Two days passed by in a blink of an eye. Yun Lintian still camping around the swamp, unwilling to let the Celestial Buddha Lotus go. After all, it was the Divine rank magical plant, extremely scarce and possibly be the only one in the Azure World.
During these days, Yun Lintian hiding himself on the top of the tree, observing the surroundings as well as finding a way to deal with the Abyssal Crocodile. In truth, he could set up a killing formation to deal with the beast, but his Profound stones were limited. He didn't want to waste them here.
Yun Lintian's concealment ability worked very well — many people passing by this spot but never discovered his presence. In the past two days, he hadn't seen any of his senior sisters around here. His heart grew worried, and he started to weigh the choices between leaving and staying here.
"Hmm?" Suddenly, Yun Lintian could smell an intense fragrance floating along with the wind. He cast his gaze onto the swamp and saw the Celestial Buddha Lotus was blooming, revealing a faint golden color at the middle.
The fragrance spread several kilometers away, immediately attracting many people nearby. Within an hour, the swamp became crowded. There were at least twenty people from various forces coming together. The members of the Hua, Li, Chen, Yang, and Qi royal clans were present and the highest number among them were members of the Qi royal clan, five people.
"Why did Senior Sister Chan come here?" Yun Lintian frowned slightly when he saw a familiar figure among the group. She was one of his senior sisters who came to this place with him. Her name was Yun Chan.
Yun Chan had a beautiful oval face, cladding in snow-white robes with a short sword in her hand. Her expression was calm and compose. There wasn't any agitation on her face despite she was facing a group of enemies.
"Greetings, Misty Cloud Fairy. My name is Yang Ping. Our Young Master and Young Mistress told us to cooperate with you. I don't know what do you think about this?" A tall handsome youth from the Yang clan took a step forward and greeted Yun Chan with a smile.
Yun Chan gave a slight nod and replied, "We can form a team together."
Yang Ping called his friend over and discussed a strategy with Yun Chan in a low voice.
Yun Lintian didn't hurry to show himself. He continued to listen to the conversation between everyone and tried to find a way to warn Yun Chan about the Abyssal Crocodile.
"Everyone, why don't we share this lotus together?" Said a man with a long sword strapped to his back. He was a member of the Qi royal clan. His name was Song He.
Everyone glanced at each other without saying a word. No one was stupid enough to believe in his word. Moreover, they didn't recognize the value of the lotus. Most of them thought it was a high-rank medicinal plant, but they couldn't determine what rank it was. They were not sure if it was worth getting into a conflict because of this unknown lotus.
Seeing this, Song He chuckled and said, "Since all of you don't want it. We will take it away by ourselves." Following that, he and his friends jumped into the swamp one after another.
"What should we do? Are we going to let them take it away?" Yang Ping said anxiously.
Yun Chan pondered for a moment and decided to follow them. However, just before she moved, there was a small needle shot toward her and it pinned accurately on her sleeve.
Her expression abruptly changed while looking at her sleeve and saw a tiny letter tied onto the needle. She secretly opened it and read the content carefully. After a while, she said to Yang Ping, "We will wait and see first."
Yang Ping was upset, but he didn't act impulsively. Even though he was unwilling to see the group of Qi royal clan's members taking the lotus away, he could still maintain his rationale.
Yun Lintian nodded his head in approval upon seeing Yang Ping managed to hold himself back. Being too greedy could lead to a tragic end. Yun Lintian had proved this point by himself two days ago. He almost lost his life because of his greed and carelessness.
In the swamp, the group of five carefully swam toward the lotus while raising their guard vigilantly. Essence Profound Realm's practitioners hadn't yet developed Spiritual Sense until they reached the Spirit Profound Realm. Hence, they could only use their eyes and ears to detect a danger around them.
"W… What is that?" Someone among the group said uncertainly while pointing at a huge shadow beneath the water distant away.
"What kind of that Profound Beast?" Another person asked.
"Hurry up! Prepare to fight!" Song He shouted and drew the sword out. Although he wasn't sure about the strength of the Profound Beast in front of him, he was confident it shouldn't be higher than the peak Essence Profound Beast. Dealing with it was not a problem for his group.
Roar!—
The Abyssal Crocodile let out a deafening roar and revealed its gigantic body above the water's surface. Its savage eyes stared at Song He's group furiously, as it still remembered the prey that slipped away from its hands two days ago. This time the crocodile didn't want to let the food to escape again.
The roar causing a tide of water to form into a huge water wall, charging at the group of five. Song He's group as well as everyone on the shore was shocked to the core by its scary appearance.
"Run!" Song He yelled out loudly and frantically fled for his life. Fighting? What a joke! Just a simple roar, he instantly realized the beast before him had already surpassed Essence Profound Beast.
Yun Chan was calm on the surface, but she was extremely shocked inwardly. If Yun Lintian hadn't warned her, she would be in a danger by now. Coming back to her sense, she said to Yang Ping, "Do you dare to kill them?"
Yang Ping was currently in a shocking state. When he heard this, he turned to Yun Chan and asked in a trembling voice, "What do you mean?"
"I'm asking, do you dare to kill a member of the Qi royal clan?" Yun Chan repeated.
Seeing she wasn't joking about it, Yang Ping swallowed his saliva and replied, "O… Of course!" Before coming here, Yang Chen and Yang Mengli had emphasized this. Chen, Luo, and Qi royal clan's members were all their enemies. They had to show no mercy toward them when the opportunity arose.
"Good! Kill!" Yun Chan responded, and a frightful aura instantly burst out of her body. She pointed her short sword at Song He's group, who were struggling to escape from the Abyssal Crocodile, and a deep blue light immediately shot out of the tip of her sword, straight at them.
Song He was currently paying attention to the crocodile behind him. Suddenly, he felt a dangerous aura approached him from the shore's direction. When he raised his head, he saw the deep blue light rushed at him at high speed, causing him unable to put up a defense on time.
Boom!
The profound light hit Song He's right shoulder, causing his body to fly backward and was engulfed by the water wall entirely.
The other four were also blown away by several attacks from Yang Ping and his friend, and were vanished into the water wall.
"What are you doing!?" A youth with a spear in his hand shouted angrily from the Chen clan's group. His aura surged, preparing to attack Yun Chan and Yang Ping.
Yun Chan didn't say a word in reply. Her gaze fixated at the water briefly before shifting to the youth from the Chen clan. Hazy ice mist slowly emerged from her body. Instantaneously, her figure disappeared from the spot and reappeared in front of the youth as she swung her short sword down on his head with a ferocious wave of sword force.
Boom—
The youth was shocked by Yun Chan's speed. He panicky raised his spear up to block her short sword. However, Yun Chan's attack was too fast and caught him off guard, he wasn't able to defend properly, and was thrown away by the impact.
The onlookers sucked in a cold breath. They heard about the famous [Misty Cloud Steps] before, but they never thought it would be this scary. Without a doubt, they wouldn't be different from the youth with the spear when facing Yun Chan's swift actions.
"Damn it! Kill her!" Another two youths from the Chen clan came back to their senses and quickly launched their attacks at Yun Chan.
Bang!
"Argggh!" Everyone was expected Yun Chan to get injured by the attack, but the reality rendered them speechless because the ones who flew out were the two youths instead of her.
The youth with the spear just got up from the ground and saw Hua Fei, a woman from the Hua clan, attacked his two friends in the back. He yelled angrily at her, "What do you mean by this, Hua Fei!?"
Hua Fei glanced at the youth and said indifferently, "Is it hard to understand? We are enemies, that's why." She brushed her long hair slightly and jumped to Yun Chan's side.
"Let's kill them together, Sister Yun." Hua Fei said with a smile.
Yun Chan nodded her head lightly, "Alright."
The two women along with Yang Ping's group immediately charged forward at Chen clan's group with murderous intent.
...
While everyone on the shore was in chaos, Yun Lintian secretly sneaked into the swamp and dived toward the lotus patiently. His body was currently covered with strange ancient runes, glowing a faint golden light from time to time. These runes were specially invented by Yun Lintian to isolate himself from the enemy's Spiritual Sense. Although the effect was weak and couldn't be used against a high-level practitioner, it shouldn't be a problem to hide his presence from the Abyssal Crocodile.
"Argh!!" A kilometer away, Yun Lintian saw Song He screamed painfully as he was brutally bitten by the Abyssal Crocodile. Blood flowing out of his body nonstop, along with some of his internal organs. Shortly afterward, he stopped breathing and died with eyes widely opened.
Yun Lintian didn't feel disgusted by the scene. He calmly moved forward to the lotus while the Abyssal Crocodile locked onto new targets and moved its large body toward them.