Chapter 117: Wanton Slaughter, the Frenzied Swamp Python!

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Wang Chen hurried downstream along the river, killing as he went.

That said, most of the beasts he finished off were carried away by the trailing mist. The haze would blanket the thirty or so meters ahead of him, so after every short stretch he would find some small ferocious beast lying dead in his path. Occasionally one that had slipped through would be left for him to handle.

Of course, he didn't forget to slaughter the beasts drawn by the river of blood, but luck wouldn't hold forever. Though he reaped a few scattered gains, there was no windfall like that great school of Bright-Scale Pomfret waiting for him again.

And so he pressed on along the river. But when the waterway abruptly twisted in a new direction, the solid footing beneath Wang Chen's feet vanished altogether.

The river changed course so suddenly that a surge of violent water spilled onto the banks, flooding a stretch of forest floor into a muddy wetland.

Wang Chen cut down a tree trunk and drove it into the mire. A pole over a meter long sank more than halfway down without resistance.

"This is trouble. The wetland looks fairly extensive—crossing it will slow me down."

Wang Chen looked across to the opposite bank. "Maybe I should ford the river and follow it down from the other side. That would let me avoid this swamp."

He gauged the distance between the two banks—some twenty-plus meters. If he wanted to cross, he would have to swim.

Wang Chen thought about the bizarre beasts he had seen in these waters along the way, then shook his head. "I'd rather spend extra time getting through the swamp than bet that the water underneath is safe."

"Besides, I still have this."

A flicker passed between his fingers, and a set of long poles appeared in his hand—spoils he had taken from that scavenger squad on the Dark Plateau.

For crossing terrain that swallowed your foot with every step, nothing could be better.

Wang Chen studied the poles for a moment, assembled them by the edge of the wetland into the length best suited for the ground here, then set both poles beneath him and stepped into the marsh like a man walking on stilts.

The poles punched easily through the soft mud and struck solid ground below, letting him support himself as he trudged across the wetland.

At first he wobbled a fair bit, but after a dozen steps he found his rhythm, and his pace quickened considerably.

Just as he was about to clear the halfway point, a wave of dread exploded up his spine.

"Not good—danger!"

Wang Chen stamped down hard on the poles and vaulted into the air, while a heavy cascade of light dropped from his fingertips.

A reeking wind howled past. The two poles still standing where he'd left them were snapped clean by a violent, charging form.

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Wang Chen snapped his fingers. A giant stone hand thrust up from beneath the soil and caught him as he fell, cradling him in its palm.

Standing on the rock hand, Wang Chen calmly studied the figure before him.

A serpentine beast over ten meters long and thick as a water vat was coiling through the wetland. The soft mud seemed to have no hold on it; it lay lightly across the mire, gliding with effortless ease.

A violet glint flashed in Wang Chen's eyes, and the beast's information surfaced in his mind.

[Wetland Frenzy Anaconda, Lv. 27]
[Skill One: Motionless Serpent Body—by contracting every muscle in its body, it gains a period of solid defense.]
[Skill Two: Moist Soil Mastery—while in a wetland environment, the beast can control the damp earth around itself.]
[Skill Three: Sacrifice the Chariot to Save the Marshal—if the beast is pregnant, it may eject serpent eggs at a target. The effect depends on the hatching state of the eggs.]

Wang Chen's brows knitted slightly with unease. "Forget the other skills for now—that Moist Soil Mastery is a real pain."

"It's essentially a small domain skill. Fighting it in the swamp won't do me any favors."

He pondered for a moment. "Why not lure it out of the wetland and kill it there?"

The Wetland Frenzy Anaconda had little patience to wait for Wang Chen to finish planning its demise.

It coiled its belly and slithered toward the foot of the stone hand.

The mist enveloping it tore low, uneasy hisses from the anaconda—even a gold-tier beast, it seemed, found the smoke unpleasant to breathe.

Seeing it close in, Wang Chen's Staff of the Forest Storm began to echo with the sound of rushing waves.

"Wave Dragon Strike!"

A water missile, drawn out into a long, whipping arc like a wandering serpent, howled toward the Wetland Frenzy Anaconda like a living dragon.

The missile drove into the side of the anaconda's neck, its spinning force twisting and warping the scales across that patch of flesh.

The beast screamed in agony, its cold, reptilian eyes fixed on Wang Chen with murderous intent, as if it wanted to swallow him alive.

But Wang Chen wasn't about to stop there. He downed a potion, and the head of the Forest Storm rang with endless wave sounds as one water missile after another blasted forth!

The shrill, dragon-like screeches resounded without pause.

Bolt after bolt slammed into the Wetland Frenzy Anaconda's body, forcefully grinding its advance to a halt.

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It could no longer endure that storm of piercing strikes. In many of its weak spots, the relentless Wave Dragon Strikes had already peeled away the scales.

It coiled its body into a tight ball, tucking its vulnerable eyes into the folds of its flesh, swelling every muscle as its bones creaked audibly.

When the Wave Dragon Strike hit it again now, it couldn't penetrate a single inch—instead it clashed with a sound like ringing metal striking metal.

"It's activated its first skill!" Wang Chen thought to himself.

"But that's fine. It gives me time to set things up."

Wang Chen drank several vials of mind-clearing potions. Only he would dare drink them like this, because even the kind with the mildest side effects would leave an ordinary person's head splitting with pain once they wore off.

But he simply said, "Rebel Boy, remember to reverse the potion's side effects for me," and the worry was gone.

Then Wang Chen flicked his fingers, sending several heavy ribbons of light to land in the earth around the giant stone hand.

When he snapped his fingers again, several more stone hands heaved up from the ground, standing silently in a ring like a forest of carved rock.

"There. Now I have room to maneuver. Otherwise it could slither freely through this swamp while I was trapped on this stone palm, and sooner or later I'd be at a disadvantage."

By the time Wang Chen finished arranging his stone hands, the Wetland Frenzy Anaconda noticed it hadn't been struck for a while. It finally shifted an eye out to take a look.

Seeing that Wang Chen was busy with other things, it released its Motionless Serpent Body, coiled its belly, and lunged at him once more.

This time, the anaconda had grown wiser. A damp ripple passed through its body, and the wet soil around it floated up from the ground, shaping itself into a shield that hung before its head.

It charged at Wang Chen beneath that shield.

Wang Chen let it come. He even let the beast's enormous body begin winding up the stone hand, slithering toward his feet, without dodging or flinching.

He simply kept raising the stone hand higher, joint by joint.

Only when the Wetland Frenzy Anaconda's body was fully coiled around the stone hand did Wang Chen suddenly clap his hands together.

The stone hands arranged around him immediately slammed in from all sides, crushing the anaconda tightly against the giant stone hand beneath Wang Chen's feet.

The Wetland Frenzy Anaconda hissed in furious rage. Its huge, eerie head was barely an arm's length away, and the stench of its breath rolled over him, repulsive beyond words.

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