Snake Demon

Legend had it that in ancient times, there was a well filled with mysterious energy. People called it the Eternal Well. A group of Night Elves lived beside the Eternal Well, and under the leadership of the great Elven Queen Azshara, the Night Elves had been studying how to draw upon and use the power of the Eternal Well.

As the power of the Eternal Well was extracted and transformed into magic, displaying tremendous might, the Night Elves grew increasingly crazed in their development of the Eternal Well.

However, extremes always breed their opposites. When anything was taken too far, it would produce the opposite result. The Night Elves' fanatical exploitation of the Eternal Well ultimately caused it to explode.

Under that terrifying, horribly distorted explosive force, the Night Elves were plunged into the depths of the sea. Their appearances were completely warped by that power as well. Their upper bodies remained as they had been, but their lower bodies became ugly serpentine tails.

Thus, the Naga were born.

Uh, all right. These creatures lived in Hogg's original world, but the Naga race did not exist in this world.

There were no Naga, but there were Snake Demons.

Strictly speaking, Snake Demons were not creatures of this world either. Or, more accurately, they did not belong to the Material Plane. They came from the Bottomless Abyss.

The most famous among them were the Six-armed Naga. They were powerful demons whose combat strength was no weaker than a Balrog's, and a powerful race that had even produced a Demon Lord.

Of course, the beautiful Snake Demon before them clearly had not reached that level of strength.

She only had two slender, jade-like arms. She was not holding any weapons at the moment, but had crossed her arms over her chest, pushing those two peaks even higher and more alluring.

When she saw Landen's gaze fall on her, she even deliberately raised her arms a little. As a result, Landen clearly saw the faint blue veins bulging across those two masses of pale, ample flesh.

Pfft!

The lord spat again.

"Miss, uh... beautiful Snake Demon, we had no intention of offending you. How about we pretend this never happened and go our separate ways?" Landen carefully chose his words and asked tentatively.

"No!"

It was not one voice, but two—or, uh... three?

"I was washing myself down there when this little puppy suddenly rushed over and attacked me. Big sister can't just pretend nothing happened so easily, you know~" The beautiful Snake Demon stuck out her rosy tongue and licked her lips, throwing Landen a flirtatious look.

"We can't let her leave just like that. Although she's shameless for not wearing clothes, I still want her to be my mount!" The pretty Beast-eared Cutie stared seriously at her "mount." The sharp, knife-like claws on both her beast paws stood upright, clearly showing that she was ready for battle.

"Hmph." Hiding in the corner, Azshara merely added that thought in her heart, but her hands concealed beneath her robe had already seized an Alchemy Tool each.

"Can't we discuss this a little more?" Landen spread his hands and said with complete seriousness, but his gaze was still wandering over a certain lofty place.

"Hehehe." The beautiful Snake Demon laughed so hard that her whole body trembled, her chest shaking especially violently, as though the hair covering it might be shaken loose at any moment. "Discuss it? It's not that we can't..."

She did not finish that sentence, because the attack began halfway through her words. Moreover, it did not come from Hogg, but from the Dark Elves who had been spread out on both sides and had looked like lecherous fools just moments ago!

They had indeed been dazzled by the beautiful Snake Demon, but that state had not lasted long. Although they had been born and raised in the underground world and had never seen a real Snake Demon, that did not stop them from hearing stories about these demons from books or bards. Stories involving demons had never ended well.

That scant knowledge alone was enough for them to swiftly shift from fascination to vigilance.

Then, after Landen made a subtle hand signal, they immediately launched their strongest attacks at the creature who had dazzled them!

Several rapiers and daggers shot toward the beautiful Snake Demon from different directions in an instant. Every attack was concentrated on the human upper half of her body—not because that was what had attracted them, but because their meager knowledge of Snake Demons told them that it was their opponent's weak point!

The sharp tips of several weapons crossed the distance of several meters and reached within mere dozens of centimeters in the blink of an eye. But at that moment, a whirlwind suddenly rose around the beautiful Snake Demon's torso!

It was no ordinary whirlwind, but a blade storm composed entirely of steel blades!

The weapons did not even touch her tender, water-soft skin before the blade storm stopped them outside. Little Lari, the weakest among them, could not even keep hold of his dagger; it flew straight from his hand. Several Dark Elves were stunned and hurriedly retreated!

Looking again at the beautiful Snake Demon, the blade storm stopped instantly. Yet somehow, two curved blades had appeared in her slender, jade-like hands. They were the very weapons that had formed the blade storm moments ago!

"Bitch!" This display did not completely frighten Landen and the others away. With a furious roar, Hogg charged straight at the beautiful Snake Demon!

At the same time, Azshara raised a hand and threw out two glass bottles. The Minotaur Butler let out his trademark howl, while the enormous battle-axe in his hands—hardly smaller than a millstone—whirled into a dazzling blur!

As for Landen, he raised the rapier that Matriarch Isis had personally bestowed upon him, supposedly renowned as the "Crimson Bauhinia." He swung it through the air once, shook his head, and sheathed it again.

He had inherited the name Landen; he had inherited Landen's body; he had inherited all of Landen's memories. Yet he had not inherited his combat talent. At that moment, he possessed only a Low-tier Black Iron body, without any battle skills to match it.

The two curved blades, which looked far more decorative than practical for combat, instantly transformed into two arcs of cold light. In the next moment, the two glass bottles Azshara had thrown came to a steady stop atop the blade of one of the curved swords.

"Alchemical Potions for dealing with snakes won't work on Big Sister, little girl~" With a tremble of her jade-like hand, the glass bottles flew back toward the Minotaur Butler!

The brave Minotaur Butler ignored the two glass bottles completely, allowing them to burst against his face. The enormous axe in his hands brought with it a violent howl of splitting air, arriving before the beautiful Snake Demon at the same time as Hogg's claws, which still gleamed brilliantly from the shadows!

Clang! Clang!

With two crisp sounds, Hogg and the Minotaur Butler discovered that their attacks had stopped dead, unable to advance even another inch!

The two curved blades had effortlessly blocked the claws and the giant axe respectively!

However, this halt lasted only a few seconds. Then Hogg and the Minotaur Butler suddenly felt their hands grow light, and their attacks continued forward as if nothing had happened!

Yet neither the claws nor the giant axe managed to strike the beautiful Snake Demon's upper body. When the attacks landed, only a serpentine tail remained there!

With two scraping sounds, the two attacks left nothing more than several white marks on those scales!

At that moment, the beautiful Snake Demon's face was less than a centimeter from Landen's.

"Little one, you haven't been very well-behaved. Making Big Sister angry isn't a good idea." The edge of her curved blade gently lifted Landen's face, while an orchid-and-musk fragrance wafted softly across it. "Tell me, how should I punish you? Hmm?"