Chapter 689 - 423: The Price of Carelessness

Chapter 689: Chapter 423: The Price of Carelessness

Upon hearing a sudden sound from behind, Lin Li abruptly abandoned his attack on Wu Xiong. He spun around and threw a vicious punch.

BANG.

RRRIP...

Lin Li’s ferocious fist struck the figure that had suddenly appeared behind him. At the same time, his opponent’s claws tore through the clothes on his chest.

THUD, THUD, THUD... After taking Lin Li’s ferocious punch, the ambusher staggered back a dozen steps before finding his footing.

The ambusher clutched the shoulder Lin Li had struck, his face contorting in pain.

Lin Li’s punch had crippled his left shoulder. Intense pain radiated from the wound throughout his body, and large beads of sweat quickly broke out on his forehead.

He had been hiding in the shadows, biding his time. Even when Wu Xiong and Zhang Di were in grave danger, he had held back, refusing to make a move.

It wasn’t until the last moment that the ambusher felt his opportunity had arrived. He revealed himself from the shadows, launching a sneak attack on Lin Li, who had relaxed his guard, thinking he had already achieved a total victory.

’An ambush under these circumstances should have been a surefire success.’

But to the ambusher’s surprise, the target’s reaction speed was staggering. In the end, he was forced to trade an injury of his own just to make the ambush a success.

After knocking back his ambusher with a punch, Lin Li studied the man with a grim expression.

His attacker was an old man with graying hair and an aquiline nose. He had a wiry build and was short, standing under five-and-a-half feet tall.

The man kept his fingernails long, and they were an eerie shade of purple.

A faint, golden Spiritual Light could be seen shimmering on the surface of his nails.

In the ambush just now, the gray-haired old man had used these very nails to tear through Lin Li’s clothes and leave several shallow scratches on his chest.

Tearing his gaze away from the ambusher, Lin Li looked down at his chest.

Several gashes were torn in his linen clothes. Through the openings, he could see that his skin was broken, with thin trickles of fresh blood slowly seeping out.

Hiss...

’That hurts.’

Lin Li sucked in a sharp breath. It had been a long time since he was last injured.

Theoretically, with his Elemental Incarnation Body ability, injuring him should have been extremely difficult.

The only reason he hadn’t managed to activate his Elemental Incarnation Body in time to dodge the ambush was that he had completely let his guard down.

The ambush had been so sudden that Lin Li’s first instinct was to throw a punch to knock the man back, not to use one of his abilities.

’I was careless. I really shouldn’t have gotten hurt this time,’ Lin Li thought, chastising himself as he looked at the scratches on his chest.

But then again, ’This enemy who ambushed me has incredible patience.’

’For him to wait all this time, from the start of the battle until now, before launching his ambush... that’s impressive.’

"Purple Claw, is this how your Blood Killing Sect operates? You had to wait until he nearly killed us before you were willing to make a move?" Wu Xiong, his face battered and bruised by Lin Li, spat at the old man who had successfully landed the ambush.

The old man was an assassin from the Blood Killing Sect, codenamed Purple Claw. Apparently, many years ago when he first became an assassin for the sect, he had gone by a different name.

He changed it later because the purple nails on his hands left such a deep impression during his missions that he adopted his current codename.

"You think I didn’t want to act sooner?" the Blood Killing Sect assassin, Purple Claw, angrily retorted upon hearing Wu Xiong’s accusation. "If it weren’t for your faulty intelligence, I wouldn’t have been forced to hide until now to ambush him."

Several days ago, Wu Xiong had taken a token from the Wu Family Patriarch to the Sect Leader of the Blood Killing Sect, asking him to dispatch someone to help kill the "masked fiend."

At the time, the intelligence Wu Xiong provided stated that the masked fiend was merely a Cultivator at the Peak of Tier Two, only slightly stronger than others in the same realm.

To repay a favor to the Wu Family Patriarch, the Sect Leader of the Blood Killing Sect gave it some thought and dispatched his most capable subordinate—a man whose cultivation was second only to his own—to assist Wu Xiong.

Later, Purple Claw received his orders and came to meet with Wu Xiong and Zhang Di.

He had thought, ’With me, that makes three Cultivators at the Peak of Tier Two against one opponent of the same realm.’

’No matter how much stronger he is than others at this level, there’s no way he can fight three against one. This mission should be a cakewalk.’

But the reality of the situation defied Purple Claw’s expectations. The masked fiend was unbelievably powerful. Despite being in the same realm as Purple Claw himself—the Peak of Tier Two—the target was completely crushing his two opponents in a two-on-one fight.

Watching from the shadows, Purple Claw drew upon his vast experience as an assassin and carefully analyzed what he was seeing. He came to a startling conclusion: even if he joined the fray, their side would still inevitably lose the three-on-one battle.

So, he made a bold decision: he would use Wu Xiong and Zhang Di as bait. He would let them be defeated, creating an opening for a successful ambush when the masked fiend let his guard down.

Events unfolded just as Purple Claw had envisioned. The defeat of Wu Xiong and Zhang Di did indeed cause the masked fiend to lower his guard, at which point he decisively revealed himself and launched his ambush.

And though he had paid a heavy price in the process, suffering a severe injury of his own, it was all worth it as long as he succeeded.