At the foot of the rocky mountain, scorched earth lay everywhere.
The golden sea of lightning had finally dispersed completely.
The air reeked of charred flesh and the pungent sulfur of melted rock.
The once-insufferably arrogant Demon Ape had sprayed enough blood from its severed arm to stain half the mountainside red. Howling, the savage beast smashed through countless ancient trees and dragged its mangled body into the depths of the Wilds, not daring to look back.
The Lihuo Demon Bull was worse off.
The single leg it had taken such pride in had been blasted in half by lightning. The divine flames that once blazed over its body now flickered like a candle in the wind. It hopped crookedly in another direction, leaving a pool of lava-like blood with every hop.
The two overlords were finished.
Only the Suanni remained at the scene.
This time, it truly did not move.
Its golden fur had lost its dazzling luster and turned dull and ashen. Its eyes, which had earlier snapped open as though it had risen from the dead, were now half-closed, holding nothing but deathly stillness.
Behind the cliff.
Shi Hao held his breath, his little hands clutching Shi Hou's arm so tightly that his nails nearly dug into the flesh.
"Skinny Monkey..."
His voice was so low it was as though he feared waking the dead lion.
Shi Hou took the black pot off his head, strapped it back onto his back, and tightened the straps.
"It's done cooking."
Shi Hou patted the Green-Scaled Eagle beneath him.
"Auntie, time to work."
The Green-Scaled Eagle was still trembling.
The lingering force of that world-destroying lightning was still coursing through its bones.
"Quit dawdling!"
The Green-Scaled Eagle's golden pupils contracted.
Screee!
Its wings snapped open.
A gale sprang up.
The enormous green figure skimmed along the ground like a streak of green light loosed from a bow, shooting out from behind the cliff.
Almost in the blink of an eye, they covered two thousand meters.
The center of the battlefield was a scene of utter devastation.
The first thing that caught their eyes was a huge severed arm.
The Demon Ape's arm.
It was as thick as a millstone and covered in stiff black hair. Even detached from its body, the muscles at the severed end still twitched spasmodically.
"Take it!"
The Green-Scaled Eagle swept low without stopping.
Shi Hou hung upside down, hooking his legs over the eagle's back and dangling half his body over the side.
The mouth of the black pot on his back opened slightly.
An invisible suction erupted.
The severed arm vanished into thin air.
"Good stuff."
Shi Hou muttered without slowing his movements.
Five hundred meters ahead.
A broken crimson horn stood embedded in the ground, the rocks around it melted by its heat.
The Lihuo Demon Bull's true horn.
This thing was more precious than an ordinary treasure artifact and contained fire dao runes.
"Hand it over!"
As the Green-Scaled Eagle swept past, he reached out and grabbed it.
Ssszz-
The broken horn felt hot enough to burn his hand.
He casually tossed it behind him, landing it squarely in the pot.
"Who... who is that?!"
In the distance.
The human experts who had been watching from the sidelines finally spotted that outrageously brazen streak of green light.
"That's the dark-skinned kid from Stone Village!"
Roars rose one after another.
But they were too late.
The Green-Scaled Eagle had already reached the mountain-like corpse.
The golden Suanni lay across their path like a small hill.
Even in death, its lingering might stiffened the Green-Scaled Eagle's wings, nearly sending it plunging headfirst.
"Steady!"
Shi Hou shouted.
He jumped off the eagle's back.
The moment his feet touched down, the ground collapsed with a thunderous crash.
It was too big.
Up close, the Suanni's head alone was three sizes larger than the millstone at the village entrance.
If he tried carrying it, he could work himself to death and still never haul it away.
"Pot up!"
Shi Hou reached behind him and untied the vines.
The black pot landed on the ground.
"Transform!"
Humm-
The black pot swelled violently in the wind.
Ten feet, thirty feet, a hundred feet!
In the blink of an eye, a gigantic black pot that blotted out the sky and sun appeared in the middle of the battlefield. Its ancient, weathered aura of the Great Dao briefly overwhelmed even the Suanni's aura of death.
"Get it inside!"
Shi Hao jumped down too. His little face flushed red as he pushed against the Suanni's rump with both hands, mustering every ounce of strength he had.
Shi Hou grabbed the mane around the Suanni's neck.
"One, two, three! Heave!"
Both of them exerted themselves at once.
Rumble.
The enormous Suanni corpse shifted.
One end lifted, then slid toward the tilted black pot under Shi Hou's guidance.
The instant the massive corpse touched the pot's mouth, it rapidly shrank.
Whoosh.
The last golden tail disappeared over the rim.
Deathly silence fell over the battlefield.
The human experts racing toward them in the distance faltered for an instant.
Gone?
A primordial remnant that huge had disappeared right before their eyes?
"That's a supreme spatial treasure!"
Someone caught on. "That pot... that pot is worth no less than the Suanni!"
"Kill him! Make him leave the treasures behind!"
Countless runes lit up.
All manner of treasure artifacts were unleashed.
"Run!"
Shi Hou slapped the shrunken black pot onto his back, scooped Shi Hao off the ground, and tossed him onto the Green-Scaled Eagle circling overhead at low altitude.
Then he bent his knees slightly and shot upward like a cannonball, landing firmly on the eagle's back.
"Climb!"
The Green-Scaled Eagle beat its wings for all it was worth.
But then.
"Trying to leave? Leave your lives behind!"
A furious shout rang out.
On a distant mountaintop, a middle-aged man wearing robes patterned with Flood Dragons drew the great bow in his hands.
The bow was made from a Flood Dragon's main tendon, and he now drew it into a full moon.
Twang!
A dazzling Flood Dragon phantom arrived in an instant, accompanied by the roar of wind and thunder.
From the dense forest below, countless arrows rose into the sky like flying locusts.
Packed tightly together, they sealed off every possible route the Green-Scaled Eagle could dodge through.
The Green-Scaled Eagle cried out in despair.
Shi Hao's little face turned pale. He clenched the two azure moons in his hands, ready to fight for his life.
Shi Hou stood on the eagle's back, watching the deadly rain of arrows sweep across the sky toward them.
That Flood Dragon phantom, in particular, was already right before him. Its terrifying wind pressure made the flesh of his face ripple.
Shi Hou snorted coldly.
He reached behind him with one hand.
"Grow!"
Boom!
Gripping the handle on the bottom of the pot, Shi Hou slammed it down over them.
It fit without a gap.
One older boy, one little boy, one eagle, and the unconscious pig were all covered beneath the black pot.
DONG-!!!
The first tremendous impact rang out.
It was the Flood Dragon arrow phantom striking the bottom of the pot.
A terrifying shock wave exploded through the air in a ring of visible white turbulence.
The Green-Scaled Eagle let out a mournful cry as the tremendous force knocked it dozens of meters downward.
But the black pot did not budge.
Immediately afterward.
Clang, clang, clatter, clatter, clatter!
The dense rain of arrows arrived.
Inside the pot.
Shi Hao's large eyes sparkled.
Listening to the terrifying commotion outside, he reached out and touched the cool, steady wall of the pot.
"Skinny Monkey."
Shi Hao swallowed. "Is this pot... even tougher than Grandpa Chief's Ancestral Cauldron?"
"Obviously."
Shi Hou rolled his eyes.
"The Ancestral Cauldron isn't worth a damn."
"This pot of mine is for cooking for... ahem, you-know-who."
"If it couldn't take a little tickling like this, how would I toss food in it for that lord, the Sole Sovereign Across the Ages?"
He patted the eagle's back beneath him.
"Auntie, stop shaking."
"As long as my hand doesn't get tired, this is a turtle shell with absolute defense."
"Get moving!"
Outside the pot.
The middle-aged man holding the Flood Dragon bow watched the black pot force a path to survival through the sky full of arrows, then wobble away and disappear into the clouds.
Clack.
The priceless treasured bow fell to the ground.
His mouth hung open, his jaw trembling for a long while. In the end, he managed only a single sentence:
"Th-this actually works?"
Before you continue