Chapter 26: Soul Gem

The creatures launched another vicious assault, and the crazy grey lizards smashed the wooden shield furiously as their dreadful hissing sound resonated across the forest.
They were like a troop of soldiers marching forth one after the other, undeterred by death.

“spears!”

Xiao Yu observed the interval between the lizards’ attacks and judged the best time to counter them.
Then, under his command, a row of short spears pierced through the bodies of a dozen lizards.

These lizards had been gravely hurt, and almost immediately, others of their kind bit their tails from behind and pulled them back before a new batch rushed up.
The number of dead monsters increased, and more and more lizards got devoured by their comrades as time went by, but their aggression had not weakened at all: instead, it had grown even stronger.
On the humans’ side, though, everyone’s physical strength was being rapidly consumed.

A student shouted with difficulty: “I can’t hold on anymore!”

“I’m exhausted too!”

In the end, during this collision, the police officer surnamed Chen could not withstand the force of the impact.
He was weak and couldn’t endure the continuous bombardment, before his wooden shield got shattered, and a lethal tongue stabbed deep into his chest.
Xiao Chen showed a look of horror while blood flowed out from both his nose and mouth, he threw away the wooden shield and short spear and grabbed the tongue full of thorns trying to pull it out.
Still, before he had time to exert any force, the tongue contracted, shrinking and pulling him over, and multiple lizards immediately jumped upon him.

Huang Jianmin shouted angrily: “Xiao Chen, no!”

’

When Xiao Chen was hauled out, a gap appeared in their defense.
Seeing this, everyone hurriedly wanted to make amends, but it was already too late, and instead, they exposed more flaws in their panic.
Unfortunately, the gray lizards didn’t give up on this opportunity; they gathered quickly and charged toward the gap.

At this critical moment, a voice suddenly rang out, “Miss Han, quickly use your blast flame ring!”

Han Kexin didn’t hesitate when she heard that voice, and she immediately raised her hand as the explosive red light started blooming from the blast flame ring.
The air seemed to heat up in an instant, and countless tiny red light spots materialized out of thin air before a magical force began pulling them together into In Han Kexin’s palm.
In less than three seconds, the red light spots condensed together to form an orange-red fireball the size of a football, which slowly compressed and constricted until it became only the size of a fist.
Thumb-sized bumps emerged on the surface of the fireball, which emitted a significant amount of light and heat, making it look very unstable.

“go!”

With a command from her mind, the irregularly shaped crimson fireball roared and flew out, tearing up the darkness and leaving behind a red parabola of light before landing in the middle of that group of charging lizards.
Amidst the earth-shattering boom, everyone was shocked and felt their ears ring.
The blazing fire burst forth a bunch of light and heat in an instant, and that small patch of the forest illuminated like it was daytime instead.

The explosion left behind a five-meter-diameter deep pit.
Dozens of grey lizards in that area were annihilated by the blast of flames and shock waves, and dozens more were injured.
The majority of them were sent flying after suffering varying degrees of damage.

The strong wind, mixed with the hot air, rolled in while everyone’s ears were still buzzing, and they didn’t know how to react.
Except for Xiao Yu, who already expected this level of power, everybody else opened their eyes wide, and their faces were full of shock.
Even the creator of this piece of work, Han Kexin, never imagined that the destructive power of this small ring on her hand was three points higher than that of a rocket launcher; different types of emotions filled her heart.

She was shocked, as she thought tremblingly: “Xiao Yu didn’t use such a powerful ring, but gave it to me to defend myself… Does this mean he cares about me?”

After releasing all that power, the blast flame ring lost its luster and quickly dimmed down, as it became no different from an ordinary ring.
It required two days’ worth of energy to be absorbed before it could be used again.
This was the only flaw in magic items.
Although their power was incredible, the interval between each use was far too long.

’

When the after-effects of the explosions subsided, there was a brief silence before the lizard bunch erupted once again, frantically biting their injured and dead companions, and the situation became chaotic.

Seeing this, Xiao Yu raised his long blade and shouted, “It’s time to attack.
Everyone follow me!”

Several lizards charged toward him at the same time, then he leaped out like a cheetah, his blade flashed in the air, and all of those lizards shrieked in pain.
They were all chopped in half when they landed.
However, when the monsters discovered this lone human being, they got more excited and violent, and as if their vitality had been replenished, they attacked him one after the other.
Under the constant attacks, even Xiao Yu felt great pressure.

Jinshi roared and rushed out while holding a large shield in his left hand.
His other hand got enveloped by a rocky layer, and with his current football-sized giant rock fist, he began smashing these monster one after another into meat pastes.
Most of the lizards’ attention was diverted by him.
Taking advantage of this, Xiao Yu dashed in front of Xiao Chen, chopping the surrounding lizards to death with a few blade strikes.
However, even though it had only been a few seconds, it was too late; the corpse on the ground had already been torn apart, and no one could save him from death.

“Kill!”

Wang Chao went into his berserk state and rushed out with his huge battle axe, followed by Han Kexin and Jiang Xiaowen.
They simply put down their wooden shields, took up their weapons, and engaged the lizards in a ferocious battle.
Their fighting power was excellent.
In regards to one or two lizards, none of them would feel any kind of pressure, and when they cooperated, they became even stronger.
They covered each other’s backs as they started to breeze their way through the monsters.

Everyone displayed incredible bravery by risking their lives in battle.
The majority of the lizards were already satiated since they had consumed a large amount of their own kind, as a wisp of fear began to slowly develop in their hearts, especially after being subjected to that unstoppable flame technique’s assault.
Thus their momentum gradually diminished in the face of this new wave of human counterattack.

No one knew which monster took the lead first before the group of lizards turned around, retreating into the woods.
The few lizards that hadn’t eaten enough were still fighting, but their number was no longer big enough to pose a threat.
On the other hand, the humans continued to absorb wisps of essence and grew more courageous as they fought.
In the end, it didn’t take long for the remaining lizards to be completely wiped out.

’

Even though the battle was intense, it ended surprisingly well, and only the hot-tempered policeman surnamed Chen was killed.
At this point, he was almost turned into a pile of rotten meat.
His left leg was almost completely gone, his right leg was covered in wounds that revealed parts of his bones, a gash had been formed in his abdomen, and several internal organs had been torn, while an intestine had been pulled out half a meter away from his body, the flesh on half his face was gone, but his eyes were still open, looking very miserable.

He couldn’t speak anymore, and there was a lot of fear in his eyes.

Huang Jianmin sighed and said, “Xiao Chen, don’t worry; as long as I’m alive, I will never see Wang Yan being bullied by others…”

Xiao Chen’s bloody face twitched a few times, and he moved his right hand out from underneath his body with difficulty.
The blood-stained crystal necklace was thrown aside.
It was a very beautiful crystal necklace with a heart shape; in the photo inside, you could find him and a beautiful woman smiling together.
Facing the attack of the lizards, he desperately used his body to protect the necklace with everything he got.
The necklace was left undamaged, he glanced at it for one last time, and his eyes were full of tenderness, nostalgia, and reluctance… However, these last movements of his completely consumed the last bit of vitality he had left, and he slowly closed his eyes, never to open them again.

Huang Jianmin picked up the necklace from the bloodied ground, clenched his fists tightly, and said in a low voice filled with grief: “Xiao Chen was a good comrade.
He was an upright man who hated evil to the core.
He had a good relationship with all his colleagues.
What a pity.” After a pause, he looked at the crystal necklace and into the photo inside it before sighing again, “This is his fiancée Wang Yan.
The two had been together before they started working.
Their bond has always been very deep.
His colleagues were much envious of him and had been persuading them to get married a long time ago.
But because Xiao Chen’s family was quite poor, he was afraid that she would suffer some hardship if she did follow him, so he delayed their engagement until last year when his financial situation improved.
The two were about to get married, yet this kind of thing happened… Now that Xiao Chen is dead, I don’t know what to tell the poor girl.”

After listening to Huang Jianmin’s words, the others sighed internally.

As if he didn’t hear anything, Xiao Yu sat on the ground unmoved; he just closed his eyes and adjusted his breathing.

Han Kexin said to Xiao Yu: “This place is all clear, though over a hundred monsters have been killed, no equipment has dropped.”

’

Xiao Yu told her: “It’s hardly unexpected, given the limited likelihood of equipment emerging.”

Han Kexin said again: “Well, although there is no equipment, we found some things that I have never seen before.” She stretched out her hand, holding three smooth black stones in her palm, each of which was only half the size of a thumb and round in shape, “I thought these were crystals of inheritance, but later found out that I was wrong, it seems to be something called a soul gem.”

(TN: if you’re wondering how she knew, it’s most likely because when they hold into a weapon/equipment,… etc., information about said item immediately enters their brain) 

“Soul gem?” Xiao Yu picked up one stone and examined it a couple of times, showing a hint of surprise, “Sure enough, this is really a soul gem! Great, this thing is a precious treasure, and it’s very useful.”

Han Kexin asked: “It looks just like a normal stone, though.
Is it really useful?”

Xiao Yu took one soul gem and held it in his hand, and at the same time, raised the bone blade and said, “Of course it is.
Look carefully at my blade, and you’ll realize its worth.”

Han Kexin’s gaze was drawn to the bone blade.
After a few days of use, the blade had several small dents on it, and the surface, which had been drenched in various shades of blood, was also scratched and burned.
This sharp weapon became like this in just a few days, illustrating just how intense Xiao Yu’s battles were!

Xiao Yu held the soul gem, and the gem shimmered, emitting a trace of a jet-black gas.
This gas seemed to have a kind of spiritual power as it gradually covered the blade, then a magical scene happened, the dents and holes on the blade were reassembling at speed visible to the naked eye, and a cold light bloomed on the blade again, as if it had never been damaged before.

At the same time, the size of the soul gem slightly decreased as well.