https://novelcool.info/chapter/Chapter-399-Starfall-Electromagnetic-Oscillation/12551361/
Chapter 398: Shadow Master
Chapter 398: Shadow Master
In this volley of chain-linked arrows, Ji Xinghuo infused over 2,000 star points of energy, instantly shooting them into the pitch-black area shrouded in darkness as if it were night.
Electric lights flashed, piercing the darkness.
Faster than lightning, the arrows transformed into five in flight, simultaneously striking the energy beast's head. It seemed to still be in shock from its previous escape, unable to react in time.
In the instant the arrows made contact, Ji Xinghuo understood—the beast simply had no need to dodge.
The chain-linked arrows passed right through!
The energy beast's body, still shrouded in shadow, became extremely translucent, faint, and almost imperceptible, as if it were a mere illusion.
"Damn!"
Ji Xinghuo's eyes narrowed.
With his Myriad Manifestations Star Pupils, he could clearly see that this beast was real.
Black Ring Star was not a star field; it had no spatial folds. It existed in the same space as Ji Xinghuo, but its body possessed some sort of transformative ability that made it immune to physical attacks. However, as the chain-linked arrows passed through, the electromagnetic star power they contained stirred up ripples of energy on the beast.
This detail would have been difficult for a typical person to notice.
But Ji Xinghuo spotted it immediately. Immune to physical attacks, it would need to be damaged by energy. A transformation of solidity and intangibility...
This was the innate ability of the You Gu tribe—'Shadow Master'!
Even though the You Gu tribe had long been extinct, their innate ability lived on. On Black Ring Star, some powerful beasts still possessed this ability, making them a sought-after prey for many exotic hunters who ventured to this star.
And this energy beast was one of them.
Ji Xinghuo had no intention of engaging in a protracted battle. He halted his subsequent attacks and focused solely on accelerating and fleeing into the distance.
However, the beast was not about to let him go so easily. Its fluid energy body curled up into a small mass, no larger than a fist, and slipped into the shadows, swiftly navigating through the darkness with a series of shadow jumps, quickly catching up to Ji Xinghuo.
The entire pursuit was silent and stealthy.
The magnetic field within the ruins was once again disrupted, greatly reducing the sensitivity and clarity of electromagnetic induction.
If not for Ji Xinghuo's Myriad Manifestations Star Pupils, he never would have detected it.
As it weaved through the air at high speed, the energy beast appeared behind Ji Xinghuo, arms outstretched. The surrounding dark energy instantly formed a vortex, and anything caught within its pull would be controlled for at least two to three seconds.
This was its signature move.
Having learned from its previous failed attempt, the beast unleashed a larger, faster, and more calculated attack this time.
However, just before the vortex could fully form, Ji Xinghuo vanished.
He had once again avoided the attack by instantly teleporting away.
Ji Xinghuo reappeared behind the beast, just tens of meters away. As he fell, a pulse of electric arcs burst from his body, immediately sweeping over the beast and causing it to hesitate. The black laser it had been about to fire was also interrupted.
Thunder rumbled...
A series of spiritual energy lightning bolts struck down.
At the same time, Ji Xinghuo condensed a spherical lightning bolt in his palm, infusing it with over a thousand points of electromagnetic star power before launching it at the beast.
Qinghong also revealed itself, opening its mouth to release a thick bolt of Thunderhand.
The sound of thunder reverberated endlessly through the ruins.
The energy beast became translucent and ethereal once more. The spiritual energy lightning bolts struck it, causing it to violently shake, and the liquid-like black energy splashed out, ready to dissipate into waves. The spherical lightning bolt hit it squarely and exploded.
A deafening blast!
The energy beast, only partially transformed, collapsed instantly. The liquid black fire exploded in all directions, vanishing like ice and snow without a trace.
Silence fell upon the city ruins.
Ji Xinghuo scanned the area but could not find any trace of the beast. He couldn't believe that he had killed it so easily.
His spiritual source energy did not provide any clues either.
"Where did it go?"
Just as the question formed in his mind, his Myriad Manifestations Star Pupils detected something unusual.
Over three hundred meters to his left, the shadows beneath a pile of rubble stirred, and energy gathered as a shape like a blob of ink emerged.
It was the energy beast.
In the blink of an eye, it regained its form, standing over two meters tall. Its upper body vaguely resembled a human form, with indistinct features, while its lower body was submerged in an energy vortex. Its body constantly flowed, showing no signs of damage.
Apparently, the spherical lightning bolt hadn't inflicted much harm.
Hidden in the shadows, the energy beast observed Ji Xinghuo.
Ji Xinghuo had intended to pretend he hadn't noticed it and bide his time, but after a couple of glances, the beast leaped out of the shadows once more and raised its hand to attack.
This time, its body expanded wildly, unfolding like a massive waterfall that engulfed everything beneath it. Countless liquid black flames filled a hundred-meter radius and continued to spread, seemingly intent on covering an even larger area to prevent Ji Xinghuo's escape.
If it had caught him off guard, Ji Xinghuo would have indeed struggled to break free.
However, with the Myriad Manifestations Star Art, he had foreseen this move and immediately accelerated forward with a burst of speed.
In the blink of an eye.
Ji Xinghuo flew out of the black wave by a hair's breadth.
The energy beast continued to expand frantically, like a tidal wave swallowing everything in its path, but it ultimately failed to catch Ji Xinghuo, who was now moving farther and farther away.
It immediately contracted into a small mass and merged with the shadows once more, giving chase. It pursued Ji Xinghuo until he flew out of the city ruins.
Ji Xinghuo re-entered the rift he had come through and turned back, only to find no trace of the beast.
The ruins were quiet.
"Didn't chase me out?"
Ji Xinghuo was deep in thought. This beast was unusual; it was at least at the Can level and might even be at the Zhen level!
Aside from 'Shadow Master', its other abilities were also rare.
He carefully recalled the information he had come across, but none of the known beasts matched this one. It was clearly beyond his current knowledge, but one thing was certain—its presence in these ruins must be related to the You Gu tribe.
With the Myriad Manifestations Star Pupils to warn him of danger, he never feared ambushes, and his speed far surpassed that of the monster. Even if he couldn't kill it, he could easily escape.
Ji Xinghuo advanced for over ten minutes within the ruins, but the monster didn't appear.
He came to a halt, remaining hidden.
Scanning his surroundings, he saw nothing.
For the first time, he felt the inconvenience of the lack of electromagnetic induction. Normally, with that sense active, he would be aware of everything happening around him, always one step ahead, whether in exploration or combat.
Now, he felt passive and vulnerable, having to constantly stay on guard and wait for the monster to make its move.
In fact, Ji Xinghuo couldn't even tell if the monster was secretly observing him.
"First, I'll hunt the Shadow Eaters."
Ji Xinghuo glanced at his interface.
[Spiritual Source Energy: 57,624]
He only needed a little over a thousand more points of spiritual source energy to upgrade both the Rotating Magnetic Field and the Electrostatic Field.
Pretending the energy monster didn't exist, he quickly located a group of about ten Shadow Eaters and immediately attacked, though he refrained from releasing Qinghong, wanting to conserve its strength in case of an ambush by the monster.
Ji Xinghuo nimbly navigated the ruins, his plasma pistol firing beams of light that exploded the heads of the charging Shadow Eaters.
He swung his Electric Potential Battle Blade from time to time, slicing through the monsters that appeared from the shadows.
Corpses piled up.
Soon, most of the Shadow Eaters lay dead, with only two or three stubbornly continuing their suicidal assault.
Ji Xinghuo turned his gun on them.
Bang!
The closest Shadow Eater's head exploded, and as he was about to shoot the other, he suddenly felt a sense of danger. Time seemed to slow down as he automatically entered the Myriad Manifestations Star Art, his eyes glimpsing the future shadows.
The energy monster had returned.
It hid in the shadows of a collapsed skyscraper over four hundred meters above, in what remained of the foundation. Shadows flowed from it.
A black laser shot out, vertically targeting Ji Xinghuo's head.
The laser struck the ground, blasting a deep pit.
But Ji Xinghuo had already teleported away, abandoning the remaining Shadow Eaters as he fled at full speed and retaliated with a shot of his own.
A beam of high-temperature light shot upward.
The energy monster dove into the shadows, but Ji Xinghuo had locked onto it, calculating the lead and firing a beam of high-temperature light that accurately struck the monster in the shadows, penetrating it without any apparent effect, like shooting a bull made of mud.
However, the monster's outline was forced to appear as it moved between shadows, its speed greatly reduced.
Swoosh! Swoosh! Swoosh!
Ji Xinghuo fired continuously, beam after beam of high-temperature light hitting the monster. Its flowing body violently shook, and finally, a hole was pierced through it, only to close up again in an instant.
"This is useless!"
The plasma beam clearly posed no threat to the monster; it could, at best, only cause a minor disturbance.
Ji Xinghuo stopped wasting his energy and flew away.
The energy monster didn't pursue him and soon disappeared. Seeing that it wasn't chasing, Ji Xinghuo also didn't leave the city ruins. Instead, he moved to another location and continued hunting Shadow Eaters, smoothly reaping a good amount of spiritual source energy.
Within the ruins, Ji Xinghuo discovered quite a few damaged weapons and equipment.
Some were ancient, dating back two to three hundred years.
Others were relatively new, from the last few decades or even just a few years ago, judging from the traces left behind. They must have fallen victim to the energy monster.
"Anyone who enters these ruins will be attacked by it?" Ji Xinghuo speculated.
With the monster's strength, even a True Dragon Human could potentially be overturned by its ambush. If no one had ever escaped alive, did that mean these ruins remained undiscovered by the True Dragon Humans?
"Not likely..." He shook his head. While the monster was difficult to kill, escaping it wasn't hard.
In the following hunts, Ji Xinghuo was indeed attacked several times.
But each time, he managed to dodge and flee.
After these repeated ambushes and encounters, Ji Xinghuo gradually became familiar with the monster's methods and could discern some of its abilities.
Normally, the noise from hunting the Shadow Eaters would attract more of them.
But ever since the energy monster appeared, not only were the Shadow Eaters not lured in, they even hid or fled midway through the fight.
It was all the monster's doing.
So, Ji Xinghuo would fire a shot and then change locations, taking advantage of his speed in the vast city ruins to wage a guerrilla war. He would find and kill the Shadow Eaters before the energy monster could arrive.
"That's enough!"
After hunting several groups of Shadow Eaters, his spiritual source energy had surpassed 59,000 points, enough to upgrade his abilities.
Ji Xinghuo immediately left the ruins and retraced his steps.
Moments later, he flew up from the Ever-Dark Rift Valley, mounted the Antler Cloud Elk, and headed for a rift valley dozens of kilometers away. This area had been cleared of monsters by him, so it was safe.
In a cave deep within the rift valley, Ji Xinghuo sat down cross-legged.
Qinghong stood guard beside him.
Ji Xinghuo opened the interface for his Myriad Manifestations Star Pupils and looked at the Rotating Magnetic Field and Electrostatic Field abilities. Both had a progress of [Level Four 20,703/50,069]. The frequent battles in recent days had led to some progress.
"Let's begin!"
Without hesitation, he invested his spiritual source energy into the abilities.
(End of Chapter)
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