"Greetings, I am Liu Xing from Purple Moon Sect. I intend to travel to Dragon Skull Forest on a mission. Would you permit me to pass?" Liu Xing clasped his hands in a respectful gesture. He knew the probability of them allowing him to pass was almost nil, but saw no reason to be impolite. Sensing the qi around them, he realized that only Mo Yan was at the same cultivation stage as himself, the rest were at either the fourth or third stage.

"What a polite fellow," Mo Yan said. "If only every cultivator who passed here were as polite as you. You may pass, brother, but you need to pay a toll fee. After all, the roads need maintenance. Consider the fee as a donation to the local community!"

Liu Xing glanced past their shoulders and saw a dirt road. While the path looked passable, he doubted they performed any maintenance on it.

"Is that so? May I know how much the fee is?" Liu Xing asked.

"It's cheap, only fifty spirit stones per person. And since you're polite, I'll give you a discount. Thirty spirit stones. How about that?" Mo Yan and his two friends chuckled.

Liu Xing considered his options. He scanned their clothes and noticed wrinkles, signifying they wore ordinary clothes, not the silky, shiny, self-cleaning ones common among sect disciples. This indicated they were likely loose cultivators, who were generally weaker due to limited access to cultivation scriptures and techniques.

"I'm sorry, but I'd rather not pay the fee. I'm poor," Liu Xing replied.

Mo Yan snorted. "Well, I guess we'll take the fee by force. Attack!"

Mo Yan and his gang rushed forward together. The red-haired guy brandished a dagger, the narrow-eyed one unsheathed his sword, and Mo Yan himself glowed with a yellow hue. A thought to fight without his gun crossed Liu Xing's mind, a fleeting desire to test his full capability without it. But he quickly dismissed the idea. Time was of the essence, and he wanted to start hunting as soon as possible.

He summoned his gun and made it invisible. The process was swift, and hopefully, they hadn't noticed. He then activated his Lightning Cloak and kicked off the ground. The world became a blur. In a fraction of a second, he appeared in front of Mo Yan and punched him in the belly. The force of the blow lifted Mo Yan off the ground, and he flew like a cannonball, crashing and shattering trees before landing unconscious on the ground.

"What's happening?!" shouted the red-haired guy.

The narrow-eyed guy lunged at Liu Xing, attempting to slash his neck. Liu Xing took a step, disappearing and reappearing behind him. Before the narrow-eyed guy could react, he grabbed the collar of his clothes and threw him. The man flew through the air and crashed into the cliff wall, dust falling around him.

Realizing his two friends had been defeated in the blink of an eye, the red-haired guy's eyes widened, and his feet trembled. "I-I'm sorry. This was all Mo Yan's idea! Please spare me!" He knelt and began kowtowing.

Liu Xing stroked his chin. They had intended to rob him. Not only that, they had threatened to kill him. If he was weak, the fight would probably have been longer and more dangerous. Yet, he didn't think he needed to kill them. After all, the worst hadn't happened, and he was not ruthless enough to kill them in cold blood.

"Then go get your friends and leave. If I see you again, I won't spare you."

"Thank you, senior! I, Pu He, won't forget your mercy and will lead a righteous life from now on!" Pu He scrambled to retrieve his two friends. Despite being pale and skinny, he was still a cultivator and could carry both friends on his shoulders.

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"Oh right, Pu He," Liu Xing called out.

Pu He stiffened and turned around. "Y-yes?"

"Do you know where the swamp area is?"

"Of course! After you reach Skull Hill, just go north. The swamp is there!"

"Alright, thank you."

Pu He turned and started running, carrying his two unconscious friends. After they disappeared, he turned and started running. "Spirit beasts, come to me!"

Now that he knew the direction he needed to go, he could finally begin his hunt.

***

After running for several hours, Liu Xing finally arrived at Dragon Skull Forest. The outskirts of the forest had been normal, but here, mushrooms grew everywhere. Tiny ones beside the path, others clinging to trees, and giant ones as big as houses dotted the landscape. They displayed a kaleidoscope of colors—yellow and white, brown and red, purple, pink, and countless other combinations. The sight made him feel as if he had stepped into a wonderland.

After gawking for a moment, he jumped from the ground onto the cap of a mushroom the size of a truck. When his feet landed, it felt surprisingly soft, like stepping onto soft ground, yet it didn't make him bounce like a rubber ball. He felt a pang of disappointment. Giant mushrooms should bounce like a trampoline. After testing several mushrooms, he decided to get serious about his mission. He moved swiftly from mushroom cap to branch to ground, heading directly toward Skull Hill.

After moving for almost half an hour, he suddenly felt a prickling sensation of qi around him. Sensing this, he stopped running, closed his eyes and focused, trying to perceive the qi more clearly. The ambient qi in the area was abundant, but amidst it, he sensed a strong, focused presence several hundred meters ahead. He couldn't pinpoint the spirit beast's exact location, but he was certain it possessed a cultivation stage above his own, perhaps around the sixth or seventh stage. Opening his eyes, he summoned his gun and pointed it in the direction of the spirit beast. The gun became invisible, and he willed the invisibility to extend to his own body. This invisibility was designed to activate only when he sensed danger, but it seemed he didn't need to directly target an enemy to trigger it; pointing in the general direction sufficed.

Fully invisible, he moved silently, leaping from branch to branch, mushroom cap to bush, until he finally crouched behind a large rock. He sensed the spirit beast's presence moving slowly toward him. The spirit beast had likely sensed his qi, but when his presence vanished, it began approaching cautiously, explaining its slow advance. This indicated intelligence, but he hoped it wasn't too intelligent, because while he sometimes desired to test his strength, in this situation, he preferred to act like an assassin and eliminate the threat silently.

After several more minutes, he finally saw his opponent, and he immediately needed to reassess his initial evaluation. The spirit beast that bulldozed everything in its path was a massive black turtle as large as a house. Each step it took made the ground vibrate, branches sway, and some of the smaller mushrooms shrink into the earth. The turtle possessed a menacing face with bloodshot eyes, saber-like fangs, and a long horn that extended dozens of meters from its head. Its brown shell was itself a giant mushroom, from which red tentacle-like worms extended and wiggled in the air.

Seeing this bizarre turtle, he gulped. Its eyes scanned the surroundings with the keenness of an eagle, and the tentacles seemed to act as antennae that detected vibrations in the air.

He held his breath and aimed from behind the rock. The creature appeared immensely powerful. As a turtle, it likely possessed high defense, but given its mushroom-worm hybrid shell, there was a chance it was softer than it seemed. Despite its size and strength, he estimated it was still within the Lock Opening realm, probably at the peak of the sixth stage.

The tip of his gun pointing at its head, then shifting to aim at the mushroom shell, and then back to its head again. He didn't know the turtle's weakness. He regretted not having taken the time to check the library and read a bestiary. Had he done so, he might have known this spirit beast's vulnerabilities. Still, there was no point in dwelling on what he couldn't change. He needed to adapt to the situation or brute force his way through it.

Liu Xing cycled his qi, channeling it to the pattern of Exploding Fist Technique. He didn't dare to hold back, so he poured as much qi as possible into the technique and activated it, allowing the gun to absorb and convert it into a bullet.

Aiming at the turtle's head, he pulled the trigger and a blue bolt of electricity shot towards its target. The qi surrounding the bullet was so dense that both the turtle and the worms on its shell snapped their heads in Liu Xing's direction.

As the turtle opened its mouth, a blue fireball seed materialized within. Seeing this, he realized the turtle possessed a breath-based attack. But before the fire seed could coalesce into fire breath, his bullet struck dead center in its mouth, impacting the turtle's jagged tongue, and then detonated.

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