They Could All Be Elbowed to the End

The vegetation on the outskirts of the Star Dou Great Forest was denser than expected. The damp smell of rotting leaves mingled with the distinctive, bloody scent of Soul Beasts.

The branches of towering ancient trees overlapped overhead, forming an impenetrable canopy of dark green. Sunlight filtered through the gaps in the leaves in scattered flecks of gold, illuminating the mist that veiled the forest. Beyond ten paces, nothing could be seen clearly.

The three maintained a triangular formation as they crept forward close to the tree trunks.

Bao Liang led the way, Xiao Hongchen brought up the rear, and Meng Hongchen moved along the flank. Their footsteps were so light that they hardly crushed any fallen leaves.

After releasing Second Bomb, Bao Liang kept it from exploding, using it instead as a running "heat detector"-whenever a living creature with body heat approached in the forest, the little fellow would give them advance warning.

They had barely advanced half a kilometer when Second Bomb, standing guard at Bao Liang's feet, gave a slight tremor!

"Movement," Bao Liang said in a low voice. "Ahead on the left. Soul Beasts that live in packs, and quite a few of them."

Before he had finished speaking, the little orange-red lion mastiff at his feet had already turned toward the bushes ahead and to the left. It bared its teeth and growled, its tail fluffed up like a ball of fire as its front paws restlessly scratched at the fallen leaves.

Xiao Hongchen immediately raised a hand, and several Soul Guidance Ray Guns floated silently into the air, their muzzles all aimed in the direction Bao Liang had indicated. Meng Hongchen shifted another half step toward the flank, icy-blue and vermilion Soul Power flowing faintly in her palm, ready to cover any gap.

All three held their breath, even their heartbeats seeming to slow by half a beat.

The next instant, the bushes abruptly parted.

More than twenty Hell Wolves sprang out of the forest. The leader was especially large, its black fur standing on end like steel needles and its eerie green eyes gleaming with cruelty and cunning.

The presence radiating from it was savage and violent, with a faint, oppressive beastly awe-judging by its presence, the wolf king had at least a hundred years of cultivation, while most of the others were young wolves around ten years old.

But on their first encounter with living, breathing Soul Beasts, none of the three had the attention to spare for determining their exact ages. They only felt a sudden rush of bloody stench in the forest as the wolves charged at them all at once.

"They're coming!" Xiao Hongchen barked. "Stick to the plan!"

Without another word, Bao Liang charged straight at the pack.

Relying on the outrageously tough body tempered by Ultimate Flame and Ultimate Strength, Bao Liang neither dodged nor retreated. A Hell Wolf lunged at him, and he raised an arm and elbowed it fifteen meters away, smashing it through two trees before it hit the ground;

Another went for his calf, and he struck its forehead with a backhanded slap, smashing its head to a pulp;

A third seized an opening and tried to bite the back of his neck, but he twisted and drove a knee into its jaw, sending it tumbling into the grass with a whimper.

The young wolves with ten years of cultivation could not get close to Bao Liang at all. He elbowed every one of them away, crushing his way straight through them like a young Ferocious Beast charging into a flock of sheep.

Only, this "young Ferocious Beast" wore an excited smile, and with every wolf he knocked down, the light in his eyes grew brighter.

Xiao Hongchen held the rear, his Soul Guidance Ray Guns firing bursts like rain, picking off the wolves that slipped through and tried to bypass Bao Liang and attack Meng Hongchen's flank.

He deliberately controlled his Soul Power output, suppressing the pack while guarding against an ambush by other Soul Beasts drawn by the sounds of battle.

Providing long-range fire support, Xiao Hongchen fought steadily and economically. Every shot landed exactly where it was needed most, and he wasted not the slightest bit of Soul Power.

Several Hell Wolves tried to circle around the flank, but the moment they exposed half their bodies, a blazing white ray pinned them dead on the spot. They only had time to get halfway through a scream.

Meng Hongchen stayed close beside Xiao Hongchen, guarding the flank and serving as the final line of defense.

Several Hell Wolves tried to break through Xiao Hongchen's net of fire and pounce on him, but she raised a hand and drove them back with a targeted Ice and Fire Poison Ring;

More often, she scattered deadly poison along Bao Liang's path of battle, supporting him from a distance.

The ice and fire poisons clashed within the wolves swept by her poison ring. Within a few steps, their limbs went weak and they collapsed, foaming at the mouth, without even the strength to struggle.

The battle soon ended.

A pack of wolves led by a mere Hundred-Year Soul Beast could not hold Bao Liang back for long.

He sent every Hell Wolf that lunged at him flying with a single punch apiece, as though he were driving off a pack of blind wild dogs.

Bao Liang beat the young wolves into disarray, and they howled as they shrank back. But their wolf king was still behind them, overseeing the fight and forcing them to grit their teeth and face Bao Liang.

Seeing that things were going badly, the wolf king roared and sprang for Bao Liang's throat.

Bao Liang neither dodged nor retreated, letting its fangs graze past his ear before slapping a bomb onto its face with a backhand!

"Boom!"

A violent blast erupted against the wolf king's head, sending orange-red flames, shredded flesh, and broken bone soaring into the air.

The wolf king did not even let out a howl. The vicious light in its eyes instantly dimmed, and it was hurled to the ground, dead.

With their leader dead, the surviving Hell Wolves broke apart at once and fled in all directions with their tails between their legs. In the blink of an eye, they vanished into the sea of trees without looking back.

A few slower ones were caught by Meng Hongchen's poison ring, however. The poison took effect, and they fell to the ground, never to rise again.

Bao Liang and the others did not mind-those that escaped had escaped, and those that died had died. The point of training was the process, not wiping them all out.

The little orange-red lion mastiff wandered around the forest twice more without finding a new heat source. Bao Liang beckoned to it, and it turned back into his Martial Soul and was withdrawn.

Only then did the three have time to take a closer look at the results of the battle.

A pale yellow Soul Ring slowly appeared above the corpse of the wolf king that had been blown to death. It hovered three feet above the ground, gradually solidifying as its presence dissipated.

"Gray for a hundred years, gray-black for a thousand, and pure black for ten thousand." Bao Liang squatted down, parted the wolf king's steel-needle-like gray-black fur, and sized up its body. He smacked his lips. "Going by its fur and size, I'd say it was probably around five hundred years old."

"That explains it," Xiao Hongchen said, coming over as well. "We were too busy fighting to check its age. I only went by its presence and figured it was an old wolf of a hundred years."

The three gathered around the corpse, taking turns to fill in the Soul Beast's age, fur color, and size, detail by detail, since they had not had time to examine them during the fight. In that way, they made up their field lesson on "determining age."

After all, the farther they went, the fiercer the Soul Beasts they encountered would be. Judging by presence alone would not be enough; they also had to learn to tell by fur color and body size.

With the battle over, the three did not hurry onward. Instead, they stayed where they were and went back over the fight.

"I charged in too hard just now and left my flank open for a moment," Bao Liang said, scratching his head. "If Meng's poison ring hadn't covered the gap, one wolf would've gotten behind me.

"And I should've used my First Soul Skill right away. It's too dangerous to leave the smell of blood in the forest."

"My rays had blind spots too," Xiao Hongchen admitted, unusually forgoing his usual stubbornness. "Next time, say something before you charge in. I'll lay down a net of fire ahead of you, so I won't have to divide my attention covering the gaps you leave."

"Then I need to time my poison ring properly too," Meng Hongchen said seriously. "I can't release it too early and waste Soul Power, or too late and miss my chance-I almost failed to stop the one that circled behind you just now."

"But," Xiao Hongchen said, suddenly lifting his eyes and sweeping his gaze over the shadows among the trees, "Grandpa still hasn't made a move. That means he thinks what we're doing now is barely good enough to pass."

Bao Liang grinned. "Of course we passed. Just look who was leading the team."

"Quit putting gold on your own face," Xiao Hongchen scoffed. "I'm the captain!"

"All right, all right. You're the captain, you're the captain."

Caught between the two of them, Meng Hongchen could not help bursting into laughter.

The three took turns picking out the flaws in their fight, then correcting them one by one. Their expressions were so serious that they hardly looked their age.

From the shadows, Jing Hongchen watched the three children, who had been somewhat uncoordinated at first but had quickly finished the fight, then calmly reviewed it and corrected their mistakes afterward. His face was full of a gratified smile.

He thought back to when he was their age. He had never had companions with such rapport, much less anyone watching over him.

Now these three children were each more shrewd than the last, yet they had twisted themselves into a single rope-Bao Liang's ferocity on the charge, Xiao Hongchen's steadiness holding the rear, and Meng Hongchen's agility in covering gaps came together more smoothly than in many teams of adult Soul Masters.

He quietly withdrew without disturbing them.

Deeper in the Star Dou Great Forest, more blood and harder battles still awaited these children.