Chapter 104: Tycoon’s Generosity, A Shocking Return

Roar!!

With a ferocious roar, the colossal wolf, three meters tall and entirely covered in sharp spikes, tore through the surrounding trees with each swing of its massive claws.

However, in the face of Li Meng, who wielded a heavy hammer that shattered the air with each strike, this mutated beast was powerless to retaliate.

The heavy hammer danced wildly, each strike gathering more and more powerful winds as Li Meng accumulated a formidable momentum.

Boom!

Under a continuous barrage of twelve heavy strikes, the agile and thick-skinned thorn wolf was directly crushed, its chest collapsing and its head shattered.

Phew!

Exhaling deeply, Li Meng put away the heavy hammer and looked at the mutated beast he had just slain with satisfaction. "Not bad, this is how a mutated beast should be. That so-called Rampage Ape was simply a freak."

At that moment, Xia Youhui, who had been observing the battle from afar, called out. "Old Li, stop showing off there. It's just a level 2 beast. Hurry up and get carrying."

Instantly, Li Meng's expression froze.

He glanced at the massive body of the thorn wolf and then at the two level 2 Iron Arm Black Ape corpses he had previously been carrying, feeling a bit overwhelmed.

This thorn wolf weighed at least several tons, and the Black Ape corpses were both six meters tall. He could carry them all with a burst of his true power, but he felt like that would just exhaust him to death.

He couldn't bear to leave any of them behind, though; these were all valuable contribution points.

Chen Chu spoke up. "We could cut down some trees to make a huge raft and drag the corpses along on that."

Li Meng's eyes lit up immediately. Indeed, dragging them would be much easier than carrying them. He exclaimed with excitement, "Old Xia, come and help me make it."

As the two started to build the wooden raft, Chen Chu frowned slightly. "Li Hao, I don’t think us carrying all of these beasts back is going to work."

They had traveled one or two hundred kilometers in a day when they had first come here, but that had been without carrying multiple several-ton corpses each. In the half a day since they had started walking back, they had only covered a little over thirty kilometers.

On top of that, they were still planning to kill the king cobra and the giant mutated crocodile as well. By then, with ten huge mutated beast corpses, it would be impossible for the four of them to bring them all back in one trip.

"That is indeed a problem," Li Hao nodded thoughtfully. "Alright, here's the plan. I'll make a call and rent a heavy transport helicopter from the nearby garrison to lift these corpses back."

This method made Chen Chu hesitate. "...That's one solution, but it will cost quite a bit, won't it?"

"No problem, it will just be around a hundred thousand at most," Li Hao said indifferently.

...To these tycoons, a hundred thousand yuan was more like ten.

After some consideration, Chen Chu said, "In that case, tell them to come later. We can go kill the other two mutated beasts and bring them back in the meantime. I'll hunt down the king cobra, and you go kill the giant crocodile."

After informing Xia Youhui and Li Meng of the plan, the two burst back along the same path they had come from. Within two breaths, however, Chen Chu had already left Li Hao far behind.

This was why he had chosen to go after the furthest option, the king cobra. When he activated his true power, he could reach over a hundred meters per second. Even without it, however, as he was doing now, he could still reach up to seventy meters per second. The Dragon Elephant True Power enhanced muscle strength, and that included the leg muscles.

However, the mountain road was rugged, with many bushes and other obstacles in the way. It took Chen Chu over half an hour to cross fifty kilometers and arrive at the territory of the king cobra.

Hiss!

Just as Chen Chu appeared, the black giant cobra raised its head from the big tree it was lurking in, revealing an icy gleam in its eyes.

It recognized this bipedal creature that had provoked it and then fled, and it was eager for a chance to enact some vengeance. Its massive body slid down from the tree like a black shadow, shooting out with a gust of wind.

Wherever the cobra passed, grass and trees gave way on both sides, forming a winding snake path that spread to Chen Chu in the blink of an eye.

This time, however, Chen Chu didn't run away; instead, he drew his saber off of his back. In an instant, a fierce and sharp aura erupted from his body, causing an explosion in the air.

Boom!

A fierce wind howled, causing the grass and trees to sway wildly, and a pitch-black blade light that spanned over a dozen meters shot out towards the cobra.

Spurt!

Within a radius of a few meters, the grass and trees were cut off at waist level, soaring into the sky alongside the towering snake head. Its icy eyes were filled with confusion.

What's going on? Why is the sky spinning?

Spurt!

Hot blood sprayed from the wound, and the over ten-meter-long snake body thrashed wildly, shattering the surrounding trees and sending rocks flying.

Chen Chu sheathed his saber once more, waiting for the body to stop struggling. Once it finally went still, he walked over with an indifferent air, picking up both head and body to carry back.

The value of a level 3 mutated cobra was very high; its fangs, venom, flesh, skin, and even bones were greatly prized. They could also be used to refine blood essence, albeit at the cost of wasting the flesh, bones, and skin, which was why mutated beast essence was so expensive.

It took an hour for Chen Chu to bring the huge corpse back, and he noticed that Li Hao hadn’t returned yet. Watching Chen Chu carry the ten-meter-long cobra, Xia Youhui smiled and said, "I knew Ah Chu wouldn't take long."

"...Impressive," Li Meng managed to utter after a long silence.

Judging from the smoothness of the wound on the snake's head, it was obvious that he had won in a single strike.

This was a level 3 mutated beast, though; an ordinary Third Heavenly Realm cultivator would need to be lucky to face one of these alone and win. They not only had massive bodies and formidable strength, but they also possessed certain innate abilities that were stronger than those of cultivators at the same level.

Li Meng knew that that would have been a tricky encounter for him. Its speed was too fast, and its venom powerful; one wrong move could result in his death. As long as he was careful, he would have been able to confront the cobra, but if it would decide to flee at any point, there was no way he would have been able to stop or catch up to it.

After a while, Li Hao finally came rushing back, carrying the corpse of the nine-meter giant crocodile in one arm and his iron pillar in the other.

They dragged the bodies to a flat mountaintop where the surrounding trees had been cut off. When the heavy transport helicopter arrived, it slowly descended, the swirling wind stirred up flying sand and rocks below. Similarly to the airplanes, it was equipped with a cannon underneath, and missiles were suspended on both sides to guard against potential aerial mutated beast attacks.

Chen Chu and the others grabbed the hanging steel ropes and secured them to the four corners of the huge raft upon which the mutated beast corpses had been piled. After confirming that everything was secure, they gestured the go ahead to the pilot above.

Creak!

With the helicopter rising, the steel cables pulled the raft up, emitting sounds of heavy strain.

Fortunately, when making the raft, they had been wise enough to use trees with a diameter of over half a meter that could be hugged by one person. The thickest ones were even a full meter in diameter; a weight of thirty to forty tons wouldn’t be a problem.

Watching the helicopter flying further and further away, Chen Chu calmly said, "It’s time for us to go back, too."

"Yeah, we've been out here for two days. Let's go."

With that, the four figures burst out and disappeared into the depths of the mountains in the blink of an eye.

Without the burden of the corpses and with the familiarity of the route, the four of them quickly returned. By six in the afternoon, they had already run out from the entrance of the mountain range.

Looking at Li Hao and the others, covered in dust, their battle armor torn and bloodstained, but still imposing in figure, several mercenaries came over with awe on their faces.

The burly leader hesitated and asked, "Boss, are you... alright?"

The hesitance in his tone was understandable. When they had entered the mountains, the four of them had been full of spirit, and their battle armor had been shiny and clean.

But now, when they returned, they didn't look too good. Li Meng's chest armor was cracked and deformed; three out of the four horns on Li Hao's battle armor were broken, and the arms of his armor were completely gone. Xia Youhui's heavy shield was pitted and deformed, with all the spikes broken. Chen Chu had the least amount of damage, but his cloak was still tattered.

Coupled with the fact that the four of them had returned empty-handed, it made the mercenaries worry about their final payment.

Li Hao said in a deep voice, "We're fine. I've already arranged for the final payment to be transferred to your accounts. It should arrive soon. Let's get out of here."

"As long as you're fine, that's all that matters," the big man said with a smile on his face.

As they spoke, the four of them threw their weapons in the backs of their trucks and started the engines to head back to Leisteru. By the time the four of them returned to the base, it was almost ten o'clock at night. The lights outside the hotel were still on, however... mainly because of the piles of mutated beast corpses stacked on the street in front of it.

Even though the eight-meter-tall Golden-Backed Rampage Ape was already dead, the invisible fierce aura emanating from its body made many of the still awake students' hearts skip a beat. Then there was that huge snake head, standing on the ground at a height of one meter, its pupils extremely chilling.

Four modified pickup trucks drove up with a roar of their engines, and four individuals climbed out, exuding a fierce aura. Their presence alone made many Second Heavenly Realm students feel breathless.

Looking over the dirty and messy battle armor Chen Chu and his companions were wearing, Liu Feng, Bai Mu, Yuan Chenghuang, and others who were close to them came over, expressing their envy.

𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶

"You guys hit the jackpot this time, slaughtering so many mutated beasts."

Yuan Chenghuang wore an expression of great loss. "Damn, just a day after you guys left, I broke through to the Third Heavenly Realm. What a huge loss this time."

"Hehe... actually, it's better that you guys didn't go." Xia Youhui couldn't help but feel proud. "You guys don't know how terrifying that Golden-Backed Rampage Ape was. Li Meng nearly got slapped to death by it."

Li Meng retorted, "What do you mean 'nearly slapped to death?’ I just had my vitality scattered, that was why I couldn't get up for a while. And someone, I don't know who, got punched by that ape twice and couldn't even stand up after. If it hadn’t been for the rest of us intervening... hmph."

"So many corpses."

"Chen Chu, Chen bro, you guys are amazing."

"You’re too kind. This hunt was mainly led by Li Hao."

"As expected from the second ranked..."

"Hey, guys, this time I was really awesome. Look at my heavy shield; even being smashed by that mutated king beast couldn't break its defense."

While Li Meng and Xia Youhui boasted to their classmates about the intensity of the battle and how powerful they had been, Chen Chu and Li Hao smiled and walked out of the crowd, coming to Liu Feixu's side.

"Ms Liu."

Liu Feixu nodded in appreciation. "Not bad. Not only did you dare to hunt a level 3 mutated beast with a king-level bloodline, but you actually succeeded and came back alive."

She had initially assumed that the four of them would just be going after ordinary level 3 beasts; had she known that their intended target was one with a king-level bloodline, she wouldn’t have approved the trip.

Under normal circumstances, such a thing was basically suicide. Even just a hint of a king-level bloodline made the mutated beast that bore it incredibly powerful; cultivators of the same Heavenly Realm were usually no match for them, to say nothing of four students in the beginning Third Heavenly Realm.

But, what was done was done. They had successfully killed the mutated beast and had all come back alive, and that was what mattered.

"It's just luck," Chen Chu modestly replied.

Liu Feixu asked, "What are you planning with these corpses?"

Li Hao replied, "We’ll be giving most of them over to the authorities, except for the Golden-Backed Rampage Ape."

This was something the four of them had already discussed on the way back. Chen Chu's priority was the Life Crystals, and Li Hao's goal was the Rampage Ape’s refined essence. Xia Youhui and Li Meng, meanwhile, simply needed contribution points. By exchanging the rest of the corpses for points and then dividing the spoils from that, everyone would get what they wanted.