abcnovels
Chapter 136: Ability Enhancement, Temporal Power
Chapter 136: Ability Enhancement, Temporal Power
Chapter 136: Ability Enhancement, Temporal Power
On the surface of the sea, the Sword Armored Fiery Beast let out a low roar.
Roar! What’s the matter?
The massive Single-horned Orca created huge waves as it rolled through the water, but its voice was very soft.
Squeak! Squeak! Squeak! I found something good, let's go get it together.
The Fiery Beast instantly perked up.
Roar! What's guarding that place?
This Orca wasn't stupid; it wouldn’t have sought the Fiery Beast out if it had been able to get this good stuff completely by itself. Either the terrain there was too narrow, or there were powerful mutated beasts guarding it.
Squeak! Squeak! Squeak! It's a bit small there, I can't get in, and there are two annoying fellas guarding it.
Although the two beasts could communicate through telepathy, this method was very vague, mainly due to the fact that the orca had no human-like thoughts or cognition. After finally determining that the two mentioned “fellas” were shorter than the Orca, the Fiery Beast decided to follow along and take a look.
As long as they weren't higher level mutated beasts larger than the orca, the Fiery Beast was confident it could defeat them.
Roar!! Lead the way, let's do this.
Squeak! Squeak! Squeak! Let's do this.
The massive Orca turned around and headed toward the open sea, with the Fiery Beast following behind, the sharp black spikes on its back tearing through the waves.
Squeak!!
As they passed by the orca pod, the three young orcas curiously looked at the passing Fiery Beast, emitting childish greetings toward it.
This time, the distance was even farther. It took the orca and the beast almost two hours to reach the spot, and then the Orca dived, the Fiery Beast quickly following suit.
In a short while, the two beasts arrived at a depth of one thousand meters in the ocean. The surroundings were pitch black and silent, and the water was icy cold. The Fiery Beast strained its perception to avoid being ambushed by deep-sea giants lurking in the darkness.
Squeak!! We're almost there.
The Orca’s call came from ahead, but the sound was very faint, only traveling a couple dozen meters before being drowned out by the freely undulating water.
Sure enough, after swimming for a few more kilometers, the Orca gradually slowed down. The Fiery Beast did the same, realizing why the Orca had stopped.
On the dark seabed about a hundred meters ahead, a towering mountain peak rose from the ground. What caught the Fiery Beast’s attention, however, was a cave in the mountainside. A faint blue light could be seen emitting from the mouth, and two double-headed mutated snakes covered in blue-white scales, twenty-seven meters and nineteen meters in length each, coiled around it.
The larger of the two snakes had horns on both heads, resembling a dragon and exuding an astonishing pressure.
From the invisible aura they emitted, the Fiery Beast knew that these snakes were very strong, much stronger than other mutated beasts of the same size.
No wonder the Orca had come looking for help. Even if the size of the cave hadn’t been an issue, those snakes didn’t look like they would be easy to take on alone, and whatever was in that cave was unlikely to be worth that risk.
Over time, the Fiery Beast had observed that the hunting methods of deep sea mutated beasts primarily depended on biological type and size. The size was especially important; in order to avoid injury or being targeted by a stronger creature, mutated beasts typically went after prey half their size or smaller.
Targeting prey larger than oneself was normally a suicidal act, which made the Fiery Beast’s particular method of hunting prey twice its size or more an outright anomaly.
The Orca emitted a low whistle.
Squeak!! I'll deal with the big one, you take care of the small one. After we kill them, we'll go in and take out the good stuff for everyone to share.
Roar!! No problem, but how do you know there's good stuff inside?
With a diameter of about five meters, the Orca definitely couldn't get inside the cave, which left the Fiery Beast puzzled as to how it had discovered there was something inside in the first place.
Squeak!! When I swam over from above, I smelled a pleasant aroma.
As it spoke, the Orca lightly shook its head to draw attention to the horn, which had many densely packed small holes that emitted a faint energy fluctuation when filtering seawater.
This gave the Fiery Beast pause. It had initially assumed that the horn was for combat, and wouldn’t have guessed at all that it was instead connected to sensory function. Maybe that was why the Orca hadn’t provoked the Sword Armor Beast before, due to realizing the beast wouldn’t be easy to deal with.
Just then, the Two-headed Deep-sea Snakes glanced over with their cold eyes, and circles of gray-black mist surrounded their bodies, dissolving into the surrounding water.
Roar!! They've spotted us, let's get them.
The Fiery Beast let out a low roar, and its fiercely hot aura erupted. Its four claws stirred up rolling mud and sand as it leaped up from the seabed.
Rather than charging head-on, however, it turned at an arc to flank the snakes. The frontal assault was the Orca’s job—with how much bigger it was, it was a born meat shield, just like Xia Youhui.
Boom!
The sea exploded. Leveraging its size advantage, the Orca charged directly towards the two snakes, resembling a deep sea tank with its thick, armor-like scales.
Hiss!
The two snakes emitted a cold hiss, then leaped out to meet the Orca. As the two sides approached within a hundred meters, the Orca opened its mouth. In an instant, a powerful suction force enveloped the two snakes and the surrounding water.
Boom!
The sea within a hundred meters surged, turning into a rapidly rotating vortex under the strong suction force. The snakes were pulled toward the orca’s mouth, which seemed like a black hole.
At the same time that the orca launched its attack, however, circles of gray light burst forth from the snakes’ bodies.
Wherever these silent gray halos passed, the originally turbulent water became sluggish. As they spread further, the huge water vortex began to slowly dissipate.
Even the Orca, which had been charging directly forward, and the Fiery Beast, which had been trying to circle around to attack the snakes from behind, were caught in the halos, coming to an abrupt, near-complete pause as if they were in slow motion.
There was also a faint, fishy scent, which seemed to be making the Fiery Beast’s head spin a bit. The effect was even greater for the small marine creatures in the water around it, which outright dissolved into toxic water in the blink of an eye.
Thankfully, the Beast’s fiery physique proved resistant against this effect; all it took was a shake of its head to dispel the dizziness.
This particular display of power surprised even the Beast. Not only did the snakes possess corrosive toxins that dissolved everything in the water, but they also had a slowing effect. Under those gray halos, the Fiery Beast and Orca could only move at a tenth of their normal speed.
Hiss!
The snakes, on the other hand, were completely unaffected by their own halos. They were extremely agile, one lunging toward the swaying Orca and the other toward the Fiery Beast behind it.
The nineteen-meter-long snake appeared in front of the Fiery Beast, the two fierce mouths lunging toward its head and neck.
Yes, the Beast’s reaction was slowed tenfold. So what?
The muscles of its right arm swelled, and in an instant, the water exploded as it fiercely slapped one of the snake’s heads, fast enough to leave an afterimage.
Boom!
The snake’s left head exploded, and its body was sent flying by the force, crashing heavily into the mountain wall dozens of meters away.
You can slow me down, but I’m still faster.
With a cold gaze, the Fiery Beast activated its speed ability, and the seabed shattered under its claws as it shot out like a black shadow, biting down on the snake’s neck.
Hiss!!
The snake’s remaining head screamed as it started to struggle frantically, its body erupting with both hundreds of thousands of tons of force and more of that gray halo energy.
As soon as these toxins fell on the Fiery Beast's body, however, half of them were completely broken down by the intense heat, while the rest was simply absorbed.
Having started out as a six-horned salamander, the Fiery Beast had powerful regeneration, as well as its own toxin. While its evolutionary abilities were focused on strength, defense, and agility, these innate abilities had also become stronger as the Fiery Beast continued to grow.
Add its terrifying physique on top of that, and it could completely ignore the snake’s toxins. Only that slowing effect had some impact on it, but it still couldn't stop the force gathering in its upper and lower jaws, finally snapping shut with a dreadful crunch.
The snake’s neck, as thick as a water barrel, was almost completely severed, all the way through the spine. Only a small amount of flesh remained connected, and rich blood spurted out, dyeing the surrounding water red.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The now dead snake’s nineteen-meter-long body still thrashed about wildly, sending countless rocks flying and stirring up mud and sand.
Once the Fiery Beast killed the snake, the grayish power covering the immediate surroundings disappeared, and the Beast returned to a normal speed.
It glanced over and spotted the Orca, still affected by the other snake’s power, as the snake bit into the Orca’s neck with both heads. The Orca, however, not only had its natural thick layers of fat, but an additional meter-thick layer of scales, creating a formidable armor.
Neither head could completely penetrate that combination of scales, skin, and fat, preventing the both of them from being able to inject their stronger toxins.
The orca was also smart, guarding its eyes and other vital spots when under attack. Not even strangulation was an option for the snake; the size difference was too great.
Seeing this, the Fiery Beast decided not to bother, instead turning and swimming into the blue cave.
As soon as the snake noticed this, both heads immediately let go of the orca, and it turned quickly to follow after the intruder.
Boom!
Just as the snake rushed into the cave, the water around it exploded. The Beast, which was hanging onto the roof of the cave, dove down with a terrifying aura. It burst out with a speed twenty times its base, instantly appearing at the snake’s heads. Even though its gray slowing power was still active, it had no time to react.
Boom! Boom!
Both huge heads, each larger than a sedan, immediately exploded under the force of the Fiery Beast’s sneak attack. The Beast’s momentum didn’t diminish at all, and its entire body slammed into the ground of the cave with a loud crash, shattering the earth and causing the ground to tremble.
Stones rolled, and a large amount of muddy water mixed with snake flesh rushed out of the cave. After several minutes, the tumbling water finally calmed down, revealing a cave mouth now twice its original size and a fierce black-red figure floating next to the snake carcass.
It was at this moment, the Orca approached, emitting excited sounds.
Squeak! Squeak! Squeak! Brother, well done, hurry up and get those things inside.
Roar! Roar! Don't rush me, I know.
The Fiery Beast ignored this guy. So useless. It couldn't even handle a mutated beast smaller than itself.
Now that it had the opportunity, it turned to look deeper into the cave. It turned out that the light was being emitted by what appeared to be some blue crystal-like ore that was scattered about the cave. The Fiery Beast would have almost thought that it had found some actual Blue Crystals were it nor for the fact that they weren’t also emitting any energy waves.
Something about the light itself, however, was making it feel uncomfortable. It seemed like the ore was possibly radioactive, perhaps powerful enough to cause damage even to the Fiery Beast’s body with prolonged exposure.
No wonder those snakes stayed outside.
Lost in thought, the Fiery Beast followed the winding tunnel down for hundreds of meters, until it found itself in a slightly spacious cavern. A stalactite over ten meters long hung from the ceiling, and the entire cave glimmered with a faint blue light that converged at the top of the stalactite, gradually condensing into what appeared to be a liquid.
Three fist-sized drops of this blue liquid floated in the water below without dissolving, crystal clear like pearls and emitting a faint halo. As soon as the Fiery Beast looked at those liquid “pearls,” its instinctual devouring nature surged again.
Good stuff. The Fiery Beast’s eyes lit up with curiosity and anticipation as it swam closer with a slight swish of its tail. It extended a sharp claw and gently touched one of the drops, causing it to bounce away instantly.
Is it because of a higher density compared to seawater, or does it contain special energy?
The Fiery Beast didn’t wait any longer, opening its mouth and outright swallowing one of the blue pearls along with some water. The moment the blue liquid pearl entered its stomach, a chilling surge of energy spread throughout its body.
Boom!
Under that chilling energy, the temperature of the Beast's internal fiery energy surged rapidly. The heat emitted from its flesh skyrocketed from 150 degrees Celsius to 300 in an instant.
Red light burst from the gaps between its scales, as fire danced and flickered. Even the thick, black scales turned slightly red due to the intense heat, resembling burning steel.
The temperature of the surrounding water rose significantly, and bubbles frantically churned.
Huff! Huff! Great stuff! The Fiery Beast exhaled a hot breath from its nostrils, its eyes fixed on the two remaining blue pearls with sheer excitement.