The Story Never Ends

Deep down the lake, there was a large number of rocks with shiny purple pearls attached to them. Nearby them, icy colored guardians looking like octopuses could be seen. They had many tentacles in their bodies and all of them were radiating energy belonging to the early stage of the Golden Core Stage.

However, they were not the most dangerous ones but rather the squid in the middle. Yes, a hundred-foot-tall squid was floating while holding a large pearl with its tentacles.

"It is at the peak stage of the Golden Core State and that pearl should be more than a hundred years old," Leyla said from the barrier.

"So, how are we going to strike?" Davion asked. He didn't care about anything except for the experience points.

"These guardians are all based on the ice element. As a result, we can use flames to counter them." She explained while glancing at Olivia. As for the earlier embarrassing incident, she had already thrown it out of her head.

"Ok! Then what do you want me to do?" Olivia questioned.

"I want you to make the first move and attract the attention of those guardians. Afterward, you can run and lead them some distance away from here," Leyla replied.

"Does this mean that we two will take this opportunity and attack the squid?" Davion guessed what she wanted to do.

"Of course. I heard from my mom that these guardians are really protective of their king. Thus, it will be very troublesome to deal with them at the same time. Not only that, who knows if the squid will try to escape by using them as bait?" Leyla clarified the situation.

"It would be even better if Olivia could trap them all with her formations until we finished dealing with the squid," She added.

Olivia nodded and said, "Leave them to me. With my strength, I will even be able to kill them."

"I trust you," Leyla smiled.

"However, Olivia, can you not kill them? I have some use for them." Davion suggested.

"As you say." She winked at him and went outside the barrier.

"Wew, she agreed to it without any hesitation. At least she is not causing me any trouble." Only thinking this way gave him some peace of mind.

Olivia after coming out didn't waste any time. She put her hands infront of her and produced many balls of flames.

"Go!" she yelled and the flames rushed downwards.

The guardians instantly became alert when they saw this. They made some noises as if communicating with each other and finally responded to these flames.

They released a cold breath from their siphons, and the water around them began freezing.

"Swish…"

Although her flames were strong enough to burn in water, they extinguished immediately after coming in contact with the ice that was forming around them.

The squid in the center saw everything clearly and felt that it didn't need to make a move. It believed that the enemy was weak, and its subordinates should be able to handle it. So, it just continued on absorbing the energy from the pearl.

"Humph" Seeing her attack not working, she felt annoyed.

"Let's see if you all can handle this." She, like earlier, threw out her needles. However, it was twice as many.

"Thirty-two Needles Star Formation"

The needles took the shape of a pentagram and when they shined a large image of a star could be seen.

"Flame Burial"

The star burned and released terrifying heat waves. The temperature of the water became so high that it began boiling and the ice protecting them had already melted. The guardians panicked when they saw this, but all of a sudden everything stopped.

"This should be enough…" she muttered and took back those needles. If she wanted, she could have used much more of her Qi and killed a lot of them. Nonetheless, this would have definitely caught the attention of that squid.

As she had thought, the squid indeed felt a bit threatened. It then produced some sounds and signaled them to attack her. The guardians didn't disobey it and swam towards her.

"Good!" Leyla exclaimed from inside the barrier.

"Indeed. Now, it's our turn," Davion reminded her.

Leyla withdrew her barrier and took out her whip. She then went ahead while Davion followed her behind with his halberd.

The squid was waiting for the good news when suddenly it saw a ring of lightning coming in its direction. It became furious and froze everything ahead of it. However, nothing happened to the ring but rather it became much larger. This was indeed the lightning ring spell used by Leyla in the Wild Northern Forest to capture Ryland.

The ring neared and bound it before it could react. Leyla smiled after seeing this, "How could my spell be this easy to crack?" But her smile froze in the blink of an eye.

She saw the squad sucking the ring like some food. After a few seconds, the ring had disappeared and it had freed itself. After this, it swung its tentacles in her direction. Bolts of lightning emerged from them and they reached her instantaneously.

"Don't underestimate it. It's already close to the Nascent Soul Stage." Davion came ahead of her and deflected them easily.

"Bang..Bang.."

Explosions took place as they crashed onto the nearby rocks.

"How could it be a double attributed guardian?" Leyla became shocked as it was her first time seeing it. Not only that, she would have suffered right now if Davion didn't intervene.

"Your cultivation is too low to fight with it head-on. I will engage with it in close combat and you use your abilities from the back." Without waiting for her reply, he had already dashed forward.

"You…" She opened her mouth and wanted to say something. But she didn't as she knew that what he said was true.

"It looks like he is far stronger than me. This might be the reason why mom convinced him to help me," She thought and shook her head, "I'm really naïve."

After reaching the middle stage of Golden Core State, she thought that she should be able to handle a late-stage Golden Core expert. But it seems like it is not true.

"I should work hard," she sighed and channeled her Qi into her whip.

"Lightning Serpents"

She swung her whip and produced many more serpents than previously during her fight with Ryland.

***

"Haiz, is this bullying?" Davion smiled as he dodged the tentacles filled with lightning coming for him. Then he tossed his halberd towards them. The halberd drew a circular arc and returned in his hands while chopping them off. In this way, it had already lost more than half of them. If it was made from flesh and blood, then it would surely die a long time ago.

However, due to being a lifeform born from energy, it was still alive and kicking well. But this could not be said for its emotion. It was getting irritated as it couldn't even touch a single strand of his hair after everything it had tried. Not only did its ice technique fail to freeze him, but its lightning techniques were also meaningless since he managed to dodge them all.

"Haha, look out!" Davion laughed all of a sudden and reminded it.

The squid knew what was about to happen. But it didn't react as it knew that it was pointless. Lightning serpents crashed on it causing explosions to take place.

"BOOM"

"Is it accepting its fate?" Davion was confused.

While he was pondering, he saw the squid beginning to enlarge. It became thrice as large in the speed visible to the naked eyes.

"Leyla, get back. It seems like it's desperate," Davion shouted.

"Be careful," She reminded him and swam upwards. She knew that she would be a burden if she stayed here.

"What is it trying to do? I can't sense anything extraordinary even with my Mind-Eye," He gazed at it with curiosity.

After a few minutes, the squid finally made a move. But Davion nearly coughed out blood after seeing it.

The squid shot out a huge amount of black ink from its siphons. The whole lake became black, and nothing could be seen. Then it began to run with the pearl.

"F**k" Davion cursed and revealed a trace of his true abilities. Dark lightning gathered on his halberd and he hacked it in its direction.

The inky water separated and a wide path of at least 20 feet diameter was formed. His lightning traveled in this path and destroyed everything on the way.

The squid detected a very dangerous aura coming from the back when it was running. So, it tried to change its direction. Even so, it was useless as the lightning was too fast.

"BOOOOM"

A large explosion occurred and similarly, a huge wave of water splashed out from the surface of the lake. From there, a young girl was hurled outside to one of the surrounding mountains.

"Bang"

She crashed on the ground and thought, "This power is definitely above the Golden Core Stage."

She slowly stood up and went near the lake. Yet, refrained from going inside as she was a bit scared.

"Is he safe? Olvia too..." Worry could be seen on her face.