Chapter 44 : Chapter 44
Chapter 44: Fog
When Li Mu said that, the others looked at one another, then all smiled.
Ma Jun asked with a grin, "You mean the vanguard?"
In every battle, Ma Jun had always charged at the very front. Sometimes, a single slash from him could even wound the monster.
And even if he failed to make a decisive impact, when the monster launched its counterattack, Ma Jun's strong physique and solid cultivation art let him withstand it.
That bought time for his teammates.
That was the squad's vanguard, and it was Ma Jun's position that Li Mu had pointed to.
Li Mu nodded.
"Hahaha, good! Then you can try it on the next one."
Ma Jun was not angry in the slightest. He laughed heartily.
"Being the vanguard isn't that easy. Are you sure?"
Zhao Meiting also smiled as she reminded him.
There was no contempt for Li Mu in their smiles.
But they really did think this was just youthful competitiveness.
After all, he was the champion of the Abyss First Battle.
Seeing how imposing Ma Jun looked as he took the lead in every fight, it was only natural for Li Mu to feel a little unconvinced.
That was perfectly normal.
"I'm sure!" Li Mu answered without the slightest hesitation.
"This little brother's got more guts than I do!" Song Biao said with a laugh.
He had not never tried being the vanguard while following Ma Jun.
But unless it was absolutely necessary, when it came time to face a monster head-on by himself, he truly did not dare trade blows with one directly.
What he excelled at was nimble hit-and-run fighting.
The so-called vanguard was the one who launched the first attack against the monster and bore the first wave of the monster's furious retaliation.
Charging in only to dodge right away would not do.
After joking around for a bit, the group rode on again.
Not far ahead, they encountered the seventh monster.
It was still a Dirt Hound at the peak of the Second Grade Realm, but this one was a full three meters in size.
It looked a whole circle larger than the previous ones, as though it were about to break through.
"Dismount!"
After saying that, Ma Jun had been about to remind Li Mu that perhaps he should handle this one first, and let Li Mu try the next monster instead.
But he discovered that Li Mu had already flashed past him and rushed to the front.
His feet tapped lightly from side to side, seeming slow but actually fast, and in the blink of an eye he was already in front of the monster.
Then he swept his cudgel across!
Li Mu had noticed that monsters like this never tried to dodge Ma Jun's saber.
They only knew how to charge straight in with brute force.
This kind of monster was simply too well-suited for him.
And when Ma Jun saw Li Mu swing his cudgel out without taking any defensive stance, he hurried forward at once, ready to support Li Mu at any moment.
But what he saw next made his scalp go numb!
The Dirt Hound bit down toward Li Mu's Thornflower Cudgel.
Bang!!
The Thornflower Cudgel smashed through the Dirt Hound's mouthful of sharp teeth like rotten wood.
It directly crushed through the side of the hound's jaw!
More than half of its head was actually driven into its chest by that single blow!
Its neck and exposed bones twisted into an extremely grotesque angle.
The powerful shockwave blasted the dust on the ground outward in a circular wave.
The huge hound body had originally been lunging at Li Mu with tremendous momentum, but that one strike stopped it dead in midair. Then, with a thud, it dropped straight to the ground!
Instant kill!
Everyone who had been preparing to support Li Mu's attack froze where they stood.
Ma Jun was the closest, and the sight nearly made him throw out his back!
The air fell silent for a full six or seven seconds.
The group simply stared at the Dirt Hound's corpse on the ground, then at Li Mu, who was neither red-faced nor out of breath.
The shock in their eyes refused to fade for a long time.
"Iron-Cleaving Form?"
Even as Ma Jun spoke those words, his heart was trembling.
He had seen it very clearly. Li Mu had used Iron-Cleaving Form.
But Ma Jun himself only dared use Iron-Cleaving Form at the finishing stage.
Monsters had combat instincts. If he used Iron-Cleaving Form at the very start, his saber swing would be too slow.
Once the monster sensed the power of the attack, it would dodge quickly and attack him from the side.
He had tried using it when facing enemies before, against Dirt Hounds just like this.
After one Dirt Hound swiftly dodged and bit into his thigh, he had never dared use it that way again.
But Li Mu's Iron-Cleaving Form...
Why was it so fast?
The Dirt Hound had clearly sensed how powerful Li Mu's attack was.
It had wanted to dodge, but it was already too late.
Li Mu's Iron-Cleaving Form was practically faster than Ma Jun's ordinary attacks!
"Talent trait."
Li Mu casually brushed them off with that answer.
As long as there was something Li Mu could not explain, or did not want to explain, he could simply push it all onto the excuse of a "talent trait."
After all, his F-Grade talent had been transferred over.
So he could just insist that it had mutated or evolved. What could anyone do about it?
In any case, no one else could inspect his talent trait.
As for that explanation, the other three all wore skeptical expressions.
But since he had put it that way, there was no real way to keep asking.
"Holy hell! But if you fight like this, little brother, there's really no way for us to coordinate."
"I feel like if I team up with you, I'm just dead weight!"
Zhang He had a lively personality. Grabbing his own hair, he complained about Li Mu in an exaggerated manner.
"I didn't expect it to be that fragile either."
"Next time I'll try it without Iron-Cleaving Form."
Li Mu shrugged. He was telling the truth.
After all, it had been his first time facing this kind of monster. Out of respect for his opponent, Li Mu had used Iron-Cleaving Form with one percent of his True Qi.
But now it seemed that even without Iron-Cleaving Form, the results would still be effective.
While they were speaking, Li Mu added the 36 Triumph Points he had just earned into Divine Weapon Art.
[Consumed 36 Triumph Points. 'Divine Weapon Art' enhancement successful.]
[Divine Weapon Art: Grants weight to a weapon. Current weight: 364 jin.]
At once, black lines appeared across the faces of all four teammates.
Fragile?
Was that something a human being should say??
The soldiers of the Abyss-Suppressing Army did not care much about whether someone's talent was high or low. They only respected true fighters.
Trying to rank people by talent within the Abyss-Suppressing Army was the most laughable behavior there was.
If you were dissatisfied, then battle merit would decide the matter.
And if you were still dissatisfied, then fight!
But Ma Jun and Zhao Meiting were both B-Grade talents.
The other two were both C-Grade talents.
As for Li Mu's F-Grade talent, they simply could not understand why it was so monstrously strong.
And since they could not understand it, they stopped trying.
The group mounted up again one after another.
Having a powerful comrade was an enormous blessing to them. They would only feel excited.
There was not the slightest trace of jealousy. That would have been the stupidest thing imaginable!
"Looks like I can take a break from being the vanguard now."
"But you really can try dropping Iron-Cleaving Form for the moment. Save your True Qi and preserve your strength."
"The point of team coordination is to use the least amount of effort to produce the strongest result."
"And that way, the brothers can split some Contribution Points too."
Ma Jun tugged lightly on the reins and advised Li Mu.
"That's true!"
Li Mu accepted the advice humbly. Ma Jun was absolutely right.
In the battles that followed, Li Mu stopped using Iron-Cleaving Form. With a cudgel weighing over four hundred jin, a single strike was still enough to badly wound a monster.
As long as Li Mu took part, he would inevitably take more than half the Contribution Points for himself.
Because of that, he and Ma Jun had to alternate taking the vanguard role.
Otherwise, the others would not have any chance to show what they could do.
But one thing had to be admitted.
With Li Mu participating, their efficiency in killing monsters was far beyond what it had been before.
That scene at the beginning, where three people had joined forces to instantly kill a monster, had actually been considered a very smooth fight.
As they went deeper into the monster-dense region, encounters with two or three monsters at once became increasingly common.
That was where Li Mu's role became extremely apparent. Even when three monsters attacked at the same time, the squad never lost its footing.
Meanwhile, Li Mu silently harvested Triumph Points while constantly feeling out the limit his current body could endure.
In the end, he increased the weight of Divine Weapon Art to 675 jin.
Adding the weight of the cudgel itself, that brought it to 735 jin!
Li Mu had to admit it.
Those two Low-Grade Body-Fortifying Pills were truly no joke!
The toughness of his body had increased by far more than a little.
Seven hundred thirty-five jin!
If a Dirt Hound failed to dodge in time, Li Mu could crush its skull with a single strike!
There was no need for Iron-Cleaving Form at all!
Still, at this weight, Li Mu felt that both his body's toughness and Mountain-Bearing Art had reached their most comfortable state.
If the weight went any higher, it would start to feel a little taxing.
So Li Mu stopped increasing it any further.
Soon enough, he had accumulated another 120 Triumph Points.
Coordination among the teammates also became smoother and smoother.
But because the frequency and number of monster encounters kept increasing, they stopped riding their horses and continued on foot instead.
"It's been more than two hours. The color of this zone seems to have faded a lot."
Zhao Meiting checked the map on her tactical watch and spoke to Ma Jun.
The others were also very satisfied with today's results. Their performance today was more than double their usual output.
"Mm. Stay sharp, everyone. We should be gradually leaving the Dirt Hounds' territory now."
Ma Jun gave everyone a warning.
He had not come to this particular area very many times himself.
But before they had gone much farther, Li Mu suddenly stopped in place.
Then he turned to the others and asked in confusion, "Wait. Is there something wrong with my eyes, or is fog rolling in?"
The others all stopped and looked up.
Their faces changed drastically at once.
Because in the few seconds it took them to stop, a dense fog had already completely engulfed and swallowed them...