Seeing the look Luo Yue gave him, Jiang Wei immediately understood what she was thinking. Caught between laughter and tears, he said:
"Of course you're not fighting Senior Nether Flood Dragon. What are you thinking, Little Yue?"
"Your opponent is that one."
With that, Jiang Wei motioned for Luo Yue to look up.
Luo Yue's icy-blue eyes narrowed slightly as she followed Jiang Wei's gesture.
Only upon closer inspection did she discover a relatively "petite" figure coiled atop the Nether Flood Dragon's enormous head, which was covered in dark scales.
It was a young flood dragon, roughly ten feet long!
Unlike the adult Nether Flood Dragon's thick, dark scales, the youngster's scales were a deep violet, their edges traced with mysterious golden patterns that gleamed in the light piercing the mist.
With golden slit pupils just like her mother's, the young flood dragon lifted her head slightly and looked down at Luo Yue on the shore, her face full of provocation.
When she saw Luo Yue looking over, she even displayed a remarkably human sneer. The young flood dragon spread her mouth into an uncannily human grin, extended a little claw, and crooked it at her in challenge.
She had actually been looked down on by a little four-legged snake...
Even with Luo Yue's composed temperament, she could not help feeling dark lines gathering across her forehead.
Looks like if I can't get past this little fellow, I won't earn that Nether Flood Dragon's approval or truly settle on this Divine Island, much less gain access to the inscriptions left by that female Divine King.
Luo Yue clicked her tongue inwardly.
The Jiang Family certainly had plenty of rules. Even moving in was such a hassle.
"Awooo-!"
Before Luo Yue could think any further,
the young flood dragon seemed to lose patience-or perhaps Luo Yue had stirred her competitive spirit.
She abruptly released a clear, piercing cry wholly at odds with her size, yet carrying the beginnings of draconic might. The enormous Nether Flood Dragon lowered her head slightly, and the youngster used it as a springboard to leap into the air.
In an instant,
an oppressive aura far greater than her size came crashing down! Cold and fathomless, it carried the weight of vast waters and the ferocity unique to flood dragons.
A Vision manifested around the young flood dragon of its own accord. The phantom of a boundless, shadowy sea unfurled behind her, its waters black as ink and radiating a chill that devoured light. Amid that vast black sea, silver-gray stars rose and sank.
A powerful suction came from the Vision behind the young flood dragon, turning into a mighty binding force that seemed intent on swallowing Luo Yue into it.
"One of the Demon Race's ten great Visions-the Cangming Devouring Heaven Sea!" Luo Qingluan's expression changed drastically.
Though this Vision was only a nascent form and could not fully manifest, it was already astonishing enough to defy the heavens!
At the same time, she clearly sensed fluctuations from the young flood dragon far beyond the Sea of Bitterness Realm and could not help crying out in alarm.
She whipped her head around, seized Jiang Wei's cloud-patterned sleeve, and demanded, her beautiful eyes blazing with anger:
"Jiang Wei, what is the meaning of this?"
"That 'little mud loach' is clearly at the Dao Palace Realm, and she's even cultivated such a terrifying Demon Race Vision! Little Yue is only at the Divine Bridge stage of the Sea of Bitterness. How is she supposed to withstand that? Isn't this bullying her? Just what is your Jiang Family plotting?"
Fiercely protective, she spoke in an urgent, sharp tone.
Jiang Wei swayed under her tug. Before he could speak, the enormous Nether Flood Dragon above heard the somewhat insulting phrase "little mud loach." She immediately turned her head and fixed them with a death glare!
Luo Qingluan's expression froze. In an instant, she felt as though she had plunged into an ice cellar, and she offered a smile uglier than a crying face.
Jiang Wei hurried to smooth things over. He would never dare put on airs as the Jiang Family's young prince before a Nether Flood Dragon at the Immortal Platform Realm. In a gentle voice, he said:
"Qing Luan, please calm down. The Nether Flood Dragon lineage knows its limits. The Little Juvenile Flood Dragon only advanced to the Dao Palace Realm recently. This is merely an ordinary test, not a battle to the death."
"Besides..."
As he spoke, he turned his deep gaze toward the silver-haired figure in the arena and said with a smile:
"Luo Qingluan, is that all the confidence you have in your little Divine King?"
In the distance,
even as Luo Qingluan challenged him, Luo Yue's small, silver-haired figure showed no panic in the face of the young flood dragon's assault and Demon Race Vision.
Very well. This is the perfect chance to test the results of over a month of cultivation.
She possessed the Divine King Body, had refined divine source to build her foundation, and had expended immense resources to fuse several ancient scriptures through the Yellow River Chart and Lo Shu. Both her aptitude and her Dao Foundation ranked among the finest in the world. How could she let a little mud loach look down on her now!
As Luo Yue thought this, a layer of divine brilliance covered the depths of her icy-blue pupils.
"Cold River Reflecting the Moon, rise!"
Boom!
Centered on Luo Yue, a far vaster and more substantial Divine Body Vision instantly unfolded.
It, too, was only the nascent form of a Bitter Sea Vision and could not yet be fully projected outward.
The phantom of a boundless cold river spread behind her, and a cold moon emerged. Moonlight cascaded down like a waterfall, freezing part of the chill that seeped from the Netherdark Cold Abyss. The mirror-smooth ice reflected the Vision above.
"Humm-!"
The cold moon's clear radiance collided violently with the young flood dragon's Nether Sea Abyss. Ice crystals shattered and re-formed, producing a piercing grinding sound. The two Visions pressed against each other, actually reaching a strange, temporary stalemate.
With her Divine King Body's Wheel Sea Phenomenon, Luo Yue forcibly held off the young flood dragon's Vision head-on.
A flicker of surprise crossed the young flood dragon's golden slit pupils, as though she had never expected Luo Yue to withstand it.
She hesitated no longer. Like a bolt of dark lightning, she tore through the frozen air, her razor-sharp claws wreathed in shadowy demonic power as she lunged straight for Luo Yue's face!
"Whoosh!!"
Wherever the gust from her claws passed, it seemed to tear space itself apart.
At this, Luo Yue advanced rather than retreated, instantly activating an offensive divine art from the Divine King Scripture!
The Life Spring within her Bitter Sea gushed forth. Vast divine power, fused with a trace of the true essence of taiyin and taiyang and chaos dao resonance, surged out and rapidly gathered into shape in her right palm.
A spear formed entirely of taiyin's shadowy chill appeared out of thin air. Wisps of blazing golden Sun divine radiance wound around its shaft, while a tiny chaos vortex swirled at its core. An ultimate point of cold brilliance condensed at its tip, as though it could pierce the void.
Cold and keen, blazing and imperious!
It perfectly fused a trace of the true essence of taiyin and taiyang, bearing the supreme majesty of the Divine King Body.
At the same time,
a crimson-gold immortal shield also took shape beside Luo Yue's left hand. Like the divine spear, it was a peerless divine art from the Divine King Scripture-the Divine King Immortal Shield.
"Clang-!!!"
The young flood dragon's sharp claws, wrapped in a dark, frigid current, struck savagely
against the newly formed Divine King Immortal Shield!
A deafening metallic crash erupted. A violent shock wave spread outward in a ring, raising enormous waves hundreds of feet high from the surrounding waters and cracking the rocks on the ground inch by inch.
The Divine King Immortal Shield in Luo Yue's hand shook violently and instantly filled with spiderweb cracks, fragments scattering everywhere. In the end, however, it stopped the claw strike that could have torn apart a small mountain.
She felt an overwhelming force slam into her. The solid ice beneath her feet exploded, and her petite body slid backward helplessly for hundreds of feet, plowing two deep furrows through the ground. She only stopped upon crashing into a small hill, her left arm aching and numb.
"Hiss..."
Luo Yue drew in a light breath.