Chapter 54
When the forceful leopard claw hit Ou Yangming’s back, he felt an enormous impact that almost made him collapse even though he was protected by armor that was High Grade Rank Five.
Ou Yangming understood something at that moment.
He gained enough power with the help of his equipment set’s attributes, but his body quality could not complement the power yet.
Just like the forest leopard behind him at that moment, its power exceeded his withstandable limit.
Ou Yangming’s armor protected him against the leopard’s claw, but it could not defend him against its great power. If he were to resist it by force, his bones would break and tendons would be torn for sure.
Therefore, he quickly fell down by following the momentum to minimize the damage.
All of a sudden, the purple light that allowed him to multitask began flickering intensely as if it sensed that he was in danger.
Next, the light arrived between his eyebrows to merge with his mental power.
This was not the first time Ou Yangming did something like this. After learning the extremely powerful skills, he was able to transfer his mental power into his Military Fire whenever he smithed weapons.
However, other than the time he was forced to release his mental power when he was pressured by Yan Haobo, he never initiated the power during a fight.
This time, his potential was unleashed again as he was in a critical moment of life or death.
“Swoosh…”
Although no voice was heard at that instance, Ou Yangming’s consciousness seemed to have ascended from his mind and soared mid-air.
There was a drastic change in the view of the consciousness that was detached.
The observing angle was not parallel with Ou Yangming’s body anymore because his consciousness was overlooking the area from mid-air.
By watching from that angle, he felt like a divine being who had everything under control.
Almost at the same time, countless light spots appeared on the forest leopard’s body. No explanation was needed as Ou Yangming somehow understood what they were.
The light spots were the forest leopard’s force-bearing points and weak points when it leaped, which were fully exposed to Ou Yangming’s consciousness that was looking from above.
‘Skill…’
The word crossed Ou Yangming’s mind at that moment, and he gained a brand new and unexplainable perception of it.
Following that, his mental power suddenly left from the middle of his eyebrows and transformed into an invisible rope that appeared beside him. His mental power was suddenly pulled, causing a strange turning point for his body that was on the ground.
The pull was not done to resist the forest leopard’s enormous force as it only made a tiny adjustment according to the leopard’s power, but it was as though the bit of power levered the natural moat’s foundation.
From the soldiers’ point of view, Ou Yangming’s body twisted, and he staggered as if he was going to fall anytime.
Despite that, the seemingly unstable teen managed to dodge the continuous attacks from the forest leopard, and soon arrived behind the beast.
It was then when Ou Yangming’s consciousness in the sky identified the leopard’s weakest point.
Therefore, Ou Yangming stabbed it with his saber without hesitation…
The forest leopard shrieked while falling to the ground, and rolled away with the intention to escape, but it fell down again as soon as it moved. Its body twitched, and plenty of blood along with some odd substance flowed out from the back of its body. Eventually, its eyes turned dull.
Ou Yangming took a step back, then looked at his military saber that had 15 points of Sharpness. He was secretly glad that he did not add the Devouring attribute into it as he had companions, or he would have endless troubles if something strange happened to the leopard’s carcass.
After putting his saber away, Ou Yangming sensed that the atmosphere was unusual.
When he turned to look, he realized that everyone was looking at him, and they were dumbfounded and in disbelief. Other than that, some of them looked at him respectfully and fearfully.
Regardless of how Ou Yangming killed the forest leopard, be it his real strength or just pure luck, he answered everyone’s question perfectly and was recognized by all of them.
“Handle the carcass,” Yan Haobo ordered as he was the quickest to react.
The men immediately removed the forest leopard’s internal organs to cover them, then spread medicinal powder on its body. Even though they worked very fast, a bloody smell filled the air.
Yan Haobo noticed the deep wound on the last soldier who was injured, and he could not help but sigh. “Throw half of the quarries away, we must leave as soon as possible.”
Ou Yangming was stunned. “Squad Leader Yan, we acquired a new quarry, why are we throwing the other quarries away?”
“We’re short-handed, and we must have two scouts to scout the trail this time, so we have to discard half of our gains.”
After experiencing the dangerous incident earlier, Yan Haobo dared not take things lightly anymore. Even if they had to reduce their gains by half, he must guarantee everyone’s safety.
“I haven’t been contributing, so let me help you carry some stuff,” Ou Yangming hesitated for a while before he suggested. After all, they put in a lot of effort to obtain those items, so he carried the dead forest leopard, as well as another wild boar. “We can go now.”
The other men looked at each other as they wondered, ‘How strong exactly is this fella?’
“Okay, let’s go.” Yan Haobo sighed.
Since Ou Yangming carried two ferocious beasts, he did not ask them to abandon any of the quarries anymore. Nevertheless, everyone was more cautious this time.
The archer led the way with another partner at the front of the line. After verifying that there was no danger around them, they gave a secret signal to the others.
Perhaps their bad luck was all used up, they did not face any more danger for an hour.
However, the two men conversed secretly.
“Hey, what do you think about… Master Ou’s strength?” The archer hesitated before addressing Ou Yangming in a respectful way.
“He’s very strong!”
“Indeed, but don’t you think that he’s overly strong?”
“What do you mean?”
“Master Ou’s power is probably related to his equipment set, don’t you think?”
The soldier who was scouting the trail with the archer stopped suddenly to stare at his partner.
“Why are you looking at me like this?” The archer forced an embarrassed laugh.
The soldier replied, “Brother, Master Ou is Squad Leader’s guest, and he saved our brother just now. Do you remember?”
“You misunderstood me, I was just saying, and I didn’t mean anything else!” The archer’s face changed, and he quickly explained.
“It’s best if you didn’t mean anything else.” The soldier nodded, then continued checking their surroundings seriously.
The archer sighed to himself helplessly and cast his thoughts aside to continue scouting.
On the other hand, Ou Yangming was crying to himself bitterly at that moment because he regretted deeply the fact that he showed off his abilities earlier.
It was true that he possessed sufficient power after wearing the powerful pieces of Attribute Equipment, but comparatively, his body quality was far from his gained power.
Ou Yangming did not feel much when he journeyed in the forest with his equipment set.
After all, the 11 Points of power were not added in vain.
Nonetheless, he realized that something was off when he had nearly 500 kilograms extra burden on his body.
The 11 points of Power allowed him to withstand the weight easily, but his physical power was obviously insufficient. Before long, he found it difficult to walk and was also breathing heavily.
Ou Yangming was suddenly struck with an idea, thus he retrieved his dagger.
Following that, he used his Military Fire to attach the Devouring attribute into it. The dagger was one of the daggers that he especially refined to have the self-explosive skill, but it was extremely sharp as it was at the peak of High Grade. Hence, it could be used as a weapon before it was thrown out.
By utilizing the chance where the two quarries were blocking him, Ou Yangming turned his wrist to stab the dagger into the wild boar’s body.
The Devouring attribute showed a great effect right away as a substantial amount of Qi and blood were transferred into his body through the dagger.
It was an extremely enjoyable process, but Ou Yangming had other plans this time. Seconds after the Qi and blood flowed, he pulled the dagger out decisively.
With that, the Qi and blood stopped flowing, and everything went back to normal.
Consequently, Ou Yangming was no longer weary, and was full of power instead.
While he did not absorb a lot of Qi and blood, the amount was more than enough for him to compensate for the lost physical power.
In return, the wild boar that he carried shrunk a little.
Nevertheless, it was dead for more than a day, so who would notice even if it shrunk a bit?
Through his Military Fire, the Devouring attribute was transformed back into a purple light in his mind.
Yan Chengcai glanced at Ou Yangming strangely, and he let him carry two wild beasts without offering any help. Clearly, it was because he needed to be alert, but more importantly, he hoped that Ou Yangming would give up after some time.
Just a few moments ago, he heard Ou Yangming breathing heavily, hence he began counting down to the time that he would give up.
Who knew, not only did Ou Yangming begin breathing normally again after a brief moment, his footsteps became lighter.
Yan Haobo was astonished and had more respect for Ou Yangming who was enigmatic.
Without warning, a deep yell was heard in front, which interrupted his train of thought.