Li Shen, the eldest, remained the most lethal point of their diamond. When a cluster of five Sand Warriors managed to bypass the perimeter, moving with surprising speed through the dunes, he didn't even turn his head.
He simply stepped into their path, his Silver Diamond Boundary of the Space element rippling slightly.
"Ice Element: Brittle Fracture."
This is High level control, he didn't freeze the air; he reached into the very sand that made up the demons' joints and sucked out every trace of moisture. The warriors halted, their knees and elbows turning to white frost instantly. With a casual flick of his wrist, a pulse of Space energy hit them.
Because they were now as brittle as dry twigs, the pulse didn't just knock them back-it disintegrated them into a fine, frozen powder that drifted away on the breeze.
In the center of the carnage, I held the Soul Vessel steady, but my focus wasn't on the Vessel, It was on the interface only I could see.
As the brothers systematically de-animated the horde, streamers of sickly green light-the remnants of the servants-and the occasional brilliant blue spark of a warrior's essence began to rise from the sand. To my brothers, it looked like a standard harvest. To me, it was an avalanche.
[System Notification: Kill confirmed. Sand Servant (Servant Class). Base Reward: 1 Soul Remnant. 10x Multiplier Applied... Received: 10 Soul Remnants.]
[System Notification: Kill confirmed. Sand Warrior (Warrior Class). Base Reward: 1 Soul Essence. 10x Multiplier Applied... Received: 10 Soul Essences.]
My heart hammered against my ribs. In the Versatile Mage world, a single Soul Essence from a Warrior-level creature was worth a small fortune-enough to fund a mage's cultivation for months. Getting ten at once from a single kill was highway robbery against the heavens.
The jade vessel in my hands began to glow with a density it shouldn't have possessed yet. The green and blue lights didn't just flow; they surged like a river within a river.
"Yuzi, your vessel..." Li Jun glanced back, his brow furrowing as he caught a glimpse of the blinding radiance leaking from the jar's mouth. "Is it working? That's too much light for a few dozen servants."
"It's working, the quality of this Soul vessel is really High, Brother Jun!" I lied quickly, stepping closer to Li Shen's shadow to hide the overflow. "This Soul vessel can really increase the drop rate of soul essence, don't stop keep going brother Li Shen."
Li Shen raised his eyes, sensing the abnormal surge of energy, but he didn't question me. He trusted his brothers, and more importantly, he trusted the results. He swept his hand out, and a silent ripple of Space energy decapitated another row of rising skeletons.
"If the harvest is this rich, we don't stay until dawn," Li Shen commanded, his voice dropping an octave as he scanned the shifting dunes in the distance. "We hit the quota in an hour and we vanish. Something this 'loud' in the Sand Lake will eventually draw a Commander, whether we use Advanced magic or not."
I nodded, gripping the pendant. My brothers were providing the muscle, but the system was providing the future. By the time we left this river, we will have good amount of spirit essences.
...
The rhythm of the hunt had been perfect—too perfect.
For two hours, the Li brothers had operated like a surgical team, peeling away the layers of the Washing Sand River without so much as a stray spark of mana alerting the wider desert. But beneath the surface, the 10x Reward System was doing something I hadn't anticipated. It wasn't just filling my vessel; it was creating a spiritual vacuum. The sheer density of soul energy being ripped out of the atmosphere was acting like a flare in the darkness of the underworld. The 10x multiplier had turned our "efficient grind" into a beacon of divine-tier slaughter.
The first sign of trouble wasn't a sound, but a vibration that traveled through the soles of our boots. Li Han, whose connection to the Earth was the most sensitive, froze. His hand, buried in the sand to maintain the Earth Wave, began to tremble.
"Something is coming," Han whispered, his face turning pale. "Something heavy. It's rising from the river...."
Five hundred meters away, a massive dune—one we had assumed was a natural part of the landscape—began to stand. It was a terrifying sight. Ton after ton of compressed silt and ancient bone cascaded off its shoulders like a golden waterfall. This was no Warrior. This was a Sand-Dune Tyrant, a Commander-level entity that ruled this stretch of the Scorching Plains. It stood forty meters tall, its "head" a hollowed-out cavern of darkness lit by two swirling vortices of baleful amber fire.
It let out a sound that wasn't a roar, but the screech of tectonic plates grinding together. The shockwave hit us like a physical blow, threatening to collapse our lungs.
"Formation break!" Li Shen's voice cracked like a whip, shattering the stunned silence. "It's sensed the soul drain. Han, Rock Barrier! Now!"
The Tyrant didn't waste time. It raised a hand the size of a villa, and the very ground we stood on rose up in a tidal wave of crushing sand. The "No Advanced Magic" rule was gone in an instant; to hold back now was to be buried alive.
"To hell with the noise!" Li Wei roared. He bit his thumb, his blood acting as a catalyst as his Star Palaces linked with violent, practiced speed. The violet glow of his Lightning element surged, turning the air ozone-thick. "Lightning Element: Silent Thunder - Sky Punishment!"
The dark sky above the river tore open. A massive, jagged bolt of violet lightning slammed into the Tyrant's raised arm. The explosion was deafening. The sand of the monster's limb vitrified instantly, turning into a jagged, glowing wing of glass. But the Tyrant didn't flinch. It simply pulled more silt from the river, regenerating the glass arm back into a mountain of grit within seconds.
"Jun, Space! Move Yuzi!" Li Shen commanded.
Li Jun's eyes turned entirely silver. "Space Element: Rhythm - Blink!" In a blur of refracted light, I felt a hand seize my collar. We reappeared on a high rocky outcrop five hundred meters away. We had escaped just in time; the spot where we had stood was pulverized into a fifty-meter crater by the Tyrant's fist.
Li Shen was the only one who hadn't retreated. He stood at the base of the behemoth, a speck of midnight-blue shadow. His Soul Seed, Glacier's Breath, flared to life, sending a visible wave of frost crawling across the dunes.
"Ice Element: Ice Age - Frozen Coffin!"
He forced the 6x multiplier of his Soul Seed through his Advanced Level 3 Star Palaces. A shockwave of absolute zero raced outward. The Washing Sand River, for a mile in either direction, ceased its grinding. The flowing sand turned to solid, unmoving permafrost. The Tyrant's lower half was instantly encased in a block of ice so dense it shone like blue diamond, anchoring the titan to the earth.
"Han! Finish the anchoring! Wei, burn it down!" Li Shen bellowed.
Li Han unleashed his full power. "Earth Element: Rock Monster's Judgment!" Six massive pillars of high-density rock erupted from the frost, slamming into the Tyrant's chest and shoulders like giant nails, pinning it against the icy riverbed.
As the brothers hammered the Commander, my system interface went into a frenzy, flashing gold.
[System Notification: Kill confirmed. Sand Servant (Servant Class). Base Reward: 1 Soul Remnant. 10x Multiplier Applied... Received: 10 Soul Remnants.]
[System Notification: Kill confirmed. Sand Warrior (Warrior Class). Base Reward: 1 Soul Essence. 10x Multiplier Applied... Received: 10 Soul Essences.]
The collateral damage between High Level Mages and Commander level demon is killing more servent and warrior level demons then before.
To be continued...
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