As soon as the rats had picked up a scent, Lin Fan contacted the Gale Sparrow and called it back through Greeny.
The village chief had come along with Lin Fan, but once Lin Fan picked up the scent of the fox spirit beast, he immediately had the village chief and other villagers head back.
The village chief and the other villagers didn’t need any convincing since they knew that if they stayed with Lin Fan, they would definitely be in danger.
Once the village chief and villagers left, Lin Fan had the rat puppets lead the way while he had the Gale Sparrow scout from above. That way he could have a bird’s eye view of the entire area and make sure that nothing unexpected happened.
The rat puppets led Lin Fan out of the range of the village fields and deep into the surrounding forest. They continued walking for close to half an hour before the rats finally slowed down and indicated that the source of the scent trail was just ahead.
Lin Fan also slowed down and had the Gale Sparrow scout out the area ahead of them to see if it could find the fox spirit beast’s burrow.
The Gale Sparrow was already experienced in this and it didn’t take long before it was able to find it. But the strange thing was that the Gale Sparrow seemed a bit afraid of what was in the burrow.
Greeny translated for the Gale Sparrow, “It says that it can sense something dangerous hiding inside of the burrow.”
Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this. The Gale Sparrow had never once shown fear towards anything that Lin Fan had it search for before, but the strongest thing that Lin Fan had it search for was only a Fifth Qi Gathering Realm Beast.
So for it to be afraid didn’t mean that Lin Fan had to run away. There was still a chance that it was only in the Sixth Qi Gathering Realm.
Lin Fan could always check it out first before deciding whether to retreat or not.
So with this mentality, he sent in the rats to check the burrow as he linked his senses to them.
As expected, there was only the fox spirit beast that was sleeping inside the burrow. There wasn’t anything that should have made the Gale Sparrow afraid inside of the burrow, so Lin Fan couldn’t help being confused, as well as a bit worried.
So instead of attacking the fox spirit beast right away, Lin Fan had the rats search the area to see if there were any other spirit beasts around.
However, no matter how the rats searched, they weren’t able to find a single thing.
It was as if there were no traces of any other spirit beasts in this entire surrounding area.
Lin Fan just couldn’t understand why the Gale Sparrow was afraid of this fox spirit beast…
But still since there was nothing at all that could pose a threat, Lin Fan chose not to hold back any longer. It was time for him to take care of this fox spirit beast and finish this mission.
The sooner that he did it, the sooner that he could leave this place.
After all, he was still unsettled by the Gale Sparrow’s reaction.
If he didn’t have to stay in this place, it was better not to stay here just in case something powerful came back.
So Lin Fan controlled the rat puppet to bite the fox spirit beast and wake it up before having the rat puppet run out of the fox burrow. As expected, the fox spirit beast immediately woke up and started chasing the rat puppet out of the burrow.
Lin Fan waited until the fox spirit beast was lured out into a clearing that he had prepared as a trap before making his move.
Based on the aura that the fox spirit beast released, it was indeed only in the Second Qi Gathering Realm. Just to be sure, Lin Fan even checked it with his Appraisal Eyes and they also confirmed that this fox spirit beast was only in the Second Qi Gathering Realm.
With this, Lin Fan no longer hesitated and jumped out to attack the fox spirit beast.
The fox spirit beast’s cultivation was much lower than Lin Fan’s, so it didn’t even notice Lin Fan approaching until it was too late. By the time that the fox spirit beast had reacted, the tip of Lin Fan’s sword was already at the fox spirit beast’s neck.
It tried to fight back with its spiritual energy, but there was a large difference in cultivation between the two sides. So Lin Fan’s sword immediately pierced through the spiritual energy that the fox spirit beast had gathered as a shield.
But before Lin Fan’s sword could stab into the fox spirit beast, there was a sudden burst of spiritual energy that came from the fox spirit beast. This spiritual energy completely stopped Lin Fan’s sword before taking the form of a spiritual energy fox around the smaller fox spirit beast.
This spiritual energy fox looked down at Lin Fan and gave a roar, almost as if it was saying, “Who are you to touch those under my protection?”
This roar immediately shook Lin Fan to his core, pushing him back several steps as he also suffered internal injuries. He could tell that this roar wasn’t a normal roar, even the spiritual energy that surrounded the fox spirit beast wasn’t normal.
This spiritual energy was much more condensed than his own, almost as if it came from a higher realm of cultivation.
This confirmed right away as a giant two tailed fox suddenly fell from the air and landed in front of the fox spirit beast, standing between Lin Fan and the fox spirit beast.
Lin Fan could immediately tell that this two tailed fox was the parent of the smaller fox spirit beast and that it was angered by the fact that Lin Fan had just tried to attack its child.
But that wasn’t the worst part.
The worst part was that when Lin Fan used the Appraisal Eyes on this two tailed fox, he was able to see its cultivation.
Foundation Realm…This was a Foundation Realm two tailed fox!
Where did this Foundation Realm spirit beast suddenly come from!?
Why didn’t the villagers tell him anything about this?!
Could it be that this was all a trap for him?
No, when he thought about it carefully, he immediately threw out that idea.
After all, he knew that the villagers wouldn’t be able to set up a trap like this. He had used the Appraisal Eyes back in the village and had seen that none of these villagers had any cultivation at all.
Those without cultivation weren’t qualified to plot against those with cultivation. They would have no way of contacting the two tailed fox in the first place, let alone plot with it.
The most likely explanation was that only the child fox spirit beast had attacked the village and stolen their livestock, which was why only the child fox spirit beast was reported.
That also explained why the Gale Sparrow had been scared earlier.
It wasn’t because of the child fox spirit beast, but rather the scent and aura left by the two tailed fox. That was also why there weren’t any spirit beasts roaming in this area.
This area had been marked as the two tailed fox’s territory, there wasn’t any spirit beast crazy enough to risk their lives fighting this Foundation Realm two tailed fox.
These thoughts quickly passed through Lin Fan’s mind and he just as quickly threw them away.
He didn’t have any time to think about the reason behind this situation, what he needed to do now was figure out a way to escape this situation.
Lin Fan quickly looked around, but he couldn’t find a single thing that he could use.
He had seen the two tailed fox suddenly appear in front of him, but he hadn’t been able to tell where it came from and how it had arrived. This just told him that the two tailed fox was much stronger than him.
Even if he wanted to run, it was unlikely that he would be able to get far…
Since that was the case, he had to find something to distract this two tailed fox as he made his escape.
It was just too bad that there really wasn’t anything.
That was also because of Lin Fan’s own choices.
He had lured this fox spirit beast to this opening clearing so that even if he missed his attack, he would still be able to stop the fox spirit beast from escaping.
However, this has backfired on him as he was now the one that was trapped by his own plans.
Lin Fan was still looking around when the two tailed fox’s figure suddenly disappeared.
When he reacted to the reappearance of the two tailed fox, he found that it was already right in front of his face. The two tailed fox had already raised its claws and was about to slash down at him.
It moved so fast that Lin Fan didn’t even have a chance to try to escape.
He just watched as the claws became bigger and bigger in his line of sight, wondering where he had gone wrong.
He didn’t even have time to put up his guard…
But as his life was flashing in front of his eyes, there was a ball of blue energy that suddenly flew by his head and hit the two tailed fox head on.
The two tailed fox couldn’t resist this ball of blue energy at all and was immediately blown away, being sent right back to where it had started.
Lin Fan just stared at it in a daze as he had no idea what had just happened.