Chapter 76 Chapter 76 "Inert Beast Core Power"...
After taking care of the defense and wounded at Outpost No. 3 and receiving two healing team members urgently dispatched from Outpost No. 7, Renata readjusted the deployment.
Given the unique roles demonstrated by Jiang Qing and Zhu Tianba, whether it is spatial mobility, perception of ice cores, or the unexpected emergency treatment.
Renata decided to give them greater autonomy.
"Jiang Qing, you and Zhu Tianba will form a reconnaissance team. Prioritize searching for ice cores or high-value resource locations." Renata pointed at the map on the screen. "This area, near the 'Sleepy Fjord,' has complex terrain, making it difficult for a large force to quickly explore. I'll leave it to you."
"Keep communication open, evacuate immediately if in danger, and put your own safety first."
"I understand." Jiang Qing nodded. She was also looking for an opportunity to test Zhu Tianba's deep perception of ice energy, and... see if she could find another "beast core source power" similar to the crystal.
After a little preparation, Jiang Qing took Zhu Tianba and quietly left the No. 3 outpost, blending into the vast snow and wind.
The closer we got to Howling Fjord, the stronger the wind and snow became, the visibility became extremely low, and the temperature dropped sharply.
Even though Jiang Qing was wearing special warm clothes, he still felt the coldness penetrate every corner.
"Tianba, how's your perception?" Jiang Qing buried his face in his hood, his voice muffled.
Zhu Tianba stood on her shoulder, a faint blue light emanating from his body, dispelling the biting cold.
It closed its eyes and carefully felt the air fluctuations around it.
[The ice is very thick, and there are undercurrents underneath.] Zhu Tianba delivered a vague message.
"I feel it's very warm there, and I can't help but want to get closer." Zhu Tianba opened his eyes and said to Jiang Qing.
Jiang Qing pondered for two seconds. The feeling of "warmth" was a bit strange. After all, the beast core power used to be only cold.
"Show the way." Jiang Qing said.
Under the guidance of Zhu Tianba, Jiang Qing trekked across the ice field, taking one deep step and one shallow step.
The snow covered almost all traces. If it weren't for Zhu Tianba's unique perception of energy and space, it would be impossible to determine the direction.
Suddenly, Zhu Tianba warned: [The ice ahead is very thin, be careful when walking across.]
Jiang Qing suddenly stopped and carefully tested the front with his feet.
Beneath the accumulated snow, there was indeed an unsteady hollow sound coming from the ice surface.
She was about to go around when her footing suddenly loosened without warning.
"boom--"
It was as if the entire ice surface had collapsed. There was no time to react and the feeling of weightlessness came over me instantly.
The surrounding snow and ice mixed with broken ice fell on his head.
Jiang Qing only had time to scream before he was swallowed by endless cold and darkness.
Zhu Tianba reacted extremely quickly. With a flash of silver light, he tried to activate a short-distance teleportation to take her away, but the falling speed and the chaotic energy field interfered with the spatial positioning, and the teleportation failed. He could only hold on to her collar tightly and fall together.
“Plop—”
Jiang Qing bent his waist in the safest position, holding Zhu Tianba and falling straight down. His back touched the ice field, and a piece of snow splashed.
The huge impact force made Jiang Qing's eyes go dark and his internal organs seemed to shift.
Fortunately, there was thick snow underneath to cushion the blow, otherwise I would have been seriously injured.
The freezing sea water instantly soaked through her clothes, making her shiver.
She actually fell into a huge cavity under the ice. It seemed to be a layer between the ice and the sea water, half of which was ice and the other half was dark and cold sea water.
"Cough cough..." Jiang Qing struggled to get up. He was soaked and his teeth were chattering from the cold.
She quickly checked herself and fortunately, apart from some abrasions and frostbite, she had no serious injuries such as fractures.
"Kang..." A weak response came from the side.
Zhu Tianba was crawling out of a pile of broken snow and shaking off the icy water on his body. He was also very cold, but it didn't seem like any problem.
Jiang Qing breathed a sigh of relief and immediately took out a spare emergency thermal blanket from his tactical bag and wrapped it around Zhu Tianba. He then wrapped another blanket around him before looking around the ice cave.
The space here is not big, as if it was forcibly opened up. There is cracked ice above the head, and faint light can be seen through it.
The ice walls around are rugged and steep, covered with thick frost.
What is even more eye-catching is that the dark water area in the center of the ice cave emits white mist on the surface, which makes people feel uncomfortable just by looking at it.
Zhu Tianba lowered his head and sniffed the ground, his nose twitching. He raised his head and tried to identify the smell in the wind and snow.
Its attention was suddenly drawn to one side. At the same time, the dark water surface silently broke open, and a pale shadow shot towards Jiang Qing like an arrow.
It was a strange-looking spirit beast, shaped like both a fish and a lizard, its entire body covered in pale, bone-like ice armor. It had only one large, single eye on its head, which flashed with cold malice.
Its mouth opened, revealing a dense mass of icicle-like teeth.
"What the hell?!"
Jiang Qing reflexively opened the golden light shield for defense.
When the shadow gradually slowed down, Jiang Qing instantly recognized this ice-type beast that was famous for its ambush and sneak attacks.
It has a nice yet scary name: "Cold Abyss Stalker".
This guy was extremely powerful in the extremely cold environment, and he obviously regarded them as prey for invading his territory.
The Frost Abyss Hunter was extremely fast, and a pale beam of freezing light shot out from its single eye, heading straight for Jiang Qing.
“Crack!”
The freezing beam hit the light shield, making a sharp cracking sound. A thick layer of ice quickly condensed on the surface of the light shield, and the coldness continued to penetrate through the light shield.
Zhu Tianba reacted extremely quickly, opening his mouth and spraying out a high-pressure water cannon, which accurately hit the side of the Hanyuan Stalker, knocking it staggering and interrupting its attack.
But at such a low temperature, the water cannon almost instantly froze a layer of ice on its surface, which was like adding a layer of armor to it.
"Tianba, don't use water abilities. Its ice resistance is too high. Use the space blade to interfere with it." Jiang Qing shouted hurriedly. At the same time, he drew out the gun from his waist, poured source power into it, and was ready for battle.
In this environment, her beast taming talent skill has limited effect, and close combat is more reliable.
Zhu Tianba immediately changed his strategy, with silver light flashing in his eyes. Tiny cracks in space appeared like invisible blades, cutting towards the Hanyuan Stalker.
The Frost Abyss Stalker let out a hoarse and unpleasant scream. The bone armor on its body was extremely hard, and the spatial blade could only leave a shallow white mark on it, but it successfully attracted its attention.
It suddenly changed direction, and its thick tail swept towards Zhu Tianba like a steel whip. The strong wind it brought even blew away the snow on the ground.
Zhu Tianba used his small body and spatial flashes to dodge flexibly, and occasionally used spatial confinement to try to restrict his movements, but due to the level gap and environmental suppression, the effect was not significant.
Jiang Qing saw the opportunity and stepped forward suddenly. With the sound of breaking wind, the dagger stabbed fiercely into the relatively soft abdominal joint of the Hanyuan Hunter.
“Buzz!!”
The dagger stabbed, but it was like it had pierced the hardest alloy, only a few ice chips flew out, and the shock made Jiang Qing's wrist numb.
The Cold Abyss Hunter felt pain, and the fierce light in his one eye became even brighter. He gave up Zhu Tianba, turned his head and bit Jiang Qing, and a fishy and cold air hit his face.
Jiang Qing rolled backwards in a panic, narrowly avoiding the bite. The cold teeth scraped across her mask, leaving several clear scratches.
Jiang Qing's brain was working rapidly and his eyes swept around.
The space in this ice cave is limited, and the activities of the Cold Abyss Stalkers are also restricted. Perhaps they can take advantage of the terrain.
"Tianba, attack the ice top above it." Jiang Qing conveyed the idea to Zhu Tianba.
Zhu Tianba understood what he meant and immediately fired several compressed water arrows at the ice spikes above the head of the Hanyuan Hunter.
The water arrows froze and expanded rapidly under low temperatures, impacting the already unstable ice top and causing it to become shaky.
“Rustle, rustle—”
Large chunks of ice mixed with snow fell down, smashing into the Frost Abyss Stalker.
The Frost Abyss Stalker roared angrily and swung its claws to shatter the falling ice, but it was still knocked dizzy and its movements were delayed for a moment.
Jiang Qing was waiting for this moment.
A fierce look flashed in Jiang Qing's eyes, and he poured all his energy into the dagger without reservation, forcibly attacking the single eye of the Cold Abyss Hunter.
The Frost Abyss Stalker let out a painful scream, his single eye instantly became bloodshot, and his movements became stiff.
Zhu Tianba and Jiang Qing were in tune with each other. Almost at the same time, they gave up all their fancy techniques and used the surrounding ice and snow to rub into an extremely sharp, almost invisible ice cone.
Like the most precise scalpel, it followed the momentary pause created by Jiang Qing's mental shock and shot into the wide-open mouth of the Cold Abyss Hunter like lightning, penetrating directly into the brain.
“Z—”
After a muffled sound, the huge body of the Cold Abyss Hunter trembled violently, and the fierce light in its single eye quickly dimmed.
The Frost Abyss Stalker transformed into a diamond-shaped block in a bizarre way, and then with a "pop" sound, Jiang Qing's eyes seemed to be covered with a layer of mosaic.
The body of the Frost Abyss Stalker was blurred out, which was not there in the previous game.
This means Ji Changsu is nearby.
It’s not that she is at the stadium at the moment, but Ji Changsu ran here from school specifically to watch their game.
Jiang Qing stared at the air. Two seconds later, a blue-gray drone flew into the cave. After scanning the cave, it paused on Jiang Qing's face.
Finally, he flew over and took a photo of the blurred body of the Frost Abyss Stalker.
Then a familiar broadcast voice sounded in the stadium.
The Fifth Beastmaster Academy successfully killed the Frost Abyss Stalker, granting the temporary status "Frost Hunter's Resilience": Increases ice resistance and slightly increases stamina recovery. Duration: 3 hours.
In just a moment, everyone in the Fifth Academy felt a warm current flowing into their bodies, dispelling some of the coldness and alleviating a lot of fatigue.
The man and the strange beast sat on the ground for a short while to rest and eat something.
While she was developing a relationship with Zhu Tianba, she suddenly saw something in the distance out of the corner of her eye.
"Um?"
Jiang Qing immediately became excited, put Zhu Tianba behind his mind, stood up and rubbed his eyes.
On the ice in the distance, a white crystal shimmered slightly in the sunlight, and a beam of sunlight penetrated the crack in the ice and shone in, which was very obvious at a glance.
Looking to the side along the white crystal, Jiang Qing saw a dying white giant mosaic.
Judging from the intelligent mosaic, this thing should be a living organism, and a dead one at that.
Jiang Qing estimated the distance between her and the mosaic body. The straight-line distance was less than ten meters, and it might take ten minutes to walk there.
Because there was no straight line between her and the thing, the space under the ice was complex, and it would take some time to jump up and down.
Jiang Qing stepped carefully on the slippery ice and approached the blurry white mosaic area.
Zhu Tianba, contrary to his previous tiredness, became extremely excited and circled back and forth at her feet.
This reaction... is so familiar!
Jiang Qing's heart skipped a beat and he understood instantly.
What else could make Zhu Tianba so excited, besides that strange "beast core power"?
She unexpectedly met someone by accident in this desperate situation.
No…that’s not it.
It's Zhu Tianba's luck.
Ever since Zhu Tianba had awakened more than halfway, her luck had also improved.
Jiang Qing looked at Zhu Tianba suspiciously, thinking that one of its skills must be a lucky skill.
She walked up to the huge, constantly distorting and changing mosaic, unable to see what was hidden behind it.
Is it the corpse of another Frost Abyss Stalker, or the remains of some other ice-type spirit beast?
unknown.
The only thing that can be confirmed is that the "beast core source power" sensed by Zhu Tianba is behind this blurry mass.
She tentatively reached out her hand, and her fingertips touched the invisible shielding barrier. It was cold and tough, impenetrable, and her visual and physical perception were completely blocked.
"The principal's ability is really..." Jiang Qing shook his head, withdrew his hand with a headache, and walked half a circle around the mosaic.
Zhu Tianba was so anxious that he used his nose to push the invisible barrier, but he touched nothing and could only worry about the air.
Under the principal's ability, both humans and animals will be affected by the "filter".
"I can't see... I can't see..." Zhu Tianba sounded aggrieved and anxious.
"Don't worry, now that we've confirmed it's here, there's always a way." Jiang Qing comforted Zhu Tianba while observing carefully.
She found that although Zhu Tianba was extremely excited, he did not show any uncontrollable pain or strong sense of energy impact like he did last time when he encountered the water-attribute beast core source power.
The fluctuations emitted by the "Beast Core Source Power" this time seemed very restrained, one could even say... silent.
"This one seems a little different?" Jiang Qing pondered. "I don't feel a strong energy leak, nor do I feel that kind of chaotic mental impact."
Zhu Tianba: "I feel like eating it will be very comfortable!"
Inert beast core power?
Jiang Qing immediately recalled a conjecture that Teacher Chen Ming had briefly mentioned.
Some beast core source forces may be in an inert state due to the environment or their own characteristics, with low energy and extremely difficult to detect, but once they are correctly stimulated or absorbed, they may have unexpected effects.
The one in front of you is most likely an inert ice-attributed beast core source of power.
Luck strikes again.
After easily finding the beast core source power again, she encountered an inert beast core source power.
Inertia means that it is relatively safe at the moment. It will not actively emit dangerous energy to cause trouble, nor will it immediately cause huge absorption pressure on Zhu Tianba.
But there are also troubles.
The principal's mosaic perfectly shields it and its carrier.
She couldn't see where the source power was exactly or what form it took, let alone how to collect it safely.
Forcibly destroy the principal's shield?
She had never even thought about it; it was simply unrealistic.
Jiang Qing stood where he was, looking at the distorted and blurry area before him, then at Zhu Tianba who was running around in a panic, and quickly thought of a countermeasure.
Wait? Wait for the principal to leave?
Jiang Qing shook his head and directly rejected the idea.
Suddenly, an idea struck her.
"Tianba, although you can't see or touch it, you can clearly sense its location, right? The exact location?" Jiang Qing squatted down and looked into Zhu Tianba's eyes.
Zhu Tianba nodded affirmatively.
Jiang Qing immediately took out a spare high-intensity energy isolation bag and a fluorescent signal stick for marking from his tactical backpack.
She broke the signal stick, which emitted a faint cold light, and handed it to Zhu Tianba. "Tianba, carefully sense the core of that object. Then, use your spatial ability to send this glowing little thing as accurately as possible to the nearest place. Can you do it?"
Zhu Tianba instantly understood Jiang Qing's intention, his eyes lit up: "No problem."
It held the dimly glowing signal stick in its mouth, concentrating its mind, and the diamond-shaped mark on its forehead flickered.
The next moment, it shook its little head, and the signal stick was instantly wrapped in a layer of imperceptible silver light, and disappeared with a "whoosh".
Almost at the same time, inside the huge mosaic barrier, somewhere close to the inner wall of the barrier, a faint light lit up.
Although it was still blurry and distorted when viewed through the mosaic, that clear fluorescent light, like a beacon in the darkness, accurately marked the approximate location of the inert beast's core power.
With this mark, she can know where the target is even if she can't see it.
She took out another energy isolation bag, carefully compared it to the position of the external marking point, opened the bag, aimed it in that direction, and got as close to the invisible shielding barrier as possible.
"Tianba, try again. This time use the smallest force possible and see if you can transfer that thing directly into the bag through this barrier?" Jiang Qing held his breath. This was the most daring attempt.
Zhu Tianba concentrated and tried, and a silver light flashed at the mouth of the bag, but then he shook his head in frustration: "No... This invisible wall is too hard, and I can't get through it."
Sure enough, the principal’s shielding was not that simple.
Jiang Qing was not too disappointed, as this was within expectations.
"It doesn't matter, we already know where it is." Jiang Qing put away the bag and looked at the mosaic and the faint light inside.
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