Chapter 809: A Primordial Demon

The toxic poison within the demons' pustules significantly bolstered their own regenerative abilities and countered Zhou Ying's.

"If dealing with enemies of this caliber is difficult, it simply means that I'm not using enough of my strength. I just need to be even stronger!" Glowing green light shot out from Zhou Ying's body. Her hair glimmered with green threads. "[Avatar of the Fae: Worldbound Enclosure]!"

Thousands of wood dragons emerged from the ground, covering up the entire battlefield. Zhou Ying's dragons had increased in quality and quantity. The thick dragons were almost thrice as large as before, with black bark that shone with the luster of gold.

The demons continued swinging their maces, but to little effect. The gigantic dragons wrapped around the demons.

This time, the demons' poison was no longer effective. Rather than turn the demons to wood, the dragons crushed the demons directly. Blood splattered everywhere. The demons' blood was still poisonous, and the dragons avoided absorbing or coming into contact with them as much as they could.

Zhou Ying's lifeforce had been strengthened once and again from the disaster-grade lifeforms she had absorbed in the second realm, and her strength was incomparable to what it was before.

She believed that victory was all but guaranteed after summoning her ebony dragons, only to have a ferocious demon suddenly emerge from the demons' ranks. He was over four meters tall, his skin a nauseating purplish-black color, with large pustules all over his skin. He leaped out from among the demons and headed straight for Zhou Ying, still standing atop the city walls. In just two leaps, he had advanced by hundreds of meters.

The ebony dragons it jumped off of were immediately stricken with purplish-black sludge which gave off a noxious smell and emitted a purple vapor as it corroded the ebony dragons' barkskin.

Deliberately or otherwise, this demon had lain hidden among the demon troops, and no one had taken note of him. The demon ranks were unruly; even if they knew about tactics and strategy, they didn't apply them, or only did so haphazardly. In the chaos, it was easy for such a demon to go unnoticed.

Several ebony dragons reached out for the demon, trying to halt his progress. However, despite the demon's size, it was unusually agile, and it deftly avoided the dragons trying to chase it down. It continued leaping toward Zhou Ying.

The demon's lips curled up in a sneer. He was certain that such a petite, frail woman would be piteous in close combat; all she could do was summon some silly plant-based dragons.

The demon raised his spiked mace high into the air as the human and draconian guards stood protectively in front of Zhou Ying.

However, Zhou Ying seemed to be as calm as ever. As though she could understand the derision in the demon's eyes, she murmured, "Just what makes you think I'd be weak at close combat?"

With a wave of her arm, a ray of light pierced the demon's throat, scoring a line through the demon's neck. Purplish-black blood shot out from the demon's neck wound as his head slowly slid off his neck and fell down the wall, his eyes bulging all the while.

The demon's headless body fell with it, smashing into the ground. To his last breath, he couldn't believe how strong the petite human woman had been.

Even the human and draconian guards were shocked by Zhou Ying's strength. Their backs turned cold with sweat. They believed her to be physically weak, that her combat style was much like a summoner's: she would stay back and have her dragons harry enemies from afar.

However, they were completely mistaken.

They had all seen the gigantic demon, which even the hundreds of guards working together might not have been able to take down by themselves. One strike from the demon's mace would easily kill dozens of them—and yet Zhou Ying had taken the demon down with a simple wave of her hand.

Naturally, after the gigantic demon fell, the other demons didn't do much better.

They quickly realized that they were no match for Zhou Ying and ran off as soon as half their number was decimated. Before they could escape, however, the ebony dragons opened their maws wide and expelled a storm of leaves.

The leaves had such sharp edges that they might as well have been serrated daggers. The leafstorm struck the demons and slowed them down tremendously. It couldn't do much damage to the resilient demons, but preventing them from escaping was good enough.

Zhou Ying knew that it would be impossible to restrain all the demons with just her thousands of ebony dragons. Instead, as she knelt down and placed her palms on the ground, ring after ring of green light spread out from her. The guards on the wall felt a curiously refreshing sensation, as though they had just been immersed in a hot spring.

Their cells feasted on the vitality as the guards gaped at their bodies.

Zhou Ying shouted, "I've boosted everyone's strength! Go kill all the demons. Don't leave even a single one behind. Don't worry—as long as I'm around, no one will be injured!"

The human and draconian guards charged forward in a frenzy, leaping down from the walls and rushing toward the demons.

Beneath the wall, a series of great vines rapidly grew out of the earth and formed a throne. Zhou Ying stepped delicately onto the throne and followed behind the guards. As she moved, ebony dragons grew out of the earth right in front of the demon wormhole, preventing them from escaping.

Meanwhile, the guards, along with huge numbers of ebony dragons, slaughtered the demons that were trying to escape. The demons struck at the guards, but the guards were healed almost immediately by the light that Zhou Ying gave off.

The outcome of the battle was obvious. Bolstered by Zhou Ying's vitality, the guards were easily able to deal with all the demons on the battlefield.

Zhou Ying reined in her energy and began to replenish her supply of vitality.

One of the draconian guards walked over to her. "The draconian sage had me come over with information about the demons' homeworld. The sage mentioned that, if the members of Team Zenith were to kill the invading aliens, they would keep on going and pursue the invaders into their homeworlds. These worlds can be quite dangerous, and there are still a lot of unknowns within them. As such, the sage had me bring over a report containing whatever information we draconians know."

Zhou Ying asked, "Does the sage know that our captain has made this task into a trial?"

The draconian guard nodded. "Yes, but given the danger of the situation, he believes the champion of mankind won't mind."

Zhou Ying nodded thoughtfully. "Indeed, this information will help."

She certainly didn't plan to look a gift horse in the mouth.

The draconian began, "The demon homeworld is composed of a huge swampy forest, filled with poisonous herbs and grasses. Even the air is fetid and poisonous. The demons are a crazed race; all they care about is slaughter and women. They kill the men they defeat and rape the women."

As Zhou Ying thought back to the demons' horrifying appearance, their bodies covered with pustules, she shuddered.

The draconian guard spread his arms. "Apparently, they even quite like corpses. Not only can they rape them with abandon, they can even consume the corpses once they're done with them..."

Zhou Ying's eyes sparked with horror. "These bastards—I won't let them reproduce and spread their evil any longer! It's well past time someone took care of them!"