Chapter 2323 — Top-Tier Remaster

"Since you insist on asking, there's no harm in telling you. A Heaven-rank martial artist will escort them to another branch of our Red Conch. As for exactly where, I don't know either—my clearance isn't high enough. This is all I've got!" The Third Boss had assumed Wei Zhao was after something else; this question he had no need to conceal at all, and answered directly. "That said, if you're thinking of going after them, let me give you a piece of advice: save yourself the trouble. There are Heaven-rank experts over there. You may be formidable for an Earth-rank, but you won't stir up any waves."

"Oh. Thanks for the warning." Wei Zhao was rather disappointed. It seemed Dafeng hadn't been wrong—what the Third Boss knew was even less than Dafeng did. At least Dafeng had once presided over the poison-refining base; the Third Boss, though the head of this branch, knew little about the base's affairs. "Is it your poison-refining base?"

"The poison-refining base? You're rather well informed." The Third Boss paused a beat. "It should be. But I don't know the details. Your girlfriend was never actually sent out, so let's call it even here, shall we? We keep to our own waters, you keep to yours!"

In truth, the Third Boss loathed Wei Zhao to the bone. But he also knew that if he fought Wei Zhao, even killing him would cost him dearly—and right now every capable fighter at this branch had been wiped out by Wei Zhao. If anything happened to him on top of that, and the Mystery Investigation Bureau seized the chance to sweep them all up in one net, the Third Boss would be weeping with no tears left to shed.

"Oh—forgot to tell you. My father-in-law is Feng Tianlong. So go to hell!" Wei Zhao had asked everything he needed to ask, and naturally would not leave this Third Boss alive. Besides, Wei Zhao had his own designs: here in the country, the Red Conch's people had all been killed by him, leaving only Dafeng. Most likely the Red Conch's headquarters would let Dafeng step straight into the vacancy and take charge of the domestic branch—and that would mean Wei Zhao had planted a nail inside the Red Conch, handy for ferreting out secrets later on.

So for Dafeng's sake—so that this nail could rise smoothly into place—Wei Zhao would fight to the death to clear away every obstacle before him.

"Frenzied Fire Eight-Trigram Palm—Fifth Form!" With a furious roar, the aura around Wei Zhao surged instantly to its peak!

In that instant the Third Boss's gaze sharpened and his body moved. He could feel Wei Zhao's killing intent. What startled him, though, was that when Wei Zhao had dealt with the Fourth Boss earlier, he seemed not to have gone all out at all—this was his true strength!

"Fire Wolf Gang secret art, Fire Wolf's Roar—Tenth Form!" The Third Boss cultivated the Fire Wolf Gang's mental techniques and employed the gang's own self-created martial arts. Constrained by the attributes within their bodies, not everyone in the Fire Wolf Gang and the Red Conch could cultivate them.

Only those with a fire-attribute constitution could practice the Fire Wolf Gang's internal arts—though the levels each attained varied widely. It was said that the strongest were those who had survived fire-wolf gene modification, or whose bodies had been ravaged by rabies bacteria and lived. Such people could receive the Fire Wolf legacy and become the Fire Wolf Gang's mightiest inheritors.

Only, these "inheritors" were not the same as the inheritors of the ancient sects. Though called inheritors, they were not truly inheritors; put plainly, they were merely experts the Fire Wolf Gang had engineered to possess strength equal to an inheritor's.

And as yet, no one had survived fire-wolf gene modification; those ravaged by rabies bacteria had likewise all perished. So for now, the Fire Wolf Gang had no inheritors.

The Fire Wolf's Roar technique took form in the attack of a fire wolf: the Third Boss's body transformed into a blazing wolf and charged at Wei Zhao, his hands hooked into claws like a pair of wolf talons, trailing fierce, searing flame!

Wei Zhao frowned. He hadn't expected the Third Boss to be so quick—no sooner had he struck than the man answered, reacting countless times faster than the Fourth Boss had. Any hope of a surprise attack was gone. Facing an opponent stronger than himself, Wei Zhao had no choice but to clash head-on—unless he used a true-qi bomb.

But he hadn't compressed a true-qi bomb; he had come in too much of a hurry, and besides, his main aim was to test his new move!

The Third Boss was no Heaven-rank expert—only a peak late Earth-rank, and not a particularly formidable one at that—so Wei Zhao had not used the true-qi bomb, a technique that would only wound himself.

"BOOM—"

The collision of the two forces burst out in a peal like muffled thunder. Wei Zhao's palms and the Third Boss's claws met with a dull, heavy crash.

After the impact, Wei Zhao and the Third Boss were both flung backward, each spitting a mouthful of blood—both had taken no small internal injury!

The internal injury was something Wei Zhao had foreseen. The Third Boss might not be one of those truly formidable peak late Earth-rank experts, but his cultivation rank was what it was, and so was the grade of his martial technique. For Wei Zhao to clash head-on like this, injury was unavoidable.

But this one move of Wei Zhao's had certainly made the Third Boss suffer too! A blow equivalent to the eleventh form of a Heaven-rank expert's martial technique—the fifth form of the Frenzied Fire Eight-Trigram Palm—had landed squarely on the Third Boss, and he felt as though his five viscera and six bowels had been knocked out of place!

"You... that wasn't the fifth form!" After landing, it was a long while before the Third Boss caught his breath, and he spoke in shock.

The moment Wei Zhao landed, he began circulating the second layer of the Xuanyuan Dragon-Taming Art to repair the internal injuries in his body, wasting not a single moment. What he and the Third Boss were contesting was endurance—whoever lasted to the end would win. So Wei Zhao had to seize every second to recover; once his injuries were healed and he clashed with the Third Boss again, killing him would be certain.

"The ultra-enhanced fifth form!" Wei Zhao had only restored the injuries to his meridians and five viscera—just enough to keep himself alive. He gave the Third Boss no time to catch his breath; he wasn't afraid of failing to beat the man to death, only of him running away!

"Ultra-enhanced?" The Third Boss was stunned.

"Try another move of mine!" Wei Zhao leaped up and sent another strike of the Frenzied Fire Eight-Trigram Palm at the Third Boss!

The Third Boss was startled—he hadn't expected Wei Zhao to still be capable of moving. True, his own tenth-form technique was inferior to Wei Zhao's fifth form of the Frenzied Fire Eight-Trigram Palm, which was equivalent to an eleventh-form technique; but Wei Zhao was only genuinely mid Earth-rank, while he, the Third Boss, was peak late Earth-rank. The two were not on the same level at all!

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