Chapter 312: Desperate Battle, Each With Their Own Plans
This enormous creature was a saint rank spirit creature?
Jiang Chen hid himself and observed from afar. He couldn’t help but glance at the enormous creature when he heard the Fire Raven King’s words.
A name immediately floated up in his mind — the Redscaled Firelizard.
As an offshoot of the ancient dragon tribes, there was indeed a bit of the dragons’ lineage within their bloodlines. Although it had been continuously diluted through the generations, the Redscaled Firelizard still possessed many of the dragon tribe’s characteristics.
The scales on its body, for instance, were formed in a shape unique to the dragon tribe.
Its limbs, although slightly different from the dragon tribe’s claws and possessing far less attacking power, was still quite similar in form to the dragons.
Regardless of how diluted their lineage had become, they were still the descendants of dragons.
Therefore, the Redscaled Firelizard possessed heaven defying strength, and equally incredible potential to ascend. Being at the saint rank, it was equivalent to one of the old origin realm monsters overseeing the selection.
A saint rank sounded quite impressive, but when considering a dragon lineage, the level of this Redscaled Firelizard was actually rather low.
The fact that this Firelizard was about to die at the saint rank indicated that it had a minuscule amount of a dragon’s lineage within its body.
Otherwise, with the might of the dragon lineage, it shouldn’t have stopped at just the saint rank.
When a saint rank spirit creature pa.s.sed on, it would’ve usually lived for at least ten thousand years.
After all, spirit creatures enjoyed a longer lifespan than humans.
If a human origin realm pract.i.tioner didn’t run afoul of disaster, they could usually live for three to five thousand years. Luckier ones lived for seven to eight thousand years. There were even rumors of ones living past ten thousand years.
In contrast, under normal circ.u.mstances, spirit creatures would live for even longer.
Whether a spirit creature or a human pract.i.tioner, when the end of their lifespans approached, it was unavoidable that their cultivation would slowly dissipate. They would revert back to a mortal being, finally withering away and dying of natural causes.
Judging from the Raven King’s words, the sun was setting on the Redscaled Firelizard. It was nearing the end of its life.
It was also obviously unwilling to accept the fact that its cultivation would slowly start to dissipate.
Even if it was an old monster that had lived for tens of thousands of years, it still couldn’t face death noncommittally. Before the light in its eyes would fully extinguish and it had pa.s.sed on, it would continue to struggle.
Jiang Chen suddenly recalled that he’d felt a strong disturbance in the ground when he’d still been traveling through the depths of the rocks.
Now that he thought about it, that must’ve been the Redscaled Firelizard moving.
It must’ve been targeting the Cloudflame Flower.
The Redscaled Firelizard must’ve been pursued all along the way because it’d stolen the Flower. The dead Fire Ravens along the way was also most likely because of the Firelizard.
The Cloudflame Flower was a heavenly treasure, and if the Firelizard swallowed it, it would indeed nourish it to a certain point and decrease the rate at which its cultivation would dissipate, slowing the arrival of death.
However, to the Raven King, the Cloudflame Flower was its life, the key point of whether or not it’d be able to evolve to the saint rank.
It had naturally flown into a rage after the Flower had been stolen and brought the entirety of the Fire Raven army down in hot pursuit.
They’d fought continuously along the way and had finally stopped the Redscaled Firelizard.
At the battle’s end, both sides were grievously injured, unable to dispatch the other with another blow.
As strong as the Raven King was and as numerous as its descendants were, at the end of the day, he was still at the peak of the spirit rank. His advantage lay in the numbers of his army and his agility.
The effectiveness of a peak of the spirit rank was largely mitigated when faced with a saint rank spirit creature. Therefore, it couldn’t do away with the Firelizard all at once.
Although the Firelizard was a saint rank creature, its candle was nearly burnt out, and was barely clinging on with its claws. It was highly likely that half its cultivation had already been lost.
It was because its current level of cultivation was only twenty, perhaps thirty percent of its peak that it had been run into the ground by the Fire Ravens.
Otherwise, with the Firelizard’s usual level of cultivation, wiping out the Fire Ravens would’ve been a matter of minutes.
“A saint rank spirit creature is indeed something not to run afoul of. A saint rank creature in the last stages of life is still strong enough to kill half of the Fire Ravens. It looks like as fierce as the Raven King is, he doesn’t have much of an upper hand.”
Jiang Chen could tell that although the Firelizard was heaving, obviously exhausted, the Raven King wasn’t much better off.
At least, it wasn’t fully confident of being able to thoroughly kill the Firelizard.
Otherwise, with the Raven King’s ferocity, why would he waste so much time in empty blather? He would’ve commanded his children and descendants to besiege the Firelizard.
Crouched on the ground, the Firelizard let out a low roar and spoke in a conciliatory tone, “Stinky feathers, I’ve already swallowed the Cloudflame flower. If you keep forcing me, it will only cause great devastation to both sides. How about this, we stop, you let me refine this Flower so that I can recover part of my cultivation. If I have a chance of living, I will be certain to repay you in the future with something ten times more valuable.”
The circ.u.mstances were greater than the person.
If this was during ordinary times, the Firelizard would’ve never spoken in such a humble tone to a creature sitting at the mere peak of the spirit rank.
But now, it couldn’t afford to waste time. One more minute wasted meant one less minute left in his life.
In order to live, the Firelizard didn’t mind lowering its posture and trying to strike a deal with the Raven King.
The Raven King wasn’t having any of it as it sneered, “Stop? Are you senile in your age or do you take me for a chick? Where do I go to find you after I let you go? Besides, even if you refine the Flower, you’re just slowing the advent of death. Do you think you can defy the heavens? Do you still hold onto the hope of prolonging your life and returning to your peak? Stop dreaming! Even if you can prolong your life and return to your peak, how will you repay me? Your first task then is likely to kill me in revenge!”
The Firelizard hastened to say, “I can swear to the heavens that I will never seek revenge upon you.”
“Forget it!” The Raven King cawed. “I won’t let you go even if you talk a hole through the heavens. You’ll be dead sooner or later, so why not die now and let me get a mouthful of fresh meat. Although your body is old and life is fleeing you, the matters of lineage will never age. Your heritage will always be there. If I devour you, breaking through to the saint rank will be an easy matter even without the Cloudflame Flower. Hahaha, stupid lizard, you said you’re about to die, so you should’ve stayed in your cave to await death. Yet here you come, running into my territory. This is a fortuitous occurrence that the heavens have given to me to break through to the saint rank!”
The Raven King was beside himself with pride as excitement gleamed in its fierce eyes.
It turned out that the Raven King’s goal hadn’t been to retrieve the Flower at all, but to devour the Firelizard!
The bloodline of a saint rank spirit creature were exceedingly n.o.ble. The Raven King was naturally very clear on this.
He would only have a fifty percent chance of breaking through with the Cloudflame Flower, but if he could devour a saint rank spirit creature’s bloodline, he’d have at least a ninety percent chance.
Not to mention that he would access the heritage of memories written within a saint rank creature’s bloodline. This would be an added bonus for the Raven King.
Therefore, even without the Cloudflame Flower, the Raven King would never let the Firelizard go.
A violent beam shot out of the Firelizard’s bright copper eyes as it started laughing crazily. “Eat my flesh and blood? You soggy excuse of a bird, what a lofty tone you have. A base creature of the spirit rank dares cast covetous eyes on the bloodline of a dragon’s descendants?”
“Hahaha, descendants of the dragons alright. This is precisely why this king must devour you and take the heritage of memories from within your bloodline!” The Fire Raven King’s tone was crazed and arrogant.
The Raven King suddenly threw its head back and cawed.
The surrounding Fire Ravens suddenly shot madly towards the Firelizard from all directions like loosed arrows .
It looked like the Raven King had hardened his heart to use strength of numbers to exhaust this Firelizard to death.
The Firelizard was at the end of its tether as it crouched on the ground. There wasn’t much left of its cultivation.
However, it was still a saint rank creature. The Raven King knew that his opponent may die at any time, but still didn’t dare to take the field himself.
He knew that once this saint rank creature started rampaging, even if it was its final breath, the power it could call upon would be exceedingly frightening.
As greedy as the Raven King was, he didn’t dare take the Firelizard’s last strike.
Therefore, he sent his children and descendants to mob the Firelizard and use them as cannon fodder to chip away at his enemy.
It only had one breath left. Given enough time, the Raven King would be able to bash it to death with all his troops!
The Firelizard had been noticeably enraged by the Raven King, and the repressed emotions within its heart were about to explode. It’d enjoyed a n.o.ble bloodline throughout its entire life, when had it ever been so humiliated?
Today, it was being subjected to indignity because it had lost its position and influence!
To be thus bullied by a pack of lowly Fire Ravens — it, a saint rank creature, a descendant of the dragons, had lost all face!
“Feathered dumb animals, die!”
The Firelizard roared as its tail swept in an arch, forming a devastating whip several hundred meters long and sending out countless sparks of lightning.
Crack crack crack!
The very air seemed to collapse from this blow. The hundreds of Fire Ravens diving down were caught up in the light and churned into bits of flesh and blood, scattering randomly to the ground.
The weakest of these birds were at the human small spirit realm.
However, all of them had died with a single sweep of their opponent’s tail.
The Firelizard was a saint rank spirit creature alright. The power encompa.s.sed within this sweep had completely exceeded the spirit rank, giving the Fire Ravens no time to even escape.
However, this blow had exhausted even more of the Firelizard’s feeble, remaining strength.
Huff, puff.
The Firelizard panted heavily as it rasped out, “Stinking feathers, let’s see how many more you can sacrifice! When you’re done, you’ll be alone. Even if you advance to the saint rank, who will you rule over? Keep sending them if you’re not afraid of death. I won"t be able live, but I still have some confidence in taking you with me!”
The Firelizard also knew that it would be hard pressed to escape from this situation.
However, spirit creatures tended to be fierce and violent by nature. Even if they died, they would take down their opponents with them!