Dai Chengfeng listened to Huo Wu and Feng Xiaotian's gratitude, gently releasing Huo Wu, his expression calm.
"If I've decided to intervene, I didn't just come here to save someone and then flee in a panic."
Feng Xiaotian was startled by his words. "You mean… you're going to?"
Dai Chengfeng smiled but offered no explanation.
Instead, he slowly turned around, fully locking his gaze on the terrifyingly massive beast before him that resembled a small mountain.
He took a deep breath, unleashing all of his surging soul power without reservation—it erupted with tremendous force!
As his White Tiger martial soul was fully unleashed, Grand Priest Zhu Hongye watching from afar instantly showed an expression of disbelief!
At this moment, the soul power enveloping Dai Chengfeng's White Tiger martial soul was no longer just the pure gold characteristic of the Dai family's White Tiger martial soul, but instead displayed a mysterious and noble blend of golden-blue hues...
The gold radiated majestic brilliance, while the blue exuded profound coldness.
The fusion of the two emitted an aura far surpassing ordinary soul power—a noble, regal presence.
Even more astonishing was that his White Tiger martial soul now possessed a pair of wings. As they gently flapped, air currents naturally swirled and accelerated around them.
It seemed as though the traditional weakness of the Dai family's White Tiger martial soul—speed and agility—had been greatly compensated for, and might even have turned into an advantage!
"This martial soul... not only has its form changed, but even its fundamental essence has shifted? What's going on?"
Grand Priest muttered to herself, her mind racing. "It seems I'll need to ask him about it when he returns."
Meanwhile, as Zhu Hongye pondered...
In the center of the battlefield, the Golden-Horned Giant Ape, enraged at losing its prey to Dai Chengfeng, locked its blood-red eyes onto this meddlesome intruder.
Roar——!
It let out an earth-shattering roar, its massive body charging forward with overwhelming momentum.
Each step caused the ground beneath to tremble.
Facing such a formidable display, Dai Chengfeng remained calm. His first soul ring abruptly lit up, glowing with energy:
"First Soul Skill, Origin Metal Qi!"
An extremely condensed, sharp beam of golden energy shot out from Dai Chengfeng's fingertips.
Like an invisible divine sword, it tore through the air, emitting a sharp whistling sound as it targeted the most vulnerable part of the Golden-Horned Giant Ape's face.
Whoosh~
The Golden-Horned Giant Ape eyed the thin golden light with disdain.
Relying on its incredibly tough dark golden scales, it made no attempt to dodge or evade, intending to withstand Dai Chengfeng's seemingly insignificant attack head-on.
Simultaneously, its massive palm continued its relentless assault, aiming to crush Dai Chengfeng into a pulp.
Seeing this, Dai Chengfeng smirked.
"You think my soul power is weak? You're not dodging? Then go ahead and try!"
Whoosh——!
Accompanied by a gust of wind, the Origin Metal Qi struck.
The next second, disbelief filled the Golden-Horned Giant Ape's eyes.
It realized that the sharpness of this tiny golden blade far exceeded its expectations.
Upon contact with its scales, the golden light did not bounce off. Instead, it emitted a teeth-grinding "shhh" sound, forcibly cutting open a wound so deep it exposed the bone on its resilient scales.
Dark golden blood, dotted with star-like specks, gushed out immediately!
"Roar——!"
The intense pain caused the Golden-Horned Giant Ape to emit a pained roar, its fury escalating further.
"You little brat, how dare you wound me?"
The next moment, the horn atop its forehead, symbolizing its lineage and power, began to gather a heart-stopping glow.
"Die!"
Dai Chengfeng's brow furrowed instantly. "Good thing it's already weakened; otherwise, it'd be hard to dodge…"
Thinking this, he dared not slack off. His third soul ring lit up:
"Third Soul Skill, Nine Abyss Mysterious Wind!"
With the activation of the soul skill, Dai Chengfeng's figure seemed to transform into an elusive wisp of ethereal breeze. His movements became graceful and unpredictable.
With near-impossible trajectories and speed, he narrowly avoided the direct impact of the destructive beam at the last possible moment.
Using the extreme speed granted by the Nine Abyss Mysterious Wind, he began circling the Golden-Horned Giant Ape's massive body at high speed, leaving behind trails of afterimages as he searched for any openings in the beast's weakened and injured state.
Seeing its attack miss, the Golden-Horned Giant Ape grew even more agitated. Its massive palms swung with roaring winds, each strike carrying the power to split mountains and crack stones.
Yet, time and again, Dai Chengfeng deftly avoided them by the narrowest of margins, leaving behind only deep craters where his palms struck the ground in vain.
Huo Wu and Feng Xiaotian were utterly dumbfounded as spectators.
They never imagined that Dai Chengfeng, with his Soul King level cultivation, could engage a furious fifty-thousand-year-old soul beast to such an extent, even holding his own without falling behind!
Such strength completely surpassed their understanding of peer-level geniuses.
"How can his strength be so absurd?"
Huo Wu murmured, her red lips slightly parted.
Feng Xiaotian's face revealed a bitter smile as he sighed, "It seems back in town, he held back by not directly intervening."
"If he had acted then, we would probably…"
At this moment, after some maneuvering, Dai Chengfeng had gained a clear understanding of the Golden-Horned Giant Ape's current condition.
"Enough testing. It's time to test the true power of the fifth soul skill bestowed by the Three-Eyed Golden Lion, infused with the force of destiny."
Thinking this, a glint of determination flashed in Dai Chengfeng's eyes.
The dazzling and mysterious soul ring beneath his feet, glowing with a beautiful rose-gold hue, finally lit up with brilliant light for the first time in actual combat!
An indescribable, strange fluctuation spread with the soul ring's brilliance.
This fluctuation was neither an energy blast nor mental pressure, but a deeper, more fundamental power that seemed to touch some underlying rule governing the workings of all things in the world.
"Fifth Soul Skill, Fate's Sorrow!"
Dai Chengfeng's low voice echoed as he raised his hand, pointing remotely at the Golden-Horned Giant Ape.
There were no dazzling visual effects, no deafening booms—only an intangible force that seemed capable of manipulating fate and causality.
In an instant, it crossed space, striking the Golden-Horned Giant Ape's massive body with precision.
At first, this eerie attack seemed to produce no visible effect.
The Golden-Horned Giant Ape's massive body merely paused momentarily, its blood-red eyes flashing with a hint of human-like confusion.
But the next second, terrifying changes began to occur!
The luster of its proud, harder-than-steel dark golden scales began to visibly fade at an alarming rate.
An instinctual perception told it that its most powerful physical defense was being drastically weakened in an incomprehensible manner!
Even more terrifying was that it lost control over its soul power. The raging energy within its body sometimes stagnated, sometimes uncontrollably dissipated, making it difficult to maintain even basic soul skills.
Even its "luck" seemed to plummet rapidly...
A section of the previously solid ground beneath its feet inexplicably collapsed, causing its massive body to stumble;
Energy blasts it tried to unleash fizzled out mysteriously in its throat;
Even an innocent bird flying overhead "coincidentally" dropped its waste precisely on its nose. Though harmless, it greatly disrupted its vision and focus.
Enraged, it jumped and roared, yet could do nothing!
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