Ceceada easily noticed the spear's movement because the bald man moved swiftly, disrupting the air around it.
Opening his eyes, he saw the bald man with his teeth crooked, sneering on his face as he extended his spear in a relatively slow motion in Ceceada's brown pupil.
As the spear got closer to his left eye, it left an aesthetic trail of a deathly aura behind it.
The sharp tip of the spear is now just a few millimeters away from his face, yet Ceceada still kept his eyes open, showcasing absolute nonchalance on its intimidating appearance.
After impatiently waiting for a moment, the spear's sharp tip met with Ceceada's pupil, blocking his left eye' entire vision with the spearhead!
Clang!
A loud clang rang in everyone ears, as if the spear had hit an extremely hard rock!
Crack!
The spear tip cracked as the bald man tried to force his spear forward, making sparks as it grazed on the surface of Ceceada's unharmed pupil!
What?!
Everyone, including the bald man, was stupefied when he realized what just happened!
"Run!"
The middle-aged man saw everything that just occurred and shouted to prompt the bald man, waking everyone from their awe!
Swish!
Hearing the prompt, everyone immediately ran away with panic, fear evident in their eyes...
Who the f**k did they just offend?!
They have already experienced the power and hardness of the bald man's spear before because they often spar every day.
Seeing such a powerful weapon getting destroyed just by colliding with Ceceada's eye made them almost pee from terror!
In the distance, the old man also saw everything, his mouth wide agape, showcasing his gums alongside his extinct teeth!
Even though he have a cultivation of level 9 in Body Refinement Realm, he wouldn't even dare risking it by using his own body to block that attack!
Elemental Formation Realm!
The old man can only think of these resounding words in his mind as he also ran away, afraid that the young man will target him first!
Ceceada is not looking at them at this point, too focused to a prompt that he heard from the system:
[Damage too negligible. No damage taken.]
Ceceada faintly smiled when he heard the prompt. It is because he also noticed his health bar not decreasing a bit, validating the system prompt.
He shook his head, not much surprised since he also initially expected that he will not even feel anything from the attack.
After that, he turned his attention to his surroundings and saw that everyone is running away for their lives.
Ceceada exhibited a faint grin on his face, thinking to himself that they are way too slow to even have a chance to escape from him!
Judging from the speed of the old man that is escaping to the forest, he can guess that the cultivation of the old man is only at level 9!
Greed appeared in his eyes as he thought about putting their corpse inside his ring, absorbing their cultivation to get points!
Although he cannot currently use Cultivation Thief since he just used it today, with its cooldown preventing him, he planned that he will just store their body first and wait for tomorrow when the skill cooldown is already done.
The result will be even better than the huge tiger that he just killed and absorbed since he can fit their bodies inside the ring much easier, allowing him to absorb multiple lifetimes worth of hard-earned cultivation just by activating Cultivation Thief a single time!
While thinking of this, he noticed that everyone is running away, making him feel slightly afraid of losing the opportunity to increase his points.
Who wouldn't want easy free points?!
In his mind, since they dared to loot him, thinking that he is weak, he should do the same with no remorse!
At the same time, he will be giving the future adventurers of the Dyst forest a favor by killing these bandits, increasing their chance of survival when they come here.
He urged his burning core in an instant, controlling the law of fire to summon a marble-sized, ember-looking fireball.
In his palm, the fireball instantly appeared out of thin air!
Ceceada closed his eyes for a moment and thought of a plan in his mind, hoping that it will work.
He took off Auster's ring from his finger and then he inserted the fireball on the ring's hole.
To make sure that he fireball won't fall from the ring's hole, he secured it by making the fireball a bit bigger.
Ceceada's looked at the escaping bandits, his eyes showing a cold glint.
"Shoot him!" The middle-aged man, while still running, shouted with all his strength, commanding the crossbow-equipped cultivator in the distance.
He wanted to buy time!
On the edge of the destroyed patch of land, the crossbow user didn't waste any time and immediately released his explosive projectile while aiming at Ceceada.
Swish!
Ceceada saw the projectile coming towards him and while it is flying in mid-air, he flicked his thumb to propel the burning fireball towards it!
Bang!
The fireball quickly collided with the projectile, making a loud explosion at the sky!
As the explosion sounded in the sky, the fleeing bandits felt dizzy for a moment. However, they didn't waste time and continued running, hoping that they won't die.
The fireball didn't even slow down from the impact and continued flying with the same speed, but this time, heading towards the crossbow user!
Swish!
The fireball traveled so fast that the crossbow user don't have time to process anything from the start to finish, too late to find out that he had already died when the fireball penetrated his forehead!
Bang!
That cultivator's head exploded from the impact, making the bandits watch in horror as the head of their friend burst into a beautiful fountain of blood and flesh!
They immediately looked away in horror, wishing that even if they die, they shouldn't suffer the same fate.
Immediately after that, before his headless corpse can even have the time to fall to the ground, the scene immediately turned into a grandiose scene as the body turned into white spots of light and entered the ring's isolated space.
It works!
In his mind, he can see within the ring that there is a puddle of blood mixed with grinded meat. Although a bit disgusted, Ceceada smiled because he can save extra space inside!
He isn't worried a bit about the mess, for the system can just easily clean it up when it absorb their cultivation!
Ceceada smirked because he can't fully believe that a random plan that just entered his mind worked seamlessly. With this strategy, not only will he save much more space in the ring, he will also reduce the time to individually collect the body!
At the same time, he can see various application for this strategy in the future... like stealthily breaking into someone's treasury using his fireball, then stealing their items.
Ceceada then shook this evil thought in his mind and focused at the heat of the current situation.
In Ceceada's perspective, he can see that there is a thread-like red energy connecting him with the fireball, which is letting him control it.
Intuitively, just like his health bar, he knows that only he can see the energy- a very useful property for stealthy long-ranged attacks.
Earlier when he first learned of the skill, he wasn't able to control that easily because manipulating it probably consume mana, but at that time, he doesn't have a single bit of mana in his core.
Now, that he have mana, he can now also control it at farther and greater distance without much effort!
At the same time, he can also choose not to immediately release all of the power within the fireball, only making a small portion of its compressed mana explode explode a bit!
Right now, he can still perceive the outline of the old man's fleeing body in spite of the thick canopy that that blocks their vision.
He immediately directed the fireball to go where he think the old man is!
Whoosh!
The fireball's speed distorted the air around as it tore through the barks of the block trees easily, following the old man!
Thud!
In a short while, the old man heard a light thud nearby, thinking that the cultivator is throwing something at him, the old man tried to speed up his pace. However, he found out that no matter how much he forced his body, he can't. In contrast, he felt like he is slowing down instead!
He kept trying again and again, only to be shocked when he felt a sharp pain on his chest. He immediately looked down and saw that there is a fist-sized hole in his chest, his transparent core can be seen near his heart.
Bang!
But before he can lament at his own faith, his body instantly exploded , leaving not a single piece of him.
While the rain of blood are beautifully scattering, a marble-sized fireball was revealed, quickly keeping the destroyed body in the ring's isolated space.
After that, Ceceada started retracting the ring-bound fireball from the explosion, reappearing immediately in Ceceada's hand.
While all of this are happening, the fleeing bandits saw that Ceceada is looking at the forest, to which they reacted like they were given a second chance at life.
In their mind, they know that Ceceada is currently focused at dealing with their boss, the old man!
They haven't heard a shriek from the lush forest yet, indicating that Ceceada is probably not done from dealing with the old man!
Thinking of this, they ran away with a bit more confidence on their survival now...
However, what they didn't see is that within Ceceada's clasped hand is the fireball the he just retracted from the forest.
Ceceada quickly threw his fireball on the farthest bandit, the middle-aged man!
Whoosh!