Chapter 31

Divine watched as the giant bear tanked Flaming Paw's next attack, gaining a moment to gather its qi.

The bear smashed its front paws repeatedly on the ground, missing the quick foxes completely.

The earth quaked.

The foxes lost their balance.

Chunks of earth and stone flew around and peppered them.

The bear was using his earth qi in an explosive manner.

That forced the foxes to retreat.

While they escaped the blast radius, the two four-tailed foxes received many small injuries, but lucky for them, they escaped the bigger chunks.

Meanwhile Flaming Paw had already jumped back and was retaliating by sending a chain of fireballs at the bear.

The bear's fur darkened and Divine sensed, that it was armoring itself with earth qi.

The fireballs didn't even manage to singe its fur.

They were in a stalemate, but only momentarily.

As the fight dragged on, it didn't look good for the foxes.

The earth bear was an incredible tank and the foxes suffered more under the few of the bear's attacks, that only scraped them, than the bear under their much more precise and numerous hits.

The four-tails, that had been bodychecked to the side before the fight had really started, saw his packmates' worsening situation and snarled in frustration.

The injured fox gathered all of his strength to stand up on his four legs and took a step forward, intending to join the desperate battle and provide the support that would tip the scales.

An errand big chunk of stone came flying and hit the four-tails right on the head.

With a mix of a yelp and a huff, the poor fox went down again.

Divine was really impressed by the four-tails' luck.

Watching the foxes losing the battle, Divine knew the most practical thing to do would be to wait for one side to die and then kill the exhausted victor.

But Flaming Paw had jumped in right away, when Divine had fallen before the earth bear earlier.

He didn't know if he was going to regret this, but Divine gathered his power and clad himself in dark qi.

Suddenly speeding forward, the bear didn't see him coming at all, mostly because it was busy and Divine was coming from behind.

The Dancing Feather Sword was drawn in one smooth motion.

Dark qi made its blade look ominous and terrifying.

Divine slashed at the bear's left hind leg.

Its qi-reinforced hide was extremely resistant.

Feeling a great backlash as if he had hit a mountain, Divine feared his blade would be stopped.

The dark qi corroded the heavily resisting hide and a spray of blood spurted out.

After the initial resistance, the blade went through the flesh, muscles, tendons and bone very quickly.

The leg was completely severed and fell to the ground with a thud.

The bear let out a terrible roar of pain.

Divine rushed passed the bear with his top speed, to quickly get out of its range.

This distraction and the bear's sudden limited mobility gave Flaming Paw the opportunity he needed.

The five-tailed fox threw fire again, but this time there were no fireballs, just one continuous stream.

Like a flame thrower in the bear's face.

Blocking the fire stream with its front paws didn't help and only gave the other two foxes an opening to attack its flanks.

It was difficult to say what killed the bear in the end.

There definitely wasn't going to be an autopsy to find the exact cause of death.

But it didn't matter. What mattered was that the bear was finally dead.

[+34 Blood Qi Essence]

That was a good haul.

Especially since his only investments were a little bruising, that was already healing, a blood bath from the leg stump, that could easily be washed off, and some of his time and nerves.

Flaming Paw joyfully began digging into the bear's flesh for his own prize.

A really bloody spectacle ensued.

When he finally found it, Flaming Paw's orange-red fur had already turned completely blood-red.

Seeing how happily the mighty five-tailed fox repeatedly jumped into air with a fist-sized magical beast core with an impressive earth qi concentration in its snout, made even Divine smile.

Divine noticed he had let his guard down a little, after the conclusion of the fight.

Now would be the best opportunity for the foxes to bite him in the back.

The happy Flaming Paw and the three exhausted and injured four-tailed foxes had no intention of doing something like that, at all.

But even if it may not be warranted this time, Divine didn't intent to lose his caution in the future.

After his victory dance, or victory jumps, Flaming Paw looked at Divine.

Flaming Paw was keeping the earth bear's core between his teeth the whole time.

It seemed like Flaming Paw wanted to get rid of him. At least he wasn't trying to accomplish that by killing Divine.

After giving the earth qi core in his mouth a lick, the five-tailed fox gulped, looked at the cave and then shot an impatient look at Divine.

It seemed Flaming Paw intended to consume the magical beast core right away.

And if Divine was the biggest worry for him, the fox was either stupid or knew for sure that with the bear's death, Flaming Paw and Divine were the strongest in the region and the only ones who really posed a danger to the other.

Divine really hoped this conjecture was true, but he definitely wouldn't count on it, not in a world where theoretically, at every moment, a dragon could descend from sky and lighten up your day.

Divine naturally had nothing against going home right now at all.

He quickly went to skin the giant bear. Even if the foxes' earlier attacks and Flaming Paw's digging definitely left some damage, the bear was so gigantic, that there were still a lot of good parts.

Because of all the practice he had gotten since his arrival in this world, even as he hurried with the skinning, it wasn't such a rough job.

Sharpening his sword with qi a little helped tremendously with cutting the bear.

Divine rolled the bloody pelt into a sausage. Then he took it and the bear's leg on his shoulders.

Both were bigger than him, heavy and unwieldy.

Although he could have carried them only with the strength of his body, Divine preferred to carry them with his qi.

He only packed them on his shoulders, so they wouldn't float behind him and clue in everybody about his abilities.

With a nod at Flaming Paw and the other foxes, Divine set off.

Flaming Paw watched him leave.

Divine forwent tree hopping, because of his load, but he made good time anyway.

Some magical beasts and even some animals were lured over by the smell of blood Divine trailed behind him.

But when they came closer and noticed the smell of bear, they kept their distance.

Only a haggard looking lynx made the mistake of attacking, leaving its life for that.

[+2 Blood Qi Essence]

As soon as Divine was out of sight and smell, the others pounced on the lynx' remains.

The goblins back at the tribe were especially respectful and distant this time.

Could be because he was carrying these big spoils, and was carrying them like it was nothing.

Or was it his appearance? He was still caked in the bear's blood from top to bottom.

Compared with the unobtrusive and respectful distance the tribe members kept, the gobling disciples and Minion Scarface were the complete opposite.

The four goblings were simply happy that their master was back. And they were curious about his red get-up and what he had brought.

Minion Scarface worriedly fussed over him until he assuaged her.

"Not my blood." Divine told her in Gobble.

She looked really relieved.

The other minions and the humans looked over interested too. But they kept their distance.

After Divine had loaded off the spoils and the disciples were busy inspecting the bloody pelt and the bear leg, Minion Scarface pulled him some water and brought it near the latrine pits.

She took out a relatively clean rag, made from the human's old clothes, and helped Divine wash.

Scarface was getting bolder with him.

She took care of his head and hands first.

After that, she roughly wiped off the Sea Serpent Hide Robe he was still wearing.

The blood was surprisingly easy to clean off from the material.

His newest robe was worth its higher price.

Then his minion helped him out of the robe and with the cleaning of his body.

Divine was much more comfortable around goblins now than in the beginning.

Before, he never would have let one touch him.

Seeing them had become normal and Divine didn't think they were disgusting and ugly anymore.

He had really gotten used to them.

But goblins didn't look pretty to him.

The female goblins didn't excite him and couldn't get his blood pumping.

That's why Divine was relieved, when Scarface didn't try to go too far and didn't touch anything she shouldn't.

He kind of liked this minion of his by now, so he didn't look forward to rejecting her advances.

Divine hoped their dynamic would stay just like this, and Scarface would never try to cross the line.