Chapter 351: Chapter 350: Demonization Two-tailed Golden Scorpion Chapter 351: Chapter 350: Demonization Two-tailed Golden Scorpion The massive casualties did not deter the Insect Army, and the Insect Army continued to attack, led by numerous Double Silver Striped Beetles and even Silver Shell Beetles, charging at high speed toward the narrow pass.
Richard constantly released the Greasy Swamp spell, emotionlessly continuing to eliminate beetles. In this process, if he spotted any beetle that crossed through the fierce flames and threatened him by entering the pass, he would unhesitatingly release Cold Ice Fragments to nail it dead or use Wind Repulsion to knock it back into the flames. Even the extremely difficult Silver Shell Beetles couldn’t withstand many attacks and would turn into charred corpses.
“Whoosh whoosh whoosh!”
The flames kept burning.
“Rustle rustle rustle!”
The Insect Army attacked with all its might.
Standing in the narrow pass, Richard felt utterly calm, no longer worrying about the danger from the Insect Army. The pass, extremely narrow, was specifically designed to counteract the numerical advantage of the swarm. With the narrow pass in place, even if the Beetle Army tried its hardest, only a few beetles could squeeze through, and their numerical advantage was completely negated, allowing them to die off in batches in the flames.
Of course, the Insect Army had ways to solve this problem.
Richard noticed that after suffering heavy losses, the Insect Army no longer just attacked him blindly but shifted to purposefully destroying the pass. Some beetles even began to dig downwards, trying to excavate a tunnel that would bypass the pass and reach directly behind him.
“Creak crack creak crack…”
“Splash splash splash…”
“Scatter scatter scatter…”
Accompanied by the sound of beetles’ bodies charring, the frantic destruction of the pass, and the rapid digging underground continued resonating.
Finally, when Richard again released a spell attack, the narrow pass constructed with “Earth Stone Control” collapsed with a thunderous crash, and numerous beetiles burst out from the sea of fire, screaming as they charged. The ground beneath and behind Richard also cracked open, and several beetles successfully excavated a tunnel, emerging to attack.
Richard was not much surprised by this; he was completely prepared for the Insect Army to reach this point, otherwise he wouldn’t have designed the tunnel in the shape of a Three-section Gourd. The Three-section Gourd shape–representing three passes–meant that even if the first and second sections were lost, there were still the pass between the second and third sections, and the pass at the end of the third section.
The next moment, Richard’s lips parted, and he recited a spell, releasing a powerful Wind Repulsion that knocked away approaching attack beetles. Then, his body swiftly retreated into the second pass.
If beetles had greater intelligence, they would be furious at seeing Richard’s arrangement. They might either curse at Richard shamelessly and give up attacking, or think of another plan. However, the intelligence of the beetles was obviously not that high; they had only basic instincts and stress responses. Suddenly losing Richard as their attack target, they briefly hesitated before re-locking onto Richard and crawling towards him to launch an attack.
As they approached Richard, at some unknown time, a familiar black oily viscous liquid had appeared on the ground. The beetles struggled as they stepped on it, quickly getting stuck. Some lucky ones stepped on their companions’ bodies to move forward, but they soon also fell into the viscous liquid, then were continually stepped on by other companions behind. In a moment, numerous beetles had stuck together, black oily viscous liquid splashing everywhere.
Just then, a dark red spark fell, rapidly expanding and exploding.
Fierce flames engulfed everything, the terrifying high temperature searing every beetle’s body, repeating the earlier scenario.
Richard stood in the third pass, facing a hellish sight: heaps of insect corpses, charred heaps, broken clods of earth scattered messily on the ground, small clusters of flames hiding quietly in the corners burning silently.
Not far behind him was the exit, where strong winds constantly surged in due to the pressure difference, slightly dispersing the pungent smell of the scorched beetle carcasses.
It had to be said that the number of beetles was truly horrifying. As an Arsonist, Richard had been setting fires non-stop until now, finally managing to eliminate all the beetles; if it had been close combat, it might have taken months to kill them all.
There had been dangers during the arson as well. The Double Silver Striped Beetles and the Silver shell Beetles together had crossed through the sea of fire to launch an attack, directly overwhelming the second barrier and forcing Richard to retreat to the third.
But that was all; as it turned out, no matter how strong, the beetles couldn’t withstand the prolonged roasting by the flames. When the third barrier once again turned into a defensive position, the high-temperature passageway in front of it became the final resting place for the remaining beetles.
Taking a deep breath, Richard stepped forward, his boots treading on the still scorching surface of the passageway. While walking, he looked at the piles of insect corpses and pondered: What sustains the intake of food for so many beetles living in this tomb? And what kind of special ecological environment could be deeper inside this tomb?
Thinking this, Richard entered Hall One, which was quiet.
His eyes shimmered with a faint crimson glow as he carefully scanned the entire hall. Finding nothing unusual, he walked towards the new passageway directly opposite, going deeper.
This second, new passageway wasn’t notably different from the initial one, being just a bit wider.
Remaining vigilant, Richard soon reached the end of the passageway and then saw the second hall appear–Hall Two.
Hall Two was nearly a thousand square meters in size, over four meters high, overall larger than Hall One, and felt somewhat desolate and cold.
Richard’s eyes flickered, somewhat puzzled by the purpose of the hall, and just as he was contemplating whether there might be a Hall Three or Four, he heard a familiar yet slightly different sound.
Richard’s eyebrows shot up, alert with caution: Could it be another Insect Army?
He had just defeated the first Insect Army, and the three barriers were already nearly destroyed. If another new Insect Army were to arrive, he would have no choice but to retreat temporarily.
With this thought, Richard saw more than a dozen brown scorpions, each over thirty centimeters long, quickly crawl out from the third passageway opposite the hall, their tails held high in an attack posture.
“Scorpions, huh? About a dozen… these should be a bit easier to deal with. As long as there’s no additional scorpion army following, they should be relatively easy to eliminate.” With that thought, Richard didn’t hesitate much and waved his hand to release a spell.
A mars-sized fire star shot out, exploded, produced new sparks, and exploded again.
Magic Rune Magic.Zero-Circle High Order.Double Ring Explosion!
This was Richard’s way of testing, testing the strength of the scorpions. The result of the test, however, made Richard’s gaze turn serious–none of the more than ten scorpions died.
Richard had assumed that if they were common scorpions, a Zero-Circle High Order spell would be enough to kill them all. But all it did was shake their bodies and scorch their shells without causing any real damage.
After this unexpected attack, the scorpions, as if enraged, raised their hidden Scorpion Tails from beneath their bellies–both tails erect, their hooks shining with a chilling gleam!
Then, a sharp strange noise emanated from within the scorpions’ bodies, and their shells rapidly changed color, turning from brown to gold in the blink of an eye.
Two-tailed Golden Scorpions!