Half an hour later.
"Rustle rustle rustle..." On the other side of the stream, a sudden unnatural rustling came from behind a cluster of bushes.
"Hmm?" Yang Yunhai, who had been partially focused on listening to his surroundings, was instantly alerted and opened his eyes in a flash.
Looking up, he saw a flying snake. It was more than two meters long, pale red all over, with thin membranes on either side of its belly stretched out like wings, and a crimson fleshy lump on its head.
It was flying at a height of less than three meters, but its speed wasn't slow. In the blink of an eye, it had already swept across the riverbed and flown towards him.
"A flying Phoenix-Crested Snake. No wonder it managed to avoid the ground-level sensing of Blue Silver Grass and got here," Yang Yunhai's eyes gleamed. He immediately summoned his martial soul and muttered to himself,
"Perfect timing. I'll use you to test my martial soul's current devouring ability and energy storage effect."
With that, he flicked his right hand. A vine shot out swiftly, aiming directly at the incoming Phoenix-Crested Snake.
This snake's cultivation was less than 400 years, and its speed was nowhere near fast enough to evade his eyes. Plus, at over two meters long, it was quite an easy target.
With a thwack, the vine hit its waist dead on.
Buzz buzz... An electric sound followed. The snake froze mid-air, twisted in pain, and fell to the ground.
"Gotcha!" Yang Yunhai raised an eyebrow and immediately increased the force of the vine's grip, wrapping the snake tightly like a giant meat dumpling.
He then controlled the barbed end of the vine to pierce into the fleshy lump on the snake's head and activated the devouring ability to begin absorption.
"Whoa! It's even sucking in body fluids? My barbs really work like a syringe!" he exclaimed in surprise.
Then he frowned. "This won't do."
"This ability is way too overpowering. It'll easily be mistaken for an evil soul skill. I'll need to spend some time practicing to control it properly."
With that thought, he quickly closed his eyes and carefully sensed the fluid and energy being absorbed from the snake's head, trying to differentiate and control it better.
To do so, he deliberately slowed down the devouring speed.
About fifteen minutes later, he felt the Phoenix-Crested Snake was extremely weak. A thought struck him.
"If the barbs are the needles, doesn't that make the vine a drip tube? If I can extract, can I also..." He suddenly recalled the hospital scenes from his past life.
Driven by curiosity, he channeled his soul power and pushed everything he had absorbed back into the crimson lump on the snake's head.
Immediately, he felt the snake's vitality begin to recover, and before long, it was struggling vigorously again.
"It actually works?!" Yang Yunhai was shocked by the force coming through the vine.
"Aww, struggling so hard. Must be terrified. Don't worry, I was just as scared during my first injection!"
With that, he activated the devouring ability again.
To master the ability as soon as possible, he helplessly decided to keep using this poor snake for a while longer.
Over an hour later.
"Thanks for your help, brother. Safe travels!" he said, watching the Phoenix-Crested Snake fly into the dense forest without looking back.
"The root storage effect is about one-tenth of my own soul power. Not bad. As for devouring, blood, body fluids, soul power,it really can absorb them all! If it could suck in spiritual energy too, that'd be insane." Yang Yunhai shook his head as he walked back to the campfire and sat down.
For now, his martial soul could only absorb physical energy. It clearly couldn't handle spiritual or soul-based energies.
With that, he glanced at the girl. Still unconscious.
He closed his eyes again and resumed meditation.
Fifteen minutes later, another clueless hundred-year soul beast wandered in and became the next test subject for Yang Yunhai's "injection" experiments.
Then came the third, the fourth...
Yang Yunhai grew increasingly proficient with the devouring ability.
By the next morning, as the sun slowly rose in the east, a large white rabbit carcass lay quietly beside him. It was the seventh soul beast he encountered the previous night,perfect for breakfast, so he kept it.
As for the devouring ability, he had basically figured it out.
"Still not awake?" He glanced at the girl again, sighed, stood up, and picked up the rabbit. He walked toward the stream, preparing to skin, clean, and cook it into rabbit skewers.
The stream bank was shallow and easy to muddy, so he rolled up his pants and stepped into the water to work.
While washing, he suddenly looked up.
"Rustle rustle rustle..." The sound, though faint under the noise of flowing water, reached his ears. No doubt, soul beasts were approaching,and they were close.
"Which clueless soul beast is it this time?" Yang Yunhai frowned, then his expression tightened. "It's not just one. It's a whole pack." In just a short moment, the sounds were coming from all directions.
Clearly, they were pack beasts,and he was surrounded.
Standing in the stream, he couldn't use his Blue Silver Grass to gather information about the surroundings. But it hadn't been long since he started washing the rabbit. For the soul beasts to arrive this quickly, their speed must be impressive.
He jumped ashore, placed the rabbit meat on prepared leaves, and summoned his martial soul, ready for battle.
Surrounded and at such close range, using his sensing abilities to identify the species was no longer necessary.
This was a hundred-year soul beast zone. What was there to fear?
A moment later, with a whoosh, a gray wolf over two meters long leapt out of the nearby bushes not far from the girl.
Then came the second, the third...
Within seconds, Yang Yunhai scanned the area,seven wolves in total. All with gray fur, glowing green eyes, and exposed fangs, looking vicious.
"Awooo..." As the largest wolf howled, the other six moved in to surround him.
"Hmm?" In the gentle sunlight, Yang Yunhai clearly saw the head wolf glance back at the unconscious girl.
It drooled hungrily, clearly craving her.
The next moment, it turned its head back, expression fierce again. It stomped its front paw, the fur on its head bristled, and two green wind blades formed and shot out.
Yang Yunhai reacted instantly. Eight vines sprouted from his back like living things. Two of them lashed out like whips.
At the same time, he muttered, "Damn it, could these wolves be the legendary Gale Demon Wolves?"
The notorious perverts of the soul beast world,he remembered them well from his past life reading. But in this world, he hadn't seen them before. Still, gray fur, wind blades, and checking out a girl,pretty suspicious.
"Did they smell her blood from when she cleaned her wounds earlier? Or were they just passing by?"
Wolves had an extraordinary sense of smell. A few hundred meters was nothing; they could pick up scents from kilometers away. So it wasn't impossible that they tracked her from afar and launched a group hunt.
As he thought, thud thud! his vines met the incoming wolves, piercing their throats and stirring violently. The wind blades hit the vines but didn't even scratch the surface.
"Awoo..." Painful cries echoed through the forest. Seeing things go wrong, the head wolf immediately turned to flee.
Just then,
"Mm..." came a soft groan.
"Trying to escape? Not so fast!" A cold glint flashed in Yang Yunhai's eyes. He had no intention of letting a Gale Demon Wolf go. Two vines shot out again, wrapping around the head wolf's legs.
With less than 500 years of cultivation and not being a top agility-type soul beast, it wasn't fast enough to get away.
"Awooo!" It howled in agony as its legs were torn, a heart-wrenching cry.
Thud! A sharp stomping sound followed.
Yang Yunhai instinctively turned his head,and saw the girl standing in a battle-ready pose, slightly crouched, ten fingers curled like claws.
Apparently startled awake by the howls, she had reflexively rolled to her feet.
Flexible body, great form. Incredible potential for the future! he noted inwardly.
"Gale Demon Wolves?!" she gasped as she saw the soul beasts clearly in the morning light, her face instantly pale. She looked down at herself instinctively, then quickly calmed.
Then she scanned the battlefield littered with wolf corpses and immediately understood what had happened.
It was clear: the man before her had saved her, dressed her, guarded her all night, and fought off multiple waves of soul beasts.
Especially these Gale Demon Wolves.
She knew them well. If she had encountered them while weak, she would have rather ended her life early than fall into their hands.
"Thank you for saving my life," she said solemnly, looking up at Yang Yunhai's fair and handsome face.
If you want to read 40 advanced chapters and 3 new chapters daily, please subscribe to my : patreon.com/Moorowkeel