Chapter 864: Frostfur Ape!

"Li Yun," Bai Yuchen called as he walked over. "Do you want to travel together for this trial?"

The Frostbound Heavenly Range was clearly a very dangerous place, and a strong companion would make both of them much safer. Besides, Li Yun had already broken through to the 1st level of Spirit Manifestation Realm.

Bai Yuchen did not know exactly how strong Li Yun had become since then, but he knew the gap between their combat strength was no longer a huge one. In his eyes, Li Yun was already qualified to fight at his side.

"I think I’ll go alone," Li Yun said, shaking his head.

Traveling in a group would certainly be safer, but it would also make hunting much less efficient. More importantly, splitting the points could easily cause trouble.

Ordinary Frostfang Beasts would not be an issue, because two people hunting together could simply share those small gains.

The real problem would come if they ran into a Commander-class Frost Beast worth one hundred points, or a Monarch-class Frost Beast worth one thousand. In that case, it was hard to say who should get the points.

The person who landed the killing blow might take everything, or they might try to divide the points by contribution, and arguments over that kind of thing could easily ruin a friendship.

Rather than risk parting on bad terms later, Li Yun thought it was better to go their separate ways from the start.

He also had another reason for wanting to act alone. If Bai Yuchen and the others stayed with him, he would have to hold back his real strength the entire time, and he had no wish to do that.

"That makes sense," Bai Yuchen said with a nod.

He was a little disappointed by the refusal, but he did not push the matter. With his own strength, he was confident that he could travel alone through most of the Frostbound Heavenly Range without facing any serious danger.

As for Huang Tianze and Huang Tianlin, there had never been any question of them splitting up. The two brothers naturally planned to travel together. Huang Tianlin was much weaker than his older brother, so Huang Tianze was not going to let him wander through the Frostbound Heavenly Range by himself.

After a few parting words, Li Yun, Bai Yuchen, Huang Tianze, and Huang Tianlin went their separate ways. They quickly disappeared in different directions, each starting the trial in his own way.

"Li Yun..."

In the thinning crowd, Lei Xuankong stared coldly at Li Yun’s back as he walked away, and his face was twisted with hatred.

"This time, I’ll make sure the Frostbound Heavenly Range becomes your grave," he muttered, so quietly that only the people closest to him could hear.

He then deliberately picked a direction completely different from Li Yun’s and soon vanished into the snowy wilderness.

One after another, the remaining cultivators left as well. For now, nobody started hunting other participants, because there was little point in doing so while everyone’s tokens were still nearly empty.

Even so, everyone understood that this peace was only temporary. Once half the trial had passed and people had built up large numbers of points, the situation was bound to change.

By then, hunting beasts might no longer be the fastest way to climb the rankings, and hunting other cultivators would be far more profitable. When that time came, the Frostbound Heavenly Range would almost certainly turn into a battlefield soaked in blood.

+++

"The frost qi in these mountains really does slow down the flow of essence qi," Li Yun said to himself.

He was walking alone through the endless snow, dressed in nothing but a thin white robe. The cold wind cut through the mountains like countless blades, and heavy snow kept falling from the sky. Before long, the snow had covered his shoulders and hair and left him almost completely white.

The temperature here was frightening. A cultivator below the Spirit Manifestation Realm would struggle to survive for long, and even someone at the 9th level of Heavenly Core Realm might eventually freeze to death if he stayed out in the open.

Li Yun, however, was perfectly calm. His expression hardly changed, as if the bone-chilling cold could not touch him at all.

"Screech! Screech! Screech!"

A series of sharp cries suddenly rang out from somewhere ahead. Right after that, more than a dozen fist-sized snowballs shot toward him at astonishing speed.

"Hm?"

Li Yun raised an eyebrow. He did not bother to draw his sword and simply pushed a palm forward. A surge of essence qi burst out with a loud boom, and every snowball exploded into a cloud of white powder before it could reach him.

He turned toward the place where the attack had come from. A strange ape was standing among the snow-covered rocks a few dozen meters away. It was about three meters tall, and its whole body was covered in thick white fur that blended almost perfectly into the snow around it.

Stranger still, its aura was extremely faint, so an ordinary cultivator who was not paying close attention could easily miss it altogether.

The ape was already holding several freshly made snowballs. When it realized that Li Yun had spotted it, it grew even more excited.

"Screech!"

It jumped up and down and then hurled another volley of snowballs at him.

Li Yun’s eyes turned cold. "You’re asking to die."

This creature was clearly one of the ordinary Frostfang Beasts that Elder Mu Cang had mentioned. Its attacks looked almost childish at first glance, but that was only because Li Yun was so much stronger than it was. I

f an ordinary cultivator at the 1st level of Spirit Manifestation Realm were caught off guard by these snowballs, a direct hit could easily cause serious injuries.

Li Yun stepped forward, and essence qi erupted from his body. The incoming snowballs burst one after another in a string of loud booms.

"Screech! Screech!"

The Frostfur Ape finally realized that something was wrong. Fear flashed in its surprisingly intelligent eyes, and it dropped the snow it had just scooped up, turned around, and ran.

Li Yun did not chase it right away. Instead, a faint smile appeared on his face.

"This thing is smarter than I expected," he said.

Apes naturally lived in groups, and there was little reason to think that instinct would disappear just because these ones lived in the Frostbound Heavenly Range. If one Frostfur Ape was here, a whole colony was probably nearby. Instead of searching blindly, he could simply let this one lead him straight to the rest.