51: Driving apes and swallowing tigers

“Humans have already set their sights on this place.”

After Lin Xiaoxiao's death, her invisibility naturally deactivated, revealing a huge penetrating wound on her chest, with blood gushing out.

Xia Fan stared at her corpse, his eyes filled with contemplation. “It seems that the time we destroyed the human drone during the beast invasion was still a bit too late.”

“If we could have destroyed the drone immediately after it appeared, the news about this place might not have leaked out.”

“Meow, meow, meow?”

At this moment, the Magic Cat beside him let out a few confused meows, tilting its head. “Tiger Brother, what are you thinking about?”

“Didn’t we win this battle?”

“It is precisely because we won that we need to be even more careful.”

Xia Fan snapped back to reality and growled, patiently explaining, “Humans sent four Awakened Ones into Yunxia Mountain this time, likely intending to secretly steal the seven-colored lotus.”

“Perhaps humans already know about their failure, and it’s very possible they will send more powerful beings here in the future.”

“If we don’t prepare early, it will be too late then.”

He thought for a moment, then suddenly let out a long howl to the sky. A moment later, he summoned Yuan Dali, Wolf Three, and all the other fierce beasts back, roaring loudly, “Humans have set their sights on us. For the next period, everyone must be careful and patrol more often.”

“Also, if humans come again next time, try to leave one alive.”

Xia Fan knew that if something happened once, it would happen again. Now that an invisible Awakened One had appeared, if another Awakened One were to sneak in unnoticed, the seven-colored lotus might be lost.

He also wanted to try if his Soul Fire could control humans.

If it could, he would be able to take the initiative in the future and prevent human attacks in advance.

For a time, the fierce beasts roared, and the scene became quite chaotic… “Professor Xia, it failed…”

Imperial Capital, conference room.

After triple-checking, an officer still reported the bad news. He stood with his head slightly bowed before Professor Xia Xinyu. “All four Awakened Ones were wiped out!”

“Even the special forces team that supported them suffered heavy losses trying to retrieve the recording equipment, with only a few returning severely wounded.”

“Otherwise, we wouldn’t have known the news so quickly.”

In an instant, there was a silence in the conference room.

Professor Xia Xinyu’s eyes were red. After a long silence, he turned to the officer. “How… how exactly did they die?”

“Logically, even with the Golden Tiger King, it’s impossible for four Awakened Ones to be completely wiped out.”

“Could the information be wrong?”

Originally, he had planned to cultivate Awakened Ones like Wang Xu and Lin Xiaoxiao as seeds, believing they would become pillars of strength in the future.

But before the plan could even begin, they all perished prematurely.

“This is the data brought back by the survivors. Perhaps we can find the reason from it.”

The officer held a blood-stained memory card, choked up as he said, “To ensure the smooth operation and to continue further research on the fierce beasts, they all carried recording equipment during the mission.”

“Oh, only Lin Xiaoxiao’s recording equipment was not retrieved. According to the survivors, Lin Xiaoxiao encountered the Golden Tiger King.”

“Play it.”

Professor Xia Xinyu stared at the memory card with a solemn expression for a long time, finally handing it to his assistant to play.

Soon, the voices of the other three Awakened Ones, excluding Lin Xiaoxiao, before their deaths, came through.

“…Are you kidding me? Can plants kill people?”

“…”

“It’s too late, retreat!”

“…”

“Don’t be afraid, you can do it…”

In the video footage, the faces of those Awakened Ones were not seen, but as the mission progressed, communication could be heard from time to time.

Professor Xia Xinyu was shocked to discover that the turning point for the Awakened One squad’s annihilation was after the phrase ‘Can plants kill people?’ fell, countless strange vines swept over, first killing Xu Liang.

The remaining three Awakened Ones fled separately but ultimately could not survive.

“This… such a huge centipede!”

An officer’s eyes widened as he stared intently at the Thousand-Legged Centipede that killed Wang Xu, his face filled with disbelief. “It looks like its strength is also very formidable, otherwise, he definitely wouldn’t have died so quickly!”

“It’s a second-tier fierce beast.”

As the person in the room who knew the most about fierce beasts, Professor Xia Xinyu quickly deduced the strength of the Thousand-Legged Centipede and was astonished. “They say one mountain cannot accommodate two tigers. If there are fierce beasts of the same level in other places, they either divide their territories or fight to the death. How could it help the Golden Tiger King kill people?”

He had seen the previous great beast battle and knew the Golden Tiger King was powerful, intimidating some fierce beasts. But something like precise killing was truly incredible.

“Chief, Professor, there’s more!”

At this moment, another person exclaimed, “That Golden Eagle is probably also a second-tier fierce beast, and there seems to be another second-tier fierce beast flashing by nearby?”

“I didn’t expect there to be so many second-tier fierce beasts on Yunxia Mountain!”

The conference room immediately filled with gasps of cold air.

Everyone thought that there was only one Golden Tiger King to worry about in Yunxia Mountain, but now, the Golden Tiger King hadn’t even appeared, and four Awakened Ones had already been killed.

Especially that Bloodthirsty Demonic Vine, which filled everyone with fear.

“What is this?”

Someone stared intently at the vines in the footage, repeatedly watching the scene of Xu Liang’s death, and finally exclaimed in shock, “Can plants kill people?”

“That vine was not controlled by other fierce beasts; it acted autonomously.”

“Could it be that it has already become a spirit?”

Everyone fell silent, unable to describe their feelings at the moment.

Soon after, Professor Xia Xinyu looked at everyone with extreme seriousness and said in a deep voice, “It seems that there is a great secret hidden in Yunxia Mountain.”

“If we can study it, it will certainly allow us humans to greatly increase our strength.”

“But right now, there are no Awakened Ones strong enough to contend with the Golden Tiger King, or even to deal with the second-tier fierce beasts under its command.”

As soon as he finished speaking, someone immediately retorted, “So I think it’s not advisable to act rashly until a strong person capable of contending with the Golden Tiger King appears.”

“But waiting will only become more and more disadvantageous for us.”

“…”

The attendees started discussing animatedly.

Finally, after some deliberation, an officer’s eyes suddenly lit up. “Can’t we have the King Kong Giant Ape, one of the Four Great Beast Kings, go to Yunxia Mountain to fight the Golden Tiger King?”

Seeing everyone’s gaze converge on him, he became even more excited. “Look, the King Kong Giant Ape is also in Yunzhou City. Before the mutation, it was an ornamental ape in the zoo.”

“Now that it has become a fierce beast, its temper is still as volatile.”

“If someone opens fire on it and enrages it, leading it to the Yunxia Mountain Range, then when the ape and the tiger fight, there will surely be casualties.”

“At that time, we can reap the benefits, eliminate these two powerful enemies, and of course, take the opportunity to go to the Yunxia Mountain Range to steal the seven-colored lotus.”