Rise of The Demon General

Chapter 689: Chapter 689. Another Ingredient

Huang Er didn’t last long. She couldn’t free herself. The darkness engulfed her, turning her into a black cocoon. She was eroded inside the cocoon.

Bo Wu came out. ”Hey, don’t consume her completely. You gain no benefit from it. Let me do it.”

The darkness shroud covering the demon dispersed, revealing Amon. He ignored Bo Wu’s request. He kept Huang Er inside the dark cocoon.

Seeing that Amon didn’t grant its request, Bo Wu lunged at Sima Fang’s corpse. Unfortunately, it couldn’t reach her. Its tether to Amon’s left arm prevented it from venturing too far.

”Can you step back a little?” Bo Wu asked.

Amon replied, ”There are plenty of beast carcasses on the ground. Why didn’t you consume those?”

”Those long-dead beasts are useless to me,” Bo Wu said.

Amon snickered. Now he knew his beast passenger could only benefit from consuming fresh corpses.

”By the way, how did this girl know your identity behind that veil?” Bo Wu asked as it tried to grab Sima Fang unsuccessfully.

”She was guessing,” Amon answered. ”She had good intuition. I’m glad I got the chance to eliminate her here before she causes me trouble in the future.”

Lin Li came running back after the situation seemed resolved. ”Brother, when I fled, I heard them talk about encountering the Soul Flayer.”

”Really?” Amon asked. He looked in the direction from which Huang Er and Sima Fang came when he arrived. The cave had a dead end in that direction. After further observation, the dead end appeared to be a recently occurred cave-in. He understood then that behind the cave-in was where the Soul Flayer had been spotted.

Amon asked Lin Li to pick up the space ring on Sima Fang’s finger. When she did, Bo Wu asked if she could pull the corpse over so it could touch the corpse. Lin Li turned to Amon, who shook his head.

”Grhh...! Why are you being so mean to me?” Bo Wu complained.

Amon continued to ignore Bo Wu. Now that he had completed his side objective, it was time to return to his main objective. After learning the general direction of the Soul Flayer, it should be easier to find the beast.

”Huh?” Amon suddenly frowned. A strange feeling came to him. At the same time, the beast carcasses around the place began to move.

Lin Li and Bo Wu’s beast instincts also felt the change. Lin Li went into an alert stance, while Bo Wu returned to Amon’s side.

”Hehe, it seems the hunted had become the hunter,” Bo Wu laughed.

”Lin, return to the ring,” Amon ordered. Lin Li didn’t object.

Amon let go of the dark cocoon. The cocoon dispersed, revealing a half-decomposed human. Half of its skeleton was visible. Huang Er’s remains dropped lifelessly to the ground.

Amon sensed a powerful spirit beast approaching as the beast corpses around them stood up. Amon moved in the direction opposite to where the spirit beast came from. The cave they were in was too small. There was not much space to move. He preferred the freedom to move around when fighting an enemy with unknown ability.

The zombie beasts that had risen lunged at him to prevent him from fleeing. His ceremonial dagger flared with a black flame. It sliced through the zombie beasts easily. Those beasts couldn’t even slow him.

He finally came to a large enough cavern with an unusual aesthetic. The entire cavern appeared to be made of glass with mirror-like qualities, even the stalagmites that jutted out at weird angles. There were small holes in the ceiling high above. Rays of light shone through those holes. This showed that this cavern was close to the surface. The light from those holes was reflected by the mirror surfaces, making the entire cavern unusually bright.

More beast carcasses were there. These carcasses rose and lunged at Amon. Amon’s ceremonial dagger flashed around him. His slashes left trails of black flames. The flashes were so fast that they merged and formed a protective sphere. All the zombie beasts that charged into the flaming sphere were turned into mincemeat.

Amon finally saw the source of the carcasses returning to life. The Soul Flayer stepped into the cavern. Following behind it were two walking human corpses, Xa Li and Huang Er.

”A spirit beast with necromancy power...?” Amon uttered. His surprise turned into a grin. ”Hehe. I was looking for the ingredients for the Demon Revealing talisman, but it turns out you also contain another ingredient I have been looking for.”

A deep and guttural voice sounded from the Soul Flayer. ”Hmph! I was chasing the intruders who had disturbed me, but I ended up finding a trespassing demon instead. Did you just say that you are hunting me for ingredients?”

”I did,” Amon replied. He reactivated the Elder God Veil. The darkness shroud returned to wrap his body, turning him into a being composed of darkness. At the same time, around one hundred standard battle puppets, together with the Alpha and Beta Puppets, materialized behind him.

”Let’s see whose puppets are better, demon,” the Soul Flayer stated.

The zombie beasts in the cavern, as well as the ones the Soul Flayer brought from other parts of the cave, swarmed toward Amon.

Amon had his standard battle puppets fight the zombie beasts. He still had the special giant puppets in his black space ring, but there was not enough space for them to move inside this cavern. They would only complicate the battle. He only needed the battle puppets to hold the zombie beasts while he dealt with the Soul Flayer.

While the zombie beasts formed by the long-dead carcasses of spirit beasts were mostly weak and clumsy, the two fresh human zombies were not. Zombie Huang Er and Xa Li moved with speed and precision as if they were alive. They could even use their arts.

Zombie Xa Li slashed his swords, forming multiple rapid slashes that cut Amon’s nearby battle puppets. Zombie Huang Er had lost her sword, but her palms, enhanced by her martial arts, were devastating enough against the battle puppets.

They were, however, not the Alpha Puppet’s opponent. The Alpha Puppet charged into them. It used its chainsaw sword to cut off Xa Li’s arm, and its morningstar fist crashed into Huang Er’s side. The morningstar fist hit the part where Huang Er’s flesh had been eroded, where one could see her bones. Her ribs broke to pieces as the Morningstar fist smashed into them.

Both zombie Huang Er and Xa Li were unaffected by the punishment. Xa Li grabbed his sword from the hand that was severed using his other hand, while Huang Er continued advancing with her palm strikes despite her broken ribs.

While these zombies didn’t feel pain or fear, their opponents were the same. The Alpha Puppet wasn’t troubled by its opponents’ persistence. It used raw power, slamming into the two and staggering them. It swung its chainsaw sword, attempting to cut both its opponents in half.

Before that happened, a tentacle grabbed the Alpha Puppet’s swinging arm. It prevented it from swinging. While its arm was seized, the Soul Flayer’s large head came butting into the Alpha Puppet’s chest. The headbutt sent the puppet crashing into the ground.

The Soul Flayer lifted its two massive forelegs. It wanted to stomp the Alpha Puppet into paste.

The Beta Puppet came to its partner’s rescue. The energy shields in its two arms blocked the Soul Flayer’s stomp. The ground cracked as the force of the stomp was transferred into the Beta puppet’s feet. The Alpha Puppet quickly rose while the Beta Puppet blocked the Soul Flayer. Its morningstar fist turned into a flail, and it swung the weapon to the Soul Flayer’s head.

The Soul Flayer grunted. One of its four tentacles grabbed the flail before it hit. It then pulled and threw the Alpha Puppet high into the air. Its other tentacles caught the Beta Puppet’s legs and caused it to fall. It lifted the Beta Puppet and slammed it repeatedly on the ground. As it did that, it sensed something on its back.

Amon utilized his concealment art and the speed boost from Elder God Veil to get a jump on the Soul Flayer. He stabbed his black flame from his ceremonial dagger into the Soul Flayer’s back. To his surprise, he felt resistance.

Amon had yet to encounter things that he failed to cut after using the ceremonial dagger’s secret power. The black flame still pierced through the Soul Flayer’s thick hide, but it did so with much difficulty. Hot, yellowish blood spurted from the wound.

”RAWWRRR...!!!”

A pained howl escaped the Soul Flayer’s mouth. It had been some time since it experienced pain. Its first response was to trash around to throw Amon off. When its mind cleared a little, it swung its tentacle at Amon, who still clung to its back.

Amon pulled his ceremonial dagger out and slashed the incoming tentacle. He was met with another surprise. The tentacle was even harder than the Soul Flayer’s hide. His dagger was like hitting another high-grade weapon. Another tentacle came from a different direction. He had no choice but to jump away.

The Soul Flayer stared at Amon with a furious growl.

Amon noticed a few nearby zombie beasts turn into dust. The dust came to the Soul Flayer and swirled around its wound. Before long, the wound was gone.

’It can heal itself using its minions,’ Amon thought. This made capturing the spirit beast much more difficult.

The Soul Flayer stomped its foot angrily. Its mouth started to glow. It fired a thin laser beam at the Alpha Puppet, which was charging toward it.

The laser beam was fast enough that the Alpha Puppet failed to dodge. It hit the puppet’s shoulder and started tearing through its outer plate. The Alpha Puppet stopped advancing and moved away, but the laser beam kept on it. The Soul Flayer aimed the beam to follow the puppet’s movement.

With the beam constantly on the Alpha Puppet, it started to tear a hole in its frame.