Chapter 398: No Escape from Calamity

Carrying another person through the air consumed a great deal of spiritual power. The resistance while gliding could easily be imagined.

Yuan Gang noticed that the distances Su Zhao covered between each landing had become shorter than at the beginning.

When they came down again, he called, "Stop for a moment!"

They landed. Su Zhao looked at him in confusion.

Yuan Gang said, "Carrying me is consuming too much of your spiritual power. Rest and recover for a while. Otherwise, if pursuers catch up, we'll be in trouble."

Su Zhao said, "How are we supposed to rest now? Sit here and wait for them to catch us?"

Yuan Gang said, "I'll carry you. ..."

Su Zhao was briefly speechless, then smiled bitterly.

"Forget whether you can carry me. Running on foot through a desert leaves obvious tracks. Xiaoyue Pavilion will definitely have sent giant flying birds for this pursuit. Footprints would be too easy to spot from the air."

"I'm fine. I can keep this up for another two hours or so."

Her face held a bitter smile, but sweetness filled her heart. There was someone who refused to abandon her. That feeling was wonderful. Even this barren desert could have been a garden.

Yuan Gang said, "If they can chase us this far, then leaving tracks no longer matters. Preserving our strength gives us a chance to face whatever comes. Listen to me."

For him to say something like that meant even he thought their chances of escape were very small.

At this point, they truly were treating a dead horse as though it were alive, fleeing as far as they could while searching for that last possible opportunity.

Since he had already said as much and clearly prepared himself to face the worst, Su Zhao became calmer too.

"No need to carry me. You run. I'll fly."

"Recover your spiritual power as quickly as you can."

Yuan Gang left no room for refusal. He pulled the bundle around to his chest, caught hold of her, crouched, wrapped both arms around her legs, and hoisted her directly onto his back. Then he opened his stride and began sprinting across the desert. Su Zhao felt both embarrassed and delighted.

At the same time, she could not help worrying.

"Running through sand is tiring enough on its own. Can you really do this while carrying me?"

"I could carry two more of you and still run!"

Yuan Gang threw back the words and concentrated on sprinting. He raced up and down the dunes as though the desert were level ground, moving as fast as ever, almost like a streak of smoke.

Before long, that barely visible red mist began cycling around his mouth and nose again with every breath. At first, Su Zhao remained worried.

Gradually, she discovered that this man seemed not to know the meaning of exhaustion. His stamina appeared endless, impossible to use up. His breathing remained steady throughout.

Only then did she slowly relax, deciding she would ask him what was going on when she had the chance. Wind roared past her ears.

It blew directly across her body, unlike when she flew under the protection of spiritual power and could hardly feel it.

The sensation was like galloping on horseback, except she did not even need to divide her attention to control the mount. She could rest completely at ease. Su Zhao took out a Spirit Essence Pill and swallowed it.

Then she slowly rested against Yuan Gang's back, breathing in the masculine scent from his body. She realized again just how powerfully built this man was.

Gradually calming herself, she began circulating her art to recover the spiritual power she had consumed...

Across the boundless desert, Yuan Gang continued racing without any sign of fatigue. Then something unexpected interfered.

Just as he carried Su Zhao up the slope of a dune, the sand suddenly split open.

A sand scorpion the color of the desert burst from beneath the surface and sprang toward Yuan Gang. The monster was as large as a calf. Its sudden appearance startled Yuan Gang.

He released one arm from around Su Zhao's leg and, in the same motion, swung his saber in a violent slash. The sand scorpion had launched itself fiercely.

Yet as it came close, it suddenly began waving its pincers frantically and twisting its body, seeming to want to turn and flee. Momentum carried it onward anyway.

"Don't!" Su Zhao shouted from behind him.

The warning came too late. Yuan Gang's saber had already swept through. The Saber split the sand scorpion cleanly in half. A splash of vivid, almost dazzling blood sprayed across Yuan Gang. The creature's blood was clearly a brighter red than ordinary blood.

Having killed it in a single strike and realized the monster was not especially difficult to deal with, Yuan Gang never even stopped moving. He crested the dune and kept running.

Su Zhao sighed helplessly. "You don't know that sand scorpions in this desert must never be killed?"

"What's the problem?" Yuan Gang asked without slowing.

Su Zhao sighed again.

"There are many sand scorpions throughout this desert. The stingers on their tails are highly venomous, and they crawl extremely fast. Across the sand, they come and go like the wind, and their ability to leap and strike is very strong."

"Because food is so scarce here, they're extraordinarily sensitive to the smell of blood. The moment something is wounded and they smell it, countless sand scorpions from every direction will immediately converge to feed."

"They'll even eat their own kind once one of them is injured. You've brought us serious trouble."

Yuan Gang fell silent for a moment. He roughly understood the helplessness in her sigh. He could not fly. He could only run across the ground.

Yet Su Zhao could not carry him through the air for very long.

Sooner or later, they would be trapped in endless attacks throughout the desert.

Even with Su Zhao carrying him, they might not be able to break free.

"Let's turn back. If we go any deeper..."

Su Zhao smiled bitterly.

"Facing Xiaoyue Pavilion may still leave us a thread of survival. These monsters can't be reasoned with."

As if to prove her point, sand scorpions of every size began appearing one after another across the desert.

The moment they saw living prey, they became visibly excited and raced toward them from all directions.

Su Zhao said, "Put me down. Wait."

Yuan Gang refused. His gaze focused on the downwind side, as though he wanted to confirm something. The sand scorpions approaching from downwind suddenly began slowing. Then they seemed to stop altogether. Yuan Gang's eyes brightened.

"It's fine. Keep recovering your spiritual power. We may have found a chance to get away."

Su Zhao did not understand. Yuan Gang had already veered to the left and begun running downwind. As he approached, the sand scorpions ahead seemed intensely afraid of him.

Before he could get close, they retreated to either side one after another, crouching motionless along the path he was taking, none daring to move. Su Zhao stared in astonishment.

"What's happening? What did you do?"

She had not seen Yuan Gang make any move at all. She could not understand why the sand scorpions had suddenly become so docile.

"I'll explain later."

Yuan Gang was not brushing her off, nor was he deliberately hiding anything.

Running through a desert with another person on his back truly was not easy.

If he kept talking without end, it disrupted the rhythm of his breathing.

Only by maintaining that rhythm could he sustain the stamina needed to keep running under such a burden.

And some matters could not be explained in one or two sentences anyway. Su Zhao remained astonished by the strange phenomenon. She kept looking around. Then, when she glanced back, her gaze abruptly fixed on something.

A black speck was faintly visible in the distance, pursuing them at high speed.

"Someone from Xiaoyue Pavilion has caught up. Put me down!" Su Zhao said through clenched teeth.

Yuan Gang turned his head enough to glance back while still carrying her. He had no intention of putting her down.

"Let's see whether the sand scorpions can slow him."

Su Zhao said, "It won't work. Xiaoyue Pavilion has experts everywhere. If he dares pursue us alone, a few sand scorpions won't stop him. Even slowing him down is enough. I heard there's a Boundless Pavilion somewhere in this desert. No one dares act recklessly there. If we can reach Boundless Pavilion, we can find someone to contact Master Dao. Then Master Dao can think of a solution. His brain works better. It's useless. I'll stay behind and delay him. You find a way to reach Boundless Pavilion and contact Master Dao. Even if I fall back into Xiaoyue Pavilion's hands, they may not kill me immediately. You go find Master Dao. There are orders inside Xiaoyue Pavilion that no one is to act recklessly against him. If he has enough ability to make them issue an order like that, perhaps this Master Dao of yours truly can find some way to save me. Even if it's useless, we still have to try."

Yuan Gang tightened his hold around her legs. He refused to give up. He stopped speaking, gathered his focus, and concentrated entirely on running. His speed increased again.

He knew Su Zhao's words might very well have been meant only to comfort him. He had been the one to bring her away from Xiaoyue Pavilion. That meant he had to take responsibility for her.

"Let me go!" Su Zhao struggled for a while and even pounded once on his shoulder.

Then she stopped. This man's strength was ridiculous. And she knew struggling was useless. This man plainly had no intention of abandoning her and escaping alone. If that was so, what meaning was there in resisting?

Watching the man before her carry her on his back and run desperately through the desert, tears slipped from Su Zhao's eyes. She cried. And she smiled.

She had once thought she would always be the one protecting this ordinary mortal.

She had never expected that now, it was this ordinary mortal who had stepped forward to protect her.

"The thing I regret least in this life is choosing to be with you," Su Zhao murmured beside his ear.

Yuan Gang seemed not to hear. He only kept running. The bearded man pursuing them really had encountered trouble.

Each time he descended, groups of sand scorpions immediately sprang at him from every direction.

With a sweep of his sleeve, a blast of powerful spiritual force knocked them all flying. Then he launched himself onward again. What astonished him even more was Yuan Gang.

That fellow could actually run this fast across the desert on nothing but two legs while carrying another person on his back.

Even stranger, sand scorpions tangled with the pursuer every time he touched down, while Yuan Gang ran through a desert thick with the creatures as though crossing empty ground. Not a single sand scorpion attacked him. What kind of bizarre situation was this? Yuan Gang's speed while carrying someone across the sand was genuinely impressive.

Because the sand scorpions left him alone while constantly interfering with Elder Bai's landings, the two sides actually maintained roughly the same speed for a time.

Elder Bai had no intention of allowing such an absurd situation to continue.

As he prepared to descend again, he stretched one hand toward the sand below and clawed at the air.

Buzz!

A pillar of sand several zhang high abruptly rose from the desert. He flashed onto the top of the sand pillar, used the greater height to launch himself again, and flew onward. Starting from higher up let him leap higher and travel farther.

It consumed more spiritual power, but it also kept him away from the sand scorpions below.

The moment he left each sand pillar, the spiritual power supporting it vanished. The pillar collapsed with a roar, burying the sand scorpions beneath it.

After repeating this several times, Elder Bai rapidly caught up with Yuan Gang. He flew past them from overhead, landed ahead, then turned. A cold flash slipped from his black robe. A treasured sword appeared horizontally in his hand, barring the way.

For some unknown reason, the sand scorpions around him now crouched motionless as well. Standing downwind, he was no longer being attacked. Yuan Gang stopped abruptly and set Su Zhao down.

The Three-Roars Saber angled across his hand as he faced the man, breath coming heavily through his nose and mouth.

At last standing on her own feet again, Su Zhao carefully examined the newcomer's build. The eyes visible beneath his mask. The beard beneath that mask. The treasured sword in his hand. Recognition slowly dawned. Her face twisted with pain as she shook her head.

"Master... even you won't let me go? Even you came to kill me?"

Elder Bai pointed his sword at her. His voice was full of grief and anger.

"Why did you betray us? I exhausted my heart arranging everything for you. I exhausted my heart preparing a way out for you. Any danger could have been severed at Qin Mian. Whatever risk appeared, I would have found a way to protect you."

"Why did you betray us?"

The sorrow in his final shout was impossible to describe.

[End of Chapter 398]