Chapter 79
Translator: T_Fan
Wang Shulin smiled, as though she was already used to their masters bickering.
“Come on. They’re always like that, so there’s no need to pay them any mind.”
“Yes.”
A small flying boat hovered over the open ground before the Mountain Gate. A female cultivator was already standing on the deck, her hair tied high with a red cord.
The sleeves of her dark navy enchanted robe were fastened tightly around her wrists, and a black spear case was strapped across her back. The head of a spear, hung with six iron rings, protruded from the top of the case. She had been gazing down the mountain with one hand resting on the railing, but turned when the two approached.
‘Ah, so that’s her.’
Lee Hyun recognized the face from Senior Brother Mingxiu’s picture album. She was a beautiful woman with a pleasant, refreshingly straightforward air.
Cultivators were generally better-looking than mortals.
Even Qi Refining cultivators benefited from a degree of marrow cleansing, and by the time one reached Foundation Establishment, not only did blemishes disappear from the skin, but facial asymmetry and irregularities in the bone structure were largely corrected as well.
For example, Li Dongsi appeared to cultivators to be somewhere in his forties, while his actual age was estimated to be between forty and a hundred. But that was merely the impression he gave by the cultivation world’s exacting standards. To a mortal, he would have looked no older than his late twenties or early thirties.
The effect was even more pronounced among female cultivators. Once the flaws in their appearance disappeared, even a little makeup was enough for them to be called peerless beauties by the standards of the mundane world.
Some even went out of their way to obtain and take pills such as Appearance-Preserving Pills to make themselves look younger. As a result, they generally looked younger or more beautiful than male cultivators.
This was one of the reasons certain monks of Baoguang Temple who had sworn to preserve their primordial yang suffered all the more!
The female cultivator from the Demon-Subduing Court before him did not seem to have made any particular effort to beautify herself, but perhaps because she had broken through to Foundation Establishment at a young age, she looked remarkably youthful.
Wang Shulin raised a hand toward the flying boat.
“Senior Sister Lu, have you been waiting long?”
“I only just got here.”
The female cultivator gave Lee Hyun a slight greeting.
“I’m Lu Hongyan of the Demon-Subduing Court. I’ll be handling the escort this time.”
“I’m Li Dongsi of the Lotus Court. I’ll be in your care, Senior Sister Lu.”
Lee Hyun could sense the aura of late Foundation Establishment from Lu Hongyan. Wang Shulin was around Foundation Establishment Stage 6, so Lu Hongyan was considerably stronger. He had also heard that Lu Hongyan had entered the sect several years before Wang Shulin.
“You two focus on examining the materials. If any demon beasts appear, I’ll take the front.”
After confirming that both of them were aboard, she activated the flying boat’s restrictions.
The vessel slowly rose into the air.
…
Mountain ranges stretched endlessly beneath the clouds.
Whenever the flying boat descended, they could see terraced fields arranged like steps and villages strung out along the waterways. Many of the villages had small temples at their centers.
Lee Hyun gazed down at the scenery for a while before taking a book from his storage pouch.
It was a popular novel he had not yet finished.
“What are you reading?”
As Wang Shulin sat down beside him, a faint fragrance drifted over on the wind.
“A novel.”
“Is it good?”
“It’s decent enough. I tend to read just about anything.”
Wang Shulin tilted her head slightly toward the open book. A lock of her hair slipped down and brushed against his arm.
“Mind if I read along?”
“Hmm… Shall I take out another novel for you?”
“That sounds like too much trouble. I’ll just read what you’re reading.”
Lee Hyun looked at her.
Up close, her eyelashes were long. When she smiled, her eyes curved gently, and a playful glimmer danced in her clear pupils.
‘She really is beautiful. But I can’t let my two-thousand-year record end now! I have to stay strong.’
Ever since witnessing the power of the Clear Yang Purifying Fire, Lee Hyun had developed the strange goal of preserving the record he had built up over all those years.
In terms of his past life, it was like reaching thirty without ever dating anyone and then discovering that doing so really had given him the ability to use magic.
He could actually produce Buddha-Light True Qi from his hands, and its power grew stronger with every passing year. Once he became fascinated by that ability, suppressing his interest in the opposite sex was not particularly difficult.
Wang Shulin met his gaze for a moment, then the corners of her lips rose.
“Master made it sound as if you were completely uninterested in romance.”
“Haha. I’m simply focused on cultivation…”
Wang Shulin let out a soft laugh, and Lu Hongyan, who was piloting the flying boat, glanced back at them.
…
Quite some time later.
As soon as Lee Hyun closed his book, Wang Shulin spoke as though she had been waiting for him to finish.
“Last time, when I was working on the inside of the golden ring, I tried doing it the way you do. It was much easier.”
“It’s only a minor trick.”
Wang Shulin took out a small notebook and flipped through several pages. She opened it to a page containing drawings of a demon core’s cross-section and the flow of flames, asked him a couple of questions, then jotted down a few notes in the margin.
“No wonder Senior Martial Uncle Huitan treasures you so much when you have skills like this.”
“It’s all because Master taught me well.”
“Still, he goes too far with all that talk about primordial yang. You have desires too, don’t you?”
Wang Shulin lowered the notebook onto her lap.
“By the way, do you plan to keep that vow forever?”
“Hmm… It hasn’t been very long since I made the vow. From the records left by the Seniors, preserving one’s primordial yang seems to be one of the most powerful ways to generate vow power.”
“What if you change your mind later?”
“I suppose I’ll think about it when that happens.”
“Apparently, there’s also a way to cultivate vow power without making vows.”
Lee Hyun turned his gaze toward her.
“How?”
“There’s an inheritance like that on the third floor of the Scripture Pavilion. It’s called the Sutra of Refining Intent into Vow.”
At the front of the flying boat, Lu Hongyan turned her head.
“Junior Sister Wang, you read that too?”
“Only the preface. Master once sent me up there to look for some records, and the title sounded strange, so I took a look.”
Wang Shulin turned back to Lee Hyun.
“Did you know? Even if you keep an oath, vow power won’t accumulate unless you’re consciously aware that you’re keeping it. What do you think that means? It means it isn’t as though heaven itself is keeping track of who keeps their oaths and handing out vow power.”
“Uh… Then what matters isn’t simply whether you actually keep the oath, but your own state of mind?”
“Right. A Dharma teaching refines your conviction that you’ve kept your vow and turns it into vow power. So vow power can be considered a kind of mental power. It isn’t something only sects of the Buddhist tradition, like our Baoguang Temple, can use. Cultivators skilled in sorcery or incantations can wield similar powers.”
“Does the Sutra of Refining Intent into Vow create vow power in a different way?”
“That inheritance uses visualization and spirit refinement to nurture a mind seal within the primordial spirit. Once it becomes stable enough, it can generate vow power without relying on a vow that requires adhering to a particular course of action.”
Lu Hongyan asked,
“If it’s that good, why don’t they teach it?”
“Because it’s too difficult and takes too long.”
Wang Shulin gave a small shrug.
“Plenty of people cultivate it for decades without managing to establish a proper mind seal, and establishing one isn’t the end of it either. Forcing an unstable mind seal into use can injure the primordial spirit, so it has to be refined for a long time afterward as well. By comparison, if you simply make a vow and keep your oath, you can use Buddha-Light True Qi with similar effects in a much shorter time.”
“I see. Better to spend that time learning a different inheritance. Time is spirit stones, after all.”
Wang Shulin laughed and nodded at Lu Hongyan’s remark.
Lee Hyun was silent for a moment.
‘So that’s how it works. If I learn that, I won’t have to keep clinging to my vow forever. I can just cultivate it slowly…’
Wang Shulin added,
“If you’re interested, look it up sometime. If fate allows, you might get a chance to read it. But learning it won’t automatically erase the vow you’ve already made. I heard you’d also have to separately learn how to withdraw the vow power you’ve accumulated. And it’s also true that preserving your primordial yang benefits the Clear Yang Purifying Fire Art.”
“I see.”
Wang Shulin placed a small drawing board on her lap.
The rooftops and trees of a village they had passed earlier were drawn on it.
“You learned to paint as well?”
“Mm. It’s actually related to my vow.”
Wang Shulin answered as she moved her brush.
Instead of ink, golden Buddha-Light True Qi suffused the tip of the brush.
“I vowed to draw one thing I’ve never drawn before with my own hand every day.”
“That’s a good vow. It must be useful for sharpening your powers of observation.”
“Exactly. It comes in handy during fights too.”
“In fights?”
“This brush is a magic tool. If I draw a crane with fire, it flies out and attacks my enemy. If I draw a tiger, it charges out and bites them.”
“That’s remarkable.”
The sheets of paper stacked beneath the drawing board depicted things like an unknown insect, a broken teacup, and a twisted tree branch.
The tip of her brush moved along the tree’s slender branches.
A while later, Wang Shulin raised the brush and examined her drawing.
“This tree really is shaped strangely!”
She suddenly stood up and struck an absurd pose.
Lu Hongyan looked at her.
“Do you really have to act it out with your whole body?”
Lee Hyun asked,
“Senior Sister Lu, what vow did you make?”
“I vowed not to hide the mistakes I make in battle. Win or lose, I record them.”
Lu Hongyan pointed to a small booklet at her waist.
“Do you show it to other people?”
“No. I’m pretty much the only one who reads it.”
“And that still counts as a vow?”
“Surprisingly, yes. People have a tendency to deceive even themselves and rationalize their mistakes. Facing those things head-on is quite difficult.”
She spoke calmly.
“When I win, it’s easy to think I won because I was skilled, and when I lose, to blame it on my opponent having a better magic tool or better luck. But I may have been luckier than I realize, and my opponent may have been unlucky. Most importantly, when it sounds like an opponent was simply lucky, that’s often because they were being modest when they described what happened. Thanks to this vow, I’m not only producing Buddha-Light True Qi, I’m improving my actual skills more quickly as well.”
“That’s a good vow.”
“The downside is that I need to fight often to create opportunities for my vow power to grow. If I’m not careful, that can turn into a dangerous habit of throwing myself into deadly situations. It’s important not to let your own vow control you.”
…
As sunset approached, Wang Shulin spread out a fresh sheet of paper.
With the brush handle held between her teeth, she looked around. Her gaze passed over the sky, the clouds, the railing, and Lu Hongyan before finally settling on Lee Hyun.
“I haven’t drawn Junior Brother Li’s face yet.”
A short while later, Wang Shulin stopped her brush and looked back and forth between the picture and Lee Hyun.
“That’s strange…”
“What is?”
“Your face doesn’t have many distinctive features. Maybe I’d say it leaves a sort of vague impression…”
“Haha…”
Lee Hyun realized it was because of his Seven-Aspect Disguise Method.
‘I should research disguise arts a little more too.’
***
Several days later, Baisha Port in Haiguang Kingdom.
It lay roughly thirty thousand li (about 11,760 km) south of Baoguang Temple.
Small houses stretched beyond a wooden palisade erected along the coast. Flat stones weighed down the roofs, and wooden posts for hanging fishing nets out to dry stood in every alley.
But perhaps all the nets had been taken down, because when the flying boat entered the air above the port, the only thing stirring was a lone scrap of cloth.
Two boats remained at the docks. One had a large section torn from its side, while the other lay tilted on the beach with its hull exposed.
Lee Hyun examined the underside of the damaged boat.
A thick scale was lodged between the planks.
“Have you come from the main temple?”
An elderly monk in gray robes approached from a low hill behind the port, accompanied by two young monks.
All three were Qi Refining cultivators. The elderly monk had reached Qi Refining Great Perfection, but in the presence of three Foundation Establishment cultivators, even his steps were noticeably cautious.
Lu Hongyan lowered the flying boat and showed her spirit tablet.
“I’m Lu Hongyan of Baoguang Temple’s Demon-Subduing Court. These two have come with me from the Lotus Court.”
The elderly monk pressed his palms together and bowed until he was nearly bent in half.
“This humble monk is Yuanwu, abbot of Hai’an Temple. This humble monk and the others lacked the strength to handle the matter ourselves and have troubled the Immortal Masters to journey so far.”
Dried mud stained the hem of his robes, and one sleeve had been patched with a piece of new cloth.
“Have all the residents been evacuated?”
“Yes. The last cart left three days ago. They’re staying inside the city to the north now.”
“Good.”
Wang Shulin spoke.
“You’ve been keeping the demon-beast carcasses, I hear?”
“We have no intact specimens. They are not demon beasts this humble monk and the others are capable of killing. We did recover a few that washed ashore already dead, however….”
“Show us those first.”
…
A stone chamber behind Hai’an Temple.
When the sealing talisman on the door was removed, a fishy stench seeped out.
A turtle’s hind leg, fragments of a shattered carapace, and part of a water snake’s torso lay on a stone table. A preservation formation was running, but the materials were in poor condition.
Yuanwu explained,
“They say the water snake coiled around the boat while the turtle rammed it from below. When this humble monk and the others approached using talismans, the two withdrew eastward together.”
Lee Hyun examined the carapace fragments and the water snake’s torso in turn. He saw neither gu insects nor silver needles.
‘Could it really have nothing to do with the Dongming Sect?’
There was too little left, however, to conclude from this alone that the creatures had not been controlled.
“Have they appeared again recently?”
At Lu Hongyan’s question, Yuanwu nodded.
“Yesterday around sunset, we saw two turtles on an offshore sandbar. We did not dare approach them carelessly.”
“Show us where.”
…
A little over a hundred li east of the port.
Narrow channels ran between sandbars exposed by the receding tide. In every pool left behind by the sea, small fish moved about, flashing their silver bellies.
Lu Hongyan lowered the flying boat.
“There they are.”
Two shapes like black boulders huddled together at the end of the sandbar.
When Lee Hyun swept them with his divine sense, one slowly moved.
It was a turtle.
Its carapace was nearly three zhang (about 9.9 m) long. Seaweed and barnacles clung to its shell, and hook-like claws grew from the ends of its thick feet.
“Dark-Armored Sea Turtles. The big one looks like it’s late Tier 2.”
Lu Hongyan spoke.
Lee Hyun looked at the channel between the two turtles.
There was a long red line beneath the water.
“There’s a snake as well.”
“Mm. I saw it.”
Lu Hongyan landed on a rocky stretch of coast and put the flying boat into her storage pouch.
“Let’s take those three down first.”
A palm-sized bronze incense burner floated out of Wang Shulin’s sleeve.
It stood on three short legs, and its lid was shaped like a closed lotus. When she infused it with spiritual power, the petals opened, revealing a glowing red ember inside.
She held a brush in her other hand.
“I’ll keep the smaller one pinned down. Please leave the head intact. We need to see whether it was being controlled.”
“Got it. Junior Brother Li, watch the water snake.”
Lu Hongyan flicked two fingers and pointed into the air.
Thoom!
The spear case on her back burst open, and a long spear tore through the air.
Its six iron rings shrieked as a piercing whistle split the air.
It crossed dozens of zhang in an instant. Golden Buddha-Light True Qi flowed like lightning along the shaft of the flying spear.
The Dark-Armored Sea Turtle raised its head.
Whoooosh!
A torrent of murky water erupted from its mouth like a cannon shot.
“Break through!”
The instant Lu Hongyan stabbed her fingers downward through the air, Wang Shulin’s brush scattered sparks behind her.
She slashed the brush through the air, sketching a neck and wings. The crimson ember inside the incense burner spewed fierce flames that swallowed her brushstrokes.
Fwoooosh!
Just as the long spear twisted in front of the torrent and expanded to three zhang in length, a blazing fire crane swept in low.
Boom!
The long spear slammed down on the turtle’s back, crushing the barrier of water surrounding its carapace.
Golden ripples spread from the point where the spearhead struck. A low sutra chant sounded, and each successive ripple shattered another layer of the water barrier, spraying enormous sheets of water in every direction.
Hidden by the spray, the fire crane swept in and lashed flames across the smaller turtle’s face.
Hissss―
The shallow seawater boiled in an instant, filling the air with thick, fishy steam. Blinded, the smaller turtle recoiled in fright and tucked in its head.
But the larger one, a late Tier 2 demon beast, was different.
Grrrrrr!
With a piercing roar, all the seaweed clinging to its shell stood on end. Seawater surged upward from every nearby pool and gathered into a spinning water wheel as large as a house.
The fierce vortex repeatedly knocked aside the long spear as it tried to strike the creature’s flank. Sparks flew from the spearhead as it scraped across the carapace and glanced away.
Then an enormous water wheel, tearing up the entire sandbar in its path, hurtled toward the rock where the three stood.
“Up!”
Lu Hongyan rose first, and Lee Hyun and Wang Shulin split to either side and flew into the air.
Rumble!
The water wheel swept directly beneath their feet and tore away the entire edge of the rocky outcrop. Spray and gravel flew in every direction, stinging their cheeks.
When the surging seawater collapsed one of the fire crane’s wings, the smaller turtle seized the opening and burst through the spray.
“Not so fast!”
As Wang Shulin descended, she turned her brush sideways and drew a long stroke.
The fire crane’s body instantly unraveled and transformed into a low, elongated wall of fire.
Terrified by the flames blocking its path, the creature twisted away from the scorching sand. But directly behind the larger turtle was a blind spot with no room to escape.
“Got you!”
A vajra shot from Lu Hongyan’s sleeve, trailing golden light as it fell over the heads of the two turtles.
Hummm!
The vajra swelled to three zhang long and released an enormous wave of spiritual power.
A huge golden circle spread beneath it. As though crushed beneath an invisible millstone, the two creatures’ feet sank deep into the sand. Sand was forced outward all around them, and even the current the larger turtle had been gathering was crushed apart.
But the larger turtle desperately raised its head.
Its thick neck stretched taut, and a mass of blue water swelled inside its mouth, brimming with toxic qi.
Lu Hongyan crooked her finger downward, and the circling long spear plunged like a bolt of lightning.
Boom!
The spear, dyed golden, drove into the creature’s open mouth, pierced through its neck, and buried itself in the sandbar. Blood erupted like a fountain, and the gathering mass of water burst apart without strength.
Amid the reek of blood, Lee Hyun caught sight of a red line at the edge of his vision. It was slicing through a shallow channel as it slipped away.
‘The water snake!’
It was trying to escape across the tidal flats while the turtles held their attention.
Lee Hyun reached out, and the gigantic hand formed by the Condensed-Essence Grasping Hand split through the surface of the water in an instant.
The water snake twisted its body.
Shwaaak!
Dozens of water needles burst from the surface and rained toward Lee Hyun’s face.
Clang!
A turquoise shield plate swept in front of him and shattered the needles to pieces.
Meanwhile, the giant hand plunged beneath the surface and clamped tightly around the water snake just below its head.
Splash!
A body that looked at least five zhang long was hauled into the air. The water snake thrashed its tail violently around the giant hand’s wrist, while dark red mist seeped from its gaping mouth.
Just before the poison mist could spread, Lee Hyun lightly flicked a finger.
Slice.
A flash of silver sword light shot from his sleeve and grazed the back of the snake’s neck, cutting cleanly through the joint between two vertebrae.
Its long body writhed several times before going limp.
As Lee Hyun dragged the carcass onto the sandbar, he wrapped the escaping poison mist in flames and burned it away.
The Sinking Moon Sword had already returned to his storage pouch.
Thoom!
At that moment, Lu Hongyan’s long spear tore free from the larger turtle’s neck and traced a crimson arc through the air. It pierced the smaller turtle through the back of the neck, still pinned beneath the vajra, and buried itself in the sandbar.
The surroundings fell silent.
…
Lu Hongyan recalled the vajra and washed the blood from the tip of her long spear in the seawater.
After shrinking the spear back to its original size and returning it to the case on her back, she examined the larger turtle’s foreleg, which had been hidden beneath its carapace.
“It was already injured? Come to think of it, its reactions were strange from the start.”
Lee Hyun approached to inspect it as well. A deep chunk had been gouged from its thick flesh. Dark, clotted blood crusted the edges, and some of the muscle deeper inside had been severed.
When Wang Shulin shifted the turtle’s body slightly, a similar wound appeared on the opposite side of the carapace.
“You didn’t inflict these wounds, did you, Senior Sister?”
“No.”
Wang Shulin took out a small piece of paper and marked the locations.
Lu Hongyan turned toward the water snake Lee Hyun had moved aside.
“Junior Brother Li, you’re surprisingly good in a fight.”
“I was fortunate.”
Lee Hyun washed the remaining sand from the water snake’s body.
The fellow had a long wound along its flank as well.
…
The three moved the carcasses onto a flat stretch of rock along the nearby coast.
A low cliff extended behind them, and a narrow path wide enough for a person to walk along ran to the left.
While Lu Hongyan kept watch over the surroundings, Wang Shulin and Lee Hyun divided the carcasses between themselves.
Wang Shulin straightened out the water snake’s body, inserted needles at each point she intended to cut, and sliced beneath the scales.
She collected the flowing blood directly into jade bottles and tied off the meridians around the venom sac in advance.
Lee Hyun examined the turtle’s neck and the inner side of its carapace.
‘If there were a gu insect, the fuzzbees should react…’
The spirit-insect pouch remained quiet.
Still, Lee Hyun examined the carcass thoroughly, just in case.
The location where a gu insect was implanted varied depending on the method and the host.
In the demon beasts he had captured long ago at Haimen Port, he had found spirit insects beneath the venom sacs or around the neck. The breeding records for Life-Bound Gu also described methods that used other locations where meridians converged.
He opened each suspicious area in turn.
But even after employing several detection methods, including his divine sense, Aura-Reading Art, and Keen Hearing Art, then dissecting the carcass himself, he found nothing.
‘Looks like the fuzzbees won’t be getting a meal.’
…
Quite some time later, Wang Shulin called to Lee Hyun.
“Junior Brother Li. Come look at this.”
A piece of flesh cut from the water snake’s flank lay in front of her.
Several thin meridians beneath the wound had turned black.
“At first I thought the fellow’s own poison had seeped into them, but the reaction is different.”
Wang Shulin dripped a drop of medicinal liquid onto it. The reddish mucus slowly turned clear, but the blackened sections remained unchanged.
Lee Hyun activated the Aura-Reading Art and examined the interior.
“It seems to be demon power from another demon beast.”
Lee Hyun placed a piece of flesh he had cut from the turtle’s foreleg beside it, and the same energy revealed itself within those meridians.
Wang Shulin spread two sheets of paper beside them, each marked with the locations of the injuries. They showed the marks on both sides of the carapace and on the water snake’s flank.
Lu Hongyan had approached without them noticing and looked down at the papers.
“…Claws?”
“It looks as though something grabbed them and then lost its grip. The same demon power remains in the wounds too.”
“There were no traces of gu insects either. It doesn’t look like someone was controlling them and making them move together.”
At Lee Hyun’s words, Lu Hongyan turned toward the sea.
“Does that mean there’s something around here capable of attacking Tier 2 demon beasts?”
All three felt a vague sense of unease.
“Let’s head back for now. Don’t search any farther.”
They were hurriedly gathering the venom sac, demon blood, and pieces of carapace when a sloshing sound came from below the rocks.
Lee Hyun looked down and saw that a stone which had been visible beneath his feet moments earlier was now underwater.
‘Is the tide coming in already?’
But something was wrong.
The seawater was not flowing inward. Instead, it was swelling upward in a broad curve from farther offshore.
A black back broke the surface.
A Dark-Armored Sea Turtle.
Then another appeared behind it.
“Senior Sister.”
Before Lee Hyun could finish calling out, Lu Hongyan was already taking the flying boat from her storage pouch and activating its restrictions.
As the three boarded, the vessel lifted away from the rocks.
Its altitude had changed only slightly, yet the sea looked completely different.
Black shadows filled every channel beyond the sandbars.
There were far more than one or two.
Lee Hyun extended his divine sense, then his expression hardened.
Ten, twenty.
There were dozens within sight alone. Beneath the surface, the auras of Tier 2 demon beasts surged toward them like waves.
“We’re heading north immediately.”
Lu Hongyan turned the bow of the flying boat.
Wang Shulin summoned her incense burner and took out a voice-transmission talisman with her other hand.
“Yuanwu. A horde of Tier 2 demon beasts is converging on the eastern coast. Evacuate the temple and retreat to the city. Immediately.”
As soon as she finished speaking, the talisman streaked westward, leaving a trail of light behind it.
BOOM!
At that exact moment, the surface below the rocks exploded, and a demon beast with a blue dorsal fin burst from the water and slammed into the underside of the flying boat.
Thud!
A turquoise shield plate flashed beneath the vessel and deflected the impact at an angle.
Thrown off course, the demon beast’s massive body crashed into the cliff opposite them.
Rumble!
With a deafening crash, the sheer rock face collapsed.
“Keep going.”
With a single gesture, Lee Hyun sent two more shield plates spinning into place, completely covering the underside and right side of the flying boat.
Wang Shulin’s brush danced, tracing dazzling arcs.
Using the fierce flames erupting from the incense burner, she drew a huge ring in the air, infused it with spiritual power, and hurled it toward the sea behind the flying boat.
Rrrrrumble!
The flames exploded outward in a circle the instant they struck the surface. An enormous volume of seawater boiled in moments, sending up a dense wall of scalding steam that completely obscured the vision of the dozens of demon beasts leaping after them.
The flying boat shot over the top of the cliff at tremendous speed.
Yet even as Lu Hongyan accelerated, she could not tear her gaze away from the sea.
The outer waters from which the demon beasts had come.
Several li away, a reef was slowly sinking beneath the surface.
No.
Something behind the reef was rising to its feet.
A long, massive arm emerged, and its fingers closed around the rock. The reef, large enough to be clearly visible even from this distance, crumbled helplessly in its grasp.
Shaking seawater from its body, an enormous ape straightened its back.
The fellow was covered in brown fur, while scales grew across its chest and belly. When it lowered its webbed hands, the waist-deep seawater split apart to either side.
Thoom―
The instant it looked in their direction, a headache struck all three of them as though lightning had exploded inside their skulls. Chilling killing intent and crushing pressure washed over them.
A tremendous wave of divine sense had swept across the entire coastline.
“A Tier 3 demon beast….”
Lu Hongyan’s voice dropped.
The flying boat accelerated again.
Lee Hyun looked back and judged the distance. It was still far away. He did not know how fast that thing could move through the sea, but if they flew farther inland now….
Whoooosh―
At that moment, a shadow passed over the flying boat.
All three of them looked up almost simultaneously.
Above the mountain ridge running parallel to the coast.
Dark blue-black wings slowly tilted beneath the clouds.
It was a bird.
Long feathers like spearheads extended from the tips of its wings. Two pale streams of wind trailed far behind its tail.
As the creature banked, the forest below flattened in a single direction as though struck by a typhoon.
A sharp, tearing demonic qi, entirely different from that of the ape in the sea, rolled along the mountain ridge.
Wang Shulin’s brush froze.
“Two Tier 3 demon beasts…?”
⚬──────────✧──────────⚬
Join our discord server: https://discord.gg/96hMXymzMP