With Stinger around, Qianye couldn’t use his domain at will. Life Plunder was indiscriminate in its attacks, and there was no telling if the little critter could survive contact with those blood threads.
Qianye wasn’t afraid even without an area-of-effect attack. He went on to contend with the beast horde with exquisite swordsmanship, felling each beast in one blow. His speed wasn’t slow, either. Considering his regenerative powers, Qianye’s combat endurance only increased after finding a rhythm.
Stinger was extremely powerful in short bursts, but its stamina was rather limited. After killing hundreds of beasts in succession, it returned to Qianye in exhaustion and lay down in a comfortable spot on his body.
Qianye was in no rush to escape from the endless horde of beasts. He seemed intent on exploring the bottom line of his strength in this new world. He contended patiently with wave after wave of beasts, turning all of them into corpses.
The slaughter went on for the entire night.
By the time the last creature fell with a mournful cry, the sky had once again lit up. A new day had begun in this new world.
The ground around Qianye was covered in beast corpses. If the werewolves were to see this, they would insist on dragging everything back at all costs. Stinger was already asleep on Qianye’s body. It looked ready to evolve yet again after devouring the flesh of the biggest enemy beast.
These ordinary creatures posed no threat to Qianye no matter their numbers. On the contrary, he was now more familiar than ever with the utilization of origin power in this new world. A commotion erupted from up ahead, almost as though a group of beasts was waking up from their slumber.
Qianye came to a sudden stop when he saw a thin vine in front of his feet. This was a crude trap that would likely activate thorns or mines. Such a roughly-crafted trap could only be used against beasts. A somewhat experienced hunter would never fall for it. But why would there be a trap where beasts lived?
A shrill whistle echoed from the center of the forest as a long spear tore through the air and arrived before Qianye.
Frowning, Qianye’s instincts told him that something wasn’t quite right. With a flick of his wrist, East Peak’s movements turned from hard to soft, tapping lightly on the spear and deflecting it to the side. As expected, the force behind this javelin was beyond terrifying. Just the shockwaves were enough to shake Qianye and push him back several steps.
The spear stabbed into the ground at an angle and vanished. Soon afterward, the earth swelled up and exploded in a rain of gravel. Several large trees were uprooted and flung into the air during this process. This was the result of a single spear.
Qianye’s expression was serious, but that didn’t stop him from going deeper into the forest. Another whistling gale kicked up as two more spears flew in, but this time, Qianye didn’t even try to block them. His figure flickered as he used Spatial Flash to evade the attacks. More spears came flying at him after that, but they were all duly evaded. A furious howl erupted from the depths of the forest and with it came a wave of powerful consciousness.
“Scram! This is not a place you should come!” That consciousness planted his message inside Qianye’s mind. It wasn’t a type of language.
“Return my men.”
“They entered my territory and have thus become food for the holy tree.”
Qianye revealed a cold smile as he walked deeper in.
There was a rather large clearing at the heart of the forest. Three giant trees stood tall at its center, the confluence of tree saps forming a small lake between them. A six-armed creature could be seen on a small stony island in the lake.
This particular creature was much more human-like than the one Qianye had killed a while ago, not to mention much stronger too. He simply sat there on a stone chair, eyes closed and immobile. There were obvious creases on his face which, like the rings of a tree, probably spoke of his age. That was if this rule applied to the new world as well.
The six-armed creature grabbed one of the stalagmites near his seat and molded it into a spear. The material of this stalagmite seemed soft, strong, and more metal than stone. After being molded, the stony-metal weapon had a metallic shine to it.
The previous six-armed creature’s sword was also made of the same material, but it seemed like this spear was stronger. Qianye also noticed something off—this six-armed creature neither stood up nor opened his eyes. Only two of his six-arms were moving, while the remaining four hung limp at his side.
Qianye soon realized that most of the stalagmites around him had been chopped away, and the remainder were out of his reach. He could no longer reach them no matter how long his arm was. This was the real reason why the spear attacks had ceased.
Qianye had a clear idea of things now. This six-armed creature was either injured or hibernating. In short, he was in an immobile state and could only use a pair of hands to retaliate against enemies. He couldn’t even stand up. The spear in his hand was his only remaining weapon; he would have nothing left after hurling it. On the other hand, this immobile fellow was the best target for the Shot of Inception. Three shots would surely cripple him no matter how powerful he was.
The six-armed creature wasn’t dumb enough to hurl his last spear, either. He turned his closed eyes in Qianye’s direction and spoke through the mind, “Return and you might live.”
“Where are my men?”
“Your men? Do you mean these creatures? They’re not like you.” The six-armed creature pointed at the giant tree near him. His perception was truly sharp and could immediately tell that humans and werewolves were different.
Qianye followed the creature’s finger to the tree and only figured out the peculiarity after some observation. There seemed to be some human silhouettes on the tree trunks, camouflaged by the natural pattern of the bark. He might have overlooked them if it weren’t for the six-armed creature’s reminder.
Qianye’s eyes lit up with a blue hue as True Sight outlined the human body underneath the bark. It would seem that there was still life in him. The tree sap was flowing into his body and being absorbed into his bloodstream. At the moment, that person’s entire circulation was filled with the giant tree’s sap.
Next to him was a werewolf in the same state.
The two other trees also had humans and werewolves buried in its trunk. Judging from the number, all of the missing scouts were probably here.
Qianye’s gaze landed at the root of the giant tree where several pebbles were scattered, ranging from grey to white. Under his True Sight, he could see some origin power fluctuation from within them, as well as exuberant vitality. These weren’t pebbles but more like eggs.
Most of these eggs were soaked in the pond waters, which, in turn, was made up of tree sap. This meant that these eggs were absorbing the tree sap to gestate life.
Qianye said with a frown, “These eggs are the early form of those beasts?”
The six-armed giant only repeated the same words, “Scram.” There was no telling whether he understood what Qianye was saying.
Qianye wanted to squeeze some information out of him, but seeing that the six-armed creature wasn’t falling for it, he decided not to waste words. He simply pulled out Heartgrave and opened fire!
This shot wasn’t aimed at the six-armed creature but at the pile of eggs at the bottom of the giant tree. As expected, the six-armed creature was shocked and actually stood up from his stone chair.
This movement caused pieces of skin to fall off from his body, almost like a cracking rock. The dehiscent parts revealed the flesh beneath, and blood began flowing out from it.
The wounds were painful just to see, but the creature was in no mood to care about them. He flung the stone spear at lightning speed and struck the origin bullet before it could reach its target!
A loud roar erupted in the woods, and the resultant sound waves shook the three giant trees. A hemispherical shockwave took form inside the woods and slowly spread outward.
Despite its great power, the shot from Heartgrave was actually dissolved by the six-armed creature’s spear. Thinking back to the dozen or so spears from before, this six-armed creature was actually able to launch dozens of attacks at the grade-nine level in a state of hibernation. His strength was truly terrifying.
However, Qianye’s true target wasn’t those eggs—the moment that six-armed creature jumped out, he turned his muzzle toward him and fired at the stone chair.
The six-armed creature was drenched in blood, and movement was difficult for him to begin with. How could he stop his forward momentum under such circumstances? Without his last spear, all he could do was watch Qianye blast his chair to pieces.
After a momentary daze, the six-armed creature’s furious howls spread far and wide. The entire forest was shaken, with leaves falling down like autumn rain. The impact left Qianye seeing stars, almost as though he had been struck by a sledgehammer.
Just that roar had almost injured him. This six-armed creature’s true strength was above that of a duke, maybe even comparable to a prince. Qianye became more cautious.
The creature shook his body, shedding pieces of stony skin to reveal the bloody body underneath. Although he was trembling from the agony, this restored his ability to move. He took several large steps and arrived before Qianye.
Of course, the latter wouldn’t fight head-on against this monster; his figure flickered hundreds of meters away in a flash. This infuriated the giant who charged once again, spraying blood in all directions as he did so. One could easily imagine the pain inflicted by this process. By the time he arrived, Qianye had flickered away once more.
This went on several times before the six-armed creature stopped giving chase. Qianye had just caught his breath and was about to fight back when the creature’s figure turned blurry and appeared immediately in front!
Qianye was shocked out of his wits. Fortunately, Spatial Flash was now an instinctive reaction. The enemy’s silhouette had just materialized when Qianye’s faded away. However, the creature’s figure receded at almost the same time and appeared beside Qianye’s new location!
Qianye immediately thought of Luo Bingfeng. The Tidehark city lord possessed the ability to counter Spatial Flash. Qianye flickered several times in the blink of an eye, but the six-armed creature remained on his heels.
Realizing that the enemy could lock him down and that there was a substantial strength gap between them, Qianye made a firm decision to exit the forest. As expected, the six-armed creature seemed rather apprehensive of the outside environment—he stretched a foot out but pulled back almost immediately afterward.
Qianye stopped hundreds of meters away and stood face-to-face with the six-armed enemy. The creature’s wrathful consciousness rammed into Qianye’s body.
“All of you humans will become nutrition for the Holy Tree!”
