Chapter 221: Breakthrough to the Extraordinary! A Miracle Architecture! |
The Giant Rock Dragon stopped its retreating steps, laboriously lifting its neck.
Its massive body lunged forward with force, crashing into the wall ahead.
Its hard head embedded into the cliff face, causing the ground to tremble slightly.
The Crowned Eagle spread its wings, and under the night sky, it silently ascended into the air while clutching God's Rod.
Fifty meters, one hundred meters, two hundred meters, three hundred meters...
The Giant Rock Dragon, sensing the humans at a high point nearby through vibrations felt by its thick foot pads,
let out a low roar and resolutely began walking towards the western exit.
"Pour the gasoline on it now!"
Splashes of gasoline were poured onto its spine, the pungent smell of gasoline spreading through the air.
"Whoosh—"
Four heavy crossbow bolts, almost simultaneously, slammed heavily into the Giant Rock Dragon's body.
The thick mud armor on its surface was instantly shattered, the thick arrowheads brutally and unreasonably smashing into its flesh.
"Moo!!"
"What a tough body." Qin Ziwen was somewhat shocked. Judging by the length exposed outside, these arrows had only penetrated about half a meter deep.
How dense must its muscles be, or perhaps it had several layers of bony plates hidden within its body.
However, the effect of four heavy crossbow shots at point-blank range was still very apparent.
Qin Ziwen could notice its movements were clearly affected.
It could run just moments ago, but now it could only walk.
Lighting the long arrow already burning with flame in his hand, Qin Ziwen narrowed his eyes and took aim.
In truth, given its massive size at such a close distance, excessive aiming wasn't necessary.
The flaming arrow, trailing a long tail of fire, landed precisely on its spine.
Boom—
The flames illuminated its entire body, the Giant Rock Dragon instantly becoming a living torch.
With a low roar, the Giant Rock Dragon spun in place, turning its head and rushing back in the direction it came from.
"Ignite, drop the rocks, don't let it go back!"
Atop the canyon walls on both sides, Tian Zhuang, Shi Hu, and the others took burning torches from the bonfires behind them and threw them down.
At the bottom of the canyon, the dry branches and leaves mixed with large amounts of gasoline and other flammable materials instantly caught fire.
The entire passage soon turned into a sea of flames.
Du Yu let out a low roar, faint patterns appearing on the blood vessels visible on his skin's surface, as he pushed a massive boulder before him with great force.
"Thud!"
The boulder fell, blocking the cave entrance the Giant Rock Dragon had just emerged from.
Trapped in the sea of flames, the Giant Rock Dragon let out a panicked bellow.
One could imagine that from its birth until now, it had likely never experienced such a scene.
Flames and thick smoke were everywhere, surrounding it on all sides.
Although its spine was covered with heavy rock and crystals, its belly and limbs were exposed. In the sea of fire, the Giant Rock Dragon fell into chaos, like a headless fly.
"It's here."
Qin Ziwen looked up, gazing overhead.
A slender whistling sound pierced the sky.
High above, a pale cyan air shield continuously fell.
The sound grew closer, the air seeming to be compressed and torn, emitting bursts of sonic booms.
He could even see the Crowned Eagle circling around God's Rod, layers of airflow swirling around the spear's body, the pale cyan air currents wrapping around the shaft like a silver sheath.
Its falling speed increased rapidly, the whistling sound becoming sharper and more piercing when it was about a hundred meters from the ground.
The tip of the cone glowed faintly red from the high-speed friction, like a meteor falling from the heavens.
In the blink of an eye,
"Thump!!!"
God's Rod instantly plunged entirely into the Giant Rock Dragon's spine, a visible shockwave radiating outward.
The Giant Rock Dragon's body shuddered, taking one staggering step forward. Its massive frame seemed to be yanked downward by an invisible force, its spine collapsing as it fell to the ground like a mountain, lying within the sea of flames.
The flames burned for a full ten-plus minutes before finally extinguishing.
The air was filled with a faint, charred smell.
On the surface of the Giant Rock Dragon's corpse, a dense cluster of light appeared,
bursting forth into five cards.
Two red, one black, one pink, one multicolored.
Before he could even pick up the cards, Qin Ziwen felt a surge of strength rise from within his body out of nowhere.
In a daze, he seemed to hear the echoing sound of a lock shattering in his ears.
The power within his body climbed higher and higher in stages.
【Superhuman·Beast Tamer·Human (Qin Ziwen): ☆☆☆★★】: Level 2 Spirit Nurturing & Glory Absorption, Level 2 Dominion Over Remains & Inheritance of Grace, Level 2 Resonance
After breaking through, these newly mastered abilities were quickly understood by Qin Ziwen as if they were instinct.
First was Spirit Nurturing & Glory Absorption. Simply put, it allowed him to form a spiritual contract with a target. Once the contract was established, based on the compatibility between both parties, he could temporarily inherit one of the most suitable abilities from the other party. The inherited ability would undergo some adaptive changes according to his own physique.
When the spiritual contract ended, the inherited ability would also dissipate.
Currently, Level 2 Spirit Nurturing & Glory Absorption allowed contracts with two targets.
Dominion Over Remains & Inheritance of Grace was even more domineering. For any target he personally killed, he could arbitrarily plunder one of its abilities. However, this plundering was permanent and could not be discarded. The current upper limit for inherited plundered abilities was also two, so the choice of ability required more careful consideration.
In other words, although there were only two abilities, they could actually be used as four abilities.
Finally, Resonance allowed him to more easily perceive the target's emotions and also let the target perceive his emotions. In his view, this was probably to facilitate the use of Spirit Nurturing & Glory Absorption.
He looked at the Giant Rock Dragon, feeling a bit regretful. That ability to alter the form of rock was really quite good.
At the bottom of the canyon, the Giant Rock Dragon was dead, but the surrounding area still retained rolling waves of heat.
Only after it gradually cooled down did Du Yu pull on a rope and descend from the side of the cliff wall.
He retrieved the five dropped cards.
【Hunting Task Completed: Hunt Ferocious·Giant Rock Dragon*1】
【Reward Obtained: Function Card (Insight)*1, 20 points】
Adding the five dropped cards, they had obtained six cards at once here.
The red ones were Function Cards.
The pink one was a Healing Card.
The black one was a Giant Rock Dragon Summoning Card. Although it was a Summoning Card, it wasn't a big problem. With the Blood Sand Gladiator Arena present, the Summoning Card could be turned into a permanent, top-tier sparring partner.
Suddenly, Qin Ziwen's eyes flickered. He thought of a possibility: if he summoned the Giant Rock Dragon within the arena, and then killed it himself, could he inherit its ability through Dominion Over Remains & Inheritance of Grace?
If that worked, wouldn't this be considered a bug?
Apart from these cards, the most eye-catching was that multicolored card.
Compared to the single color of the other cards, the surface color of this multicolored card was constantly changing.
When picked up, as the angle shifted, the colors viewed from different directions varied, like a gorgeous, magnificent rainbow.
This type of card was also something Qin Ziwen had never seen before.
【Wonder Card】Eternal Hunting Mausoleum (Miracle Building, Card Unique)
【Construction Requirement】Superhuman prey hunted by the Home*10
(Note: The upgrade of this Wonder is related to the quantity of trophies. Trophies can be complete corpses or significant, important organs. When the quality and quantity of trophies reach the upper limit, the Wonder will automatically upgrade.)
"A Miracle Building... isn't this just building a wonder?" Qin Ziwen was both shocked and doubtful, though the construction requirement was a bit high.
It required a full ten Superhuman-level prey. So far, the only Superhuman prey they had encountered was this Giant Rock Dragon.
He could only hope that the next map would have a few more Superhuman prey.