Chương 103: Jade-Crowned Serpent Tiger

I reached my awareness out into the surrounding plants and got them ready, and then I snapped a branch on the far side of the clearing with a thought. The tiger's eyes opened instantly, pupils flashing like polished jade catching sunlight, it rose in one single fluid motion, and then between one heartbeat and the next, it was gone.

"Above us!" I shouted, already pulling the first vine up from the ground.

"Split up, go!" Wei Lin and Lin Mei threw themselves in opposite directions as the beast came crashing down in the space between them, its jade claws tearing deep furrows into the earth. My vine shot upward like a spear aimed at its exposed flank, but the tiger was already twisting away, scales catching the light as power gathered beneath them.

Its tail came whipping around at Wei Lin with the jade barb glowing a dim greenish color but Wei Lin didn't dodge, he planted his feet and let it hit his raised forearm, the jade energy just disappeared into him like water soaking into dry ground.

"First trade," Wei Lin said through his teeth, the multi-coloured qi churning around him as his inner world started working through what it had just taken in. The tiger didn't give him a moment to breathe, it spun toward Lin Mei, and I knew immediately what it was doing, marking her as the softer target, two fast slashes sent waves of jade energy cutting through the air between them.

A fifth stage peak beast hitting Lin Mei clean would have been bad, possibly worse than bad, so I drove the second vine up through the ground right in the path of the attack. It got shredded clean through, but it bought her enough time to pull moisture from the air around her and sweep her hands outward into a spinning shield of water droplets that scattered what was left of the energy.

"Eight o'clock," Lin Mei called out, tracking the beast as it circled into the trees. I followed its movement through the plants it disturbed as it moved. When it gathered itself to pounce, I sent my third vine wrapping around a thick branch above its position. The vine pulled taut just as the tiger leaped, altering the branch's angle enough to throw off its trajectory. The beast landed awkwardly which gave Wei Lin an opening.

He was already moving, his right fist carrying the converted earth essence from the earlier hit, but the tiger shook off the awkward landing faster than any of us expected and its jade crown blazed as it met Wei Lin coming in.

"Watch the—" I started to warn, but it was too late. The beast's tail came around in a surprise attack, catching Wei Lin in the side before he could react, sending him tumbling. He went flying across the air.

"Wei Lin!" Lin Mei's voice had that edge in it that was somewhere between worried and furious. She was already moving her hands through a pattern I hadn't seen her use before, dozens of water needles forming in the air around her, each one compressed down until they looked like they were made of actual metal. They flew at the tiger in overlapping waves that drove it off Wei Lin, and forced it back toward the center of the clearing.

I pulled all three vines back and repositioned them, I'd need them placed right for what I was thinking. The tiger was focused on batting Lin Mei's needles aside with its jade barrier, its crown blazing hot with defensive energy, so I called over to Wei Lin to find out how the conversion was doing.

"Working on it," he said, his voice tight, one hand pressed against his side.

"Jade energy converts slow. I need five seconds." I sent two vines at the tiger's front legs just to keep its attention on me and the third I held back and waited, the beast ripped through both vines without much effort but that was fine, I wasn't trying to wound it, I just needed its eyes on me.

Lin Mei had been quietly pulling moisture from further and further out, then she let all of it go at once, not as an attack but as a fine mist that flooded the clearing and made movement inside it genuinely hard to follow as reflections bounced everywhere. The tiger's head started swinging back and forth, its jade eyes struggling to sort out what was real.

"I'm ready!" Wei Lin called. The brown glow around his fists was thick now and threaded through with green, jade energy partially broken down into earth essence and rebuilt into something he actually owned.

"Lin Mei, pin its right side, Wei Lin come around left, I'll hold it in place!" A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation. I threw the last vine straight at the tiger's face, and it reared back swatting it aside. In that moment, Lin Mei's water needles peppered its right flank. While they couldn't punch through the scales, they kept it rotating that way defensively.

I brought the other two vines up through the ground on either side to cut down how far it could go. The beast gathered itself to leap into the air, but Wei Lin was already there, his strike caught it in the shoulder. It wasn't clean, but it disrupted its balance. The tiger's tail came back around on instinct, but Wei Lin was ready for it this time. His method pulled the jade energy right out of the impact and folded it into the rest.

"It's protecting its left leg," I said, watching how it distributed its weight as it moved.

"Old injury. Wei Lin, keep absorbing, Lin Mei, can you slow it down?"

"Yes," she said simply, and her hands moved through something I'd never seen her do before. Water essence condensed into rings that spun in the air. They launched themselves at the tiger and expanded as they got closer. When they reached it, they didn't strike, they just began orbiting it at different heights. I could feel the localized pressure they were creating even from where I stood. The tiger's movements went sluggish, just slightly but enough.

I drove the first vine at its head to push it right into the thickest of the pressure rings. Then I sent the second vine sweeping low. When it jumped to clear it, I could see clearly how it struggled to push off its left leg properly. The third vine went straight for the injured side. It tried to counter with a clumsy defensive swipe that left the whole flank open. This created the opportunity that Wei Lin needed. He moved in with converted earth essence in his right hand.

The tiger sensed him, its jade crown blazed and its right claw came down in a killing arc. But Wei Lin's merchant method activated. The sigils around him flared brilliant green, straining against the sheer volume of energy trying to push through.

"Too much!" Wei Lin called out. Lin Mei was already moving, a sphere of water essence forming around him where the air pressure was held perfectly steady, softening the incoming energy enough that his method could get hold of it. I reinforced the bubble with two vines crossing in front of it and sent the third at the tiger's injured leg to make it shift its weight again. The beast snarled in frustration. It spun into a complex combination: right claw, tail sweep, left claw. Each attack blazed with jade essence.

Wei Lin barely managed to absorb the first strike through the vacuum bubble. As for the tail, he ducked to let the jade barb whistle over his head.

"I need more time!" he called, backing off to properly process the absorbed energy.

"Lin Mei, freeze the ground!" I shouted. She swept water essence across the floor of the clearing; it locked into ice immediately. The tiger's claws scraped and scrambled, and for just a second its injured left rear leg came down on exactly the patch of earth I'd been waiting on. All three vines came up at the same moment, the first around its right foreleg, the second around its tail, and the third coiling around the injured leg. The tiger's eyes went wide; its jade crown was already blazing.

It was gathering power for a blast that would blow through the ice, vines, and probably most of the clearing too. But Wei Lin was already there. Everything he'd absorbed through the whole fight, all of it, concentrated and released in one strike directly into the jade crown just as the beast was trying to push the energy through it. There was a moment where nothing happened, and for a second, I thought we failed. But then the crown shattered with a sound like a shelf of glass falling.

The shockwave blew leaves off every tree around us. The tiger was sent flying through the air and hit an oak trunk hard enough to crack it halfway through. The impact shook the whole tree. As branches came down around it, it slid to the ground. It lay there on the ground; its scales dull and flat as the power left it. The three of us stood there breathing hard for a moment.

"Did we really…" Wei Lin started.

"Yeah," Lin Mei breathed.

"We did." The look on their faces brought a smile to my face. A feat like this would be almost impossible for them on their own. It just goes to show how valuable teamwork is.

"Your team coordination has obvious gaps," Azure interrupted my thoughts, "but for a first attempt, that was acceptable, but I noticed you passed on multiple opportunities to end the battle yourself."

"I wanted to let them see what they're capable of." That was true. It wouldn't help them much if all they did was watch from the side as I fought the beast. They needed to experience the danger.

"Master, you should check up on your friends, I think the adrenaline has begun to wear off." I turned to see that Azure was right. Wei Lin was sitting on the ground, looking exhausted, while Lin Mei was staring at her own hands like she couldn't believe what she did. I walked over and pulled Wei Lin back to his feet.

"That crown placement was perfect timing."

"Thanks," he said, accepting my hand.

"Can we fight something smaller next time?"

"Actually, this was the right starting point," Lin Mei said, looking up at us, "Jade-Crowned Serpent Tigers are predictable, and now we know how we move together, next time, we could face something more challenging."

"More difficult?" Wei Lin groaned.

"Can't we just enjoy this victory for a minute before planning the next near-death experience?" That made me laugh because beneath all his complaints, his eyes shone with pride. The thrill of what they accomplished was addictive.

"Come on," I said, making my move on the beast core.

"Let's get this preserved properly. Lin Mei, we could probably earn some good spirit stones selling it to the herb gardens." She nodded eagerly.

"The jade essence will be especially useful for certain medicines. Though..." she looked at Wei Lin with a mixture of exasperation and fondness, "we should probably check you for injuries first. Fighting the beast in close quarters was a bit reckless."

"Hey, it worked, didn't it?" he protested, though he didn't resist as she began examining him for wounds.

"That's not the point." I watched them argue about it while I worked and smiled despite myself. We had a long way to go before the tournament, but this was a decent start. The sun had moved further than I expected when I finally looked up.

"We should get back; I want to get to the archives today."

"What are you looking for?" Lin Mei asked as we started walking toward the gate.

"Soul bonds," I said.

"I have some theories I want to check out."

"Soul bonds?" Wei Lin raised an eyebrow.

"Sounds like you're thinking of getting a spirit beast."

"Something like that," I said, "hopefully one that doesn't threaten to eat me on the first meeting."

"Always a good quality in a companion," he agreed.