Chapter Eighty-Nine: Evolution Island, Part Fifteen

Luohan Ya stared indifferently at the black-violet beam spat out by the monster and broke into a wide, tooth-baring grin. “Take this! Ultimate Cosmic Super Annihilation Bomb! Evil one, receive the judgment of justice!” In his right hand he held a tiny glass vial, raised high above his head in an absurdly embarrassing pose worthy only of a delusional adolescent. He paid the monster’s blazing attack no mind at all, his eyes shining with the certainty of victory.

“Fool!” The monster cast a contemptuous glance at the little glass vial Luohan Ya had thrown. Its enormous body vanished in a flash, and in an instant it had already retreated hundreds of meters, still falling back. As it withdrew, the monster laughed triumphantly. “Hahaha, remember this, you pathetic worm: next time, use your move before you name it!” No sooner had the words left its mouth than it spat another beam from far away.

“Monster Flame!”

“Tch... I haven’t even thrown it yet! Didn’t expect you to be this chicken-hearted...” Luohan Ya wore a strange expression, staring rather speechlessly at the monster, now reduced to a tiny dot on the horizon. “Since you’re such a coward, I won’t keep you company. Farewell then...”

He waved at the monster, who had retreated who knew how far, and contemptuously raised his middle finger. Then he dispelled his demon form and landed on the grassland, looking as though he were about to stroll away step by step...

“Roar!” The monster did not rush in in a fit of fury. Instead, it turned its lantern-sized eyes with a surprisingly human motion, then threw its head back and let out a long howl, as if summoning something. In less than thirty seconds, a tremendous commotion erupted where the grassland met the forest, thunder rolling like the end of the world.

Luohan Ya still looked utterly unconcerned, sauntering leisurely across the grassland with a careless, roguish air. He did not look like a player being hunted by a monster at all, but rather like a tourist traveling through the open plains. Rising onto his toes, one hand shading his eyes, he peered at the billowing dust in the distance and teased, “Well, well, what a huge herd of wild boars! So this is your trump card, is it, Harley? Commanding swine? Don’t tell me your true form is a pig?”

The monster gave him a sidelong look and said in a muffled voice, “Boy, once you’ve been trampled into meat paste by this herd of diamond boars, let’s see if you can still keep talking tough!”

“Just these pigs can trample me? Don’t make me laugh! I can fly, you know. What, are you planning to make these pigs fly up and stamp on me?” Luohan Ya said mockingly, shaking his head at the wild boar stampede kicking up mountains of dust in the distance.

“Hmph... enjoy the terror of the boar herd.” The monster seemed to possess a strange, unwavering confidence in the diamond boars, and looked down smugly at Luohan Ya.

Boom, boom, boom... The earth’s pounding seemed to make the entire grassland tremble, filling the air with an indescribable, dreadful pressure.

Luohan Ya’s expression abruptly changed. A flash of fear surfaced in his eyes, and his former contempt twisted into something distorted and peculiar...

The diamond boars were huge, their heads gleaming with gold. Their tusks were absurdly large, and black bristles as sharp as steel needles stood erect along their backs, making them look like giant elephants as they crushed every low tree and tall blade of grass in their path. Their momentum was astonishing.

And yet such a herd, which seemed capable of grinding everything in its path to dust, did not charge at Luohan Ya. Instead, they veered in panic toward the monster, as though some terrible thing were chasing them.

The monster’s face stiffened, and it fixed a grim, concentrated gaze on the direction from which the diamond boars were fleeing.

“Hahaha! Little piglets, don’t run! Old man’s here to grant you mercy!” A voice rang out from the distance. A burly man came charging in at full speed, his hair a tangled mess, fur strips tied about his body, swinging his weapon like a savage from prehistoric times. It seemed he had not noticed Luohan Ya or the monster at all. Laughing heartily, he plunged straight into the diamond boar herd, where his ghost-faced saber danced like a gale. With every flash of blade, blood flew; in the blink of an eye, hundreds of diamond boars had already fallen beneath him.

“Hahaha! Harley! Today is your death day. I lured you here just to set the ambush!” Luohan Ya’s eyes gleamed as he dashed toward the distance, shouting to the butcher blade, “Bro Butcher! You hold him off first! I’m going to get another brother. Together we’ll butcher the Volcano King!”

The butcher blade froze. Before he could even speak, scorching demonic flames slammed into him without the slightest obstruction. The sound of sizzling rose in a frenzy, and the smell of roast meat soon followed.

“Damn it! You dare ambush me? I’ll hack you apart!” The butcher blade roared madly as he burst out of the black-violet flames, completely ignoring the fire still burning on his body. Like a mad demon, he rampaged through the diamond boar herd...

“Come on, then, and hack me!” The monster’s face twisted with fury as it watched the butcher blade ravage the boars and devour them to heal his wounds. With each passing second, his anguish deepened. Seeing his capable subordinate being butchered by a savage, who could remain calm?

“Die, die, die!” The monster flew into a rage, and the Monster Flame fell like rain upon the butcher blade. The butcher blade’s eyes bloodshot, he glanced at the monster without expression, as though intending to burn Harley’s face into his memory forever. Yet his hands did not slow in the slightest; he continued harvesting the diamond boars, which had nearly frozen in terror and could barely move.

The stalemate dragged on for nearly half an hour. Even Luohan Ya, hidden in the distant grass and watching in secret, was sweating heavily. He wiped the cold sweat from his brow with a trace of trepidation and sighed, “Damn... this guy is like a monster himself. Suffering under that creature’s torment like this, his flesh burned away only to regrow, regrow only to be burned again...” At the thought, Luohan Ya’s mouth went dry, and he shuddered involuntarily. “Such pain must be dozens of times harsher than the cruelest torture. To endure that... this guy would definitely be a dangerous man in real life...”

“Aaaah!!!” The butcher blade suddenly let out a roar, and a strange, formidable aura rose from his body. Then he laughed uproariously. “Damn it! You motherf...ing bastard, you dared to treat me like this, and now I’ve finally evolved. Go to hell!”

“You... all that before was to stimulate your potential and complete your evolution?” The monster’s gaze grew grave as it stared at the butcher blade, who had been burned into an almost charcoal-like state. Slowly, it asked, “Was it worth it?”

“Hmph! Evolution is meant to be gambled with one’s life!” The butcher blade wiped the nearly congealed blood from the ghost-faced saber and licked it at the corner of his mouth. “Life against life, injury for injury. Every time I kill a lower creature, I’ve already been prepared to be killed by a higher one. And now you ask if it was worth it? Of course it was worth it! If I stake my life on it, how could it not be worth it? My evolution was bought with my own blood!”