Ping An was originally under the encirclement of the steel-toothed rat and no less than twenty gray-spotted rats.
However, at this moment, the gray-spotted rats around Ping An had already fallen.
Almost all of them were either dead or seriously injured, completely losing their combat power.
The steel-toothed rat in the lead was also heavily injured.
The steel-toothed rat that had once again taken Ping An's attack was injured, so it could only let its subordinate gray-spotted rats surround and stall the latter while it took the opportunity to run far away.
This was already a common trick of the steel-toothed rat.
If it wasn't for the help of a large group of subordinates, the steel-toothed rat would've long been killed by Ping An's Monstrous Strength.
Ping An also noticed that Ji An's situation was precarious.
It decided not to continue the stalemate and decided to try its best to break the situation.
After Monstrous Strength was activated, the muscles under Ping An's skin trembled.
It was accumulating power.
"Roar!" After the charge, Ping An let out an angry roar.
The winter bear cub transformed into an unparalleled war bear. Its feet stomped on the ground, and like a war hammer, it rushed towards the gray-spotted rats that were surrounding it.
It ruthlessly knocked away the dozen gray-spotted rats, bulldozing straight toward the injured steel-toothed rat.
At this moment, two of the steel-toothed rat's four legs had been crippled in the fight against Ping An.
This was the result of the steel-toothed rat's reckless choice to fight head-on with Ping An at the beginning. As a result, it was crippled by Ping An's Monstrous Strength.
Half of its body was covered in frost. It looked like a piece of frozen meat that had been in the freezer for a long time before being taken out.
The steel-toothed rat's body was also twitching and shivering from time to time. It was obvious that it had been frostbitten.
Blood was dripping from its mouth.
No matter how one looked at it, the injuries on the steel-toothed rat's body did not look light.
In contrast, there were only a few rows of teeth marks that were not too obvious on Ping An's body.
Compared to its opponent, its injuries were almost negligible.
These teeth marks were left behind by the steel-toothed rat by trading injuries for injuries.
An ordinary gray-spotted rat simply could not break through the defense of Ping An's Hard Ice.
Faced with Ping An, who had scattered its subordinates and was charging straight at it, the steel-toothed rat's eyes revealed a trace of panic.
Seeing that its subordinates could not stall the enemy, the rat turned around and wanted to run away.
However, its speed was greatly reduced due to its crippled legs, and the Cold Air had crept up its body again.
Ping An caught up to the steel-toothed rat before it could run far.
"Roar!" Ping An pounced forward with an angry roar, and its heavy and round body landed directly on the steel-toothed rat with an overwhelming force, pressing it to the ground.
This was not the end.
"Bang! Bang! Bang!"
Ping An, who was on top of the steel-toothed rat, did not give its opponent any time to catch its breath. It waved its thick arms and attacked the steel-toothed rat under it.
The bear's paw, which was shining with an icy blue light and had the power of the Ice-breaking Palm, was used in a combo.
With the buff of Monstrous Strength, the steel-toothed rat's head was smashed into a bloody mess after a few hits.
At the same time, under the power of the Ice-breaking Palm and Cold Air's ice attribute, the steel-toothed rat's head and the flesh that had been blasted apart were all frozen.
Therefore, there was no scene of blood and flesh flying.
The steel-toothed rat's underlings even wanted to run over to save their leader, but Ping An simply ignored the biting of the gray-spotted rats.
The attacks that could tear wood and bite through iron could only break some of the ice when they landed on Ping An's Hard Ice armor. They could not break its defense at all.
Not long after, the steel-toothed rat that had been struggling under Ping An's body was no longer breathing.
Only then did Ping An slowly get up.
With murderous intent, it slapped away a gray-spotted rat hanging on its back.
It couldn't care less about the probably dead gray-spotted rat that had taken a full-force blow and plunged into the group of rats, killing the remaining gray-spotted rats.
This group of gray-spotted rats had not realized that their leader had already breathed its last.
Thus, they were still wandering around and did not have the awareness to escape in all directions.
It was only after Ping An finished off the steel-toothed rat in a few moves and seeing that their leader was not moving that the rats realize that the latter was probably dead.
Only then did they screech in fear and run out of the cave.
Ping An chased after them aggressively.
With Cold Air fully activated, a few more that could not move were thus killed too.
Meanwhile, Ji An also took this opportunity to beat the dog while it was down and killed the two rats around him.
In the end, only two-fifths of the gray-spotted rats managed to escape.
After the battle, although Ji An was so exhausted that he didn't even want to move a finger, he held the feeling back and didn't let himself relax.
In front of him were materials from the corpses of nearly thirty gray-spotted rats and a steel-toothed rat, waiting for him.
This was undoubtedly a delightful burden.
Ji An could only apply some of the external injury medicine he had bought during Ping An's training to his injured hands.
Then, without stopping, he began to cut up the corpses on the ground.
Even though Ji An's material collecting skills were superb, after dividing the materials from nearly thirty gray-spotted rats, he was still exhausted.
His throat was almost smoking.
That being said, although he was so exhausted that he was about to collapse to the ground, he couldn't help but smile as he looked at the materials that were classified and piled into little heaps.
The gray-spotted rat's material was indeed not worth much, but he had many!
Those experienced bounty hunter teams might not even get as much as he did on a mission.
An experienced hunter team would definitely be stronger than him.
However, the rats were not fools.
When faced with an opponent they couldn't resist, they would've long chosen to escape.
The reason why they chose to stay behind and fight with Ping An was naturally that they felt that they were on par with it in terms of strength and could fight it.
Unfortunately, they were wrong.
Ping An's evolution level might only be the same as the steel-toothed rat, but whether it was in terms of energy level or skill mastery, ordinary familiars that had only gone through their sixth Morphing could not compare to her.
This led to the destruction of the steel-toothed rat and its subordinate rat group.
However, when Ji An started to pack up the materials, he was met with a difficult situation.
After being used as a shield several times, his backpack had been completely torn apart by the gray-spotted rats.
In foresight, Ji An had specially prepared many bags.
However, after all the pockets were filled, some still had not been stored.
Helplessly, Ji An could only take off his jacket, wrapping the rest of the materials in his jacket.
It was just enough to pack everything.
Though, this way, Ping An's four gravity rings could not be packed away.
He could only let Ping An wear them again.
As for the steel-toothed rat's corpse...
Ji An's deboning knife, which had turned blunt during the fight with the gray-spotted rats, couldn't cut it.
He could only let Ping An carry it back.
This was nothing to Ping An, who had just experienced a great battle but was not injured at all.
The last thing to deal with was the fountain starfish.
The fountain starfish's body had already been torn to pieces by the gray-spotted rats.
Even one of its five horns was almost torn off.
However, after Ji An finished dividing the materials, the horn of the fountain starfish, which had been almost completely torn off, had already stuck back to its torso.
Its tattered body had also mostly recovered.
At least it didn't look as tragic as before.
Ji An couldn't help but once again marvel at the tenacious vitality of the fountain starfish.
After placing the packed luggage on the ground, Ji An walked up to the fountain starfish.
He squatted and looked at the fountain starfish that was lying on the ground like a salted fish, "Little guy, this place is too dangerous. You might be attacked by a group of rats at any time and become food. Are you willing to leave with me?"
The fountain starfish was lying on the ground, tilting its body as if it was thinking.
After a long while, it let out soft cries at Ji An as if it was saying something, "Nigu,nigugu~"
Ji An, "You're saying that you got lost here and don't know how to get home. You're hoping that I can send you back in the future? It's a small matter, of course, no problem."
For Ji An, the most important thing was to abduct and subdue the fountain starfish.
As for the future, he could only take it one step at a time.
After hearing Ji An's promise, only then did the fountain starfish happily get up from the ground.
Then, it jumped onto Ji An's back, sticking onto Ji An like a ball of rubber.
"Nigu, nigu~" They could leave now.
Feeling the weight of the fountain starfish, Ji An couldn't help but laugh, "You really know how to save energy."
However, he didn't chase the little one down, taking into account the injuries of the fountain starfish.
Instead, he picked up the two big bags of materials.
With the fountain starfish on his back, as well as Ping An who was carrying the steel-toothed rat and a few big bags of materials while following behind him, he walked toward the entrance of the sewer.