Archfiend

Chapter 186: Danxia Temple (5)

The livyatan finally moved. Looking upon this black light, the beast carried a hint of caution in its large eyes for the first time. Soon, its body began to inflate like a balloon!

“This…” Xu Yangyi looked all around in shock. Streaks of aqua-blue qi, using a speed that the naked eye could hardly perceive, entered the giant body at lightning speed! As the black light was on the cusp of nearing the livyatan’s body, a loud boom rang out! From the beast’s head, an immense blue light-beam erupted!

Countless droplets were sprayed in the wake of this light-beam as if a rainstorm was in the cave! Like snowflakes of fragmented jade!

“This is…” Zhao Wuye solemnly studied the water beam and gritted his teeth. “An elysial divine ability?” This wasn’t just a lost ancient specimen at the Great Circle of Qi Condensation, but also a giant demonbeast that had awakened an elysial divine ability!

Swoooosh… Oddly, as the raindrops pattered down, the black light actually began to visibly shrink. Like fire meeting water, the ray was swiftly obliterated! As it reached the front of the giant whale, all that remained was a sliver the thickness of an arm!

BOOM!!!

“ROAAAR!!!” 

Two noises loudly resounded, irrespective to either first or last in arrival. Following the livyatan’s world-shaking roar, a scarlet mark appeared on its skin for the first time! And yet… there was still no explosion!

Crash! Sharp pain arrived, and the tremendous body suddenly began to slowly turn over in the water. An enormous fin and tail rose up to conceal the earth and blot out the sun, ruthlessly striking into the water again! In a flash, the lake surface, just tranquil like a mirror, billowed with immense ripples. Shortly, these ripples transformed into a giant wave! It was as if a wild tsunami had surged high!

“Command!” The enormous several-meter-high wave faced everyone and struck, yet Zhao Fenglai shouted and a blackish-green cloth scroll unexpectedly flew out! In merely a wink, it formed a large hundred-somewhat-meters-wide and twenty-plus-meters-tall barrier in front of everyone!

In the next second… the barrier flared with red light. As if it had encountered a heavy blow, it trembled ceaselessly. Even behind the barrier, the tsunami-like might could be felt!

“We can’t be hit like this!” Zhou Tingting’s anxious voice echoed from behind. “The thickness of a whale’s epidermis is tens of centimeters! There’s also a fatty layer under the skin that’s two to three meters thick! A divine ability will find it hard to blow open the defense!”

“Then what are we going to do?” Gao Wuguo clenched his teeth. Moments ago, his all-out strike had actually been dissolved into shades by the creature. Concerning this giant demonbeast’s strength, he was more understanding than anyone in his heart!

A hard collision of force was difficult to fight out, extraordinarily difficult!

“There are two ways!’ Zhou Tingting said urgently. “The first is internal, but with a Qi Condensation cultivator’s protective qi, I’m afraid that it’ll be melted after entry! The second…” She pointed towards the crown of the giant whale’s head. “Modern whales have two blowholes, but the livyatan hasn’t evolved to this stage. It only has one! Whales use lungs to breath, not gills! Even the blowhole of the present world’s largest blue whale is only forty centimeters. The livyatan’s mass is almost triple the size of a thirty-meter-long blue whale! Its blowhole is at most 1.2 meters! As long as…”

“As long as someone can block it up.” Xu Yangyi turned his head. Back then, he hadn’t driven out Zhou Tingting precisely because he favored her vast and varied knowledge. Right now, it had surprisingly granted him an unexpected delight.

“Then what’re we still waiting for?!” Quan Ningyue gasped. “I’ll go, alright? Everyone knows what my body is made from. I can use my body to expand by two times from what you now see. It’s enough to block up the demon’s blowhole.”

Any cultivator or demonbeast held their own fatal regions. For example, if a human’s brain or heart was pierced, they were still doomed to die. As a result, the modern cultivation world had a marvelous lineup of demonologists. When he was at Heavens Law, Xu Yangyi had also studied these topics.

“It’s not that simple…” Xu Yangyi narrowed his eyes and looked towards the small, motionless mountain in the lake, licking his lips. “First of all, haven’t you thought out that once you stuff up the blowhole yourself, the livyatan will struggle? How powerful is the rushing force of the qi blasted out from inside? If your body isn’t sturdy enough, you might hold on for no less than twenty minutes.”

“Secondly, if I haven’t remembered incorrectly, a whale can hold their breath for up to half an hour. This livyatan is the primogenitor of whales. It has such a massive bulk. Based on that, I figure it can hold its breath three times over. Are you sure you can stay in its blowhole for an hour?”

Quan Ningyue was stunned. She couldn’t accomplish this.

“Lastly…” Xu Yangyi laughed grimly, “haven’t you guys figured out… that it hasn’t taken the initiative to attack at all? Everything’s been a passive defense.” These words caused everyone’s eyes to glimmer. “Its waiting on the Rootless Nine Bends Aqua to ripen,” he said resolutely, his voice chopping nail and slicing iron. “A majority of true spirit-objects generally have a demonbeast guarding them at the side. This is common sense in the cultivation world. The demonbeast protector of this Rootless Nine Bends Aqua is the livyatan. I fucking bet that this demonbeast might only be a step away from Form Transformation, since it’s strength is so overwhelming. The Rootless Nine Bends Aqua is a supreme water-attribute item. Both the whale and aqua are water-related. I’ll take a wild guess that this might be the final step to its Form Transformation!”

“It’s possible.” Cheng Jianfeng was dazed and followed up, “When I achieved Form Transformation back then, it still kicked my bloodline up by a notch even though my demon form is pretty weak. After reaching Form Transformation with a heavenly treasure, this demon’s aptitude will rise to another level.”

“Right now, it’s still more cautious than us.” Xu Yangyi took a step forward and locked his eyes on the giant whale that was silent once more. “It doesn’t risk attacking. There are too many of us. It’s afraid if someone slips out, they’ll take the flower. On the contrary, its huge body is its weakness… A weakness of perspective.”

“Without having achieved Form Transformation, it basically doesn’t understand how to use spiritual sense. Spiritual sense exists in its body, but it can’t be used. It can only rely on its eyes and a whale’s sonar organ for detection. Since there are a lot of us, it’s not attacking but defending right now. Just in case there’s a slight shortfall. It cannot bear this.” He sneered, “Right now, what it’s scared of shouldn’t be us but rather… itself!”

Zhao Fenglai glanced deeply at Xu Yangyi! The speed of this person’s response… truly was not ordinary! Some things would always exist. Merely, no one had discovered the livyatan’s eyes. So long as this was mentioned, one would discover… such a massive demon form was instead an inconvenience!

“The last two points.” Xu Yangyi laughed and snapped his fingers. The livyatan’s enormous gaze motionlessly flickered, yet it didn’t move. He chuckled, “It explained one puzzle for us. Why is the water here so deep?” He smiled. “Everyone saw that divine ability just now. It’s able to take qi and transform it into solid water. And as for what these waters are doing…”

Xu Yangyi lifted his head upwards, and Zhao Wuye couldn’t help but look up, discovering to his shock that through the blue light-beam from moments ago, the Rootless Nine Bends Aqua actually wasn’t completely transparent! Rather… a strange kind of red had emerged!

Mao Ba’er energetically sniffed, and his canine eyes greatly brightened. “It’s b-being w-watered?!”

“That’s right.” Xu Yangyi laughed and said, “The livyatan is using this method to supply the required qi for the Rootless Nine Bends Aqua. But this also demonstrates…”

“It can’t go up!” He still hadn’t finished speaking, but Fang Cheng yelled out in enlightenment. “It’s basically can’t climb the cave like us! It can only use this way! I got it! As soon as the flower matured, it would’ve used a similar method to take it down!”

“No.” Xu Yangyi patted Fang Cheng’s shoulder. “It exposed its greatest weakness!” Since the beginning of this point, his entire face became more lively as he spoke! “What is it using to water the flower?”

“Out of its air hole…” Fang Cheng’s gaze twinkled, seemingly thinking of something yet not. He only sensed an answer in his heart, yet nothing would leave his mouth.

“I understand…” At this moment, Jun Man inhaled deeply, glancing at Xu Yangyi with incredible admiration. His commander… The degree of this mental agility… A true fiend!

“Everyone.” Jun Man cupped his fist and continued speaking in Xu Yangyi’s stead. “Watering is a verb. As long as the livyatan seriously favors this Rootless Nine Bends Aqua, it definitely won’t use 100% of its spiritual force to ‘water’ the flower. To the extent that it’s certainly worried about injuring it! Instead, the livyatan uses a soft spiritual force that the spirit-object can endure to water it. And at that time…”

Fang Cheng seemed to have been struck by lightning. “Its greatest weak point! It’ll be e-exposed in front of us! We also won’t be fatally injured!”

As long as the livyatan was up above at that time, in that case… to cultivators, the spiritual force that the spirit object was able to bear was like scratching an itch! Furthermore… they could also directly face the creature’s greatest weak point!

“Besides, it doesn’t risk allowing the Rootless Nine Bends Aqua to go to waste.” Xu Yangyi licked his lips, thirsty for blood.

Dead silence. Everyone contemplated thoughtfully. After ages, Zhao Wuye deeply cupped his fist towards Xu Yangyi. “Commander Xu, I am convinced. If there is harvest from this livyatan, I won’t say a thing if the Xingtian Legion takes 90%.” His words were also of his own scheme.

While the price of a demon core that hadn’t achieved Core Formation was high, it wasn’t excessive at all. The crux of the matter was… that he’d already seen the Xingtian Legion’s battle strength! What was there to think about comparing the Xingtian Legion’s fighting strength with the Zhao Clan’s few big cats and kittens? It would be better for him to first yield a step. The livyatan wasn’t important, what was important was the flower on the cave ceiling! He could move back a large step for the livyatan. As for the Rootless Nine Bends Aqua… couldn’t he always thicken his face a bit more for a drop?

“Besides the demon core, there’s nothing else to harvest.” Xu Yangyi passionately glanced up at the cave-top flower that already carried a tinge of enchanting red, laughing. “The Rootless Nine Bends Aqua is an item I must have!”

“No! No! Commander!” At the back, Zhou Tingting remembered something and shouted loudly, “The demon core isn’t important! A demon core that hasn’t achieved Core Formation is at most considered precious! But not famous and valuable! B-But the ambergris! The ambergris! That’s an item without market!” [1]

Zhao Wuye slapped himself on the spot. This slap was exceptionally crisp. Everyone looked at him bewilderedly. He blushed and gritted his teeth, laughing as his heart dripped with blood. “N-Nothing.”

Not properly studying demonbeast biology could kill a man! How could he forget about this?!

“A whale-type demon in itself is incomparably rare. That’s furthermore due to the ambergris of whale-type demons being extremely difficult to obtain! Its other functions aren’t that great, but it can weaken heart devils when assailing each great realm! Calm down spiritual sense! This item… is unlikely to be inferior to the Rootless Nine Bends Aqua by much!”

Everyone’s eyes flashed. A wisp of fiery-red even surfaced in the eyes of quite a few people. In addition, the Zhao Clan’s tens of cultivators resentfully eyed Zhao Wuye, who wished he could cut off his tongue.

Xu Yangyi watched all of this at full attention, finally revealing a faint, cold smile. “How many days until it ripens?”

“Three days! At most three days!” Mao Ba’er shot a fervent glance at the cave top. “When it ripens, a strange aroma will cover a hundred meters. There’s only fifteen minutes of picking time!”

Xu Yangyi nodded. He said nothing, sat cross-legged, and meditated.

The true decisive battle would be in three days.

1. Ambergris is a solid, waxy substance produced by the intestines of sperm whales. It is used in perfumes/fragrances. French for “Grey Amber”