Charcoal flapped its wings, propelling its huge body up to the upper s.p.a.ces of the cave. Charcoal then darted down on the blood-colored vine with claws extended and a deafening roar.
As soon as the roar was heard, the blood-colored vine trembled a little in what seemed like fear. Soon, it entered a defensive state.
It resembled a lair infested with giant pythons. It was unwilling to let go of the energy sphere at all cost.
"Both of them are bronze-level rank-3"s and have mutated twice but, Charcoal as a dragonkin will probably be a lot stronger than the parasites!" Lin Huang thought. He was confident of Charcoal"s abilities.
As Charcoal flapped its wings and stopped mid-air upon its descent, it spat its Black Dragon Flames towards the vines.
Right when the vine was tainted by dragonflame, the body of the blood-colored vine turned black. It then growled from the pain it suffered and began rolling on the ground.
"Did the dragonflame just work?!" Lin Huang"s eyes brightened as the parasite seemed to be pinned down by Charcoal.
Fire element monsters were the natural enemies of most plant-based monsters, let alone a dragonkin who could spit dragon flames.
Soon, he noticed that the burned, black patches on the blood-colored vine were slowly recovering on its own. It had completely recovered at a speed that was visible to the naked eye. Lin Huang frowned.
"This monster has an abnormally fast ability to heal…" He thought.
The parasite species was completely pinned down by Charcoal at first as the dragonflame hurt it quite significantly, causing it great pain. Moreover, black scars were left on the surface of the monster even after it healed. The vine was afraid of Charcoal but was not actually injured by it.
However, as soon as the wounds had recovered, it seemed to have realized that Charcoal could do it no harm and it had become more courageous.
Charcoal had been attacking it all the while and now it was about to counterattack.
Its attack pattern was the same, as he expected. It was trying to use its vines to hit and trap Charcoal in any way it could. Charcoal easily dodged its attacks and it was not a threat at all.
Both of them entered a stalemate; Charcoal could not cause any significant damage and the defense of the blood-colored vine rendered Charcoal"s attacks useless as well. However, it had no means of retreating at all.
"If this continues, I wonder how long they would have to fight to know the results of this battle," Lin Huang thought. He frowned, looking at the battle between them. However, he did not help to attack.
The reason why Lin Huang did not attack the vine was simple. Since Charcoal"s ability was not able to hurt the parasite at all, Lin Huang"s attack would not have any effect on it as well.
He clearly knew that once he was involved in the fight, he would instantly become the target of the parasite. If this many leech pods were released in such an enclosed s.p.a.ce, he would have nowhere to hide. The attack would definitely hit and infect him.
Fortunately, it seemed that the parasite species did not notice the presence of Lin Huang. It did not care so much as it had to defend itself against Charcoal.
Despite Charcoal attacking the vine nonstop, the parasite did not seem to intend on leaving the place at all and insisted on guarding the spherical energy object.
Soon, half an hour had pa.s.sed. Lin Huang had reached the time limit set for the transformation. His body appeared on the ground in human form.
At that moment, Xiao Hei"s voice was heard.
"We have been discovered," it said.
"How could it be? Didn"t you say that we will not be discovered as long as we are 100 meters away from them?" Lin Huang asked as he felt it was strange that Xiao Hei could have been mistaken.
"It"s not my problem. Your aura is dissipating," Goldfinger said to him.
Lin Huang then realized that when he appeared in his Specter form earlier, he would exude a different kind of aura. However, the effect of the Specific Transformation Card could only last for an hour. After that, his body would automatically give off his aura.
The blood-colored vine that was fighting with Charcoal seemed to have sensed Lin Huang"s existence too. It became ferocious and its counterattack became more intense.
At the same time, the purple flowers began to leave its body, hundreds of leech pods were dispersed in all directions.
Seeing this to happen, Lin Huang crushed the Specific Transformation Card immediately, transforming himself into the Specter and hid behind one of the giant rocks. He was not sure if transforming into the Specter would have any effect on the leech pods but he was not going to push his luck.
The entire s.p.a.ce was covered with leech pods in less than a minute and they did not leave any corners empty.
Lin Huang was not worried about Charcoal as the dragonkin had various types of immunities on its own. Even if it were to become a host, it could be recalled, turning it back into a card. He could figure out ways to resolve it later.
Indeed, Charcoal was not distracted by the leech pods at all. Despite many of them getting attached to its body, they could not penetrate through its scales.
Lin Huang"s aura disappeared instantly causing the blood-colored vine to be even more furious. The leech pods were like its eyes. They covered almost the entire area and still, they found no trace of Lin Huang.
The blood-colored vine could vaguely sense the Will given off by the spherical energy object, knowing that the energy sphere wanted to own something on Lin Huang"s body with great eagerness. The blood-colored vine had always been grateful to the glowing orb and wanted to satisfy it.
It was originally a vine seed that was as small as a sesame seed and it flew into this place unintentionally. It fell on the ground somewhere near the energy orb. In less than a month, it grew into a monster with self-conscious awareness in addition to becoming a monster that had mutated twice. All these were thanks to the energy sphere.
Not only did it treat the energy sphere as a precious treasure, the blood-colored vine treated it like family, something it could count on.
This was the reason why despite encountering Charcoal - a strong opponent, it did not retreat and insisted on fighting tooth and nail until the end.
However, the human that the energy sphere needed had disappeared making it very angry.
The blood-colored vine had only one target now. However, the target"s ability was way stronger than the blood-colored vine. It would be impossible for the vine to win the battle. This had triggered its urge to become even stronger.
Once the blood-colored vine thought of this, the leech pods instantly reacted to its thoughts. The leeche pods that had completed their infection in the outside world started to absorb the Life Light of the body of the host.
This Life Light was then transfused into the blood-colored vine body through the air. Slowly, it was getting stronger.
The people at Xiaoxia City had no idea what was happening underground.
The infected people, including the hosts that were caught by the hunters began to faint due to the drastic drain on their Life Light.
Soon, Charcoal who was in the battle with blood-colored vine noticed the changes. The aura of the blood-colored vine that was originally bronze-level rank-3 was rising quickly and it was very close to silver-level.
Charcoal knew that it had to speed up the frequency of its attacks urgently. It tried to interrupt the blood-colored vine"s upgrade to silver-level.
However, the blood-colored vine had gone berserk! It still felt that the power it had was still insufficient.
"It"s not enough! I want to be stronger!" A thought suddenly resonated throughout the underground cavern.
That thought stirred up the atmosphere. What seemed like thousands of leech pods in the air drifted upwards, gus.h.i.+ng towards the direction of the crack.
That aside, all the remaining purple flowers on the vines suddenly matured, turning into leech pods and left the body of the blood-colored vine, moving towards the crack high up in the s.p.a.ce