The purple sea formed by countless chains of lightning continued to crackle for a full minute before finally coming to a halt.
When the power in the Purple End Bracelet on Bai Zemin's left wrist was fully depleted, the radiance surrounding the treasure disappeared and its natural color dulled slightly. While the stats the treasure bestowed were still there, the skill could not be used again before it naturally recharged its power using the world's mana.
Bai Zemin had discovered some time ago that whenever a treasure lost its power, the reason the skill went into cooldown was because the treasure needed time to recover the power necessary to activate and/or maintain the skill active. Unfortunately and despite the fact that he tried to supply the treasure with his own mana, the result was naturally failure.
When the sea of purple lightning disappeared, the result of the attack was finally revealed.
The land that was previously already slightly blackish was now in a completely burnt state with patches of burns revealing small holes after the upper rock layer was broken. As if that wasn't enough, white smoke was slowly rising into the sky from those patches as if from a recently controlled fire.
For a sparse attack, the damage the world had suffered was considerable; even more so considering that the main target of the lightning blasts had never been the ground since the earth was a poor conductor of electrical energy. But it was also understandable, after all, a Magic grade treasure in the hands of someone with such high magical power as Bai Zemin would end up causing more damage than normal as long as the attached skill was governed by the user's stats.
Bai Zemin advanced slowly, closing the distance between him and the giant eagle with leisurely and nonchalant steps.
The giant eagle no longer seemed to have the ability to stand up again and occasional small cries of pain seeped through its beak; a beak which previously seemed to have metallic properties but had now cracked a bit on the surface.
The burnt smell coming from the eagle's body at the moment was really foul-smelling. The creature's skin and flesh had scorched to pitch black and except for its still intact wing feathers, the entire body of the beast was unrecognizable.
"Stand up and flee." Bai Zemin said as he arrived right in front of the monster's head.
The eagle slowly opened its golden eyes to look at him. Its energy had been completely drained and the wounds on its body only made things worse, so even if it wanted to, the eagle didn't even move a muscle in its legs let alone stand up.
Bai Zemin waited for a couple of seconds until he finally realized that it was impossible for the creature in front of him to continue putting up the slightest resistance, therefore, he finally decided to end it.
"Do you know why I haven't killed you yet?" Bai Zemin reached out a hand and grabbed onto one of the giant eagle's legs. Then, he began to drag it along the ground in Shangguan Bing Xue's direction and ignoring the creature's cries of pain and fear, he explained in an indifferent voice, "You hurt my friend. She ended up in this kind of condition where her life is not even guaranteed because you attacked her and because she was protecting me. I'm sure she felt fear when she felt the aura of your body, but of course.... A filthy monster like you would never understand such a thing. So, the least I could do is return the favor... And let you experience the feeling called despair!"
Bai Zemin stopped when he reached 50 meters ahead of where Shangguan Bing Xue was resting and climbed onto the eagle's back. Then, he clutched with both hands at the junction between the right wing and the beast's back before fiercely pulling upward.
The sound of something tearing spread amidst the terrifying silence and then a scream similar to a roar filled with pain and suffering traveled several kilometers away.
The giant eagle's eyes widened and it seemed to receive some kind of magical injection as it began to struggle again due to the terrifying pain it was feeling.
Bai Zemin frowned as he saw the beast begin to writhe and after throwing the eagle's right wing casually to the side he fiercely slammed his fist on the monster's head.
Bang!
The eagle felt as if a multi-ton hammer had fallen from the sky directly on its head. Its neck swung a couple of times before its head fell with a loud boom to the ground and raised a cloud of dust in the process.
"Stay quiet." Bai Zemin ordered in a deep voice before moving to the left side to do the same.
The eagle screamed in pain again as its left wing was brutally ripped off its body and blood along with fragments of burnt flesh flew everywhere. The pain was so strong that the beast even came out of the daze that Bai Zemin's punch had caused it. Unfortunately, the creature could no longer move its body anymore and except for slight shudders could only shriek and cry.
Bai Zemin showed no mercy at all to the giant eagle and was truly cruel. The treatment the creature received was several degrees worse than the treatment Bai Zemin bestowed on the then leader of the goblin race located in northern China as he did not stop after tearing off the wings of the big bird.
He stood right on top of the beast's back and after a bit of searching, he punched lightly with his right fist downwards.
Bang!
Even though he was holding back over 70%, the power behind his punch was something that could not be underestimated at all considering how high his Strength stat was under the effect of Blood Berserker's Wrath skill.
Bai Zemin's right fist sank deep and easily into the giant eagle's flesh until his gauntlet struck something that made a slight metallic sound.
Completely ignoring the eagle's cries, he scrambled around a bit and several seconds later grabbed at the object that his fist had struck before fiercely pulling upward.
The giant eagle's eyes widened and its pupils contracted to the smallest possible size as a roar of pain that completely overwhelmed all before it caused even the atmosphere to shudder for a moment. The sound traveled from the forest in which the rift was located to the nearest city 100 kilometers away, surprising the residents of the asura race living there as they accurately identified the source of the sound.
Unlike most worlds, the asura race was a warrior race and they all grew up battling from an early age. Leaving aside the fact that they could not evolve by absorbing Soul Power due to the taboo their ancestors committed, the asuras were undoubtedly very talented warriors who in addition to possessing great battle prowess also had the characteristic of being able to communicate with practically any other race.
In a way, had it not been for the greed of power that the ancestors of the asura race had and which was still visible, the asuras could easily have been a race capable of reaching the level of a faction of Higher Existences.
Unfortunately, they chose to invade Earth of all possible targets.
Bai Zemin tore out the spine of the giant eagle and then stepped off the back of the beast which at this point was no different than a useless rag.
He stood before the eyes of the dying beast and in its last breaths to let it get a good look at who would be its killer. Then, he brandished the monster's spine as if it were a whip and struck with the full power of his Strength stat directly at the creature's neck.
Booom!!!
The spine seemed to be made of metal instead of bones and when it was used to hit such a weak area of a giant eagle already weakened by someone as strong as Bai Zemin, the result was clear.
The head separated from the body, blood sprayed uncontrollably, and the ground split into countless pieces with cracks extending for over 500 meters.
Only the place behind Bai Zemin was untouched by the damage, precisely where she fainted.
[You have absorbed the Soul Power of Second Order Silver Gale Eagle level 99.....]
Two orbs charged with Soul Power flew from inside the giant eagle's body. The smaller sized and less bright one entered Bai Zemin's body while the larger and brighter one flew in a parabola pattern before entering Shangguan Bing Xue's chest.
She clearly got a big boost in her Health stats as the cells in her body began to move faster and clone one after another at speeds fast enough to form tissues visible to the naked eye. Moreover, since Bai Zemin had already expelled all traces of the giant eagle's corrosive blood from her body and had also been constantly using Blood Manipulation to prevent the wound from worsening, it was only a matter of time before her wounds healed.
"But at this rate it will take months." Bai Zemin muttered with a frown as he saw how the wound on her chest was having trouble healing.
Moreover, he noticed that strangely his anger had not calmed down in its entirety even though he had just killed the main culprit of Shangguan Bing Xue's current condition. That terrifying power was still coursing through his veins and after looking at the reflection of his face using the giant eagle's bloody spine he noticed that his eyes were still of a bright reddish hue.
Bai Zemin looked at the ground and for the first time since this whole senseless war started, he saw something he liked.
Treasures.
Since the eagle was still receiving the benefits of the Soul Record if it defeated in a battle to the death, naturally its death would benefit the one who defeated it.
There were only two items that the giant eagle dropped.
A skill scroll called First Order Rampaging Gale level 4 and a bottle with a strange liquid inside.
Bai Zemin ignored the scroll and simply set it down next to Shangguan Bing Xue as he inspected the bottle.
The shape of the bottle was truly exquisite and it seemed to be made with a special crystal as Bai Zemin had a hunch that a bullet would not be able to pierce it. Inside it was approximately 100 ml of bright red liquid that looked really viscous and bizarre.
Bai Zemin pulled the cork with a popping sound and the aroma that came from inside the small bottle flooded his nostrils. He felt his body feel lighter immediately and also noticed that small hidden injuries were starting to recover quickly.
"Good stuff!" Bai Zemin exclaimed in amazement and immediately wished to know the records of the bottle in his hand.
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[Instant Recovery Potion (Rank 3): Possesses incredible healing capabilities. Its effect works on existences whose Health stat has not yet exceeded 1000 natural points.]
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The description was vague, to say the least.
However, Bai Zemin refused to believe that such a potion could not heal Shangguan Bing Xue's injuries.
"I wonder if the Soul Record bestowed this treasure because it understood that technically it was Shangguan Bing Xue who did all the work and urgently needed to be treated..." Bai Zemin muttered under his breath as he brought the tip of the small bottle to her lips.
He carefully forced her fleshy red lips to open slightly and let the contents of the potion slowly drip down her mouth. Unfortunately, Shangguan Bing Xue was unconscious so far from being able to properly swallow the liquid she coughed fiercely, which not only expelled the liquid from her mouth but also caused her recovering injuries to worsen.
"Tsk." Bai Zemin clicked his tongue and after thinking for a moment sighed, ".... There is no choice."
Then, he brought the bottle to his mouth and drank about 1/4 of the potion. However, he did not swallow the liquid.
'You can slap me or whatever you think is fair later.' He thought as he leaned forward.
His eyes momentarily lingered on that beautiful pair of lips, but far from feeling any sort of temptation, what he felt was sorry for the condition she was in and shame since he was partly the cause of it all.
Throwing all useless thoughts to the back of his head, his lips finally touched hers and he slowly let the reddish liquid of the potion flow into her mouth. Then, to prevent the liquid from being wasted, he pushed his tongue into her mouth and helped the liquid flow down her throat.
Bai Zemin only moved away from her when all the contents had been consumed and looked down.
The potion was truly amazing, to say the least. The terrifying gash on her chest had healed in an instant by half!
The only "downside" was that now that Shangguan Bing Xue's wounds had been almost completely treated, her chest area no longer looked bad like before.... Then, Bai Zemin's eyes naturally saw things they shouldn't have seen.
It was just that under the effect of the third wrath level of the skill Blood Berserker's Wrath, he had no crazy thoughts in his head. Therefore, he took another quarter of the potion's contents and reattached his lips to Shangguan Bing Xue's lips.
Just as her throat moved after he forced the liquid down with his own tongue, Bai Zemin nearly died of fright when Shangguan Bing Xue's previously tightly closed eyes suddenly opened.
Her sky blue eyes met his blood red eyes and time seemed to have stopped.
Shangguan Bing Xue was dumbfounded.
Bai Zemin was dumbfounded.
The two stared at each other blankly for several seconds and they even seemed to forget that their lips were still firmly pressed together with their tongues casually touching in the process.
Amidst panic, embarrassment, disbelief, and surprise, Bai Zemin for the first time felt how soft were the lips of the beautiful woman under his body.
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Part 5/6 guys!
Really thank you very much to all those who send gifts to the novel and support with valuable Golden Tickets. I hope we can all keep it up <3