Chapter Thirty-Seven

Li Feng rapidly descends in freefall, chasing after Ruan Zan. Dozens of levels of the mine quickly pass as Li Feng catches up the man wrapped in chains, all the while increasing the bonds around the man. With a gust of air magic, Li Feng pushes Ruan Zan into the chains at the side of the hole and melds his chain bindings to those chains, locking Ruan Zan in place. At the same time, Li Feng uses air magic to stabilize himself at the same level, enabling him to grab onto the chains at the opposite side of the hole.

“Hey, thug,” Li Feng shouts at the man. “You have someone important to me.”

“A kid?” Ruan Zan says, noticing Li Feng but not connecting him to the strange occurrence. With the pull of his arm, the chains binding him come loose. “What are you doing down here?”

“You have someone important to me!” Li Feng shouts and uses fire magic to engulf Ruan Zan in flames. When he lets the flames subside, Ruan Zan’s clothes are burnt away, the fire aided by the coal mixed into the cloth, but his skin is barely affected. “Where is my servant?!”

“Ha, you must be the young master she kept going on about!” Ruan Zan shouts and frees his other arm. “How would you like to join her?”

Ruan Zan instantly frees his legs and jumps across the hole, and Li Feng flies up to escape. Once Ruan Zan lands on the chains where Li Feng stood a moment before, he launches himself upward at Li Feng.

Li Feng starts shooting boulders of ice at Ruan Zan, but the cultivator is hardly affected. Li Feng keeps flying himself up the stairway, but Ruan Zan can launch himself almost as fast. Every time Li Feng builds up a little distance, Ruan Zan clears the gap in a single leap.

To bring the fight to another playing field, Li Feng opens the chain wall around the hole and jumps onto the floor of the 183rd level of the mine. He runs into the darkness of the the hallways, breaking illuminated lanterns with water magic and extinguishing them.

“Are you trying to hide?” Ruan Zan yells, unable to see Li Feng in the dark but still walking forward, confident in his cultivation ability over a child. “I live in these mines; I know every inch of them!”

“These aren’t the mines you know,” Li Feng whispers and uses air magic to transfer the sound to Ruan Zan’s ears. With ground magic, Li Feng moves the walls around Ruan Zan in random directions, completely reorganizing the mine level around him.

“That’s a fancy trick of yours,” Ruan Zan says and kicks a newly appeared wall to destroy it. “But a trick won’t get you anywhere against the real thing.”

Ruan Zan continues to pummel through stone while Li Feng retreats and makes more of it. There are some residents on the 183rd level, but they are mostly strong cultivators who wouldn’t be hurt by a little debris from Li Feng and Ruan Zan’s fight. A few step out of their apartments to see what the crashing sound is, but the fall back when Li Feng uses his magic to shift the walls surrounding them.

Once in the very back of the 183rd level, the furthest possible away from the stairway without going down a branch tunnel, Li Feng fills the tunnel between himself and Ruan Zan with ice. Ruan Zan punches through a wall of stone only to be met with the wall of ice, but he isn’t stopped by it. Like before, Ruan Zan just keeps jumping and kicking away at the ice as if it was made from spider webs.

As Ruan Zan gets to the center of the iced tunnel, Li Feng increases his magical output exponentially. The ice drops a hundred degrees and completely encircles Ruan Zan, quickly lowering his core temperature. Also, in the bubble Ruan Zan has made for himself inside the ice, Li Feng fills it with water. Ruan Zan’s skin gradually turns blue as his martial techniques fail to penetrate the ice and he loses breath.

Just before Ruan Zan loses consciousness, Li Feng removes his mana from the ice and water above Ruan Zan’s head, giving him air to breathe. However, just because Li Feng gives him this, doesn’t mean Ruan Zan is in any better of a situation. Right now, he can’t feel his arms or legs, and his chest is pumping blood much slower than usual. If he stays in the ice for a few minutes longer, he’ll certainly die.

“Now, if you want to live with your cultivation in tact, tell me where my servant is,” Li Feng threatens Ruan Zan, and uses the technique he hasn’t used in five years to grab ahold of Ruan Zan’s dantian. “Or else I’ll cripple your cultivation.”

Li Feng reaches out for Ruan Zan’s dantian, feeling it pulse within his fingers. The housing organ for cultivated power is scared of Li Feng, and Li Feng knows it. With a gentle pull on the dantian, Ruan Zan shouts, “I’ll tell you whatever you want to know!”

“Excellent,” Li Feng says, removing his grasp from Ruan Zan’s dantian. “Tell me quick, or else this ice will be getting the better of you.”

“She’s on the seventy sixth level, quadrant three, room twenty four!” Ruan Zan shouts.

“Thank you, kindly,” Li Feng says and bows to the man. “You may keep your cultivation.”

Though Li Feng sounds calm, Ruan Zan is not. “Gah!” He shouts, blood pouring from his mouth. With just a thought, Li Feng sent a spike of ice through the back of Ruan Zan’s skull, piercing his brain and freezing anything it touched. Within a few seconds, Ruan Zan died.