went on, by the time his energy ran out, the boy would have definitely gotten exhausted as well.
After continuous overexertion, the circulation of oxygen in the blood would begin to decelerate, causing the cognitive functions to decline and the body to break out in cold sweat, impairing the critical thinking ability.
He would gradually turn irritable and lose his patience.
But inexplicably, as time passed by, the sense of oppression was instead becoming stronger!
In Cao Wei's perception, throughout this chase that had been going on for nearly ten hours, the boy's footsteps never fell into disorder, never giving him the chance to fight back.
It was as if he was a cold, powerful, and emotionless machine.
Cao Wei kept asking in his heart, was this the kind person who was qualified to become a Knight?
Cao Wei was certain that the boy's physical strength was not as good as his, but he was undoubtedly the most patient opponent he had ever faced in his life.
An enemy that would not appear, in a road that would not end, led to a feeling of unbearable despair and constriction.
Whenever Cao Wei wanted to rest, the ruthless Autumn Leaf Blade would come whizzing by, forcing him to continue escaping.
Countdown 25:00:00.
Cao Wei tripped over a branch and fell to the ground.
But this time, he didn't intend to get up again, simply turning over to lie on his back as he panted on the ground. He then spoke to the darkness of the forest, "Won't you get tired? I know your real target is Qing Huai, so why are you coming for me first instead of going after him?"
Nobody answered.
Cao Wei didn't care, however. He continued talking, "I also wanted to become a Knight when I was young, but my life was not as good as yours. Later, I joined the army and exchanged my military achievements for genetic medicine. I thought that even if I couldn't become a Knight, it was fine since I could also become a superhuman this way. But today made me realize that I'm still too far behind."
As he spoke, another Autumn Leaf Blade slashed through the air.
"Found you!" Cao Wei suddenly jumped up from the ground.
With an eruption of power, he roared and exploded to his final potential!
Like a dying tiger, he fiercely charged into the dark woods!
His purpose for lying down was definitely not to admit defeat, but to put his ears closer to the ground and determine Qing Chen's position!
In order to prevent Cao Wei from discovering his hiding location from the trajectory of the leaf, he knew that the boy would immediately change directions after each throw of Autumn Leaf Blade.
Therefore, his footsteps would make a sound at that moment!
In his army career spanning over a decade, Cao Wei's meteoric success was credited not only to luck and strength, but also due to his brains, courage, and tenacity.
He had struggled through challenge after challenge in the federal army camp, he had gritted his teeth and continued to climb up even after he was demoted to become a corporation descendant's dog. This kind of person would definitely not sit still and simply wait for death!
In an instant, Cao Wei had already rushed into the dark woods. After more than ten hours, he finally caught sight of the boy once more, seeing the flame patterns on his cheeks.
Although the distance between them was very close, there was no sign of the slightest fluctuation in the boy's eyes.
It was as though Cao Wei hadn't been the one who found the boy, but that the boy had been standing in wait for him in this Forbidden Land.
The way the boy was looking at him made Cao Wei feel a little strange — those were the eyes of a butcher staring at a cow who was about to be slaughtered.
In the dark night, the federal soldier furiously slashed forward with the dagger in his grip, piercing through the tangles of foliage to viciously stab at Qing Chen's torso.
But Cao Wei found that the moment his muscles tensed up, just like a prophet, the boy in front of him already seemed to know the moves he was about to make.
After more than ten hours of pursuit, the injuries had dragged his strength to the lowest level. There was no impact at the other end of his dagger, and the blow he thought would be fatal had missed.
What followed was the boy's counterattack. His dagger brushed past Cao Wei's own to cut a deep slash on his arm.
Like a bow, Cao Wei's catapulted his legs to leap forward once again. He kept on brandishing his dagger, but none of his slashes managed to land.
The boy could seemingly always predict his upcoming attacks based on the way he exerted his force, and then counterattacked accordingly.
After a span of mere seconds, there were more than a dozen of new wounds on Cao Wei's body, yet he couldn't even leave a graze on Qing Chen's clothes!
Cao Wei knew that he had become slower and weaker, so weak that he kept losing his breath, but this was not the reason for the one-sided suppression.
It was the boy's predictive capability that cornered him to this extent.
The boy's reaction speed was not faster than his, but he could judge what action Cao Wei was going to take by looking at the changes in the folds of his clothes, the areas where his muscles bulged, the shift in his eyes, and the distribution of strength in his waist and legs.
Cao Wei didn't know how the boy could possibly do it. He only knew that he was inching close to death.
Very, very close.
Translator: Zee