Chapter 899: Fire Ant vs. Nether Spring
Elder Nether Spring's eyes suddenly turned extremely deep and seemed to be piercing through the Fire Ant King, the underground temple, and beyond. "You will know the reason very soon."
Along with his words, the aura around him suddenly expanded, filling up every corner of the magnificent and spacious underground temple and turning the building into a narrow matchbox!
Even Li Yao was intimidated by the aura despite merely observing through Neltharion. The hair on his back all stood up, and his spine was emitting cracking noises. His fighting will expanded and flowed inside his veins like fire!
The few elites of the Blade of Chaos naturally did not have such keen senses. But they also felt that an overwhelming, limitless horror was leaking down through the rocks that were almost a hundred meters thick, placing them in an impenetrable coffin and making them have nowhere to run to!
The few members of the Blade of Chaos all shook violently in fear.
In the underground temple, the Fire Ant King's aura burst out like a surging tide, too. With his roars, the front ends of the two antennae on his forehead suddenly blossomed like flower buds.
From the soil below his feet, eight enormous fire pillars suddenly rose up!
The fire pillars surrounded the Fire Ant King like eight snakes and danced crazily before they entangled and condensed each other above his head!
Some of the fire snakes crawled to the body of the Fire Ant King and knitted a glamorous armor of flames, but more fire snakes formed a majestic giant of flames, which opened its bloody mouth toward Elder Nether Spring!
"Hoooo!"
The roars of the fire giants blasted out intense airwaves, as if a cannon ball had just been detonated.
Even the Nether World Watch, strengthened by the demon cores and brought by Elder Nether Spring, could not do anything but retreat in front of the dominating aura!
The smile of Elder Nether Spring remained unchanged. He said calmly, "So, you've been stalling in order to summon the biochemical beasts in secret."
"Exactly!" The Fire Ant King grinned hideously. "Big brother, they are the 'Thousand Ghostly Fire Ants' that I refined at the cost of endless Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures and strengthening drugs after ten years. I'm afraid that the Ghost Face Silver Mosquitoes and the Colorful Flying Locusts will be burnt into ashes should they come any closer!"
Li Yao observed carefully and finally discovered that the armor condensed on the Fire Ant King and the fire giant behind him were actually not made of flames but formed by countless crimson ants!
Li Yao risked spreading out his telepathic thoughts and improving the scanning ability of Neltharion to the highest.
He found that the crimson ants were all the side of thumbs with sharp antennae and cold shells. They looked dozens of time more ferocious than the 'Purple Ring Sword Rings' that he was most familiar with.
On their shells and their wings, swirl-like natural spiritual stripes were growing, which, according to the pattern and structure, could significantly enhance the force of the flames.
Even one of the Thousand Ghostly Fire Ants should have been more than enough to burn the internal organs of a person into ashes when it crawled into their stomach.
But the Fire Ant King had refined thousands of Thousand Ghostly Fire Ants that were under the control of his telepathic thoughts. It was truly horrifying!
Li Yao was secretly alarmed. He had a better understanding about the mysteriousness of the biochemical beasts right now.
If he were faced with the Fire Ant King, he would not be at much of an advantage even if he made the best use of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit, and he was not confident that he could secure the final victory at all!
BOOM!
While Li Yao was thinking quickly, the fierce battle between two demon emperors inside the underground temple had already broken out!
With the biochemical armor made of the Thousand Ghostly Fire Ants on his body, the Fire Ant King's aura was levels higher than before. He took the initiative to attack Elder Nether Spring!
Since the fire giant behind him was made of the Thousand Ghostly Fire Ants, it was not restricted to a fixed form. The two arms whipped out and immediately turned into almost hundred tentacles, darting at Elder Nether Spring and more than ten soldiers of the Nether World Watch near him!
The front ends of every tentacle were blossoming like a flower, revealing a hideous bloody mouth that looked that the most vicious carnivorous flower!
But Elder Nether Spring simply put his hands behind him while he faced almost ten fiery carnivorous flowers casually. He did not even bother to defend himself.
CRACK!
The fiery carnivorous flowers lunged on Elder Nether Spring and bit him hard.
The Thousand Ghostly Fire Ants flooded into his body like magma and burnt him through from inside to outside!
Li Yao was dumbfounded. You can't be serious. The giant of the Blood Demon Sector has been defeated so easily?
But there was no ecstasy from slaying an enemy quickly on the Fire Ant King's face at all—he looked incredibly gloomy.
BAM!
A moment later, Elder Nether Spring who was consumed by the flames suddenly exploded into tiny sparks like roaming fireflies.
Well—
Li Yao gasped hard. The body of Elder Nether Spring was actually made of thousands of ants?
Right at this moment, dull humming sounds echoed inside the holes on the ceiling of the temple. A large cluster of green mist dropped down like the thick tar and condensed into errorless balls.
The green balls were all made of ants that looked like green jade.
A moment later, the green ants wriggled and rippled out into the shapes of green figures.
The green ants were all translucent and looked both like jade and like glass. Rays of lights flowed like water, and they soon all turned into the image of Elder Nether Spring!
Biochemical beasts that can simulate the shape of other creatures!
Li Yao was truly shocked.
The Elder Nether Spring in the beginning had been made of biochemical beasts, but he did not sense anything wrong at all!
Although there was latency and distortion when he was perceiving the opponent via Neltharion, Li Yao was not confident that he could have distinguished the real identity of the 'Elder Nether Spring' if he had been standing right before him a moment ago!
Ten clusters of green ants phantomized into ten Elder Nether Springs and stood in front of the Fire Ant King with exactly the same sunny smile.
They narrowed their eyes, as if they had just enjoyed the most delicious meal, and said casually at the same time, "With the 'Gold Flame Poison Ants', 'Demolishing Devil Ants', 'Purple Ring Sword Ants', and another dozen types of brutal ants as the foundation, and feeding them with the Phoenix King Grass, the Red Cloud Crystals, the Soul Separating Ghosts... and other materials, you've successfully made your Thousand Ghostly Fire Ants trigger a high temperature of more than two thousand degrees instantly. Huh. They can also detonate themselves?
"Very impressive biochemical beasts!"
Hiu!
Before he concluded his sentence, the ten 'Elder Nether Springs' launched attacks toward the Fire Ant King at the same time!
In a moment, more than ten green air currents and streams of flames appeared and crashed into each other brutally.
Most of the 'Elder Nether Springs' were broken and shattered by the Thousand Ghostly Fire Ants. However, they were all clones made of the green ants. With the incessant supply of the green ants from the ceiling, it was impossible to annihilate all of them!
In the eyes of most bystanders, the fierce battle was perhaps merely the flashing lights of green and red. But Li Yao felt cold sweat covering all over his forehead while he was observing!
Elder Nether Spring was of the same origin as the Fire Ant King. They were both super experts in manipulating the ant-type biochemical beasts, but their combat styles were vastly different.
The Fire Ant King's armor and weapons that were made of countless Thousand Ghostly Fire Ants were already dazzling enough for Li Yao.
But the endless clones that Elder Nether Spring created based on the phantom green ants were all connected to himself in a weird way. When a clone suffered an attack, he could even calculate the enormous data regarding the source of the attack and even gasp the essence of the weapon.
Strong. That's too strong!
Judging from the speed, strength, and reaction of every clone of Elder Nether Spring, Li Yao estimated that all of them boasted a combat ability above the middle level of the demon king state!
But ten Elder Springs combined were far stronger than ten middle-level demon kings!
It was because one's mind was hard to predict. Even deeply connected twins could not guess every step that their sibling was going to make in the next second—neat as their cooperation might be, there would certainly be tiny loopholes.
However, all the clones there were manipulated by Elder Nether Spring, and they were essentially his ten fingers. Their teamwork was flawless and marvelous!
What was more critical was that Li Yao could not tell whether or not the real Elder Nether Spring was hiding among them!
It was exactly what the Fire Ant King was wary of.
With the immense capability of a demon emperor, he would not have been blocked by the clones. But he seemed to be bound by invisible chains. There were several times when he could have broken out of the siege or implement a destructive strike on one of the clones, but he simply retreated at the most crucial moment every time.
Others might have thought that he was too timid, but Li Yao knew that he was making the most sensible choice.
Elder Nether Spring's tactics were very similar to Xiao Xuance's strategy in the end when he chose to hide himself among the Grand Illusionary Soldiers.
How come those super experts are all more cunning than me?
Li Yao felt a splitting headache coming on because he discovered that he would not have too many options if he were in the Fire Ant King's place faced with such an unreasonable tactic.
The total number of the Fire Ant King's Thousand Ghostly Fire Ants was finite after all. After multiple bombardments, the armor and the giant of flames were all getting much more lackluster than before.
But Elder Nether Spring's clones were utterly unhurried, showing no intention to speed up the pace of attack.
In the meantime, the Nether World Watch behind him was lunging at the members of the Blade of Chaos like wolves and tigers!
What should I do?
Li Yao, who was observing the battle in the lower floor, thought quickly and calculated the speed and strength of all the soldiers of the Blade of Chaos and the Nether World Watch in order to compare their overall combat ability!
Almost a hundred different changes of the situation popped up inside his brain at the same time. They were the most likely outcomes when he joined the battle at different timings.
The Nether World Watch is quite strong. After the enhancement of the demon cores, more than ten of them have a combat ability equal to that of a demon king. The members of the Blade of Chaos are no match for them at all!
But they do not seem to be slaying the members of the Blade of Chaos—instead, knocking down and capturing them?
Elder Nether Spring hasn't revealed his real capability yet. There's no telling whether or not he can summon more clones or perform an even more irresistible deadly skill.
Right now, I have three options!
Firstly, run away immediately without bothering anything!
Secondly, join the battle and fight against Elder Nether Spring with the Fire Ant King!
Thirdly, flee deep underground and lurk in the darkness while waiting for a better opportunity!