Wolf-Lizard. Half an hour later, the small squad finally reached the first planned bait coordinate.
Before them lay a forest polluted and corroded by the earlier rain of giant beast blood.
The trees covering the mountains and plains had long since twisted into an eerie dark purple. Even their bark had begun sprouting dense, cold keratinous scales. Deep within the dim woods, several packs of native ferocious beasts were tearing into poisonous mutated plants with loud crunches, as if munching on cabbages.
From the deepest shadows came faint bursts of heavy breathing, like a bellows.
[Shadow] silently condensed from the shadow beneath a bush.
"Captain, there's a tough one lurking inside. Judging by its pressure and aura alone, it's at least at the peak of Tier Two. It might even be Tier Three, or already have one foot in Tier Four."
[Redemption] rubbed his forehead. Tier Two to Tier Four? That scouting was so bad he might as well do it himself!
As for why the estimate spanned such a huge range... naturally, it was because players could not sense monsters that were too powerful.
But [Lin Ziye]'s eyes lit up, and he grinned.
"Good enough. This is exactly the level we need."
He made a gesture, swiftly dug a hole on the spot, and firmly buried the first simply sealed Shadow Core beneath a thick tree root soaked in tainted blood.
Then, a faint cyan flash of psionic energy flickered at his fingertips. Using the invisible airflow of [Wind Track], he precisely cut an extremely thin slit into the outer shell of the Shadow Core.
Threads of dense shadow aura slowly drifted out through the slit.
Almost at that exact moment, the thunderous, massive breathing from deep within the forest abruptly stopped.
Happy Fat Otaku's entire body tensed, and