“Big Brother Lin, we—”
Meng Chao’s back was turned to the White Spirit’s carcass, and he was about to say something a mega fan would say when they met their idol to dissolve the awkward situation, but suddenly, all his hair on his back stood up.
Unable to believe his senses, he turned his head around and saw a bewitching and monstrous bloody flower made of flesh growing out of the White Spirit’s empty left eye socket.
Slitheerrrr…
A squirming sound that made his skin crawl rose. The bloody flower of flesh bloomed swiftly, and dozens of red tentacles that looked like nerve bundles crawled out of the middle. They connected the torn up left face and made it look like a shattered mask of a demon.
Bloody tentacles crawled out of the wounds on its body, and under the overabundant radiation from the Red Radiance Jades, they started growing and swelling up rapidly. They bound the torn up body and went to envelop the stalagmite within it.
‘No, no no! NO!’ Meng Chao nearly fell into despair. ‘It’s infested by a Blood Flower! It turned into an undead!’
Crack!
A few especially thick tentacles bound the rock formation, and the thick and big stalagmite started cracking.
Meng Chao staggered to his chain sabers. He swung them at the mutated White Spirit’s head.
But it swiftly rose and opened its mouth to spit out dozens of long and thick red tentacles. They threw themselves at the two sabers and nearly bound themselves around Meng Chao’s head to crush it into brain juice.
Then, the White Spirit opened its right eye.
It had no luster, was murky, and bloodshot.
It no longer had the cunning and wisdom from when it was alive. It only had killing intent that made it want to destroy everything.
“Whitey!”
When Lin Chuan saw that the White Spirit had started moving again, he called out to it with delight.
But soon, he noticed that the White Spirit had turned into a monstrous and ugly creature, and he could not help but be stunned.
When the White Spirit cast him an indifferent glance and coughed up a lot of tentacles at him, he was rooted to his feet due to shock.
Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack! Crumble!
The blood-red tentacles twisted the stalagmite in the White Spirit’s body, and it crumbled with a bang. The White Spirit regained its freedom, and its empty abdominal cavity soon filled up with raging tentacles. Under the light of the Red Radiance Jades, will o’ the wisps danced madly around it. It was just like a demon who came slaughtering its way out of the deepest depths of hell to take revenge.
It was only at that moment that Meng Chao realized that the White Spirit had long since been infested by a Blood Flower.
However, the Blood Flower was a very smart parasite. While the host was healthy and strong, it usually did not try to take over the body. Instead, it was in a semi-hibernating state and focused fully on improving the host’s physiological functions and the activity of their brain cells.
When the host’s life was drained, it woke up and turned its host’s corpse into an even more terrifying lifeform.
In his previous life, the White Spirit had smoothly completed its plan of blowing up the Red Radiance Jade mine and stopping the humans in the northern offense, so it did not die here. Hence, the Blood Flower in its body never had the chance to wake up.
But Meng Chao reckoned that the Blood Flower’s help was definitely related to how it was able to grow from a small Illusion Wolf to a Supernatural Entity that surpassed an Apocalyptic Beast.
Due to his arrival in this place in this life, he changed a lot of things, and most importantly, he ended its life beforehand, but it also led to it turning it into an even more terrifying undead.
How would this transformation change the direction of Dragon City’s future?
He did not have time to think about it. Cracking sounds were already coming out of the White Spirit’s body, and its broken bones were returning to place. It struggled to its feet.
Its originally white fur had already fallen off, and a layer of fine red hair squirmed about on its mottled skin. The beast’s appearance was completely different from when it was alive. It should be called the Blood Spirit!
Qin Hu and Lu Siya could tell just how terrifying the Blood Spirit was.
So, Qin Hu shouted and brought his arms high above his head. It looked as if he was holding an invisible saber. He summoned around thirty Shooting Star Blades and finally did not mess it up. They formed a huge saber, and he swung it at the Blood Spirit’s head.
Meanwhile, Lu Siya pressed both of her index fingers at her temples. She stirred up her final shreds of mental power, and her vitality magnetic field surged out like a volcano eruption. It allowed her to resonate once more with the magnetic field of the planet, which was at the depths of the ground. She summoned nine spikes shaped like fangs.
Unfortunately, after the White Spirit turned into the undead Blood Spirit, its fighting power was much greater than when it was alive. The bloody tentacles swung about and knocked away most of the Shooting Star Blades. Even if a few of them stabbed into its body, they were still pushed out once its flesh squirmed.
And besides, Lu Siya had only begun learning how to fight over the last two years. She had also been using the Spike Art just now, so she had already drained her spirit energy a long time ago. Her head hurt so much that she felt as if it was about to split apart. She could not lock on the Blood Spirit with the nine spikes, and the beast avoided them easily while leaving behind red afterimages.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
The afterimages of the Blood Spirit divided into three. They appeared at the same time in front of Meng Chao, Qin Hu, and Lu Siya.
The three of them felt as if they had just been attacked by a Hellish Cerberus and were sent flying like falling kites. They crashed into the wall of the mine and coughed up blood as they fell limp on the ground.
The Blood Spirit twitched as if it was suffering from some kind of neurosis. But it did not go forward to attack them. Instead, it went to the place where the crystal bombs were placed and used a few blood tentacles to nimbly sweep up a crystal bomb. It tore off the seal, which was covered in a large amount of runic symbols, and tossed the bomb at the place with the most Red Radiance Jades.
Boom!
The Red Radiance Jade crystals blew up and shattered to pieces. They released an incredibly violent wave of spirit energy, which filled the whole cave with a heat that could burn spirits!
Regardless of whether they were on Earth or the Other World, when humans mined minerals, they always used explosives.
However, the atomic structure of the materials on Earth was relatively stable, and most of the changes happened on the atomic level. After scientists conducted repeated research, they created safe bombs that were incredibly stable. If detonators were not inserted in them, even if they were struck with weapons or burned, they would not explode.
But the crystals in the Other World were materials with super high energy and were incredibly unstable.
Even the humans’ brainwaves might be able to activate the terrifying energy in them.
Hence, detonators were not required to activate crystal bombs. Instead, runic symbols were needed to seal them so that their power could be controlled, which would allow them to be safely stored and transported.
At that moment, the Blood Spirit had torn off the seals from a few crystal bombs. It threw them into the depths of the Red Radiance Jade clusters, which shook the entire mine so much that it started swaying violently. All the Red Radiance Jade clusters started cracking. A hidden force surged in the crystals as if they were seeking the ancient power at the center of the planet to wake it up.
Meng Chao, Qin Hu, and Lu Siya had still not managed to get back to their feet. They were swept back down a few times by the impact wave caused by the explosions.
“Is it mad?!” Qin Hu yelped. “It’s just blowing up the Red Radiance Jade mine! It’s not even setting up time for itself to run away!”
“In a certain sense, it has indeed gone mad,” Lu Siya gritted her teeth and said, “Professor Ye told me that the undead transformed by Blood Flowers are like zombies. Before their brains completely rot away, they remember their greatest obsession in life.
“This monster’s greatest obsession was to blow up the Red Radiance Jade mine. After it turned into an undead, its obsession turned into an instinct.
“The Blood Flower itself is just a fungus-type lifeform that is at the lowest level of its category. It doesn’t have the ability to think. It’s just using its instincts to throw the crystal bombs. It doesn’t have the ability to think of leaving itself at least twelve hours to run away.
“Right now, the crystal bombs and Red Radiance Jade mine are the only things in its sight. It cannot see anything else!”
The spirit energy that surged madly in the cave soon gathered together to turn into a tidal wave.
Even though the Blood Spirit lacked sufficient intelligence to pierce holes in the mine and stuff the crystal bombs inside before sealing them so that it could maximize the power of the explosives, no one could be certain whether just tossing this many crystal bombs within the Red Radiance Jades wouldn’t be enough to reach the requirements for a chain reaction that would create a spirit energy tsunami.
Meng Chao, Qin Hu, and Lu Siya were suppressed completely by the impact waves.
It seemed like the only thing they could do was to pray.
At that moment…
Whoosh!
When the Blood Spirit wanted to sweep up more crystal bombs, the remaining half of the sealed crystal bombs were swept away by a chain spear.
It was Lin Chuan!
“Whitey, we can’t…” He looked dazed as he mumbled to himself.
The Blood Spirit growled and turned into a fierce, bloody figure that swept past Lin Chuan’s shoulder.
A pool of blood instantly bloomed on Lin Chuan’s shoulder, and his skin and flesh were torn.
“Big Brother Lin, it’s no longer your Whitey!” Meng Chao shouted anxiously. “It’s an undead! A parasite occupied the White Spirit’s corpse! It’s an ugly zombie! Look at her now! Do you think that the White Spirit would want to look like that?!”
Lin Chuan was stunned for a moment, and the Blood Spirit pounced on him again.
He instinctively swung his chain spear to parry the attack, and the Undying Bird shone brilliantly once more.
Unfortunately for him, the fierce battles throughout the day had used up most of his spirit energy, and when he fought against Shen Yulong earlier, he was heavily injured as well. Otherwise, it would have been easy for him to handle Qin Hu. After all, the man was just at the peak of Earth Realm.
The Blood Spirit, however, had gained additional powers from the Blood Flower. While its ability to create illusions and control minds might have weakened, its physical power had increased.
The two figures intersected with each other. A deep wound was left on Lin Chuan’s chest. He fell on the ground and revealed the vital point on his neck.
The Blood Spirit’s eyes shone with a fierce light, and a barbed tentacle rushed out of its mouth.
With just one bite, it could rip apart Lin Chuan’s neck.
But at the last moment, it stopped.
Then, the beast turned into a puppet controlled by two puppeteers, just like how Lin Chuan had been earlier.
Its spine started making cracking sounds and twisted as well as shuddered strangely.
It looked like there was some sort of energy controlling its body and making it pounce on Lin Chuan to bite his neck, but there was also another force that was stopping it with everything it had.
For an instant, the fierce light in its remaining eye disappeared without a trace.
Instead, just like how it happened with Lin Chuan, a crystalline tear stained with blood rolled down its face.
The bloody flower had bloomed over the left side of the face, and it was still twisted into a face filled with rampaging will for murder.
But the right side of the face remained just like that of a fox, and it had the expression of conflict and pain that was just like a human’s.
It opened its mouth as if it wanted to say something to Lin Chuan.
But its throat was already stuffed full of bloody tentacles. It could only let out hissing moans.
“This is…” Lin Chuan was stunned.
Qin Hu and Lu Siya were dumbfounded.
A thought flashed in Meng Chao’s head.
Kindling had never announced the end of his quest to kill a Hell Beast nor given him his reward.
Even if he did not kill the White Spirit alone, he had still used his body as bait and nearly sacrificed his good friend so that Lu Siya’s spike could pierce its abdomen.
No matter what, Kindling should have given something, no matter how little it was, to motivate him to continue spreading the fires of civilization, right?
But if the White Spirit had not died…
It did not seem like the Blood Flower had full control over it.
‘Yes, that’s right. When a Blood Flower infests a normal monster, it only wakes up after the monster is completely dead.
‘But the White Spirit has two brains. Even if the main brain was taken over by the Blood Spirit, a bit of its soul may be left attached to the swollen bundle of nerves at the end of its coccyx, which allows it to exist for a few minutes or seconds!’
After realizing this, Meng Chao started shouting at the top of his lungs. “Big Brother Lin, do you see that?! The White Spirit is in great pain!
“It was originally an ignorant monster and only obeyed its instincts to survive and fight. Regardless of whether it kills or is killed, it shouldn’t be experiencing such conflicted emotions like uncertainty and pain that humans feel!
“You’re the one who created it and taught it human emotions, desires, ambitions, and the most profound form of love. You gave it a soul and gave it the ability to feel emotional pain.
“Now, it’s already dead. Are you going to watch its soul be endlessly tormented by this ugly zombie?!”