Seven days later, once everyone had arrived, Chu Qing and the others left Dou Ling City to hunt Soul Beasts.
Besides Xue Zhan, there were Wu Feng's grandmother, a Soul Saint with the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Pagoda Martial Soul, and two elders summoned from the Spirit Rhinoceros Sect, one a Soul Saint and the other a Soul Emperor.
The Dou Ling Empire lay in the remote northeast of the continent and possessed vast plains and the East Sea. Scattered throughout it were a few Soul Beast habitats that could not be called small; they were better described as miniature.
In these places, Thousand Year Soul Beasts could generally reign as lords over their own territories, while Ten Thousand Year Soul Beasts were rare.
In fact, the various medicinal pills and herbs produced here were at least a little better known than the Soul Beasts.
And Chu Qing and the others were headed to one of those places: Lerna Swamp.
The people they had sent ahead to lie in ambush had long since scouted it out. Hydra, the lord of Lerna Swamp, had already broken through to the ten-thousand-year level and currently had around twenty thousand years of cultivation.
Hunting a Soul Beast was just for show. In truth, Chu Qing was using himself as bait; all that remained was to catch the turtle in the jar.
The journey was calm and peaceful on the surface, but turbulent waves had long been surging beneath it.
Not many people wanted to see a Limit Douluo emerge in Dou Ling's future.
Once they reached Lerna Swamp, the Nine-Headed Serpent Hydra was no match for the two Titled Douluo. It could not even escape.
Xue Zhan kept cutting off its heads, but each severed head grew back almost in the blink of an eye.
Faced with Hydra's terrifying regenerative ability, even Xue Zhan could not help exclaiming:
"I can't even kill it."
Dragging this out would take quite a bit of effort, so Wu Feng's grandmother said:
"Let me do it."
With a lift of her hand, the fire elements in the air grew restless. Scorching flames engulfed the Nine-Headed Serpent Hydra, sending countless clouds of stinking, poisonous mist billowing from its body.
The terrifying flames scorched the surrounding swamp until it dried and cracked. Though the flames countered it, the tenacious nine-headed serpent kept thrashing within them, its cries especially harrowing.
Of course, no one present felt sorry for it.
Xue Zhan looked around, puzzled.
"Could it be that no one dared come?"
Chu Qing looked somewhat disappointed too. Had all their preparations been for nothing?
Wu Feng's grandmother withdrew the flames, leaving the nine-headed serpent with a trace of life.
Chu Qing did not rush to absorb it. Puzzled, he said:
"Seniors, isn't it a little too quiet?"
Throughout Lerna Swamp, the weaker Soul Beasts were all hiding in their holes, trembling. A few humans had suddenly arrived today and left their mighty lord unable to resist in the slightest. Its screams had echoed throughout the swamp. With what little intelligence they possessed, they felt endless fear, as though the sky had fallen.
The two elders of the Spirit Rhinoceros Sect said:
"Young sect master, we'll check the surrounding area."
Chu Qing had just been about to tell them to be careful when, at some unknown point, an old man covered in grease and wearing clothes torn in several places had walked up beside the half-roasted Nine-Headed Serpent Hydra on the ground. Holding a chicken leg and eating it, he took a deep sniff and exclaimed in admiration:
"What a rare ingredient."
"Prepared properly, it would be an absolute delicacy."
When had he arrived?
Xue Zhan and Wu Feng's grandmother were startled. Only after they saw that the newcomer was Xuan Zi did they feel somewhat reassured.
Seeing that the two Titled Douluo, Xue Zhan and Wu Feng's grandmother, were not treating the newcomer like a formidable enemy, Chu Qing felt a little more certain. The man was presumably the famous Xuan Zi, supreme elder of the Holy Spirit Cult.
Xuan Zi gazed at the nine-headed serpent, clicking his tongue in wonder.
"Don't worry. I scared away those rats lurking around here."
"To absorb a Ten Thousand Year Soul Ring as your fourth Soul Ring-what a genius!"
"Come on, kid, absorb it. Let me have a good look, and then we can eat roast snake meat."
Scared them away?
They had painstakingly prepared a trap, and he had scared their targets away?
Xue Zhan could not help frowning.
Though he was no match for Xuan Zi, he was not afraid of him in the slightest.
He did not have long to live. Even if he could not kill Xuan Zi, he could leave him a cripple afterward.
So he showed Xuan Zi no friendliness.
Wu Feng's grandmother was even more direct.
"We're the ones who fought this nine-headed serpent. Even if we eat it, you won't get a share."
"If you want to watch, step aside. Don't interfere with us absorbing the Soul Bone."
Xuan Zi shook his head repeatedly. Eating his chicken leg, he leaned against a dead tree to the side and said helplessly:
"You've gone from a little dragon girl to an Old Dragon Lady, and your temper is still as fiery as ever."
"When will this cycle of vengeance end? I'm helping you, keeping you from killing each other."
"Hmph, meddling in other people's business. Easy for you to say-you can stand there and talk without your back aching."
Seeing that Wu Feng's grandmother truly would not give him any face, Xuan Zi did not want to damage his image in Chu Qing's eyes any further, so he put on the air of a magnanimous expert who did not mind in the least.
Xue Zhan said to Chu Qing:
"Pay him no mind. He's half an acquaintance. Focus on absorbing the Soul Ring first."
Chu Qing nodded and stepped forward to finish it off. He had to admit it was truly hard to kill. Only after he had struck it dozens of times did a pitch-black Soul Ring float out.
He steadied his breathing, then sat down cross-legged and began to absorb it.
The instant he started, Hydra's nine hideous, terrifying snake heads appeared in his mind, their bloody maws gaping as they lunged to tear into him.
Chu Qing's body trembled involuntarily for an instant.
That tremor alarmed Xue Zhan. The Nine-Headed Serpent Hydra had suffered every kind of torment before its death and was bound to harbor immense resentment. The Soul Shock from its Soul Ring would be far more dangerous than that of an ordinary Twenty Thousand Year Soul Ring.
Fortunately, Chu Qing's body trembled only once before growing still.
Night soon fell. Chu Qing's brows were tightly furrowed, and sweat poured from his body.
This Hydra had been hard to kill in life, and it was troublesome even after death.
Watching from the side, Xuan Zi could not stop marveling at the strength of Chu Qing's physique.
It was not until the next day that Chu Qing opened his weary eyes.
The Nine-Headed Serpent Hydra had haunted him relentlessly. If he had not eaten quite a few Golden Sun Flowers and considerably improved his spiritual power, it truly would have been difficult to deal with.
He got to his feet. Xuan Zi looked at him with a satisfied smile and said:
"Kid, after all these years, I'll make an exception today and give you a chance. I'll take you as my disciple."
Wu Feng's grandmother flew into a rage at once.
"I knew you couldn't have come here without cooking up some foul fart."
Xuan Zi, however, was very confident in himself.
"Little dragon girl, don't be so quick to argue with me."
"We should be asking this kid whether he's willing to become my disciple."
"Listen carefully, kid. Don't be fooled by how slovenly I look. I'm a level 98 super powerhouse, the Taotie Douluo and deputy pavilion master of the Sea God Pavilion!"
Then, afraid that Chu Qing would not understand what the Sea God Pavilion was, he added:
"If you don't know the Sea God Pavilion, you must at least know Shrek, right?"
He knew that the Soul Fighting Society made Shrek Seven Devils cards and felt certain of success. He was even somewhat gratified, as though he had already glimpsed a corner of the future.
"As long as you take me as your master, you'll have a lofty standing equal to that of Shrek's dean."
"Hundred Thousand Year Soul Rings, Soul Bones, and the like will all be provided for you."
"I'll nurture you into the strongest expert on the continent. In time, you'll take over my position and become the Sea God Pavilion's deputy pavilion master and pavilion master."
"Other people could scarcely hope for such things in a lifetime. But now, all you need to do is kneel, kowtow to me in the disciple-taking ceremony, and call me master. Afterward, all of it will be yours."