Heading to the Star Dou Great Forest

Chen Zhuo and Dugu Yan calmly followed the imperial guards away.

They knew full well that this kind of questioning was nothing more than a formality.

Marshal Ge Long had been attacked and killed, an incident that caused an uproar before abruptly ending.

The case was officially classified as the work of operatives from the enemy Star Luo Empire.

Faced with such a conclusion, the public found it absurd yet reasonable.

Marshal Ge Long was already a high-ranking Soul Douluo, so one could only imagine how strong the entity capable of killing him must have been.

Catching a killer of that caliber was nearly impossible.

Fortunately, a speech delivered by Prince Xue Xing and the First Guest Dugu Bo of the Heaven Dou Empire stabilized military morale.

It kept the citizens of the imperial capital from falling into a panic.

Inside Dugu Manor.

Several people sat together to hold a brief meeting.

Two soul bones lay on the table, naturally harvested from Marshal Ge Long.

When it came to anyone below the level of a Super Douluo, the current Chen Zhuo never waited overnight to settle a score!

He could only blame Marshal Ge Long for provoking someone he could not afford to cross.

"This fifty-thousand-year blood-thunder sword dragon torso bone belongs to you."

A soul bone with the dual gold-thunder attribute was a very good match for Snake Lance Douluo.

Nobody raised any objections to Chen Zhuo's distribution.

In this battle, Snake Lance Douluo She Long had contributed a great deal, and this was what he deserved.

"As for the remaining one, find a channel to transfer it directly to the Star Luo Empire and exchange it for gold soul coins."

Chen Zhuo had no use whatsoever for the three-thousand-year tyrant tiger right arm bone, nor did he intend to gift it to any of his subordinates.

The soul bone skill produced by a beast of this age was only equivalent to a fourth-ring soul skill at best. What good could it possibly be? It was far too redundant.

In addition, after killing Marshal Ge Long, Dugu Bo and Snake Lance had also confiscated the man's storage soul tool.

The various valuables inside amounted to a total value of nearly two million gold soul coins.

In this era, if a thousand-year soul bone were put up at an auction, it could easily fetch a closing price of one million gold soul coins.

Chen Zhuo intended to allocate all of this money to the Dragon Duke and Snake Granny to be used as public funds.

As for Ge Long's head, Dugu Bo had sent it to Prince Xue Xing.

This served both to warn the man and to ensure that the prince would clean up the mess for them afterward.

Naturally, with every stick came a carrot.

The massive power vacuum left behind by Marshal Ge Long's death brought forth a huge pool of controllable and plundering resources.

The crown prince's faction and Prince Xue Xing would both stuff themselves to the point of obesity.

That evening, Chen Zhuo went to see Qian Renxue.

The sight of Chen Zhuo instantly irritated Qian Renxue.

It was not only because he had acted on his own accord to kill Ge Long, but also because Chen Zhuo had promised to wait for her so they could hunt soul beasts together.

She had waited a full year and a half!

"My good Highness, we leave tomorrow."

Chen Zhuo was already prepared to go to the Star Dou Great Forest to hunt a hundred-thousand-year soul beast.

He had long since reached level 50 himself. What he had really been waiting for all along was Ye Lingling.

Right on cue, she had finally reached level 40, making it the perfect time for them to head out together to acquire a suitable soul ring.

"Should we notify Grandfather?"

Qian Renxue was uncertain whether she, accompanied by one Titled Douluo and one Super Douluo, along with Chen Zhuo and his Titled Douluo, could successfully take down a hundred-thousand-year soul beast.

"There's no need to trouble the enshrined elders."

Chen Zhuo stated that he had absolute certainty.

The Star Dou Great Forest.

Spanning both the Heaven Dou and Star Luo Empires, this primeval forest was the soul beast habitat with the largest land area on the entire continent.

After entering the Star Dou Great Forest, Chen Zhuo, Qian Renxue, and their party headed straight for the inner region.

Because human soul masters and soul beasts existed in a state of natural hostility.

Generally speaking, the outer region only held hundred-year and thousand-year soul beasts. The further one went toward the center of the forest into areas increasingly untouched by human footprints, the stronger the soul beasts became.

Those were regions where ten-thousand-year soul beasts were active.

"Why don't we run through a drill these next few days? I don't want any mistakes on our end when the time comes."

Qian Renxue instructed Snake Lance and Pufferfish.

For this trip Qian Renxue had ordered them to take Chen Zhuo as the leader, following his commands in all actions.

"Understood!"

The expressions of the two men turned solemn.

If they were truly going to hunt a hundred-thousand-year soul beast, any minor mistake in a battle of that tier would be fatal.

It was entirely necessary for the soul-hunting team to familiarize themselves with each other's soul skills and combat habits.

During this period, Chen Zhuo began tracking the movements of the Titan Giant Ape.

On the surface, there were two hundred-thousand-year soul beasts in the core region of the Star Dou Great Forest.

The Titan Giant Ape and the Sky Azure Bull Python.

The individual strength of either soul beast emperor was equivalent to that of someone above a level-95 Super Douluo.

The Sky Azure Bull Python resided year-round in the Lake of Life, and though its movement route seemed fixed, it was actually the hardest one to capture.

Because the forbidden being beneath the Lake of Life was not someone the current Chen Zhuo could afford to provoke.

Therefore, for the sake of safety, the battlefield naturally could not be chosen at the Lake of Life.

The breakthrough he sought had never been with the Sky Azure Bull Python.

Instead, it lay with that hot-tempered, somewhat simple-minded and reckless Titan Giant Ape.

Weeks later, Chen Zhuo and his group finally discovered the traces of the Titan Giant Ape.

"Everything goes according to plan!" Chen Zhuo said.

Qian Renxue had originally disagreed with the crazy plan Chen Zhuo had proposed.

A quasi-soul king going to lure a hundred-thousand-year soul beast? What kind of joke was that!

It was not until Chen Zhuo revealed the aura of a hundred-thousand-year soul beast from his own body.

That Qian Renxue, fighting her utter disbelief, finally agreed to let Chen Zhuo put himself in danger.

"Get ready!" Following Chen Zhuo's instructions, Dugu Bo, Snake Lance, and Pufferfish each finished setting up their positions.

Meanwhile.

Dozens of miles away, a mountain-like behemoth was drinking water by a stream.

Wading into the stream with its hind legs, it directly blocked most of the current.

The mountain waterfall had ceased flowing due to its arrival.

Even deep within the towering ancient trees of the Star Dou Great Forest, its presence remained striking.

"Da Ming, Er Ming... Where are you?"

The Titan Giant Ape, currently bowing its head to drink, gave a start. The water in its palms surged like an inverted heavenly river, cascading down like a flying waterfall to flood the mountain forest.

"Wuwuwu..."

"Xiao Wu is so scared."

The Titan Giant Ape, which had initially thought it was experiencing auditory hallucinations, could no longer hold back.

"Sister Xiao Wu?"

As it stood up, the cliff beneath its feet collapsed.

With a sweep of its arms, it cut through patches of millennium-old trees like a bulldozer, brushing them aside as if they were weeds.

"Is that you, Sister Xiao Wu?"

The Titan Giant Ape ran along the sound, flattening everything that blocked its path.

Squish!

A ten-thousand-year earth dragon was directly crushed to death beneath the giant ape's massive foot.

The sounds were intermittent.

Yet that was clearly the aura of Sister Xiao Wu.

It missed Sister Xiao Wu so much.

Ever since a lot of detestable humans came last time, Sister Xiao Wu and Aunt Rou had completely vanished.

"It's here!"

Dugu Bo sensed a giant beast step into his poison circle. Snake Lance and Pufferfish looked at the shadow not far away that blanketed an entire mountain forest, unable to help themselves from swallowing hard.

Their throats bobbed and their mouths parted slightly.

Dugu Bo's eyes narrowed, also feeling that his previous remark had been redundant.

The opponent did not even deign to conceal its movements.

This was the instinct and bearing of an emperor standing at the pinnacle of soul beasts.

Crack!

The sound was faint, like snapping a section of dead tree branch.

Yet it triggered a chain reaction.

In the mountain forest basin, the jade-phosphorus poison mist instantly enveloped the entire woodland.

The Titan Giant Ape sensed something was amiss, but its rationality was quickly swept away by boundless rage.

"Damned humans-"