Chapter 1 Danger!

The moment she saw Su Zhou nock an arrow and gather his strength, the Garuda, who had not suffered any real damage from beginning to end, immediately changed her expression. Her life instinct sent a premonition of 'life-threatening' danger!

The Gangshe Method (forceful shooting method) shouldn't have been considered a particularly precious and powerful martial art, but because of the extraordinariness of the user, it inspired a fear that death was about to descend!

*Whoosh!*

In the next instant, accompanied by the explosive sound of the atmosphere being torn apart, a vacuum corridor appeared in mid-air. Su Zhou's full-strength arrow directly broke the sound barrier, causing sonic boom winds to surge around. The specially-made armor-piercing arrowhead, as bright as a shooting star, flew towards Garuda like a retrograde meteor, carrying flames from the friction!

"I can't dodge it!"

With no other choice, the golden-haired humanoid girl could only raise her hands and cross them in front of her chest, as a barrier to protect her vitals – and in an instant, this armor-piercing long arrow, enough to pierce the armor of a tank, slammed heavily into Garuda's arms like a small missile!

*Boom!* The sound, like a small rocket exploding, rang out in mid-air, and the violent spiritual power impact even blew away all the dust within hundreds of meters around. The entangled and chaotic winds conflicted and cancelled each other out, even forming small spiritual power tornadoes in the surrounding area.

The ferocious beasts that had not yet dispersed around were swept by this violent wave of spiritual power. Among them, those that had been more severely injured before had their wounds burst open, spraying blood, and died on the spot. Those that were lightly injured or not injured at all simply softened at the knees and knelt on the ground.

As for the target of the bombardment, Garuda could only hear a *crack* coming from her arms – instantly, her flesh was torn, and the sound of her arm bones breaking rang out. Her entire body was once again blasted into the air by the violent power contained in this arrow, tumbling hundreds of meters higher before slowly coming to a halt!

"That hurts!"

*Drip, drip.* The sound of blood slowly dripping rang out – this time, Garuda was truly injured. The arrow had pierced her left arm, and pale golden fluid flowed from the wound, the area around the wound seared by the high heat.

"Impressive. If my body hadn't already completed the forging of golden bones, I'm afraid I would have been pierced through both arms by this arrow, directly stabbing into my heart!"

However, even though she was injured, Garuda, with a tightly furrowed brow, did not become enraged. She calmly endured the pain, pulled out the arrowhead, and then pulled the arrow shaft from her arm. The wound began to heal slowly – although the golden-winged bird has a sturdy body, its regenerative ability is not strong. What it is displaying now is just the normal recovery power after the spiritual organ transformation.

As for why she wasn't angry, it was because she saw that the longbow in Su Zhou's hand had turned to ashes. He had lost his means of physical ranged attack – although a modern longbow, which isn't a true spiritual artifact, has a sturdier load-bearing capacity than some ancient spiritual artifact longbows, its ability to conduct spiritual energy is still far inferior. In Su Zhou's hands, a full-powered Gangshe Method (forceful shooting method) was its limit.

However, just when Garuda thought that the other party should slow down after losing his ranged weapon and using so much spiritual energy to condense such a powerful blow, she saw the spiritual light in Su Zhou's eyes blazing. He was like a berserker, riding the wind, carrying the dragon-horned spear, and charging towards her!

"Why? Doesn't he need to recover his spiritual energy?"

"And isn't I the one who's injured? Why does he look like he's the one who's enraged and berserk?!"

At this time, Garuda was dumbfounded. She used her own spiritual power to assess Su Zhou and felt that the other party, with a thunder spear, a Gangshe Method (forceful shooting method) arrow, and the previous fighting and probing, although seemingly gaining the upper hand, had consumed at least four-fifths of his spiritual power – while she still had three-fifths left. As long as she fought steadily, victory was only a matter of time.

But why could the other party charge towards her so unhesitatingly?! Couldn't he see the advantages and disadvantages? What he should be doing now is to delay time and recover his spiritual energy!

"Hoo—hoo!"

And Su Zhou, whose spiritual power in his body had just been replenished, was breathing heavily – he was riding the wind, rapidly approaching Garuda at a speed of eighty meters per second. The incredibly rich fragrance in the other party's blood was truly eye-catching to him, and his whole body was bursting with power.

It was hard to imagine how fragrant this spiritual bird with such a natural seasoning would be if it were roasted.

But now was not the time to think about roasting the other party. There were still things to ask later.

Thinking this way, Su Zhou forcibly suppressed his appetite. His heart was beating violently, like thunder, and true lightning bloomed from it. As he rapidly approached Garuda, he once again used the dragon-horned spear to guide lightning, turning it into heavenly thunder and striking towards Garuda, bombarding the gale spiritual power shield that the other party had quickly erected – and this time, because it happened suddenly and did not condense too much, the gale shield was directly blasted apart, and Garuda fell diagonally towards the earth below, like a plane being shot down.

"How can you still have lightning?!"

Even though her whole body was electrified, her hair was standing on end, and the wound on her arm was torn open again and began to bleed, Garuda couldn't help but be shocked: "How much spiritual power do you actually have left?"

"About full."

Approaching the other party again, Su Zhou raised his spear, gathering a second heavenly thunder. While bombarding, he honestly replied, "The spiritual energy in this place is quite dense. The recovery speed is very fast. This kind of attack basically doesn't consume spiritual energy."

Native Garuda of the Kunlun Secret Realm: "Huh? Why don't I know that?"

But next, Su Zhou, who entered a bombing mode, began to talk trash: "Speaking of which, this Golden-Winged Great Peng, do you know Pokémon?"

How could a bumpkin country god-bird like Garuda, who had no childhood and had never played games, have heard of Pokémon? Naturally, she was confused, and then continued to condense spiritual power, resisting Su Zhou's heavenly thunder bombardment, and then charged towards Su Zhou in reverse – she didn't believe that Su Zhou's spiritual power and stamina were truly unlimited. Anyway, it was a competition of spiritual power consumption. Both were descendants of divine beasts, who was afraid of who!

When Su Zhou ran out of spiritual power, everyone would engage in close combat again, and see who would rub against whom!

Then, when the third heavenly thunder ruthlessly fell, she heard Su Zhou leisurely say: "That is, the Thunder type actually counters the Flying type. And if you want to counter me, you should use the Ice type, Dragon type, or Fairy type."

"What exactly are you talking about?!" Garuda couldn't bear it any longer – and at this time, she was already very close. In the next second, she would be able to punch this damned Dragon descendant in the face!

"Just trash talk to disturb your thoughts – look, take my Thunder Fist!"

Saying this, facing the golden-winged bird that had already withstood the lightning strikes and rushed in front of him, Su Zhou swept out his spear without hesitation. The blazing thunder light turned into microwaves, heating the atmosphere – the dragon horn on the dragon-horned spear, heated to extremely high temperatures by the electrical resistance, now ignited a spiritual power fire. With this deceitful blow that turned lightning into fire and was completely different from the previous announcement, Su Zhou forced back the naive Garuda, who really thought he would unleash a Thunder Fist, and incidentally set a wisp of her hair on fire.

The extremely hot aura on the spear swept across dozens of meters, and even the ferocious beasts that had been injured by the aftermath of the battle between Su Zhou and Garuda were roasted to medium rare.

--Speaking of which, what's going on with these ferocious beasts? This is simply not a battle they can interfere with, so why are they so desperately refusing to retreat even though they are covered in wounds?

Su Zhou was also paying attention to Garuda's expression at this time and found that after the other party hurriedly extinguished the flames on her head, she didn't care about the life or death of these ferocious beasts at all. In fact, after realizing that most of these ferocious beasts seemed to be dead, she even felt a little relieved: "Could it be that these ferocious beasts are not on her side? But isn't she the local emperor in the Kunlun Secret Realm? I didn't see any other forces."

Speaking of which, this golden-winged bird's thoughts are really too easy to see through. Basically, everything is written on her face. It was the same during the previous battle. Wherever she wanted to attack, her eyes would look there. It was really too easy to see through.

"Although she has combat experience inherited from her bloodline, her combat awareness is still far behind."

At this time, the advantages and disadvantages of both sides were already very obvious, but considering that the other party had always fought in humanoid form and had not used the golden-winged bird's main body, the strongest means of a Dao-seeking cultivator, Su Zhou felt that the other party should not be very convinced.

Therefore, he stopped and didn't chase after her. Instead, he politely reminded, "That golden-winged bird over there, I advise you to quickly transform back into your original form and then continue fighting me."

"Why? Do you really think you've won?!"

Su Zhou's words aroused the golden-winged bird's doubts and unwillingness – according to her inherited memories, when two demons fight, whoever uses their main body first means that they admit they are at a disadvantage. Although she was a little disheveled before, essentially, only her left arm was pierced by an arrow, and a little of her hair was burned. She could completely regenerate it.

In contrast, Su Zhou consumed his weapon and wasted a massive amount of spiritual power. It was hard to say who suffered a greater loss!

"Because you will die."

At this time, Su Zhou even took back the spear in his hand. He put his hands behind his back and calmly said, "Let me remind you in advance, I never joke."

Of course, this advice was useless. Garuda, with an expression of being insulted, began to charge towards Su Zhou again.

But then, in an instant, a burning meteor lit up in the distance.

The meteor flashed past, wrapped in blazing spiritual light, pierced through the heavy atmosphere and gale, and flew from afar with a shrill scream!

*Bang!* The muffled sound of bones shattering rang out, and Garuda, with a bewildered and angry expression, froze in place, her eyes dull – because right in the center of her forehead, there was a sunken bloody hole! Flesh could be seen tearing here, and the skull was shattering inch by inch!

Sniping!

It was Bai Canglang's sniping!

"Finally caught up – the fighting before was too flashy, the speed was so fast that I couldn't aim at all."

On a distant mountain peak, Bai Canglang, who had put all his attention into firing this one shot, tremblingly exhaled: "Did I take down the target?"

Even a spiritual artifact-level anti-material sniper rifle plus a specially-made spiritual power bullet could not completely penetrate Garuda's head, but making a hole was more than enough!

But whether this could kill an extraordinary-tier great demon...

The answer, of course, was no.

Suddenly, a piercingly shrill cry of a bird, containing immense anger, echoed on the silent Yaochi Lake!

"Liiiii!!!"

The clear cry spread across the lakeside, shaking the atmosphere.

As the golden-haired girl's humanoid form disappeared in a flash of light with a shattered skull, there was another bright light – accompanied by a spiritual pressure that suddenly thickened two or three times and a gust of wind that seemed to blow away all the peach blossoms and lake mist around, a huge golden peng bird, with a wingspan of nearly twenty meters, appeared before Su Zhou with a furious aura!