CHAPTER 25: THE PLAN

The Grand Elder’s face lit up with a gleeful expression as he charged toward Yu Tian.

He thought to himself that he just needed to capture this pretty boy.

Yu Tian, on the other hand, let out a quiet sigh. He thought to himself that maybe he was expecting too much from her. Compared to him, who realized that his chances of survival were higher if he was the one hurt instead of her, she didn’t seem able to think this way.

Well, it all worked out in the end.

The Grand Elder was closing in on Yu Tian when he suddenly noticed something strange. The pretty boy seemed to be... smiling?

He looked at him more closely and saw that Yu Tian had his hand positioned behind his back. Oh no, he was hiding something.

The elder glanced back and saw an angry, bloodied Xueling charging at him with everything she had, ready to tear him limb from limb the second he stopped. Dammit, he couldn’t back down now. It was just a pretty boy anyway - what could he possibly do? If she was really confident in him, would she charge at him so desperately?

But just to be sure, he wasn’t going to capture but attack seriously instead. His eyes locked onto Yu Tian and his hand began glowing subtly.

Yu Tian noticed the change in the elder’s eyes. "So you noticed, huh," he thought.

He thought to himself that the elder was much more scheming than he had expected. Well, no matter.

Yu Tian tracked exactly where the elder’s gaze was targeting. At the last moment, he moved his body just subtly - a movement so slight that anyone watching wouldn’t notice anything strange.

At the same instant, a sharp earth spike protruded from the elder’s arm and pierced through Yu Tian’s body.

Yu Tian felt intense pain shoot through him, but this was nothing. He gritted his teeth. Compared to the agony of his qi pathways being torn apart when he was forming his inner core, this was nothing.

Besides, he had moved just slightly to ensure the area the elder struck wasn’t a vital point, meaning his chances of dying weren’t as high.

Now, taking advantage of this brief moment where the elder let his guard down, Yu Tian made his move.

He reached out and grabbed the earth spike connecting to the elder’s hand with one of his hands. Then he brought out his other hand from behind his back, slamming it onto the elder’s chest. He moved the hand that was holding the spike, crushing it with his grip, and jumped back with all his strength.

Before the elder could wonder what was happening, he felt a powerful explosion go off against his chest, injuring him greatly and throwing him backward. He felt immense pain, but he was still conscious.

He tried his best to regain control over his body, but it was too late.

His body was thrown in Xueling’s direction.

She was already prepared, energy flowing into her sword. As the elder’s body came toward her, she swung with all her might, slicing him cleanly in half.

...

Even after cutting the elder’s body in two, she didn’t stop and moved with the same momentum, reaching Yu Tian who had also been thrown back by the explosion before he could fall down. She caught him in the air and gently placed him down on his side because of the spike piercing through him.

Yu Tian looked at her. He wanted to scold her for her bad judgment, but looking at her face covered in tears and her battered body, he decided to let it slide for now.

"Why are you crying?" Yu Tian asked.

"I was so scared. I really thought I lost you," she said.

"Why would you think that? Didn’t we discuss the plan already?" he asked.

She looked at him with a blank expression. "You’re weird, you know that?" she asked.

"How so? I think you’re the strange one for not doing the best thing for both of us," he said.

"Do you really believe in chances that much?" she asked.

"Of course. How else am I supposed to survive?" he said matter-of-factly.

She looked at him, and he also looked directly at her. She didn’t see any waver in his eyes. He was really crazy.

She remembered the plan they had gone through.

Yu Tian had asked her to give him her trump card just in case. She didn’t know how he knew about that, but she gave it to him anyway. Besides, she would be more at ease if he had it to protect himself.

She was about to charge it for him, but he refused.

"I need you at full power to have a chance at facing the enemy," he had said.

She thought it was reasonable. If she charged it, she might not be able to fight as well as she would have with her full energy. Even so, she wondered how he would use it with his limited energy.

"If you use this yourself, not only will it cost you energy, it might also not work," Yu Tian said.

She thought it made sense. This was meant to be used as something that was already charged and just deployed to save you at the last moment. Charging it in battle was really dangerous - an enemy might realize what she was doing and could even dodge the strike, meaning she lost energy for nothing.

That was when he told her his crazy plan.

"That’s why I’ll use it instead. I’ll keep it with me and slowly charge it under concealment," he said. "Although using qi will likely make me easier to find, it doesn’t matter. With my qi and internal energy, I should be able to charge it in about an hour. When it’s done, I’ll let you know."

"Let me know?" she asked.

"That’s right. I’ll then reveal my position and the enemy will likely charge at me to use me as a hostage. As the enemy does this, you need to follow behind them. This will fuel their belief that I’m just a weak guy and make them let their guard down. And when they do, I’ll use this, then you’ll finish them off," he said.

At the time, she was opposed to the plan and they had agreed on it being the last resort. But in the end, it still turned out like this.