Chapter 1824: Respect

Patting Qiuqiu's head, Ye Zhongming felt that heaven never seals off all exits.

Just moments ago, his situation had been extremely perilous. Even after activating his bloodline, gaining the 'home advantage' on sandy terrain, with the Lightning Sand Monster's assistance, and even having eliminated one opponent in advance.

The beings he faced were simply too numerous and too powerful. Once trapped, what awaited the Cloud Peak King would be either death or capture—for Ye Zhongming, death in battle would be preferable.

But now, his situation remained far from optimistic.

His bloodline has entered a cooldown period and cannot be used for a short time, reducing his combat effectiveness by at least one-third. His left arm was severely injured and had lost its fighting capability; moreover, due to being wounded twice in succession, the healing process there was extremely slow.

The two blade wounds from Hofkaf were somewhat manageable—though deep enough to reveal bone, with the arm bone slightly cut and accompanied by minor fractures, and blood vessels and meridians severed—given enough time, even without treatment, the recovery abilities of a nine-star evolved and the Beautiful Celestial Body should eventually heal them.

But the holes pierced by Wade were troublesome. A light green substance was attached to the wounds, hindering healing and causing constant pain.

Ye Zhongming hasn’t forgotten that his troubles don’t end there. The abilities of the Mountain King Crown and Sea King Crown were also on cooldown; the specially made Black Earth Armor cannot be summoned, he no longer dared to block blades with his arm, and that damned curse!

The loss of hearing kept Ye Zhongming in constant danger. He had tested it—even his Detection Art was greatly affected, no longer providing the extensive detection range it once did.

Having killed Hofkaf and the bent-over long-armed opponent, according to the rules, he was entitled to one-third of their points. Probably because they had been constantly pursuing Ye Zhongming, their points were few. Ye Zhongming gained only nine points in total, meaning the two guys he killed had only twenty-seven points combined.

Now, Ye Zhongming’s points had reached sixty-two.

This score wasn’t very high. He glanced at the rankings and found himself placed around twenty-two hundred.

Earlier, after killing the Spirit Fire Rhino, Ye Zhongming’s ranking was still around nineteen hundred. Now, with nine additional points, his ranking has dropped instead of risen—it seems others have been quite productive.

Ye Zhongming also looked for Jie Kui and found his points unchanged. He was still on the leaderboard, which means he wasn’t dead yet.

This was good news, as the Star-Eye Clan’s final ranking depends on overall points. Additionally, that tracking expert followed Jie Kui. Before he returned, Ye Zhongming’s safety was relatively higher.

After carefully observing his surroundings, Ye Zhongming confirmed that no one was pursuing him for now. He took out a dagger, inserted it into the bloody holes on his arm, and scraped off the light green substance along with bits of flesh.

He didn’t know if this substance had any long-term toxicity, but it certainly wasn’t good for his body. The sooner he got rid of it, the better.

But what made Ye Zhongming’s heart sink was that after scraping off the green substance, he found that the wounds still had glowing green specks.

Ye Zhongming scraped again, sweating profusely from the pain, but the result was the same. This thing seems like a bone-deep parasite—it simply could not be removed by this kind of 'scraping the bone to heal the poison' method.

It seemed he must return to the camp to find a solution.

Now, less than a day has passed. In other words, his left arm would be unusable for the next two days.

And it seems that even if he returned to the camp, recovery would require significant cost—who knows how many points it would take.

Ye Zhongming ate something casually to replenish his energy, then identified a direction and continued running.

…………………………

Jie Kui was exhausted. The bent-over long-armed man and the Tearhound Ghost Race member have been following him like haunting ghosts, trying every way to kill him, while he has no choice but to try his best to escape.

The two sides have been chasing and fleeing, and now they have no idea how far they’ve run.

But because of the tracking expertise of the Tearhound Ghost Race member Kuma, Jie Kui couldn’t shake them off, no matter what he did.

Feeling his body nearing collapse, Jie Kui knew this couldn’t continue. As he fled, he thought of a plan. While occasionally checking if Ye Zhongming’s name was still on the leaderboard to see if he was alive, Jie Kui suddenly noticed something else.

He stopped, thought for a moment, then sat down to eat and drink. Only when the bent-over long-armed man and Kuma appeared did he get up and start fleeing again—but this time, he changed directions.

……………………………………

Ye Zhongming threw Qiuqiu out. The little guy extended several thin threads in mid-air, wrapping them around a large tree, turning itself into a slingshot. When the threads left the tree, it shot out.

It crashed into a level-nine creature, causing it to stagger. Seizing the opportunity, Ye Zhongming attacked and, with Qiuqiu’s help, successfully killed the target within a minute.

This wasn’t a particularly powerful level-nine life form, but the time taken to kill it was more than ten seconds longer than expected.

“Not having one arm really slows things down,” Ye Zhongming said to Qiuqiu beside him as he continued fleeing after briefly looting the battlefield.

“Mmm?” Qiuqiu shakes its body, as if to say, “What are you talking about? I don’t really understand.”

“Is everything okay at home?” This is what worries Ye Zhongming—he doesn’t know how Cloud Peak on Earth was faring.

“Mmm mmm?” Qiuqiu simply jumps off onto the ground, bouncing forward.

“You’re really useless,” Ye Zhongming scolded with a laugh.

His escape route had no particular purpose; he was merely buying time, which was very important to him at the moment.

Behind him, Aimusi and the others are not pleased. Due to the failure of the first encirclement, conflicts have arisen among them, especially between Wade, who had lost his brother and was now very dissatisfied with Aimusi and her husband.

It was only after Aimusi pressured him and promised fifty points that Wade did not withdraw.

Investing so much, Aimusi and her husband were not just pursuing Ye Zhongming for revenge, but also for the joint hunt that would follow.

After all, they still have to aim for rankings in the end.

“When we catch up to him again, we won’t insist on capturing him alive but will kill him. Anyone can do it.” Although Aimusi has become somewhat twisted in her quest for revenge, she was still rational. From the previous battle, she knew how troublesome Ye Zhongming was. If they continued trying to capture him alive, there may be more casualties.

“He’s still running. Does he have that much stamina? Then why not just run farther away?” The little girl has no particular expertise in tracking, but the traces Ye Zhongming leaves are obvious, so they won’t lose him.

“He’s doing it on purpose,” Hawkins said with extreme gravity.

“He’s buying time, waiting for his skills to cool down. At the same time, he never conceals his traces, allowing us to find him easily. Besides not wanting us to recall Kuma, I’d say… he still wants to kill us. Do you believe it?”

The five of them looked deep into the forest, feeling a trace of… respect for the first time.