"Master, watch out!" Morosa's voice rang out in Luo Feng's mind.
The Sea Marten he had dragged out suddenly sprouted several more tentacles and lunged at Luo Feng. Each tentacle moved at several hundred times the speed of light.
"What?" Luo Feng sensed the tentacles sweeping toward him, and his expression changed.
Even the Sea Marten he was grappling with unleashed greater strength, throwing off Luo Feng's judgment.
There was no time to dodge the Saint Realm Sea Marten's tentacles.
Luo Feng drew his blade in an instant, using the Draw Blade Technique from the Shadow Blade Hundred Thousand Forms, a move meant to counter sudden sneak attacks.
The strike was blindingly fast and strangely elusive. It met several of the incoming tentacles head-on, but there were too many. Though he blocked one or two, the rest slipped through, wrapped around his body, and tried to drag him into the sea.
This is bad! Luo Feng felt the Saint Realm Sea Marten's immense strength. He tried to break free, but could not.
At the same time, the Eternal True God Pinnacle Sea Marten seized the chance to coil more than a hundred tentacles around him and drag him toward the water.
"Chaos Sea!"
He unleashed his Chaos Domain.
"Eternal Light!"
It was Luo Feng's most concentrated strike, and the strongest blade move he currently possessed. Enhanced by the Blood Shadow Blade, its power rivaled that of a high-tier First-Origin Saint Realm expert. The slash severed the smaller Sea Marten's tentacles one after another, but the five thickest remained unscathed. His blade left only faint marks on them.
"Divine Eye!"
Luo Feng fixed his gaze on the shadow writhing rapidly beneath the sea. His fierce Will Impact became a sharp arrow that ignored the water and shot straight into the enormous shape below.
"Hmph. Sea Martens are born with powerful wills. You think you can shake mine?" A shrill, low voice entered Luo Feng's mind. The Soul Attack carried in it tried to shake him as well.
"Morosa, deal with him!" The Soul Attack had no effect on Luo Feng, but the tremendous force kept dragging his body downward.
At Luo Feng's command, Morosa acted without delay.
"Die!" Morosa's strength erupted. With a thunderous heave, he hauled a colossal creature straight out of the sea.
It was a gigantic black tentacled monster resembling an octopus, more than fifty million kilometers across. The tentacles extending from its body looked far longer than the body itself.
Boom!
Another arm suddenly grew from Morosa's body. The moment the Sea Marten emerged from the water, Morosa drove a fist brimming with Destruction Origin Power into its head.
The blow was stronger than that of an ordinary Four-Origin Saint Realm expert. Against a Sea Marten with strength around the Two-Origin Saint Realm, it was devastating. Part of the creature's skull caved in, and black blood gushed out.
"Aaagh!" Its piercing scream rang across the heavens and earth.
Its tentacles thrashed wildly. The punch had dealt it a grievous blow.
"Run! Run!" it frantically ordered the others. "That despicable alien hid his strength! Get away!"
Its tentacles began breaking off one by one, while its body seized the chance to plunge back into the sea.
"Run!" The other Sea Martens, still beneath the surface, were terrified. They severed their own tentacles and fled madly into the depths.
"Hmph! You think you can escape?" Morosa turned into a streak of light and gave chase. Several more arms grew from his body and coiled around the Saint Realm Sea Marten. How could the creature outrun him?
The Sea Marten's enormous body was completely bound by his arms.
"No! I don't want to die! This can't be how it ends!" Realizing it could not break free, the Sea Marten fell into despair.
Destruction Origin Power flowed through Morosa's arms and poured into its body. Within a breath, the creature stopped its frantic struggles. It was so thoroughly restrained that it could not even self-destruct.
On Luo Feng's side, the Eternal True God Pinnacle Sea Marten severed its tentacles and escaped into the deep sea.
Only Tie Nanhe managed to capture one. The others got away.
Of the eight Sea Martens, they had caught just two, though one possessed Saint Realm strength.
"As long as Sea Martens stay in the sea, you can't kill them without an overwhelming advantage. No wonder a single Sea Marten Stone is enough to complete a danger-level mission." Luo Feng looked at the large Sea Marten pinned down by Morosa and sighed. Hunting one alone would be difficult unless he happened upon a weaker Sea Marten that chose to provoke him.
Luo Feng had to admit that, in the sea, he could probably only fight an Eternal True God Pinnacle Sea Marten to a standstill. To kill one alone, he would need to get close and combine the Divine Eye Secret Technique with his Blade Technique, or use the Lie Yuan Technique. Otherwise, even he would struggle.
"Kill them and take their Sea Marten Stones," Luo Feng ordered. With a wave of his hand, he drew both Sea Martens, Morosa, and Tie Nanhe into the Star Tower.
The two Sea Martens would make fine nourishment for Morosa.
Several huge tentacles grew from Morosa's body and pierced the two captives. His Devouring Force erupted, and the Sea Martens visibly shrank.
"No!" Both the Saint Realm Sea Marten and the Eternal Level one despaired. "You damned aliens will die! The king will kill every last one of you! He will!"
No matter how they struggled, their bodies eventually crumbled to dust. Morosa consumed everything except the two Sea Marten Stones.
Each Sea Marten Stone was a dark, smoothly oval crystal only the size of a small car. It was extraordinarily hard and gleamed with a black-and-gold luster. Even Morosa's full-force blow left no mark on the Eternal Level stone.
"That's somewhat like the Golden Horned Beast's Golden Horn World Stone." Luo Feng thought of his own. Both had absorbed essence over countless ages to become so hard. They were indeed excellent materials for forging weapons.
The Saint level stone was slightly larger than the Eternal Level one, and its black-and-gold sheen was brighter. On close inspection, Luo Feng could even sense faint fluctuations of the Law of Metal within it. The Saint level Sea Marten must have comprehended the Metal Origin Profound Mystery, which was why its stone carried those fluctuations.
"A Saint level Sea Marten Stone isn't easy to get," Luo Feng remarked.
With two Sea Marten Stones, including a Saint level one, he had completed his mission soon after arriving at the Floating Sand Sea.
Luo Feng only needed to turn in an Eternal Level Sea Marten Stone. He figured the Saint level one could fetch a good price.
"Let's keep moving." The Saint level Mechanical Flow ship appeared, then streaked toward the nearest Floating Sand Island.
The rest of the journey was much calmer.
They flew for another two months, with only one minor incident along the way: a sea beast attacked them. That beast was much smarter, though. As soon as it realized the situation was unfavorable, it fled.
At last, they reached Floating Sand Island.
Floating Sand Island was almost perfectly circular, with a diameter of eighty-one light-years.
Strange vegetation covered the island, but none was more remarkable than the Floating Sand Tree, famed throughout the Floating Sand Sea. It was a divine tree with an immensely thick trunk that rose thirty-six light-years high. Its crown of countless lightning-shaped leaves covered the entire island. From afar, it looked like a colossal umbrella blotting out the sky.
Strangely, the sky above the island was clear of lightning. Around its shores, bolts shaped like electric serpents shot into the Floating Sand Tree's crown. They did not harm it at all; instead, they seemed to nourish it.
At the top of the tree, a huge, deep-green fruit the size of a football field hung quietly from a branch. It radiated a powerful aura of life. This was the Floating Sand Fruit every visitor coveted.
A ripe Floating Sand Fruit was golden. This one clearly had a long time to go before it matured.
"The Floating Sand Fruit." Luo Feng's ship had entered the canopy, and he gazed longingly at the tiny-looking fruit on its branch.
It was the reason he had come to Floating Sand Island!
"Master, there are quite a few Saint Realm presences here. I can sense six in the area I've scanned alone," Morosa warned. His senses were exceptionally sharp, making life auras easy for him to detect.
"Six Saint Realm experts." Luo Feng nodded and tore his gaze from the Floating Sand Fruit. He could sense faint auras in five locations, though he could not determine their exact strength. "There will probably be more as the fruit gets closer to ripening. We need to be careful. Everyone who comes to Floating Sand Island is a rival, and some may not be able to resist attacking us."
"Don't worry, Master. Only one poses a threat to us. The others are mostly at the Four-Origin Saint Realm. If they come after us, they'll be throwing their lives away," Morosa said confidently.
Luo Feng nodded with a smile. "Let's find somewhere to settle for now. If they don't come to us, we'll go to them."
The ship then plunged toward the island's surface.
Meanwhile, the six Saint Realm experts nearby had long since noticed the arriving ship. They seemed to share an unspoken understanding: none rushed to be the first to attack.
In a cave, a Five-Origin High-Grade Saint Realm expert named Tablo had already made his home. He was among the first Saint Realm experts to reach Floating Sand Island and had been there for more than ten billion epochs.
"Another newcomer. Looks like things will get lively again. I wonder if they'll manage to stay. Without enough strength, they have no right to compete for the Floating Sand Fruit." Tablo chuckled softly.