Chapter 541.1. Oceanic Soul Beasts

Tang Wutong frowned as she lamented, “Yuhao, it seems like it’s not likely that our plan will turn out to be successful!” She was the one who had suggested they come to the Ice Sea. But from the look of things, especially from how things had turned out with the Sea Devilwalruses, the chances of leaving with any takeaway were getting slimmer.

Huo Yuhao consoled her, “It’s okay. We’ll just accept whatever comes our way. Since we were already so close to the Ice Sea, it’s only right that we come here to take a look. I believe we have to blame the Myriad Soul Douluo for the sour relationship between Humans and Merfolk. Judging from the number of avenging spirits he had, he must have offended plenty of aquatic soul creatures. And we don’t even know how many soul beasts he needs to kill before getting a single avenging spirit. I’m not surprised that the Merfolk hate us when he chose not to spare even the descendants of the Princess of the Sea. This tension is probably the reason why Eastern Sun City has started to install soul tools to counter attacks from the aquatic soul beasts.”

Tang Wutong said, “From the current look of things, it’s going to be very difficult for us to move around. On top of not being able to leave with anything useful, we might even find ourselves in trouble.”

Huo Yuhao replied, “With the help of the Ice and Snow Empresses, I believe the situation won’t be as bad as you think. Let’s look deeper, we might just find something useful. We will stop at the distance the Snow Empress told us earlier. If things truly turn bad, we’ll leave right away.”

“Alright.” Tang Wutong nodded in agreement. With the power of their combined abilities, they really had a good chance of escaping unscathed.

Suddenly, Huo Yuhao frowned as he warned Tang Wutong. “It’s coming again. Be careful. Don’t hurt or kill any of the aquatic soul beasts.”

Tang Wutong naturally understood what he meant. As long as they did not injure any aquatic soul beasts, their mission could still be successful.

While they were talking, a streak of grey light suddenly shot out from the ocean. In the blink of an eye, the light was already in front of Huo Yuhao.

Because of his spiritual detection, Huo Yuhao had long been aware of the movement of this unknown entity. He pulled Tang Wutong and dodged the light as it streaked past and ascended higher into the sky before plunging back down in a parabolic arc. It found a small crevice on an iceberg and crept back into the Ice Sea.

Even though the entity took only a split second to do all of the above, Huo Yuhao was able to see what it was because of the powerful vision granted by his Spirit Eyes.

It was a very strange-looking fish that was shaped like a long blade. It was black, and about two meters long. It was like a bolt of lightning, and was able to move at an impossibly fast speed. If not for Huo Yuhao’s spiritual detection, it might have been difficult for Huo Yuhao to dodge its attack.

From the look of the sharpness of its aura, its attacking prowess should be more or less similar to Ji Juechen’s normal sword aura. In addition, the fact that it was able to launch itself from the sea to a height of five hundred meters was a sign of the attacking power it possessed.

“What was that?” Huo Yuhao and Tang Wutong were both shocked by what they had just seen. Once again, they had witnessed how different aquatic soul beasts were from the usual soul beasts. However, this time around, they were not able to identify the species of the soul beast.

Before they could even mull over it, another grey streak of light appeared. This time, Tang Wutong had become the target.

Huo Yuhao pulled Tang Wutong’s hand as they executed the Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track by pulling one another. Although they managed to successfully dodge the fish’s attack, Huo Yuhao was visibly worried by what had just happened.

“Holy! There are so many of these weird fish under the water. I think we need to go higher.” As he spoke, he increased the power of the Class 9 flying soul tool behind his back as he brought Tang Wutong to a higher altitude. These weird fish might be fast and strong, but they should have a maximum attacking range. As long as Huo Yuhao and Tang Wutong got to a sufficiently high altitude, they should not be a need to fear them anymore.

However, just when they were about to ascend, a loud cracking sound caught their attention.

A deafening cracking sound echoed outwards across the expansive sea as Huo Yuhao and Tang Wutong watched a gigantic iceberg shatter, revealing the dark blue seawater beneath it.

The seawater started to become volatile as a giant whirlpool formed after the iceberg shattered. A powerful suction force was released by the whirlpool as it threatened to suck in everything around it. Huo Yuhao and Tang Wutong felt as though they were about to sink into a marsh. When Huo Yuhao tried to rev up the power of his soul tool, he realized its force had been countered by the suction force.

At this very instant, ten of the weird blade-shaped fish leapt out from the whirlpool and went straight for Huo Yuhao and Tang Wutong. This time around, they had sealed off all possible escape routes.

What a good ambush! Both Huo Yuhao and Tang Wutong gasped at the same time.

Even though the gigantic whirlpool was unable to drag them down, this was already the second type of flight disabling skill they had seen the aquatic soul beasts use. Even though it was theoretically possible for them to force themselves away from the attraction of the whirlpool, they were not only facing the problem of the whirlpool. At the same time, they had to figure out how to handle the attacks from the fish! This meant that they could not focus their energies on escaping from the pull of the whirlpool. These fish were really intelligent in the timing of their attack.

Huo Yuhao pulled Tang Wutong with his right hand as she moved behind him. This would effectively reduce their surface area. Tang Wutong spread out the wings behind her back as she executed her Dragon God’s Fury. With the help of Huo Yuhao’s spiritual detection, golden light pellets were directed toward different fish as they sped towards them.

But the attacks from the blade-shaped fish were indeed powerful. They were actually able to slice the light pellets in half upon colliding with them.

However, Tang Wutong was no pushover either. She detonated some of the light pellets before they reached the fish, and their explosive power blasted the fish away.

The blade-shaped fish were not only strong in their attacks and extremely quick, but also fairly resistant to blows. After being blasted away, they were not injured in any way. All they did was fall back into the sea.

Nonetheless, Dragon God’s Fury had successfully blocked the attacks from the fish, and bought precious time for Huo Yuhao and Tang Wutong to react.

A spark emerged from Huo Yuhao’s eyes as the image of the Ice Jade Empress Scorpion appeared behind him. A bright jade light projected itself from his chest into the whirlpool beneath him.

“Whoosh!” As the streak of jade light entered the whirlpool, the rapid dark blue whirlpool paused. Following which, the whirlpool gradually disappeared as a thick icy fog rose from the water and froze that area up again.

Ice Empress’ Wrath!

Since you wanted to suck me in, I shall freeze you up!

The blade-shaped fish did not appear again, and the whirlpool was resealed. The threat seemed to have ended. However, Huo Yuhao and Tang Wutong were still visibly worried.

Compared to the attacks from the group of Sea Devilwalruses, the attack this time round was significantly stronger. Other than the blade-shaped fish underneath the water, there must have been a powerful aquatic soul beast which had started the whirlpool. By using his spiritual detection ability, Huo Yuhao was able to see this aquatic soul beast.

When his Ice Empress’ Wrath entered the seawater, the aquatic soul beast suddenly dove deeper into the water. It used the resistance of the water to neutralize the impact of Huo Yuhao’s attack, and managed to escape without any injuries.

It was a humongous blue whale, and the whirlpool was created by its blowhole. This whale was more than sixty meters long, and possessed powerful soul power. It had cultivated for at least fifty thousand years.

And those blade-shaped fish were like its minions. They followed the whale after it left. The truth was that the blade-shaped fish had not launched a full-scale attack on Huo Yuhao and Tang Wutong previously. The whale had over a hundred such blade-shaped fish.

While the blade-shaped fish had incredible attacking power, defensive capabilities, and speed, Huo Yuhao discovered that they had a weakness. They were unable to launch another attack after launching themselves into the air until they had returned to the sea.

Every entity would naturally be restricted by the laws of nature. Even the powerful blade-shaped fish were no exception.

Huo Yuhao mulled over what they should do next as he floated in mid-air with Tang Wutong. After a short while, he said to her, “We can’t go any deeper. The hostility and hatred the aquatic soul beasts have for us humans is a lot deeper than I had thought. I can’t risk your safety like this. Let’s go back.”

Huo Yuhao was a very decisive individual. When he sensed that the danger in the sea ahead was unpredictable, he immediately made the decision to leave. He grabbed Tang Wutong’s hand as he revved the Class 9 flying soul tool to its maximum possible speed. Together, they flew back on the same path they had taken earlier.

Tang Wutong could sense Huo Yuhao’s worry as she smiled and asked, “If I wasn’t around, would you have continued to venture deeper?”

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “No, I wouldn’t have. Even if you were not around, I still wouldn’t have risked my life doing so because you would still be around somewhere, waiting for me. I will always think about you first before doing anything foolish. Of course, if you are referring to the time when you were missing and when I was in my worst moments, I just might have risked it and ventured further.”

Tang Wutong was very touched by Huo Yuhao’s words as she tightened her grip on his hand. “Yuhao, do you know how happy I am to hear what you just said?”

Huo Yuhao turned his head and flashed her a smile. “Were you touched by my words?”

“A little.” Tang Wutong stared at him with a serious look on her face. She continued, “Actually, after truly falling in love with a guy, a girl would not wish for her guy to be overly outstanding or powerful. She just wants him to be safe, and to be with her forever.”

As they locked eyes, Huo Yuhao nodded with an equally serious look on his face. “I will take care of myself. I won’t let you worry unnecessarily.”

Right now, both of them were flying at a very fast speed, at least twice the speed at which they had been flying when they were venturing out into the sea. At their current speed, they should take at most an hour to return to land. No matter how strong an aquatic soul beast was, it would definitely be a lot weaker on land. That was why they were still unable to threaten Eastern Sun City even till now.

Just when Huo Yuhao and Tang Wutong were starting to relax, Huo Yuhao suddenly frowned.

Tang Wutong immediately sensed the change in his mood. “Yuhao, what’s wrong?”

“Something isn’t right.” Huo Yuhao muttered seriously.

“What’s wrong?” Tang Wutong asked.