ACSP: Chapter 191: Shameless Traitor!
Jiang Chen knew this was no time for idle chatter. The regional battlefield was still highly volatile, and every second wasted was a luxury they couldn't afford.
After ensuring Yang Ke and He Gen were stable, he cut straight to the point, clearly laying out his strategic objective and detailing exactly why he had tracked them down in this sector.
Hearing the blueprint, He Gen immediately nodded, expressing zero objections. After all, this wasn't his first time executing this specific macro-play. He was already highly familiar with weaponizing his [Wood Release] secret techniques in perfect tandem with Jiang Chen's [Heavenly Transfer Technique] to facilitate secure, long-distance spatial teleportation for high-value targets.
In strict technical terms, Jiang Chen was entirely capable of casting the Heavenly Transfer Technique to displace individuals without relying on He Gen's structural buffers. Under standard conditions, the violent friction of spatial displacement would tear a normal human body to shreds. However, because Jiang Chen possessed the colossal reserves of the [Nine-Tails Chakra], he could theoretically coat the targets in a protective shroud of the demonic cloak, leveraging its dense shroud to offset the crushing atmospheric and spatial tearing forces.
The structural bottleneck, however, was that safely isolating multiple people under that intensity required him to unlock the [Perfect Nine-Tails Mode]—a peak evolution threshold his current progression path hadn't fully realized yet.
Consequently, if he wanted to guarantee the absolute safety of weaker personnel during a high-velocity spatial jump, he had to rely on specialized external force fields. To date, the reinforced, chakra-dense containment cages manifested by He Gen's Wood Release remained the most flawless protective dampeners he had engineered.
"By the way, Boss... there's something else," Yang Ke muttered, swallowing a high-concentration military ration pill. As the nutrient dense compound hit his system, a healthy color gradually returned to his hollow cheeks. He wiped his mouth, his eyes sharpening as a vital piece of combat intelligence resurfaced. "When we first breached this sector, that massive legion of Dongdao Contractors was locked in a brutal siege against a wild [Lihuo Demon Flood Dragon]. They successfully executed the beast right before they turned on us, but because we immediately disrupted their lines, they never had the window to harvest the corpse for its [Summoning Scroll]..."
Hearing that such a tier-one resource was sitting completely unclaimed in the local grid, Jiang Chen's interest was instantly piqued.
Exotic beasts possessing the pristine bloodline of a flood dragon were absolute anomalies; their biological adaptations allowed them to navigate the treacherous currents of the deep ocean without a single physical obstruction. In this current New Era, where maritime zones were choked with high-level apex predators, a flood dragon was the undisputed sovereign of the seas.
If that fallen Lihuo Demon Flood Dragon truly harbored an unbonded Summoning Scroll within its remains, it would serve as an unparalleled tactical asset for his future maritime deployment—especially for his planned traversal to the East Island.
Wasting no more time, Jiang Chen signaled the two, immediately guiding Yang Ke and He Gen back toward the coordinates of the giant beast's carcass.
In truth, his sharp sensory grid had already registered the massive, lingering energy signature of the flood dragon when he first entered the perimeter. However, because the creature was already completely devoid of life at the time, he had naturally assumed the highly organized East Island raid unit had already stripped the body of its high-value drops. It seemed their fanatical pursuit of vengeance had blinded them to the ultimate prize.
Even if a coveted Summoning Scroll had been concealed within the beast's anatomy, conventional wisdom dictated it should have been plundered long ago. Jiang Chen had never anticipated that those pathetic excuse for competitors would be so utterly incompetent, lagging behind to such a laughable degree.
Without a moment's hesitation, Jiang Chen strode directly toward the colossal, lifeless carcass of the demon flood dragon. Stepping into its shadow, he drew the legendary Kusanagi Sword. With a practiced, fluid motion, he drove the blade forward, making a precise, shallow incision directly into the center of the leviathan's massive forehead.
It was universally acknowledged among seasoned hunters that if an exotic beast were to harbor a Summoning Scroll within its flesh, the artifact would manifest exclusively within the cranium. This had long since become absolute, foundational knowledge in this brutal era.
—Pfft!
The moment Jiang Chen's blade pierced the scales, the pressurized skull relented. A torrential geyser of dark, viscous green blood erupted violently from the wound, spraying upward like a grotesque fountain. Instantly, an overpowering, rancid odor—thick with a nauseating, metallic fishiness—permeated the atmosphere, heavy enough to trigger an immediate wave of vertigo in anyone nearby.
Subconsciously, Jiang Chen executed a swift, two-step retreat to avoid the cascading defilement of the dragon's blood. Yet, despite the retreat, his gaze never wavered. His eyes burned like twin torches, piercing through the crimson and green haze, desperately attempting to decipher the secrets hidden within the wound.
His vigilance was instantly rewarded. Just a heartbeat prior, amidst the violent eruption of gore, he had caught a fleeting glimpse of something extraordinary.
Emerging slowly from the depths of the fractured skull, bathed in a crimson luminescence, was a fluorescent red scroll.
"An actual Summoning Scroll... I never imagined a catastrophic entity like the Lihuo Demon Flood Dragon would genuinely yield such a legendary treasure..." Yang Ke's eyes dilated to the size of saucers, his countenance completely overtaken by sheer, unadulterated astonishment.
"It appears the fortune of those Dongdao Contractors was remarkably formidable," He Gen remarked, unable to suppress a breathless exclamation of awe.
Upon hearing those words, however, Yang Ke's expression soured. He whipped his head around, glaring at his companion with intense dissatisfaction. "What absurdities are you spouting? This is our spoils, bought with our triumph. How dare you attribute such magnificent luck to those subhuman animals?"
"Right, right, precisely! It is entirely our windfall, a blessing of our own destiny, hahaha..." He Gen quickly corrected himself, a collaborative smirk breaking across his face.
As the two men exchanged ecstatic glances, a feral glint of excitement danced within their eyes. Armed with this particular Summoning Scroll, their faction could seamlessly integrate another catastrophic, Kage-level vanguard into their ranks.
Yet, the truly revolutionary aspect of this artifact lay in its universal compatibility.
Unlike standard techniques, this category of Summoning Scroll could be mastered by literally anyone. It bypassed all conventional restrictions; whether one was a bottom-tier Contractor struggling at the nadir of the hierarchy, or a Class-Transferred individual completely devoid of an innate contract character, the scroll welcomed them all.
This absolute versatility was precisely why high-tier Summoning Scrolls commanded such astronomical astronomical value in the market. They required no tedious, complex unlocking rituals tied to a specific contract character's lineage. So long as a cultivator successfully claimed ownership of the scroll and possessed a sufficiently vast reservoir of Chakra, they could directly summon the apex predator sealed within to dominate the battlefield.
"Good grief, Jiang Chen, is your luck fundamentally broken? To think you actually manifested the Summoning Scroll of the Lihuo Demon Flood Dragon itself!"
"I've read the archives on this beast—the Lihuo Demon Flood Dragon uniquely wields the dual, conflicting attributes of both devastating water and volatile fire. Even among the pantheon of Kage-level exotic beasts, it reigns as an incredibly formidable nightmare!"
By this time, Li Yanran and the rest of the vanguard had finished sweeping the remnants of the battlefield. As they gathered around the carcass, their eyes fell upon the shimmering crimson scroll in Jiang Chen's hands, and a collective wave of shock rippled through the group.
They were all too aware of the grim mathematics of this world: the more cataclysmically powerful an exotic beast was, the more infinitesimally low the probability became for it to drop a Summoning Scroll upon its demise. For a sovereign entity possessing undisputed Kage-level might like the Lihuo Demon Flood Dragon, the mathematical probability of harvesting such a prize was practically indistinguishable from zero.
In fact, since the catastrophic dawn of the Dimensional Era, the historical records had never once documented an instance of a human successfully extracting a Summoning Scroll from a Kage-level exotic beast.
"When it comes to the whims of fortune, I have never found myself wanting..." Jiang Chen murmured, a faint, enigmatic smile playing upon his lips.
His foundational contract character was none other than Uzumaki Naruto—the ultimate child of prophecy, an entity possessing the absolute zenith of protagonist destiny. As the sole Contractor bound to that legendary soul, Jiang Chen naturally walked beneath an aura of celestial favor, inheriting a sliver of that reality-bending luck.
Beneath the hyper-focused, breathless stares of the entire cohort, Jiang Chen unhesitatingly crushed the fluorescent red scroll in his palm.
In the immediate, staggering wake of the artifact's destruction, a brilliant flash of spiritual energy flared and faded. Deep within the cognitive interface of his status system, a majestic new entry materialized clearly within his Summoned Beast Control Manifest:
[Lihuo Demon Flood Dragon]
Witnessing the seamless binding of the catastrophic beast, the surrounding onlookers could only stand frozen, their expressions contorting into a mixture of profound awe and agonizing envy.
"Alright, I am going to deport the rest of you back to Kang City immediately," Jiang Chen commanded, his voice carrying the calm authority of a true leader as he addressed Li Yanran and the surrounding cohort. Finishing his instruction, he pivoted on his heel, his sharp gaze locking onto the man standing quietly at his flank.
"Brother He Gen, I will have to trouble you to assist me with the preparations."
"Think nothing of it; a trivial task at best," He Gen replied with a casual shrug.
Without missing a beat, He Gen brought his palms together, slamming them down in a crisp, resonant clap.
Rumble—!
In an instant, the earth violently groaned. Massive, interlocking wooden stakes erupted from the fractured soil, weaving together with terrifying velocity. Within a heartbeat, they had formed an airtight, impenetrable wooden sepulcher that completely sequestered Li Yanran and the others from the outside world, shielding them from the spatial turbulence to come.
Simultaneously, Jiang Chen's fingers blurred into a dizzying sequence of hand signs, manipulating his inner energy to weave the intricate seals required for the legendary [Heavenly Transfer Technique].
A blinding, incandescent pillar of pure white light suddenly tore through the heavens, completely illuminating the desolate landscape. When the radiant glare finally dissipated into the atmosphere, the wooden prison was empty—Li Yanran and her companions had vanished from the spot, displaced across space in the blink of an eye.
Meanwhile, across the horizon, a grim spectacle was unfolding within the borders of Jinghai City.
The metropolis was unrecognizable, utterly choked beneath a suffocating shroud of dense, oily black smoke. High above the skyline, Li Dala was maintaining a relentless, aerial bombardment, methodically raining down devastating clay explosives from the heavens.
Down in the labyrinthine streets below, Lei Li, Cai Kun, and the remaining elite forces were aggressively sweeping through the urban ruins, hunting down and exterminating the lingering pockets of Dongdao Contractors.
Ever since the catastrophic downfall of the enemy's vanguard commanders—most notably the formidable Shimura Kenta and Asakura—the backbone of the invasion force had been thoroughly shattered. What remained scattered throughout the burning remnants of Jinghai City were nothing more than disorganized, terrified remnants and low-level grunts.
With Song She's formidable, immortal Edo Tensei legion tirelessly prosecuting the purge, wiping out these fragmented skirmishers was merely a foregone conclusion. It was a matter of time, not capability.
However, just as total victory seemed within their grasp, the liberating forces collided with a deeply frustrating and insidious obstacle.
The nexus of this new dilemma stemmed entirely from the treacherous scum of the 'Eastern Coalition Army'—the local turncoats who had shamelessly defected to the enemy at the onset of the invasion.
These traitorous sycophants were not merely devoid of honor; they possessed a deeply ingrained, rat-like cunning. The absolute moment they realized the Dongdao Contractors had lost their momentum and that the tide of war had definitively turned, they abandoned their posts. Shedding their military regalia, they seamlessly blended into the shadows of the metropolis.
This cowardly camouflage left Li Dala and the cleaning crews in a state of paralyzed frustration, completely at a loss as to how to proceed.
The chaos of the warzone made it virtually impossible to differentiate target from civilian. They had no viable metric to determine whether the terrified faces lurking in the basements were innocent survivors who had miraculously weathered the siege, or the venomous vipers of the 'Eastern Coalition Army' waiting for the storm to pass.
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