Chapter 117: Choosing Ability, Terrifying Giant Beast

Boom!

Beneath the surface of the sea, raging waters churned violently as two oceanic titans engaged in combat.

A seventeen-meter-long gray giant squid wildly thrashed its barrel-thick tentacles, covered in suction cups and razor-sharp teeth. With each strike, these tentacles unleashed tremendous force, stirring the surrounding waters into a murky frenzy.

However, it remained in a defensive posture.

Over the past few days, the Sword Armored Beast had grown even larger, nearly ten meters in length, resembling a fierce dragon as it circled the mutated giant squid and launched relentless attacks at terrifying speeds.

Each swipe of its claws left dreadful wounds on the squid’s tentacles, occasionally tearing off a segment.

Within a moment, the surrounding waters turned darker under the squid’s blood, driving it frenzied as its two longest tentacles swept like pythons.

Boom! Boom!

The water exploded from the force of the tentacles’ swings, but they failed to catch the attacker. Instead, one of them was torn apart by a swipe of the Sword Beast’s claws.

Unlike the shorter supporting tentacles, these two primary tentacles were the squid’s main weapons for hunting and combat. As they were torn apart by the armored beast, it emitted piercing screams like that of a baby.

Puff!

At that moment, a dense black energy surged from beneath the squid, enveloping the surrounding area within dozens of meters in an impenetrable darkness.

Within the cloud, the Sword Beast sensed no waves, saw no light, and even felt no sensation of the water as it moved its limbs.

It was like entering a realm of dead silence.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

The Sword Beast finally sensed vibrations in the darkness, only to find itself ensnared by massive tentacles, binding it into a bundle and dragging it towards the mutated squid’s gaping maw.

Spewing ink had originally been a survival skill for a squid to escape after blinding its predator. After numerous mutations, this skill had now evolved into a special ability that temporarily deprived prey and predators alike of all senses, even affecting their consciousness.

The squid, meanwhile, could move freely within the dark energy, allowing it to swiftly capture prey with its powerful tentacles and suffocate them before slowly devouring them.

Today, however...

With a roar resembling that of a tiger, the beast’s muscles swelled, and it unleashed a terrifying burst of strength as it started to struggle.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Under the beast’s hundredfold strength, the squid’s tentacles were ripped off one by one, and its claws reached out, tearing the squid apart.

Puff!

The squid’s seven-meter-long body was nearly torn in two halves by the Sword Beast, gushing out a large amount of blue blood that turned the surrounding water a deep cobalt in an instant.

At the same time, a black bone spike shot out, piercing through the squid’s three squirming hearts to completely kill it.

Suddenly, the darkness vanished to reveal the Sword Beast holding both halves of the squid’s body. Its figure was menacing, exuding a terrifying and ferocious aura.

With the battle over, it was time to feast.

The Sword Beast grabbed the squid’s corpse and tore into it, chewing on the tentacles as if they were snacks, while its icy eyes showed signs of contemplation.

These mutated beasts, surpassing level 4, all possessed energy-based abilities; just like the Sword Beast’s innate abilities, these attacks became more powerful as their strength grew.

Now that the beast had had enough physical enhancements to cover strength, defense, and agility, the fourth evolution should be an energy-based ability. Otherwise, it would be much harder to fight against level 6 or 7 mutated beasts, not to mention those colossal beasts that were as devastating as natural disasters.

The problem now lay in choosing which ability.

The only energy-based abilities it could think of at the moment were the power of the electric eel and the Crystal Horn Fish’s blue icy light.

While it had encountered other mutated beasts with abilities, such as the sawfish and mutated beasts that could control deep-sea whirlpools and create bubble bombs, these abilities were all average.

There was also the fact that absorbing the genes of other creatures had a requirement—the target creature had to be consumed completely during evolution. This restriction made it a bit challenging; it couldn't choose creatures too large in size, or it wouldn't be able to consume them entirely in a short enough time.

Hence why the electric eel seemed like the best choice. Firstly, it could be purchased, and secondly, the power of lightning was also formidable underwater.

However, Chen Chu also had some reservations; he was primarily concerned that the electric eel would be too weak in terms of physical attributes.

The rhinoceros beetle could move objects hundreds of times its own weight, the ironclad beetle could withstand a force of thirty thousand times its own weight with its defense, and the tiger beetle had speed so fast that even another tiger beetle couldn't react in time.

On the other hand, the reason why insects could be so abnormally strong was entirely due to their small size and special structure. If one was converted to the size of a human, it would probably just get crushed to death under its own weight.

During evolution, however, the avatar possessed the ability to fuse, optimize, and selectively choose genetic characteristics. Ultimately, the only thing that mattered was the strength of the special ability.

Compared to insects with abilities that surpassed their own limits, the electric eel's ability seemed rather ordinary. If the beast absorbed the eel’s electricity generation, but it wasn’t strong enough to condense into a proper ability, the fourth evolution would be wasted.

Perhaps it could find a mutated electric eel or devour other low-level mutated beasts with special abilities as well?

Despite its size, the squid had little flesh, making it a quick meal. Just as the Sword Beast finished the last of it off, however, it suddenly felt a terrifying aura emanating from a distance.

This aura’s strength was so great that even though it was far away, the Sword Beast instinctively felt the urge to flee.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

The seawater ahead churned violently, and countless marine creatures surged in from a distance, flooding past the beast.

All kinds of fish, even mutated whales measuring twenty or thirty meters long, were fleeing, as if they were being chased by a terrifying creature.

Such an overwhelming aura made the Sword Beast's expression pensive.

However...

Bang! Bang! Bang!

The beast shot rapidly towards the sea surface in a shadowy blur. Any ordinary fish that got in its way were smashed into a bloody mess.

In the blink of an eye, the beast had risen a hundred meters and broke through the sea surface.

The sky was completely covered in rolling dark clouds that flashed with lightning and thunder, and gusts of wind stirred up waves hundreds of meters high. Many marine creatures that had not escaped in time fell with the towering waves, thundering down to their deaths and leaving only their bodies floating on the surface of the water.

It was almost as if the world was ending.

Boom!

A massive lightning bolt descended from the sky like a winding thunderous dragon, crashing into the sea and splashing water everywhere.

With its dazzling light, the Sword Beast could vaguely see a terrifying giant beast rampaging in the sea in the distance.

Even from dozens of kilometers away, that beast’s enormous body was clearly visible, like a fortress in the sea. Even just the slightest of movements would stir up towering waves.

The Deep Sea Restricted Area!!

Subconsciously, the term popped into the Sword Beast's mind.

After temporarily sparing that group of Crystal Horn Fish, the beast had been hunting and wandering in one particular direction. Normally, it frequented waters with a depth of one to two hundred meters, but it had also discovered that the deeper the sea, the more abundant the transcendent energy, and the more powerful the mutated creatures that inhabited it.

The Sword Beast didn’t know why that was the case, and it was something that it had been intending to investigate once it had gotten stronger. It just didn't expect that it would already reach a Deep Sea Restricted Area and become witness to a terrifying giant beast's activities.

Despite the overwhelming aura surging from afar, the Sword Beast was able to suppress its instinctive urge to blindly flee. It gave the giant beast a long look, then turned to leave.

It would have to stick within a range of two to three hundred kilometers from the coast for now; any further away was simply too dangerous.

The Sword Beast blended in with the fleeing marine creatures. As the distance from the giant beast's activity range grew farther and farther away, that terrifying aura gradually weakened, until finally...

Boom!

In an instant, the ocean started hustling once again, as countless predators launched attacks on the surrounding prey.

That included the Sword Beast, targeting a fifteen-meter-long mutated swordfish covered in spikes. Its claws descended with a thunderous crash like collapsing heavenly pillars.

Bang!

In an instant, the water roiled, and a huge vacuum shockwave exploded. Under the Sword Beast’s claws, the swordfish’s skull was smashed open.

As the beast’s size grew larger and larger, its ability to erupt with hundredfold strength became more terrifying. Coupled with its ability for explosive speed, a mutated beast one level higher than it would be instantly killed if it wasn’t paying attention. Its combat power was truly, horrifyingly formidable.

***

Evening had arrived. On the balcony outside the ward, Chen Chu’s aura became heavier as warm currents appeared in his body and strengthened his physique, increasing the density of his flesh to a frightening degree.

Suddenly, a majestic spiritual force surged, covering Chen Chu’s entire body, and the heavy aura disappeared instantly.

Withdrawing his attention from the beast, Chen Chu's gaze fell on the scripture in his hand, and he rubbed his brow with a sigh. "These scriptures really aren't meant for the ordinary."

Although most of his attention had been on the Sword Beast, Chen Chu had flipped through the Pure Heart Scripture several times over half an afternoon.

Although he recognized each of the words, however, the phrases only left him confused.

Thankfully, it wasn’t for nothing. After sitting in meditation and reading for an afternoon, Chen Chu found that his mind had indeed become slightly calmer, as if the scripture really did have some effect.

Knock knock!

A knocking sound came from inside the room, followed by a middle-aged female doctor in a white coat entering the ward with a nurse.

Seeing this, Chen Chu couldn't help but walk over. Luo Fei had also woken up by now.

"Ms. Luo Fei, I've reviewed today's examination report. Most of your vital signs have returned to normal, though your cardiopulmonary function is still a bit weak. You'll need to stay in the hospital for observation for another two days. If there are no complications by then, you can be discharged."

Luo Fei nodded slightly. "Okay, thank you, Doctor El."

She shook her head slightly. "We should be the ones thanking you. If it hadn’t been for the Federation's intervention, Kyria would have become a hell on earth under the demon cults."

The doctor gave a few more reminders and politely left.

Seeing this, a smile appeared on Chen Chu's face.