Chapter 158: Desperate Situation
Chapter 158: Desperate Situation
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The last desperate assault of the strange beasts in front of her didn’t seem to cause any visible reaction on her face.
She looked at it with her cold expression, then raised a finger and pointed it at the beast.
Immediately, on the raised finger a small condensed sphere of red orange elemental energy formed, covered in thin streaks of lightning running across its outer layer.
The energy sphere formed in no time and as soon as it was complete she hurled it at the beast that had already reached her.
The energy sphere shot forward and struck the beast full on, and before it could even react it felt itself tremble,
then a red orange bubble of energy exploded from its body and in less than a second expanded to a diameter of about four meters, essentially engulfing the whole beast.
But as soon as it finished engulfing it, it did not continue to expand, instead it stopped, stabilized, trembled once, and began to shrink, disappearing quickly just as it had appeared,
with the only exception that of the monster that had been there a moment ago, no traces remained.
It had been completely disintegrated by the attack.
Liang Yuexin didn’t bother to stare at the destructive scene that had become a part of the forest and instead turned her calm gaze in a certain direction, where she saw a tall tree and the figure of someone very familiar to her.
"I see you never lose the habit of spying on me," she said as if it no longer surprised her.
"They say old habits die hard.
though I don’t mind much, afterall it would be a crime not to admire such a sight when the occasion presents itself," Zhu Rong replied, jumping down from the tree branch.
Liang Yuexin: "..."
She wanted to say something but decided not to.
She had already figured out some time ago that Zhu Rong always had a remark ready, and in their current situation there wasn’t time for such things.
That said, she couldn’t help but glance at him while trying to probe his cultivation, but just like the last time she failed, in fact this time she absolutely could not sense Zhu Rong’s presence even though he was literally in front of her, it didn’t seem like he was there.
"I guess you also ended up separated from your group upon arrival, but how did you find me? You haven’t started stalking me again, have you?" she asked, wondering how he had found her first, was it really just a coincidence?
She expected to draw some attention as she unleashed that powerful attack against all those monsters that had decided to attack her in a group, but she certainly did not expect to run into him.
"Hm? Stalking you? Unfortunately not. As much as I’d like, I have too many things to do and not really much time to spend with you.
Although if you want, we could arrange a quick date here in the secret realm." Zhu Rong said while looking at the corpses of the beasts on the ground.
Unlike the last one that had been completely wiped out, these were still there, but he could see that their organs had been damaged and some even destroyed by the strong shockwave from the energy explosion that had occurred earlier.
This also damaged their cores, which killed them outright, although not all of them met that fate.
"Tch, you never miss an opportunity to-" she was about to snap back at Zhu Rong’s words when she immediately noticed something with the corner of her eye that was coming toward her.
Of course, with her current level she noticed it straight away, but precisely because of that it surprised her a little,
the creature in question was one that had been killed by her a little while ago, a third stage beast no less, yet the others who were stronger than it had died,
how had this one survived?
Just as she was about to attack it again, something thin sliced across and in an instant struck the charging beast that had been rushing at them, causing it to stumble and fall to the ground.
However, unlike she had expected this time the beast did not move anymore and remained on the ground with no sign of life.
She turned her gaze to the side and saw Zhu Rong wiping his hands.
It had been him.
With her strong vision she could see the object that had flown like a projectile, it was a simple rock.
Yes, a rock.
Just as she was about to say she didn’t need his help dealing with the creature, Zhu Rong’s voice interrupted her.
"You can’t really hope to kill all these creatures with normal attacks.
You have to destroy their cores, which in this case is in their hearts. If you miss that, no matter how badly they’re hurt, they’ll recover," Zhu Rong said.
***
While Zhu Rong explained the strange nature of these creatures to Liang Yuexin, in another part of the forest, near the foot of the mountain, more and more people had begun to gather.
The number kept increasing by the minute and soon a clear division among them became visible.
They were none other than the various groups who had entered the secret realm and had been split up from the start.
Having all had the same idea, everyone had come here and soon they were finally able to reunite with their teams, but unlike the beginning, the teams were now very different.
Some were missing many members, others had members who were badly injured, and some even had members on the verge of death
Needless to say, the surprise the secret realm gave them upon arrival was not pleasant for many, and given the average strength of the creatures here, many ended up falling with little chance to resist.
Given the gravity of the situation, the groups did not attack one another, instead turning aside to tend to their own members.
There were already too many casualties, creating more wouldnt be good for any of them.
By a large tree near the forest boundary at the foot of the mountain, a group of seven people had gathered.
They were none other than Zhu Rong’s group.
A heavy atmosphere hung between them while all wore grim expressions as they looked toward a figure crouched by a tree trunk.
It was Shi Gong, the third year student who, after losing to Zhu Rong and admitting defeat to Li Duoji, had managed to secure a spot on the team.
At this moment though he was in very bad condition, panting hard while his left hand pressed the area where his right arm should have been.
The area was empty, with only a bandage where the missing piece of arm lay, traces of blood everywhere.
Although he had been treated, the pain and the absence of his arm were still there.
He had been one of the unlucky ones who had encountered beasts he could not handle, which in this case was quite unfortunate, since the beast that did this to him was only an early third stage one.
Being also of the third stage, he had managed to prevail after a couple of blows, but just as he thought he had won, the beast, as if completely ignoring the deep wound on its forehead, lunged at him.
Caught off guard, he tried to block with his right arm, but he never would have thought that it would be torn off in the next second.
In the end he managed to kill the beast after delivering desperate continuous strikes, but the damage had been done.
Since then he had endured the strong pain while wandering around in a daze until he managed to get here.
Needless to say, his condition lowered everyone’s morale, and unfortunately this was only the beginning.
Soon others joined, and the more arrived the more the spirits of those who had already reached the place sank.
At a certain point no one knew what to think anymore when they discovered that even one of the fourth stage instructors had been gravely injured, but unlike Shi Gong, he couldn’t make it and died before he could arrive here.
The only reason the others knew about him was because he had been fortunate enough to meet another instructor thanks to a communication artifact that they all had,
and it was precisely this latter who carried his corpse, which at this moment was stored within a dimensional ring.
Frustration and pain had seized the minds of many, and even those who had been lucky enough to get out in one piece trembled as they wondered if they would die here.
"Three are still missing, we’ll wait here another hour and if they don’t arrive, head up the mountain," said Chen Ao, one of the instructors who had participated in the expedition.
He, unlike the rest of the group, was relatively unharmed, which was to be expected since he was at the peak of the fifth stage.
if he too had been seriously injured, then everyone would have already taken it for granted that none of them would leave alive this place,
but fortunately that wasn’t the case, and now all they could do was rest while waiting for the others.
As much as they wanted to leave the place, none of them knew where the exit gate was to leave, and that was because they hadn’t come to a single location but had been sent to various points in the forest,
usually there would be a portal that served as both entrance and exit, but in this case no one knew where that portal was since they had been separated at the start.
The only place that came to everyone’s mind was the white palace at the top of the mountain, so even though the situation was difficult, everyone decided to go there.
By now, survival was the main priority for most of them, and all they wanted was to get out of here alive.