It was another bright day.
Zhang Che laid on the platform on the mountain summit, sleeping without any shelter, and was woken up by the glaring light. He blinked his eyes, slowly sitting up, stretching himself.
Without a sleeping bag and a tent, the quality of his sleep was truly lacking.
Even though Zhang Che’s physique far exceeded any normal man’s, it wasn’t like he could just sleep soundly anywhere. The basic requirements for a sleeping environment applied to him, too.
When his groggy mind slowly cleared up, Zhang Che summoned the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon with a wave of his hand, then mounted him and headed towards the stream at the mountain’s foot. That area was almost as good as Zhang Che’s private plot of land now. His daily washing up and cleaning of exotic beasts was all done along this stream.
However, it wasn’t wrong to say that this area was indeed his private land, either.
Let alone the fact that there weren’t any notable strong exotic beasts in this area due to the pressure emanating from the skeleton, the exotic beasts had gone through some terrible times during the last few days. Other than some trash beasts that Zhang Che couldn’t care less about, the remaining exotic beasts he encountered were all wiped out.
Now, the difficulty of hunting exotic beasts around here had risen greatly!
After a simple wash up, Zhang Che took bites out of the fruits the Purple Crystal Tortoise spat out as he lamented to himself, “Looks like I have to go even further out to hunt now. God knows how many more exotic beasts I have to hunt to reach Tier Five. If I don’t work harder, who knows when I can ever return to the real world?”
After filling his stomach, he dragged the Purple Crystal Tortoise along and mounted onto the back of the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon, flying deeper into the mountain range.
If it was in the past, Zhang Che definitely wouldn’t dare to ride on the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon so ostentatiously. If some powerful exotic beast set its eyes on them, they surely wouldn’t be able to escape.
However, now that the Purple Crystal Tortoise housed that pile of a hundred and eight bone spikes with astonishingly high penetrative strength, which could even heavily injure a legend-quality exotic beast with just a single shot, Zhang Che no longer had anything to fear.
If his luck was truly bad and they encountered an even stronger exotic beast, the Purple Crystal Tortoise could still shoot all the bone spikes in one go. He didn’t believe that he still wouldn’t kill a strong enemy that way.
As for the divine-quality exotic beasts from the legends, Zhang Che didn’t think his luck would be so terrible as to bump into one of them. Unless he was looking for death and ran to the ocean shore when he first arrived, the chances of running into one were even lower than striking the lottery.
As the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon flew along, the mist surrounding him gradually thinned out. Zhang Che had him stop and descend towards a valley ahead with a thin layer of fog in the skies above it.
Zhang Che didn’t choose this valley at random.
When he was still high in the sky earlier, he vaguely saw silhouettes of a large group of exotic beasts moving around in the valley through the fog. It just so happened that the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon could no longer continue flying, so Zhang Che decided that it was good to come down and gain some experience while they waited for the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon to recover.
As the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon drew closer to the valley, Zhang Che saw the the group of exotic beasts more clearly.
They were large crawling creatures that resembled Chinese giant salamanders. Their bodies were around six to seven meters long, their skin brownish-black in color, giving off a smooth luster. Seeing the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon descending from the sky, every one of them raised their heads warily, cautiously sizing up this creature.
“Hmm? There’s actually water in this valley!”
It was only now that Zhang Che realized this wide valley covered in a layer of thin fog actually had an extended lake in its inner section, like several ponds of various sizes connected together.
It was no wonder these Chinese giant salamander-like fellows were gathered here in such large numbers. There weren’t many water sources nearby; only a few mountain streams here and there, and they were pitifully small.
It was likely that they felt some kind of suppression coming from the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon. Once the Chinese giant salamander-like exotic beasts saw him descending, they all let out waves of “guagua” crying sounds resembling that of an infant’s and turned tail to run.
Zhang Che also finally saw these exotic beasts’ attributes, and was a little stunned.
“Such huge bodies are wasted on the likes of you. You’re actually only two-star bronze-quality! Really, I don’t even have any interest in messing with you.”
His plan to earn some experience fell through. Zhang Che could only jump off and watch as the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon continued flying towards the lake ahead, while he found somewhere to sit and rest.
After a while, Zhang Che suddenly heard a furious roar from the lake deep in the valley. It was the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon’s roar. Zhang Che was shocked and hurriedly stood up, running in that direction.
-Could there be some powerful exotic beast hiding here?-
The Cold Abyss Flood Dragon wasn’t actually very strong. As he ran, he summoned all his strong subdued beasts and pets. Every one of them rushed over in a group, thoroughly upsetting the silence in the valley.
Zhang Che could see the lake from afar. The Cold Abyss Flood Dragon was floating on the water’s surface, in a stand-off against an eccentric, serpent-looking exotic beast.
The serpent-like exotic beast’s entire body was icy blue in color. Its body was like a blue ice crystal sculpture. Although its appearance resembled a serpent, there was a translucent sharp horn on its head, like a blue icicle.
Zhang Che rejoiced inwardly. It went without saying that such a weird-looking exotic beast wouldn’t be of a low level or quality.
In the next moment, he signalled his intent to the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon, ordering it to quickly retreat. He was Zhang Che’s only pet with A-Rank potential. If he died here by accident, there really was nothing he could do to bring him back.
However, this time the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon actually defied his order. He remained on the lake, confronting that strange exotic beast.
-Hmm? What happened to this guy?- Zhang Che found it really strange. This was the first time his pet had ever defied his orders. Although he didn’t gave the hard order for him to return, such a situation had never happened before.
Just as Zhang Che was wondering in his heart, ready to force the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon to return to his side, this fellow actually expressed his strong desire to eat to Zhang Che via their spiritual link. -I want to eat it. I want to eat it!-
-What the heck? You want to eat it?- Zhang Che widened his eyes, unable to understand what the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon meant at all.
-That thing looks so dazzlingly blue; won’t it contain deadly poison? Are you sure your stomach will be fine after eating it?-
However, the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon’s intense desire to eat it couldn’t be wrong, making Zhang Che even more suspicious. -Could that peculiar exotic beast ahead actually be some kind of tonic?-
Right at this moment, the exotic beast noticed Zhang Che and his army of subdued beasts and pets rushing in its direction.
It couldn’t be helped; it was mainly due to the fact that when the Steel-Armored Tyrannosaurus started running, the commotion it caused wasn’t just a normal level of big. If it wasn’t for that exotic beast having similarly set its eyes on the Cold Abyss Flood Dragon, it would have noticed Zhang Che and his party’s presence long ago.