Molting the Mortal Coil

Chapter 977: Black Fire

Sage was actually quite excited to see so many rare beasts here in one place and felt that despite being almost turned into a scapegoat by Beast Keeper Deng, it was actually quite fortunate for him. He didnt care about the Charming Slate Boar, but the Thousand Limbed Lungfish and Black Fire Bullfrog would be quite useful for him.

The Black Fire Bullfrogs simple name did not capture the strangeness of its existence. When the four fiery horns sprang into existence on top of its head, a matching flame appeared on the corpses of the four lungfish clones. Only a moment after the flames ignited, the corpses began to move once again. The dark energy had somehow brought the beasts back and their mutilated bodies flailed around for a moment before they started rushing towards the Discipline Keeper once again.

After just expending most of his energy, the Discipline Keeper had to fight a lot more conservatively this time. The lungfish clones were missing parts of their bodies so they couldnt move as efficiently as before. They werent as agile as before, but they also no longer cared about their own injuries.

If the Beast Keeper was still here, then this point of the battle might have started to get dangerous. The Black Fire Bullfrog would resurrect a number of the fallen lungfish clones, allowing the Thousand Limbed Lungfish to keep creating more of them with less pressure. Once a dozen or so of them were on the field, dead or alive, then it would start to become difficult for a pair of Nascent Souls to hold them back. It would also allow more of them to be spawned without dying. Then their numbers would start to accumulate and Beast Keeper Deng would then spring some final weapon to finish them off.

Unfortunately, for the Beast Keeper, Sage was no normal Nascent Soul. Now that the Beast Keeper was out of the room, he no longer had an incentive to hold back as much. There was still a small chance the Discipline Keeper was also an enemy, but that chance was quite small. Rather than falling into the trap that the Beast Keeper had tried to set up, he immediately moved to break it. Sage brought out eight of the Purple Mist Sect members and they surrounded the Thousand Limbed Lungfish. Sheathed in purple auras, the Golden Poison Body was the precursor to the Jade Mantle before it was tuned for the Lang Clans Mantis bodies. It was a version that could use Poison Qi unlike the original Golden Mantis Body passed down in the Lang Clan. Along with that, it had the fun addition of taking on a snake-like theme instead of a mantis based one. The outward appearance of the aura surrounding their head and hands appeared to be viper heads rather than a mantis head and forearm blades.

These three-headed snakes bit rapidly at the flanks of the Thousand Limbed Lungfish, taking turns to harass it. Half of them focused on avoiding its attacks while the others struck it from behind. Sage waited for the perfect opportunity using Foresight and then jumped in, dousing the lungfish with a jet of blood red liquid. He didnt have to dilute the Ruby Blood poison into a mist in order to affect the lungfish as it was already pinned down by the Purple Mist Sect members. Then Sage used a few bundles of sticky silk webbing to attach a few glowing green seeds to the flanks of the lungfish. One slap meant one seed. He jumped back after each strike, joining in with the Purple Mist Sect members to harass it.

The seeds sprouted roots which then burrowed into the side of the beast. Sages corruption law boosted the Parasitic Roots to pierce into the lungfishs body and drain its energy. When combined with the paralytic Ruby Blood poison, it took less than a minute for the beast to lose most of its fighting strength. In fact, much of that time was just spent on dealing with the second wave of clones that the lungfish finished producing. The four clones forced the group of Sage and the Purple Mist Sect to step back for a moment to deal with the smaller lungfish. Once they were defeated, Sage returned to poisoning and planting seeds on the Thousand Limbed Lungfish.

Finally, it slowed down for Sage to wrap it up with bands of Spirit Power and then pull it into the Inner World. With this main problem dealt with, the Purple Mist Sect members split up. Two of them ran over to stop the Charming Slate Boar while the other six surrounded the Gold Scaled Porcelain Crocodile. Theyd already been fighting off the croc while they had surrounded the lungfish, so it was quickest for them to turn around and change to a new target. Sage joined them in disabling the croc, following the same plan as with the lungfish to debilitate it for capture.

The Discipline Keeper was able to fight the four dead lungfish as well as the bullfrog to a standstill, so Sage chose to solve the other enemies as quickly as possible. Two of the Purple Mist Sect went to the Charming Slate Boar and threw nets over it. While the boar wasnt currently a threat, Sage was worried it might charge into the Discipline Keepers fight and disrupt the fragile balance that had formed. Teacher Zhou and Teacher Gray were helping battle with some of the dead lungfish which allowed the Discipline Keeper to reserve half of his concentration on avoiding the bullet-like attacks of the Black Fire Bullfrogs tongue.

Once the nets fell onto the boar they got caught up in its legs and it tumbled over. The two Purple Mist Sect members attacked quickly, targeting its back and smashing against it to rattle its insides. Even with its entrails scrambled the boar was still strong enough to rip through the nets in a few breaths time, but they were enough to trip the boar and get it to focus upon the two of them rather than continue to run around madly. If its attention was focused upon the two of them then it would no longer be at risk of ruining other arrangements. The two of them didnt have to worry about trying to kill it, and only had to keep it occupied.

The Discipline Keeper only had to hold his own for a few more minutes while Sage and the Purple Mist Sect captured the rest of the beasts one after the other. Each of them were beaten down and captured to the Inner World using the same tactics. The Gold Scaled Porcelain Crocodile, the dead clones of the lungfish, the Black Fire Bullfrog and lastly the body of the Charming Slate Boar after it finally laid down and accepted death. Sage didnt bother explaining the sudden appearance of the eight Purple Mist Sect members to the Discipline Keeper or the others. Instead, they moved to help him work on the two doors to the room.

One of them led to the den area and the secret passage they took to get here while the other set led out towards the area where the Beast Keeper had fled to. It would be best if the den door could be breached first and the vulnerable students could flee back to a safer space. Then the Discipline Keeper could go along with Sage to catch Beast Keeper Deng. It had already been a few minutes since the Beast Keeper fled and they had to hurry before the man had too much time to set a new trap for them.