It was clear that Hu Lei was thoroughly enjoying himself.
After swinging the whip about for a while, he flicked his arm and Gan Ning's body suddenly broke free from the whip's control, hurtling like a kite with its string cut toward a massive tree not far away, with no hope of escape.
Boom!
Gan Ning's body crashed hard into the canopy, plunging headfirst into it.
Hu Lei let out a strange laugh, knowing that Gan Ning had already lost the ability to resist. Anyone struck head-on by his Purple Thunder Lightning would need several hours at the very least to recover their vitality.
Right now, Gan Ning was no different from a lamb waiting to be slaughtered.
Hu Lei strolled over at a leisurely, unhurried pace.
However, something utterly unexpected happened. The Gan Ning who had fallen into the treetops seemed to have vanished into thin air.
"Hmm? The kid can still run?" Hu Lei found it hard to believe. He had absolute confidence in his Purple Thunder Lightning.
Under these circumstances, forget someone like Gan Ning at the fourth level of the Heavenly Domain — even a cultivator at the ninth level would absolutely lose all capacity to resist after being struck directly by Purple Thunder Lightning.
The idea that Gan Ning had any chance to escape was something Hu Lei simply could not accept.
He searched the area in a circle and truly could not find a trace. Hu Lei flew into a rage, and his long whip swept through like a broom, leveling the entire scene in an instant.
Every branch, every leaf of the canopy was reduced to piles of fine wood shreds.
Yet there was still no sign of Gan Ning.
It was as if Gan Ning had simply vanished from existence. Everything that had just happened felt like an illusory dream.
"How is this possible?" Hu Lei was practically stamping with fury. He simply could not accept what he was seeing before him.
"Kid, I refuse to believe you can fly to the heavens or burrow into the earth!" Hu Lei truly would not let this go. It defied all common sense entirely!
Could it be that Gan Ning was naturally immune to the power of lightning?
But even if the kid hadn't been injured, how could he have slipped away right under his very nose?
If he'd taken to the sky, there would be traces of flight. If he'd tunneled underground, there would be signs of tunneling.
"Tunneling underground?" Hu Lei's expression shifted. He suddenly thought it quite possible that the kid had actually escaped through the ground.
Taking to the skies was out of the question — if the kid had tried to fly, Hu Lei had his eyes wide open and couldn't possibly have missed it. Tunneling underground from within the tree canopy was actually far more plausible.
However, the scene had been thoroughly destroyed by him, so finding evidence of tunneling would not be easy.
Still, before long, Hu Lei did discover a small clue. Beside that massive tree, he actually found some telltale signs of underground movement.
The thing was, the tunnel space appeared extremely narrow — almost too small to detect any traces of burrowing at all.
"That kid, could he have shapeshifted or something? He could slip through a mouse hole this tiny?" Hu Lei found it nearly inconceivable.
But Hu Lei was not someone who gave up easily.
Prey that had been within his grasp absolutely could not be allowed to slip away like this.
So what if it was tunneling? Hu Lei gritted his teeth and activated his divine sense, beginning to sweep the area with a thorough search. Even tunneling left behind traces of aura.
As long as he found the aura, he could pinpoint the other party's location.
In truth, Gan Ning had not gone far at all. In that situation, there had been no possibility of flight or escape. The one who had actually saved him was a Gold-Munching Mouse.
This particular Gold-Munching Mouse was of the Gold-Munching Mouse King's progeny — a son-level mouse, and its cultivation was reasonably good. But forget comparing it to Hu Lei; even compared to Gan Ning, it was far inferior.
However, the mouse had only just arrived at this location when it discovered Gan Ning gravely wounded. It thought to itself that this was Chen Shao's companion — surely it could not simply stand by and let him die.