Chapter 1480: Any Last Words?
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Slash by slash, Lin Huang battled with the aberrant species.
The area where the two of them were fighting was filled with the phenomenon of red and black sword gleams from their clashes.
As the battle progressed, he managed to obtain a rough idea of the aberrant species' strength.
Its strength was almost equivalent to that of a Supreme God rank-5 monster, with full control of the True Self Level of Sword Dao true meaning. It had also mastered more than forty types of Rule Bending Power, some of which had reached Control-level. In terms of overall ability, it was considered top-tier among True Gods. In fact, its overall strength was in no way inferior to Teng Ran from the Thousand Snake Sect.
The fact that an individual with this kind of ability was unable to escape being polluted by Abyssal energy was really surprising to Lin Huang.
It was hard enough for Lin Huang to meet a powerhouse sword cultivator of a caliber on par with his own, so he had every intention of learning whatever he could from the exchange. Although his opponent's every attack could prove fatal, for Lin Huang, it was an excellent learning opportunity. He restricted his Rule Bending Power to the same level as that of the other party and confronted his opponent time and time again.
He could also sense that there more and more powerhouses in the surrounding area that were starting to pay attention to the battle, but he ignored them.
The fight lasted for more than three hours until his opponent had exhausted practically all its tactics. Once he observed that there were no more new moves from the other party, Lin Huang began getting down to some serious action.
Twenty-eight layers of Control-level Rule Bending Power were compounded onto the blade of his blood-red sword, with the additional integration of True Self Level Sword Dao. The moment the blade sliced down, even the color of heaven and earth faded.
The entire universe seemed to be awash with that blood-red ray of light.
The aberrant species swung its sword repeatedly in resistance. However, it was all in vain—its form was instantly swallowed up by the blood-red sword gleam…
A number of individuals watching the battle from nearby witnessed this attack, and their pupils contracted.
However, there were also a few of them who became curious about Lin Huang.
The intense battle lasted for more than three hours. In addition, Lin Huang's final blow seemed to have revealed his final trump card. To some individuals, this signaled an opening that they could take advantage of.
Several figures quietly appeared on the battleground where the fight between Lin Huang and the aberrant species had just ended.
Of course, Lin Huang had also noticed these small stirrings around him. His Divine Telekinesis sensed several monsters approaching him, and the corners of his lips quirked up ever so slightly.
"The core zone is such a great place! I never knew that meals were delivered straight to you!"
Lin Huang realized that he was not the only hunter around. The three Abyssal hunters who had targeted Lin Huang did not rush into action but slowly revealed themselves instead.
"Oh! It seems this prey is extremely in demand." One of the monsters laughed—it looked a bit like a giant ape, but with nine heads and eighteen pairs of limbs. When it spoke, all nine heads spoke at the same time in different pitches and voices, creating a hallucinogenic effect and sound that was very soporific to the listener.
"This prey looks very delicious—I really want to eat him, eat him, eat him…" A giant baby with a huge belly salivated non-stop. Its head was also extraordinarily large and it only had a single pitch-black eye, as well as a huge mouth that took up half its face.
Except for its massive size, abnormally proportioned head, and a belly that made it look pregnant, the biggest difference between the giant baby and a human was the two huge black wings on its back that seemed at once both real and ephemeral. A closer look revealed that the pair of wings was not, in fact, wings—they were actually made up of arms of various shapes and sizes that numbered into the thousands.
"Since all of us fancy the same prey and we don't want to give him up, then each to their own!" The last one to speak was a humanoid black-scaled monster.
Its appearance was similar to that of a burly human wearing a layer of full-body scale armor. The scale armor even covered its entire face, making it seem as if it were wearing a helmet.
However, on closer inspection, the scales were not really scales, but a kind of fine black crystal, densely stacked to simulate the form of scales. However, its specific material was unknown.
The three monsters obviously already knew each other.Lin Huang's gaze swept over the three monsters, lingering a little longer on the third one because he felt it was a human that had been transformed into an abyssal creature. However, he only paused very slightly before withdrawing his gaze.
The auras of the three monsters were very clearly no less powerful than the aberrant species from earlier—perhaps a little stronger, even. All of them were top-tier True Gods, close to the very peak of true god-level limits.
However, Lin Huang was not shocked. Instead, he was thrilled that he had run into them because it had been a while since he had encountered such powerful enemies.
"Enough nonsense; come at me then, all three of you!"
Before the trio could say more, Lin Huang interrupted them.
"Hehehehe, what an arrogant fellow…" The nine heads of the multi-headed ape laughed simultaneously. It was not annoyed but said with a smile, "If you were able to go full force on us, perhaps one or two of us would be worried, but right now…"
Lin Huang could not help but chuckle when he heard what it said. "I don't doubt that I can kill all three of you!"
When he fought the aberrant monster, he had only used about a third of his ability at most, so it did not really consume much of his strength.
The reason the battle lasted for more than three hours was purely so he could practice his sword skills.
However, the onlookers did not know this. They assumed that Lin Huang had already used up all of his strength in the battle earlier and that he won the fight only because he utilized his final trump card.
As a result, they severely misjudged his ability and thought that they could take advantage of this opportunity.
However, Lin Huang was delighted at their mistake because the three monsters were extremely high-quality prey.
'It's too bad I can only absorb one last Divine Fire…' Lin Huang felt a slight twinge of regret.
After hunting down the aberrant monster, he had already accumulated nine ninth-rank Divine Fires within him. According to his experiences from first-rank to eighth-rank, his Life Wheels could only hold ten Divine Fires. If there were more, they would not be absorbed.
However, alongside his regrets, Lin Huang was also somewhat relieved because this final hunt would mean that he could finally leave the Battlefield of the Dragon Abyss and go back to refine his Divine Fires.
"Kill us… What a cute response… I really want to eat you, eat you, eat you…" The monster baby opened its eyes wide and looked at Lin Huang with even more excitement. Its shouts became louder and louder, and its pitch rose increasingly higher, becoming even more piercing to the ears.
Its voice instantly traveled a distance of over several hundred kilometers. Wherever the sound passed through, except for ninth-rank True Gods, the bodies of any living creatures would burst as if shattered by the sound waves.
The powerhouses who were watching from a distance had a slight change of expression.
"That demon baby looks like he's going to explode…"
"Right now from the looks of the demon baby, the nine-headed ape and the black-scale monster will get the target. I'm thinking each of them will have a slice of that particular cake."
"That human will die, that's for sure, but it's really hard to say who will be the last one left standing…"
On the battleground, only the scaled monster remained silent.
Lin Huang waited for the two monsters to finish speaking. He then looked at the scaled monster with a smile. "Both of them have said their last words; aren't you going to do so as well?"Chapter 1481: The Symbiotic Creature of the Abyssal Fountain
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
As Lin Huang faced the three monsters, he was not planning on holding back anymore.
Since the aberrant species from before was a sword cultivator, he had spent more time on it because he was thinking in terms of a sword cultivator improving his skills. Of course, no one knew what the aberrant species might have been thinking.
However, this time, none of the three monsters were sword cultivators, and Lin Huang only needed one last Divine Fire before he successfully retired from the battleground. Naturally, there was no need to waste any more time.
The blood-red battle sword made a series of horizontal slashes, and three brilliant rays of scarlet light as bright as the noonday sun suddenly lit up, instantly illuminating the dim world into blood-red day.
When the three monsters saw the blood-red suns rising, their expressions immediately changed dramatically.
They had initially thought that Lin Huang's final slash when killing the aberrant species was his final move. They had not expected that he might not have unleashed his full power in the earlier battle. These three seemingly casual slashes looked several times more powerful than the previous one.
Lin Huang had compounded forty Control-level Rule Bending Powers onto the three slashes and integrated them with True Self Level Sword Dao as he made his attacks.
Rule compounding power was not simply adding on in terms of numbers. With each Rule that was compounded, the power of Lin Huang's sword increased by leaps and bounds. When he killed the aberrant species, he had only compounded twenty-eight layers of Rule Bending Power. Right now, compared to previously, the power of his current three slashes was twelve times the strength of his earlier slash.
The three monsters had initially thought that this was going to be an easy win; it had never crossed their minds that they might be serving themselves up as easy meat.
"We're going to die! We're going to die! We're going to die…" The demon baby shrieked in a strange voice, flapping its so-called wings and fleeing the scene at a frightening speed.
However, as fast as he was, he could not outrun the speed of the blood-red sun's rays. Under the brilliant blood-red beams that illuminated the entire sky, the various shapes and sizes of arms that made up its wings melted swiftly at a speed visible to the naked eye, like ice melting under the hot summer sun. They melted together with its body…
"Don't kill me, I surrender…" The nine-headed ape yelped dismally as he frantically fled.
It used its nine pairs of upper and lower limbs together. Every time it used the void as a stepping stone and jumped, it traveled a certain distance like a flash in space. It was as fast as the demon baby with wings.
However, its escape was still in vain. The blood-red rays quickly melted its limbs and head like a lighted candle.
Of the three monsters, only the blackscale monster did not try to escape.
Instead, the black scales all over its body stacked up in front of it, turning into a pitch-black shield.
Only now did Lin Huang notice that its scales were actually a kind of liquified black crystal. Not only could the black crystal absorb energy, but it also reflected and refracted energy.
At least fifty percent of the power from Lin Huang's blow was deflected by it.
It was then Lin Huang finally saw the monster's figure, sans the covering of black scales.
It was a well-built human male who appeared to be around forty years old. Except for its completely jet-black eyes that were without whites, it was almost no different from a human being.
After being besieged by the blood-red sword gleams for about ten seconds, the shield created by the black scales finally could not withstand the energy impact and retreated back within the body of the middle-aged man.
The middle-aged man violently spat out a mouthful of fresh blood, and his entire body was sent flying backward.
Lin Huang noticed that the man's body had not completely melted away; it was merely in the condition that it would be in the aftermath of an extremely high-temperature inferno.
"A combat cultivator?!" Lin Huang could not help but raise his brows. When this monster was still a human being, he had probably been an extremely powerful combat cultivator.
However, the fact that he was able to survive was not entirely due to his strong physical body, but also because the black scales integrated into his muscles and bones after retreating into his body, taking at least half the subsequent impact from the blood-red rays.
Even so, at a glance, Lin Huang guessed that the combat cultivator's physical strength was probably close to that of a first-rank Heavenly God. Otherwise, he would not have been able to withstand the power of Lin Huang's assault.
The three slashes killed two of the monsters within seconds, and although one was not dead yet, it had completely lost its ability to fight.
When Lin Huang glanced toward the blackscale monster in the distance whose Divine Power had been completely exhausted, his expression suddenly changed to one of slight puzzlement.
This was because he sensed that the Divine Fires within the bodies of the two slain monsters had all been absorbed by his Life Wheels.
"What's going on? Why did they absorb eleven Divine Fires?!"
According to his previous experiences from Virtual God rank-1 to Virtual God rank-8, every transition of rank would only allow absorption of ten True God Divine Fires. Virtual God rank-9 should have been no exception.
However, his Life Wheels seemed to have absorbed an eleventh ninth-rank Divine Fire; this was entirely unexpected.
However, his doubts only lasted for a moment. Lin Huang then turned his gaze in the direction of the blackscale monster again.
"Since I can absorb more, then I'll continue hunting until my Life Wheel stops absorbing!"
He did not bother racking his brain any further over what might have caused this change.
His figure flickered, and he appeared beside the blackscale monster—more precisely, beside the naked middle-aged man whose body had entirely cast off its black scales.
"Your consciousness seems to have preserved its state of awareness, which is rare among polluted individuals." While Lin Huang carefully scrutinized his opponent, his Divine Telekinesis also made a sweep of the other's body. "It seems to be in an unusual state of symbiosis…"
After studying the blackscale monster, Lin Huang did not spare it. He raised his sword and beheaded his opponent right away.
"Congratulations to the host on obtaining the entire monster card set for the Symbiotic Creature of the Abyssal Fountain (Supreme God)"
"I obtained a complete monster card set?!" Lin Huang immediately took out the card to check it.
"Monster Card: Symbiotic Creature of the Abyssal Fountain"
"Rarity: Supreme God"
"Monster name: Blackscale"
"Type of Monster: Unique Species / Unknown Tribe"
"Bloodline: Golden Fountain (Unawakened)"
"Combat Level: Sixth-rank True God (Ninth-rank True God)"
"Major: Combat Cultivator, Parasitism, Water Elemental Enlightenment…"
"Major Skills: Immortal Being of the Cosmos…"
"Combat Dao: True Self Level"
"God Rule: Tenacious…"
"Summon Authority: Activated"
"Card Remarks: Trainable!"
"Remarks: An extremely rare and unusual symbiotic creature type!"
"Even Xiao Hei thinks it's rare?!" Lin Huang glanced through the card information and quickly noticed the final remarks. This was the first time Xiao Hei had specifically emphasized that a card monster was rare.
"Xiao Hei, do you have any suggestions about how its training direction should go?" Lin Huang asked immediately.
"There is insufficient information; it is not possible to give training suggestions ."
Xiao Hei's answer also surprised Lin Huang a little.
"Alright." Lin Huang did not bother to pursue the matter further. For him, obtaining this supreme god-level monster card was already an unexpected thrill.
He also noticed that after slaying Blackscale, his own body had absorbed the monster's Divine Fire. At that point, he had absorbed twelve ninth-rank Divine Fires into his body.
"I don't know if I can continue absorbing…" Lin Huang felt a little helpless. He did not know what was going on with his body or why the absorption of ninth-rank Divine Fires did not seem to satiate his Life Wheels. "Whatever. I'll just keep hunting until my Life Wheels refuse to absorb any more!"
Chapter 1482: Saturated?
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Due to unknown reasons that allowed Lin Huang to continue absorbing Divine Fires, he had no choice but to change his itinerary and postpone his plan to leave the Battlefield of the Dragon Abyss so he could continue hunting in the core layer.
The core layer was undoubtedly a good place—ninth-rank True Gods were everywhere.
It took Lin Huang less than half an hour to hunt down four more ninth-rank monsters.
After he killed the fourth one, his Life Wheels finally stopped absorbing Divine Fire
s.
"Are they saturated now?!" Lin Huang was puzzled as he sank his consciousness into his Life Wheels to check.
Among the ten Life Wheels, there were five with double-stacked ninth-rank Divine Fires and five Life Wheels with only single ones.
"What's going on? Why didn't these five Life Wheels absorb more?" Lin Huang looked doubtfully at the differences between the Divine Fires in the five Life Wheels. After a while, he finally discovered where the problem lay.
The five Life Wheels that contained two ninth-rank Divine Fires all had one rank-4 Divine Fire plus one rank-5 Divine Fire. The five rank-5 Divine Fires came from five monsters—the Demonic Buddhist Holy Son, the aberrant species, the nine-headed ape, the demon baby, and the Symbiotic Creature of the Abyssal Fountain.
The remaining five Life Wheels with only one ninth-rank Divine Fire only had rank-4 Divine Fires, not rank-5 Divine Fires.
"So the rank-4 Divine Fires are saturated, and only rank-5 Divine Fires will be absorbed?!"
With this speculation in mind, Lin Huang immediately knew what direction his next hunt should take.
He made a sweep with his Divine Telekinesis and began to lock in the locations of the strongest auras in the core layer one by one.
"I found one!" It only took a moment; he could not help quirking his lips slightly as he swiftly headed toward the figure.
However, he had not flown very far before the figure seemed to notice Lin Huang's pursuit and began to flee quickly.
"Seems like someone saw me…" The corners of Lin Huang's mouth turned up, and he pursued his prey even more hotly.
The two played cat and mouse for around ten minutes before Lin Huang finally caught up with the other party.
It was a monster with several dozen pairs of black wings, dressed in white, and wearing a silver mask. If one ignored the wings on its back, it looked just like a human being.
Before Lin Huang could make a move, the winged being voluntarily stopped, put the walking stick in its hand away, and said to Lin Huang, "I surrender! Don't kill me!"
"You're not weak. Why don't you want to fight?" Lin Huang raised an eyebrow.
He did not attack immediately because, unlike the nine-headed ape who had begged for mercy, it did not try to provoke him, nor did it have any intention of doing anything.
"I saw your fight just now. I'm no match for you," the winged being said frankly, "It's meaningless to try and fight you."
The winged being was even more alarmed that Lin Huang had caught up with it. One must know that up until this very day, it had depended on its exceptional speed in the core layer. If its best ability had been superseded by Lin Huang, it knew the disparity between its own abilities and Lin Huang's was vast.
"Then give me a reason not to kill you." Lin Huang smiled and looked at it.
"I am Shadow Wing. I'm very familiar with the core layer and can act as a guide for you." The winged being bowed toward Lin Huang and then introduced itself.
"You don't feel bad betraying your own kind?" Lin Huang sneered at this sort of behavior.
"You're wrong about that." Shadow Wing was not annoyed, merely smiled and corrected Lin Huang, "The Abyss has hundreds of millions of types of creatures, just like the human world has birds, quadrupeds, and insects. However, birds, quadrupeds, and insects are not the same as humans. The Abyss is the same. Except for my kin, there are very few allied tribes. The other tribes are not the same as ours, and some are even enemies to me. Therefore, it's not a betrayal."
Lin Huang did not refute its statement. Although he had never been to the actual Abyss, he knew that there were many types of Abyssal creatures, and the competition was extremely fierce. Moreover, he knew that there was no camaraderie to speak of between different tribes.
In addition to that, the winged being did not regard the other tribes in the Abyss as being of the same race as itself, which was normal.
After thinking for a moment, Lin Huang stated his request, "I don't need a guide; I only need prey.
"As long as you help me find more than five prey as strong as you or stronger, I'll let you go!" According to the map from Mysterious Item Pavilion, the entire surface layer of the core layer was as big as the surface areas of four Earths combined. With his Divine Telekinesis under extreme suppression, it would take Lin Huang some time to find five rank-5 targets.
If the winged being could help him find five suitable targets quickly, he had no qualms about letting it go.
After Shadow Wing heard Lin Huang's request, the eyes behind its silver mask blinked twice. "It's as easy as that?"
"You might not want to say that so soon." Although the winged being agreed very quickly, Lin Huang did not fully believe that it was up to the task.
"I've been in the Battlefield of the Dragon Abyss for more than ten years; it's been more than three years since I entered this core layer. Anything else, I wouldn't dare to say much, but as far as familiarity with the core layer goes, there aren't very many people who know it better than I do.
"You want to hunt down rank-5 creatures—well, I happen to know a few hunting groups made up of rank-5 members. However, if you add them all up, there's a lot more than five of them." Shadow Wing chuckled.
"The whereabouts of the hunters aren't fixed; what's the use of knowing who the members of those teams are? Or is it possible that you can still ascertain their locations?" Lin Huang asked.
"Now, this is something you don't know. In this core layer, there's a place called the core source. It's the place where the Abyssal energy is densest. Even peak True God powerhouses don't dare to approach it willy-nilly. The core source is a place that churns out powerful Abyssal creatures continuously. The strongest teams in the core layer divide the vicinity of the core source into a few hunting grounds, and each of them occupies one part. As long as the members of these teams enter the core layer, they usually stay in their own part of the hunting grounds most of the time. Therefore, it won't be difficult to find them."
Lin Huang listened to Shadow Wing's explanation and remembered that the map he obtained from Mysterious Item Pavilion had a large red shaded area without any descriptive text. He guessed this was most likely the location of the core source that Shadow Wing had mentioned.
He could not help but ask somewhat curiously, "Can the core source really churn out powerful Abyssal monsters from thin air?!"
"Yes." Shadow Wing nodded. "No one knows the specific principles of it. Some say that there is a space tunnel deep in the core source that is connected to the deepest reaches of the Abyss. Others say that the core source is connected to a powerful internal Abyssal kingdom. Some also speculate that the entire core layer is a laboratory for a powerful entity in the Abyss…
"In fact, in addition to churning Abyssal creatures out of thin air, throwing any living or dead Abyssal creatures into the depths of the core source will also result in Abyssal energy infiltrating them, generating aberrant species, fallen species, undying species, or spirit types…
"The sword cultivator aberrant species you killed became what it was when it was initially forced into the depths of the core layer by a hunting team…" It seemed that Shadow Wing had been paying attention to Lin Huang since his battle with the aberrant species.
Lin Huang frowned slightly when he heard this.
When Shadow Wing noticed Lin Huang's change of expression, it quickly changed the subject. "Since the Abyssal energy in the core source is too dense, True Gods have no way of going in very far. As for what secrets the core source hides, nobody knows except the Lords who set up the barriers."
"I see." Lin Huang nodded slightly and did not bother continuing with small talk. "Take me to the hunting ground right away then!
Chapter 1483: If One Slash Doesn't Do The Job, The Second One Will!
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
The hunting ground of the core layer was an area in the shape of a ring around the core source.
The entire ring was occupied by the core layer's top powerhouses and strongest hunting teams.
The core source generated various polluted creatures every day, sometimes in the form of Abyssal creatures, or aberrant species, or perhaps evil spirit types, or demons… Sometimes, it even produced evil weapons with strange abilities.
As for the information about the core source producing evil weapons, Shadow Wing deliberately kept it from Lin Huang.
These evil weapons were growth-type items similar to God Weapons. For Abyssal creatures, their value was not below that of lord-level god relics.
These powerhouses stayed here in the core layer for the long term, mainly to guard the evil weapons—hunting was merely their second priority.
Lin Huang followed Shadow Wing, moving at a swift pace, and quickly arrived near the hunting ground.
"The first target I've chosen for you is a three-person team. The three members are all rank-5s, and two of them are about as strong as me. One is stronger than me and is estimated to have mastered over thirty types of Control-level Rule Bending Powers…" After Shadow Wing had helped Lin Huang to choose his targets, he then revealed various pieces of information about them.
Not only did Shadow Wing reveal their general level of strength, but he also gave a comprehensive description of their areas of expertise and their weaknesses.
"Do these three fellows have a grudge against you or something?" Lin Huang squinted at Shadow Wing after hearing this.
"It's not a grudge, per se. There's just some slight conflict between us," Shadow Wing smiled and said. In front of Lin Huang, he did not dare to lie openly. He had decided to be as honest as possible, especially in obvious matters. After all, his life was still in Lin Huang's hands.
When he saw Lin Huang looking at him wordlessly and smiling, Shadow Wing finally revealed with some embarrassment, "They stole my prey and tried to chase me down."
As they closed the distance, Lin Huang turned his gaze from Shadow Wing and looked in the direction of the three targets. The three monsters had already entered his Divine Telekinesis sensing range.
Based on the intensity of their aura, they were indeed rank-5s.
However, Lin Huang could clearly feel that the auras of the three monsters were much stronger than Shadow Wing. Two of them were slightly stronger and one was more powerful by a full level. In terms of aura intensity, they definitely surpassed the Demon Baby's group of three monsters that he had just killed.
Shadow Wing had evidently exaggerated his own powers when evaluating the strength of the three monsters.
Just when Lin Huang's Divine Telekinesis sensed the three monsters, the three monsters also sensed the covert probing of Lin Huang's Divine Telekinesis.
"Seems like prey walked right up to our door!" The one who spoke was a huge creature with a body that mostly resembled a mouse. However, its head was that of a human—it was bald, bearded, and had a gaunt face. The only part of it that was not human-like was its eyes that shone dazzlingly scarlet even in the dark.
"It seems like that birdman Shadow Wing is with him, too." The one who said this was a fish-headed monster. It looked like an intensely muscled giant bullfrog that walked upright. Both its huge eyeballs protruded outward, and it had organs that resembled fish gills on both sides of its neck.
"Don't let it get away this time!"
Among the three, the monster with the most powerful aura—a batwing monster—finally spoke.
It looked a bit like a fiend with fiend-like wings and ram's horns. However, apart from the pair of ram's horns on its head, it possessed no other facial organs and looked just like a faceless human. Its spine tapered to a long tail that had a poisonous scorpion-like sting at the tip.
The three monsters abruptly went into action without waiting for Lin Huang and Shadow Wing to get any closer.
Lin Huang's Divine Telekinesis sensed the movements of the three monsters. Initially, he was a little worried that they would run away. However, the next instant, he saw all three monsters starting to charge toward himself and Shadow Wing.
It only took a moment for both parties to come face-to-face.
The batwing monster headed the monster team; the three of them surrounded Lin Huang and his companion in a triangle formation.
"Tsk tsk tsk… so you're working with a human. Birdman, how degenerate have you become?" The fish-headed monster saw the two of them and mocked Shadow Wing.
When Shadow Wing saw the three monsters, he clearly looked a little nervous at first. However, when he glanced at Lin Huang beside him, he immediately gained back considerable courage. "You're a fish-headed monster working with a damn bat, and you have the gall to call me degenerate?! Do your fish-headed monster friends know about this?"
Lin Huang knew something about these two monster tribes.
Batwing monsters belonged to the Night Devil tribe in the Abyss, while fish-headed monsters belonged to the Water Walkers. The Water Walkers were one of the many staple foods of the Night Devils, which made the Water Walkers extremely hostile to the Night Devils. The two tribes could almost be said to be arch-enemies.
This fish-headed monster and batwing monster in front of them working together were indeed much more outrageous than an Abyssal creature working with a human being.
"Birdman, do you have a death wish?!" The fish-headed monster had not expected that Shadow Wing would talk back at it, and its humiliation turned into anger.
Just when the fish-headed monster was about to start arguing with Shadow Wing, the batwing monster secretly sized up Lin Huang.
However, after observing for a moment, he did not notice anything out of the ordinary.
Under Thousand Face's camouflaging, Lin Huang was an extremely run-of-the-mill ninth-rank True God of normal ninth-rank combat level. He possessed the same aura strength as an ordinary ninth-rank True God, with absolutely no special features whatsoever.
Thousand Face's disguise was good enough to fool a peak heavenly god-level powerhouse. The batwing monster was only true god-level and could not see through the subterfuge.
However, this also puzzled it slightly because Shadow Wing was aware of their abilities. It was illogical for Shadow Wing to bring along an easy kill who was weaker than himself. It was equivalent to bringing food right to their doorstep.
Lin Huang was also sizing up the three monsters in front of him.
A Night Devil, a Water Walker, and a human-faced rat—these were Abyssal monsters that had appeared in the monster guide. According to the records in the monster guide, these three types of monsters had considerably large tribes and belonged to the lower-ranking tribes in the Abyss. However, the three monsters in front of him seemed to be individuals of note within their respective tribes, and their abilities were that of peak True God powerhouses.
Among the three, the Night Devil's aura was obviously the strongest, and it did not try to hide it at all.
Lin Huang's lips slowly quirked up because after seeing the three of them, he was absolutely sure that they were the rank-5s that he wanted to hunt.
Without waiting for the fish-headed monster and Shadow Wing to finish bickering, the battle sword in Lin Huang's hand transformed into three blood-red lightning bolts and sliced toward the trio.
The blood-red lightning bolts swept across the void in a flash, closing the distance and directly appearing in front of the three monsters.
Before the fish-headed monster could even react, its body had been impaled.
The human-faced mouse noticed Lin Huang's attack, but it could only watch as the sword gleams pierced through the air. It had no time to escape.
Only the Night Devil dodged immediately when it saw the glow of the sword gleams, but it was a touch too slow. It managed to avoid the attack that could have ruptured its head, but the sword gleams pierced through its left wing.
"That's fast?!" As the Night Devil teetered on the verge of life and death, its entire body was drenched in cold sweat from shock.
It had assumed that the human Shadow Wing brought along could not possibly be weak in terms of ability, but it had not expected Lin Huang to be so powerful.
When Lin Huang saw the Night Devil dodging his rapid speed sword skill attack, he raised his brows but said nothing. Instead, he immediately attacked a second time.
The Night Devil had only just calmed down a little from its shock when it instantly sensed an even bigger threat heading its way. When it looked up, the second blood-red lightning bolt was already right in front of its face.
"I'm going to die…" Before it could finish its thought, half of the Night Devil's damaged horn flew off. Its entire head burst open.
"If one slash doesn't do the job, the second one will…" Lin Huang murmured as he sheathed his sword.
Next to him, Shadow Wing was completely caught off guard; a moment later, it still had not recovered from the shock.
It knew that Lin Huang was very powerful, but even having witnessed the event with its own eyes, it still found it hard to believe that Lin Huang could have killed off the Night Devil's team so easily.
"Let's go!"
Only after Lin Huang had gathered up the loot and shouted at Shadow Wing did it finally came back to reality, gazing at Lin Huang with eyes full of awe.
Chapter 1484: Completion
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
After killing the Night Devil's team of three monsters, Lin Huang did not stir up very much activity.
This was something he had done quite deliberately.
Even if there were monsters nearby that sensed the energy fluctuations from the battle, it was only a fleeting thing.
On top of that, the hunting grounds near the core source were divided by using their respective Divine Telekinesis sensing range limits as boundaries and did not overlap with each other. Even the Divine Telekinesis of the owners of the two nearest hunting grounds could only probe the respective boundaries of their own hunting grounds, so it was impossible for them to learn what had happened in the hunting grounds of the Night Devil's team.
Having witnessed Lin Huang beheading the Night Devil's trio, Shadow Wing put aside its scheming thoughts entirely.
In the beginning, when it took the initiative to lead the way for Lin Huang, it did not have the best intentions.
It had brought Lin Huang to the Night Devils' team here because it felt that the three of them together would not be that much weaker than Lin Huang. If both parties fought against each other, there was a high chance that both would suffer and lose. This way, it would stand to reap benefits from both sides.
What it had not expected was that Lin Huang's abilities far exceeded its wildest imaginings.
Even a strong team like the Night Devil's trio had been easily killed off in an instant.
One should know that while the Night Devil's small team of three was not the most powerful in the core layer, the three members complemented each other very well. Their overall strength was also extremely impressive, almost in the top five among all the teams in the core layer.
This was also why the three of them were able to occupy an area of hunting ground outside the core source.
Sensing the extra three fifth-rank Divine Fires within his body, Lin Huang was basically sure that his previous guess had been correct.
His fourth-rank Divine Fires were saturated, but fifth-rank Divine Fires could still continue to be absorbed.
'I've already accumulated eight fifth-rank Divine Fires. Based on the Life Wheels' inherent behavior from before, they should be fully saturated after another two…' Lin Huang made some mental calculations.
"What's the situation with the next wave of prey?" Lin Huang asked via voice transmission as he followed swiftly behind Shadow Wing.
"The next target I've picked for you is a two-person team. One member is a Devil Giant, and the other is a Rotten Soul…"
Lin Huang was not unfamiliar with these two types of monsters because they had been described in the monster guide.
A Devil Giant was a giant with black hair covering its entire body and a height of around ten meters on average. The reason why it was referred to as a Devil was because its face only had a single organ—a gigantic mouth with six petals that could open up like a blooming flower. The insides of each mouth were full of razor-sharp teeth. Aside from this, there was also a tongue full of poison needles in each mouth. This tongue was an offensive weapon that could shoot out from the mouth and extend for thousands of meters; it was a hundred times more agile than an elephant's trunk.
Its defensive abilities were also astounding—four thickset, muscular arms covered in black hair. As for its hands, they resembled the steel claws of a fierce bird and were frightening to behold.
As for the Rotten Soul, it was a green monster with a shape similar to swamp sludge, its entire body emitting foul-smelling bubbles at any given time. It could even change into any form it desired when it had to fight, but its most common form was that of a pool of sludge with countless tentacles.
Its body contained countless deadly toxins. Even if lightly pricked by the protruding tentacles, the toxins produced in an instant were enough to poison creatures of the same level of combat strength.
This team of two monsters could be considered quite formidable. Their team ranked third in terms of overall strength within the core layer.
Although they were only two individuals, their abilities were a step up from the Night Devil's three-member team.
Lin Huang followed behind Shadow Wing; after only two or three minutes of swift travel, they arrived at the territory of the Devil Giant and the Rotten Soul.
Even before Lin Huang saw the two monsters, he could smell the stench in the air from afar.
This was the smell emitted from the Rotten Soul's body. Not only was it foul in the extreme and nauseating to the point of causing others to vomit, but it was also highly poisonous.
Even if the toxins were not taken into consideration, probably apart from the Devil Giant, very few individuals were willing to team up with the Rotten Soul. This was because most of the Abyssal creatures would not be able to stand the noxious odor alone, whereas the Devil Giant had no sense of smell, and its body was immune to a majority of toxins.Lin Huang hurriedly shut down his body's external respiratory system; only then could he block out the nauseating smell that was making him want to throw up. The truth was that his tolerance for foul odors was extremely high, so even when faced with different types of rotting corpses and internal organs, he did not react much. However, this kind of stench given off by the Rotten Soul's body would directly assault the physiological limits of many creatures' sense of smell, causing them to involuntarily vomit. This was no longer a matter of whether or not one could bear the smell.
Standing off to one side, Shadow Wing used Divine Telekinesis to envelop its entire body, unwilling to allow any part of itself to come into contact with this odor.
"If you knew this would happen, why did you choose such a prey?" Catching a glimpse of Shadow Wing's reaction, Lin Huang cursed inwardly.
A moment later, both of them saw the two monsters below.
The Devil Giant, which had originally been sitting with its back against a small hill, stood up and raised its featureless face in the direction where Lin Huang and Shadow Wing were in mid-air.
Not far from it, a pool of bubbling green sludge also extended its tentacles one by one like germinating young shoots.
The next instant, hundreds of tentacles suddenly surged up and shot toward Lin Huang and Shadow Wing.
Almost simultaneously, the Devil Giant leaped upward.
Although massive in size, its speed was by no means slow, and it appeared above Lin Huang and Shadow Wing almost instantaneously.
Lin Huang had not expected that these two monsters would choose to attack first.
He was momentarily surprised but reacted immediately.
The battle sword in his hand was swiftly withdrawn from its scabbard, immediately transforming into two completely different sword gleams.
One of the sword gleams, which resembled an ocean of blood, rolled with earth-shattering, crushing force toward the Rotten Soul below. Meanwhile, the other sword gleam transformed into a blood-colored crescent moon that surged up into the heavens to take on the Devil Giant above.
The waves from the ocean of blood crashed down upon the Rotten Soul like a tsunami. Wherever the waves passed, all the Rotten Soul's tentacles were obliterated in an instant. Before the Rotten Soul had time to escape, it was completely submerged by the blood-colored waves. Its ear-piercing shrieks of agony only lasted for less than two seconds before abruptly ceasing.
On the other end, the terrifyingly sharp blood-colored crescent moon attacked the Devil Giant.
The Devil Giant seemed to be aware of the danger of this attack and quickly retracted all four limbs in front of itself, stacking them in the shape of a shield and supplementing them with dozens of types of Rule Bending Power.
From its point of view, given its own naturally terrifying defensive abilities as well as Rule Bending Powers, it was confident that it would be able to defend itself against the attacks of any powerhouses, except for top-tier true god-level powerhouses.
The next moment, however, its expression suddenly changed drastically.
This was because he saw that when the blood-red arc touched its arms, the dozens of types of Rule Bending Power it had supplemented itself with disintegrated layer by layer, providing no defense at all.
The blood-colored crescent moon encountered no resistance whatsoever, directly slicing off the Devil Giants's four retracted limbs in front of its torso, before continuing on to slash through the Devil Giant's body as if it were cutting up tofu…
It was another crushing instant kill!
Shadow Wing looked at Lin Huang with increasing awe and respect.
At this point, Lin Huang was ignoring his surroundings. He sank part of his consciousness into his inner world and looked at his ten Life Wheels.
In the ten Life Wheels, the ten fifth-rank Divine Fires—all rank-9— were fully complete.
Lin Huang had originally wondered whether or not he still needed to hunt and kill one or two more monsters after these two, just to see if he could continue absorbing Divine Fires. However, he now knew that it was unnecessary as he could sense the satisfaction that was transmitting from his Life Wheels.
After the ten fifth-rank Divine Fires entered the Life Wheels, his true god-level had reached a state of completion.
The rest just needed to be refined and absorbed…
Withdrawing his consciousness, Lin Huang glanced at Shadow Wing by his side. "You're free to go now."
Shadow Wing was startled when he heard this. "Don't you need to continue hunting?"
"Not anymore." Lin Huang shook his head. "I'm about to leave the Battlefield of the Dragon Abyss."
After saying this, he did not look at Shadow Wing again. He sent out his telekinetic threads and gathered up the loot on the ground before making a beeline straight toward the exit of the core layer.
Shadow Wing remained rooted to the spot in a daze, watching Lin Huang's departure. Only after Lin Huang had left the sensing range of its Divine Telekinesis did it snap back to reality, muttering to itself under its breath, "I'm afraid the humans are about to produce an exceptional prodigy in this epoch…"