Chapter Sixty-Two: Encirclement

With a piercing cry, Ji Hao threw his head back and let out a long howl. A surge of flame burst from his back, coalescing into shining wings of fire that unfurled majestically. With a mighty sweep, the fiery wings enveloped his body, and Ji Hao transformed into a streak of light, shooting out of the forest, skimming over the river, and crossing more than a hundred yards of open ground before the tribe. Trailing heatwaves and afterimages, he stormed into the Fire Leopard Tribe’s encampment.

The Blood Crocodile warrior wielding twin sabers was already at the peak of the Lesser Shaman realm. As he swung his massive blades and roared at the sky, a mist of blood billowed behind him, within which the faint shape of a colossal, writhing blood crocodile could be seen, stretching dozens of yards long.

Each time the spectral crocodile rolled, the warrior’s skin became nearly translucent. Through the divine sight of Ji Hao’s Golden Crow eyes, he could clearly see seven or eight glowing meridians within the man’s body, each entwined with a crimson aura, and several thumb-sized shamanic apertures shining brilliantly.

This man was but a step away from opening his shamanic apertures!

“But you’ll never make it in this life!” Ji Hao laughed aloud, traversing several miles in a single instant to appear before the man and smash a fist down at him.

The wings of fire granted Ji Hao speed—a velocity beyond the ken of ordinary men. In ancient times, the Golden Crow soared through the void, with the mightiest able to traverse hundreds of thousands of miles in a heartbeat. Ji Hao, though far from matching such legendary creatures, was already unmatched in speed within the Lesser Shaman realm—so fast as to plunge his foes into utter despair.

The Blood Crocodile warrior before him, for instance, could not even register Ji Hao’s presence. He swung blindly, relying solely on his battle-hardened instincts, slashing madly at empty air.

“Break!” Ji Hao’s hands formed incantation seals. The four sacred words—“Lin, Bing, Dou, Zhe”—were invoked together. His essence, energy, and spirit fused into a single indestructible jewel, drawing upon the power of heaven and earth, surging forward with indomitable will.

His muscles tensed, bones ringing like bronze bells, and a faint dragon’s roar sounded from within his body. In his lower abdomen, above the five-colored flame, the last trace of Grand Shaman blood from Ji Xiao burned furiously.

The twin-bladed Blood Crocodile warrior howled in despair.

He still could not see Ji Hao’s figure, but strangely, he beheld Ji Hao’s fist.

It filled the world, as if summoning the power of mountains and rivers, radiating boundless light and heat—a fist crashing down like a falling star. In panic, the warrior abandoned his attack and crossed his massive blades before him as a shield.

The sabers were each eight feet long, a foot wide, and three inches thick, forged from refined iron, their spines engraved with three glowing runes.

These were shamanic weapons—an incomparable treasure in the Southern Wilds, reserved for the most outstanding warriors of a tribe. Once inscribed with shamanic runes, their strength and resilience surpassed even their base material by tenfold, a hundredfold!

Ji Hao’s gaze was fixed unwaveringly on the man’s chest.

He paid no heed to the blades blocking his path. His right fist, filled with the mysterious harmony of heaven and earth, drove straight into the crossing point of the two massive swords.

The Blood Crocodile warrior let out an incredulous howl of agony. At last, he saw Ji Hao’s young, unlined face!

“My own sons are all bigger than you!” In that split second of life and death, the warrior roared these words.

The great blades shuddered violently under Ji Hao’s blow, which fell like a mountain. Unable to withstand the terrible force, the warrior’s arms shattered inch by inch. Splinters of bone, torn loose by the shock, ripped through his muscles and shot far away with whistling speed.

Ji Hao’s fist, pressing against the blades, crashed into the warrior’s chest.

The iron sabers bent. The runes upon their spines flashed with blinding light, then faded. With a crackling sound, both blades split into a web of fractures and rained fragments to the ground.

The warrior’s chest caved in, and great gouts of blood and flesh spewed from his mouth.

On his back, his soft armor burst open in the shape of a fist mark—Ji Hao’s blow had punched through his body, carving a clear path through him for more than a dozen yards. Seven or eight Blood Crocodile warriors standing along this line all turned stiff and stared at Ji Hao with strange expressions.

These were all Lesser Shamans, yet the residual force from Ji Hao’s punch killed them outright—none survived.

With a thunderous bang, the Blood Crocodile warrior who had taken Ji Hao’s punch head-on exploded, his crocodile-hide armor shattering with him. The seven or eight warriors behind him also detonated, one after another, sending blood flying dozens of yards.

Such was the power of a single punch.

All around, the Fire Crow warriors paused in their slaughter, stunned. After a few heartbeats, they erupted into wild, hysterical cheers, raising their weapons to the sky.

Cries of “Hao! Hao! Hao!” shook the heavens, as the Fire Crow warriors rejoiced at Ji Hao’s valor.

The Blood Crocodile and Ghost Frog warriors, meanwhile, wailed in despair and fled as if they had seen a vengeful spirit.

Ji Hao’s face was strikingly youthful, his stature shorter than the Fire Crow adults; he could not possibly be very old. Many of the Blood Crocodile and Ghost Frog warriors had children older than Ji Hao.

Yet this youth had, with a single blow, slain the Blood Crocodile war leader and seven or eight of their elite captains. That punch shattered the last vestige of fighting spirit in the enemy. They dropped their weapons and fled in utter panic.

The Fire Leopard Tribe’s camp was well chosen: a river to the front, which the Fire Crow warriors had crossed to attack; on the left, right, and behind, sheer cliffs thick with poisonous thorns blocked all escape.

Like headless flies, the remaining two thousand or so Blood Crocodile and Ghost Frog warriors ran in circles before finally collapsing to their knees and surrendering, trembling before the Fire Crow.

The Old Tree Demon trudged across the river, dropping countless tough mountain vines. The Fire Crow warriors wasted no time binding their captives tightly, wrapping them up like bundles of reeds.

“They’ll make excellent mine slaves!” Ji Hao remarked, standing atop Fat Bear and surveying the prisoners with a shake of his head. “The Fire Leopard Tribe lost many of their own this time. We’ll need to give them a share of these slaves.”

Atop the cliff behind, the ancestral banners of the Fire Leopard Tribe fluttered. Dozens of fiery leopard spirits vanished into the long banners.

A score of Fire Leopard elders and shamans, faces creased with sorrow, descended from the cliffs and approached Ji Hao.

Straightening his expression, Ji Hao leaped from Fat Bear’s back and strode forward to greet them.

Just as the parties exchanged formal salutations, a shrill, stirring horn sounded from the distant woods. Bizarre calls echoed in answer, and a quarter of an hour later, massive columns of warriors began to pour from across the river.

Hundreds of giant flying birds soared from the forest, each bearing towering, broad-shouldered warriors who raised the standards of their own tribes.

Dozens of banners of varying length and height waved in the wind, as triumphant laughter pealed from the warriors across the river.

Each banner signified the full muster of a tribe. Dozens of banners meant that the entire strength of dozens of tribes—nearly a hundred thousand warriors—had gathered in the forest across the way.

Ji Hao was left speechless. He turned to the Fire Leopard elders, whose faces had grown ashen, and managed a wry smile. “It seems we’re surrounded, aren’t we?”

***

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