Gao Wu: Oh no! Young Master Zhen is a cultivator!

"Quite alert!" Lin Ran was ready to strike.

Upon seeing this, the sea serpent launched the first attack, its entire body bursting out of the seaweed with lightning speed.

Lin Ran dodged to the side, the bone spur grazing his sleeve.

laugh!

The sleeve was torn, but Lin Ran's arm was not injured.

He swung his sword backhand and slashed at the sea serpent's side, the blade striking the scales with a metallic scraping sound.

Crunch!

The longsword ultimately failed to pierce the sea serpent's scales, leaving only a scratch.

The sea serpent's tail swept across, and Lin Ran blocked it with a punch.

Bang!

The defense and strength of a fifth-order mutant are far superior to those of a fourth-order mutant. Even Lin Ran, who had advanced to the Foundation Establishment stage, was knocked back several meters by this immense force.

"Great, this is more interesting!"

Lin Ran steadied himself, exerted force with his feet, and cut into the sea serpent from under its belly, stabbing his long sword into the gap in its scales.

Pfft!

The sea snake, its flesh pierced by the knife tip, hissed and writhed in pain.

Lin Ran drew his sword and struck the snake with a palm strike.

Bang!

The electric arc spread throughout the sea serpent's body, causing it to freeze momentarily.

Lin Ran seized the opportunity and stabbed the sea serpent in the pupil, the blade penetrating its skull.

"Snap!"

The sea snake's bony spikes stood up again, and after a violent tremor, it slowly went limp.

Lin Ran drew his long sword, pried open the bone plate on the top of the sea serpent's skull, and pulled out a dark red crystal core the size of an egg.

The spiritual power contained in a fifth-order crystal core is more than ten times that of a fourth-order crystal core, but the speed of hunting fifth-order crystal cores is still too slow.

The main reason is that fifth-order mutated creatures are relatively rare, unlike third-order and fourth-order creatures which are more common.

He stuffed the crystal core into his backpack, glanced at the sea serpent's corpse, and continued his search.

They continued searching for half an hour, but did not encounter any more fifth-order mutated creatures.

Fortunately, he encountered some third- and fourth-tier mutants along the way, which he easily killed.

"Continuing to the deep water would be a waste of time."

Lin Ran silently calculated that deliberately searching for fifth-tier mutated creatures to kill was far less cost-effective than directly sweeping away third-tier and fourth-tier mutated creatures.

In the more than one hour that followed, they only encountered one fifth-tier mutated creature.

If you focus on hunting third- and fourth-tier mutated creatures, the harvest may be even greater than that of a fifth-tier crystal core.

So he changed his strategy and stopped deliberately looking for fifth-order mutated creatures.

Back in the familiar reef area, hunting efficiency immediately reached its peak.

When a school of barracudas crashes in, they slice it in half with a single blow; the swordfin fish's skull is pierced before its dorsal fin can even unfold.

Even the Ironclad Turtle, known for its defense, was no different from a paper-thin turtle shell in front of Lin Ran, who was only in the early stages of Foundation Establishment.

One crystal core after another was stuffed into the backpack. In less than an hour, he had collected more than a hundred third-order crystal cores and more than a dozen fourth-order crystal cores.

Based on the estimate that one fifth-order crystal core is equal to ten fourth-order crystal cores, this efficiency is more than twice that of directly hunting fifth-order crystal cores.

"At present, it seems that large-scale harvesting of third- and fourth-order crystal cores is still the optimal solution."

After another half hour of searching, the backpack contained nearly two hundred third-tier crystal cores and more than twenty fourth-tier crystal cores, and was about to be filled.

Lin Ran tightened his backpack straps and swam towards the underwater volcanic rocks.

He wanted to see if the giant octopus was still roaming around there; if he did, perhaps he could disable its other eye as well.

If things go smoothly, even if we can't kill that giant octopus for the time being, we won't have to worry about that guy popping up and bothering us from time to time.

Even if a mutated creature without eyes is strong, it poses no threat to me.

Upon arriving near the volcanic rock, they found the surroundings completely silent, with no mutated creatures in sight.

"Did he go out hunting? Or is he hiding somewhere to recover from his injuries?"

Lin Ran hovered above the volcanic rock for a while, and after confirming that the giant octopus was not nearby, he slowly descended.

Tonight's goal has been achieved, it's time to go back.

He used an earth-遁 (earth-遁 is a type of magic technique) to walk back, revealing himself near the sea.

I haven't tried the Wind Control Technique since I reached Foundation Establishment, so today is a good day to give it a shot.

He raised his hand, made a hand seal, and leaped into the air.

The spiritual energy within his body dropped rapidly, more than ten times the amount consumed by the Water Avoidance Technique.

As he approached Xinghu Villa, he slowly lowered himself, made a turn, and headed towards the Lin family villa.

Before he could even get close to the villa, four auras pressed down on him from four directions at the same time.

"Four Transcendent Realm experts, what a grand gesture!"

Lin Ran immediately became alert and scanned his surroundings.

A tall, thin man emerged from behind the sycamore tree on the left, a ball of orange-red flame condensing in his palm.

A dark figure stood on the roof of a building on the right, surrounded by tiny ice crystals.

A man was blocking the middle of the road directly in front of us; he was unarmed, but his arm muscles were bulging.

A person was getting out of a car by the roadside behind me, landing without making a sound.

Fire, ice, strength, and speed—four types of spiritual energy fluctuations—were clearly distinguished in the night.

The four of them blocked all escape routes, trapping Lin Ran in the very center.

"Hey guys, what brings you here at this hour, feeding mosquitoes instead of sleeping?"

Lin Ran secretly pondered that the four people in front of him were probably not sent by the Sun family.

Although the Sun family had taken him seriously in their previous two attempts, they only sent one assassin each time.

Today, the four players formed a well-rounded lineup, encompassing burst damage, control, strong offense, and roaming. This combination of four transcendent realm experts left no room for error.

If Lin Ran were truly just an Inner Breath Realm martial artist, or even if he were a Transcendent Realm martial artist, he would undoubtedly die in the face of such a force.

This move was very well-planned, and the person behind it had the demeanor of someone in a position of power.

It's completely different from the rough and tumble style of the Sun family.

The tall, thin man took a step forward: "Kid, someone paid to kill you. We're all just doing this for money, so don't blame us."

"How much is my life worth?" Lin Ran couldn't help but ask curiously.

What he really wanted to know was what price he would need to pay for four superhumans to kill someone.

The tall, thin man frowned slightly: "You still have the mind to care about this?"

"People are always curious." Lin Ran drew his long sword and assumed a defensive stance.

"It's alright to tell you." The tall, thin man continued to step forward: "The eldest young master of the Lin family, whose cultivation has not yet broken through to the Innate Realm, has a bounty of ten billion."

Upon hearing this, Lin Ran appeared slightly indignant: "So cheap? I'm the eldest young master of the Lin family, and I'm only worth a billion?"

"Enough with the nonsense, prepare to die!"

The tall, thin man swung his arms, and two fiery dragons roared from his palms, crisscrossing and twisting towards Lin Ran.

Seeing this, Lin Ran sidestepped the first fire dragon, then slashed the second one with his longsword, causing the flames to explode into a spreading cloud of fire mist.

The ice-type martial artist followed closely behind, unleashing a torrent of ice shards. He used his movement technique to dodge three times in quick succession, and all the ice shards embedded themselves into the asphalt road, exploding into a cloud of white ice mist.

The burly man with strength had already taken advantage of the situation and charged at him head-on, and Lin Ran swung his sword to meet him.

Bang!

The long sword struck the burly man's fist with a muffled thud.

Lin Ran exerted force with his feet, pretending to be thrown back by the impact, and flew backward.

The speed-type awakener seized the opportunity to swing a slash at him, but Lin Ran twisted his body in mid-air and blocked it with his slash.

when!

The two swords clashed, producing a metallic clang.

Using the momentum again, Lin Ran bypassed the speed-type awakened one and ran into the distance.

"This kid's got something!" The speed-type awakened individual gave a high evaluation.

Upon hearing this, the strength-based martial artist nodded: "He does have some skills, but not much."

The four men stepped forward and quickly approached.

Lin Ran controlled his speed, and whenever the four approached, he pretended to be doing his best, but deliberately prevented them from catching up.

"How is this possible? How can a martial artist who hasn't even broken through to the Innate Realm be faster than me?" The speed-type martial artist vaguely sensed something strange.

"Hmph, even if he's faster than you, he's still going to die today!" The strength-type awakened one said dismissively, "Don't forget, there are four of us!"

Upon hearing this, the speed-type martial artist regained his confidence and continued to chase after the enemy with all his might.