Chapter 296: The Lord of the Golden Seal

Although the golden axe creature had been burnt to cinders, it was far from enough to cow the other monsters. Their lack of consciousness had erased all fear of death, or even the notion of death itself.

Countless monsters shot out from the ravine, their numbers ever increasing. They’d cut off all paths of retreat in the span of a few minutes.

Jiang Chen may be swift, but he wasn’t faster than them.

An endless tide of monsters greeted him no matter where he looked. Feeling the pressure, he hastily summoned all six fire lotuses to his side.

A tough battle was ahead of him.

His scalp tingled with numbness at the sight of the boundless golden tide. This wasn’t an even battle, it was just shameless bullying from a mob

The fighting capabilities of one or two golden monsters was nothing to fear, even eight or ten of them together weren’t too strong. 

However, hundreds, thousands, and even tens of thousands of the golden creatures had gathered in one place. Their accumulated killing aura was an incredibly terrifying thing.

Jiang Chen himself could only barely manage to stand firm in the face of that lethal intent from the wall of golden creatures with the aid of his six lotuses.

If it was any other practitioner, they likely would’ve already been devoured to the point where not even bone fragments were left.

“This won’t do, there won’t be an end to the fighting if this continues. There’s no point to all this other than just wearing away at my resources. There’s no end to these creatures. If I fall into their tactics, I’ll be dead without a doubt!”

Although there was temporarily no danger to his life, Jiang Chen was still greatly anxious.

Bam! Bam!

The nameless blade also began to awaken a fierce aura as it pulverized some of the golden creatures.

However, this kind of defense was analogous to putting out a fire with a cup of water. To the countless golden creatures, killing two or three was as harmless as scratching an itch.

“What to do?” Jiang Chen’s thoughts spun furiously as he tried to think of a way out.

He’d only come to the second test of the tenth floor and was already feeling this pressured. He hadn’t even met the Lord of the Golden Seal that the little Cicada had spoken about.

If the lord’s power awoke, wouldn’t he be able to destroy Jiang Chen with just a finger then?

Jiang Chen became even more worried the more he thought about this.

He could no longer afford to delay. The ten days limit would be up at this rate before he saw the Lord of the Golden Seal.

At this moment, the rat king’s body’s suddenly flashed out and he cried out, “Young master Chen, release my children!”

This shout rather reminded Jiang Chen, and a flash of inspiration shot through his mind. It was like a man whose muse had deserted him suddenly looking up and seeing endless snowflakes of good ideas descending upon him.

That’s right!

There were an uncountable number of golden creatures alright, but would they outnumber the Goldbiter Rats?

Once the Goldbiter Rat tribe was released, their numbers would start from the billions.

This type of spirit creature liked to nibble on all sorts of metallic objects as well. Their affinity for the metal attribute was beyond anything.

They surged out of the Millionditch Stonenest without a moment of hesitation.

The Rat King’s children had been cooped up in their home for far too long, so it was easy to imagine the level of their pent up energy as they came surging out.

If it could be said that the ravine had previously been the golden monsters’ domain, the situation had been utterly reversed in an instant. 

The golden colored tide beneath him was slowly overcome, partitioned and devoured piece by piece.

What replaced it was an ocean of Goldbiter Rats. The entire ravine was filled with their figures in the span of an instant.

This had been so easy that even Jiang Chen found this incredulous.

He almost had the mentality of taking a stroll through the park as he sauntered leisurely to the other side of the ravine. He retrieved the fire lotuses and watched the Goldbiter Rats wreak havoc amongst the golden creatures.

The entire ravine had been thoroughly trampled by the Rats in about an hour.

There weren’t even any bones left of the golden creatures. All had been cleanly devoured by the Goldbiter Rats in a short while.

Even still, the Rats still seemed to be a bit unsatisfied. They even seemed to want to start munching away at the magnetic golden mountain.

It was a good thing that the Rat King kept them all firmly in check; all the Rats went docilely back into the Millionditch Stonenest after their king released his aura.

“Young master, how about that?” The Rat King looked proudly on as he cast an expectant look at Jiang Chen, wanting recognition for his contributions.

“Not bad, not bad. The strength of your children are going to be advancing greatly after eating so many of those creatures. If you’re lucky, some of them may even have their bloodlines advance naturally. This depends on their fortune as well.”

Jiang Chen naturally had to give a few compliments at this time. It wasn’t like saying those words cost him anything.

The Rat King seemed to be quite satisfied with Jiang Chen’s compliments as he beamed, his six golden whiskers twitching proudly.

Jiang Chen looked resolutely upwards.

He’d already walked two thirds of the steps in the tenth floor and would reach the peak after this last bit.

At this moment, Jiang Chen had thrown thoughts of this being a trial of potential to the back of his mind. What filled his mind now was to challenge the highest peak and refine the mountain for himself!

“Ole Gold, let’s go!”

Jiang Chen recalled the Goldbiter Rats when he thought of the little Cicada’s words. 

If the Lord of the Golden Seal was as the Cicada had said, waking up the more it suffered from outside interference, then the wisest decision was to recall the Goldbiter Rats.

Otherwise, if the lord was overly awake, even if all the Goldbiter Rats attacked together, a strong aura fluctuation was enough to destroy the entire tribe.

Jiang Chen had seen much and knew that the greater a being was, the easier it was to destroy the lives of those on a lower level.

Although he didn’t know what level the Lord of the Golden Seal was, of one thing he was certain. Since the lord depended on the mountain for survival, and the original ancient in charge of the mountain has designated it as the last keeper of the trials, then it would be quite a challenge.

There were still three or four thousand steps left before he reached the peak of the tenth floor.

“There is no way I can turn back now that I’ve gotten so far. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. I still have to meet him no matter how strong the Lord of the Golden Seal is. Retreating in the face of difficulties is the act of a coward.”

With this in mind, Jiang Chen no longer hesitated and dashed straight up to the peak.

All would be determined in this final battle!

The surroundings had once again returned to those of the eighth and ninth floors in the three thousand stairs. Magnetic twisters and turbulence danced in the air.

It was a good thing that Jiang Chen was prepared.

Contrary to when he faced even stronger magnetic storms on the ninth floor, Jiang Chen didn’t lose track of his steps as he placed one foot in front of another on his way to the top.

Jiang Chen was forced to use the Lotus of Fire and Ice to protect himself when a magnetic storm came with unexpected ferocity and swiftness.

The Lotus stood as one of the top five plant spirits beneath the heavens, so even the ferocious magnetic storms could only buffet it around, unable to destroy it.

However, this largely impeded his forward progress as well.

It took him a full day to finish climbing the last three thousand stone steps.

When he finally set both feet onto the peak of the mountain, he could almost see the stars swaying above his head as magnetic storms bayed like wild beasts next to his ears.

Dust and sand swirled in his vision. It was a desolate scene of irregular flying rocks.

“This… this is the peak of the tenth floor?”

Jiang Chen found it hard to believe his own eyes. The environments at the peak of every level had always been relatively calm.

But the savagery with which the magnetic storms whipped around at the peak of the tenth floor made it extremely difficult to even stand in.

Jiang Chen stayed rooted, as if his feet had been poured from lead. Desolation greeted his eyes as he gazed across the peak, as if this was a place that humans shouldn’t have come at all.

Jiang Chen suddenly felt the ground tremble slightly beneath his feet.

His expression changing rapidly, he immediately dashed to a side and looked back with alert, wary eyes.

Spiderweb cracks rapidly crept across the surface of the rock strewn ground, expanding at an ever increasing rate

Bam!

Countless numbers of rocks hurtled into the sky, some reaching heights of over several thousand meters. It seemed to be raining rocks all of a sudden.

Jiang Chen protected his vitals, never shifting his gaze from the epicenter of the cracks

There, an aura vortex formed, greedily sucking in all the magnetic twisters around it, and funneling them all into the ground below. 

“Lord of the Golden Seal?” A frightening thought flashed through Jiang Chen’s mind.

Wham!

In the next moment, a mystical beam of light blasted its way to the sky as an enormous figure crawled up from within the vortex. It rose like a mountain emerging from the ground, and continued to rise upward.

Before long, it was twenty or thirty feet high.

The giant figure shuddered, and then sprang forward like a loosed arrow, gathering the enormous aura in the air, aiming straight for Jiang Chen.

Jiang Chen’s hands spread out as six lotuses formed a barrier in front of him, their large petals catching all the flying rocks like nets spread across the heavens. 

“Human!”

The figure roared lowly, not articulating very clearly. Rather, it seemed to be an alien race voicing human language, stilted and unpracticed.

Jiang Chen looked up at this enormous figure, which clocked in at twenty, even thirty feet tall. It looked to be formed completely of metal. The corded muscles seemed to be poured bronze, giving off an invincible feeling.

“Lord of the Golden Seal?” Jiang Chen asked automatically.

“Mm? You know my name?” This enormous giant was indeed the Lord of the Golden Seal.

The lord seemed to have just woken up. This sentence was much clearer than the one it’d voiced before.

“Lord of the Golden Seal, ultimate protector of the magnetic golden mountain, am I correct?” Jiang Chen was happy rather than surprised to see that the being was willing to converse with him.

Things would be easy as long as it was willing to talk.

Jiang Chen also wanted to make use of this opportunity to observe this Lord of the Golden Seal and see if he could find any weaknesses. After all, these muscles that looked like they’d been cast from metal gave one a scalp numbing feeling just looking at them. Jiang Chen didn’t feel that he had the strength to engage in direct battle.

The Goldbiter Rats?

They were strong, but Jiang Chen wasn’t sure if he would thoroughly provoke this lord if he released the Rats, and result in his opponent awakening to another level.

Jiang Chen didn’t want to run the risk of causing the Lord of the Golden Seal to awaken to a higher level unless he was forced to.

Besides, judging from the way the lord was currently slurring its words, it seemed rather low level for now.

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