Skinning Art Mastered

At dawn on Goat Horn Mountain, a giant wolf two meters long, with a horn growing from its head, let out a low growl filled with anger and fear. For the past few nights, ferocious wolves had disappeared every night. No matter what it did, it could not stop it. It was as if a giant maw had opened in the darkness, waiting for the ferocious wolves to deliver themselves into it.

"Howl, howl, howl..."

Its gaze sweeping over the nearby beastkin, Ferocious Horned Wolf found itself with nowhere to vent the fire in its heart. Compared to it, these fellows were simply too stupid. Left with no choice, it headed toward the mountaintop.

At that moment, atop Goat Horn Mountain, a giant wolf three meters long lay sprawled across a large bluestone. Its body was covered in sky-blue fur, a single horn rose from its head, its mouth was full of sharp fangs, and its emerald-green eyes gleamed like two gemstones. It breathed rhythmically, and the spiritual energy around it moved with each breath.

Seeing this, Ferocious Horned Wolf, which had just reached the summit, did not dare disturb it and simply waited in silence.

After a while, the giant wolf finished cultivating and opened its eyes.

"Howl, howl, howl..." Without hesitation, Ferocious Horned Wolf immediately told it everything that had happened.

After hearing this, a glint of intelligence flashed through the giant wolf's eyes. Compared with an ordinary Ferocious Horned Wolf, it possessed even greater spiritual intelligence as the wolf king.

"Organized hunting..."

Its thoughts drifted afar. Looking down from on high over the forested mountains, the giant wolf considered every possibility.

It did not care much about the deaths of ordinary ferocious wolves. If they died, more could be born. Food had been scarce lately, so reducing the number of ferocious wolves was not necessarily a bad thing for the pack as a whole. Yet it had caught the scent of danger in this matter.

"Howl, howl, howl..."

Its eyes turned cold. Drawing back its thoughts, the giant wolf gave its orders.

Hearing the command, Ferocious Horned Wolf was puzzled. The giant wolf had actually told it not to bother with the matter, only to maintain the current situation. It even wanted to send some ferocious wolves out to continue hunting. The order was undoubtedly unreasonable.

But after meeting the giant wolf's icy gaze, it still let out a whimper and silently withdrew.

Watching Ferocious Horned Wolf leave, the giant wolf shifted its body, exposing its soft belly. There was a savage wound there.

Thinking of everything that had happened in Five Immortal Mountains, fear flashed through its eyes.

"Howl, howl, howl..."

Sticking out its tongue, the giant wolf licked its wound. It forcibly suppressed the fear in its heart and once more entered cultivation.

It was now like a bird startled by the mere twang of a bowstring. It did not want to take any risks. It only wanted to delay for time, recover from its injuries, and then break through to Qi Refining as soon as possible. Before those two matters, everything else was insignificant.

And so, the wolf pack and rat swarm unwittingly reached a strange tacit understanding.

Three days later, in a forest, Jiang Chen extended his hand toward a fallen ferocious wolf.

"Skin..."

As the talisman art circulated, Jiang Chen casually tore, and an intact wolf pelt appeared in his hand.

Seeing this, Jiang Chen let out a soft breath. After so many days of practice, he could finally use this Skinning Art proficiently.

"At this point, the Skinning Art can finally be used in actual combat."

He examined the wolf pelt in his hand. After confirming that it had no flaws whatsoever, satisfaction appeared on Jiang Chen's face.

Compared with the Bloodflame Art, the Skinning Art was far more difficult. He had spent no small amount of effort learning this talisman art. In the end, he had seized this opportunity and, with the help of numerous ferocious wolves, truly taken the first step into this talisman art, making it the second talisman art he had mastered.

"My strength has already reached its current limit. There won't be any further improvement in the short term. It's time to meet that wolf king."

He tossed aside the wolf pelt and flicked out a spark of bloodflame, setting the ferocious wolf's corpse ablaze before walking into the distance.

After he left, several shadows immediately darted out from the dense forest and pounced beside the bloody flames, greedily absorbing the ferocious wolf's blood qi. Some rats grew stronger because of it, while others died because of it.

Seeing a companion beside it die violently after absorbing blood qi, one rat gave a piercing squeal, suddenly exerted force, and hurled the corpse directly into the bloody flames. Then it happily resumed absorbing the blood qi. One wolf fell, and ten rats ate their fill.

It was precisely through such abilities that the rat swarm sustained war with war. Not only had it not been crushed in its clashes with the wolf pack, it had instead shown signs of growing stronger. Compared with the past, the rat swarm had now surpassed its former peak in both numbers and elite strength.

The next day, before dawn, when the sky was not yet light and most living creatures were at their most weary, urgent cries rang out as a great number of rats gathered beneath Goat Horn Mountain, turning into a Dark Tide.

"Squeak, squeak, squeak..."

Standing atop a huge boulder, Rat Prodigy looked at its subordinates and gave the command to attack.

The next instant, the rat swarm went mad and charged toward Goat Horn Mountain. Before long, wolf howls and rat cries interwove into one, while the pungent smell of blood began to spread.

Following the opening torn through by the rat swarm, Jiang Chen brought Rat Prodigy and slowly set foot upon Goat Horn Mountain.

"I wonder whether several more mutant rats will be born in the rat swarm after this life-and-death slaughter..."

Looking at the fallen rats and ferocious wolves, Jiang Chen's heart remained completely unmoved.

Soldier against soldier, general against general. With his current strength, these ordinary ferocious wolves could not trouble him at all. But since he had the rat swarm to use, he would not waste effort on these ordinary ferocious wolves. Though he was confident he could deal with the wolf king, he still had to preserve his condition as much as possible.

As Jiang Chen steadily approached the mountaintop, a figure blocked his path. It was another Ferocious Horned Wolf from the wolf pack.

Jiang Chen ignored it. His body drifted upward like willow catkins, while Ferocious Horned Wolf tried to stop him. Rat Prodigy, however, pounced before it.

Its tail lashed back and forth, leaving crack after crack across the ground. It stared coldly at Ferocious Horned Wolf, as if telling it that it was its opponent.

Jiang Chen paid little attention to the battle between Rat Prodigy and Ferocious Horned Wolf. With Rat Prodigy's strength, even if it truly could not defeat Ferocious Horned Wolf, holding out for some time would not be a problem. At that moment, he focused more of his attention on the wolf king. He could clearly sense a gaze already locked onto him. The moment he exposed any flaw, the other party would bare its fangs.

Meanwhile, atop the mountain, the wolf king watched Jiang Chen advance straight toward the summit without stopping. Irritation and savagery flashed through its eyes.

"After delaying for so long, my injuries have mostly healed. Since he's delivered himself to my doorstep, he'll make a fine meal."

After confirming that the other party was a human cultivator rather than the savage demon creature from Five Immortal Mountains that it had expected, killing intent surged in the wolf king's heart. It was one thing to be bullied by those savage demon creatures, but could it also be bullied by a human? Did they truly think it had become wolf king for nothing?

The next instant, it slowly rose to its feet.