"Quickly, quickly! Move it! Monarch Flynn has ordered all Fire Elements to assemble and form an army. We’re heading south to teach those wretched Water Elements a lesson!"
"Move your asses! If you delay the Monarch’s business, I’ll personally rip out your Element Cores and toss them into the South Sea to let you soak to death!"
A Mythic-tier Fire Element Lord stood atop a small volcanic crater. There were nearly a hundred such craters in the vicinity.
Fire Elements continuously drifted out of the craters, lining up into orderly phalanxes.
Thanks to elemental summoning magic, the elements had learned about the warfare and military structures of the human transcendent world. Over the ages, they had developed their own unique elemental formations.
These phalanxes were composed of eighty percent Fire Elements and twenty percent Lava Elements.
Lava Elements were a higher evolution of Fire Elements. They burned at higher temperatures and had integrated a portion of the earth attribute, granting them significantly stronger defensive capabilities.
In addition to the standard phalanxes, a group of special squads had gathered around the Fire Element Lord. Every member of these squads was a Mutated Fire Element.
They usually possessed three or more elemental attributes and were far more powerful than ordinary elements.
Generally speaking, those who weren't powerful enough had simply died during the mutation process.
Hidden beneath the volcano, Flideng listened to the Fire Element Lord’s shouts and commands, calculating his next move.
The Fire Elements were attacking the Water Elements? Strange. Could they be in the middle of a competition for the Element Overlord position?
Flideng was unfamiliar with the customs of the Elemental Spirit Realm. He simply assumed they had a traditional culture of competing for the Overlord title, much like the Land of the Undead, and subconsciously projected that onto them.
Flideng remained in stealth for a while longer, intending to gather more intelligence before he started harvesting Element Cores.
After all, he had made a solemn vow. If he failed this time, even if Chen Xu spared his life out of old friendship, any future chances for promotion would likely be gone forever.
So, Flideng continued to wait. Just as the Fire Elements here had finished assembling, a bolt of lightning struck the ground, followed by a rolling peal of thunder.
A Mythic-tier Lightning Element Lord descended and approached the Fire Element Lord.
The Lightning Element Lord nodded in satisfaction at the assembled Fire Element army.
"Impressive. Lord Explosive Flame, your speed is remarkable—much faster than the other lords. I will be sure to record this and report it to the Monarchs."
"Heh, then I must thank you, Lord Thunderbolt."
"No need for thanks. It is my duty."
With that, the Lightning Element Lord produced a map and handed it to the Fire Element Lord.
"Lord Explosive Flame, your mission is to head southeast. Stand by at Camp Number Seven on the map. We need to prevent those wooden-heads and mud-piles from getting any ideas about interfering in our business."
"Understood, Lord Thunderbolt."
"Good."
Having delivered the orders, the Lightning Element Lord transformed back into a bolt of lightning and shot into the sky.
Boom!
The thunder rolled again. A second later, the Lightning Element Lord reached the dark clouds above.
However, it quickly realized something was wrong. The air was too cold. An extreme chill was freezing its body, and even its soul’s thought process was slowing down.
Before the Lightning Element Lord could struggle, a pale hand covered in frost punched through its back and out of its chest, dragging its Element Core out of its body.
Deprived of its core, the Lightning Element Lord instantly lost consciousness. Without resistance, its body was overtaken by the spreading frost and frozen into a peculiar elemental ice sculpture.
The owner of that pale hand was, of course, Flideng.
Without a word, Flideng swallowed the lightning-attribute core and began to absorb it.
The soul within the core tried to resist, but Flideng, bolstered by the power he had borrowed through his Off-Duty talent, ruthlessly crushed it. Moments later, the core was fully absorbed.
With the support of his ghost traits and the Soul of Freedom talent, a faint trace of lightning attribute was born within Flideng.
Flideng sensed it carefully; the lightning attribute was still too weak. He estimated he would need ten more cores to unlock a new form—specifically, the Nether Ghost Fire form that wielded the power of lightning.
Along with the elemental attribute, Flideng also gained the element’s recent memories from its soul fragments.
The Element Overlord was missing, the Guardians were enraged, and the Fire Element Monarch Flynn had suggested striking at the Water Elements. The armies were on the move.
At this point, Flideng had a complete understanding of the current situation in the Elemental Spirit Realm.
He first sent this information to Chen Xu before beginning to map out his hunting plan.
"Since Lightning and Fire are at war with Water, I might as well make the waters even murkier."
With a flick of his wrist, Flideng tossed the ripped-open elemental remains toward the ground.
Below, the Fire Element Lord keenly sensed a chill descending from the sky. It looked up and saw an ice sculpture falling.
What terrified it even more was the shape of the sculpture; it was the Lightning Element Lord who had just left.
While the Fire Element Lord was still in shock, Flideng quietly appeared behind it. His right hand, covered in extreme frost, reached out and effortlessly pierced through the Fire Element Lord’s chest.
The core was ripped out. Before the Fire Element Lord could even react, it lost all ability to resist.
Flideng repeated his trick, letting his frost power explode to freeze the Fire Element Lord’s remains into an ice sculpture. He intentionally let the ice power spread, freezing many of the surrounding Fire Elements and even sealing a nearby volcanic crater in ice.
With that done, Flideng swallowed the core. As he absorbed it, he rushed toward the next location.
The Lightning Element Lord had been a messenger. Its memories contained the locations of many other Fire Element Lords.
Flideng planned to start with the Mythic-tier Fire and Lightning Element Lords to gather enough elemental energy. Once he unlocked his new forms, he would head south to the Water Elements' territory.
Once there, he would go on a rampage using the powers of fire and lightning.
Heh. By then, the conflict between the races would be pushed to the breaking point, leaving them exhausted from fighting each other. Only then could he, the assassin hiding in the shadows, continuously harvest them.
Flideng’s slaughter was incredibly efficient. His ethereal ghost body allowed him to ignore the complex terrain of the Elemental Spirit Realm, letting him zip between volcanoes with ease.
Before long, over a hundred Fire and Lightning Element Lords had been ripped open and stripped of their cores by Flideng.
By fusing a massive number of cores, Flideng successfully unlocked the Nether Ghost Fire form that wielded lightning and the Explosive Flame Red Spirit form that wielded fire.
The hundred ice sculptures he left behind threw the Lightning and Fire Elements into a state of blind fury.
The name of the "Element Ripper" began to spread across the volcanic lands.
Since the risk of exposure had increased, Flideng turned his gaze toward the south.
Flideng’s form shifted. The frost on his body vanished instantly, replaced by arcs of lightning that coursed through his transparent spirit body.
A bolt of lightning shot into the sky, vanishing into the clouds as it raced toward the south.
...
On the other side, Chen Xu had quietly bypassed several Element Guardians and arrived at the Overlord's Palace—the residence of the Element Overlord.
After receiving the message from Flideng, Chen Xu had been puzzled. This was the Elemental Spirit Realm; who could possibly kill a World Lord inside their own world without making a sound?
Yet Chen Xu truly could not sense any other presence of the same tier within this world. Thus, he arrived at the Overlord's Palace, prepared to investigate.
However, since this was the residence of a Unique-tier being, Chen Xu did not plan to enter with his true body.
"Flesh Curse of the Life-Essence branch: Aberrant Sarcoma Avatar."
Chen Xu cast the curse upon himself. A lump of flesh rapidly bulged at the tip of his pinky finger.
Once the lump grew to the size of an egg, it detached from his body, fell to the ground, and transformed into Chen Xu’s likeness.
Then, with a thought, he altered the mini-Chen Xu’s appearance to look exactly like the Lord of Heaven.
After that, Chen Xu submerged back into the ground, using his mental strength to control the miniature Lord of Heaven as it entered the Overlord's Palace.
As soon as he stepped inside, Chen Xu sensed a dense aura of resentment and vengeful souls.
Seeing this, Chen Xu couldn't help but complain to himself.
"Is this really an elemental palace?"
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