Chapter 864: Unexpected Turn

"You don't know the situation. This mystic combat absolutely cannot continue. If we don't stop it now, it'll be too late." Chen Yang pressed down on his arm, about to leave by force.

"Don't forget the city's rules. Once you step into mystic combat, you're responsible for your own life or death, and there's no possibility of stopping midway. Are you going to defy the city lord just to avoid losing a beauty to me?" Huben, also losing his temper, said angrily.

Hearing this, Chen Yang calmed down slightly. Frowning, he pushed aside Huben's arm and said coldly:

"I'll go find the city lord right now."

"Don't say I didn't warn you. The city lord won't break his own rules." Huben slowly withdrew his arm and said with a half-smile.

Chen Yang ignored him completely, turned around, and left the VIP seats.

At this moment, the spectators in the mystic combat arena also reacted, and someone finally recognized it as a Twin-Pupil Tiger-Scale Beast.

But now everyone was only astonished and bewildered, momentarily unsure whether to continue cheering for the human or to cheer anew for the Tiger-Scale Beast.

Vaguely, some people even felt a trace of sympathy for that human.

The horned man who had bet on Han Li sat down in a daze, his heart a mix of emotions. The green-skinned man who had been taunting him earlier had his grin stretched to his ears, laughing with immense satisfaction.

Regardless of the onlookers, Han Li, standing in the center of the mystic combat arena, was tense.

After its pupils changed, the aura emanating from the Tiger-Scale Beast transformed completely, a world of difference from before.

Han Li leaned forward slightly, stepped back with one foot, and assumed a simple boxing stance, clenching his fists as he looked at the Twin-Pupil Tiger-Scale Beast.

Having suffered a loss before, the strange beast did not recklessly charge at Han Li this time. Instead, it twitched its nose, bared its gleaming white teeth, and growled lowly at him.

Just then, the Tiger-Scale Beast suddenly hunched its shoulders forward, and a series of crackling sounds came from its body. Then, thousands of black and white scales shot out from its surface, scattering like a rain of arrows.

The black and white scales flew through the air, forming a fan-shaped canopy that descended, covering Han Li below.

Seeing this, Han Li suddenly exerted force with his rear foot, stomping hard on the ground. His figure blurred and vanished from the spot, reappearing in the next instant to the left of the scale fan rain.

But no sooner had he steadied himself than the Tiger-Scale Beast, as if already premeditating its attack, suddenly lunged before him, opening its maw to bite down on his head.

Han Li immediately bent backward, arching his body to narrowly dodge beneath its bloody maw.

He moved beneath the Tiger-Scale Beast, stomped his feet hard on the ground, leaped into the air, and raised a fist to smash upward.

A dull thud rang out as the Tiger-Scale Beast's body was struck by a tremendous force, toppling sideways.

Han Li's figure reappeared from beneath it, but the hand he had clenched into a fist trembled incessantly, covered in wounds and bloodstains except for the middle and index fingers.

He seemed utterly unaware of this, his eyes fixed solely on the Tiger-Scale Beast as he hurriedly pursued it, intending to pin it down again, strike its vital point, and kill it with one blow.

However, before he could reach the Tiger-Scale Beast, the ferocious beast had already flipped over, shook its body violently, and sent countless scales flying through the air once more.

Han Li forced himself to a halt, rolled forward to evade the rain of scales, then all the acupoints on his legs suddenly lit up. He kicked off the ground and pounced like a leopard straight at the Tiger-Scale Beast's face.

The latter, seeing this, also opened its bloody maw and snapped at Han Li.

This time, Han Li made no evasive move but suddenly raised a fist and smashed it hard against the ground.

An invisible fist force erupted, turning into a powerful blast that struck the ground. The recoil propelled Han Li's body abruptly several zhang into the air, just dodging the Tiger-Scale Beast's maw.

He tapped the tip of the Tiger-Scale Beast's nose with his toe and, as before, shot straight toward its brow.

But just as his foot left the beast's nose and the other was about to land on its nasal bridge, the beast suddenly tilted its head, causing Han Li's foot to miss and land on its cheek.

Unable to fly and with no leverage in midair, Han Li slipped down toward the Tiger-Scale Beast's cheek after missing his step.

Yet before his foot could touch the beast's face, a sound of something cutting through the air suddenly rang out.

Three whiskers on the beast's cheek, like three sharp swords, swept toward Han Li.

Light seemed to flow on the whiskers, as if they were wrapped in a layer of starlight, revealing an unprecedented sharpness, poised to cut him into four pieces.

At the critical moment, Han Li pressed his middle and index fingers together, which glowed with a white light, and actively reached out to press down on the uppermost whisker of the beast, bending it downward before it rebounded violently.

Before the other two whiskers could sweep across Han Li, he had already bounced high to evade them.

"Good!"

"Well done!"

Seeing this thrilling scene, the spectators in the arena erupted into an uproar, with cheers rising one after another.

Han Li's expression was grim, and he paid no heed to the noise. His body twisted in midair, and instead of landing on the brow of the Tiger-Scale Beast, he landed beside its left ear.

He immediately grabbed the beast's ear, swung his body around like a pendulum, twisted in midair, and kicked fiercely into its ear canal.

At the same time, he activated both the Great Zhou Star Origin Art and the Feather Ascension Art, channeling all his strength into that kick, which he delivered with full force.

A thunderous boom!

The Tiger-Scale Beast's head jerked sharply to the right, dragging its entire body sideways.

Han Li's body fell from the beast's ear, half of it drenched in crimson blood. He staggered backward and collapsed to the ground.

The Twin-Pupiled Tiger-Scale Beast wobbled a few steps to the right and finally fell.

Its nostrils flared, its breath even weaker than before. Blood gushed from its left ear like a spring, and two winding streams of blood flowed from its eye sockets, making it look utterly miserable.

"Damn it, if it's down, who wins?" Hu Ben spat lightly and said.

On the various stands of the arena, shouts erupted. Only a few called for Li Feiyu to get up, while most urged the Tiger-Scale Beast to rise and devour him.

Although Han Li had delivered a spectacular fight, in the end, they still hoped the beast they had bet on would win—or at least that there would be no draw, so the city lord's mansion, as the house, wouldn't take all.

Amid the frenzied cheers, the Twin-Pupiled Tiger-Scale Beast stirred and stood up first. Its vision blurred by blood, it swayed and staggered toward Han Li.

Another thunderous boom.

But after struggling only three steps, the beast could no longer support itself and fell, its massive head landing right in front of Han Li.

Han Li frowned, enduring the sharp pain in his leg, struggled to his feet, and climbed step by step onto the beast's head.

He sat cross-legged above the beast's brow, pressed together two fingers that had refined the Flower Branch Cavern, channeled all his remaining strength into them, and stabbed down into the beast's skull.

Once, twice, three times...

The brow of the Tiger-Scale Beast gradually turned into a bloody mess, and a fist-sized hole was gouged out.

A grim smile appeared on Han Li's face. He reached in and yanked out a fist-sized purple beast core.

Sensing the pure star power within the core, his smile grew more unrestrained. Without even wiping off the blood, he tossed it into his mouth and swallowed it.

On the arena stands, there was a moment of silence, followed by an eruption of热烈的 cheers.

The horned man laughed heartily, looking at the dejected green-skinned man beside him, and shouted, "You bastard, your daddy hit the jackpot this time, haha..."

...

In the city lord's mansion of Qingyang City.

Du Qingyang stood before a desk, one hand behind his back, the other slowly rubbing two skulls of unknown exotic beasts, producing a grating sound of bone friction.

After rubbing for a while, he turned to look at Chen Yang, who stood below the hall, and said, "Alright, I know what you've said. I ordered the replacement of that Tiger-Scale Beast on a whim."

"City Lord, forgive my dullness, but this Twin-Pupiled Tiger-Scale Beast is a Xuan-rank exotic beast. Li Feiyu is no match for it. If he dies on the spot and becomes the beast's meal, then the true spirit bloodline..." Chen Yang hesitated.

"If he lives, he has his uses; if he dies, he has his uses. I know what I'm doing. Alright, this is not your concern. Go about your business." Du Qingyang said slowly.

"Yes, I'll take my leave." Sweat beaded on Chen Yang's forehead, and he quickly withdrew.

When he returned to the arena, he saw spectators already leaving in droves. The crowds were excited, still passionately debating the fight as if they couldn't get enough.

Skeptically, he walked back to the VIP seats and saw Hu Ben sitting in a large chair, one arm around his beautiful concubine, the other already inside her robes.

Seeing Chen Yang return, the woman's smile stiffened. Trapped in Hu Ben's embrace, she could only glance at her master with pleading eyes.

Chen Yang frowned slightly, then looked directly at the arena floor, which was shattered and bloodstained, a complete mess.