Chapter 345: Clap
Truth be told, Liam had already been in a similar situation, albeit with far lower cultivation levels involved.
The Divine Cult’s jailer had kept fighting despite the fatal injury on his neck, and Dominic’s predicament was basically identical due to his still-bleeding hole.
In the past, Liam had only been a clueless monkey-boy, but he knew how cultivators worked now. His superhuman perception even made him see that functioning, which the hyper-clarity turned into subconscious conclusions.
Liam didn’t need to inflict another deadly blow. As long as Dominic ran out of Qi, he would die.
That also probably didn’t involve the entirety of Dominic’s Qi reserves. His level made him a superhuman entity, but he might need that energy to circulate through his body to remain alive.
The core continuously sent more energy to the body, and the process had to be faster for branching experts. However, Liam might be able to tip that frail balance as long as he forced Dominic to waste more Qi.
Liam didn’t know that Dominic was already on borrowed time. He honestly didn’t dare to consider such an optimistic possibility, no matter how reasonable it was. Reason had left the equation now that he had seen a heartless body refusing to become a corpse.
Nevertheless, Liam knew his own power and resilience. Things would have been different if his cultivation had been more advanced, but it wasn’t. Despite everything, he might still fall short in the face of such an opponent, meaning he needed help.
Liam threw the alchemical products at Lancelot while another thunderous noise resounded from his feet. While the plan only involved buying time, be it to wear down Dominic or wait for Lancelot to recover, the situation still demanded everything he had.
In an ordinary hunt, Liam would have bled his prey for hours on end from a safe position until it ultimately died. That just wasn’t possible against a branching expert. Liam would still employ the same strategy, but going all-out was the only way to pursue it.
The Seismic Palm hadn’t worked. Honestly, Liam had been stupid to use it. A rank 1 martial art was too inferior to the branching stage to have any effect. No matter how much superior Qi and momentum Liam added, it simply wouldn’t work on Dominic.
However, Liam’s physical strength had worked. The Primal Urge was showing its true power now that he had reached the rooting stage, empowering his body to a level not dissimilar to rank 2 items.
Liam could work with that, even if it meant crossing the breaking point.
Five speed bursts in a row hadn’t been enough, so Liam would use six. The skin under his feet broke, and a few toes snapped. His ankles hurt, and his knees groaned, but he still accelerated beyond his previous sprint.
Dominic was at his wits’ end. It was already shameful that two measly rooting experts had put him in such a terrible condition, but the previous exchange had added insult to injury.
Liam had not only resisted Dominic’s push. He had even spat on him and thrown him as if he were a mere sack of rice. There should be a limit to how much disrespect a branching expert could suffer, but that wasn’t even the end.
Whatever Liam had spat, Dominic’s Qi had felt the need to contain it. His left cheek burned, hurting, wasting more of his precious energy. Moreover, he had actually felt the impact with the ground.
On top of that, Liam was already coming. Dominic saw that blur as soon as he restored his footing, being faster than earlier, putting him in a pickle.
Killing a rooting expert was easy, or at least it should be. One serious attack had put Lancelot out of commission, so chances were Liam would suffer from a worse fate.
However, martial arts demanded a lot of Qi and put a heavy strain on the body. It was why ordinary cultivators often couldn’t perform techniques superior to their level. They either lacked the energy to activate them, the ability to physically endure them, or both.
Dominic didn’t lack any of that, but his current predicament had deprived him of both. He needed his Qi to remain alive, and his body was fatally injured. Any additional strain would increase his energy consumption.
Normally, Dominic would continue holding back because saving energy was paramount. Yet, he had to swallow his pride and admit the truth. Those rooting experts were exceptional, demanding appropriate reactions.
Instead of a palm strike, Liam delivered a punch when he reached Dominic. His empowered body and conditioned hands gave that simple attack power no different than a rank 2 martial art.
The punch hit Dominic’s burned chest, only for it to feel more unmovable than the previous clash with his forearm. Black spiderwebs had covered his body, his blood vessels turning into unbreakable stone, the skin above Liam’s knuckles being the one breaking instead.
Yet, the impact also pushed both Dominic and Liam back. Dominic quickly halted himself, the world parting as he charged forward to reach Liam in no time, only to see a series of yellow and dark pills materialize in his still raised hand.
The new space-ring, the white one, wasn’t just bigger. It also enabled more immediate summoning of its contents, fast enough to be used in battle.
Liam had already moved everything he might need in a fight there, so he summoned all his remaining Poisonous Cloud Pills, even the rank 1 ones he hadn’t sold, crushing them in his grasp to make them explode.
Tides of poisonous smoke, yellow and dark, blew in Dominic’s face and expanded in the area. He would have typically completed his attack, but avoiding injuries was paramount in his condition, so he clapped his hands.
That single clap transformed into a violent vibration that instantly blew away the smoke and shattered the ground below, sending the debris flying, too.
That was another martial art, a rank 2 one to be precise. Dominic had every intention to defend and attack at the same time, only for Liam to be already at his side. His skin had broken everywhere, and blood leaked from his mouth as he released a hiss and swung his fist at the branching expert’s side.
