CHAPTER 167: RAW CHAPTER

The rain had long stopped, but the air still clung damp and heavy.

Each step Lin Fang took pressed into soft earth, his boots sucking against the mud as he walked deeper into the savanna’s heart. The night stretched wide — a black ocean beneath a dying crescent moon.

He wasn’t hunting weaklings anymore.

This time, he was after the giants.

He remembered Li Liu’s voice from days ago — her calm, precise tone echoing in his mind.

"The elephant-type monsters," she had said, "are the kings of defense. Slow, yes, but near unbreakable. Don’t provoke a herd unless you’re confident you can end it in one strike."

Now, standing at the edge of their territory, Lin Fang finally saw what she meant.

At first glance, it looked like nothing but scattered boulders. Enormous stones dotted the plain, each one glinting faintly under the moonlight. No movement. No sound. Just silence — the kind that presses on the ears.

But Lin Fang didn’t need Alpha’s reminder. His instincts screamed louder than words.

They’re here.

He focused his senses, letting mana ripple from his feet through the soil. A dozen—no, more—responses flickered back at once. He frowned slightly.

"They’re hiding underground?"

Alpha’s voice came, faint and amused in his head.

Not underground... right in front of you.

Lin Fang blinked. "You mean..."

Those rocks.

For a moment, he thought Alpha was joking. But when he activated his Inspect skill and glanced at one of the larger "boulders," his interface lit up.

Stonehide Elephant

Level: 37

Tier: Commander

Grade: Epic

His eyes widened. "Epic?" he muttered under his breath.

He turned slowly, scanning the rest. The smaller "rocks," barely reaching his waist, shimmered faintly too — Elite tier, levels in the twenties, all with the same grade. Even the "younger" ones were monsters far beyond normal difficulty.

Lin Fang’s heart thudded once, hard. The thrill of danger mixed with the urge to fight.

"Epic defense... that explains the camouflage," he murmured. "Even their skin pretends to be stone."

Alpha chuckled in his mind.

Looks like they’ve evolved under constant threat. Probably learned to sleep in disguise to avoid night predators. Clever for beasts that used to just charge at anything that moved.

Lin Fang smiled faintly.

"Clever or not, I’ll still need their cores."

He crouched low, fingers brushing the damp grass. Mana swirled faintly at his fingertips — blue-white, cold, alive. Ahead, the field of "rocks" remained still, unaware of the intruder among them.

The night breeze stirred again, brushing across his face. The faint scent of stone and iron filled the air.

Lin Fang’s grip on his dagger tightened.

"Alright then," he whispered, eyes narrowing. "Let’s wake the herd."

Chapter 73 — The Stone Herd Falls

Lin Fang chewed the spirit core like a bitter candy and swallowed. The world tilted for a second — warm mana flooding his gut, then settling like molten metal in his chest.

"Quicksand," Alpha said in his head, flat and pleased. "You asked for range. This one works at distance."

He didn’t think long. There were eighteen "rocks" ahead, eighteen sleeping giants pretending to be boulders. Lin Fang crouched, felt the new skill coil under his skin like a rope, and spoke it out loud, simple as breathing.

"Bind the ground."

The soil answered. A ripple ran across the plain — not water, but a hungry, slow-moving sink. The disguised elephants twitched, then panicked as the earth at their feet turned soft and sucking. Huge legs flailed. Trunks slapped uselessly at air. One by one the "rocks" collapsed into the quagmire they had made for themselves.

Anne and Wang Jie yelled. The two direwolves barked and leapt back from the edge. Lin Fang didn’t wait to watch them sink. He hit the system command, pulled the Lightning Pterosaur summon from his inventory. The beast exploded into being with the smell of ozone and feathers — a streak of blue lightning beating wings against the rain-cooled air.

He vaulted up, the world shrinking beneath him. From the sky the trapped herd looked like a patchwork of dark lumps, each one half-swallowed, each one thrashing. Their weight had them pinned; they could not get free. Perfect.

"Alpha’s Blessing," he muttered again, and the power prickled in his fingers. The daggers in his hands flashed cold light. He drew a deep breath and let himself fall into the motion he’d practiced a hundred quiet nights: launch, spin, cut.

From above he descended like a falling needle. Each slash was clean, practiced — right throat, left flank, center spine. The first cut opened a torrent of rusty blood that steamed in the cool air. The second split bone and earth together. When he moved, the blades sang; when they stopped, a carcass sagged.

It was clinical. Brutal. Beautiful in a way that made Anne cover her mouth and Wang Jie drop to his knees. Lin Fang hit every vital gap exposed by the quagmire. No battle shouts, no wasted theatrics — just efficient motion: strike, withdraw, strike again.

Half an hour later the mud stank of iron and the field was a field of bloated shapes. Lin Fang landed, boots sinking, breath steady. He walked between the carcasses like a man checking his harvest. He didn’t smile much — just a small, satisfied nod.

"How many?" he asked, casual.

"Eighteen down. Twelve cores, three epic-grade." Alpha’s voice was smug.

Lin Fang stuffed the orbs into his pouch. Coins pinged into his inventory one after another. He felt that familiar calculation — debt coming down, step by step.

He looked up at the sky, where the Lightning Pterosaur beat its wings and vanished. The herd was gone; the perimeter was clear. Lin Fang wiped the dagger on a dying leaf and pocketed it.

"Good," he said, to no one and to everything. "Let’s go deeper."

81–83 Continuation Draft

The Quicksand skill pulsed under Lin Fang’s feet like a living thing. He had tested its limits earlier — three hundred meters in every direction — a whole battlefield in his grasp. He didn’t hesitate. The moment he spotted the massive "rocks" under the faint moonlight, he used Spectral Dash, streaking forward in a blur of pale blue light. The skill ate the distance instantly, sixty meters in a heartbeat. Then, without slowing, he poured mana into his legs. The earth cracked under the surge, dust lifting behind him like smoke.

The herd stirred.

The first tremor of his footsteps broke the silence.

Then came the thunder — trumpeting roars that echoed across the plains. Every "boulder" uncurled, massive forms rising, eyes flashing like molten amber. Their skin gleamed in faint moonlight, dust shedding from them as they locked their gaze onto the single blur cutting through their midst.

Lin Fang stopped dead-center, sliding to a halt in a spray of dust. For one heartbeat, the night held its breath — then an elephant lunged, trunk rising to crush him like an insect. Lin Fang’s lips curled.

"Now."

He slammed his palm down.

The world broke.

The three-hundred-meter radius of earth turned to liquid death. The hard savanna soil liquefied into a vast whirlpool of sand, every step sucking, dragging, devouring. The colossal beasts cried out, trumpeting in panic as their immense legs sank halfway down in seconds. The air itself seemed to vibrate from the chaos of their roars.

Lin Fang didn’t stay on the ground. He activated Fly, his figure shooting skyward in a burst of wind. But before he could rise more than a few meters, something whipped through the air — fast, metallic, coiled strength hidden in that sound.

CRACK!

A trunk — silver-gray and gleaming — wrapped around his torso. His breath punched out of him as the force yanked him back down like a rag doll.

"Wha—!" Lin Fang twisted midair, eyes locking on his attacker.

It wasn’t one of the standard dark-gray elephants. This one gleamed even in the dim light — a smaller, silver-gray variant, with three heads and sharper tusks. Its aura was different, heavier, layered. As he tried to scan it, Alpha’s voice rang in his head, half in awe, half laughing:

"How did I miss this gem? Kiddo, you’re truly blessed by fortune. Even among Overlords, your luck might be at the top!"

Lin Fang barely processed the words when the elephant dragged him close — its central head bellowing while one of the side trunks struck the sand.

BOOM!

A golden ripple burst from the impact, spreading like a shockwave across the battlefield. For a heartbeat, the entire landscape turned to gold — blinding brilliance consuming everything. Then the light vanished, and with it, the quicksand was gone.

The ground was solid again.

The trapped elephants were free.

Lin Fang landed hard, rolling once before coming up on one knee, cursing under his breath.

"Damn it..."

The young three-headed elephant stepped forward, its silver eyes narrowing — an unmistakable intelligence glimmering within. The rest of the herd surrounded it, trumpeting in unison.

Alpha’s tone turned sharp now:

"That one... is no ordinary commander. It’s a variant Overlord-type, the progeny of something ancient. Brace yourself, Lin Fang — you just woke the king’s heir."