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"Whoa—now that's a huge ant!"
Wu Liuqi couldn't help shouting when he noticed Nine-Tails' opponent.
Nine-Tails had finally met a real challenge.
Its enemy was a Thousand-Jin Ant with over ten thousand years of cultivation, strengthened even further by Void energy.
All things considered, it was basically at the hundred-thousand-year level.
A pair of massive transparent wings stretched from its back, clearly built for aerial combat.
With other soul beasts constantly supporting it, throwing poison and various attacks, Nine-Tails gradually started to look a bit battered.
Fortunately, Elsa's support kept things under control. Nine-Tails looked rough, but it hadn't suffered any serious injuries.
And even if it did, its regeneration would fix it almost instantly.
Once the battle fully broke out, Sam decisively summoned the undead, buffing them to drastically boost their strength.
Since they were undead… or rather, undead beasts, they successfully blocked a large wave of soul beasts.
Sam himself chose close combat, just like Nine-Tails.
He fought as a magic tank, freezing enemies solid with ice magic at close range.
But these soul beasts were no pushovers. His ice magic was draining fast.
"Be careful," Sam said grimly. "I can feel something moving toward us at high speed."
Liu Erlong's gaze snapped toward a single point as her hands moved just as fast, blasting away a soul beast that had tried to ambush her.
"So fast!" Wu Liuqi flashed behind Elsa, gripping his weapon and bracing himself.
His instincts were screaming at him. This opponent was no joke.
The soft rustling grew louder by the second. As an assassin, Wu Liuqi relied heavily on sensing airflow, and right now he could clearly feel how absurdly fast that unknown creature was closing in.
"Holy crap, th-this… this thing's a flying snake?!"
Seeing a snake gliding through the air about three meters above the ground, Wu Liuqi couldn't help blurting it out.
Elsa: "..."
They were in the middle of a fight. Did he really need to freak out like that?
Still… that snake was seriously ugly.
She stared at the massive fleshy crest on its head, which looked even bigger than its skull, and couldn't help thinking so.
"Bright red, fan-shaped tail," Liu Erlong's eyes sharpened. "It's a Phoenix-Tailed Cockscomb Serpent!"
The Phoenix-Tailed Cockscomb Serpent was a rare and powerful non-venomous snake-type soul beast. It attacked by wrapping its body around enemies and suffocating them. Its methods were simple, but its speed was terrifying.
The fleshy crest on its head stored nutrients, and in moments of danger, it could burn them to explosively boost its speed.
Seeing the serpent fly straight toward them with its mouth wide open, Liu Erlong immediately unleashed her strongest attack.
Unfortunately, she was still too weak.
After a brief clash, she was blown back.
"Damn it… that strength. No doubt about it, this thing is at least a ten-thousand-year soul beast!"
With her strength barely at the forty-level range, even holding out for a moment had gotten her knocked away. If this thing wasn't tens of thousands of years old, she'd stand on her head and drink water.
"Does that big thing have any weaknesses?" Wu Liuqi asked, gripping his Demon Blade Thousand Edges as he stared at the serpent gathering power in the distance.
"It's a rare, powerful non-venomous soul beast," Liu Erlong replied while batting away a thousand-year soul beast attacking from the side. "It mainly relies on constricting its enemies. Fast as hell, but its weakness should be the fleshy crest on its head."
"Speed, huh?"
Wu Liuqi grinned. Speed happened to be something he was pretty confident in.
Besides, Sam had frozen the ground solid, and Elsa had been flooding the area with ice magic nonstop. The serpent's speed was definitely being affected.
And him?
With Sam's Nine-Tails chakra boosting him, his speed had jumped to a whole new level.
Environmental debuffs?
Sorry. The Nine-Tails chakra had completely isolated him from that nonsense.
With one side getting stronger and the other getting weaker, Wu Liuqi had nothing to be afraid of.
"Elsa, be careful. It's moving," Liu Erlong warned the instant she sensed the serpent stir.
The Phoenix-Tailed Cockscomb Serpent was fast, no question about it. But Wu Liuqi didn't feel outmatched at all. If anything, he welcomed it being faster.
He leapt straight onto a tree, kicked off hard at just the right angle, and dove down from above.
At that moment, in Wu Liuqi's eyes, thousand-year or ten-thousand-year soul beasts made no difference at all.
The serpent's ferocious body shot forward at full speed, only to collide head-on with Wu Liuqi, who had used the rebound to amplify his attack. His Demon Blade Thousand Edges slashed straight down at the crest on its head.
The serpent reacted quickly, but it was already mid-charge at top speed.
With Wu Liuqi moving just as fast, the blade still connected, slicing a chunk clean off the fleshy crest.
If the serpent hadn't instinctively jerked back at the last moment, it would already be dead.
Startled, the serpent twisted its head and suddenly spat a mouthful of seven-colored mist straight at Wu Liuqi.
"....."