140: Chapter 140 Abyss Squid
The surface of the sea exploded.
It wasn't spray, but a massive, ink-black figure rushing out from beneath the water.
A column of water shot into the sky, crashing down with the stench of salty seawater, causing the inflatable boat to rock violently.
Yu Nian gripped the tiller tightly, while Xu Tao half-knelt at the bow to steady himself.
Lin Fan grabbed the gunwale with one hand, his left eye fixed on the dark shadow.
It was a squid.
Its size was absurdly large; just the part protruding from the water was three or four stories high. Its tentacles were as thick as water buckets, and the dense barbs on its suckers glinted coldly in the gray light.
Its body was dark purple, with fine silver patterns on its skin that looked like lightning frozen onto its surface.
The two giant eyes on its head were dark gold, with pupils narrowed into vertical slits, staring at the four people on the boat.
The most terrifying part was its tentacles.
There were eight tentacles, each thicker than Lin Fan's waist. The suckers at the ends of the tentacles opened and closed like hungry mouths.
Lin Fan's left eye burned frantically as information surfaced in his vision.
[Species]: Abyssal Squid
[Rank]: Rank 63
[Aptitude]: emperor spirit inferior
[Attribute]: Water/Dark
[Status]: Extremely angry, highly territorial
[Evaluation]: Overlord of the Deep Sea, survives by devouring the spiritual power of Armor Beasts. The suckers on its tentacles can attach to and drain the spiritual power of enemies.
"Rank 63... emperor spirit inferior..."
Lin Fan's voice was a bit dry.
Shen Shuang did not hesitate.
She stepped in front of Lin Fan, shielding him behind her. "Step back!"
At the same time, light flared intensely from her body.
Her arms lit up first; her left arm was covered in a layer of ice-blue scale armor, with frost-like patterns on the edges of the scales.
Her right arm lit up simultaneously, as a layer of greenish-gray light armor covered her from shoulder to wrist, with a row of fine, serrated bone spikes extending from the outer side of her arm.
Next were her legs.
Her left leg was covered in silver-white fur armor, with fine downy hair at the ankle.
Her right leg was covered in dark gray thick-skinned armor, appearing nearly fifty percent thicker than her left leg.
Her torso was covered in a heavy layer of ice-blue breastplate with a wood-grain texture, looking extremely solid.
With five Armorization parts and five intersecting rays of light, Shen Shuang looked like a mobile ice fortress.
Her right leg had already stepped onto the bow of the inflatable boat, her eyes fixed on the Abyssal Squid.
Lin Fan's left eye quickly captured her information.
[Name]: Shen Shuang
[Rank]: Rank 61 Armor Sovereign
[Armor Spirit]:
Left Arm: Frost Spirit Python, Rank 49 heaven spirit intermediate.
Right Arm: Bladed Armor Turtle, Rank 49 heaven spirit superior.
Left Leg: Snow Shadow Leopard King, Rank 59 King Spirit intermediate.
Right Leg: Mountain Mad Rhino, Rank 59 king spirit superior.
Torso: Ice Armor Tree Spirit, Rank 62 emperor spirit inferior.
A Rank 61 Armor Sovereign. Lin Fan raised an eyebrow slightly.
For Shen Shuang to reach the realm of Armor Sovereign in her early thirties, her Aptitude was considered quite good.
It was just a pity that the Aptitude of the Armor Spirits she contracted early on held her back somewhat.
However, this was the reality for most Beast Armor Masters.
After all, not everyone was like him, able to see the upper limit of an Armor Spirit's Aptitude at a glance.
And since Shen Shuang hadn't contracted her sixth Armor Spirit yet, she likely wanted to find one with a high Aptitude limit.
Then Lin Fan turned his gaze toward Yu Nian and Xu Tao.
Their strength was more than a notch below Shen Shuang's, but they were both in the Armor Emperor realm.
Yu Nian leapt from the stern, and while in mid-air, five rays of light exploded from his body simultaneously.
His left arm lit up first.
Greenish-gray feathers spread from his shoulder to his wrist, their edges glinting with a metallic luster.
His right arm followed closely, with dark purple scale armor covering his forearm. A slit opened on the back of his hand, revealing a shimmering poison gland inside.
Both legs underwent Armorization at the same time.
His left leg was wrapped in silver-white wind-patterned light armor, with two wind wings as thin as cicada wings extending from the ankle.
His right leg was covered in black and red lightning-patterned heavy armor, with electrical arcs jumping at the knee.
Finally, on his back, two pairs of translucent armored wings burst through his clothes, with a wingspan of two meters.
Yu Nian hovered in mid-air with his arms crossed—left claw and right spike—his legs slightly bent and the wings on his back flapping gently. He looked like a bird of prey ready to strike.
Lin Fan's left eye quickly scanned him, and lines of information appeared.
[Name]: Yu Nian
[Rank]: Rank 54 Armor Emperor
[Armor Spirit]:
Left Arm: Swift Thunder Eagle, Rank [missing] heaven spirit inferior.
Right Arm: Shadow Viper, Rank 49 heaven spirit superior.
Left Leg: Wind-Feathered Pheasant, Rank 52 king spirit inferior.
Right Leg: Thunder-Patterned Leopard King, Rank 51 King Spirit intermediate.
Back: Mystic Light Dragonfly, Rank 52 king spirit superior.
Xu Tao did not leap; he stood where he was and stomped his feet, causing the entire inflatable boat to sink slightly.
Five earthy-yellow rays of light surged from him, as heavy as a mountain.
His left arm was covered in a layer of dark brown rock gauntlets, each rock sharply defined, with three stone spikes protruding from the elbow.
His right arm's forearm was wrapped in grayish-brown thick-skinned armor, with a turtle-shell-shaped buckler bulging on the back of his hand.
At the same time, his fingers were covered in grayish-white stone finger-guards with tips as sharp as awls. Fine scales rose on the back of his hand, each with sharp protrusions on its edges.
Next, his right eye lit up.
A layer of amber crystalline membrane spread from the edges of his eye socket, covering his entire right eye.
The membrane was grid-like, resembling the compound eye of a dragonfly or the cracks on a turtle shell.
Through the membrane, his right eye's pupil turned dark gold, with the phantom of a mountain deep within.
Finally, there were his lips.
A layer of light gray keratin grew from the edges of his lips, with two curved, pincer-like protrusions extending from both the upper and lower lips. When closed, they looked like a lock; when open, they were like a pair of fangs.
With five Armorization parts, all of the Earth element, Xu Tao looked like a mobile rock statue.
[Name]: Xu Tao
[Rank]: Rank 56 Armor Emperor
[Armor Spirit]:
Left Arm: Rock-Armored Bear, Rank 39 earth spirit superior, Earth.
Right Arm: Mountain-Bearing Black Turtle, Rank 49 heaven spirit superior, Earth.
Right Eye: Rock Spirit Eye, Rank 53 king spirit inferior, Earth.
Right Hand: Mountain Giant Scorpion, Rank 51 King Spirit intermediate.
Lips: Earth-Breath Sub-Dragon, Rank 50 king spirit superior.
Compared to Shen Shuang, these two were significantly inferior in terms of both their own cultivation and the Rank and Aptitude of their Armor Spirits.
However, among ordinary Beast Armor Masters, they were already quite good.
...
Shen Shuang and the others had entered full combat readiness. The Abyssal Squid's dark gold vertical pupils stared at them as its eight tentacles slowly unfurled, as if measuring the distance to its prey.
"Lin Fan, take care of yourself."
Before Shen Shuang had even finished speaking, she stomped hard on the boat, shooting toward the Abyssal Squid like a cannonball.
The serrated bone spikes on her right arm let out a piercing shriek in the air as she aimed directly for the squid's head.