The Speedrun Begins with Choosing Hunter

"After I wipe out Old Dog Ji’s Hawk Riders, I’ll go kill that precious disciple of Old Thief Dong!"

Liu Wen’s eyes held nothing but savage killing intent.

He was now truly alone, the last surviving member of the Liu Family.

’How could he bear it?’

He wanted to kill people from the County Magistrate’s Office, the Iron Saber Gang, and Flying Eagle Castle. He even wanted to kill people from the Divine Mansion Sect. He had become an assassin for the Soul-Chasing Tower entirely for the sake of revenge.

These assassins from the Soul-Chasing Tower all followed his command, and their strength was formidable.

The Hawk Riders fell one by one until only the Eagle Cavalry Commander remained.

"Die!"

Liu Wen’s long sword pierced a vital point on the Eagle Cavalry Commander.

The Eagle Cavalry Commander was killed instantly. This was the difference between a Strong Internal and a Yijin master—a chasm that could not be crossed.

Liu Wen was extremely cautious. He ordered the Soul-Chasing Tower assassins to check the bodies of the Hawk Riders on the ground one by one, ensuring no one was left alive.

Liu Wen walked impassively through the field of carnage, inspecting every corpse.

This was only the beginning of tonight’s slaughter.

He raised his long sword and thrust it toward a corpse beside him. Even if someone were playing dead, this would finish them off for real.

The very instant the tip of his sword was about to touch the body—

A cyan gleam suddenly shot out from beneath the corpse, streaking like a bolt of light toward the wrist of his sword hand.

Liu Wen’s brow tightened. As a Strong Internal Martial Master, his reactions were extremely fast, and he retreated explosively.

In a flash!

He heard a fierce gust of wind approaching from behind. The bone-chilling killing intent made the hair on his body stand on end.

In that split second, Liu Wen made a choice.

He chose to endure the saber strike from behind!

It was a decision made almost purely on combat instinct; his brain had no time to react.

"Urgh..."

Liu Wen’s right arm was severed by Bai Yuan’s Blood Tiger Scimitar, falling to the ground with a soft THUD. The fingers twitched ceaselessly, as the nerves had yet to die.

"You?!"

Liu Wen saw clearly the person who had ambushed him and was filled with absolute fury.

He was supposed to be the one ambushing this person, yet he had fallen into the other’s trap instead.

’What is this?’

’Reversed Celestial Spirits?!’

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a Little Cyan Snake slithering over a corpse near his feet. The cyan gleam from before had been this very snake.

Liu Wen was horrified.

The higher a Martial Artist’s realm, the more reliable their intuition. For this Little Cyan Snake to make him so wary, there could only be one explanation—it was a Snake Demon!

The shock in his eyes could not be greater.

’This person can actually control a Snake Demon?!’ 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

As the Patriarch of the Liu Family, Liu Wen had dominated Qinghe County for decades. His knowledge far surpassed that of an ordinary Martial Artist. He knew that in the Outer States, there was a type of person with such abilities, seemingly called... a Demon Hunter.

They hunted demons as their prey, and every single Demon Hunter was exceptionally powerful.

’But why would a Demon Hunter appear in Qinghe County?’

He knew of Bai Yuan’s background, which made it even more incomprehensible how a simple Hunter from a small town could be connected to a Demon Hunter.

But Bai Yuan had no intention of giving him time to think.

The scimitar, like a blood-red moon, slashed toward Liu Wen’s neck. The attack was vicious and decisive, aimed to kill.

Liu Wen moved lightly on his feet, evading without fighting back. But no matter how he dodged, the young man opposite him stuck to him like glue, and the terror in his heart grew.

’Is he really just a Yijin Martial Master?’

This kid was unreasonably strong. He had heard the rumors of Bai Yuan fighting eight opponents at once, but he never imagined that the boy’s strength would be so terrifying in an actual fight.

Bai Yuan’s saber strikes were like a great river flowing into the sea—relentless and unending, giving Liu Wen no chance to escape.

His master-level skills as a Tiger-shaped Crane Master gave him the confidence to fight across realms, to say nothing of Liu Wen already having lost an arm to his sneak attack.

As Liu Wen fled, he was cursing internally.

He pushed his Soul-Hooking Steps to their absolute limit, but the kid behind him still clung to him relentlessly—because his opponent was using Soul-Hooking Steps as well!

’Damn it all, who the hell knows why a disciple of the Huwei Arts Hall would know a Soul-Chasing Tower cultivation technique.’

Bai Yuan glanced at his surroundings.

The black-clothed men nearby had noticed the commotion and were closing in. Before long, he would be surrounded. Experts of the Strong Organ Pass were indeed difficult to kill.

’I must end this quickly!’

Bai Yuan’s eyes narrowed.

He channeled a thread of power, cultivated through his Tiger-Crane Form, into his feet.

Instantly, his speed increased several times over.

Liu Wen saw this from ahead, his eyes wide with fury and disbelief, but having lost an arm, he had no way to resist.

PSHHHT!

The Blood Tiger Scimitar hacked directly into Liu Wen’s back. The blade was so sharp that the single strike tore his back open, exposing the stark white bone beneath.

The excruciating pain made Liu Wen instinctively falter for a moment.

But that one pause was enough to cost him his life!

Like a god of slaughter incarnate, Bai Yuan’s next strike cleaved Liu Wen in two.

The approaching Soul-Chasing Tower assassins arrived just in time to witness this scene. They were all stunned by Bai Yuan’s overwhelming Evil Qi, their movements freezing for an instant.

Without Liu Wen, the Strong Organ Pass expert, to lead them, Bai Yuan was a wolf among sheep.

These Soul-Chasing Tower assassins were lambs to the slaughter.

「Fifteen minutes later.」

The mountain forest had returned to complete silence. Only Bai Yuan remained.

A mountain of corpses lay at his feet.

This time, to hunt him and the Flying Eagle Castle’s Hawk Riders, Liu Wen had dispatched a full twenty assassins from the Soul-Chasing Tower.

These assassins were all Bone Forger Martial Masters, and with Liu Wen of the Strong Organ Pass, they could be called the elite of the elite.

Only such a team could have hunted down over a hundred Hawk Riders, yet Bai Yuan had killed most of them by himself. Aside from a few who escaped, the majority had been cut down by his saber.

Such a terrifying combat record was likely only achievable by a monster of stamina like Bai Yuan.

His master-level Tiger-Crane Form granted him endurance far beyond that of an ordinary person. Otherwise, just cutting all these people down would have been an exhausting task.

Xiaoqing slithered over every corpse, its crimson eyes gazing upon them as if they were the most exquisite delicacies.

Including the fallen Hawk Riders, there were over a hundred corpses here. It was nothing short of a Taotie feast.

It would likely eat until it was stuffed tonight.

「An hour later.」

A pile of white bones lay on the ground.

After Xiaoqing had drained their vitality, the corpses shriveled at a visible rate, eventually turning to white bones.

This saved Bai Yuan the trouble of burying the bodies.

Having absorbed its fill of vitality, Xiaoqing looked utterly comical. Its length was almost unchanged, but it was now as thick as a water bucket. Its skin was stretched taut, looking as if it might burst at the slightest poke.

At Xiaoqing’s current rate of progress, it probably wouldn’t be long before it returned to its peak.

’A Three-Metamorphosis Snake Demon...’ Bai Yuan was greatly looking forward to it.

Including Assassin Four, whom he had killed with Old Xue’s help, this was the second Strong Internal Martial Artist to die at his hands.

A Yijin Martial Master killing two Strong Internal masters in a row—if word got out, no one would believe it.

Bai Yuan sheathed his Blood Tiger Scimitar and looked at his panel.

[Name: Bai Yuan]

[Occupation: Demon Hunter, Swordsman, Boxer, Cook]

[Skills: Cooking (Master), Demon Finding (Proficient), Demon Taming (Proficient), Tiger-Crane Form (Master), Blood Tiger Saber (Expert), Soul-Hooking Steps (Proficient)...]

[Enhancement Points: 611]

’As expected, grinding mobs is the fastest way to level up.’

This one battle had earned him a full 611 enhancement points!

’Allocate points!’