Chapter 1: Failed Heist (Part 2)

Everyone was stunned as they watched this scene—Guo Shier could actually fight Ming Liang head-on. Though he was sent flying, Ming Liang was also flung away. Both sides wore expressions of disbelief. How was this possible? Such a challenge across skill levels had never been seen before; the gap in strength between them was enormous.

Guo Shier retracted his Moon Blade and found it covered in cracks. The old man immediately crushed a spirit core to begin repairing the blade. That strike had nearly destroyed it—the power of an eighth-tier sacrificial artifact was truly formidable. If not for Li Ran’s secret reinforcement of the Moon Blade, the Dragon Python Sword would have shattered it and struck at Guo Shier’s altar.

The old man grumbled, “So many experts stayed idle, but only you could do this… You brat! That guy has the strength of an eighth-tier altar. It doesn’t matter if you die, but I still want to live a few more days!”

Guo Shier laughed, “Heh, I got carried away. That guy really deserved it. Seeing his pathetic appearance made me want to slash him!” In truth, he regretted it too—fighting a professional at an eighth-tier altar was indeed reckless.

Ming Liang was filled with doubt. He stared in disbelief at the Dragon Python Sword, which also had cracks. That was his life sacrificial artifact, an eighth-tier one—yet it had been cracked by a professional at a sixth-tier altar. What did that mean?

Roar!

Hai Miluo suddenly turned his head and saw a massive figure appearing on the other side of the mountain ridge. Its thousand-meter-long body resembled a small mountain, and a huge head slowly rose from behind the ridge, its two enormous eyes glowing with wild intensity. The earlier fight had alarmed the Silver-Striped Patterned Dragon, which entered combat mode.

Li Ran shouted, “Go!” A tremendous force enveloped everyone, instantly pulling them back dozens of kilometers.

Ming Liang was terrified. He roared, “Run!”

The Silver-Striped Patterned Dragon wasn’t an ordinary Abnormal Talisman Beast—it was a sixteen-tier Abnormal Talisman Beast, its body covered in flickering talisman lights, with countless runes scattering in all directions. After roaring, Ming Liang tried to teleport, but he was shocked to find that space around him was now blocked—countless tiny runes floated in the air, sealing off the area.

The Silver-Striped Patterned Dragon crossed the mountain ridge in one step; that tiny ridge couldn’t stop it at all. It let out a deafening roar at Ming Liang and the dozens of professionals, unleashing an unimaginably powerful attack mixed with countless electric sparks. Arcs of electricity, like snakes, leaped and spread outward.

Ming Liang and Ming Wu Deng couldn’t figure out why their opponent could escape so quickly. As the Silver-Threaded Spotted Dragon lunged at them, this thought flashed by in their minds for just a moment. Ming Wu Deng shouted, “Defend… retreat! Don’t fight head-on!” They had all seen how terrifying the Silver-Threaded Spotted Dragon was—it was impossible to resist; it was utterly monstrous.

The Silver-Threaded Spotted Dragon was extremely annoyed by the professionals who disturbed it. It had no intention of eating humans, mainly because humans were too insignificant—like tiny insects, not even worth filling a crack in its teeth—so it didn’t like to eat them. But it enjoyed torturing them. These little insects had disturbed it, so it intended to kill them all.

The Silver-Threaded Spotted Dragon charged forward with its head, then suddenly swung its massive tail, hundreds of meters long, covered in crackling arcs of electricity. The sound of its tail slashing through the air was deafening, accompanied by explosive booms.

Ming Liang broke into cold sweat. He slammed his hand on the altar and forced himself upward into the air. Ming Wu Deng also fled frantically to the side. The other ancestors weren’t as strong; they desperately invoked their sacred artifacts and attacked wildly, activating all their defenses in an attempt to block the tail’s strikes.

With a series of explosions like beans bursting, eight altar-level professionals were hit by the Silver-Threaded Spotted Dragon’s tail and instantly reduced to piles of flesh. Their altars crashed to the ground. As the dragon turned, it stepped on one of the newly fallen altars, crushing it to dust with a loud noise. Just a single tail strike had killed eight experts at the fifth-tier altar level.

Ming Liang’s gaunt face showed a frenzied expression as he roared, “Beasts! Die!” Each family ancestor was extremely valuable; losing one was unbearable, let alone eight at once. Adding to the earlier losses, this encounter caused huge casualties, driving him to madness.

With his strength, Ming Liang could actually fight back against the Silver-Threaded Spotted Dragon, but he was held back by his subordinates. He shouted, “Ming Wu Deng, organize the retreat! I’ll hold it off!”

His Dragon Python Sword slashed fiercely, leaving a wound on the Silver-Threaded Spotted Dragon. But for the dragon, such damage was insignificant. Hurt by the strike, it became furious—it couldn’t believe a tiny insect could wound it.

Ming Wu Deng’s altar power was second only to Ming Liang’s. He conjured a series of phantom talismans, forming a chain of them to bind the other altar-level professionals, then flew outward desperately. As long as they got out of the dragon’s reach, they could teleport away.

The Silver-Threaded Spotted Dragon was enraged and refused to let go of those little insects. An Abnormal Talisman Beast evolved to level 16 possessed intelligence far beyond that of ordinary Abnormal Talisman Beasts. The leap from level 15 to level 16 was a significant hurdle; once crossed, the beast’s intelligence would soar sharply, allowing it to think rather than act on instinct.

Ming Wu Deng suddenly realized that their surroundings seemed filled with a viscous substance, severely restricting their flying speed. Even more terrifyingly, they were gradually pulled back, unable to fly away at all. He roared, “Stop running! Fight with me!” He was a decisive man—once he saw no way out, he immediately decided to fight to the death.

The elders also understood that if they couldn’t kill the Silver-Threaded Spotted Dragon today, they would all die here, so they too resolved to fight desperately. After all, they were top-tier professionals, and their strength couldn’t be underestimated when they fought with all their might.

Guo Shier and the others watched from a distance. Due to the dragon’s enormous size, they could clearly see its movements. As for Ming Liang and the rest, they could only see black dots moving like ants, with occasional glimmers of talismanic light revealing those figures.

Hai Miluo said with lingering fear, “If not for the senior pulling us out, we would have ended up in a tough fight like them.”

Li Ran stared intently at the distant battle, assessing the dragon’s combat strength. Gradually, a faint smile appeared on his lips as he said calmly, “It’s not that great. I’m confident I can defeat it!”

Guo Shier eyed it greedily. “The soul of this Abnormal Talisman Beast… must be an elite sacrifice.”

Li Ran replied, “Of course. You recklessly tried to fight it just now—shouldn’t the Moon Blade be in ruins by now?”

Guo Shier’s face turned slightly red as he nodded. “It took the soul of a level 9 mutated Talisman Beast to restore it, and it still needs a few days to fully recover.”

Li Ran nodded. “If we had the soul of the Silver-Threaded Spotted Dragon, as long as it swallowed the Moon Blade, it could recover instantly without any damage… That’s the beauty of elite sacrifices.”

Sacrifices were an essential part of the altar, extremely important. The spirit offering might not be necessary, but sacrifices were indispensable—they maintained the stability of the altar and the sacred treasures, especially elite sacrifices, which had an even greater impact.

Hai Miluo asked, “Senior, when shall we go up?”

Li Ran said calmly, “Once all those from the Gu Ming family are dead, we can go up. For now… we wait.” Of course they would take this opportunity; he wouldn’t be foolish enough to charge in now.
Hai Miluo laughed, “Yes, we’re not in a hurry. Hehe, I didn’t expect this to happen…”
It had to be said that the Gu Ming family was extremely unlucky. No one could have predicted that Guo Shier’s attack would alert the Silver-Striped Spotted Dragon, and their reaction wasn’t fast enough, so they fell into crisis with no room to maneuver, forced to fight head-on against the Silver-Striped Spotted Dragon.
The ancestors of the Gu Ming family attacked desperately. To their despair, the Silver-Striped Spotted Dragon’s defense was incredibly strong. Aside from Ming Liang and Ming Wu Deng, who could break through its defenses, even professionals from the sixth-tier altars found it hard to harm it. Ming Liang kept shouting, “Find its weakness! Damn it… find its weakness!”
Ming Wu Deng also yelled, “Just hold them off! Don’t get too close… Survival is priority! Don’t damn it try to die… Lao Jiu! Dodge quickly!” His heart ached as he watched the ancestors of his family fall one after another. Dozens of altars had already been destroyed on the ground, almost all ruined under the Silver-Striped Spotted Dragon’s stomps.
Lao Jiu still failed to dodge in time and was engulfed in a mass of silver lightning slurry. Before Ming Wu Deng could rescue him, he was reduced to ashes, not even managing to manifest an altar before disappearing completely. It was unclear what that silver lightning slurry was, but it was terrifyingly powerful.
As more and more ancestors fell, Ming Liang and Ming Wu Deng went wild. With their strength, leaving this place wouldn’t be a problem. The issue was that they couldn’t bear to abandon their family’s ancestors, so they fought desperately. Eventually, Ming Liang reacted first. He shouted, “Ming Wu Deng, cover their retreat! Let as many escape as possible… scatter and run…”
The loss of their family’s ancestors had reached an unbearable level. Ming Liang hated Guo Shier and the others deeply. If it weren’t for Guo Shier’s sudden attack, he wouldn’t have ended up like this. He swore silently that if he survived this ordeal, he would kill every one of those professionals led by Guo Shier.
The frantic attacks from a group of ancestor-level professionals would be unbearable even for a level-16 Abnormal Talisman Beast, let alone the relentless assaults from Ming Liang and Ming Wu Deng. The Silver-Striped Spotted Dragon’s thousand-meter-long body was gradually covered in wounds, with massive amounts of blood spraying out, filling the air with a strong scent of blood.

Li Ran said, “Let’s go down. Don’t stay in the air. This smell of blood… hehe, this is fun.” Everyone followed his orders and descended from the air, retracting the altar to hang it above their heads. Guo Shier asked, “Brother Li Ran, what’s so fun?”
The Eagle Demon stared to the left and said, “It’s not fun; it’s terrifying… Look over there.”
Guo Shier turned to look and felt a stir in his heart. He asked, “What’s that?”
Li Ran said, “We don’t know what it is, but it must have come from the smell of blood…”
Guo Shier laughed, “Hehe, worse still… The professionals of the Gu Ming family are really unlucky.”
Not only Li Ran and his group had noticed the thing flying in the distance, but Ming Liang had as well. His pupils constricted slightly, like countless tiny needles, and he shouted, “Retreat quickly! Something’s coming!” His voice had changed. There were countless mutated and aberrant beast symbols on this continent—who knew what terrifying thing might appear?