Charles roared, and hundreds of black-robed knights suddenly surged out of the forest.
Right behind them came a sharp, choking smell of blood.
Nancy Priest and the Temple Knights behind her all frowned at the sight.
Behind the black-robed knights, giant wolves with blood at their mouths were howling. They looked terrifying.
"It's the Black Church's wolf riders!" Nancy Priest warned the people behind her in a low voice. Her hands tightened around her staff. "What are you doing here?"
As soon as she spoke, the golden Griffin behind Nancy Priest spread its wings and gave off a soft golden glow.
Bathed in the golden light, the Temple Knights felt the pressure ease, and even the harsh blood smell faded a lot.
Even the giant wolves behind the wolf riders were cowed by the light, their fur stood on end.
Seeing her show of force take effect, Nancy Priest was about to give the order to fight the Black Church wolf riders.
But just as the words reached her lips, the wolf riders and their giant wolf familiars suddenly froze and started twisting their limbs.
Crack...
Crack...
The sound of snapping bones came one after another. In moments, hundreds of wolf riders and their familiars went limp and fell to the ground like mud.
Shocked by the eerie scene, Charles and the Temple Knights hurried to call out their best skills, summoning their familiars.
Besides the Silver-maned Griffin, spirit dragons, water giants, blast-scale dragons… all kinds of familiars were released, packing the small clearing until it was crammed.
As everyone stood ready, staring hard into the deep shadows of the forest, Natalia rode in on a giant spider, her eyes cold as she swept her gaze over the crowd.
"The Black Church is strictly ranked. Grunts won't tell us anything." As soon as she finished, the spider beneath her spit out a mass of web, weaving a huge cocoon, and dropped it in front of Nancy Priest.
"Nancy, I know your Temple is good at dealing with the Black Church. You have ten minutes. Make him talk." Natalia's voice was icy, and by the end the threat in it was clear. "Otherwise, your Temple will cover half of the losses this time."
Hearing the warning, Nancy Priest steadied herself.
She looked at the giant spider behind the cocoon and frowned. "Legend-class familiar, Dark Side—the Hellweaver!"
Then she lifted her eyes to Natalia, her tone turning cold. "Natalia, you come from a noble house, yet you chase power and stand with darkness. Do you know you're staining your family's name? Your sister…"
Boom!
Before Nancy Priest could finish, the Hellweaver's spider spear shot toward her.
With a thunderous crash, the sudden strike forced Nancy Priest back. She stumbled, looking battered.
When Nancy Priest steadied herself and looked back, there was already a deep pit where she had just been standing.
"You!" Nancy Priest glared at Natalia, but Natalia only looked down on her.
"Nancy Priest, even if your rank in the Temple is high, if you slander a city lord and his family, I can still punish you!"
Feeling the killing intent in Natalia's eyes, Nancy Priest forced herself to swallow the curses on her tongue.
Then, under Nancy Priest's command, the Temple Knights carefully cut into the cocoon's outer layer.
Soon, a wolf rider who had passed out from lack of air lay in the center of the cocoon.
Just from his outfit, you could tell he held a high rank among the wolf riders.
With that in mind, Nancy Priest closed her eyes and quietly pushed her mental power, guiding it into the wolf rider's mind to search his memories.
After about twenty minutes, Nancy Priest ended the mind-reading, her face pale.
When she looked up at Natalia again, her eyes were full of despair and plea. "City Lord, please, you must save Evelynna! The Black Church plans to sacrifice every living thing in the Blood Cultivation Realm to summon a once-sealed A-level familiar, the Three-Headed Hell Wolf, Kerparos!"
"When it was sealed back then, it already had Legend-level power."
"Even though it has been sealed in the Blood Cultivation Realm for many years, its rank has fallen."
"But if they sacrifice enough lives, it will recover fast."
After hearing Nancy Priest's report, Natalia's eyes turned sharp and cold.
She picked up her phone and quickly called the military command center. "This is Natalia. Send more support. I want you to blow open the Blood Cultivation Realm and get the three high school team members out as soon as possible."
"In a crisis, who do we save first? Logan from Twilight City, of course!"
Hearing that, Nancy Priest's eyes went wide. She stared at Natalia, baffled. "Your sister is in there too, and you still want to save an outsider first? What kind of spell did Logan put on you?"
"Nancy Priest, the Temple sits above the rest. Since you had the nerve to take half the rights to the Blood Cultivation Realm from our city lord's office and the military, your Temple people should rely on your own power to do your rescue." Natalia's words left Nancy speechless, shaking with anger.
Natalia only gave her a contemptuous glance, then turned to lead the rescue work.
Right now, Natalia only knew one thing: the strength Logan had shown was worth backing and training.
As for Evelynna, the sister she'd never gotten along with since they were kids, she had no plan to send anyone to save her.
…
Meanwhile, outside, things were in chaos.
Inside the Blood Cultivation Realm, Logan, with Yelena and Sawako, had left the forest and reached a desert.
Looking at the endless dunes and the circle in the center, Logan frowned. "What's that? Looks familiar."
"It's a summoning circle!" Yelena recognized the portal at a glance. "There are others in this Blood Cultivation Realm besides us!"
Hearing that, Logan told Yelena to release the Icebound Phoenix to scout the whole desert from above.
Soon, the Icebound Phoenix returned with news: the oases in the desert were filled with Twin-Headed Wolves.
These Twin-Headed Wolf monsters kept destroying the oases. Each time an oasis vanished in fire and quakes, the portal hanging in midair grew bigger.
Even stranger, the Twin-Headed Wolf monsters didn't leave the ruins they made.
After they killed every living thing in an oasis, they started killing each other until they died among the rubble.
Seeing this, Logan felt a bad feeling rise in his chest. "We need to move faster and clear as many Twin-Headed Wolf monsters as we can."
He didn't know what would happen next, but leveling up Lilith's Infernal Lord Form was the only way to keep the team safe.
So Logan stopped being polite with Yelena and Sawako and pulled both of them onto the backs of the Twin-Headed Wolf monsters.
With Logan and Lilith, that made four riders on four Twin-Headed Wolf monsters, racing into the desert like the wind.
The Icebound Phoenix and the Centaur followed behind, carrying loot and supplies.
Soon, they reached the nearest oasis.
A quick scout showed three Twin-Headed Wolf monsters roaming there.
For Lilith, now at elite 3 star, a combo of the skills [Weaken Will] and [Mind Lash] was enough to take away their will to fight.
"Life Drain!"
Lilith knew Logan was in a hurry, so she used the fastest, most brutal way—she drained the life energy from all three monsters.
In barely ten breaths, the Twin-Headed Wolf monsters, once as bulky as baby elephants, shriveled fast.
With a low, satisfied sound from Lilith, the three monsters turned into dried corpses on the spot.
Watching up close, Yelena and Sawako both gasped.
Sawako turned her head, leaned to Yelena's ear, and whispered, "Do you think Lilith's ranking could be A-level?"
"At least A-level. The power Lilith is showing already beats the Icebound Phoenix and your Demigod Hybrid Centaur," Yelena sighed softly, fully convinced by Lilith's strength.
Logan didn't listen to their talk.
From the moment Lilith began to drain the monsters' life energy, Logan felt a surge of fury coming down from the sky.
…