Crushing Victory

They say normal people live by the rule: "If you don't offend me, I won't offend you." Having already detoured 100 kilometers, only for humans to send a Soul Tool to track him, it was clear they truly believed that just because they were Soul Masters, they could treat Soul Beasts like prey. This wasn't the Legend of the Dragon King timeline where Soul Beasts would be utterly suppressed without technology; nowadays, if you want to kill a Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beast without being cautious, even a Title Douluo will die.

Furthermore, sensing that the strongest member of the human squad coming toward him was only at level 92—even accounting for the fact that he had concealed his aura—they were clearly looking down on him far too much.

Therefore, Rus Wang turned around to meet them head-on.

The squad composed of the strongest Soul Masters from the Sun Moon Empire's Research Station, sent out to hunt, naturally noticed Rus Wang's approach, but they didn't find it strange. Such behavior from a Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beast was perfectly normal in the eyes of human hunting parties. Whenever a Soul Beast was weaker than humans, it would often fear and hide, but when they were stronger or evenly matched, they would often take the initiative to attack humans. There was no other reason; humans and Soul Beasts were mortal enemies.

The opposition was clearly provoked by the Soul Tool they had released earlier.

The Title Douluo was delighted, immediately signaling the others to release their Fixed Soul Guidance Cannons while still in flight, launching a round of ultra-long-range strikes at Rus Wang from a great distance. These were high-quality goods that Shrek Academy had secretly provided to the Star Luo Empire. Although they were cautious about level 9 and level 10 Fixed Soul Guidance Cannons due to the Sun Moon Empire, Shrek had almost brazenly provided level 8 ones.

"Fixed Soul Guidance Cannon! Fire!"

It was laughable, really. The most advanced weapons in the Star Luo Empire's army for the first two hundred years were imitations of the Soul Tools made public by the Sun Moon Empire. Now, two hundred years later, they were using imitation Soul Tools that Shrek Academy had stolen from the Sun Moon Empire.

The Fixed Soul Guidance shells were launched from the barrels of the cannons, covering the area where Rus Wang was moving with a barrage of fire from over ten kilometers away. Even from that distance, one could feel their terrifying power.

Seeing the effect of the strike, the hunting party's confidence grew. The Title Douluo didn't even let the Spirit Douluo members follow behind him, choosing to go ahead and investigate personally as the entire squad swarmed toward the Soul Beast in the air.

"Is this a level 8 Fixed Soul Guidance weapon? The power doesn't seem like much."

Rus Wang's Soul Guidance shield had activated. Although he wasn't very talented at carving core arrays for Soul Tools, over the course of two hundred years, by focusing solely on the single category of Soul Guidance shields, he had learned how to craft level 9 ones.

"Perhaps I can use the dust raised by these shells as cover, wait for the humans to get close, and wipe them all out at once."

Thinking this, Rus Wang stopped in his tracks, sensing the humans rapidly closing in to a distance where he could kill them in one strike.

However, humans were not stupid. Seeing that the Soul Beast was still in the dust, the Title Douluo activated his beast spirit, using his Soul Power to disperse the smoke, revealing an unscathed Rus Wang to the naked eyes of the humans.

"Unharmed?"

The Title Douluo was shocked, immediately signaling the Spirit Douluos in the squad to keep their distance and use their Soul Tools and soul skills to exhaust the stamina of this Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beast, while he took the opportunity to land a killing blow.

Seeing the humans disperse the dust, Rus Wang didn't stay put; he flapped his wings and lunged toward the humans high in the sky.

The humans scattered upon seeing this, unleashing soul skills and Fixed Soul Guidance shells at Rus Wang's massive body. But an unexpected situation occurred: as their soul skills and shells struck Rus Wang's body, the continuous reactions of his Soul Guidance shield appeared vividly before their eyes.

"A Soul Guidance shield!"

The Title Douluo's eyes widened. How could a Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beast possibly be equipped with a Soul Guidance shield, unless...

A massive pressure descended upon every member of the soul-hunting squad. Those who had been floating in the air were like wild geese shot down by a hunter, plummeting straight to the ground. The humans in the squad with only Spirit Douluo cultivation didn't even last a few breaths during the fall; under this sudden pressure, blood flowed from their noses and mouths, their eyes rolled back, and they died instantly. As for the Title Douluo himself, after hitting the ground and struggling for only a moment, he was impaled by Rus Wang's claws, which pierced through all his Soul Tools and Soul Guidance mecha, shredding all the organs inside his stomach into a bloody pulp.

"Six hundred thousand years, how despicable..."

Rus Wang had no interest in conversing with this Title Douluo. With another swipe of his claw, he crushed the man's head into a puddle of red paste and took flight from the ground once more. His direction, however, was toward the human Research Station, now devoid of high-end combat power.

He could sense many complex Soul Beast auras there, but what the drone had observed earlier only showed humans and human structures, which meant those Soul Beasts had been captured and locked up.

Rus Wang had come to this old continent where his wife Thalassa once lived with the intention of exploring the world beyond the Folded Ear Continent, as well as the heavy responsibility of bringing back more Soul Beasts to enrich the biodiversity of the Nanshan Rainforest.

Since he had already slaughtered a batch of humans, he had to cut the weeds and pull up the roots, ensuring every human in the Research Station died. That way, he would avoid the risk of humans escaping back and reporting him—a mysterious six-hundred-thousand-year Soul Beast—to even more powerful humans, who would then come to bother him in waves.

This wasn't because Rus Wang was heartless. Although he had indeed been a human in his past life, he was Rus Wang now—the King of the Soul Beasts and Elves on the Folded Ear Continent. Even with the soul, emotions, and hobbies of his past human life, the first thing he always remembered was his current identity. (Here, Rus Wang would like to fiercely diss the Silver Dragon King.)

"What a mess."

The station commander closed the door, took off his heavy cold-weather coat, and slumped into his chair. After confirming no one was around, he began to curse.

"Damn it, the pay isn't much, and as a captain, I still have to be ordered around by people from the Spirit Pagoda. Is this the Empire's army, or the Spirit Pagoda's private militia?"

The officer thought about the storage Soul Tool he had just secretly traded to the Spirit Pagoda people, which contained over a dozen century-old Soul Beasts.

Now, on this cold, snowy plain far from home, all sorts of trades were taking place. The Title Douluo turned a blind eye to it all; things like food trades between soldiers or money-for-sex trades between officers and female research team members were perfectly normal.

As a commoner who had risen to the rank of captain through cultivation level, he was neither here nor there. Although he had some officer benefits, he was still just a company commander. He was two ranks higher than soldiers and non-commissioned officers, but in the Research Station, he was still firmly in the middle-to-lower tier. There was no guarantee that if he wanted to be promoted to major in the future, the military brass wouldn't pull some strings, force his retirement, and then arrange for someone else to take the major rank. Once retired, if the people in charge of pensions saw he was a commoner officer with no power or backing, they would inevitably embezzle the money and hire gangsters to beat him half to death.

Therefore, knowing the nature of the military, he had his own ways—such as maintaining secret trades with the Spirit Pagoda, getting his hands on Soul Beasts that weren't for sale and passing them to Spirit Pagoda members. That way, if the military really did pull that stunt, he could use that favor to become a regular employee at the Spirit Pagoda and earn a stable salary.

It was just a pity that his beautiful vision would likely never come to pass.

Accompanied by Rus Wang activating [Skill: Giant Pincer Overwhelming Strike], the entire Research Station—designed solely for cold resistance and never considering an attack from a Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beast—along with every human inside, met their end.