Chapter 21: Being Chased Around

Lance's encounters grew rarer as he moved north, he was puzzled by this as all cultivators should be moving in the same direction that is towards the centre. He asked Cloud the same.

'Only the strong cultivators reach the centre, most of the weaker sects usually stay at the rim of the domain as they do not have the strength to compete with the 4-star sects. They can only try their luck at the edges. The centre is where you will find true competition and better treasures.'

Lance nodded as he kept moving. After a couple more days of travel, he came upon a small grove of trees. He was surprised to see the trees in the middle of the desert especially at the division. The dry sand simply ended and made way for black soil.

'This is absolutely not natural! Be careful, I sense a powerful beast.'

Lance then hesitantly asked, "Then shouldn't I avoid it?"

'No, go inside.'

Lance instantly understood, 'The weak sects couldn't even provide a challenge to him, he had felt the essence energy absorption from the fruit slow down. He knew that the current challenges weren't enough to stimulate him anymore.'

He moved forward without hesitation as his mind calmed. He had enough confidence on himself, he was far from the rookie he had been a few days ago. Even though the sects weren't enough of a challenge, they still helped him polish his skills.

The grove was bigger than he expected, he had been walking from the last hour and he still hadn't encountered the beast, which according to Cloud should be at the centre.

Soon the grove gave way to a small pool, a leopard was resting in the shade of a tree on the other side but the small plant which seemingly floated a couple feet above the water attracted his attention. The small plant was only 1 foot in height but the most fascinating thing was its translucent nature. It seemed to emit hundreds of different colours as it danced in the light breeze that blowed through the grove. The blast of colours made Lance blink as he took in his surroundings.

As the plant danced, even the surrounding trees tens of meters tall seemed to move. But a black flash interrupted his musings, he instantly saw that the leopard was missing from the place it had been lounging a few moments ago. Lance instantly materialised the swords in his hands and crossed them in front of him to block the beast.

Lance felt as if he had been hit by a caravan as he was lifted off his feet and thrown into a tree. He dazedly looked around for the beast and saw it standing at the place he had been a moment ago. The leopard growled and immediately pounced at him.

Lance clumsily rolled away and almost dropped his swords while trying to stand. He saw the leopard pull out its claws embedded in the tree he had crashed on. His body shivered involuntarily as he saw the deep claw marks, he had no doubt that he would have been sliced to pieces if those landed on him.

Lance tightened his grip on the swords as he observed the leopard snarl at him, he understood that he would have to actively attack if he wanted to win this fight.

He immediately swung one sword forward while keeping the other for defence. It paid off as the leopard easily sidestepped as clawed at him. They both retreated as they observed each other.

Lance could feel himself being pushed back with every clash, he had never experienced being on the back step in a fight. Even though Gong Yu had been able to supress him, he had never been able to push him back. Lance had never fought an opponent with such overwhelming power.

He again lunged forward to attack while carefully maintaining his defence. This time he had anticipated the claw as he dodged it and attack the beast's side. But he gasped as he saw his sword merely leaving a scratch which bled a bit.

The leopard seemed to more annoyed than hurt as its prey wounded it, it again pounced forward with a snarl. But this time it tried to bite Lance's head off as it deflected the swords with its claws. Lance stumbled backward awkwardly as he hadn't considered the beast to bite him.

Now that he thought about it, he realised that he was fighting the leopard the same way as he fought other cultivators. But the difference was that he was fighting a single powerful beast instead of many weaklings. He couldn't deflect the claws easily without being pushed back, he instead had to dodge them.

'So be it, I will whittle down the beast slowly. It cannot last long.', he thought to himself.

Then started a game of cat and mouse as he ran around the clearing jumping around dodging the wild beast. He got a few hits in between but they didn't affect the beast much.