The chill of a winter morning permeated the air as Luo Feng stood on the balcony of the twelfth-floor room, the icy breath against his face jolting him instantly awake.
“It must be five or six degrees below zero,” Gao Feng said, walking over with a smile.
“It’s certainly cold.”
Luo Feng looked down from the balcony, pointing toward the monstrous beasts already sniffing out prey below. “But look at the number of monsters in this complex so early in the morning! I can see twelve beasts in my immediate view, and three of them are Beast General level! Tsk, City No. 003 truly lives up to its reputation as a monster den.”
Gao Feng chuckled as well.
Indeed, in a regular county town, a single Beast General would typically command a retinue of hundreds of regular monsters, marching proudly with followers all around. The county where Luo Feng had previously honed his blade skills had Beast Generals leading hundreds, even thousands, of ordinary Soldier-level beasts!
The fewer Beast Generals in a county, the larger the swarms of ordinary monsters they commanded! But here in City No. 003, even in the suburbs, a Beast General usually led only two or three Soldier-level subordinates. Some were even solitary commanders, completely unattached.
“These are the weaker Beast Generals; they don't have many followers! The truly formidable High-Level Beast Generals, or even Lord-level monsters—those lead armies numbering in the tens of thousands!” Gao Feng glanced back at the others. “Everyone, snap out of it. Let’s head down and hunt some monsters!”
“Let’s go, brothers, time to make money,” Chen Gu quipped, grinning.
“City No. 003 is incredible! Beast Generals are everywhere you look!” Wei Qing and Wei Tie’s eyes gleamed with excitement.
City No. 003 was dangerous!
But where there was crisis, there was opportunity. Although there were too many powerful monsters—and insufficient strength meant certain doom, even the strong could be wiped out if surrounded by a pack—the Beast Generals here generally lacked large entourages. This made hunting a Beast General significantly easier!
Swish! Swish! Swish!
Luo Feng stood at the stairwell, sweeping his mental energy around the corner. He waved a hand. “It’s clear. No monsters within twenty meters.”
Corners were prime locations for lurking monsters to launch surprise attacks, but Luo Feng’s psychic power was the ultimate detector.
“It pays to follow a Psychic!” Chen Gu chuckled darkly.
“Everyone be careful. Don’t make a sound. Monsters have sharp hearing,” Gao Feng shot Chen Gu a glare, silencing him instantly.
Luo Feng took the lead, with Gao Feng covering the rear. Wei Tie and Wei Qing took the flanks, and Chen Gu remained in the center!
“Hmm?” Luo Feng’s gaze settled on three Monoceros Boar monsters about a hundred meters ahead. The leader was massive, its single horn a deep, absolute black. Unlike the gray fur of ordinary monsters, every hair on its body resembled steel needles and had turned black. All this pointed to its status: a Low-Level Beast General!
“That’s the one,” Luo Feng whispered. “The Monoceros Boar in front—everyone watch your surroundings carefully. I’ll take it.”
Swish! Swish! Swish!
Luo Feng charged first. The four behind him naturally dispersed according to their formation, keeping alert for other Beast Generals or human martial artists who might interfere.
“Roar~~” The Beast General Monoceros Boar roared in fury as Luo Feng, a human, charged it. Its speed instantly spiked to one hundred meters per second—about 360 kilometers per hour—its horn aiming squarely at Luo Feng! Given its bulk, this impact force could shatter a truck.
Luo Feng held his Blood Shadow Battle Blade, maintaining his usual speed of sixty to seventy meters per second.
The two met in a flash!
Luo Feng’s speed surged instantly. He shifted his feet with precision down to the centimeter, dodging the Monoceros Boar completely. Luo Feng’s Blood Shadow Battle Blade sliced upward in a diagonal slash! During the strike, the blade accelerated twice in rapid succession, making it instantly blurry and ethereal—transforming into a hazy glow of light!
Whoosh!
The cold blade light struck like a bolt of lightning. A sharp beam instantly cut across the Monoceros Boar’s neck, and then, like dissipating mist, the light vanished instantly!
Blade Technique—Thunderclap! The first strike was effective!
Thwack! Thwack!
Luo Feng’s Blood Shadow Battle Blade executed two seemingly casual cuts, instantly severing the throats of the other two Soldier-level Monoceros Boars.
“Rumble~~” The Beast General Monoceros Boar, its life force extinguished, continued its momentum, running forward another ten meters before it crashed heavily to the ground. It slid several meters before colliding with a thick, decades-old tree nearby, shaking the entire trunk before finally stopping.
“Tsk tsk, good job, kid. You wiped out a Low-Level Beast General with just blade work,” Chen Gu and the others converged.
“Your improvement is significant,” Gao Feng said, clearly pleased, already moving to dissect the monster corpses.
Luo Feng mused internally: The combination of movement technique, blade skill, and vast experience made slaying a Low-Level Beast General this easy. Having personally killed over ten thousand monsters, Luo Feng maintained absolute calm against these creatures, utilizing his blade and movement skills with maximum finesse. Use the minimum force to eliminate the opponent instantly!
“Good, harvest complete,” Gao Feng smiled faintly. “Looks like we can clear quite a few Beast Generals in a single day.”
“Let’s move on to the next one,” Luo Feng smiled back.
The entire Fire Hammer Squad was invigorated.
...
In City No. 003, although they expected high efficiency in monster hunting, the reality of the combat proved astonishing. Luo Feng thought: Good heavens, this isn't hunting monsters; this is an automatic money-printing machine! The speed of the press couldn't even match how fast they were earning!
Important materials from a Low-Level Beast General typically sold for five million to fifteen million. Important materials from a Mid-Level Beast General typically sold for ten million to over one hundred million. Important materials from a High-Level Beast General typically sold for fifty million to around six or seven hundred million.
Of course, there were occasional exceptions—extremely rare monsters, or High-Level Beast Generals that bordered on Lord-level—naturally driving the price higher. But the vast majority fell within the ranges listed above.
The Fire Hammer Squad was killing nearly ten Beast Generals every day! Admittedly, almost all were Low-Level Generals! Their rate of acquisition was terrifyingly fast!
...
After ten consecutive days of intense effort, Luo Feng and his team had killed 92 Low-Level Beast Generals and three Mid-Level Beast Generals, accumulating an estimated total value of about one billion. Ten days of continuous, high-intensity combat left them quite fatigued, so they took a well-deserved day off. When they resumed hunting, the surrounding population of Beast Generals had noticeably thinned out.
The fifteenth day.
Everyone in the group was resting on the balcony of the twelfth floor of the eighteen-story building.
“Captain, we barely see any Low-Level Beast Generals in this immediate area anymore,” Chen Gu lamented.
“No choice; we’ve been hunting too aggressively lately,” Gao Feng chuckled. “But no need to worry. Monsters are highly migratory... My estimate is that within ten days, the monster population in this complex will build up again! All we have to do is wait quietly here, since we know this environment best.”
Luo Feng nodded in agreement. Over these ten-plus days, although the complex was large, they had memorized every corner.
“It’s still City No. 003 where the money flows fastest,” Wei Tie couldn’t help but sigh.
Although Luo Feng and Gao Feng were the main contributors, Wei Tie, Wei Qing, and Chen Gu also benefited significantly; after sharing the earnings, each of them had cleared over one hundred million! In the past, finding Beast Generals in those small counties and cities, Wei Tie and Wei Qing wouldn't earn a hundred million in an entire year. Now, they’d done it in fifteen days.
Of course— Greater reward meant greater danger! Over the past ten days, the Fire Hammer Squad had encountered one perilous attack by flying creatures. Luckily, they managed to hide indoors, and Luo Feng’s throwing knives were enough to frighten the avian monsters into fleeing.
“High earnings? Not that high,” Gao Feng laughed. “It’s completely normal for a Psychic to earn billions a year. The main reason we dare operate here is because of Luo Feng.”
“Haha,” Chen Gu, Wei Qing, and Wei Tie laughed in agreement.
“Captain, don’t put it like that. Having you all assist made the hunting process significantly more comfortable and straightforward,” Luo Feng said honestly. One person couldn’t possibly monitor dangers from all four directions simultaneously. With the other three team members responsible for vigilance and clearing minor threats, and the support of Gao Feng, a ‘Mid-Level Wargod,’ Luo Feng’s efficiency was greatly boosted.
Luo Feng and his team chatted easily, though their voices remained low.
“Hmm?” Chen Gu, leaning on a heavy sniper rifle, suddenly muttered quietly while looking through the optical scope down below. “Damn, a big one’s coming!”
“What is it?” Luo Feng and the other four simultaneously grabbed their binoculars.
Luo Feng focused his gaze...
On a distant residential building, the corner walls were covered in moss and vines. Currently coiled upon these vines was a colossal python, thick as a human waist and nearly twenty meters long. This snake was covered in nearly parallel black stripes, and these stripes grew thicker the closer they got to the head! At the very front segment of the huge snake, the pattern split into two triangular serpent heads, the foreheads of which possessed slight bulges.
“Damn, is that a ‘Blackline’ viper, known for its potent venom?!” Gao Feng cursed softly. “And it’s a mutated version, a ‘Two-Headed Blackline Snake?’ It’s even starting to grow horns—it’s almost a Flood Dragon!”
Luo Feng sucked in a sharp breath. A mutated, two-headed Blackline Snake on the verge of becoming a Flood Dragon? This creature would not be easy to handle!
———— P: Should they try to take down this behemoth? .