17 ~Aiyoo~

Looking to the crater in front of him, and then over to the tree that was now lying ten meters away from him and he couldn't help but want to roar into the heavens.

However, remembering that it was late, he quickly suppressed his urges; after all, he didn't want to send his entire estate into panic.

"Excellent, not including other factors and just by relying on my raw strength and the Battle God Buff, I can probably match up to a 5 Star Skin Refining Stage expert."

Min Hong couldn't even believe what he was saying, as he marveled at the effectiveness of the Battle God Buff.

Though, his estimation was helped by the fact that he had the Soul Qi and Spirit Sense that was far beyond any expert within his tribe; it still didn't change the fact that the only energy being used here was the one contained within his physical body, and that energy was only equivalent to that of a Peak 2 Star Skin Refining expert at best.

Then when he thought about the fact that he had not even stepped into the body tempering realm yet, he couldn't help but praise the Jade Primal Dragon Body.

If this was the result of overlapping the technique with the martial skill, then Min Hong couldn't help but anticipate what he would be able to do when he eventually entered the body tempering stage, and comprehend the martial skill even further; after all, he hadn't attained peak mastery yet.

"I've seriously found an untapped gold mine." Min Hong couldn't help but smile complacently.

The two martial skills he had found today were almost vintage; after all, they were the only ones in the entire library that allowed him to use his powerful Spirit Sense and Soul Qi directly in battle.

However, oblivious to Min Hong, these techniques weren't actually meant to be used with Spirit Sense or Soul Qi; rather, they were meant to illustrate how a martial artist can better efficiently use their Qi flow to achieve an even more explosive strength.

The thing was; whilst he was contemplating the technique, he had been using the intellect of the Shrine Protector as well; and what that did was allow him to subconsciously perfect the martial skill by optimizing its requirements to suit Min Hong's advantages.

So whilst he was thinking, the technique had been created that way by the owner; it was actually the intellect of the Shrine Protector translating what he was reading in a perfected manner. It was almost like the illustration; Reading Between The Lines.

"Speaking of the second martial skill..."

Min Hong muttered to himself as the cogs of his intellect began to spin at full throttle. Raising his foot, Min Hong suddenly began to run through the woods in a straight line. Then upon reaching full speed, he suddenly activated the Chaotic Steps technique.

Whoosh! Whoosh! Bang!

 After taking two erratic steps, Min Hong suddenly ran into a tree.

"Damn, that hurts. It seems this technique wouldn't be that easy to master after all." He muttered as he dusted off his clothes and rose to his feet.

"Again!"

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh! Bang! Crack!

This time, he managed to take three steps but ended up running into a thick, low hanging branch.

"Again!"

Just like that, Min Hong continued to practice the Chaotic Steps. 

If anyone came towards this area, they would be shocked by the entertaining spectacle occurring within the woods, in the middle of the night.

All they would see is a drunk ten year old boy running recklessly through the woods; ramming into tree trunk and branches whist shouting "Again!", over and over again.

After an unknown period of time, Min Hong realized the sun was beginning to rise, so he quickly slipped back into his room and laid down to sleep. However, he was simply too excited to sleep.

Jade Primal Dragon Body... Battle God Buff... Chaotic Steps… Just what level can these techniques reach? If I manage to overlap them properly and find a way to amplify them with each other in an endless loop, then just what kind of battle prowess would I be able to unleash?

Min Hong was simply too excited and ended staying awake all through. When the sun finally bathed the entire Desert Flame Tribe in its warmth, Min Hong finally rose from his bed.

"Hehe, you want to steal and deprive me of my talents? That's quite a big dream; too bad you've failed your end goal."

After rising and cleaning himself up, Min Hong stepped out. Welcoming the sun's warm embrace, Min Hong couldn't help but smile as a certain thought sprouted into his mind;

"Today's a good day. I can accomplish anything."

Quite a few people had already assembled around the martial arena. Other than some idle people who regularly enjoyed watching, there were also a few of the tribe heirs.

Today was the day of Min Hong and Mu Cheng's life and death battle. Although this place would normally see a constant stream of duels and fights, life and death battles were still very far and between.

What was even weirder about the situation was that the two heirs didn't have any remarkable cultivation, yet, countless people had still come to watch.

In addition, the Nilan Gambling House, the most famous gambling body in the entire tribe, had also come to open up a public betting stall.

Mu Cheng's victory: 2 times the odds.

Min Hong's victory: 20 times the odds.

Since no kinds of counterfeit could occur during a life and death battle, and considering the owner of the establishment was from a Grand Family, betting on the outcome was extremely exciting to the crowd of spectators.

Even some respected figures who were known to fear or detest gambling could be seen placing bets; and for the most part, everyone bet on Mu Cheng's victory.

Although Min Hong did defeat Mu Cheng the last time, back then, Mu Cheng had been caught totally off-guard, and Min Hong had managed to capitulate on the advantage of that opening. Thus, it was certain that such a miracle couldn't occur a second time.

Only a handful of selected weirdos, who liked to either mess around or were desperate, decided to take a long shot and bet on Min Hong.

The betting stall was set up pretty close to the martial arena, and the section to bet on Mu Cheng's victory was completely packed with a sea of heads, while the section betting on Min Hong was utterly deserted.

"500,000 gold coins on Min Hong."

Suddenly, a tall and lofty teenager appeared and tossed a gold card over to the person in charge of the betting.

"...?!"

The handler was utterly stunned speechless by this situation unfolding before his very eyes. If someone had told him when he woke up this morning what was happening would happen, he would have probably told that person he shits pure gold.

Throughout the entire morning, he had only collected about ten thousand gold coins, and now, someone had actually come to bet this much? The poor man had to smack himself across the face, and only when a line of blood streamed down his nose did he believe he wasn't going nuts.

That tall figure was, of course, Long Feng. The moment Min Hong received the 200,000 gold card back in the lecture hall, he had set aside the fifty thousand he needed to submit as stake and asked Long Feng to lend him another 150,000 gold coins which the latter agreed to in a heartbeat.

Afterwards, he had told Long Feng about his plans to stake all that money on himself when the time came. He had also advised his friend to put every other funds he could lay his hands on into the same bet.

Because of his status, Min Hong already knew that the Nilan Gambling House would definitely open up a betting stall, and so he had already preemptively told Long Feng to bet on him.

Even if the Nilan Gambling House ended up in a deficit from opening up the betting stall, he definitely wouldn't back out.

Most of the money he normally earned was from his own personal bets, and as for these outer public bets, he didn't actually make much money off them. The main reason he had to hold public bets was to keep the people satisfied.

And even if he were to take a loss, with the Nilan Gambling House's tyrannic wealth, it could easily be brushed off. It was for these reasons that Min Hong decided to take his share from their coffers.

Originally, he had planned on just betting with Mu Cheng, but when he remembered the financial straits of his family, as well as the herbs he needed to cultivate; not to talk of the fact that the Nilan Gambling House had basically served themselves to him on a platter, He might as well suffocate himself to death with tofu if he didn't shake their coffers.

Yesterday, after emptying his coffers to give Min Hong the entire 150,000 gold he had in his savings, Long Feng noticed the confidence Min Hong had in his own victory; thus, he had thickened his face and coerced his father to cough out another 200,000 gold coins.

Long Feng's family were actually not overly rich, and that was because they were more battle oriented than business savvy. The families of Fatty Yu and the others tended to be better off.

The reason why Long Feng possessed that much money in his personal savings was simply because he was a simple guy; he didn't like standing out, and as a result the only thing he had ever spent any significant money on was his sword.

Furthermore, since he was the only child, and his mother and grandma were so dotingly generous, he had ended up with an amount of gold that starkly contrasted his expenditure.

However, the 200,000 gold he had wringed out of his father was basically his family's entire savings, thus, the he was placing a mount tai level faith in Min Hong.

Long Feng's heart couldn't help but shudder a couple of times in anxiety when he saw the manager take his gold card away.

Brother Hong, you have to stay calm and steady… You're now fighting for two lives.

Mu Cheng arrived at half before noon. With a light stomp on the ground, he shot several meters into the air before doing a superhero landing onto the martial arena stage, prompting a burst of cheers from the spectators.

However, this time the cheers weren't for his appearance, but rather because everyone was excited to see the start of a good show.

Today, Mu Cheng was wearing clean and neat robes that were quite attractive; one that planted a proud confidence within his heart;

'Long Chen, the humiliation you've given me will be returned to you tenfold!' He thought to himself.

However, even after some time had passed after he had stepped onto the stage, no one saw Min Hong appear. They couldn't speculate the reason why he had yet to appear; some of them even began to wonder if perhaps he had chickened out.

Just as everyone was wondering what was going on, an old man in charge of the martial arena coldly reminded Mu Cheng; "The assigned time for your battle is for 12:30, so you're early by almost an hour. You can either continue to wait on top of the stage or you can come off to wait."

Hearing this, everyone suddenly began to boo in disappointment, robbing Mu Cheng of all his charged up excitement and vigor. The latter was even dumbstruck; he had been so amped up that he had forgotten to check the time.

"Whatever, I'll just wait here until he comes up here. In any case, as a person who's about to die, his remaining time is certainly very much more valuable than mine."

Mu Cheng retorted indifferently; and just like that, he sat down cross-legged atop of the martial arena, putting on the air of an expert. However, his attempt to maintain an expert's manner only lasted for ten minutes before everything started to look a bit strange…

It was noon, and the sun was very high up in the sky and extremely powerful, buffeting the entire tribe with barely endurable heatwave.

Then, when one considered the fact that the stage of the martial arena was made out of black and red stone tiles, it certainly won't be an exaggeration to say the tiles were already blistering enough to fry an egg.

Since Mu Cheng had already sat on it with the air of an expert, he definitely couldn't stand up now, otherwise it would ruin his act.

So, yes... you guessed right... all he could do was suffer.

~Aiyoo~