Thunderbolt Yaksha
The Growling Earth Ape fell to it's death as bolts of lightning fell from the cloudy sky for a brief moment and engulfed the bleeding Ape from all sides.
Cao Guang fell flatly to the ground as he ran out of energy, his Fire, Lightning and Summoning Nebula were almost emptied during the fight as he realised a new found weakness. The Little Flame Belle came near him to console him as he took out a piece of a spirit grade seed for her lunch.
It was the strongest enemy that he had defeated alone since he became a mage. He had defeated a Bewitching Magic Spider of the same level but there was a certain element of luck in that. After all the spider had very weak capabilities other than it's psychic ability.
This was also a reason why he did become a mage. To fight stronger and stronger foes. It was rare for a peak Intermediate mage to fight an advancing Warrior. Killing one at his level was more than just impressive. Yet there were more than ten billion of these creatures in the world.
The magic world's Earth was larger than The Earth by about fifty percent. And the resources like food were abundant especially with magic. Even if humanity was on the back foot, it's population here was larger than on Earth due to many reasons.
The world had more resources, due to an existential threat looming over, the humans were better adapted to life, death and procreation. Cao Guang noticed that a drive for reproduction was indeed higher in this world.
Cao Guang calmed himself and helped his teammates to eliminate the pack as fast as possible and then led them to collect loot and move from the battle zone and covered their tracks.
Monsters weren't the only enemies in the wild. Cao Guang had so far gone with his life without much contact with human degeneration. But he was more than sure it existed.
They rested about a couple of kilometres away from the spot and meditated in turns out recover spiritual energy.
"What was that, a rare Bone?"
"Yep, One of the Warriors dropped one, can't be sure but they are probably worth a couple million" Yao Nan analysed the discoloured bone he held while explaining.
Rare Bones and items dropped by demon beasts and monsters were a result of their cultivation that broke away from the norm for their species. They were quite rare and could be used in different fields from medicine to artificing.
After the group rested the moved on and watched the vegetation slowly change. The elemental sacred land was twenty kilometres in radius. In the outer regions, the vegetation was sparse but they still existed.
The trees weren't evergreen anymore, they had lost their leaves even though they were an evergreen type. The presence of other elements were slowly shrinking causing a mutation in pretty everything.
Experts beleived that the Growling Earth Apes acquired the earth element as an adaptation to this sacred land. As for why they would leave it. It mainly contained resources of Earth element which Growling Earth Apes possessed on birth.
They needed more resources and materials as they grew in strength, driving them away from the elemental sacred land. So the Growling Earth Apes here were weaker than the ones outside. It wasn't suprising they didn't have more than two reported Commanders so far.
But as Growling Earth Apes left the Elemental Sacred land other species were more than happy to take their place without a fight.
The team sighted far more Ferocious Gale Alligators on their way as they avoided as many demon beasts as possible while picking up a few soul seed fragments here and there.
"We can't go any further, they are far too strong and in large numbers" Yan Liling reported back after scouting.
The Alligators seemed to crowding their way in to heart of sacred land like an overflowing river.
"We will have to go around them then, we don't need to progress to the centre, there will probably be Commanders and Advanced mages there, let's find some resources in the mid to outer layers of the Elemental Sacred Land."
Resources were sprayed around the sacred lands just like Northern Burning Valley, only Pang Lai wasn't around. The team was trudging at snail's pace at this point to avoid monsters and due to an occasional ambush from an overzealous beast. The injuries and fatigue were building up again as they rued the lack of a healer with them.