The Creatures That We Are

Chapter 542: Hat Trick

After the insidious scream, the little abomination radiated bright red light like a steel ingot reaching its melting point.

Rumble.

The crimson force field expanded again. They all staggered and lost their balance, the disorientating effect greater than before.

With the help of their respective Talents, War Tiger and Gao Yang were the first to adapt to the force field, and they barely recovered their mobility. The others took longer to get used to the situation.

Gao Yang knew they must end things now!

The most terrifying aspect of the little abomination wasn’t its strange power or unusual survivability, but its capability to quickly evolve during fights.

Although with Lucky, Gao Yang also gained Luck points in fights, which allowed him to keep growing stronger, the little abomination grew much more quickly, at least ten times his growth rate.

With a few more exchanges of blows, it would’ve become nearly as powerful as Zhuang Mei in her life monster form! Then things would be really bad!

The enhanced crimson force field covered the entire court. The little abomination “melted” into five long round creatures, resembling giant leeches. Carrying terrifying distorting power, they rushed toward the five humans with incredible speed like they were swimming.

Shit!

Gao Yang’s heart clenched. He, War Tiger, and Qing Ling might be able to deal with one leech each, but Lithe Snake, now armless, and Nine Frost, who could only fight close range with his fists, would certainly die.

Even though Lithe Snake and Nine Frost could come back to life with the resurrection pills they had taken like Gray Bear, Gao Yang, War Tiger, and Qing Ling would have a difficult time killing all five leeches under the circumstances, with the crimson force field restraining them.

And if they failed to kill them all, the leeches would merge again and evolve.

Gao Yang clenched his fists, his mind on overdrive. He must use Willful Power and hit all five leeches with Fire Punch to destroy all of them completely. However, given everyone’s Talent and their way of fighting, they wouldn’t be able to create the chance for him.

Damn it!

At the split second, a giant red leech shot toward Gao Yang. Whoosh, whoosh. Two Black Gold darts were thrown, but they were slowed by the force field around the red leech, and the leech dodged the darts easily by twisting its body, continuing to fly toward Gao Yang without even slowing down.

Clink.

The red leech suddenly stopped two meters from Gao Yang. Or it would be more precise to say that it had knocked into something.

Gao Yang was surprised and glad. It was a translucent barrier with light purple ripples.

White Dew!

Clink. Clink. Clink. Clink.

At the same time, the other four red leeches hit the translucent barrier, too.

Two seconds later, White Dew showed up.

Dressed in bright red extravagant royal dress, her silver hair flew in the air, her crimson eyes captivating.

With her legs pressed together, she stood on the tip of the obelisk on her toes, her arms extended as she manipulated special water elements, which took the shape of about a dozen translucent purple walls that hovered above the plaza.

White Dew tugged at her sensuous red lips, speaking with a soft, gentle voice but in a slightly prideful tone, “Oh, isn’t this the son-in-law of Spectres? It’s only been a few days. How did you become such a loser already?”

Gao Yang almost choked. He was touched, but also irritated.

I haven’t wronged any of you! And...

Before he could grumble further, a gust of wind swept through him, and when he realized it, he was already standing before the woods of stone pillars at the edge of the court.

Whoosh, whoosh.

Dressed in an old-fashioned tuxedo, Waking Insects also had an arm around the topless Gray Bear. Gray Bear’s belt was taken off, and his pants dropped down as he was whisked away at ultrasonic speed, revealing a yellow underpants with the patterns of a certain blue cat, the round curve of his butt on full display. It wasn’t a pleasant sight, to say the least.

While Waking Insects was quite weak as a fighter, he was the fastest known creature in the Mist World.

It was the first time War Tiger, Qing Ling, Nine Frost, and Lithe Snake witnessed such speed, and they stood rooted to the spot, eyes wide and jaw dropped with shock, their hair messed up.

They were all wondering the same thing: what happened, who were they, and where were they?

“Good work. Leave the rest to the Spectres.”

Waking Insects gently laid Gray Bear down and bowed at them politely.

As he spoke, White Dew had been making moves.

Manipulating the dozen translucent water walls, she condensed them into sturdy violet ice crystals and pulled them together toward the heart of the court. Threatened, the five red leeches fled like headless flies, but ended up hitting the crystal walls; even when they turned around for a way out, they hit another wall.

She’s gotten much stronger too, Gao Yang marveled to himself.

Then he wondered, Where did she get all the water elements from? Has she extracted this much from the air so quickly? No, that’d be absurd.

Or maybe she’s come here with a sprinkler truck...nah, that’s even more ridiculous.

Wait!

Gao Yang suddenly remembered the riverbed they had walked along to get to this temple. It seemed that the river hadn’t completely dried, only the water had been taken by White Dew.

That meant White Dew had found the temple before them, but she hadn’t opened the sarcophagus or woken up the abomination inside the belly of the mummy.

With Waking Insects’ tremendous speed, the Spectres had avoided Gao Yang and his teammates, hiding in the dark and waiting for them to trigger whatever there was at the temple, biding time to make a move or not make a move.

That’s dirty!

Clack.

Rumble.

As Gao Yang mused, the violet crystal walls had come together to form a sturdy polygonal prison. Within it, the five red leeches continued to knock into the walls at increasing speed until they became red afterimages to the human eyes, shooting around like a firework of tadpoles.

Alas, they could never break out.

Accepting reality, the little abomination returned to one entity, pulling the crimson force field back to protect itself.

With its legs tucked in and its arms around its knees, it buried its face into its knees.

“Sniffle...sniff...”

It started to sob again in heartbreak, but Gao Yang wasn’t going to be fooled this time. It was thinking, evolving, and soon, it would become stronger with even more lethal moves.

“Heavenly...”

A clear voice roughened by years came from above.

Spring was here, looking like a seven or eight year old boy in a black tuxedo and red bowtie, his soft silver hair parted in the middle and covering half of his forehead.

Hovering in the air, he splayed his hands downward, his eyes glinting with fierce red light.

“...Might!”