The vast sea was boundless.
Yu Qing was alone, conducting a long and tedious search in this deep, blue unknown.
Although he had roughly determined the sea area where the Evil Orca pod was active, trying to precisely locate a massive, constantly moving group in such a vast and topographically complex deep sea was far more difficult than finding a specific Spirit Beast on land.
This was certainly not the work of a single day.
He was like a tireless ghost, gliding through the dark seawater. The effect of the Formless Nirvana Glazed Leaf remained active, suppressing his entire aura and presence to the absolute minimum; only in this way could he avoid the perception of countless powerful sea Spirit Beasts and reduce unnecessary trouble.
His mental force was like the most precise radar, spreading out from himself into the surrounding seawater as much as possible, carefully scanning every inch of the sea he passed, capturing any spirit power fluctuations or physical characteristics that might be related to the Evil Orcas.
However, in the deep seawater, the detection of mental force was greatly hindered and suppressed; not only did the effective range shrink significantly, but the consumption was also staggering.
Therefore, every so often, Yu Qing had to find a relatively safe reef at sea, surface, stop, and fully operate the Star Meditation Technique to recover his depleted mental force and nearly exhausted spirit power.
Furthermore, the pressure of the deep sea was everywhere. The deeper he went, the more terrifying the pressure became, as if it were about to crush a person. Yu Qing had to continuously consume his Sixth Soul Skill (Unbreakable Golden Lotus Leaf) to maintain a protective shield and resist this pressure.
Had he not possessed Yin-Yang Complementary Dual Soul Cores, with a spirit power recovery speed far exceeding those of the same rank and an incredibly profound foundation, he would never have dared to stay in the deep sea area for such a long time conducting high-intensity searches with his level 97 spirit power.
Even so, the process was still filled with hardships and dangers.
The depth of the ocean far exceeded the imagination of land Spirit Masters. Not only were the Spirit Beasts here staggering in number, but their average age and ferocity were also far beyond those of land Spirit Beast habitats like the Star Dou Great Forest. In just a few days of searching, Yu Qing had encountered no fewer than seven powerful sea Spirit Beasts with cultivation exceeding fifty thousand years!
Once, he even startled an Eighty-Thousand-Year Abyssal Giant Octopus lurking beneath a thousand-meter trench! Its mountain-like massive body, countless terrifying tentacles covered in suckers, and its cold, bloodthirsty compound eyes all brought immense pressure to Yu Qing. If not for the extreme stealth of the Formless Nirvana Glazed Leaf and his speed that far surpassed the opponent's, he only narrowly avoided an unnecessary fierce battle.
And so, searching, recovering, encountering, evading... the cycle repeated.
Days passed one by one. Yu Qing had been searching in this peril-filled deep sea for a full half-month. The range of the sea area he had explored reached several hundred kilometers! During this time, he had even sensed a terrifying aura of the hundred thousand year level from afar; that abyss-like pressure forced him to temporarily avoid its edge and take a detour.
However, the Evil Orca pod remained like a needle in a haystack, with no news at all.
Any ordinary person, facing such long-term futility and constant danger, would likely have long since felt like retreating or become restless. But Yu Qing's resolve had long been tempered as hard as a rock. He knew that the more powerful the prey, the more patience was required. Compared to returning empty-handed after giving up halfway, he enjoyed the ultimate sense of achievement after going through countless hardships to finally lock onto a target and successfully hunt it.
This extraordinary patience and persistence finally paid off after nearly two months of long searching!
On this day, Yu Qing was hiding within a cluster of massive, colorful deep-sea coral, recovering his consumed mental force. Suddenly, an extremely violent, chaotic, and evil spirit power fluctuation came from the southwest far away!
Yu Qing snapped his eyes open, a sharp light bursting from his pupils!
"This should be... the spirit power aura that only Evil Orcas possess! And... they are hunting!"
He immediately withdrew all his aura, becoming like a shadow merging into the seawater, silently and rapidly gliding toward the source of the energy fluctuations.
Soon, a bloody and shocking scene of deep-sea slaughter appeared within his mental perception.
Those were six massive, grayish-black Evil Orcas with hideous heads! Their cultivation was all over ten thousand years, and they were currently frantically besieging a Giant Turtle of about fifty thousand years, which was larger than them but clearly at a disadvantage!
The coordination of the Evil Orcas was extremely tacit. They had clear divisions of labor: some charged and bit the turtle's relatively fragile head and limbs from the front, while others circled to the flanks and rear, using their terrifying massive tails like meteor hammers to fiercely strike the Dragon Turtle's hard dorsal shell!
Bang! Bang! Bang! Boom!
Muffled impact sounds and the sound of the turtle shell cracking echoed through the deep sea. The Giant Turtle let out a cry of pain and struggled desperately, trying to fight back against the attackers by spitting high-pressure water cannons. But under the siege of the six seamlessly coordinated and bloodthirsty Evil Orcas, its resistance seemed so pale and weak.
Blood quickly dyed a large area of seawater red, attracting some smaller predators, but they only dared to hover in the distance, not daring to approach this terrifying battle zone.
The battle ended quickly. In just fifteen minutes, that powerful Giant Ao Dragon Turtle completely lost its life, its massive body slowly sinking toward the seabed. The six Evil Orcas emitted excited, low-pitched hums and began to tear and feast on their prize, a scene bloody and primal.
Yu Qing was like a cold bystander, hiding in the shadows, quietly watching all this. His gaze was as sharp as an eagle's, carefully observing every detail of each Evil Orca: their attack patterns, their level of coordination, their power levels, and... the direction they left in.
Waiting for them to finish their bloody feast and satisfiedly flap their tail fins to prepare to leave, Yu Qing immediately followed quietly, like a shadow attached to the bone, trailing far behind them.
He was extremely careful, always maintaining a safe distance and pushing the effect of the Formless Nirvana Glazed Leaf to the limit to ensure he didn't leak the slightest aura.
These six Evil Orcas were clearly just a small hunting squad of the pod. After eating their fill, they didn't seem in a hurry to return to their nest, but instead cruised aimlessly for over a hundred miles in the deep sea, as if patrolling their territory.
Yu Qing followed them with great patience, and another half-day passed.
Finally, while patrolling an area where the seabed terrain suddenly dropped as if leading to an endless abyss, these six Evil Orcas suddenly turned together and dove toward the deeper, darker abyssal seabed!
Yu Qing's spirits rose, and he followed behind without hesitation.
Diving! Continuously diving!
The surrounding pressure abruptly increased, and light almost completely disappeared, leaving only eternal darkness and cold.
The depth quickly exceeded a thousand meters! The pressure here had reached an extremely terrifying level! Even with spirit power protecting his body, Yu Qing felt a strong sense of suffocation and pressure coming from all directions, as if countless invisible giant hands were squeezing his body, and even the circulation of his spirit power became slightly sluggish.
But instead of fear, a strong sense of excitement surged in his heart! Because his mental force perception detected that in the endless darkness below, there existed countless... powerful, violent, and homogeneous spirit power fluctuations!
Diving another hundred meters, Yu Qing's "vision" suddenly opened up!
With the help of the mental force scan, a magnificent yet hair-raising scene was clearly presented in his mind:
On that vast and boundless abyssal plain, dense, massive black shadows like moving hills were slowly cruising! Their number exceeded three hundred! Each one radiated a heart-palpitatingly ferocious aura!
This was an Evil Orca pod of a scale beyond imagination!
More than half of them had reached the ten-thousand-year level of cultivation! Their spirit power fluctuations were incredibly powerful!
Over twenty of them were exceptionally massive, their spirit power fluctuations as deep as an abyss, clearly powerful existences of over seventy thousand years!
More than ten others had even more terrifying auras, their bodies seemingly surrounded by materialized purple-black evil Qi—those were Evil Orcas of eighty thousand or even ninety thousand years!
And in the very center of this group of terrifying behemoths, a giant far exceeding its kin, like a deep-sea demon god, was quietly suspended there.
Its length was nearly thirty meters, its body an ashen, metallic dark gray, its skin covered in hideous scars and battle marks. Its head was massive, with exaggerated proportions; that giant mouth seemed capable of devouring everything, filled with cold, sharp teeth like hay cutters! Most heart-palpitating were its eyes—huge, cold, and brutal—the dark red pressure they radiated was like a Domain, enveloping the entire pod!
The Evil Spirit Orca King!
Found it! Finally found it!
Yu Qing's heart was instantly filled with immense joy and excitement! After nearly two months of arduous searching, the target was right before his eyes!
But in the next moment, an unprecedented gravity and caution replaced the joy.
The pod before him was not a prey he could face head-on, but a war fortress entrenched in the deep sea! A vortex of death!
Once his whereabouts were exposed and the entire pod was startled, even as a level 97 Super Douluo with twin spirits and many trump cards, he would definitely only be able to flee in a sorry state! He might even, with one slip-up, be torn to pieces by these hundreds of violent deep-sea behemoths!
"I must use wit, not brute force," Yu Qing immediately set the tone for his actions.
His goal was clear: hunt the Evil Spirit Orca King and at least ten high-level Evil Orcas of over fifty thousand years! Use them to synthesize his third Vicious Beast spirit ring!
"How can I complete the hunt without startling the entire pod?" Yu Qing's brain worked rapidly.
Charging in was definitely not an option. A sneak attack? How could he simultaneously sneak attack eleven scattered top-tier sea Spirit Beasts in the deep sea without being discovered?
Soon, he thought of two special items in his storage spirit tool.
The first was a small bottle of pink liquid—Rosemary. This was a special incense he had bought from the System Mall a long time ago. Its effect was extremely overbearing; it was said that even a Hundred Thousand Year Spirit Beast inhaling a sufficient dose would fall into a deep coma for up to half an hour!
The second was that uniquely shaped triangular military bayonet flashing with a faint green cold light. This bayonet was coated with a potent poison that killed upon contact with blood, which would be highly effective for breaking through the Evil Orcas' tough defense and injecting lethal toxins.
However, a new problem arose: Rosemary was a liquid incense; its effect was excellent on land or in the air, but in the high-pressure environment of the deep sea, it couldn't effectively disperse! How could he make this group of deep-sea behemoths "smell" the incense?
Yu Qing pondered for a moment and had a plan. He carefully withdrew from this oppressive deep-sea nest and began to surface.
He needed to return to the surface to do some "preparatory work."
Surfacing, it was currently late at night. The night sky was as clear as if it had been washed, filled with stars, and a silver crescent moon cast a cold glow, paving a path of broken silver on the sea surface.
Yu Qing found an isolated reef protruding from the sea and stepped onto it. He first sat cross-legged to adjust his breathing and restore his state to the optimum, then took out various bottles and jars from his storage spirit tool—all precious medicinal materials and auxiliary ingredients he had collected or refined on ordinary days.
He took a deep breath and held his hands out. In his palms, a cluster of silver flames radiating star brilliance quietly ignited—this was the Star Flame he had transformed by compressing Star Power to the limit; its temperature was controllable, making it extremely suitable for refining medicines.
He used the Rosemary as the main ingredient, supplemented by Dewflower, Dream Grass powder, Calming Stamens, and several special catalysts that could enhance the permeability and persistence of the medicine's power, carefully tossing them into the Star Flame.
Under his precise control, the various medicinal materials quickly melted, purified, and fused... Soon, the medicinal fragrance permeated (constrained within a certain range by his spirit power).
This process lasted for a full hour.
Finally, all the medicinal power fused perfectly, the Star Flame went out, and in Yu Qing's palm lay a pill the size of a longan, entirely a strange pale pink, its surface smooth as jade, with a misty pink fog seemingly flowing slowly inside.
An extremely faint yet lethally seductive sweet fragrance radiated from the pill.
"It's done!" A flash of joy crossed Yu Qing's eyes. "Potent Rosemary Pill! I hope it will be effective."
But he didn't act immediately; for caution's sake, he needed to conduct an experiment first.
He left a mental mark on this isolated reef, then his figure flashed, and he swept toward the distance. He needed to find a suitable "experimental subject."
Soon, he found a Ten-Thousand-Year Spined Mad Shark cruising near the sea surface. Yu Qing hid his figure, quietly approached, and flicked his finger!
Whoosh!
That pale pink rosemary pill, as if it had a life of its own, shot precisely into the Mad Shark's open giant mouth!
The Medicinal Pill melted as soon as it entered the mouth, and its majestic medicinal power instantly dispersed!
That fierce Mad Shark didn't even have time to struggle before its massive body suddenly stiffened, the fierce light in its eyes rapidly dimmed, it became confused, and then its eyes completely closed... Its massive body lost all strength and slowly sank toward the seabed, falling into the deepest slumber! Yu Qing could perceive that its life aura was still strong, but its consciousness had been completely stripped away.
"The effect is good!" Yu Qing was delighted.
Next, he followed the same pattern, finding a Thirty-Thousand-Year Giant-Mouth Thunder Eel, a Fifty-Thousand-Year Ironclad Dragon Turtle, and an exceptionally powerful Seventy-Thousand-Year Abyssal Ghost-Head Octopus for testing.
The results were encouraging!
The thirty-thousand-year Spirit Beast fell unconscious instantly, with an estimated sleep time of over twelve hours!
The fifty-thousand-year Spirit Beast struggled for a few breaths before falling unconscious, with an estimated sleep time of eight hours!
Even that seventy-thousand-year Ghost-Head Octopus, after swallowing the pill, only lasted for less than half a minute before its tentacles went limp and it sank into a deep-sea dreamland, sleeping for three hours!
"What strong medicinal power!" Yu Qing was very satisfied with this effect. Now, the only unknown was—how effective would it be on a Hundred Thousand Year Spirit Beast? How long would it last?
If the effect on the Evil Spirit Orca King was poor or the duration was too short, he would have to start Plan B.
Yu Qing's Plan B was simple and direct: choose a position relatively far from the core of the pod and suddenly release his Life Domain! Use the vast and pure Power of Life of the Life Domain as bait!
He believed that no Spirit Beast, especially a predator like the Evil Spirit Orca King at the top of the food chain, could resist the temptation of such pure life Origin! It would very likely leave the pod to investigate alone, or even try to devour Yu Qing, the "Source of Life"!
At that time, it would be a one-on-one hunting moment! He was guaranteed to win.
"I hope this rosemary pill will be effective..." Yu Qing thought to himself.
Ready, he no longer hesitated, followed the mental mark he had left, and returned to that isolated reef. He adjusted his breathing, and his gaze became sharp and cold.
The hunt begins!
He leaped, diving once again into the cold, dark deep sea, silently gliding toward that terrifying nest located fifteen hundred meters below.
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