Chapter 53: Trampling All of Humanity
[ BONUS EXTRA CHAPTER FOR COMPLETING 100 COLLECTION GOAL]
Inside the Mist Forest Monitoring Command Room.
A soldier clad in camouflage fatigues stumbled in, crashing through the door. The communicator on his helmet was still crackling with static.
"Vice General Zhao! Urgent report!"
The soldier's voice was breathless. He braced his hands on his knees, gasping for air before he could continue.
"On the west side of the defense line—the junction between the Eighth District and the Mist Forest—we've detected at least fifteen ferocious beasts breaching the perimeter in the last half hour."
"They are all Second to Third Order beasts! Iron-Armored Pythons, Ground-Splitting Lizards, and several Iron-Spine Blue Wolves... they're all burrowing deep into the Mist Forest!"
Zhao Lie frowned deeply. "Three days ago, a Third Order beast broke in. Why are there so many now?"
He straightened up abruptly, his finger tracing the border of the Eighth District on the map, his brow furrowing tighter. "Beasts from the Eighth District?"
"Why are they leaving their own territory and running into the Mist Forest?"
"We don't know!" the soldier added hastily. "We strengthened the patrols on the defense line three days ago."
"But those beasts acted like they were attracted by something. They charged the checkpoints like they were insane. And..."
He paused, his tone growing heavier. "The squad responsible for monitoring the Seventh District's Beast King, the Black-Maned Bear, sent back a message."
"The Black-Maned Bear colony hasn't made any unusual movements. They are still active within their territory and haven't reacted to these invading beasts."
"No movement?" Zhao Lie's fingers drummed on the table, the rhythm faster than before.
"The Eighth District's beasts are flooding across the border, yet the Seventh District's Beast King ignores them..."
"This defies logic." He looked up at the technical officer. "What about the blackouts? Has the Tech Division found a solution yet?"
The technical officer shook his head, sweat pouring down his face. "Currently, there appear to be two sources of interference waves.".
"One isn't strong, but it's intermittent."
"The other wave is extremely powerful. I suspect it's man-made interference, possibly a examinee...".
Suddenly, he stared at the screen, his face changing color drastically.
"Vice General Zhao! Look! We've detected another burst of intense waves!"
"The intensity is even higher than the previous explosion! The source is in the central region of the Mist Forest!"
Zhao Lie immediately leaned in close to the screen. The red ripples representing signal intensity were spiking instantly.
It almost broke the upper limit of the gauge. The coordinates of the signal source matched the direction where Chen Chen and Zhao Hu had been earlier.
His heart skipped a beat. Could it be that group of examinees causing this?
__________
Mist Forest.
The moment Zhao Hu's fingers touched the hilt of the sword, a chilling aura shot through his fingertips and into his body.
Immediately after, an indescribable sense of power surged up.
It felt as if something was awakening the dormant sword techniques within him.
"Is this... Instant Mastery of the Slashing Steel Sword Style?" Zhao Hu gripped the hilt tightly.
Feeling the skyrocketing power within him, the fear of being crushed by Chen Yu earlier and the humiliation of being ordered around by Chen Chen vanished in an instant.
He raised his head, looking at the crowd
surrounding the White Snake beast. The corner of his mouth hooked up.
In the past, it was always Chen Chen who took the final kill and showed off. This time, it's finally my turn!
Zhao Hu held the sword. Without any teacher, he intuitively waved the longsword and joined the fray.
With his addition, it took only a few minutes.
The Silver-Patterned White Snake lost the strength to struggle.
Its scales were shattered and scattered, blood seeping from its wounds.
Zhao Hu was displaying god-like might.
The gazes of the crowd, which used to look at Chen Chen with worship, now fell entirely on him.
There was shock, envy, and awe...
This feeling of being in the spotlight was even more exhilarating than he had imagined!
A smug smile curled on Zhao Hu's lips. Someone seemed to be whispering in his mind: Prove your power, and you will receive even more worship...
He felt this voice was incomparably "correct"!
"Brother Zhao Hu... that sword... did Brother Chen give it to you?" one of Chen Chen's former lackeys asked cautiously, his tone ingratiating.
"He was killed by Chen..." Zhao Hu blurted out, but suddenly remembered Chen Yu's decisive, murderous gaze and overwhelming strength.
He forcibly swallowed the rest of his sentence.
"He... I don't know where he went."
"Let's kill this beast first."
Sensing the killing intent from Zhao Hu, the White Snake suddenly raised its head and emitted a strange, buzzing hum.
The sound was sharp but carried a frequency of despair, as if it were calling for help in a specific direction.
This sound of despair made Zhao Hu even more excited.
A trace of ruthlessness flashed in his eyes. Before, he had to hide even from First Order beasts. .
Now that he had the Seven-Star Sword, what was a Second Order beast to him?
He gripped the sword with both hands, green demon fire rising from the blade. "Die for me!"
A flash of sword light.
The Seven-Star Sword pierced precisely into the White Snake's vital spot, seven inches down its neck.
The White Snake's body convulsed violently, and the buzzing sound came to an abrupt halt.
Its golden vertical pupils gradually lost their luster, and finally, it collapsed limply onto the ground.
Blood slowly dripped down the blade of the sword.
"Brother Zhao Hu is awesome!"
"A Second Order Mid-rank beast, killed in one strike!"
"Brother Zhao Hu, we'll follow you from now on!"
Several fence-sitters clapped and flattered him appropriately.
Zhao Hu stood beside the corpse of the White Snake, raising the still-dripping Seven-Star Sword.
Basking in everyone's worshipful gazes, the desire in his heart was like a lit flame, burning hotter and hotter.
He licked his lips and muttered to himself, "So this is the taste of power..."
He clenched the Seven-Star Sword, his eyes becoming obsessed and fanatical. "I want stronger power..."
What they didn't know was this:
At that very moment, deep within the nest of the Ice Soul Silver Python in the Eighth District of the Great Wall border.
Eternal ice covered the rock walls. On an ice platform in the center of the nest, a giant python over thirty meters long was coiled.
It was the Beast King of the Eighth District, the Ice Soul Silver Python.
Unlike ordinary Silver Pythons, its scales shimmered with a cold, icy blue. Every breath it took condensed into tiny ice crystals in the air, radiating a suffocating pressure.
Suddenly.
The Ice Soul Silver Python snapped its eyes open. Its golden vertical pupils instantly filled with bloodshot veins.
The bloodline link between it and its offspring had completely severed in that instant, replaced by a cold aura of death.
It could clearly sense that its offspring's life was dissipating rapidly, its final location fixed in the central region of the Mist Forest.
ROAR!
A deafening hiss erupted from the depths of the nest. Sound waves impacted the ice on the rock walls, causing countless icicles to fall from the ceiling.
The Ice Soul Silver Python's massive body twisted violently, and the ice layer around the nest began to crack.
The ice-blue scales on its body instantly burst forth with blinding light, and the surrounding temperature plummeted to dozens of degrees below zero..
"Humans..." Its voice was raspy and cold, carrying bone-chilling hatred. "You dare kill my child..."
Their species was born powerful, but they had a fatal weakness: extreme difficulty in reproduction.
Each generation of Beast King often had to spend decades and eliminate hundreds of male pythons to conceive a single offspring.
As the matriarchal Beast King, the offspring was her everything, the only hope for the continuation of the bloodline.
Now that her child was killed, this rage was enough to make her destroy everything in her path.
She slowly raised her head and emitted a special snake cry...
It was very similar to the cry the White Snake beast made before dying, but this one carried monstrous fury.
The Ice Soul Silver Python slowly slid out of the nest, her ice-blue scales gleaming with the luster of death under the sunlight.
Her gaze locked onto the direction of the Mist Forest, her voice carrying unquestionable killing intent..
"Trample the Mist Forest flat... Kill all humans!"
(To be Continued)