251: Transformation into a Dragon (The End)

Niu Mengmeng caught a glimpse of the admiring look Hei Jing threw her way, and she tapped her steel fork lightly against the stone platform.

"Xiao Hei, my troop-training skills are decent enough to look at, right? One must be more devoted to the Yin Soldiers under their command than to a girlfriend."

Before Hei Jing could respond, she had already brandished her steel fork and spun around to avoid a sweep of the dragon's tail.

Under the moonlight, the silver fork drew a cold, sharp arc of light.

Her gaze suddenly locked onto the swarm of Gu insects churning in Jiao Rong's abdomen.

Those insect bodies bulged and contracted within the demonic light, like Profound Yin eggs boiling at the bottom of the Wangchuan River.

"Third Brother Ma."

Niu Mengmeng spoke up loudly, her steel fork picking up a wisp of Gu mist.

"If we roast the Soul-Sacrificing Gu with Nether Ghost Fire and season it with Ziling Grass grown by the Wangchuan River, would the taste surpass the iron-plate squid on Yin Street?"

Ma Sanqiang was currently stumbling back from the gale whipped up by the dragon's claws. As he straightened his body by leaning against a stone pillar, he rubbed his lower back.

"Hahaha... If you want to know the taste, Little Mengmeng, why don't you try it yourself?"

Before his voice had even faded, over a thousand Yin Soldiers exerted their strength simultaneously. The chains in their hands, like spirit snakes emerging from their burrows, accurately hooked onto Jiao Rong's right claw.

The massive dragon body was actually dragged until it tilted to the right. Its tail smashed onto the altar, kicking up a hundred-fathom-high pillar of rubble and smoke.

"Mengmeng, catch the talisman."

Ma Sanqiang saw a great opportunity to heavily wound Jiao Rong.

Immediately, he pulled out the Restriction-Breaking Talisman he had kept for several months.

This talisman had cost him three months of Underworld performance bonuses; at this moment, it glowed with a scorching purple light in his palm.

The moment the talisman was thrown, Niu Mengmeng accurately caught it with her steel fork and, with a flick of her wrist, threw it toward Jiao Rong's lower abdomen.

"Bang~"

Where the purple light exploded, hundreds of Gu insects turned into blood mist.

Jiao Rong curled his dragon body in pain, letting out a screech like a night owl.

"You dare to harm this old man's Life Gu!"

Jiao Rong's dragon scales peeled off like raindrops, revealing the pitted and twisted muscle texture beneath the skin.

"So what if we harm you?"

Niu Mengmeng approached while swinging her steel fork, the soles of her boots crushing the remains of the Gu insects. "The skeletons of young flood dragons under the Yin Jiao Clan's altar are piled up like a small mountain. Did you ever consider their pain?"

She spotted a gap between the dragon scales and suddenly raised her hand to stab.

Sizzle, sizzle, sizzle...

The sound of clashing metal echoed throughout Yao Zui Cliff.

The steel fork in her hand vibrated incessantly from the rebound, as if she had struck ten-thousand-year profound iron.

Ma Sanqiang couldn't help but chuckle. He took the opportunity to wrap his chains around the dragon's horns and pull hard.

"With Mengmeng's strength, I'm afraid it'll be hard to shake this old turtle shell's defense."

He immediately waved his hand to signal the Yin Soldiers to change their formation.

"Everyone, bind its claws and teeth with Immortal-Binding Ropes, seal its eye apertures with Evil-Expelling Talismans, and concentrate the Fire-Explosion Talismans on the Gu swarm in its abdomen..."

"Yes, Commander Ma!"

The Yin Soldier array moved in response.

Soul-Settling Nails shot through the air, and Immortal-Binding Ropes wove a net of light in the sky... some Gu insects were accidentally bound into cocoons, tracing strange spiral trajectories in mid-air.

Seeing this, Hei Jing almost burst out laughing. "Brother Ma's tactics really make it look like he's hosting a circus performance in the Underworld."

"However, these 'Underworld' tactics are truly unique."

Ma Sanqiang stiffened his neck and glared at him, his serpent spear thumping onto the ground and making the pebbles bounce.

"My tactics are for dealing with evil spirits. I act upright and honorable, unlike you brat who gossips behind people's backs."

"Fine, fine, fine. You're the great hero, I'll shut up." Hei Jing smiled and made a zipping gesture over his mouth.

He lightly nudged the pale-faced Bai Xuan with his elbow, and the two of them retreated behind a broken wall.

Bai Xuan sat down against the ruins, his fingertips tracing a faint light array on the ground.

Hei Jing pulled a Meridian-Activating Pill from his suit pocket and pressed it into Bai Xuan's palm. "Meditate first and watch Brother Ma and the others show off."

"Alright!" Bai Xuan nodded and tilted his head back to swallow the pill... In a short moment, Jiao Rong let out a muffled roar under the offensive and spat out a mouthful of black blood, which hit Niu Mengmeng's steel fork directly.

She frowned and shook the foul blood off her steel fork. "Old thing, your behavior is so uncouth."

"Do you have no sense of public morality? Spitting everywhere, it's disgusting."

As she spoke, she saw Jiao Rong's dragon body rapidly shrink where the scales had fallen off.

His true form was revealed to be as thin as a stick, shaped like withered wood scorched by fire.

Even so, he still glared at everyone with a venomous gaze.

He roared with black blood trickling from his mouth, "Do you all think victory is within your grasp? Once the Sacrificial Array starts running..."

Niu Mengmeng glanced sideways at the heavily injured Jiao Rong, the corners of her eyes curving into a cunning arc.

Her scarlet fingernails unconsciously stroked the barb of her steel fork; the sound of metal scraping made one's spine go cold.

"With my current spiritual power, I indeed cannot dismantle this Sacrificial Array. But I never said I couldn't use you as the sacrifice!"

Jiao Rong's cloudy vertical pupils suddenly constricted.

Even the flesh under his scales trembled. "Absurd! How could an array harm its caster?"

"Are 'harming' and 'sacrificing' the same thing?"

Niu Mengmeng let out a burst of shrill, eerie laughter. The moonlight stretched her shadow into a twisted and hideous shape, looking exactly like an evil ghost crawling out of the Eighteen Levels of Hell.

"As long as you 'voluntarily' jump into the array eye, the rules won't matter."

While Ma Sanqiang was momentarily stunned,

Niu Mengmeng launched a surprise attack, pulling out a Soul-Hooking Chain to entwine Jiao Rong's limbs.

"Brother Ma, help quickly! Once we slap on the Puppet Talismans, we can control this old thing to act as a living sacrifice."

"I still have a hundred and eight of them hoarded in my storage ring, enough to play for two rounds."

The serpent spear slammed heavily onto the ground.

Ma Sanqiang's eyes widened. "Good heavens, where did you get so many treasures?"

His sour tone was so thick it practically dripped with envy.

"The Secretary-General gave them to me." Niu Mengmeng didn't even look up as she rummaged for talismans, her iron chains clattering.

"Half a year ago, Ling Qi was cleaning out her storage ring and cleared out half a room's worth of talismans."

*Crack~*

His heart shattered all over the floor. (´థ౪థ)σ

Those words were like a thorn piercing Ma Sanqiang's heart.

He looked at the bulging storage bag at Niu Mengmeng's waist, his Adam's apple bobbing twice.

Below the altar, this usually majestic Underworld General unexpectedly showed a somewhat aggrieved expression.

In his mind, he was frantically muttering: If I had known, I should have hung around the Secretary-General more often.

If I could turn into a soft and cute little girl and serve tea or water to the big boss every day, maybe I could have achieved 'talisman freedom' too?

"No, no, no... You cannot do this to me. I am a Demi-God Realm powerhouse..."

"I will not lose! I will not lose!"

Jiao Rong struggled at the brink of death, his falling scales shooting out like projectiles, but they were all crushed by the Demon-Binding Rope Niu Mengmeng whipped out.

Ma Sanqiang seized the opportunity.

Dozens of Puppet Talismans flew like butterfly wings, accurately sticking to Jiao Rong's forehead, shoulders, and abdomen... The old Yin Flood Dragon's body instantly froze like a marionette, his cloudy vertical pupils churning with venomous resentment.

"And... off you go!"

Niu Mengmeng delivered a kick.

Jiao Rong's withered body tumbled like a broken kite into the blood array at the center of the altar.

The patterns suddenly burst with a blinding red light, and the wronged souls of the Yin Jiao Clan who had been forcibly sacrificed over generations wailed as they manifested in the void.

They turned into scarlet maws that bit down hard on Jiao Rong, dragging him into the core of the array.

The ground of the altar collapsed entirely with a boom, and pitch-black resentment, carrying thousands of Yin souls, soared into the sky.

In mid-air, they condensed into a giant phantom of a 'pill furnace'.