75: The first defeat?

"Excluding those monsters that have already fled, from the three Beast General Rank Monsters and tens of thousands of Beast Soldier-level Monster, I have obtained a total of approximately 3,000 cubic meters of fungal swarm."

"That should be enough for me to level up a few times."

Qiao Yu calculated in his mind.

"System, how much fungal swarm does it cost to upgrade to the Intermediate Battle General Level?"

Qiao Yu asked the System internally.

【The host is currently at the Elementary Warlord Level. Upgrading to the Intermediate Battle General Level will cost 1,000 cubic meters of fungal swarm. Do you wish to upgrade?】

"Upgrade!"

Qiao Yu naturally had no reason to refuse, so he immediately had the System begin the upgrade.

After experiencing the dual baptism of the fungal swarm and Universe energy, Qiao Yu's Rank reached the Intermediate Battle General Level.

【Ding! Congratulations to the host for upgrading to the Intermediate Battle General Level.】

Feeling the toughness of his skin and the surging power within his body, Qiao Yu let out a long breath. The power gained from leveling up was simply exhilarating.

"System, how much fungal swarm is needed to upgrade to the High-level Wargod?"

Having just tasted the sweetness of upgrading to the Intermediate Battle General Level, Qiao Yu began coveting the High-level Wargod Rank.

【The host is currently at the Intermediate Battle General Level. Upgrading to the High-level Wargod will cost 5,000 cubic meters of fungal swarm. Do you wish to upgrade?】

"Good grief, it increased fivefold."

Listening to the System's prompt, Qiao Yu sighed inwardly. However, to upgrade to the High-level Wargod, he only needed a few more encirclement battles.

Compared to the time and price other Martial Artists had to pay, the time and amount of fungal swarm he consumed were nothing.

"However, my reconnaissance ability is indeed too weak right now. If I want to discover more Beast General Rank Monsters, I still need a Fungal Squad specifically for reconnaissance."

After all, Qiao Yu was alone; it wasn't as convenient as having other squads with specialized personnel for each role.

Most of the current Fungus Monsters were land-based; there was a lack of aerial and marine combat units.

Monsters capable of aerial activity had a huge advantage, whether in combat, reconnaissance, long-range support, and so on.

Just the ability to fly allowed them to outpace many land-based monsters; if they couldn't win, they could just fly away, and they could also harass from back and forth.

Moreover, they also had a great advantage against Martial Artists. Except for official military forces, other Martial Artists did not have many long-range attack methods.

And unless they were Martial Artists beyond the War God Level, or Psycher Masters, other Martial Artists could not fly.

Flying monsters also had extremely fast speeds; flying monsters of the same Rank were usually several times faster than land monsters.

The speed of Junior Beast General Level flying monsters exceeded the speed of sound; for flying monsters, the average human warplane was simply cannon fodder.

"It seems it is very necessary to parasitize a batch of flying monsters as a reconnaissance squad."

Qiao Yu made up his mind, but just as the thought arose, he heard a series of harsh bird calls from above.

"Caw! Caw—"

Hearing the noise, Qiao Yu hurriedly ran to the rooftop of the residential building. Qiao Yu narrowed his eyes; high in the sky, over a thousand meters up, rows of flying monsters were circling continuously.

"Talk about someone handing you a pillow just as you're feeling sleepy; I was just thinking about acquiring some flying monsters, and here they are."

Qiao Yu guessed that the smell of blood from the recent encirclement of the beast tide had been carried by the wind, drifting into the air and attracting the flying monsters from afar.

Qiao Yu looked intently, focusing his eyes on the flying monsters high in the sky.

On those avian monsters, the upper wing feathers were black, with a faint silver-gray luster.

And the down on their lower bodies and the feathers under their wings were golden yellow.

"Is this? A Golden Vulture?"

Qiao Yu recalled information about monsters with similar appearances in his mind, deducing that the flying monsters above should be Golden Vultures.

Golden Vulture, a vulture-type monster known for its ferocity; the weakest Golden Vulture is at the Junior Beast General Level.

"Looking at their size, they are mostly consistent; they should be Golden Vultures that have just been weaned, probably kicked out of the nest by their mother to learn how to forage."

If they were mature Golden Vultures, given their ferocity, they would likely have launched an attack as soon as they discovered Qiao Yu.

The fact that this Golden Vulture Flock was still circling indicated a lack of hunting experience; they still needed to judge whether the surrounding environment was suitable for an attack.

Qiao Yu looked around at the high sky again but did not find the mother vulture.

"One, two, three... exactly ten. This is enough to form a Fungal Squad, and since the mother vulture isn't here, I can definitely make a move."

Qiao Yu counted and nodded inwardly.

After making his decision, Qiao Yu acted decisively, once again using his mind to control the flying knives. The 10 flying knives immediately streaked toward the 10 Golden Vultures in the sky.

With Qiao Yu's ability as a Psycher Master, dealing with this Golden Vulture Flock was much easier than for other Martial Artists.

"Puchi! Puchi..."

Although this Golden Vulture Flock lacked hunting experience, given their keen eyesight and reaction speed, it was still somewhat difficult for 10 flying knives to shoot them all down.

Moreover, they were at a high altitude; the flying knives controlled by Qiao Yu merely grazed the wings of a few Golden Vultures, likely causing little damage.

Qiao Yu's attack had clearly angered the Golden Vultures, and the Golden Vulture Flock kept shrieking angrily in the high sky.

Soon, a Golden Vulture discovered Qiao Yu's location. Although Qiao Yu was hiding behind the rooftop wall, with the eyesight of a Golden Vulture, such hiding was useless.

After a few successive shrieks, a dark mass suddenly descended; all the Golden Vultures swooped down from the high sky.

The dense flock of Golden Vultures was like a golden cloud covering Qiao Yu's field of vision.

They didn't look large from high up in the sky, but once they got close, one could see that the size of these Golden Vultures was not to be underestimated.

These were 10 Junior Beast General Level monsters; even if a High-level Wargod Martial Artist arrived, they would likely only end up fleeing in panic, and there was no guarantee they would even be able to escape.

Within the Golden Vulture Flock, bright silver blade light flashed again and again. Qiao Yu continuously controlled the flying knives to attack back and forth within the Golden Vulture Flock, attempting to disrupt their formation.

However, the flight speed of the Golden Vultures far exceeded the speed at which Qiao Yu controlled the flying knives, and the main reason was that the huge wings of the Golden Vultures created turbulence in the surrounding air.

Not only did Qiao Yu fail to disrupt the formation of the Golden Vulture Flock, but the air currents whipped up by their flapping wings disrupted the trajectory of his flying knives.

Just as Qiao Yu wanted to continue his attack, one of the Golden Vultures rushed in front of him at an extremely fast speed.

Its sharp claws tore through Qiao Yu's fungal combat suit, exposing the bloodied body beneath.

With Qiao Yu pinned down by this one Golden Vulture, and before he could counterattack, the other 9 Golden Vultures swooped down together, launching a fierce attack on Qiao Yu.

10 pairs of sharp claws clawed frantically at Qiao Yu. In just a few short seconds, Qiao Yu's entire body became a bloody mess, turning into a pile of rotten meat.