Absorbing essence and blood

Long Chen's arm strength was extremely formidable. He took a stone and hurled it at the Shadow Leopard's massive head, the projectile whistling through the air.

The Shadow Leopard, which had been lying quietly between the boulders enjoying a sunbath, didn't react at all and was struck squarely.

"Bang!"

The immense force sent the Shadow Leopard tumbling, causing a large lump to rise on its head. The Shadow Leopard immediately let out a heaven-shaking roar, leaped onto a boulder, and scanned its surroundings.

"Good grief, what a hard skull."

Long Chen was secretly alarmed. A Middle Stage Rank 3 Demonic Beast was truly terrifying; his all-out attack hadn't even injured it.

Looking down from its vantage point, the Shadow Leopard spotted Long Chen immediately. Since he was the only living thing within dozens of miles, the culprit was obvious.

"Roar!"

The Shadow Leopard let out a furious roar, pushed off the boulder, and its seven-zhang-long body lunged toward Long Chen at high speed.

Its speed was so fast that phantom images appeared in the air; this was the terrifying speed of a Shadow Leopard.

"Damn, I miscalculated the distance."

Seeing the Shadow Leopard's running speed, Long Chen cursed inwardly. At this speed, his estimated distance was likely unreliable.

The moment the Shadow Leopard lunged, Long Chen bolted. He gave it his all, pushing his Gale Steps to the limit as he sprinted toward where he had set his trap.

However, the Shadow Leopard was simply too fast. When Long Chen was still two or three miles away from the trap, the Shadow Leopard was already closing in on his side.

"Damn it, when it comes to speed, two legs are always at a disadvantage compared to four."

Long Chen cursed under his breath, flicked his wrist, and a blue pill flame flew out, heading straight for the Shadow Leopard.

"Bang!"

The blue flame exploded with a loud bang, startling the Shadow Leopard. It instinctively slowed down, giving Long Chen a moment to catch his breath and continue sprinting forward.

The Shadow Leopard roared in anger and accelerated again, its speed even faster than before.

Long Chen knew that most fur-covered Demonic Beasts feared fire. He had been afraid that releasing the blue flame would alert the Shadow Leopard.

Therefore, his pill fire was primarily focused on explosions—loud but low-powered—serving only as a deterrent.

Seeing the trap in sight ahead, Long Chen was overjoyed. He rushed toward it while pushing his Soul energy to the maximum to locate those daggers.

At the same time, a larger fireball appeared in his hand. Once he stepped into the trap's range, he flicked his wrist and threw the massive fireball.

"Boom!"

With a loud explosion, the terrifying blue flame instantly covered an area of over a dozen zhang, rolling with heat waves.

The Shadow Leopard instinctively slowed down. At that moment, Long Chen activated his Soul energy, and six daggers were simultaneously released from the bowstrings.

"Swish, swish, swish…"

The six arrows shot out like lightning, heading straight for the Shadow Leopard. The beast's size was so massive that they all hit their mark.

Under normal circumstances, ordinary bows and crossbows could not break through the defense of a Rank 3 Demonic Beast, but the defenses of Rank 3 Demonic Beasts varied in strength.

Its weakness was its abdomen, where the defense was much weaker than elsewhere. Long Chen had adjusted the angle perfectly to hit its abdomen.

However, even in the weak spot, the six arrows only slightly pierced the fur, penetrating less than an inch into the flesh.

Ordinarily, such an injury would be nothing to a Rank 3 Demonic Beast, but for Long Chen, it was already enough.

After the arrows pierced the Shadow Leopard's body, Long Chen immediately noticed the area turning black at a speed visible to the naked eye—a sign that the potent poison was spreading.

"Awooo!"

The Shadow Leopard immediately felt unbearable pain in its abdomen and let out an angry roar as it lunged at Long Chen.

Long Chen let out a loud shout, and his Divine Ring appeared. At the same time, he summoned the Fengfu Battle Body, manifested a fire blade in his hand, and slashed toward the Shadow Leopard.

"Boom!"

The massive fire blade struck the Shadow Leopard. The terrifying force sent surrounding rocks flying and ignited the withered grass within a hundred zhang radius.

When the fire blade struck the Shadow Leopard, Long Chen was sent flying back by a violent force, retreating ten zhang before steadying himself.

A huge burn mark appeared on the Shadow Leopard's body, but it had not suffered any serious injury.

"So strong."

Long Chen couldn't help but be shocked. Fur-covered Demonic Beasts were naturally countered by fire, yet his Fire Lizard Blue Flame couldn't inflict substantial damage on it.

However, this didn't mean the Fire Lizard Blue Flame wasn't powerful; it was just that Long Chen's cultivation was too low. Pill fire grew stronger based on the quality of Spiritual Qi.

The quantity of Long Chen's Spiritual Qi was not less than that of an average Yijin Realm expert—in fact, it even exceeded it—but because he hadn't entered the Yijin Realm, the quality was far too inferior.

It was like comparing cotton thread to steel bars; no matter how much thread you had, it was difficult to match the strength of steel.

Therefore, Long Chen was at a disadvantage due to his Realm. If he had also stepped into the Yijin Realm, he would definitely be able to heavily injure the Shadow Leopard with the blue flame.

"Hum."

The Shadow Leopard suddenly opened its mouth wide, and a black sphere slowly appeared, while a terrifying force locked onto Long Chen.

"It's a Legacy skill."

Long Chen was startled. He thought of Little Snow and knew that Legacy skills were combat techniques passed down within a Demonic Beast's Bloodline, which were extremely terrifying.

When the black sphere appeared, it was only the size of a watermelon, but in an instant, it ballooned to a diameter of one zhang.

The terrifying pressure made it feel as if space itself was about to be crushed. Suddenly, space rippled, and the black sphere flew straight toward Long Chen.

"Heaven Splitting!"

Long Chen dared not hold anything back anymore. With an all-out strike, the fire blade in his hand surged in size and slashed down at the sphere.

"Boom!"

With a loud explosion, the fire blade in Long Chen's hand shattered. He felt as if he had been struck by a mountain, spat out a mouthful of blood, and was sent flying backward into the air.

"Bang!"

Crashing into a boulder, Long Chen spat out another mouthful of blood, feeling as if all the bones in his body were about to fall apart.

Long Chen couldn't help but be terrified. This Shadow Leopard was truly too terrifying; who could resist such combat power? No wonder this place was known as the Graveyard of the Exiled.

At this moment, he finally understood why, for so many years, so many peerless Prodigies had not been able to return alive.

It seemed he had underestimated this Land of Exile. A Middle Stage Rank 3 Demonic Beast was already this terrifying; how powerful would a Late Stage one be? Not to mention there were even Rank 4 Demonic Beasts!

"Awooo!"

As the dust settled, the Shadow Leopard let out an angry roar. At this moment, the fur on its body was charred, and there was a long gash on its body, deep enough to see the bone.

Clearly, Long Chen's strike had inflicted fatal damage on it. If Long Chen could execute Heaven Splitting a few more times, he would be able to kill it.

Unfortunately, let alone a few times, Long Chen couldn't even manage one more strike. The consumption of the Fengfu Battle Body under the support of the Divine Ring was too terrifying; in that state, unleashing one strike was already the limit.

Seeing the Shadow Leopard's fire-breathing eyes, Long Chen didn't even think about it and bolted. He had to take advantage of the fact that he still had some strength left; if he didn't run now, he wouldn't be able to escape.

Seeing Long Chen run, the Shadow Leopard roared and gave chase, but its speed had dropped significantly.

Previously, it could have quickly caught up to Long Chen, but now it was maintaining the same speed as him. Seeing this, Long Chen couldn't help but be overjoyed.

He knew that on one hand, the Shadow Leopard was injured, which affected its speed; on the other hand, it meant that after being injured, the spread of the poison had accelerated.

This was a very good sign. Long Chen sprinted ahead, with the Shadow Leopard desperately chasing behind, but its speed was becoming slower and slower.

Long Chen didn't dare to be careless. Seeing it slow down, he also slowed down, maintaining a distance of about a mile, constantly letting it think that if it just tried a little harder, it could catch him.

Just like that, Long Chen led the Shadow Leopard in circles around the rock piles. He dared not run out of the territory of the Silver Centipede and the Shadow Leopard; if he drew in other Demonic Beasts, he would surely die.

After chasing in this manner for nearly half an hour, the Shadow Leopard finally couldn't hold on any longer. Its steps began to stagger, but it still pursued Long Chen.

Long Chen was also exhausted to death; he felt he was almost out of strength, too. That strike just now had almost shattered his bones.

Now, after such an ordeal, he really felt like he was falling apart. His whole body ached severely, but he could only grit his teeth and endure it.

"Thump."

The Shadow Leopard finally couldn't hold on and collapsed to the ground. Seeing the Shadow Leopard fall, Long Chen also sat down on the ground, took a Qi-Recovery Pill, and let himself quickly recover his strength.

At the same time, he kept an eye on the surroundings. This was a place of great danger; he could lose his life here at any moment, so he had to be careful.

If he hadn't set up traps and had the help of the poisonous arrows, wanting to kill this Shadow Leopard would have been wishful thinking.

Long Chen felt increasingly grateful to that Elder. If not for him, he might have needed to spend more time designing how to kill a Rank 2 Demonic Beast.

His intervention had saved Long Chen a lot of precious time, which was tantamount to helping Long Chen cheat in disguise.

An hour later, Long Chen discovered that the Shadow Leopard had no breath left. Since it was already dead, he would just let it stay dead for a while longer.

Long Chen stubbornly waited for three hours. After his physical strength had recovered by seventy or eighty percent, he cautiously approached the Shadow Leopard.

He used the blue flame to probe a few nerve points and found there was no reaction. After confirming that the Shadow Leopard was truly dead, he walked in front of it.

In front of the mountain-like Shadow Leopard, Long Chen deeply felt his own insignificance. He jumped onto the Shadow Leopard's head and first removed its Crystal Core.

Immediately after, he took out a huge wooden barrel and began to drain its Essence Blood. The Shadow Leopard was enormous, so it had a lot of blood.

When all the blood had been drained, the Essence Blood was enough to fill three large bath barrels.

However, this blood was tinged with black, which was the effect of the potent poison. Long Chen took out a palm-sized Crystal Core and threw it into the barrel.

In less than half an hour, the blood in the barrel started to turn bright red. After fishing out the Crystal Core, the originally crystal-clear core now had a trace of black spots.

"Hehe, using the Silver Centipede's Crystal Core to absorb its own poison really works well."

It turned out that the Silver Centipede's poison was very precious; after hunting prey, it would also recover the poison injected into the prey's body.

The tool for recovery was its Crystal Core. By drawing the poison from the prey into the Crystal Core and then converting it into poison, it could be recycled.

After purifying the Essence Blood and removing the Impurities, Long Chen poured medicinal powder into the Essence Blood. Not long after, a large barrel of Ten Thousand Beast Essence Blood was born.

"It is time to reap the rewards."

Long Chen slowly reached his hand into the barrel, and the massive amount of Essence Blood flowed crazily into his body.