After the Immortal Disappeared

Chapter 62: Chapter 63: Shapeshifter

”Deities? I’d like to see what you’ve got!” the Black Flood Dragon roared with laughter. ”It’s been too long since I’ve had a good, satisfying fight!”

Before it could even finish its sentence, hundreds of massive fireballs suddenly rained down from the sky, crashing onto the ground where the two men stood.

The fireballs glowed white within their golden-red flames, a sign of their terrifyingly high temperature. Each one encased an Obsidian Meteorite over ten feet in diameter. The force and sound of their impact were so intense it was as if they meant to punch through the very surface of the earth.

Every strike triggered a massive explosion, carving deep craters into the ground and melting the surface of the soil into a glaze-like state.

And all these impacts were concentrated within a hundred-foot radius. Even the Golden Armored Soldiers were blasted into molten copper.

’Could those two possibly survive that?’ Not far away, Hee Lingchuan pressed his hands tightly over his ears to keep his eardrums from bursting.

The more powerful the Divine Technique, the longer it takes to prepare. The Black Flood Dragon had summoned a meteor shower with a mere flick of its tail. It looked simple and effortless, which was partly because this world was its home turf. But more likely, its earlier banter with the two men had been a cover for secretly channeling this Divine Technique.

The only thing more troublesome than the Artifact Spirit of a Divine Artifact was an Artifact Spirit as cunning as a human.

The Black Flood Dragon seemed to have a clear grasp of the situation below. With a low hum, figures began to emerge one after another from the black smoke blanketing the ground.

The Demon Apes were getting back up. Replenished by the Celestial Fire, they now looked bigger, stronger, and faster. Magma even dripped from their bodies, each droplet hitting the ground with a SIZZLE.

As soon as they formed, they charged in another direction.

It was a pile of rubble, where the massive amount of earth and stone from the collapsed South City Wall offered the best cover.

Unfortunately, this tactic was useless against the Black Flood Dragon. It could pinpoint the two enemies’ locations without needing its eyes.

They weren’t at the point of impact at all. Sunx Fuping must have used an Escape Technique, dragging them both over two hundred feet away in the nick of time.

But just as the two reappeared, the ten siege weapons on the city wall suddenly swiveled on their own and aimed at them. The Black Flood Dragon said leisurely, ”You seemed to be having a lot of fun bombing my house just now, didn’t you?”

Crossbow Arrows, Fire Stones, and Nail Bombs all fired at once, raining down on the two men.

The same Nail Bombs that had once brought Nian Songyu such delightful surprise now brought him nothing but misery. His Turtle Shield was studded with tiny nail fragments, and two had even pierced his leg.

A faint green light emanated from his body. He had already withstood two volleys of Flying Crossbows and one of Fire Stones. Unfortunately, Sunx Fuping had been exactly right. Not only was the Society Command’s effectiveness greatly diminished here, but the True Power he consumed in battle was also multiplied.

Fortunately, he still managed to buy Sunx Fuping a little time. The Earth Escape Technique was used again, and the two of them shifted over a hundred feet away.

The Black Flood Dragon rubbed its head against the gate tower. ”Don’t be impatient. This is just a warmup. There’s more fun to come.”

No sooner had its voice faded than bats began pouring out of the vents on the city wall, one after another. A single circling flight above the South City Wall and they formed a swarm so vast it blotted out the sun.

There must have been tens of thousands of them.

Then, half of the bats dove to the ground and transformed into five agile Sand Leopards; the rest split into groups in the air, morphing into Strange Birds with sharp beaks and bat-like wings.

The Demon Apes were powerful but slow, giving Nian Songyu room to maneuver. The Black Flood Dragon had noticed this, so it summoned agile Sand Leopards to cover this offensive weakness and had the Demon Birds launch an air raid. With this coordinated, multi-level attack, it wanted to see what other tricks the two could possibly pull.

But this was also where it became clear that Nian Songyu was genuinely skilled. With the Sand Leopards joining the fray, holding a shield in one hand became inconvenient. So, he put away his Turtle Shield and drew a Long Saber. From a distance, Hee Lingchuan could only see two streaks of green light dancing up and down, as nimble as a swimming dragon. They were fast, precise, and ruthless, and neither the Sand Leopards nor the Demon Apes could get close.

But in the Black Flood Dragon’s world, how could he possibly get away without paying a price? In just that short time, Nian Songyu had already sustained more than a dozen wounds, large and small. The blood flowing from them soaked his clothes. The most severe injury was dealt by a diving Demon Bird. Although he had sliced the Demon Bird in two, its sharp beak had disfigured him, leaving a gash that ran from his temple to his chin, nearly pecking out his eye.

Seeing this, Hee Lingchuan muttered, ”That’s ridiculous. How can a Demon Beast transform like that?”

The original owner of his body may not have been well-read, but even he knew one of this world’s ironclad laws: neither humans nor Demon Beasts could completely transform into other creatures, unless they naturally possessed the ability to mimic or change forms.

Simply put, humans couldn’t become Demons, and Demons couldn’t become humans. A bat was a bat; it couldn’t turn into a leopard or a bird. However, a Toad Demon could still grow from a tadpole, because that was its natural cycle.

Humans could use certain Divine Techniques or methods to partially transform, but such changes were temporary and came with significant costs and side effects.

An ironclad law was supposed to be a universal Law. For these bats to be able to shapeshift at will... wasn’t that just playing dirty?

Fuzzy Peach gave a wry smile. ”In a place like this, is there anything that would truly count as strange?”

Hee Lingchuan suddenly heard the sound of something slicing through the air above. He quickly made a shushing gesture at him, but it was too late.

A Demon Bird landed on the rubble less than ten feet away from them. They stared blankly at each other.

Now that it had landed, they could see how huge the creature was. Its standing height was nearly the same as Hee Lingchuan’s.

The creature had bat-like wings, thin and membranous. Its sternum protruded like a Dragon Bone, and the fronts of its folded wings had hooked claws. The black talons alone were longer than a human finger.

Its beak was long and sharp, shaped like a scythe, capable of shattering a prey’s skull with a single peck.

Terrified, Fuzzy Peach drew his waist-saber. Hee Lingchuan made a subtle motion with his fingers and whispered, his voice as faint as a mosquito’s buzz, ”Don’t move!”

’Stared at by those ochre eyes, his own scalp tingled with fear. This thing is an amalgam of monsters. Besides a Sand Leopard and a Demon Bird, who knows what else it can turn into?’

’Besides, these things can’t be killed. It’s useless no matter how hard I fight.’

As Hee Lingchuan tried to think of a plan, the Demon Bird tilted its head as if it, too, were thinking.

Of course, the two of them didn’t dare to move a muscle.

After a few breaths, the Demon Bird seemed to lose interest in them. It turned its back, flapped its wings, and flew away.

Fuzzy Peach’s forehead was beaded with sweat. He couldn’t help but let out a long sigh of relief. ”If we get out of this, I’m definitely going to burn some extra High Incense and tell my wife to offer up a few more meat dishes. Damn, my ancestors are really watching over me!”

That was a monster even the National Preceptor and Captain Nian couldn’t handle.

”It has nothing to do with your ancestors. It wasn’t hostile toward us. Why?” Hee Lingchuan looked toward the Black Flood Dragon on the gate tower. All these monsters were summoned by the Black Flood Dragon; they were its eyes, ears, and enforcers, their actions all under its control. The fact that this Demon Bird saw them and did nothing could only mean that the Black Flood Dragon had no desire to attack them.

Like Nian Songyu, they had also been setting fires everywhere in the Illusion Realm. So why was the Black Flood Dragon willing to let them go?