Monster Paradise

Looking at the quiet pool before him, Lin Huang frowned. Since the Specter needed more than 40 minutes to get to the bottom of the pool, that meant the pool was deep. Although he got a diving suit from Xue Jie during the Reserve Hunter assessment, he was not sure if he could dive that deep even with the suit. Furthermore, there was no way for him to breathe underwater. With his iron-level rank-1 body, the air pressure at such great depths could be an issue for him.

After much thought, Lin Huang came up with a plan. He would use a Provisional Transformation Card to transform himself into the Specter. As long as he was in spirit form, he could pass through things and even dive deep into the water without a worry.

"I still have five Provisional Transformation Cards, each card will allow me the ability to transform for an entire day. Even if this takes more than a day, the most I’d use up would only be two cards," he thought. After figuring out how many Provisional Transformation cards he needed, he took out one of them.

"Transform into the Specter," Lin Huang confirmed the monster that he was transforming into and crushed the card. After the card was crushed, it turned into a white glow that enveloped his body. Soon there were changes to his body. Within seconds, he became grayish black, translucent cloud. He looked exactly the same as the Specter. He recalled Bai and instructed the Specter, "Lead the way, I’ll follow you into the water."

the Specter floated slowly to the middle of the pool and dove in the water. Lin Huang hesitated for a moment, but then followed suit. Although he knew that the form he was currently transformed into would not be affected by water, it was still uncomfortable for him. After successfully diving into the water, Lin Huang did not feel any pressure at all. He could only sense that the temperature around him was dropping. As he followed the Specter into the pool, there were no obstacles before them. It felt the same as when he was floating into the air. He also realized that in this form, breathing was unnecessary and he had no heartbeat. As he dove deeper, he began getting the hang of his new body.

More than 10 minutes later, Lin Huang arrived at the bottom of the pool with the guidance of the Specter. He noticed that the size of the pool was much bigger than the one he saw from above. the Specter then pointed in a direction and led the way for Lin Huang. Following the Specter, Lin Huang saw a slope towards an underground cave after about six minutes. Undercurrents were flowing into the cave.

"Let’s take a look." Lin Huang instructed the Specter. It dived into the cave and Lin Huang followed.

The underground cave was long and narrow. Lin Huang followed the Specter for almost half an hour before they arrived at the other side of the cave. Coming out on the other side, he realized that they were at an underground river. He got out at the water and into an underground world. There was dry land next to the river with countless stalactites above, hanging almost 10 meters from the ground. There were so many caves around the place and Lin Huang had no idea which way he should go.

Lin Huang got out of the water. He then recalled the Specter and summoned Bai. Bai could attack at the longest distance and he was the second strongest among Lin Huang’s monsters right after Charcoal. Moreover, his size was perfect for the mission. Although he knew that the river water had washed away most of the scent for Leng Yuexin and the rest, Lin Huang decided to activate anyway. He wanted to see if he could find even the slightest clue with it, which was better than nothing.

Lin Huang did not catch their scent after was activated, but he caught a whiff on the intense iron-like scent of blood in the air. Aside from blood, he caught the scent of an unfamiliar odor that was similar to a plant but was very unpleasant. Although his expression could not be seen as he was transformed into the Specter, Lin Huang was frowning. The pungent smell made him uncomfortable.

He hesitated for a while and decided to look for the source of the bloody smell to get to the bottom of the mystery. That was the one and only clue that might lead him to Leng Yuexin.

"Here..." Lin Huang pointed towards the direction of the smell. Bai nodded and led the way while Lin Huang followed behind him. In the complicated underground cave, Lin Huang and Bai made many turns as they followed the scent. Almost an hour later, they finally arrived near their destination.

"Slow down, be careful," Lin Huang said to Bai. Bai then slowed down after he heard Lin Huang’s instructions. 10 minutes later, he saw a light after a turning. He peered around at the light source. It was a massive cave that was nearly 100 meters high. In the middle of the cave, there was a light blue semi-transparent monster that floated in the air. The light was coming from the monster’s body. This monster looked like a deep-sea jellyfish from Earth. To be exact, it was more like a deformed deep-sea jellyfish. Not only was it many times bigger, there were countless eyeballs of different color on its body. Some were closed while some were opened. Those that were closed were filled with spots of various colors. Its tentacles were swaying in the air like the flowing dress of a lady during the summer festival.

Lin Huang recognized it as the transcendent monster immediately as the aura coming off the monster was even stronger than the black python that he encountered earlier. The unpleasant scent that he caught from Blood Hunt was coming from this monster together with the smell of blood. Lin Huang then activated Boundless Vision and looked around the transcendent monster. Aside from blood on the ground, he did not see Leng Yuexin and the rest.

"Could they have been eaten by the monster?" Just when Lin Huang was thinking, the transcendent monster seemed to sense a disturbance. Its light blue tentacles darted towards the cave entrance where Lin Huang was located at the speed of light. Lin Huang recalled Bai immediately and flattened himself against the wall. The light blue tentacles seemed to detect Lin Huang even though he went through the cave walls. It looked around the cave and retracted its tentacles. Since it did not find anything at all, the transcendent monster thought it was being too sensitive to its surroundings.

Lin Huang was drenched in cold sweat. If he was a second too late, he would have been crushed to death by the monster. The attack of transcendent monsters worked on spirit-type monsters. He did not dare look in the monster’s direction anymore.

"Leng Yuexin and the rest should still be alive, if they were dead, Xiao Hei would definitely notify me that I failed the mission. The blood on the ground could possibly be theirs as they might have been hurt as they entered the underwater cavern. There were only two possibilities, they might be hidden by the monster somewhere else or they may have already escaped..." he thought.

"But if they’ve managed to escape, the description on the mission card would not ask me to look for Leng Yuexin and bring her back to Carefree City. The description was clear - Leng Yuexin was in some kind of trouble, so the first possibility was more likely. However, there’s another possibility where they may have managed to escape the battle but were badly injured so they were unable to leave Wangyou Forest..."

Lin Huang analyzed the situation and came up with the two most likely scenarios.