Chapter 336

The battle ends with Fang Yuan and Bai Ning Bing standing over a field of dead lava crocodiles on Huo Tan mountain. The thousand beast king lava crocodile king lies dying, every bone in its body broken and the two volcano-like lumps on its back smashed apart, blood pouring from countless wounds until it finally stops moving. The surviving crocodiles scatter, burrowing into the ground or fleeing, and Fang Yuan and Bai Ning Bing move on after a rough sweep of the battlefield. ^{ch. 336}

Watching from hiding, Jiao Huang and Meng Tu are shaken. They credit Bai Ning Bing’s ice path for holding back the lava crocodiles, and marvel that Fang Yuan only grows stronger the more injuries he takes, calling him a monster in human skin. Meng Tu, cursing, marvels that two twenty-year-olds could outclass their own forty years in the trade, and Jiao Huang admits he would never have taken the job had he known. Meng Tu proposes waiting instead for San Cha mountain, where the chaos around the three kings inheritance and its many rank four and rank five experts should give them an opening while Fang Yuan and Bai Ning Bing are busy fighting someone else. Jiao Huang agrees, and the two set off after them. ^{ch. 336}

As they travel on, Fang Yuan turns the ambush over in his mind: the lava crocodiles’ timing and position were too convenient to be chance, and though Bai Ning Bing noticed nothing wrong, his memories from his past life let him sense the setup. He runs through who might have set it: the Wu clan, since he knows Li Ran’s identity and has left Shang Liang mountain; the Bai clan, whose spirit spring secret he holds and whom he extorted for three million primeval stones; and Shang clan, where buying a group of Wei clansmen offended Shang Pu Lao and backing Shang Xin Ci put him at odds with Shang Ya Zi and Shang Yi Fan. He decides not to dwell on it and to meet whatever comes as it comes, trusting the strength he has built since his weaker days. ^{ch. 336}

In Central Continent, Fang Zheng leads the other elite disciples toward Tian Ti mountain on their flying cranes. He waves off their praise, reminding them that elites from every one of the ten great sects will be competing and that luck matters as much as strength. Along the way he has sparred with all of them and beaten every one, aided by Lord Sky Crane’s guidance from the spirit incubating flea in his aperture and by his myriad crane group, yet he stays modest afterward and asks them to help him improve his control of the cranes in turn. His humility wins them over, and the others make him their head. When the flying cranes cry out from hunger, the group lands to feed them, since even large numbers of ironbeak flying cranes will eat anything, stones included. ^{ch. 336}

Descending, they spot four demonic Gu Masters, the four great obscenities, Eastern Obscenity Chen Yi Dao, Western Thief Yu Ba Guang, Southern Disturbance Shi Bao, and Northern Squandering Fan Chun Yao, closing in on three female Gu Masters. One is named as Fairy Bi Xia of Heavenly Lotus Sect, who is seriously injured, unable to break free, and beginning to consider suicide rather than be taken. The four, all rank four Gu Masters strong enough combined to rival a rank five, gloat over their luck at finding her. Furious at demonic path Gu Masters, Fang Zheng orders his crane group to dive without hesitation, announces himself as Immortal Crane Sect’s elite disciple, and charges down with his fellow disciples and ten thousand ironbeak flying cranes. Outnumbered and already hurt, the four great obscenities size up the odds and flee, and the elite disciples laugh at how fast they run. Fang Zheng lands and checks on Fairy Bi Xia, who thanks him with a blush and an infatuated look, having been saved from disaster at the last moment. The rescue leaves a deep impression on her. ^{ch. 336}