Chapter 365: Ice Bees vs. War Demon Armor

"Nine Heavens Dominion"

"Is that so?" Old Wang said regretfully, "Then it seems this Soul Refining Array has no effect on you. Starting tomorrow, let Kela and the other two use it while you and I rest outside."

"Holy shit..." Winnie's face flushed red as she glared, "Wang Feng, would it kill you to let me win an argument for once? Fine, fine! Your Soul Refining Array is freaking awesome, unbeatable! Happy now? Let me make this clear—yours truly is continuing tomorrow! Hmph, keeping something good from me? What are you thinking? And that magic potion, you definitely have more. Get it ready for tomorrow too!"

Kela had been somewhat puzzled at first, but seeing even the usually proud Winnie like this left no doubt—the effects of the Soul Refining Array inside must be extraordinary. It made her itch to try it herself.

"Now that's more like it! Everyone gets a turn," Old Wang said with a smile. "To turn the current situation around, we need strength. Your current conditions aren't enough, so it's up to me, your president, to worry about it."

"From now on, we'll train like this every day. The Soul Refining Array has its limits—Fan Texi and Wu Di in the morning, Winnie and Kela in the afternoon. And while you're at it, drink the tonic I've carefully prepared for you. Guaranteed to boost your vitality and virility, make you tough as nails!"

"Can't expect pearls from a dog's mouth!" Winnie rolled her eyes. "Kela and I don't need to 'stand tall.' You, on the other hand—you look pretty weak. You're the one who should drink more!"

"Captain!" Kela couldn't wait any longer. If even Winnie praised the Soul Refining Array so highly, she was eager to experience it herself.

"Drink the potion first—it's safer," Old Wang said, handing her a bottle. "Go on in!"

Everyone's inner demons are different. Combat isn't the only theme—even for a warrior like Kela, who has already awakened her soul.

"On your knees!"

Bow down! Submit! Bow down!

Before her stood a towering giant, three to four meters tall, his body radiating blazing golden light. His eyes were cold as ice, gazing down at Kela as if she were nothing more than an insignificant insect.

At the same time, a scythe rose behind Kela, poised to strike the moment she knelt and bowed her proud head—ready to sever it with ease.

To kneel was to die!

Kela didn’t want to die. She wanted to resist that will, but her courage lasted only a few seconds before fading.

The golden giant’s presence was overwhelming. He was the direct lineage of the Beast God from the Golden Family—the master of all Beast Gods. Mighty, noble, and majestic, he was born with the purest bloodline, unparalleled strength, and absolute authority. A mere thought could decree life or death for beastfolk; a single word could shape the future of their race.

No beastfolk could oppose such a terrifying and powerful "lord." His contemptuous gaze made it seem as though he was the center of the world by birthright, compelling her to kneel and submit—an instinctive, bone-deep worship and servility.

She was born for him. All beastfolk were born for him. He decided whether they lived or died.

To defy his will? That was disloyalty, disrespect, and folly—inviting humiliation upon herself. To kneel and choose death was the swiftest release, the easiest path, and the inexorable law of history.

Kela’s will rapidly crumbled. This futile resistance was exhausting and pointless. Her knees began to bend against her will.

But in the next moment, Kela heard countless CRACKS!—the sound of bones grinding as knees bent. Normally inaudible, it now rang clear as day. Behind her, one after another, the figures of beastfolk lit up—a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, a hundred thousand...

Tens, even hundreds of thousands of beastfolk, clad in tattered clothes, sallow-faced and emaciated, the unmistakable mark of the southern tribes from the barren wastelands. Closest to her stood familiar faces—Chieftain Firecrow, Elder Blackbear, Elder Ironhand, Sister Barley, Brother Tiger... too many to name.

Their eyes were vacant, their movements mechanical, mirroring Kela’s actions. Their knees seemed bound to hers, as if she were a puppeteer controlling puppets on strings. If she knelt, they would too—and at the same time, a million scythes rose behind their necks. All would lose their heads. Her people, her kin—how could she let them die with her?

Kela trembled. *To kneel was to die!* Her will hardened anew. She had vowed to guide the southern tribes—not for glory, but so they could eat their fill and live free of scorn. Her duty was unfinished. How could she die now?

Gritted her teeth, Kela resisted. Giving up was easy; holding on was hard. Her bent knees now felt unbearably heavy. Straightening them would take a hundred, a thousand times the effort it took to bend them.

She clenched her jaw, fighting to stand tall. But the golden giant’s gaze sharpened, and an even greater oppressive aura exploded outward.

CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!

Countless golden phantoms materialized in the air—ancestors of the beastfolk, their eyes filled with disdain for the filthy bloodline-defiling southern tribes. They would crush all defiance.

"On your knees! On your knees! On your knees!"

Kela's mind exploded with a buzzing sound, as if the majestic voice of a deity echoed through the heavens! She wasn't fighting against just one Beastman, but against the entire bloodline of Beastmen, the history of the beast race, and even the pantheon of Beast gods!

BOOM!

An unstoppable pressure forced her knees to crash onto the ground, yet the sickle did not fall.

Kela propped herself up with her hands, resisting the overwhelming divine pressure. Even if it meant her body would shatter, her head remained raised, never lowering to a position where the headsman's axe could easily strike.

Her teeth chattered violently, her entire body convulsing violently. In this moment, she suddenly recalled something Wang Feng had once said.

"Are kings and nobles born into their status? All men are created equal. To define nobility by bloodline is the most absurd and laughable of customs!"

She struggled to lift her head, gathering her strength amidst the tremors. Her eyes turned bloodshot, and blood seeped from her seven orifices (eyes, ears, nostrils, mouth). Finally, she roared: "I will not kneel!"

………………

Having slept soundly in the afternoon, Old Wang was now full of energy. He had been closely monitoring Kela's condition. As expected, Kela's inner demons were likely the most challenging among them all—because she was too intelligent and carried too many burdens. She lacked Wu Di's simplicity, Winnie's carefree nature, or even his and Fantecy's reckless abandon. Even after drinking the Soul Elixir, she might struggle to endure the entire process.

About an hour into the soul refinement, Kela's body began to tremble. Cold sweat had long since drenched her, her thin clothes clinging tightly to her delicate frame. Old Wang, however, had no mind to admire this; his focus remained solely on her facial expressions.

Her face shifted from stubbornness to surrender, from surrender to resolve, then from resolve to despair, before she clenched her teeth again... Her lips were already bleeding from biting them, tears mixing with sweat as they streamed down. Eventually, faint traces of blood even appeared from her seven orifices.

Old Wang snapped his fingers, instantly halting the Soul Refining Array. Kela's body went limp, collapsing into his arms as she lost consciousness. Forcing her mouth open, Old Wang poured a bottle of potion down her throat, using his soul power to guide the potion's effects slowly through her body.

In truth, Kela possessed extraordinary talent, but she carried too much. Her previous awakening had been incomplete. To truly transform, she had to overcome this hurdle—but she could only rely on herself.

Winnie had long since returned to the Burj Al Arab, taking Fantecy and Wu Di with her. The harder the training, the more important it was to eat well, drink well, and rest well. Balancing work and leisure, knowing how to enjoy life—that was Winnie's consistent style. At this late hour, the girls' dormitory at the Martial Arts Academy was out of the question, so Old Wang simply brought Kela back to his own dorm. Laying her on the bed and covering her with a blanket, he could sense the potion beginning to take effect. Kela's condition gradually stabilized, shifting from extreme exhaustion into deep slumber—a natural protective recovery process for the body.

Old Wang exhaled in relief. Finally, he had managed to get through this round of training for the group. Now, it was time to focus on his own affairs.

These past few nights, he had been burning the midnight oil. The Soul Refining Array? The Soul Potion? Those were just for the team members. For Old Wang, who now possessed two Heavenly Soul Pearls, this was the moment he could finally invest in his own development.

Martial artist? Wizard? Exorcist?

No, no, no! Those paths were too slow, and while easy to learn, they were hard to master.

In truth, Old Wang was indeed a jack-of-all-trades, and his skills were quite impressive. But after witnessing the combat prowess of Hei Wukai and Long Feixue, he understood that "knowing" and "mastering" were two different things—and "mastering" versus "perfecting" were entirely separate concepts.

Take Old Hei's sword-drawing technique, for example. Old Wang fully understood its principles and could even perform it himself. But the power behind it was worlds apart from Hei Wukai, who had honed the move through countless repetitions. Even with sorcery—Old Wang knew every spell, but he could never match Longmoer's casting speed.

This wasn't a game. Even if the principles were the same, true strength required spending vast amounts of time refining combat techniques and spells until they became the body's muscle memory—not just something the mind "understood." Otherwise, knowing everything meant excelling at nothing. Against average opponents, he could afford to show off, but against true experts who had perfected a single aspect, even a slight edge could crush him. Mastering one skill surpassed dabbling in many—and without it, he'd be condemned to defeat.

But mastering all this would take far too long. Not only did Old Wang lack the patience, but given the current predicament facing Rose, he didn’t have the luxury of time to slowly train these skills.

A person must learn to recognize their own strengths and amplify them... And what was Old Wang’s greatest advantage now?

Knowledge! Wealth!

The 50 million euros from selling Clara’s potion—he hadn’t even spent half of it during his trip to Dragon City. Not to mention the stockpile of potions and forging materials still left over. His last trip to Dragon City had been rushed, but this time, he would fully utilize everything, showing this world what it meant to be armed to the teeth.

At the forging workshop’s workbench, Old Wang was wholly focused on crafting a meticulously crafted War Demon Armor...

This War Demon Armor was incredibly small—only about the size of a palm. Forged from pure magic silver, it consisted of dozens of intricately curved, overlapping scales. In its disassembled state, its overall shape was unclear. Seven sets of tier-three Fusion Runes were intricately engraved across its surface, their densely packed patterns barely discernible to the unaided eye.

Old Wang examined a circular lens—a makeshift "magnifying glass" he had crafted by grinding ordinary crystal. Though limited in function, it could easily magnify several times over, sufficient for this level of precision carving.

With the tiniest engraving tool and meticulous technique, Old Wang’s movements appeared almost frozen, only his fingers trembling slightly. After laboring for the better part of the night, he finally completed his work. Assembling the ultra-thin segmented War Demon Armor piece by piece, the final form took shape—not humanoid, but resembling an eagle, with even its wings covered in ultra-thin plating.

Finally, Old Wang used delicate tweezers to carefully embed fragments of a shattered Alpha-5-grade Soul Crystal into the War Demon Armor...

Bzzz bzzz~~

The flowing silver on the War Demon Armor suddenly shimmered, emitting a faint glow on its surface, making it look like an exquisite toy.

Got it!

Old Wang let out a sigh of relief. The War Demon Armor itself wasn’t much, and neither were the Fusion Runes. The real challenge lay in engraving seven Fusion Runes onto such a tiny piece of armor—that truly required a painstaking grind.

Of course, he hadn’t toiled over this thing just to make a toy. With a wave of his left hand, Old Wang activated the oil lamp, but nothing happened. He gave it a pat, connecting his will, yet the ice bees inside, which should have responded immediately, were lazily ignoring him, curled up and fast asleep in the lamp’s space.

The nerve! Frowning, Old Wang plunged his entire hand into the lamp, reaching inside and yanking one out.

Holy crap! The once palm-sized ice bee had now grown much plumper. When Old Wang grabbed its body, he couldn’t even get a proper grip and had to drag it out by its finger-thick leg.

This thing had become freakishly thick. Its originally four thin, transparent wings had mutated—no longer transparent but much sturdier, with thick, clearly visible veins running through them. It had even evolved into eight wings!

Even more terrifying were its stinger and mouthparts. The stinger had grown longer, nearly a foot in length, and was no longer a soft, tube-like needle but a sharp steel spike, glowing with the eerie chill of ancient steel, razor-sharp. Its mouthparts had evolved into four rows of sickle-like blades, and even in its drowsy state, the occasional snap of its mandibles produced a sharp, grating sound.

This bore no resemblance to its former ice bee self—it was now a straight-up monster hornet!

Looking at the thick veins on its wings, Old Wang felt a pang of heartache. That was his blood flowing in there… These eighteen ice bees might not seem like much, but they’d consumed nearly as much as Fantecy and the others. About a third of the "Tang Monk Blood" potion Old Wang had brewed had gone straight into their stomachs! Of course, additives were necessary—both to stimulate their "martial evolution" traits and to prevent them from developing into a queen. A queen’s soul power might be stronger, but without ice bees to support it, it would just be a squawking meatbag with little combat ability.