Chapter 0538: Beauties and the Beast

Weng!

The colossal, green scaled-dragons flew out like a pair of scaled boomerangs, slicing the buildings in their wake clean in two.

At the meeting point of their trajectories was the Four-limbed Demon-eye Serpent.

Although it had sensed the danger, it was helpless before the nemesis to its red, corruptive power.

Jiang Qing'e's World of Light was the perfect counter that leached away at its energy, eating away a huge part of its foul, red energy even as it tried to marshal its defenses.

The Four-limbed Demon-eye Serpent's single red eye widened in fear as its energy seemed to slip out of its hands like running water.

The green scaled-dragons were coming.

The light from its red eye split into two different portions, each facing one dragon.

The red energy shot out as a weak defense, aimed at mitigating the green scaled-dragon attack.

At the final moment, the Other even managed to twist away so the attack failed to behead it as planned.

It merely sliced across the right side of the Other's body.

Swish!

With a sickening sound, the lower right half of the Four-limbed Demon-eye Serpent was sliced off cleanly. Two limbs landed on the floor with a squishy flop, leaking black blood into the ground.

Its demonic face twisted in pain.

The Four-limbed Demon-eye Serpent's snake tail began to thrash wildly, shaking the buildings around it. Its eye had gone mad with pain, anger, and fear, and the black liquid on its body suddenly began to burn with a new evil energy.

Its body began to bloat, swelling up with new power.

The students could sense its aura climbing and climbing.

"Watch out, Qing'e!" the First Princess cried. "It's fighting with everything it has now!"

At the same time, she prepared another two scaled-dragons, sending them scything out towards their enemy.

This time, it was not as effective. One of the serpent's limbs began to twist and warp, creating a new layer of hardened flesh-armor that was much tougher than before.

Shing!

When the green light connected, it left a gash deep enough to see bone beneath, but it was not strong enough to cut through completely.

Evidently, the evil energy that it had just burned had made it much stronger.

It turned its singular berserk eye on them. With a quick twist of its body and a flash of red light, it was in front of the First Princess in a trice.

She was ready, lifting her jade scepter and calling forth powerful storms and a green shield to harry her opponent.

Pssh!

The two clashed in a titanic struggle of energies, their attacks rising to the skies.

The First Princess was sent flying back a few hundred meters, her green feather shield shattered. Some of the evil, red energy spilled over to her body, but it was stopped by her green battle armor, which corroded slightly.

"How vile!"

The First Princess was surprised by how strong the serpent's final struggle was.

Still, she understood that the Four-limbed Demon-eye Serpent could not keep this up forever. All they had to do was hold out and sustain. Once the energy was burnt away, their foe would crumble of its own accord.

"Qing'e..."

Just as she was about to convey this strategy to Jiang Qing'e, the younger girl stepped up, pressing both hands together in a seal. Pure light resonant energy rose up and turned into five nails of light that burned with fire.

Middle grade dragon-general resonance art, Demonbane Nails.

When this resonance art was perfectly mastered, one could produce seven nails that would severely handicap the victim's resonant power when they all landed.

This and World of Light were Jiang Qing'e's best dragon-general resonance arts.

One defensive, one offensive. A perfect duo.

Swoosh! Swoosh!

Five nails embedded themselves deep in the tail of the Four-limbed Demon-eye Serpent.

Their bright flames caused the serpent to thrash reflexively, but its tail was pinned firmly to the ground, causing its upper body to overbalance. It flailed and went down in a writhing heap.

"Qing'e, you..."

The First Princess was stunned speechless. Jiang Qing'e really fought with a battle style like no other.

She was only a Fiend Finisher Tier cultivator, but she showed no fear even against a Lesser Heavenly Disaster-class Other. In fact, she was fighting even more aggressively than the First Princess herself.

Of course, this was enabled by the fact that the Four-limbed Demon-eye Serpent was mostly focusing on the stronger girl, but Jiang Qing'e was truly punishing it for this target prioritization.

Of course, light resonances were especially effective against Others, especially a super rare ninth-grade one.

The First Princess understood that Jiang Qing'e wanted to end things quickly, worried that they were taking too long and the snake creatures would be free soon... and when that happened, their dear little boy spectator perched on his tower would be in danger.

"What a guardian," she thought to herself, then she blasted out with her seven heavenly pearls again. This time, she reinforced the green scaled-dragon attack with an additional edge of razor-sharp scales to make it even stronger than before.

She sent it arcing out with a flick of her hand, and this time, the buildings that she had cut through had their upper floors completely destroyed.

Total destruction.

The Four-limbed Demon-eye Serpent writhed desperately, but the green power sliced through its neck clean and true this time. Its head landed on the ground, body still spasming.

Splat.

The head fell with a limp thud, oozing out black blood.

Its body began to steam, then it split apart, revealing a horde of little, black snakes that wriggled away.

"Qing'e! All of them! They can't be allowed to escape, or it can reform!" the First Princess yelled urgently.

Jiang Qing'e nodded, then she used World of Light again. This time it was executed at its normal scope and power, and again all the corruption within its influence was wiped out.

Soon, the ground was fresh and clean again, with not a single snake to be seen.

And with that, the terror that had taken over Riverguard City was finally overthrown.

The First Princess heaved a sigh of relief, then a slow smile of triumph spread over his face.

At this time, the spectator, Li Luo, approached cautiously, giving his two squadmates a big thumbs up. "Tough fight, epic fight. If I could draw, I'd make a Beauties and the Beast drawing as commemoration, or something."

The First Princess sat down on a broken stone column. "Cheeky fellow."

Jiang Qing'e smiled at him. "Any changes to the points?"

Li Luo pulled out the spirit mirror and grinned when he saw the results.

"Thanks to you two... we're temporarily in first place."