Stranger Danger

Chapter 407: How Did You

When Ye Qing was one meter away from the Age Songstress, his pupils dilated, and his head and raised right hand abruptly fell to the ground. At the same time, his breathing ceased completely.

He was dead.

“Sigh. It didn’t need to be like this.”

On the peak, everyone felt a hint of pity and regret for the dead man. But of course, some people also felt the opposite emotion. To them, it was good that Ye Qing had perished. After all, it meant that their juniors, relatives, descendants and more had one less competitor. Besides, everyone on the peak was a bigshot with a vast amount of life experiences. It would be an understatement to say that they had witnessed far too many geniuses who rose like a star and fell like a meteor already.

When you were too familiar with something, you became desensitized. It was just a fact of life.

As expected, their lamentations disappeared into thin air just a few breaths later. They then shifted their attention to the rest of the competitors.

Chu Qingge had reached the end stage of the array. Fearless despite the storm of elements pouring down on her, she surrounded herself in purple qi and defended herself with an impressive variety of martial arts such as fist, palm, sword and finger. She intercepted water and fire and struck down wind and lightning like a war goddess.

Luo Zhan had reached the center of the quagmire. While carrying a pale, bloated body and leaking blood from all orifices, he did battle against a giant corpse made out of countless drowned bodies. His tyrannical, pitch black saber sundered the earth and filled the sky with intent.

The battle between Jian Wusheng and the sword puppet had reached the finale as well. Not only was Jian Wusheng covered from head to toe in blood, the gaping hole in his abdomen looked particularly scary. Deadly sword intent could be seen ravaging his insides. The sword puppet wasn’t doing much better either. Its left arm was missing, and half of its head was gone and leaking black qi.

The head wound had come from Jian Wusheng’s ultimate technique, “I Do Not Stand In A Sea Of Death[1]”. If it was a human, it would’ve died long ago. But because the sword puppet wasn’t alive in the first place, it was still functional. A winner would be decided any minute now.

It was the same for Yang Zhao. He was ranked even higher than Jian Wusheng on the Human Champions Ranking and a member of a prominent clan, so of course he was a powerful warrior in his own right. His fight against the rock giant had also reached the end stage, and speaking of the rock giant, it was at least twice as small as it was before. Shattered rock and fine sand could be seen everywhere.

The young Taoist Qi Xuanyun had finally seen through the secret of the river as well. He had willingly thrown himself to the bottom of the river and was currently fighting a fairly one-sided battle against a humanoid Stranger with a fish’s head. His powerful lightning was making it sing like a canary.

But despite their strong performance, none of them were in the lead right now. No, the lead was currently being held by two other warriors.

The first warrior in the lead was a cold-faced, red-eyed man wielding a spear and wearing a black armor. His spear techniques were brutal, terrifying and bloodthirsty, and he had slain every single Stranger he encountered since he began climbing the mountain. He was fearless and relentless even when going up against a Stranger who was stronger than him.

The man’s name was Xu Rulin. He served in the army, so his spear technique was honed by the horrors of the battlefield. Right now, Xu Rulin was battling against a tentacle Stranger called Mang Mang because it unleashed a highly toxic gas every time it cried, “Mang Mang!” It was an extremely dangerous foe, but Xu Rulin was pushing it back with his violent spear techniques.

If not for the fact that Xu Rulin was keeping it from escaping—he wanted to kill it just like all the Strangers he had encountered before—the battle would’ve been long over.

The second warrior in the lead was an extraordinarily ugly woman. Not only was her face jam packed with pimples like a toad’s back, she was almost as tall as she was broad. When she moved, it looked like a giant rock with legs was moving across the terrain.

Her power was no joke despite her ugliness, however. The woman had a gentle, melodious name called Wen Xiaonuan[2], but for whatever reason, she was overflowing with decadence, loss, sorrow and despair. Her fighting style was quite bizarre as well. She fought like she was trying to commit suicide, and she always targeted the enemy’s biggest weakness. Despite this, she was still alive, and every Stranger who tried to stand in her way had died.

Right now, Wen Xiaonuan was facing off against a cliff with countless arms hanging from the top. They looked like vines the way they flailed back and forth to the wind.

The cliff Stranger was called Cliff Arms for obvious reasons. It was a Phenomenon-class Stranger. It wasn’t affected by Wen Xiaonuan’s aura of despair because it didn’t have a mind. Despite this, Wen Xiaonuan had snapped off over half of its arms, and the cliff itself was covered in cracks. It was clear that it was on its last legs.

Wen Xiaonuan looked at the web of arms flying her way with a sorrowful and despairing expression. Then, she leaped into the air and straight into the arms.

It looked like she was the prey and the cliff Stranger the predator, but right before the arms would catch her, they abruptly shattered into pieces and fell like the rain. Then, Wen Xiaonuan slammed head first into the cliff and shattered it into a million pieces.

Wen Xiaonuan didn’t look happy despite her success in killing the Cliff Arms, however. She simply sighed in dejection and continued toward the peak at an even pace.

At nearly the same time, Xu Rulin killed Mang Mang and strode toward the peak as well.

On the peak, the same thought crossed everyone’s mind: It looks like the first place goes to Wen Xiaonuan, and the second place Xu Rulin.

Then, the Harmony King jumped and cheered like a kid, “Hahaha! I won! I won!”

Although he was slightly disgruntled that Chu Qingge wouldn’t be the champion of the first stage, the thought of getting the Golden Celestial Offering Censer and the Luan and Phoenix Chirping painting drawn by Zhang Baiduan cheered him up in no time.

“Xiaodan, Jianglong, prepare the items. I expect it to be delivered to my residence as soon as we get off this mountain. And you better not go back on your bet, you hear?”

Lei Xiaodan let out a bitter chuckle. “You bet, you pay. Don’t worry, Your Highness. You will have your winnings.”

“Hahahahahaha!” The Harmony King let loose a roaring laugh.

Suddenly, his laughter ceased like a chicken that was caught by the neck. It was because the person who climbed up the mountain was neither Wen Xiaonuan nor Xu Rulin. No, it was someone no one had expected to see again—Ye Qing!

“How did you get up here?” The Harmony King blurted out as his eyes widened like saucers.

The cry caught Ye Qing off guard and stupefied him before he could even catch his breath. When he looked in the direction of the voice and found an old man clad in luxurious clothing staring at him, he replied instinctively, “I... ran? What’s wrong?”

When he looked around, he noticed that almost everyone was looking at him with varying expressions of shock and surprise as well.

“How are you not dead?” The old man blurted again and stunning Ye Qing even more.

“Excuse you? Why would I be dead, pray tell?” Ye Qing subconsciously retorted at the rude remark. The fuck is going on here? Why is someone cursing me as soon as I reach the peak?

“Control yourself, Joyless! This is the Harmony King you’re speaking to!” Hong Jianglong interrupted before Ye Qing could offend the man even more.

“T-The Harmony King?” Ye Qing started in shock before taking a bow in a hurry. “This one greets you, Your Highness!”

“Well met.” The Harmony King looked Ye Qing up and down with a deep frown. “We saw the Age Songstress killing you with our own eyes, so how did you come back to life?”

Not only that, Ye Qing looked just as young as he was before. Just how was this possible?

“You’re not a ghost, are you?!”

Ye Qing felt a vein throbbing in his forehead. Who are you calling a ghost? Don’t think I’m going to take this lying down just because you’re the... on second thought, never mind.

By now, Ye Qing had noticed the screens floating on the peak and showing various competitors. Realizing what the Harmony King meant, he explained, “Your Highness, I was just pretending. I wasn’t actually killed by the Age Songstress.”

“You were just pretending?” The Harmony King repeated in confusion.

“Look over here, Your Highness!” Ye Qing was just about to explain himself when Hong Jianglong interrupted the conversation. When he turned to look, he saw Hong Jianglong waving a screen out of the large brazier at the center of the peak. It was showing the final moment of the battle between Ye Qing and the Age Songstress.

Ye Qing was stunned to say the least. I’m already shocked that this world has livestreams, but replays too? WTF?

On the screen, Ye Qing was lying on the ground perfectly still looking like he was dead. The Age Songstress certainly thought that was the case as she stopped singing and turned around to leave.

It was at this moment Ye Qing leaped into the air and closed the distance between them in the blink of an eye. Then a crimson light flashed and beheaded the Stranger.

Not done yet, Ye Qing clenched his left fist and summoned a tidal wave of Netherflame into existence, burning the Age Songstress’ head and body into ash before it could do anything. His movements were so smooth it was like he had practiced this a thousand times.

After he confirmed that the Age Songstress was dead, Ye Qing whistled triumphantly and slowly returned to normal. His thin, frail body began filling up with muscles, and black hair began covering his head once more. He transformed back to his former appearance in just the blink of an eye.

Then, he raced toward the peak at top speed once more.

That was how the battle between Ye Qing and the Age Songstress had ended. However, most people stopped paying attention to him because they thought he was dead and so missed the epic comeback completely.

“I thought the Age Songstress is a powerful Stranger. Even if you caught her by surprise, how did you kill her like it was nothing?” The Harmony King voiced his puzzlement.

“Joyless, explain!” Hong Jianglong ordered.

“As you command, commissioner.” Ye Qing performed a salute. “Your Highness, the Age Songstress’ greatest strength is her cursed song. However, that’s all she has. Her actual body is so fragile that even the average Hatred-class Stranger is tougher than her. That is why killing the Age Songstress is simply a matter of getting close to her.”

“But of course, the Age Songstress is an intelligent Stranger. I didn’t want to waste time chasing her around like a buffoon while she slowly ages me with her song. So, I pretended that I was rapidly succumbing to her curse while slowly closing the distance between us. Finally, I pretended to be dead and waited until she stopped singing before killing her.”

Ye Qing made it sound oh-so-easy, but everyone present knew just how dangerous the situation was. Not everyone could act, and in this case, not everyone could last long enough to deceive the Age Songstress. A weaker warrior might’ve fumbled and turned the act into a real tragedy.

“Hmph! Intelligence Stranger my ass! I can’t believe she got fooled by such a simple trick! Useless!” The Harmony King harrumphed with disdain.

Says the guy who was tricked by the same act? Shameless much? Ye Qing threw the Harmony King a meaningful look.

“Hmph! What are you looking at? You have an honest face, but you use it to deceive a lowly Stranger? How shameless! How inhuman!” The Harmony King harrumphed again.

Ye Qing: “...” I didn’t even say anything yet!

It was at this moment Hong Jianglong let out a cough. “You bet, you pay, Your Highness.”

“Hmph! It’s all your fault!” The Harmony King glared daggers at Ye Qing before sitting down angrily and looking away. He looked like a petulant child.

1. Cuz “No I”. ?

2. meaning “Small Warmth” ?