Chapter 46: The King of Insects (Part 3)

"Cunning human brat!"

The tough, silvery fur that conventional weapons failed to pierce was breached by the Spirit Key. Even a minor injury was enough to enrage the Canine King.

In its eyes, Zhou Ke was an unquestionable weakling.

Yet mere weakling had carved a scar upon the body of a king; this was an absolute humiliation!

"Purple Sun Heaven!" It let out a prolonged howl as the aether boiled around its body, the searing, soaring high temperatures scorching the vegetation into a brilliant purple halo.

"Hey, hey, hey, I just hurt you a little and you're already throwing such a massive tantrum? That's not playing fair," Zhou Ke muttered with a slack, deadpan expression, pulling back and retreating in a hurry.

However, the temperature rose far too quickly, and coupled with the mountain forest being filled with flammable materials, it was only a moment before the purplish-crimson flames chased after Zhou Ke along the trees, his clothes already beginning to catch fire.

Without a moment of hesitation, he kicked off with heavy, powerful strides, leaping high into the air beyond the reach of the flames.

From a bird's-eye view, vast patches of greenery were inhabited by the rapidly expanding purple flames, turning into a gorgeous yet dangerous landscape across the sprawling suburban mountain.

"Where did that dog go?" Taking advantage of his airborne moment, Zhou Ke quickly locked onto the position of the Canine King.

The opponent hadn't moved an inch, but its fiercely glaring eyes were fixed squarely on him.

"What kind of expression is that? This doesn't look good..."

Just being stared at by that gaze filled Zhou Ke with a sense of impending crisis.

True to expectation, the roaring purple flames burning fiercely on the ground were not satisfied; they leaped toward the sky in unison, condensing into several fireballs that struck at Zhou Ke.

Zhou Ke's reaction was equally lightning-fast. Facing the suddenly incoming fireballs, he timely raised his blade to block in front of him.

A fireball aimed at his face collided with the edge of the blade, but instead of shattering, it made Zhou Ke feel an active will inside it continuously pushing and contending!

Gazing closely, a pair of vertically slit pupils were actually hidden within the fireball.

"This is?"

Using the pupils as the center, the fireball rapidly shifted into a solid outline, sprouting four legs and an upright, bushy tail, transforming into a miniature version of the Canine King.

The flame hound bit down on the blade of the Spirit Key, its sharp claws attempting to rake across Zhou Ke's neck.

Naturally, Zhou Ke was not going to sit still and await his doom. He shifted to a two-handed grip on the blade and slashed forward with all his might, finally cutting the flame hound all the way from its mouth to its tail.

For a normal creature, this would be an insurmountably fatal injury.

Yet the flame hound was neither normal nor a living creature.

Cut cleanly in half, it did not vanish. After a brief pause, the two clusters of purple flames transformed respectively into two flame hounds, launching another attack in a left-and-right pincer movement!

"Are you a dorayaki sprinkled with growth serum by Doraemon? How can you keep multiplying like this?"

Zhou Ke couldn't hold his ground this time; he adjusted his posture to dodge, only to be struck in the back by a third flame hound that shot upward, plunging straight down toward the ground.

Passing by a tall tree, he reached out and grabbed it, discharging the excess momentum through a 720-degree pull-up spin before stepping off the branch to leap back into high altitude.

Colliding head-on with the flame hounds diving downward, he took a deep breath and swung his blade in successive slashes.

The blade shadows swiftly formed a pitch-black moonlight, and the killing intent converged into a black-and-red torrent.

In the mere blink and reopening of an eye, the three flame hounds disintegrated completely, shattering into countless unidentifiable pieces.

Yet, in the very next second.

The purple flames, having split into countless fragments, existed independently and morphed into countless flame hounds, pursuing him with relentless, unending fury.

The sheer annoyance of it made even Zhou Ke slightly knit his brows. "Tch, endless."

He cast his gaze toward the Canine King hiding at the center of the towering sea of fire. "Does this mean you want me to take care of the main body first?"

"However, with my current aether capacity at the Ignis Seventh Tier, merely protecting my body amidst those flames won't last me thirty seconds."

"By then, the Canine King and the flame hounds will have me tightly surrounded, and there's a high probability I won't be able to run out of the firestorm..."

Even as Zhou Ke pondered, the flame hounds launched attack after attack. He weaved and dodged between tree branches and boughs while keeping his brain operating at high speed.

Faced with such fierce and frequent onslaughts, sustaining injuries was inevitable.

Yet, precisely because of his active train of thought, Zhou Ke's smile widened further and further.

If anyone were present, they would witness a madman laughing wildly as he danced hand in hand with the flames.

Before long, Zhou Ke noticed something—

No matter where he hid, even in blind spots extremely far away from the Canine King, those flame hounds were still tracking him.

"That shouldn't be. Could their vision be shared? Or is a dog's sense of smell developed to such an absurd degree?"

In a trance of hyper-focused concentration, he caught a glimpse of one of the flame hounds making an unnatural movement—its head had deviated to the right by at least twenty degrees as it lunged to bite.

"Huh?" Zhou Ke looked along the same direction, just in time to capture a few droplets of his own blood falling toward the ground under gravity.

"So that's how it is. It's the blood."

The moment Zhou Ke settled his thoughts, his left hand gripped the pitch-black blade of the Spirit Key tightly and suddenly slashed across. The blood gushing out in streams looked somewhat eerie under the illumination of the purple flames.

Flinging his left hand toward the sky, at the exact moment a large amount of blood was scattered outward, Zhou Ke's figure abruptly plunged downward.

The relentlessly pursuing flame hounds lost their reason at this point; ignoring Zhou Ke at a greater distance, they all lunged toward the masterless blood.

There was no room to catch a breath in the brief window; Zhou Ke swept rapidly close to the sea of fire.

The Canine King presumably had not anticipated his movement, and before it could react, a sword slash was carved across its chest.

Pain stimulated the nerves, and the Canine King flew into a towering rage, roaring harshly, "Homing Flame Blast!!!"

The active purple flames nearby gathered into countless flame hounds, their eyes splitting with fury as they bit toward Zhou Ke.

Earth-shaking heatwaves rose, distorting the air until it looked as though everything were melting.

Zhou Ke had no attachment to lingering in battle; embracing the tactical philosophy of "the more cowardly, the safer," he retreated twice as fast as he had advanced.

"Doing the math, it should be about time now."

Just as he was secretly calculating to himself, a colossal giant claw suddenly burst out from the wall of flames composed of flame hounds.

The giant claw did not swipe; instead, it rode the heatwave and charged toward Zhou Ke with an unstoppable, crushing momentum.

Wherever it passed, everything turned to scorched earth.

Vigorously growing tree trunks turned to ash upon the slightest touch, and stone steps that time could not wear away were baked until they cracked into brittle pieces.

Even with aether protection, Zhou Ke's upper garments directly vaporized, exposing the explosive and well-proportioned lines hidden beneath his thin layer of clothing.

The fiery tidal wave marched from the peak of the mountain down to its base, dyeing the sky over half the city a pale purple.

After the scorching heat subsided, near two or three charred residential buildings, Zhou Ke—who looked relatively unscathed—bent over slightly and tiredly, his aether completely exhausted.

Right in front of Zhou Ke, facing the mountain peak, the Canine King held flames in its jaws and bore a fresh wound on its chest and abdomen, yet its condition was visibly much better than his.

Victory and defeat seemed already self-evident.

"Any last words?"

In the murky air drifting with ash, it was unclear who had uttered those words.