Song Chen landed on a rock at the bottom of the hollow that had not yet been completely covered by the Fungal Mat.
He looked up at the planetary core being devoured, then saw the three figures standing atop the Star Core.
They were three Seventh-Rank Peak experts of the Blood-Eclipse Civilization, fully humanoid in form, their bodies covered in dark-red organic battle armor.
The one on the left was the leanest and tallest. Four slender bone-spike tentacles extended from the ends of his limbs, digestive fluid continuously dripping from their tips.
The one in the middle was the most massive, over ten meters tall. Six thick tubular organs extended from his back, their openings flickering with dark-red energy as they absorbed the spiritual energy drawn from the Star Core by the Fungal Mat.
The one on the right was built somewhere between the other two. Dense spikes covered his entire body, and his head bore only a single enormous vertical eye, within which thick blood-colored mist churned.
Song Chen's Eye of Truth-Seeing swept over the three of them. All three were Seventh-Rank Peak, each with over ninety million Blood Qi—several times his own twenty-four million. Yet he felt no fear.
"Another one here to die." The tentacled expert on the left spoke, vibrating the air in the hollow directly through the Fungal Mat's neural network.
"Reinforcements from the Moonshadow Clan? No, your spiritual energy fluctuations aren't those of the Moonshadow Clan. Which civilization are you from?"
Song Chen ignored him. He opened the communications channel and said to Sola and Nova on the surface, "There are three Seventh-Rank Peaks in the Core Zone, each with over ninety million Blood Qi."
"I'm going to fight here. Guard the passage. No matter what you hear from below, don't come down."
Sola