Stranger Danger

Chapter 87: Ready Or Not

Ye Qing gently leaped into the air and darted all over the place like gravity had no hold over him. No matter how fast Rainbow Child swung his twintails, he was always able to dodge them by a hair’s breadth.

“No fun! It’s not fun if you dodge, big brother!” Rainbow Child complained with a pout. As if on cue, his twintails abruptly came loose and spread into a sea of black hair—or was it? When Ye Qing looked closer, he discovered that the “hair” wasn’t hair at all. It was some sort of tendril that one could usually find beneath the cap of a mushroom or other seed plants. In any case, it was spine-chilling to see them flailing all over the place and towering over the place like a tidal wave.

Swoosh!

In response, Ye Qing flicked his wrist and swung his sleeve. His energy spiked to peak levels in an instant, and the clouds in the sky vibrated as if responding to the move.

“Flowing Cloud, Flying Sleeve”

Boom!

A long gap appeared in the sea of black tendrils and temporarily revealed the sky and the moon. The next moment, Ye Qing appeared in front of Rainbow Child and bashed his skull with a downward palm strike as swift as lightning. As the Stranger was slammed into the ground, the ground split asunder, and the resulting shockwave threw countless nearby Strangers into the air or killed them outright.

Exhaling, Ye Qing rose to his feet and got ready to leave. It was at this moment he heard Rainbow Child saying, “Oh, that hurts…”

“He’s still alive?” Ye Qing blinked in surprise. He had reached the adept level in the “Blood Shadow Divine Art” and unlocked all twelve Standard Meridians, eight Extraordinary Meridians, and three hundred and sixty bodily points, so his true qi was far greater than your average Vessel Augmentor. His physical body was also strong enough to shatter rocks or kill a fellow Vessel Augmentor in one strike. He hadn’t conserved his strength when he dealt what he thought was the killing blow earlier, so he was quite surprised to find that the frail-looking Malice-class Stranger was still alive and well.

“Hehehe, it’s been a while since I felt so much pain. You’re truly incredible, big brother!”

The dust cloud had finally settled enough to reveal Rainbow Child, but the Malice-class Stranger looked very different from before. For starters, his head had transformed into a mushroom covered in rainbow-colored dots that emitted rainbow-colored flashes. Countless hair-thin tendrils were floating above the dots as well. He had also grown a thick stalk beneath its feet. The Malice-class Stranger actually looked pretty cute in its current state, if one ignored the fact that it was a murderous, bloodthirsty monster.

“The Rainbow Mushroom…” Ye Qing frowned deeply when he finally recognized Rainbow Child’s true form. The Rainbow Mushroom was a Malice-class Stranger whose body was covered in rainbow dots. Born in dark, damp, and miasma-ridden places, it emitted colorful lights at night to lure unsuspecting Strangers into its range before releasing infectious spores to consume them. In other words, the Rainbow Mushroom wasn’t just a vicious Stranger, it was one that ate other vicious Strangers to sustain itself.

“Hehehe… I’m going to get serious now, big brother! Get ready!” Rainbow Child warned before shaking its massive cap and releasing a thick cloud of flashy dots at Ye Qing. They were his spores, of course.

Ye Qing had already seen what the spores did to its victims just now, so he didn’t dare to treat it lightly and leaped out of the way. The spores did not discriminate against the living or the dead, all flesh and blood beings grew colorful mushrooms as soon as they were infected by it.

“Hehehe…”

That wasn’t all. The tiny mushrooms grew eyes and limbs before uprooting themselves from the bodies. While giggling, they hopped toward Ye Qing like miniature versions of Rainbow Child.

“Our name is Shroomie, and we fear nothing. Ready or not, here we come!”

“Our name is Shroomie, and we fear nothing. Ready or not, here we come!”

The little mushrooms waved their little hands, kicked their little legs, and chanted their little battle cry as they rushed toward Ye Qing. If a human or a Stranger happened to get in their way, some of them would explode and take out the obstacle while the rest continued to march their way toward Ye Qing.

“Interesting!” Ye Qing let out a chuckle and stopped in his tracks. When he slapped his hand on the ground, the long street in front of him shook once before spitting out a bunch of limestone bricks. Before they dropped back to the ground, Ye Qing swung his sleeves and caused them to spin wildly like he was conjuring a cyclone. Finally, he sent the cyclone crashing toward the army of small mushrooms.

Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!

There was no way the little mushrooms could’ve dodged out of their way courtesy of their short feet. As a result, they turned into mini fireballs and blew up that entire section of the street.

“This is so much fun! Yipee!” Rainbow Child cheered and clapped his hands boisterously while staring at the fireworks. He looked like he was enjoying the time of his life.

It was at this moment Rainbow Child sensed something and let out a strange yelp. He tried jumping to the side, but his feet had just left the ground when a bolt of lightning pierced through the dust clouds and hit him squarely in the chest. He instantly exploded into a million pieces.

Ye Qing slowly stepped out of the dust and curled his finger, and a sword as thin as a leaf flew back into his head. It was Lightning Bolt, of course.

“Our name is Shroomie, and you are scary. We had enough fun, so see you never!”

Ye Qing thought that Rainbow Child was dead this time for sure, but the shattered pieces on the sundered ground abruptly bounced into the air, grew arms and legs, and took off in every direction.

“He’s still not dead?” Ye Qinb blinked and unleashed his Blood Shadows. The shapeless, formless entities immediately spread out and sliced through every Rainbow Child they came across practically without resistance. It was a mistake though. The sliced chunks simply transformed into more mini Rainbow Children before running toward the nearest crowds.

“What a pain in the ass!” Ye Qing rubbed his nose in annoyance. At this rate, Rainbow Child was going to grow into a horde of his own. That said, his senses were telling him the Stranger was steadily weakening with every attack. This meant that his attacks were working to a certain extent, and that he would hit a limit eventually.

“In that case…” A wicked grin sprung onto Ye Qing’s face as he struck out with his left hand. A terrifyingly potent force mixed with a jet of bluish black flame immediately engulfed the swarm of Rainbow Children.

“Boundless Lightning Palm”

“Blue Demon Hand”

This time, his attack was far more effective. The flame consumed the duplicates in just the blink of an eye and turned most of them into ash. His change of tactics came a tad too slow, however. One Rainbow Child ultimately managed to escape the all-consuming flame and disappeared into a crowd of Strangers.

“Damn, I should’ve used the Blue Demon Hand sooner. But did it really think it could escape me?” commented Ye Qing with a positively diabolical smile on his face. He hadn’t wasted all that time and energy just so that his precious dragon-serpent runes would elude him at the last moment.

He immediately gave chase, but he made sure to kill every Stranger he encountered along the way. They too were dragon-serpent runes, and he wasn’t going to leave any behind.

“Granny Mud! Grandpa Tree! Rainbow Child has come to help you!”

Rainbow Child had not been running aimlessly like a headless chicken. He had been making a beeline toward his fellow Strangers since the moment he lost the battle.

When Granny Mud turned and saw the mushroom Stranger, she exclaimed in astonishment, “What happened to you, Rainbow Child?”

Speaking of Granny Mud and Grandpa Tree, the two Strangers were still fighting against Yan Yufei. Although the Seal of the Land was the bane of all Strangers, the two Strangers were quite strong, and it was a one-versus-two battle. It was why the battle was temporarily locked in a stalemate.

At first, Granny Mud and Grandpa Tree were glad to see Rainbow Child. Yan Yufei might be able to force two of them into a stalemate, but there was no way he could fight three powerful Malice-class Strangers at once. That was when they saw the state Rainbow Child was reduced to and realized what he was really planning. He wasn’t trying to help them, he was using them to get away from his pursuer! The human who defeated Rainbow Child must be exceptionally strong, and they could only imagine what would happen if they decided to join forces with Yan Yufei!

Granny Mud immediately let out a cry of outrage, “You would do us harm, Rainbow Child?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I came to help you, Granny!” Rainbow Child giggled with feigned innocence.

“Nani? Buy one get two? Now this is a deal I can get behind!” It was at this moment Ye Qing arrived at the scene and saw the weakened Granny Mud, Grandpa Tree and Rainbow Child all in one place. His eyes immediately lit up with greed and glee.

Yan Yufei also exclaimed in pleasant surprise when he saw Ye Qing, “Perfect timing, Joyless! I need to help the others, so I’m leaving these animals to you! Goodbye!” He then withdrew his seal and left just like that.

Ye Qing: “...” You could at least pretend to give me a hand before you up and leave, you sonuvabitch. Where is your sense of camaraderie?

Meanwhile, Granny Mud and Grandpa Tree could hardly believe their luck. They were so sure that Yan Yufei would team up with the newcomer and wipe them out once and for all, but for whatever reason, he had chosen to withdraw from the battlefield instead. The newcomer was only one person, and he was so young he couldn’t possibly put up a good fight. How could they not be overjoyed with this sudden turn of events?

“Kill him!” Grandpa Tree shouted and shook his branches. A swarm of black butterflies immediately surged toward Ye Qing, though their numbers were far sparser than before. Clearly, the battle against Yan Yufei had consumed much of his energy.

“Egg Butterflies?” Ye Qing furrowed his brow. He had read about this Stranger from a book. The Egg Butterfly was a kind of Red-class Stranger that procreated by injecting its eggs into flesh and blood creatures, and the eggs hatched immediately when it made contact with blood. It was quite similar to the Bellyfish in some ways but far more dangerous. It was because the Bellyfish could only wait for a suitable host to stumble upon them, while the Egg Butterfly could fly up to its victims to lay its eggs.

Naturally, Ye Qing wasn’t going to allow the Egg Butterflies to get close. When they swarm was around ten meters away from him, he immediately swung his sleeves and killed them all with a deadly gust of force. However, Grandpa Tree hadn’t been idle while he was dealing with the Egg Butterflies. The tree Stranger had crossed the distance between them with surprising speed before attacking his flank with half a canopy of sharp, black branches. It looked very much like a spear wall.

Ye Qing immediately channeled his qi to jump away from Grandpa Tree. He didn’t want to clash directly against Grandpa Tree, not because he couldn’t, but because it was unnecessary. With Blood Sea Fragrance he could both dodge the attack and launch a decisive counterattack at once, so why would he opt for a suboptimal solution instead?

However, the earth underneath him abruptly softened into a pool of mud before he could jump away. The next thing he knew, he had sunk to knee level and was still sinking by the second.

“Grandma Mud…”

Ye Qing frowned and tried to lift his feet, but it felt like a pair of hands grabbing his ankles with a death grip and pulling him toward the bottom with all their might. This mud Stranger was most likely the “Granny Mud” Rainbow Child had mentioned earlier.

“Keke. Die, human!” The face on the tree trunk scrunched into an eerie cackle when Grandpa Tree noted that Ye Qing was unable to break free from Granny Mud’s grasp. This was the plan they had come up with after Yan Yufei had left the scene. Grandpa Tree would launch a direct attack to attract Ye Qing’s attention, and Grandma Mud would immobilize him while he wasn’t looking. While the young man was struggling, Grandpa Tree would deal the decisive, fatal blow.

1. League of Legend reference.