Chapter 225

Chapter 225: Ice Lake Monster

Betsy researched her tonic cuisine, Nancy researched her attribute medicine, and the rest of them had something to research on as well: how to battle. In Bai Yi’s team, all of them were already quite skilled with a sword because they had already developed a systematic way of training in the sword. However, after entering LV2, they all had different attributes and gained powers that only used to exist in fantasies, so their method of combat differed greatly from each other.

Thus, they left the details of how they were supposed to fight to each person to develop and study.

In comparison to the slow changes of the others, Momo changed the fastest, practically becoming a new person every day. Momo could now even manipulate souls to attack.

Theoretically, the ones with the strongest souls were of course Mavis and the souls of the other LV2 evolved humans. However, Momo didn’t use their souls because it just felt too inappropriate, so in the end, she only used the souls of those normal soldiers. Right now, 21 balls of light were around Momo. These were the souls of the 21 normal humans that Momo picked.

The souls of these normal soldiers weren’t too strong, so Momo had to use her Soul Purifying Flame to nourish them. However, one advantage of using these normal human souls was that they didn’t have much consciousness left in them. Their memories had practically all been lost and they were only left with a simple intelligence.

Compared to Momo, the rest of them also had their own development and progress, but their changes were not as large as Momo.

Bai Yi’s team had already spent half a year in the Devil Isles by now. Even after searching 23 research facilities, they still hadn’t found any traces of Doctor Wang. As for why their progress was so slow, it was completely due to their research into their own abilities that delayed their journey.

Although the progress was slow, they still found quite a few useful things inside the research facilities. The research facilities had all been researching activated cells, but the focus of each facility’s research was all somewhat different so to advance their own interests. All of the data that they obtained supplemented the deficiencies in Yeye’s database.

…

The group of them walked forward on a snow mountain. This was the Tararua Range1 on the northern island of Devil Isles, roughly 1200 meters above sea level and the top of the mountain was already covered with snow. Based on the map, there should be a research facility there. What on earth were those people thinking back then, building a research facility in the middle of a mountain range like this? Fortunately, Bai Yi’s team could run even in an environment like this, otherwise, it would have been really annoying if their feet sunk in with every step.

“When would we be able to find that place at this rate?”

Bai Yi stopped underneath a tree branch. Suddenly, the snow piled on top of the branch fell down but bounced away when it came into contact with Bai Yi.

Bai Yi held the map and checked against the theodolite before hitting it twice.

“Bai Yi, what’s going on?” Woolf sat on the snow and asked.

“This place seems to have a very strong magnetic field that affected the theodolite. We can’t use it to accurately determine the latitude and longitude anymore.” Bai Yi looked at the randomly changing numbers on the theodolite and couldn’t help but to frown. The Devil Isles didn’t seem to be too big on the map, but people would know exactly how huge it was if they had to run around inside it. Without knowing the precise location, how were they supposed to look for the hidden underground research facility?

“Then what do we do?”

“We can only search for it bit by bit then. Even if it’s a research facility it must have left some traces previously.” Bai Yi said and looked at the rest of the group. “Let’s split up into four groups; we’ll meet back at that mountain peak in two hours.” Bai Yi pointed to a nearby peak. The rest of them heard his words, nodded, and formed four groups before going off in different directions.

Bai Yi and Alodia ‘happened’ to be in the same group. Even if nobody talked about it, ever since the incident last time the rest of them still tried to create chances for them to be alone together.

Bai Yi didn’t fight it but also didn’t seem to be falling in love with Alodia. Alodia herself was also very clear about this. Bai Yi was probably still thinking of Hong Qi Hua in his heart. Moreover, just like what Alodia said before, it was enough just to keep looking at Bai Yi’s back for her. Between the two of them, there wasn’t that kind of raging undying love, but a kind of gentle warmth that made things feel even more ambiguous.

“Come!”

Bai Yi stretched out his hands and looked at Alodia.

Alodia was still a bit shy at first, but she very quickly calmed her heart down and walked over. Bai Yi carried her in a princess carry before spreading his wings and flying up into the sky. Alodia wrapped her arms around Bai Yi’s neck, staring at the side of Bai Yi’s face dumbly for a while before finally focusing her attention to survey the mountain range below for any sign of human activity.

Bai Yi’s flying speed wasn’t too fast, but just a slow glide. The magnificent scenes of the snowy mountains continuously flew past below them.

After looking for a while, Bai Yi couldn’t help but admit that they really couldn’t find any traces of human activity. After the vegetation was infected by activated cells, it all grew extremely fast and long completely covered up any signs of human activity. Suddenly, Bai Yi saw a cloud of snow far in the distance to their east. Bai Yi’s Reverse Flower Eyes spun, focusing on the commotion in that area. The cloud of snow didn’t seem like a natural occurrence.

Bai Yi immediately turned his head and flew toward that place.

The closer they were, the surer Bai Yi and Alodia became that there was some intense battle going on over there. When they finally arrived at the place, they discovered an intense battle happening by the side of a cracked, frozen lake. On one side, were six strangely shaped evolved humans and, on the other side, was a beetle-like creature covered completely in transparent ice floe on its back. The creature was more than 30 meters long and 20 meters wide with dozens of long sharp and sinister legs on its sides. On the sides of its gigantic mouth were four continuously waving tentacles.

When Bai Yi arrived, he happened to see the beetle monster spraying frozen mist from the holes in its carapace, and one of the guys who couldn’t escape it time immediately collapsed to the ground.

“Ariza!” The teammate of the guy shouted in horror.

However, all of them could only watch as Ariza started to freeze over solid starting from his feet. Then, one of the tentacles of this beetle struck out and wrapped itself around Ariza before pulling him towards its gigantic mouth.

Bai Yi and Alodia flew over and could clearly see the four rows of sharp teeth inside its mouth. It was easy to imagine what would happen if the guy was pulled inside its mouth. Bai Yi drew Red Kiss and sent a wave of sword qi at the huge tentacle. ‘Pa!’ a dull impact rang out, but all that happened was that a ripple of energy dissipated from the tentacle, and after a violent jerk the tentacle went back to normal.

Energy defense!

Bai Yi and Alodia immediately thought. It was the defense method that they had developed recently and could greatly reduce the impact of any enemy’s attack. Unexpectedly, this monster also knew how to do it! At this time, the tentacle continued to pull Ariza into its mouth.If they delayed any longer, then this guy would definitely be done for.

“You go down first!” Bai Yi said to Alodia.

“En!” Alodia nodded before releasing her hands and plunging down from more than a hundred meters in the air.

Bai Yi flicked his wings and stepped forcefully behind him with his right foot as if pushing off a solid object. Bai Yi’s speed abruptly accelerated by two times and charged towards the monster’s mouth. At this moment, Bai Yi had already withdrawn his wings because, while his flying speed was indeed very fast, his wings hindered his ability to dodge and change directions in a true aerial battle.

The air beneath Bai Yi’s feet became a stepping board for him again so that it looked as though Bai Yi ran on the air. Bai Yi closed in on the tentacle wrapped around Ariza and pulled back his right fist.

Forward Wrecking Hammer!

The Tai Ji Fist that they were learning now no longer followed the original move sets; instead, they entered the realm of ‘retaining the essence but losing the form’. Bai Yi’s body tensed, and, as if a big taut bow, starting from his feet all the power in his body transferred through his right fist.

‘BOOM!’ The air in the area blew away in the shockwave and the tentacle trembled violently before finally releasing its grip. At this moment, Bai Yi forcefully pushed off the air again, placed his left hand on Ariza’s body, and pushed him out of the area with the soft force of the Tai Ji Fist. The frozen Ariza flew away while Bai Yi stepped on the air again and turned to face the monster.

Bai Yi carried a smile on his face, continuously dodging in the air and clashing with the monster’s tentacles with his fists. Bai Yi used the Tai Ji Fist incomparably smoothly so that every contact between his body and the tentacles would cause a small eruption of air to flow; thus, every time the monster wanted to grab hold of Bai Yi, its tentacles were easily deflected.

“Can you calm down first? I don’t have any intentions of becoming enemies with you. Just wait for my daughter to come and then we can probably talk things out then.” Bai Yi’s Reverse Flower Eyes spun as he said this to the strange creature. Bai Yi couldn’t tell where the eyes of this creature were exactly and didn’t know if it could understand him either; however, there really wasn’t much battle intent coming from Bai Yi’s body right now.

Suddenly, the four tentacles smashed down at the same time. Bai Yi pushed with his hand, borrowed the force of the tentacles and gathered the air below his feet again to complete a few rapid jumps and land on the ground.

By then, the five evolved humans had already retrieved Ariza and were anxiously trying to help their teammate to no avail. Ariza had already been completely frozen in ice; he wouldn’t die so quickly from this kind of rapid freezing and as an evolved human, he had special energy in his body to protect him, it still wouldn’t be good if things carried on this way.

The beetle-like monster also stopped. It submerged its body in the frozen lake, only leaving two tentacles waving on the surface. It wasn’t that this creature understood Bai Yi’s words, it was just extremely wary of Bai Yi.

If not for seeing this creature’s true appearance, Bai Yi would have probably thought that it was just a gigantic piece of ice floe on the frozen lake.

“Can you tell me how you managed to enrage this guy?” Bai Yi didn’t turn around as he said this to the five panicked people.