Chapter 256: Slaughter! (III)
At this time, Lin Xin’s brain almost short circuited. Li Xin’s ardent lips were like lava, melting all his anger and sad feelings. Currently, he just felt his whole body going soft, clearly turning pale as he sticked to the side of the wall, just as if he had turned into a sort of mural painting.
Separating her lips, Li Xin rapidly drew back until her armor knocked against the other side of the wall with a bang sound.
Her charming face appeared deep red, just like the color of her Rose Unicorn. Although she didn’t gasp for breath, her breast was heaving and she clearly wasn’t as undisturbed as usually.
“This should do!” Li Xin fiercely said, but gave off the impression that she could fall over at any given times now.
“You cannot beat me or curse me now! This young lady isn’t as wealthy as you, neither does she have anything precious she can give to compensate you. This will just do, now I don’t owe you anything anymore.” After she was finished, she rapidly bolted in the direction of the exit, before suddenly thinking of something. After taking a few steps, she turned back to look at Lin Xin’s painting-like-silhouette, and couldn’t help but speak out in anger, “Scoundrel, what’s up with this grieved appearance!? This was this lady’s first kiss!”
As she declared that, she picked up a small rock and threw it at Lin Xin, hitting his leg, before turning back and running away at a flying speed.
Lin Xin looked stiff and turned his head with an exaggerated motion, looking at Li Xin’s disappearing figure. His pale face suddenly became flushed, “I… Did she just forcefully kiss me?” Touching his own lips, he still felt the lingering presence of this ardent feeling.
Without awareness of the time that had passed, he walked back to the exit with the support of the stone wall, his legs still feeling unsteady and weak.
Running into Chen Ying’er, he was given a suspicious look, “What’s up with you, has-drug-bro? Have you caught a fever or what? How can your face be so red?”
“I’m alright.” Lin Xin touched his burning face, looking for a place to sit down with a sluggish face. As far as he could see, Li Xin wasn’t around.
Three whole day passed before the two Demon Hunt Squads recovered a minimal level of fighting strength, though this did not include Yi Jun and Dian Yan. The first had committed a great overdraft and needed to be nursed for some more time, whereas the second was seriously wounded and had yet to recover. But even so, they were ready to move again, and would just barely be unable to face the enemy but nothing more.
Over the past two days, Li Xin and Lin Xin seemed to be avoiding each other, but couldn’t help but occasionally steal a glance at the other party. The others weren’t blind, and naturally felt the strange atmosphere between the two of them. It was only that they were currently in a dangerous place, and everyone was focusing his energy on recovering strength, so no one payed close attention to them.
Their only thought was that the relation between the two of them was just rather awkward because of Li Xin’s forceful inquisition, but by paying good attention, one would discover that Lin Xin’s face was strangely flushed red whenever he caught a glimpse of Li Xin.
“Come here everyone!” Long Haochen stood at Cai’er’s side, raising his voice and calling them together.
Everyone immediately reacted, and rapidly gathered at his side.
“Over the past three days, everyone except from Cai’er, Yi Jun and Dian Yan have mostly recovered. I believe everyone is very curious about what I saw in the Desolate Hissing Cavern, what this cavern was in the end. I’ll show you everything.”
He was a bit ashamed of it, but Long Haochen couldn’t possibly disclose the secret of the Tower of Eternity because it would not necessarily be a good thing. Maybe it would even bring him great inconveniences.
Hearing Long Haochen’s words, everyone curiously glanced at him, but waited respectfully.
As the captain of the 21st general grade Demon Hunt Squad, who explored the cavern by himself, if Long Haochen wanted to keep everything he discovered for himself, the members of the 4th soldier grade Demon Hunt Squad would not be qualified to say anything against it. Without Long Haochen, they wouldn’t even be alive. But Long Haochen put his cards on the table and by openly revealing everything, he indicated that he didn’t have the desire of keeping everything for himself.
The Recording Gem displayed an image under the influence of the spiritual energy injected by Long Haochen, and the world existing inside of the Desolate Hissing Cavern appeared in everyone’s view.
It couldn’t be denied that this Recording Gem was indeed a rare type of treasure. Not only did it record the images, but even the incoming sounds.
Long Haochen appeared in the middle of the image, when the situation inside of the Desolate Hissing Cavern started to be displayed;
Because the whole record was very long, Long Haochen used his spiritual energy to regulate it, accelerating the whole process.
At the beginning of Long Haochen’s exploration, it could be seen that his body was surrounded by such violent fluctuations of spiritual energy, that everyone couldn’t help but feel a chill upon seeing it. Although they didn’t experience it for real, they could imagine how violent of a pressure Long Haochen had been subject to.
When Long Haochen suddenly released a Holy Mantle, his figure suddenly came to a stop and the record paused.
Under everyone’s amazement, Haochen declared in a serious tone, “The results of this exploration weren’t ideal, and I don’t know whether these images will be enough for us to get the mission approved as completed, but inside the Desolate Hissing Cavern, bearing those hissing sounds caused me to gain understanding of a new ability. Since we came here together, risking our life side by side to complete the mission, I am willing to share this ability with all of you. This way, this errand won’t have been for naught no matter how the Alliance decides. As for whether you’ll be able to understand it, it will depend on yourselves.”
Long Haochen’s words shoke everyone as one may imagine, particularly the six members of the 4th soldier grade Demon Hunt Squad, whose expression changed completely.
Luc Xi retorted with almost no hesitation, “Captain Long, you don’t need to do this. Self created abilities don’t need to be shared with outsiders, it can be said to be a part of your own ability!”
In a different situation, perhaps Long Haochen wouldn’t reveal the secret of the ability he hardly gained comprehension of, but because of the secret he kept in the form of the Tower of Eternity, he felt a bit ashamed towards the 4th soldier grade Demon Hunt Squad. His kindhearted character made him do this as an attempt to make up for his insincerity.
Long Haochen revealed a smile, “This ability that I comprehended isn’t something anyone can learn. It is rather suited to a close quarters warrior. Don’t decline it, Captain Luc, since I said this much, I’ll do it. Next, please listen with attention everyone; I’ll tell you about the whole process of my understanding, and whether you manage to learn it or not will depend on your own abilities. I named this new ability ‘Ripples of Light’”
As he said this, a Holy Mantle was released from Long Haochen’s body, and he hinted Li Xin with a gesture, “Sis, launch an attack against my Holy Mantle. Do it slowly, to let everyone have a good look.”
Li Xin gave Long Haochen a helpless glance; the greatest weakness of this younger brother of her was just too clear. Don’t forget this is a precious self-created ability!
However, she still acted in accordance to Long Haochen’s instructions. In her eyes, his disposition as a leader was just improving with time, so since he chose to do this, he ought to have his own reasons.
A fiery red aura was directed against the Holy Mantle and Li Xin made use of her spiritual energy to send a cut towards the Holy Mantle.
But at the instant this cut came into contact with the Holy Mantle, a sudden buzzing sound could be heard, and Li Xin immediately opened her eyes wide. She was completely shocked to see that her cut was deflected without a chance to penetrate Long Haochen’s Holy Mantle.
Since everyone watched carefully, they clearly saw that at the instant Li Xin’s spiritual energy made its way into the Holy Mantle, the whole Holy Mantle emanated a kind of fierce ripples. Those ripples were the cause of the Holy Mantle’s sudden increase in defensive power, so that it was able to deflect Li Xin’s cut with ease.
Long Haochen continued to speak, “This ability called Ripples of Light is something I comprehended inside of the Desolate Hissing Cavern. You should know how powerful the impacts of the hissing sounds were, right? Well, Ripples of Light will bring this kind of amplification to your offensive and defensive abilities. It is able to strengthen our offensive and defensive ability greatly at the cost of an increased consumption of spiritual energy.”
Next, Long Haochen narrated without reservation his whole process of understanding that led to the creation of the Ripples of Light, and showed it once again to everyone else.
It was just as Long Haochen said: Ripples of Light wasn’t suited to magic vocations, and only close quarters combatants could use it. Everyone had a clear understanding of how great the utility of his ability could be. Han Daosi felt that Ripples of Light could produce an incredible increase to his offensive power, whereas a Shield Warrior like Dian Yan felt that the benefits were rather to increase his defensive power by a large extent.
After the end of the record, Long Haochen gave his own narration, speaking of the Tower of Light that appeared in the very last instant before the specters threw themselves at him.
“At this time, I felt a great pain coming from my brain. It was as if these specters were trying to seize my body forcefully. It was at this time that Haoyue came, making use of a soul attack to drive them out. After this moment followed a period of stupor, and by the time I came back to my senses, the tower had already disappeared. From beginning to end, I haven’t seen it clearly enough to determine what it was. The recording ability of the Recording Gem also seems to have been affected, since it didn’t record anything that happened while I was in a state of stupor. However, I can be certain that even if that tower was still there, it’s not something that we could confront with our level of cultivation.”
Long Haochen had thought long before coming up with this story, and still felt guilty deep inside when telling it. But thinking of the shock the necromancers gave to the human world, he finally kept a strong front, telling this half-true story to his own comrades.
After he was done, the most spectacular thing to him was that no one called his report into question. It was clear that with the power of the hissing sound that appeared in the record, they wouldn’t possibly even have made it as far as him, and couldn’t possibly have done any better than Long Haochen. They had already gone as far as they could to accomplish the mission.
Han Daosi said in an embarrassed tone, “Captain Long, since it was as you said, these records should at least give us half the reward upon returning. That… That ability of yours, can we….”
