Chapter 265: Chapter 264: The Hardness Is on a Completely Different Level

[Blood and Flesh Cast Armor Body: Minor Achievement (Complete) → Blood and Flesh Cast Armor Body: Great Success]

[Based on the concentration of Blood Qi here, reaching Great Success with Blood and Flesh Cast Armor Body will require ’10 days’.]

[Blood and Flesh Cast Armor Body (Great Success) Proficiency +150]

[Blood and Flesh Cast Armor Body (Great Success) Proficiency +150]

[...]

’Minor Achievement!’

’Now that’s more like it!’

Seeing that his Blood and Flesh Cast Armor Body had surpassed Minor Achievement and was now progressing toward Great Success, Wu Chen couldn’t have been more pleased.

But looking at the rich Blood Qi all around him, and unwilling to let it go to waste, he unleashed his aura. It swept out in all directions like that of a ferocious beast.

WHOOSH!—

In that instant, a fierce wind tore through the woods.

The aura of the Grandmaster Realm, which Wu Chen hadn’t revealed while fighting the demon-people, now erupted completely as he sought to rapidly devour the Blood Qi.

With him at the center, the scarlet Blood Qi surged in madly.

As he greedily refined the pure Blood Qi around him, the proficiency on his panel skyrocketed:

[Blood and Flesh Cast Armor Body (Great Success) Proficiency +700]

[Blood and Flesh Cast Armor Body (Great Success) Proficiency +700]

[...]

The process didn’t last long. In just a few moments, the surrounding Qi and Blood had vanished, all the scarlet in the woods devoured by Wu Chen.

The air returned to normal, the sticky, cloying miasma gone without a trace.

’These corpses... I’ll pass.’

Wu Chen glanced at the hundred-odd demon-people corpses in the forest and shook his head.

Though he was eager to advance his Blood and Flesh Cast Armor Body to the Perfection stage, he had no intention of refining the corpses themselves.

His reasoning stemmed from the fight he just had. The ease with which he had torn open the chest of the Blood Envoy—one who had supposedly reached Perfection in the Blood and Flesh Cast Armor Body—made one thing clear:

Though they all cultivated the same Martial Art, the results were entirely different.

The reason was simple: these demon-people used all sorts of subpar flesh and blood, cobbling together their armor.

He, on the other hand, refined the purest Blood Qi from the bodies of Martial Artists.

The biggest difference between the two was that the hardness wasn’t even in the same league.

That was why, even though Wu Chen was only at the entry-level and had only armored one hand, he could effortlessly pierce through the chests of everyone there.

’Devouring Blood Qi might make the process a bit slower, but the resulting armor will be so solid that I doubt even Tier Five or Tier Six weapons could breach its defense!’

’So, quality over quantity it is!’

Naturally, Wu Chen chose to continue refining with Qi and Blood to forge a perfect suit of armor.

’Besides, the Blood Palace has always been generous. Would they really be short on a little Blood Qi for me?’

Wu Chen looked down again at his dragon-claw-like right hand and nodded with satisfaction.

The Blood Armor Body’s shape was not fixed; it could transform freely. This ferocious, terrifying change was a product of his own will.

’Disperse!’

At Wu Chen’s command, the jet-black armor on his hand dissolved into a cloud of Blood Qi and receded into his body, lying dormant.

His hand returned to its fair, slender form.

’I can’t let those dozen or so who escaped get away. Every little bit counts!’

A glint flashed in Wu Chen’s eyes as he scanned the surrounding woods, his gaze fixed on the direction in which the remaining demon-people had fled.

He hadn’t immediately pursued them because he was worried the Qi and Blood in the forest would dissipate back into the heavens, wasting the precious resource.

Now that he had absorbed all the Qi and Blood, that concern was gone.

With a glint in his eyes, the lingering auras of the fleeing demon-people’s trails became perfectly visible to him.

SWISH!—

The next moment, his figure vanished from the spot, chasing after the nearest trail.

「...」

After just a few moments, Wu Chen finished his hunt. He returned to the corpse-strewn forest, dusting off his hands in high spirits.

There was still one thing left to do.

’I haven’t taken the storage bags from the corpses or checked my rewards!’

However, when he returned, he found a young woman standing at the edge of the field of bodies. She was tilting her head, her face a mask of confusion as she stared at the sheer number of corpses in the woods.

She seemed unable to comprehend what had happened here.

The young woman was, of course, Sun Yuting.

According to the plan, she should have been waiting quietly for Wu Chen’s return at the foot of the mountain.

But when she heard the earth-shattering battle cries from within the mountain, she grew worried that Wu Chen had fallen into an ambush and rushed up the slope without a second thought.

She had expected to find Wu Chen in a desperate struggle, fighting for his life as he tried to break through an encirclement of demon-people.

But she never could have imagined this scene!

The sight of over a hundred demon-people corpses was beyond her comprehension.

"Didn’t you say... you were just going to sneak in and gather information?"

As the young man walked back out of the woods, Sun Yuting looked up at him. Her delicate face had been frozen in a daze for so long that her words came out stiffly.

"If no one lives to report it, it counts as a stealthy infiltration!"

Wu Chen shrugged, replying with a smile, "All the demon-people who saw me are dead now, so I’d call that a successful infiltration!"

"..."

Sun Yuting was even more stunned. ’What kind of bullshit logic is that?’

’Killing them all counts as a successful infiltration?!’

She lightly ground her perfect teeth, rendered speechless. After all, from a certain point of view, he wasn’t wrong!

"You’re not hurt, are you?"

Sun Yuting walked up to the young man and circled him a few times.

He reeked of blood, but she could tell it wasn’t his own; it was from the demon-people.

She inwardly breathed a sigh of relief, but still gave him an indignant punch. "You made me worry for nothing!"

"And another thing! You planned to kill all of them from the very beginning, didn’t you!"

"All that talk about ’gathering intelligence’ and ’coming back to discuss it with me’..."

"...was all just a lie!"

Sun Yuting’s anger flared, but as she spoke, she trailed off, unsure of what else to say.

’A lie?’

’That was complete nonsense.’

After all, whether he was investigating or gathering intelligence, these Blood Palace demon-people had to be killed eventually.

And Wu Chen had single-handedly done the work of an entire squad of Demon Suppression Guards. How was that a lie?

He had more than fulfilled the mission requirements!

If anything, she would have just been a burden had she followed him up the mountain to fight.

She might have even ended up in some clichéd drama where the demon-people captured her to force Wu Chen’s surrender.

"..."

Facing the pouting young woman, Wu Chen didn’t try to defend himself.

After all, she wasn’t being unreasonable; she was just frustrated that she hadn’t been able to help.

He walked among the corpses strewn about and knelt beside the Blood Envoy, untying the storage bag from the man’s waist.

Opening the storage bag, the first things he saw were two manuals.

Blood Evil True Gang and Blood and Flesh Cast Armor Body.

These two Martial Arts were already useless to him.

Wu Chen glanced at them, uninterested, and looked further inside, finding a large collection of bottles and jars.

They were all medicinal pills—nothing of any real importance.

It wasn’t until six pearls of a mixed, impure texture caught his eye that his expression brightened.

Soul-Storage Pearls!

’I knew they’d have these!’

He had previously found traces of Soul-Encompassing Sand, which was just ground-up Soul-Storage Pearls, so he’d guessed there must be whole ones somewhere.

And it seemed he was right!

Wu Chen didn’t take the Soul-Storage Pearls out to examine them. Sun Yuting was right beside him, and these pearls had many uses. He was worried she, or the powers behind her, might discover something.

So he simply closed the storage bag, planning to sort through its contents and take proper inventory later when he was alone.

Sun Yuting, standing to the side, watched Wu Chen tuck the storage bag into his robes but didn’t think much of it.

Wu Chen had killed all the demon-people here, so the spoils naturally belonged to him. It was only logical.

Not one to stand idle, Sun Yuting began to move among the hundred-odd corpses in the glade, searching for bodies with storage bags. She collected them one by one and handed them to Wu Chen.

But as she walked among the bodies, the sight of the gruesome wounds that pierced their hearts and lungs sent a chill down her spine.

As her gaze fell on the unfathomably powerful young man, she couldn’t help but ask an obvious question:

"You killed all the demon-people here?"

"Of course not." Wu Chen shook his head.

Sun Yuting breathed a sigh of relief. "I knew it! So, how many got away?"

"Two," Wu Chen answered truthfully.

"Hmph! And whose fault is that for leaving me at the foot of the mountain? If I’d been here to back you up, I bet a lot fewer would have escaped!"

She was still hung up on being left behind, but then she suddenly froze, her eyes locking onto him.

’Got away...’

’Two?’

’What’s the difference between that and none at all?!’

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