Dai Yueheng Wants the Three-Eyed Golden Lion as His Soul Ring?

No one answered.

Because everyone sensed an incomparably terrifying wave of Soul Power, brimming with violence and destruction, slowly approaching from the forest on the other side of the clearing.

"Roar!!!"

A beastly roar shook the heavens.

That roar was filled with pain, terror, and a bone-deep... despair.

Then, the Shrek group saw a Shadow Demon Wolf covered in wounds, one hind leg severed, stumble and crawl out of the forest. It crashed headfirst into the clearing, twitched twice, and stopped moving.

It was dead.

It had not been killed, but... frightened to death.

Immediately afterward, a golden figure slowly emerged from the shadows of the forest.

Its brilliant golden fur flowed with a sacred radiance beneath the sunlight. Its elegant, noble bearing resembled that of a king inspecting its domain.

Three eyes—two golden ones and a vertical pupil that had been tightly shut—slowly opened, revealing a pure golden eye that seemed capable of seeing through souls.

The Three-Eyed Golden Lion.

The Emperor Auspicious Beast.

It walked to the Shadow Demon Wolf's corpse, lowered its head and sniffed it, then raised a forepaw and gently pressed it onto the demon wolf's head.

"Splurt."

The demon wolf's head exploded like an overripe watermelon, red and white matter splattering across the ground.

The Three-Eyed Golden Lion withdrew its paw, licked the blood from its claws, then slowly raised its head and looked toward the Shrek group in the clearing.

Within those pure golden vertical pupils were reflected seven faces distorted by extreme shock and fear.

The air was deathly silent.

Only the rustle of leaves in the wind and the Three-Eyed Golden Lion's slow, heavy breathing, filled with scrutiny, could be heard.

The atmosphere instantly grew tense. Everyone could tell that this soul beast was anything but ordinary.

Dai Yueheng's hand froze in midair. The White Tiger claws gathered at his fingertips were less than three inches from the brow of that three-eyed golden soul beast.

He could sense an indescribably pure and sacred Soul Power contained within the beast's body.

Unlike the violent, chaotic Soul Power of ordinary soul beasts, it was like a bottomless golden lake—gentle and rich, yet containing unimaginable terrifying energy.

"This soul beast... something's wrong with it." Dai Yueheng frowned. A trace of confusion flashed through his golden eyes, but there was even more greed that he could not suppress.

He was the eldest son of the Duke of White Tiger, raised from childhood as an heir. He had seen and killed countless soul beasts. He had even hunted ten-thousand-year soul beasts, and even fifty-thousand-year ones.

But he had never encountered one like this—one with such an unusual, noble aura that even made him instinctively feel a trace of reverence.

"Yueheng, what are you standing around for?" Ma Xiaotao's impatient voice came from behind him.

"The Nether Leopard got away. This one can make up for it. Judging by its appearance, its cultivation is definitely not low. It might even suit you better than the Nether Leopard."

Dai Yueheng glanced back at her, then looked toward Xuan Zi, who floated at the rear of the group with a gloomy expression.

"Elder Xuan, do you recognize this soul beast?"

Xuan Zi took a swig of wine. His cloudy eyes fixed on the Three-Eyed Golden Lion, his brows tightly furrowed.

He had lived for nearly two hundred years and possessed vast knowledge, yet he had never seen the soul beast before him in any records.

Three eyes, golden fur, a sacred and noble aura... its traits were far too unique. If he had ever seen it, he could not possibly have forgotten.

"I don't." Xuan Zi shook his head, his voice low. "But its Soul Power is very unusual. It doesn't seem like an ordinary ten-thousand-year soul beast. And..."

He paused, a sharp glint flashing in his eyes. "That fifty-thousand-year Shadow Demon Wolf was frightened to death by it. To make a fifty-thousand-year soul beast too terrified to resist, frightening it to death outright... this soul beast likely has quite the background."

"Who cares what background it has!" A vicious glint flashed through Dai Yueheng's eyes. "No matter how great its background, it's still just a soul beast. Kill it, and the soul ring will be mine. Elder Xuan, I want this soul beast!"

Xuan Zi looked at the undisguised desire in Dai Yueheng's eyes, then at the Shadow Demon Wolf's corpse on the ground. In the end, he nodded.

"Fine. Since you want it, take it down. But be careful. This soul beast isn't simple."

With Xuan Zi's approval, Dai Yueheng hesitated no longer. He took a deep breath, and the phantom of a White Tiger emerged behind him once more. Every strand of golden fur stood on end as he entered a true predator's hunting stance.

Yet the Three-Eyed Golden Lion acted as if it had not seen his threat.

It did not look at Dai Yueheng. It did not look at Xuan Zi, nor did it look at the others from Shrek.

It merely stood there quietly, its three golden eyes fixed on the patch of open ground behind Dai Yueheng—the place where Dai Tu and Long Aotian had vanished.

Those pure golden vertical pupils reflected no one's image, only a stretch of pure, icy gold. A low rumble, like a bellows pumping, came from its throat. It was neither a threat nor fear, but... confusion?

It was puzzled by how those two humans had disappeared.

Why had they left behind no trace at all?

Why had even their auras been completely erased?

"Roar!"

Dai Yueheng let out a tiger's roar, interrupting its thoughts. He moved, his entire body shooting toward the Three-Eyed Golden Lion like a streak of white lightning. His tiger claws crossed and tore outward, bringing piercing winds as they went straight for the Three-Eyed Golden Lion's throat.

He had used his full strength in this attack. A full-force strike under Martial Soul Possession with the White Tiger Martial Soul was enough to tear through a ten-thousand-year soul beast's defenses, enough to heavily wound or even kill this strange golden-furred soul beast that appeared to be only ten thousand years old.

Yet the Three-Eyed Golden Lion merely lifted its eyelids slightly.

It did not even dodge.

Those pure golden vertical pupils slowly turned toward the charging Dai Yueheng. Deep within them flashed an intensely humanlike... disdain.

It was as though it were looking at a moth flying into flame, at an ant trying to shake a tree.

Then, it raised one forepaw.

The movement was slow and elegant, like a noblewoman adjusting her hair. But as that golden paw rose, the surrounding space began to distort, light began to refract, and the air gave a groan of unbearable strain.

"Not good!" Xuan Zi's expression changed drastically as he roared, "Yueheng, retreat!"

But it was already too late.

The golden paw lightly pressed against Dai Yueheng's crossed tiger claws.

There was no sound.

No collision.

It was as if it had pressed against a mass of air.

Yet Dai Yueheng's entire body was struck as though by a ten-thousand-pound hammer. He flew backward even faster than he had charged, slamming viciously into an ancient tree that required three people to encircle.

"Bang!"

The ancient tree shook violently, leaves raining down. Dai Yueheng was embedded in the trunk, his chest caved in as he spat out a mouthful of blood mixed with fragments of organs.

His eyes were wide, filled with incredulous horror and bone-deep fear.

The Three-Eyed Golden Lion stared fixedly at this group of humans.

"Beast!" Xuan Zi was thoroughly enraged. He was the mighty Taotie Douluo, an elder of Shrek Academy's Sea God Pavilion, a Rank 98 Super Douluo—yet a mere ten-thousand-year soul beast was looking at him with such eyes?!

What utter humiliation!

"Today, I'll skin you alive, rip out your tendons, and see just what the hell you are!"

Xuan Zi roared furiously, and the Soul Power around him erupted. His greasy gray robe billowed without wind, snapping loudly. His cloudy eyes instantly became clear, sharp as two unsheathed swords.

Behind him emerged the enormous phantom of a Taotie, its precise form indistinct. The phantom opened its mouth in a silent roar, and the surrounding air began to distort and collapse wildly, forming a visible Soul Power vortex thirty meters in diameter.

The full pressure of a Super Douluo was unleashed without reservation.

Ma Xiaotao, Chen Zifeng, Xi Xi, Gongyang Mo, Ling Luochen, and Yao Haoxuan were all forced back again and again by that pressure. Their faces turned pale, and they could barely breathe.

Even Dai Yueheng, embedded in the tree, felt as if a mountain were pressing against his chest, making it difficult to breathe.

The Three-Eyed Golden Lion also let out an uneasy roar!