Chapter 8: THE HUNT

'Kuko roo koooo!'

'Chirp! Chirp!'

The inn was filled with the ambience of crickets chirping and cocks crowing. A faintly cold breeze blew open the curtain and into the room giving way to the rising sun rays to illuminate a part of the bed.

On the bed, a figure could be seen facing the wall with its back to the window. It had distinct red hair which danced with the wind without restraint.

The figure's bare back had taut muscles and a well defined structure. It subconsciously gave one a feeling of wanting to depend on the figure.

'Sigh'

Jin opened his eyes as he exhaled fog like air from his mouth. He had just finished his routine cultivation for the morning and was ready to kick off the day.

"There are two more days before the martial tournament, that should be enough time for me to get the needed points to unlock the store. Moreover, fighting wild beasts would be a good way to practice and keep fit."

Jin thought to himself with a smile while getting dressed to leave.

At the same time

In a large room, a heavily bandaged up boy was lying on the bed. There were no movements from him and the only way to know he was still alive was to carefully listen to his faint breathing which was almost inaudible.

"Don't worry Feng'er, father will definitely make that ignorant bastard pay for what he did to you. I shall hang him up and slowly drain his blood, I will make sure I watch him beg as the wild beasts devour him alive. Just focus on getting better"

Ao Tian said to his son, Ao Feng, with a sad face. He was going about his business yesterday when news got to him that his son was beaten up and crippled both physically and cultivation wise.

When he saw the guards who were supposed to look after his son, it took all the self control he had to stop himself from killing them immediately.

After barely calming himself down he questioned the guards about the incident that occurred, which they did without any form of hesitation for fear of losing their lives.

They were trembling all through and didn't meet their leader's eyes.

Ao Tian called up the painters and had them make a painting of Jin according to the description of the guards. When the painting was done, he had all the members of the black dragon gang take a painting of Jin's face and placed a bounty on his head, dead or alive.

Back to the inn

Jin ordered his breakfast but didn't eat it, instead with a light wave of his hand he stored it in his storage ring and set out for the demon plains. He made his way through the already dense foot traffic, even though it was not too bright outside yet.

Two figures stood in a dark corner, observing. There was a piece of paper in their hand with a painting on it.

"The bastard has been spotted. Go and give the report to the others, I will tail him while you guys join me"

One of them said while the other slipped away to pass on the message and bring reinforcement.

The black dragon gang stronghold

"My lord, we have located the culprit. He is heading outside the town. One of our members is currently on his tail"

The subordinate reported while kneeling

"Good, good. Take 100 of our members and hunt him down. I don't care if you kill him but if you do, make sure to bring me his head... I will make a wine cup out of it."

Ao Tian said menacingly, his killing intent unrestrained in the slightest. The messenger buckled under the pressure and prostrated on the ground before Ao Tian.

"Yes my lord"

After several tries, he was finally able to get back to his knees and reply with sweat flowing down his face before crawling out to carry out the order.

. . . . .

"Tch! What does this bastard want to achieve by tailing me this far?"

Jin complained in his mind. As he sensed someone steadily following not too far behind him.

He had already spotted the stalker since he left the town. He thought they were going the same way out of pure coincidence but after he made some unnecessary turns along the way, he realised it was actually someone tailing him.

A few metres into the demon plains, Jin deliberately lowered his speed so as to shorten the distance between him and the person tailing him. When the distance between them was close enough, Jin suddenly changed direction and bolted back towards the hidden stalker, utilising the silent steps movement technique.

Almost immediately, Jin appeared in front of the man and delivered a roundhouse kick towards his face. Caught off guard by the sudden attack, he barely managed to block the kick with a cross arm guard. He didn't go unscathed as his left arm broke due to the power contained in the kick.

"D-damn! Why are those bastards not here yet?! Just blocking a random kick from him has left me defenceless. What a monster!"

The stalker howled in pain while looking at the approaching Jin, whose killing intent was steadily soaring, making him look like a blood thirsty demon. Jin walked towards the man as he questioned

"Who are you and what business do you have following me out here?"

"Hehe, you brat! You don't even know how screwed you are!" The man guffawed

"Hey! Can you go straight to the point? I don't have all day to waste on you!"

Jin retorted as the conversation went back and forth between them

"You crippled our young master! Son of the black dragon gang leader! Hehe, reinforcements are on the way here as we speak! Surrender now or we will make sure you beg for death! Hahahaha!"

The man laughed maniacally believing he had successfully subdued Jin. Next, he took out a firework and shot it into the sky, indicating his location to his comrades.

'Ding!'

"Issuing mission!"

"Wipe out the black dragon gang members chasing after you!"

"Killed: 0/102"

Jin heard the familiar mechanical trill of the system, after going through the mission, a smile played on his lips.

'Swish! Stab!'

With a swift handmovement, Jin retrieved his spear from the storage ring and stabbed the laughing man's throat

"Poof! Tsss! Gurgle!"

The man clutched his throat as he looked at Jin with disbelief clear in his eyes, he thought he would be able to scare Jin with his black dragon gang identity.

"Ding! Killed a 7th level of the foundation building stage cultivator, gained 100 system points!"

[Mission: killed 1/102]

Jin was wide eyed upon hearing the system's notification. He never imagined it was possible to earn system points from killing human cultivators.

"Hey system why am I getting points for killing a person? I thought only beasts and demonic creatures could give system points upon death?"

He hurriedly asked the system

"Ding! The host can gain system points from any living being that can absorb and cultivate the Qi of the world! Be it human cultivators, demonic beasts, wild beasts, even plant demons can give points when they are killed by the host!"

"Wow that was unexpected. This was also my first time killing a man and I don't even know how to feel about it due to the system points I received. It all feels like a game. I just hope I don't lose myself and turn into a killing machine while chasing after system points"

Jin thought to himself. He was expecting to feel remorse for taking another man's life but he just couldn't, maybe because of the system points or maybe because his mindset had been altered to fit in with the world he currently lives in.

. . . . .

Somewhere else within the demon plains

'Bang!'

A bright light exploded in the sky, drawing the attention of everyone nearby to itself. Seeing this bright attraction, a hefty man dressed in protective gear bellowed

"That's the firework! He must have made contact with the culprit. Everybody move towards that spot, maximum speed!"

The leader of the 100 man black dragon hunt unit gave out orders to the group as they took off in the direction of the firework.

They moved ahead with great pace and before 15 minutes they were already at the spot but what tgey saw made their faces darken in anger.

Before them laid the corpse of their comrade, cause of death, a single spear thrust to the throat. He didn't even have the time to resist.

"How is this possible?! It has not even been up to 15 minutes since the firework went off how come he is dead?!"

The heavily clad leader roared, causing the birds nesting up in the trees around them to all take off. The environment soon returned to calm but the group of pusuers were livid, they all had their hands balled up into a fist and some squeezed so much, their nails dug into their flesh, leaving their hands dripping blood on the ground.

"Get into formation everyone, keep your eyes open and be extremely vigilant. We could lose more people if we're careless!"

The leader instructed, trying to pump his troops morale and fighting spirit. They hurdled up into formations and were prepared to face any situation form any angle possible.

What they didn't know was that everything they were doing was been watched by someone hiding deep within a cluster of bushes not too far away. This was Jin.

He reigned in his Qi fluctuations and lowered his breath, it was like he blended in with nature. It wasn't perfect and could be seen through by much stronger opponents but it was more than enough for this group.

Spotting a crazy smile on his face, Jin chucked and said

"Let the hunt begin, hehe"