Wilderness: I Tame Beasts to Survive

Chapter 318: Chapter 234: Blade of Despair, Deathly Blade Light

"HISSS~"

The Blade of Despair let out a tremulous hiss, like a viper flicking its tongue. Its entire "human" form began to vibrate at a speed almost invisible to the naked eye.

"BZZZZZZ~"

Tiny flecks of Metal Spiritual Energy flew in all directions, instantly severing the chains wrapped around its Body.

Then, its feet shifted slightly.

An eerie figure had already appeared by Qingyao’s side.

"HISS!"

The Blade of Despair’s eyes narrowed. In an instant, its human-sized Body transformed into a pale, sharp blade that emanated a cold light, and it slashed down at Qingyao’s massive dragon Body.

Qingyao tried to defend itself, but the pale blade seemed unstoppable. It instantly shattered seven layers of Spiritual Energy defenses and struck the dragon’s Body directly.

"ROOOAR~"

A pained dragon’s cry echoed through the sky.

It was as if a heavy rain had begun to fall from the heavens.

Dragon Blood, rich with the breath of Life, rained down along with a nearly five-hundred-meter-long section of the dragon’s Body, which crashed violently onto the ground.

SWOOSH!

The aftershock from the blade passed through the Body, precisely avoiding all the spires ahead before dissipating into nothingness. It was a display of incredibly precise Spiritual Energy control.

"Ling!"

Floating below, her body shimmering with four-colored light, Yin Yi tried to lock onto the Blade of Despair’s position. But she found it was simply too fast; her own Spiritual Energy couldn’t land a hit. Seeing Qingyao so grievously wounded, she cried out in alarm.

After slicing off a part of the dragon’s Body, the pale Light Blade paused for a moment. Then, the blade’s gleam intensified and shot toward Qingyao’s head.

"CLANG!"

Faced with the instantaneous attack, Qingyao had already closed its eyes.

The next instant, the flying blade bizarrely froze in place.

Everyone and every Soul Beast present, including the retreating Han Ning, heard a mysterious, strange, and ethereal sound.

Strange, cyan characters tinged with the light of blood abruptly materialized from thin air. Like chains, they tightly bound the Blade of Despair.

Below, the falling section of the dragon’s Body began to burn intensely at an incredible rate.

Dragon Blood surged toward the sky, and a bloody mist filled the air.

"Ling!"

Seizing the moment while the Blade of Despair was paused, Yin Yi’s Elementalized Body flared. The three Star Cores in the sky projected their Power, which converged to form a heaven-piercing pillar of light. It completely enveloped the Blade of Despair, battering it relentlessly.

BOOM!

A torrent of Starlight particles relentlessly struck the surface of the Blade of Despair, trying to destroy its Body.

’A seal... a seal of the Flood Dragon clan. That Flood Dragon is putting its life on the line.’

At this moment, under Egg Pancake’s protection, Han Ning had already led the group of creatures to the tower’s main gate. He glanced hastily at the gushing Dragon Blood in the sky as Hom’s Spiritual Power message entered his mind.

"Egg Pancake, go open the main gate."

Han Ning took out the Jade Tree Seed and issued a command to Yin Yi.

"Yin Yi, bring Elder Qingyao and teleport back to me."

"Ling!"

Still in her Elementalized form, Yin Yi flickered and reappeared beside Qingyao’s head. She extended a dense web of Spiritual Energy branches that wrapped around Qingyao. Then, she enveloped both herself and the dragon in brilliant Starlight.

As she tried to teleport, Yin Yi realized that Qingyao’s body was too large. She couldn’t possibly transport an object hundreds of meters in size to another location.

"Ling~ Ling!"

Yin Yi cried out anxiously, her Spiritual Energy burning to its absolute limit.

「On the other side.」

A vibrating sound, like the buzzing of a swarm of bees, came from the sky.

"CLANG!!"

Hearing that terrifying metallic vibration, Qingyao roared in agony. It manipulated the surrounding chains and decisively severed its own body below the head.

The Blade of Despair had already broken free from Yin Yi’s Starlight assault and was charging toward them again.

In less than the blink of an eye, the terrifying gleam of the blade was upon them.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!!

A sea of blood raged.

Blood-red Rune chains erupted from the void, desperately locking down the blade’s light that was right in front of them.

With Qingyao now reduced to just a head and having used the Transformation Technique to rapidly shrink, Yin Yi was finally able to embrace it. She transformed into a ball of Starlight and vanished into the air.

SWOOSH~

Han Ning saw Yin Yi appear in a flash, holding a blood-drenched dragon head. Without hesitating, he led them into the open tower and slammed the door shut.

「Almost simultaneously.」

The pale Light Blade solidified in front of the tower’s stone gate.

The light burst, and the slender figure of the Blade of Despair slowly emerged.

It looked at the towering spire but did not step inside. Instead, like a loyal guard, it stood silently before the stone gate, motionless as if petrified.

The other surviving Shadow Reapers leaped one after another to the area around the tower. They crouched, surrounding the tower, but did not advance a single step.

"Whew... It seems they really don’t dare to enter the tower. We got lucky and survived."

Han Ning let out a long sigh of relief.

Soon, his attention was drawn back to the grievously wounded Qingyao.

At this moment, all that remained of Qingyao’s entire body was its head; everything below it was gone.

Even so, its eyes were still open, gazing silently at everyone before it with a look of despair and agony.

"Yin Yi, All-Encompassing Spiritual Silkworm, help it rebuild its Body!"

"Ling~" "Gumi~"

Yin Yi and the All-Encompassing Spiritual Silkworm simultaneously shot out branches and its own body, burrowing into the dragon’s head. They used every ounce of their strength to help Qingyao repair its Body.

"Elder Qingyao, hang in there!"

"Rrrrmmm~"

Qingyao let out a low whimper and closed its Dragon Eyes, earnestly cooperating with the healing efforts.

With the All-Encompassing Spiritual Silkworm frantically stimulating its Blood Qi, tender buds of new flesh began to grow from the severed part of Qingyao’s head.

Meanwhile, Yin Yi’s Life aura helped accelerate the growth of flesh and blood, while also helping Qingyao maintain its life force so it wouldn’t die from vital decay.

However, Qingyao was a Lord Limit Level Soul Beast, while the All-Encompassing Spiritual Silkworm was only at the War General Level. Even with the latter using its full Power, the dragon’s Body regenerated at an agonizingly slow pace. It could barely maintain Qingyao’s vital signs and keep it from dying immediately.

Han Ning took out every item from his pouch that could replenish Blood Qi or was related to the Wood Type and placed them in front of the Soul Beasts.

"Hmm... I remember now. This seems to be the Cosmic Light Tower, built by order of the Duke of Night Nether. It’s a place specially designed to help Soul Beasts compress their Energy," Hom suddenly transmitted.

"The Cosmic Light Tower?" Han Ning frowned. While keeping an eye on the progress of Qingyao’s recovery, he observed the tower’s interior.

He recalled the tower’s appearance from before they entered.

It was a Black Tower, entirely jet-black and nearly a thousand meters tall.

The tower’s surface had no windows. In a way, it resembled a strange... Alchemy Furnace?

"It’s called the Cosmic Light Tower. If the Starlight concentration in Night Nether City is five times that of the outside world, then the Starlight amplified by the Cosmic Light Tower will reach over one hundred times the outside world’s concentration."

"And not just Starlight. It can also compress other types of Elements. You could say it’s an ultra-powerful compression tool for concentrating Elements."

"I have a question. Isn’t the Alatak culture a culture of death? Why are there three Star Cores here, and this strange Cosmic Light Tower?"

"They believe that certain types of Starlight are Energy emitted after a Star has decayed, which also falls under the category of death."

"Of course, there are many types of Starlight. It’s clear that the Alataku People are skilled at manipulating the light of Dead Stars."

’That’s a bit of a stretch.’ However, Han Ning didn’t dwell on the Starlight issue for too long. Instead, he began to ponder how they could escape.

Hom seemed to see through his thoughts and continued his transmission: "Right now, the only way is for the Flood Dragon to break through to the Monarch Level. Only then will you have a chance of survival."

"Monarch Level... Elder Qingyao is at the Lord Limit, that’s true, but isn’t the leap from Lord to Monarch incredibly difficult?" Han Ning asked, stunned.

If it were easy to break through, Qingyao wouldn’t have been stuck at the Lord Limit for hundreds of years, working as Akatos’s subordinate.

"It is very difficult. For a Lord Soul Beast to break through to Monarch, it must grasp the rudiments of ’Divine Will.’ It must use its Spiritual Power to interfere with its own Energy flow, bestowing a Spiritual Mark upon the Energy it controls, which grants the released Energy or Soul Techniques a degree of sentience."

"Also, I suspect that Blade of Despair isn’t a true Monarch Soul Beast. Its Soul Techniques contain no Divine Will. It’s likely just an experiment created by the Alataku People, with only its physical Body’s strength barely reaching the Monarch Level," Hom speculated.