Chapter 173: Serpent-Like Beast

The Angel's Touch was an incredibly rare fruit using which one would simply have to eat the fruit at the peak of the Golden Core Realm, and they would automatically make a Nascent soul. 

You didn't have to bother breaking through or be stuck in a long bottleneck. You just had to eat this fruit and you were done.

And that fruit was the one in front of him. If he got his hands on the fruit, he wouldn't have to worry about the Nascent Soul realm when the time came. 

However, getting his hands on the fruit itself was a bit of a problem. There was a really strong creature inside the lake and everyone including Ning could feel it. 

"Hijaka, I think you should leave this place immediately," Ning said. 

"What's going on Inikaka? What is that fruit? And what is that monster?" he asked. 

"I do not know what that monster is right now, but I do know that it is strong enough for you to not care about the fruit for now. Just leave this place. These other people are just waiting for their death."

Just as Ning said that one of the people had the stupid idea of flying to the fruit. 

"Hey stop that," someone tried to stop him, but greed had overtaken his mind. He quietly flew past the beast, but just as he was about the reach the tree, a column of water shot up from the lake. 

When the water fell down, the man was no longer there. 

"Go!" Ning shouted. 

Hijaka stayed no longer and started running immediately. Before the people were even thinking of running away, Hijaka has already run over hundreds of meters away from the lake. 

Ning however decided to stay. With his cultivation base, he felt that he could run away whenever he wanted to. Besides, the fruit was too good to give up on. 

The monster in the lake started moving suddenly. The people got terrified by the aura of the beast and started running away. 

Ning knew it was too late for them to leave, so he thought, 'why don't I get the points instead of letting it go to waste.' 

Suddenly, he brought out both the sword and the spear as he started slicing and stabbing with both his hands and Qi blasts started flying everywhere. Unfortunately, he could only attack the people on his side of the lake, so he could only get around half the people.

At the same time, blades of water suddenly appeared from the water, flying towards everyone in the vicinity of the lake. 

Both his attacks and the blades of water landed on the running people around the same time and they disappeared from the secret realm. 

Ning used his sword to block the attack and was thrown away from the lake.

"Arghh…" he said as he stood back up. 'Did I get the points?' he wondered. He couldn't tell whose attack landed first or whose attack did the killing blow, but he couldn't check it right now. 

Instead, he turned around to look at the monster of the sea.

"A snake?" he thought when he saw the long body of the beast that had arisen from the lake. This serpent-like beast wasn't as big as the Yin Demon Serpent he fought in Klavis. 

However, when he looked closely, as more of the water dripped from the beast, he realized that it was not a serpent. Its body was long like a snake, it had scales like one, but its eyes looked a little different and it had some whisker on top of its mouth. 

It also had two tiny horns, actual horns, protruding from its head. 

If Ning wasn't feeling scared yet, he would now. "Th— This can't be. How is there something so rare in this secret realm? How is there a bloody Flood Dragon!!" Ning shouted. 

The beast of the sea was not a mere serpent, but a flood dragon. A flood dragon was a lesser dragon that had the physical appearance of a True dragon, but not its power or ability. 

Still, they had some blood of a True dragon mixed in them, so they weren't something everyone could fight. 

Ning looked at its majesty and nearly faltered. The fear in him did not just grow because he knew the type of beast and how strong it could be. 

He was also scared because he had just checked its cultivation base and body cultivation. 

Fortunately, it only had a Level 3 body cultivation, so that didn't worry Ning very much. What did scare him was the cultivation base. 

He looked at the cultivation base once again just to be sure. 

5th Foundation Establishment realm.

That was way too strong for him. Suddenly, he saw the flood dragon move. It opened its mouth and shot out a blast of water. This was the same thing that had killed the first guy in the lake. 

His sword would do him no good now, so he kept it away. He then immediately crossed his arms in front of his head and protected himself. 

When the column of water disappeared, all that remained there was Ning with both of his arms mostly skinless. The water was so strong that it had managed to scrape away his body-cultivated skin. 

'Ow, if I hadn't protected my head, I would've taken a lot of damage,' he thought. The Floor Dragon sucked in the air once more and blasted out a much-smaller column of water. 

Ning tried to block, but the column was so strong that he was hit right in the chest. Fortunately for him, he didn't suffer fatal damage from that. 

Unfortunately, that meant he would have to suffer through the attack now. His arms covering his body were blown away and the water landed on his chest. The spear he was holding was flung back into the forest. 

His chest somehow didn't loose skin, but he could feel his ribs crack due to the pressure. 

Suddenly, an yellow light appeared around him and he disappeared from the location once again.