Wang Ziwen was sitting not far away. Having faintly caught a few words, he couldn’t help but ask Ye Fan, “What happened?”

Ye Fan turned to look at Pang Bo. “Didn’t you record it on your phone? Play it for everyone to hear.”

By now, the others had all noticed the commotion on this side and were looking over toward Ye Fan.

Pang Bo understood very clearly that even if they were going to act, they needed to have the moral high ground — and it was best to lay everything bare in front of everyone. His expression turned ugly. “Liu Yinzhi, Li Changqing, and Wang Yan were plotting to harm me and Ye Fan.”

As he said this, his anger surged. “These three ungrateful wolves — time and time again we let them off, never holding grudges against them, yet they don’t know what’s good for them. They actually want to kill us!”

These words instantly stunned everyone. All eyes turned to him, and people asked in bewilderment, “What? What on earth is going on?”

Pang Bo pressed a few keys on his phone, and a recording immediately began to play.

“Damn it, I can’t swallow this humiliation. I absolutely cannot let this go!” — this was Li Changqing’s voice.

Then Liu Yinzhi’s dark, cold voice came through: “Let him live a couple more days. I will definitely destroy him!”

“What? You… you want to kill both of them?” Li Changqing and Wang Yan both seemed shocked.

“That’s right — either they go or I go!” Even through the recording, you could hear Liu Yinzhi grinding his teeth.

“But we can’t beat that savage who looks so quiet, and on top of that there’s that eyesore Pang Bo who’s built like a mountain — there’s simply no way.” Li Changqing’s voice carried resentment and helplessness.

Liu Yinzhi gave a cold laugh. “It doesn’t matter. A trace of divine power has appeared in my Vajra Staff. I believe that after one more night it will grow stronger. Then, catching them off guard, I can finish off both of them in one strike.”

From the phone came Li Changqing’s vicious voice: “Good! If that’s the case, what is there to be afraid of? We must finish them off!”

“Wang Yan, when the time comes, go apologize to Liu Yiyi and draw her off to the side. I always felt that her string of prayer beads is not simple — there might be a trace of divine power remaining in them. Unfortunately, you turned what should have been a simple exchange into this mess.” Liu Yinzhi’s voice was heavy with displeasure.

“Fine!” In the end, Wang Yan’s tone also turned cold as she agreed to Liu Yinzhi’s demand.

Liu Yinzhi muttered to himself in a low, hoarse voice: “We can’t make a move in front of the others — that’s a complication. We’ll need to plan this carefully.”

Snap!

Pang Bo shut the phone. “Everyone heard that, right? These three treacherous wolves want to kill me and Ye Fan. Don’t blame us this time for setting aside our classmate bond.”

At this moment, Ye Fan strode forward without a word. Pang Bo followed close behind; Zhang Ziling quickened his pace and caught up as well, and all the others rose to their feet and followed them into the forest.

When Li Changqing and Wang Yan saw Ye Fan and Pang Bo approaching with large strides, guilty consciences made their hearts pound. Liu Yinzhi’s expression, meanwhile, sank to its darkest.

“Time and again we let you go, never holding it against you — yet you plotted to kill both of us. If I let you off again this time, my name Pang Bo can be written backwards!”

“You… you’re lying!” Li Changqing broke out in a cold sweat on the spot.

Wang Yan’s face went deathly pale as she panicked and tried to defend herself: “You… what are you talking about? I don’t understand.”

Pang Bo said nothing more and simply played the recording again.

In that instant, Wang Yan and Li Changqing fell into a panic, and Liu Yinzhi’s face began to go white as well. In the face of irrefutable evidence, there was nothing they could say to defend themselves.

“We only said those things out of anger — you can’t take them seriously…” Li Changqing shouted; at this moment, he was utterly terrified.

“Out of anger? Do you think all the classmates present are three-year-old children? Everyone understands what’s going on.” Zhang Ziling — who was normally reticent — spoke coldly.

“Liu Yinzhi, this was completely wrong of all of you. How could you have even thought this way? What foolishness!” Wang Ziwen’s expression was very grave.

Lin Jia also shook her head and sighed. “We’re all classmates. How could you be so vicious?”

“This has gone too far! Even classmates stranded together in this world — you’d plot to kill them? Have you no humanity left?” The others also spoke up one after another, all criticizing and denouncing the three people before them.

Finally, Zhou Yi frowned and said, “Is it worth coming to blows over this between classmates? Quickly apologize to Ye Fan and Pang Bo…”

The faces of the three turned ashen. In that moment, they wished they could find a crack in the earth to crawl into.

“An apology is unnecessary — when someone speaks one way and thinks another, what sincerity or effect could there be?” Ye Fan glanced at Zhou Yi, then turned to face everyone. “They’ve already harbored this intent. If I were to remain calm in the face of that, I’d be deceiving myself. With people constantly looking for a chance to kill us, I can’t be on guard every hour of every day.”

With that, Ye Fan stepped forward.

Liu Yinzhi’s face went completely bloodless at that moment. He immediately gripped his Vajra Staff tightly, a flash of panic flickering in his eyes.

Wang Yan cried out in alarm: “You… what are you going to do?”

Li Changqing also showed fear on his face, and in great agitation urged Liu Yinzhi: “Use the Vajra Staff now!”

All three of them knew that this time Ye Fan would not overlook their existence — and once he made a move, it would not end well.

Pang Bo followed after him, but Ye Fan stopped him. “I’ll be the villain this time — all the way through.” So saying, he took the large bronze plaque of the Great Thunder Monastery from Pang Bo’s hands.

Ye Fan held it in one hand and pressed forward.

“You… don’t come any closer!” Wang Yan shrieked.

Ye Fan paid her no attention and walked toward Liu Yinzhi and Li Changqing first.

At this moment, Liu Yinzhi suddenly shoved Li Changqing toward Ye Fan, using him as a shield, then raised the Vajra Staff and charged forward, swinging it hard and shouting, “Die!”

Bang!

Ye Fan swung the large bronze plaque of the Great Thunder Monastery with one hand — as if swatting a scarecrow — and struck Li Changqing into the air, sending him flying four or five meters sideways. One could only imagine what enormous force was behind that blow.

Behind them, everyone was privately startled, feeling that Ye Fan truly lived up to his nickname “savage” — his strength was strangely immense.

Pang Bo looked at Li Changqing crumpled on the ground and mocked, “So this is the ‘loyal Yinzhi’ you spoke of? At the critical moment he shoved you forward to take the blow for him — how loyal indeed!”

Li Changqing felt an agonizing pain throughout half his body; several bones seemed to have been broken. He struggled to get up, but Pang Bo stepped over and planted a foot on him, making it impossible for him to move at all.

Clang!

At that moment, Ye Fan swung the large bronze plaque of the Great Thunder Monastery and crashed it heavily down on the Vajra Staff. A faint, trace-like gleam of divine light flickered in Liu Yinzhi’s hands, but it couldn’t withstand this brutal force at all!

The bronze plaque in Ye Fan’s hand emitted no radiance whatsoever, yet his strength was boundless — once swung, it was as though a bronze mountain were shaking.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

Three consecutive metallic crashes rang out. Ye Fan battered Liu Yinzhi down to the ground with sheer force, leaving him kneeling there, both arms apparently broken, convulsing repeatedly. The Vajra Staff tumbled away to one side, where Ye Fan picked it up and kept it.

At this point, Zhang Ziling walked over and brought Wang Yan forward.

“What… do you want?” Liu Yinzhi’s face was snow-white. Pinned down by that heavy bronze plaque, he knelt before Ye Fan.

Hearing this, Ye Fan gave a calm, measured smile. “What do I want? I want to feel at ease from now on — to no longer have people scheming against me.”

“You… what are you going to do?!” Liu Yinzhi was completely panicked and shouted to the people not far away: “We’re all classmates — don’t let him do something reckless…”

“Have you heard of an ancient punishment — one created specifically for vicious criminals — where they were dashed to death against a great boulder or cliff face while still alive?”

“You… no, please!” Liu Yinzhi screamed in terror, but he was powerless to resist. Ye Fan picked him up with one hand, as if grabbing a little chick, and carried him out of the forest and to that stone wall carved with the four ancient characters for “Ancient Forbidden Land.”

Pang Bo and Zhang Ziling dragged Li Changqing and Wang Yan along and followed.

“No! Help!” All three of them screamed in terror.

“Ye Fan, this isn’t right. Wrong as they were, they’re still classmates — you can’t so carelessly decide their fate.” Zhou Yi’s expression was displeased, and he spoke up to intervene.

“That’s right — don’t do this. Those are three lives after all. Wrong as they are, they shouldn’t be killed. Give them another chance to repent.” Three or four others added their voices in persuasion.

Ye Fan turned around to face everyone. “I truly have no wish to do this. But sparing their lives is the same as opening a path to my own death.”

Suddenly, Ye Fan’s expression faltered. There at the cliff wall he spotted a cave, and inside it, two tiger cubs with stripes coiling all over their bodies were baring their teeth at him. Though each was barely a foot long, they already possessed the bearing of fierce beasts.

Saber-toothed tigers!

Ye Fan was immediately startled. This species had long gone extinct on Earth — yet here they were before him today. Young as they appeared, he could clearly make out those sharp, elongated fangs flashing with a cold gleam.

This was a saber-toothed tiger’s lair. The adult tiger had gone out to hunt and was not present — otherwise, the entire group would have been in grave danger.

At this moment, while Zhou Yi was still trying to stop him, others also began to speak up. “Ye Fan, don’t be impulsive. Give them another chance — killing a classmate is easy to do but hard to live with…”

After taking in everything inside the cave, Ye Fan turned back to face everyone. “I’ve never sought to settle things with them, yet they’ve continuously harbored malicious intent, plotting to kill me and Pang Bo. What I’m doing is entirely in self-defense. But since everyone doesn’t wish to see classmates harm each other, I’ll listen to you all and give them one more chance.”

Pang Bo immediately refused to accept this, crying out, “Give them another chance? Are we supposed to wait until they get us killed?!”

Ye Fan shook his head and gave Pang Bo a meaningful look. “Tie the three of them up first. Keep them here for a while — we can’t have these three dangerous individuals traveling with us.”

Though Pang Bo was very reluctant, he knew Ye Fan well. Seeing that meaningful look in his eyes, he understood that Ye Fan must have something in mind, and so said nothing more.

Liu Yinzhi was being held in Ye Fan’s grasp and hadn’t seen the two tiger cubs in the cave behind him, so naturally he had no idea why Ye Fan had changed his mind. His heart was flooded with relief — so he would get to live after all.

Soon, Liu Yinzhi, Li Changqing, and Wang Yan were bound up thoroughly — the ropes being their own belts and strips torn from their clothing. Finally, at Ye Fan’s insistence, all three had their mouths stuffed as well.

Ye Fan picked up Liu Yinzhi and brought him to the entrance of the cave, then tossed him straight in. When Pang Bo and Zhang Ziling came close enough to see, they were struck dumb — the two tiger cubs inside were baring their teeth right there. This was actually a tiger’s den!

Every trace of Pang Bo’s reluctance swept away in an instant, and he nearly cried out. He finally understood why Ye Fan had changed his mind. Throwing the three of them into the tiger’s den — no punishment could fit better. A grown tiger was surely nearby; it wouldn’t be long before it returned.

“Mmph, mmph…” Liu Yinzhi’s face turned green on the spot. He screamed as hard as he could, but only muffled sounds came out — he couldn’t make out a single word.

Pang Bo and Zhang Ziling followed suit, throwing Li Changqing and Wang Yan into the tiger’s den as well.

On Ye Fan, Pang Bo, and Zhang Ziling’s urging, the group set off quickly, for this place was truly not one to linger in. They had barely gone two or three li when, from the direction behind them, a world-shaking tiger’s roar erupted…