Chapter 482: The Crane’s Revenge
Su Ming looked up, his eyes narrowing slightly.
In the distance, within the sea of clouds, two enormous birds were flapping their wide wings in an extremely leisurely manner, gliding slowly toward the direction of Gazing Star Cliff.
As the two birds drew closer, Su Ming got a clear look at their true forms.
They were two white cranes.
The one flying in front was shockingly massive, its wingspan stretching several zhang wide. Its feathers were as white as snow, without a single blemish. However, the most eye-catching feature was the bizarre, seven-colored sheen that faintly flowed along the edges of its broad wings, shimmering under the sunlight in a way that was both sacred and absurd.
The other white crane, flying slightly behind, was smaller in size, but its eyes exuded an unconcealed brutality. Its tail feathers also bore a few faint, colorful patches.
The two cranes circled in the air for half a turn before landing with pinpoint precision on a large, bluestone rock beside the spiritual field.
They folded their wings, their long necks curving slightly, and looked down from their lofty perch at Su Ming standing in the muddy field and Shadow hovering in mid-air. There was no hint of guilty panic in their eyes; instead, they carried an arrogant, provocative look that screamed, “Yeah, I did it. What are you gonna do about it?”
Su Ming’s pupils suddenly contracted.
The seven-colored sheen on the wing edges… wasn’t this exactly what Qingfeng’s gossip mentioned last night—the sect leader’s white crane that had stolen and eaten the Seven-Colored Ganoderma?!
And the one behind with the colorful patches was undoubtedly the crane from Spirit Beast Peak that had nearly pecked a hole through Shadow a few days ago.
This was a premeditated act of revenge!
The crane from Spirit Beast Peak had clearly remembered Shadow’s scent. Too afraid to come alone, it had actually gone and clung to the sect leader’s white crane, dragging this “tyrant among birds”—one who could run rampant in the sect—along to directly ransack Su Ming’s home!
The moment Shadow, hovering in mid-air, spotted the Spirit Beast Peak crane, old grudges and new hatreds erupted like a volcano.
It didn’t care about the other’s status or size difference. In its mind, this was nothing but a mortal enemy!
“Chirp——”
Shadow let out a piercing shriek that tore through the air, pushing the “Edge” law deep within its brow to its absolute limit. Its body turned into a faint, dark blue-black line, barely visible to the naked eye, charging straight at the massive sect leader crane’s face with a fierce, desperate momentum!
“Don’t go!” Su Ming’s face changed color, but it was too late to stop it.
Faced with Shadow’s seemingly thunderous charge, the sect leader crane, standing on the bluestone, didn’t even lower the claw it was using to preen its feathers.
It merely gave Shadow a disdainful sideways glance, as if looking at a clueless fly that was begging for death.
Just as Shadow was about to slam into its face.
The sect leader crane casually flicked its massive right wing forward.
“Thump!”
A heavy, muffled collision sounded.
There were no flashy spells, no intense clash. The sheer difference in size and power was laid bare in that instant.
Shadow’s fist-sized body, like a baseball hit by a giant sledgehammer, was sent flying backward at twice the speed it had charged in.
It traced a miserable arc through the air before crashing heavily into the muddy spiritual field, tumbling several times before coming to a stop. Its black feathers were instantly covered in mud, making it look utterly pitiful.
But Shadow’s innate ferocity was fully ignited.
Without even letting out a cry of pain, it kicked off the mud with its claws, shook its dazed head, and launched itself into the air again like a tireless mad dog, charging once more at the sect leader crane with a desperate rush.
“Smack!”
Another casual wing swipe.
Shadow was ruthlessly smacked away again, this time slamming into an ancient tree trunk, shaking down a shower of leaves.
From start to finish, the sect leader crane never even stretched its long neck. It maintained an extremely relaxed posture the entire time, even starting to use its sharp beak to preen a few slightly ruffled white feathers on its chest caused by the wing flaps, completely dismissing Shadow’s provocations.
Su Ming stood still, his fists clenched so tightly that his knuckles turned white.
The Liquid Spiritual Energy within his body was already in frantic motion; if he wanted, he could instantly condense dozens of water arrows capable of piercing through metal and stone.
But he couldn’t strike.
That was the sect leader’s crane!
In a strictly hierarchical immortal cultivation sect like Cloud Hidden Sect, the sect leader’s personal spirit beast held a status even higher than that of an ordinary inner sect elder. Let alone it just destroying a patch of spiritual fields—even if it demolished this entire Gazing Star Cliff today, as long as no one died, who would dare touch a single feather of it?
If Su Ming injured this crane today just to vent his anger, he would not only immediately become a target for everyone, but he might even lose his eligibility for the secret realm six months from now.
The core of the Way of Survival was to swallow all resentment in the face of absolute power.
Su Ming took a deep breath, forcibly suppressing the fury in his heart. He stepped forward twice, trying to resolve the issue in a relatively calm manner.
He raised his right hand, waved at the two cranes on the bluestone, and said in a firmer tone, “Gentlemen Crane, this spiritual field has already been ruined by you. Your anger should be appeased by now. Please leave quickly and stop this entanglement!”
Hearing Su Ming’s words, the sect leader crane finally stopped preening its feathers.
It slowly lifted its head, its distinctly defined phoenix eyes turning icy cold as it shot Su Ming a glance.
That look was filled with human-like contempt and mockery. Its posture seemed to arrogantly say, “Who do you think you are?”
After that glance, the sect leader crane turned its head in an extremely provocative manner. Right in front of Su Ming, it stretched out its long neck and, from a patch of intact mud on the edge of the bluestone, leisurely plucked a surviving, excellent-quality Silver-Spotted Heart-Clearing Orchid. Like a snack, it chomped it down noisily.
Within the void of the Xuantian Ring, Lin Yu was comfortably sitting cross-legged on a cloud condensed from soul power. He had seen everything happening outside clearly.
“Hahaha! This is killing this old man!”
Lin Yu’s utterly unsympathetic laughter echoed wildly through Su Ming’s Consciousness Sea, shaking Su Ming’s brain until it ached.
“This silly bird really thought having an ‘Edge’ law could make it invincible? A first-stage cub challenging a third-stage peak great demon—that’s not bravery; that’s delivering a takeout order!” Lin Yu laughed as he commented, like the harshest spectator, “Tsk tsk tsk, its positioning was terrible. On the second charge, it should have used the muddy ground for a slide tackle, but it insisted on a frontal assault. Now it’s getting batted around like a shuttlecock. What a disgrace to this old man.”
Lin Yu laughed until he was bent over: “Serves you right for pissing someone off. Now not only did they come looking for you, but they also brought a big boss from the streets to get revenge. This beating? Well-deserved!”