198: Chapter 198 Beast Horde

"Nonsense." Han Xiao had already drawn his blade, his eyes surging with Battle Intent. "Since we're already here, are we just going to let them serve us up for dinner?"

Before his voice had even faded, the first Dragon-blood Corpse Lizard had already lunged close.

A foul wind rushed at his face!

Han Xiao let out a low growl and swung his war blade horizontally. The blade's edge pulled out a cold flash, striking directly at the monster's neck.

Puchi—!

Black blood splattered.

But that Dragon-blood Corpse Lizard didn't fall on the spot; instead, it let out a sharp hiss. Black mist billowed from its severed neck, and it was actually repairing itself rapidly!

"It can regenerate?" Gu Yunting's eyes widened.

"Mutated monsters under dragon blood pollution aren't that easy to kill," Ji Wuchen said in a heavy voice. "Their core isn't in their Physical Body, it's in the dragon patterns on their chests!"

Lin Mo didn't speak.

With a sweep of his eyes, he had already seen it.

On the chests of these monsters, a small section of dark red dragon patterns was faintly glowing, like a heart that had been forcibly embedded.

As long as that thing remained, the monster could continue to move.

"Then shatter it."

Lin Mo's voice was calm.

In the next instant, his entire being had already rushed out.

Bang!

Just as the first Dragon-blood Corpse Lizard was halfway through repairing itself, Lin Mo's punch slammed into its chest.

The moment the punch's force exploded, that dark red dragon pattern shattered on the spot.

The monster's movements stiffened, and its still-writhing body suddenly lost support, collapsing directly to the ground as black blood flowed out like ink.

"Nice job!" Han Xiao's eyes lit up.

Lin Mo didn't stop.

Without pausing his steps, his figure pulled out a rapid afterimage in the black mist. Punches, elbows, knees, and shoulders were thrown in turn, each strike landing precisely on the dragon pattern on the Dragon-blood Corpse Lizards' chests.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

After several dull thuds, the three Dragon-blood Corpse Lizards that had lunged forward all had their cores pierced through on the spot, falling heavily to the ground.

Gu Yunting stood behind, his mouth twitching, and finally, he squeezed out a single sentence:

"...Do we even need to do anything?"

"Yes," Lin Mo said indifferently without looking back. "Help me finish them off."

Gu Yunting: "..."

Before he could curse, Han Xiao had already slashed his blade at a nearby corpse lizard that was struggling to get up, sending its head flying.

The middle-aged man stepped on the back of another corpse lizard and plunged a short blade into its chest, cleanly delivering the final blow.

Ji Wuchen remained at the back, his gaze alertly scanning the surroundings.

"These are just the vanguard," he said heavily. "The real trouble is still behind."

Lin Mo looked up, his black eyes narrowing slightly.

He felt it too.

After these Dragon-blood Corpse Lizards rushed out, the sense of oppression deep within the gorge had not weakened, but had instead grown heavier.

It was like a sleeping eye slowly opening.

"Go."

Lin Mo only uttered one word before stepping forward again.

The others said no more and immediately followed.

The further forward they went, the thicker the black mist became.

At first, they could still vaguely identify the gravel and skeletal remains beneath their feet.

But soon, the ground changed completely.

Massive section after section of white bone emerged from the black mist, laid out haphazardly across the center of the mountain path like an ancient bone road that had long since lost its life force.

"This place... looks like someone specifically paved it," Gu Yunting whispered.

"No." Ji Wuchen stared at those white bones, his expression more solemn than ever before. "This wasn't paved; it was trodden out."

Han Xiao was startled: "What do you mean?"

Ji Wuchen slowly let out a breath.

"This road used to be the spine of the dragon god skeleton."

With that one sentence, everyone fell silent.

Lin Mo's gaze fell on the giant bones beneath his feet, and his expression also changed slightly.

If that were true, then what they were treading upon now was not an ordinary ruin, but a part of the actual corpse of the ancient Dragon God.

"No wonder the Dragon Might is so heavy," the middle-aged man whispered. "It turns out we've been walking on its bones all along."

"Don't make it sound so easy," Gu Yunting's mouth felt dry. "Right now, I just want to know if stepping on this place will wake that thing up."

Just as he finished speaking, the black mist ahead suddenly jolted.

Dong—!

Another dull, massive sound.

This time, the sound was clearer than any before.

Even the dragon bones beneath their feet vibrated slightly in response.

In the next second, the black mist on both sides of the bone road seemed to be pushed outward by some force, revealing a massive open area.

And in the center of the open area was a broken ancient altar.

The altar was built entirely from dark gold dragon bones, its surroundings covered in dense ancient patterns, and in the center floated a slowly pulsing mass of blood-gold light and flame.

That flame wasn't large, but it emitted a nearly terrifying Dragon Might.

Just one look at it made everyone's hearts feel as if they had been struck by a heavy hammer.

"That's..." Han Xiao's breath hitched.

Ji Wuchen's expression also completely changed.

"dragon marrow fire seed."

"One of the most core essences before the dragon god skeleton truly awakens."

Gu Yunting's eyes were fixed: "Can we take that thing?"

"We can," Ji Wuchen's voice was low. "But the premise is that you have to reach it alive first."

As soon as his voice fell, over a dozen pairs of crimson eyes suddenly lit up in the black mist surrounding the altar.

Following that, a low and fierce roar slowly drifted out from the darkness.

Larger and more numerous than the Dragon-blood Corpse Lizards from before!

Lin Mo slowly raised his head, his gaze scanning that patch of black mist, his expression as cold as ice.

"It seems."

"Someone is already guarding it for us."

Deep within the black mist, those pairs of crimson eyes lit up one after another.

At first, there were only a dozen or so pairs.

But soon, twenty, thirty, fifty... it was as if the entire darkness had been ignited, spreading densely around the altar, forming a blood-colored expanse of light that made one's scalp tingle.

The color drained from Gu Yunting's face on the spot.

"...How the hell are there so many guardian beasts?"

His voice was tight.

Han Xiao had originally gripped his blade and stepped forward half a pace, but after seeing the silhouettes in the black mist clearly, his footsteps halted abruptly.

Those weren't the scattered Dragon-blood Corpse Lizards from before, but an entire herd.

Large and small, spread out in front and back, they had almost completely blocked the bone path leading to the altar.

In the front row were Dragon-blood Corpse Lizards over three meters long, their spines covered in savage bone spikes and the dragon patterns on their chests glowing dark red. Behind them were several even larger Mutated Bone Beasts, with rotting meat still hanging from half their bodies while the other half exposed sun-bleached skeletal frames. When their limbs hit the ground, even the earth vibrated slightly.

And at the very depths, the black mist slowly parted to both sides.

A Giant Guardian Beast, as tall as a small building, slowly walked out from the shadows.

It looked like a lizard-dragon, with a broken bone crown atop its head and a blood-gold crystal core the size of a millstone embedded in its chest cavity. It was surrounded by black mist, and the breath from its nostrils wasn't hot air, but wisps of grayish-white mist carrying a corrosive Aura.

As it just stood there, the surrounding Dragon-blood Corpse Lizards all crouched low.

Like subjects welcoming their king.

Ji Wuchen's expression darkened completely.

"We're in big trouble."

Lin Mo's gaze fell on that Giant Guardian Beast, and his eyes also grew colder.

He could clearly feel that this thing was on a completely different level from the mutated beasts they had encountered before.

If the Dragon-blood Corpse Lizards were just cannon fodder polluted by Dragon Might, then this Giant Guardian Beast before them had truly begun to take the form of a semi-dragon species.

Plus the herds of corpse lizards and Mutated Bone Beasts around it...

Charging through by force was absolutely out of the question.

Even if they could break through, they would surely pay an extremely heavy price.

And right now, what they lacked most was time and condition.

"Can we fight it?" Han Xiao licked his dry lips, his voice very low.

"We can," Lin Mo said.

Gu Yunting had just let out half a breath of relief when he heard Lin Mo add:

"But after the fight, we'll be just about finished."

Gu Yunting: "..."

That breath was wasted.

The middle-aged man with the old shoulder injury stared intently at the herd ahead and said heavily:

"The corpse lizards in the front are manageable. The trouble is those bone beasts in the back and that big guy at the very end. Once we're entangled, we won't get the altar, and the people from the West Federation might arrive at any moment."

The man with black wristguards also shed his reckless demeanor, grinned, and cursed under his breath:

"With these numbers, a head-on clash is just suicide."

Han Xiao did not refute.

Because it was indeed the truth.

Their group wasn't small, and their individual combat power wasn't weak, but this was Black Dragon Gorge, the home ground of the guardian beasts.

The enemy's numbers were too great and the terrain was narrow; once they charged in, the people in front would be dragged down, and the people in the back wouldn't be able to maneuver at all.

Even more troublesome was that the sense of oppression from that Giant Guardian Beast was very wrong.

It was as if as long as it didn't die, these things around it would keep lunging forward incessantly.

"We can't use brute force," Ji Wuchen suddenly spoke, his words rapid.

Lin Mo glanced at him: "You can understand them?"

"Not all of it, but enough."

Ji Wuchen crouched down and used a bone fragment to quickly draw a simple diagram on the ground.

"The altar is in the middle, and these bone patterns around it are ring-shaped. If I'm not mistaken, the outermost layer is for Sha-Gathering, the second layer is for trapping spirits, and the innermost layer is for protecting the spark."

"In other words—"

He looked up, his eyes behind his glasses shining brightly.

"These guardian beasts seem to be guarding the altar, but in reality, they themselves are also bound within this array domain."

Gu Yunting reacted quickly: "You mean they aren't completely free to move around?"

"Correct," Ji Wuchen nodded. "At least that biggest one cannot easily leave the core area. Otherwise, such a strong thing would have lunged out long ago; it wouldn't just stand there staring at us."

Hearing this, everyone's hearts stirred.

Lin Mo looked back at the Giant Guardian Beast and indeed found that although its Aura was oppressive, it had never truly stepped out of that deepest ring of bone patterns on the altar's periphery.

It was as if some invisible chain was tethering it to the spot.

"So we can win by wit?" the middle-aged man asked in a deep voice.

"We can try," Ji Wuchen said. "But someone needs to lure away the outer herd, someone needs to break the array, and someone needs to rush the altar amidst the chaos."

Han Xiao grinned: "Sounds like we still have to risk our lives."

"Nonsense," Gu Yunting rolled his eyes. "You want to come in and take the dragon marrow fire seed without risking your life?"

Lin Mo looked down at the bone pattern diagram Ji Wuchen had drawn, quickly running through it in his mind.

Brute force wouldn't work.

Then they would use wit.

This place wasn't about whose fist was bigger, but about who could find the opening first.

He looked up, his gaze scanning everyone, and quickly made a decision.

"Three groups."

Everyone looked at him at the same time.

"Han Xiao, man with black wristguards, take two people and circle around the bone slope on the left. Make as much noise as possible to draw the attention of the outer corpse lizards and bone beasts."

"Uncle Li and Gu Yunting will take the right. Don't worry about killing enemies; just focus on harassment and force those big guys to turn around."

When Gu Yunting heard he was going to the right, his face turned green: "Me? Won't I just be walking into a slaughter?"

Lin Mo glanced at him: "You have the loudest mouth; you're best suited for drawing aggro."

Gu Yunting: "..."

Han Xiao almost laughed out loud.

Lin Mo ignored him and continued:

"Ji Wuchen will go through the center with me."

Ji Wuchen frowned slightly: "You want to go straight for the altar?"

Lin Mo slowly narrowed his eyes, looking at those rings of complex bone patterns.

"You're responsible for finding the array core; I'm responsible for clearing the path."

"As long as we disrupt the outermost Sha-Gathering layer and the second trapping spirit layer, the herd's guidance will malfunction. When that happens, regardless of whether that big one moves, the situation will descend into chaos first."

Ji Wuchen pondered for two seconds, then nodded: "Feasible."

The middle-aged man also said in a low voice: "What about that Giant Guardian Beast? Once it locks onto you, the center path will be the most dangerous."

Lin Mo's expression was calm.

"That's why you have to make a lot of noise on the outskirts."

"The more chaos, the better."

Han Xiao gripped his war blade, his eyes gradually lighting up.

"I get it."

"We're not pushing through by force; we're pulling these beasts out of the very trap they're guarding."

"Yes." Lin Mo nodded. "They have the numbers, so we're at a disadvantage in a head-on fight. But having many numbers also means that once their formation is disrupted, they'll fall into chaos themselves."

This was the key to winning by wit.

As long as they relied on the altar and bone patterns to function, there would be patterns, blind spots, and cracks that could be pried open.

Lin Mo was never afraid of tough nuts.

What he was best at was finding the crack in the hardest part and then driving into it ruthlessly.

"There's one more problem," Ji Wuchen lowered his voice. "Once the dragon marrow fire seed is touched, the innermost fire-protecting array might be fully activated. At that time, that big one might not be trapped in place anymore."

"That just means we only have one chance," Lin Mo said.

The air fell silent for a moment.

Everyone understood the meaning of those words.

Once they failed, it wouldn't just be about not getting the dragon marrow fire seed; this entire group of theirs would likely be lost here.

But as things stood, there was no way back.

Outside, people from the West Federation were watching.

Inside was the awakening dragon god skeleton.

Retreating didn't guarantee survival.

Advancing at least gave them a chance to seize an Opportunity.

Han Xiao suddenly grinned and stood up with his blade.

"Fine, let's do this job properly."

The man with black wristguards also loosened his shoulders: "I like this kind of work the most—not fighting head-on, but specifically screwing people over."

Gu Yunting stood up grumbling: "You make it sound like I'm so willing to go to my death."

The middle-aged man patted his shoulder: "Don't worry, with me here, you won't die."

Gu Yunting's expression didn't improve at all; instead, it became more complicated: "When you say it like that, I'm even more panicked."

Lin Mo said no more, only taking one last look at the blood-gold dragon marrow fire seed in the center of the altar.

That thing floated quietly like a drop of dragon blood that refused to disperse, emitting a heart-palpitating attraction.

And in the very depths, that Giant Guardian Beast also slightly raised its head within the black mist, its crimson vertical pupils coldly watching them.

It was as if it had already sensed something.

Lin Mo slowly let out a breath and lowered his voice:

"Prepare."

"Once we start, no matter what you see, don't stop."

"Whoever slows down first dies."

In the next second, Han Xiao was the first to crouch and lead two people from the left path, quietly moving out along the bone slope.

On the right side, the middle-aged man also signaled to Gu Yunting and quickly vanished into the black mist.

Ji Wuchen stood beside Lin Mo, his fingertips tightening slightly as he whispered:

"Once the center path is exposed, we'll be the first ones targeted."

Lin Mo gave an 'en', but his gaze remained fixed on the thinnest gap in the bone patterns in front of the altar.

"That's why we have to be faster than them."

The black mist billowed.

In the next instant, a thunderous boom suddenly came from the left!

Han Xiao had made his move.

Immediately after, the right bone slope also exploded with scattered rocks and roars.

The entire outer perimeter of the altar was instantly torn open with the first breach.

And Lin Mo also stepped out forcefully at this moment.

"Go!"