Douluo Continent: Gourmet Prisoner

The mixed zone of Star Dou Great Forest was unusually noisy today, as twelve boys and girls dressed in Shrek Academy uniforms walked together, their chattering laughter breaking the tranquility of the forest.

They were the Soul Hunting Team from Shrek Academy, led by Xuan Lao, a level 98 Super Douluo, whose whereabouts were unknown, but who was likely secretly following them nearby.

"Sister Lexuan, look!" A blonde girl pointed to a strange grove of trees ahead, her face full of surprise. "The trees here are so weird! The trunks and branches are made of bone, and the branches are covered in flesh!"

Zhang Lexuan looked in the direction she pointed, and her brows furrowed instantly.

The forest before them was indeed extremely eerie, with bones forming branches and roasted meat forming leaves, exuding the aroma of roasted meat.

"The Star Dou Great Forest used to be completely different. It has changed so much. Everyone must be careful and not be careless." Her tone was solemn, and a strange sense of crisis lingered in her heart.

"Don't worry, Senior Sister!" a tall boy laughed. "With Elder Xuan, a level 98 Super Douluo, here, we're not afraid even if a ten-thousand-year-old soul beast appears in the mixed zone. At most, Elder Xuan just wants to test our strength."

"That's right, Sister Lexuan, don't be so nervous." Han Ruoruo gently patted Zhang Lexuan's back and comforted her softly, "With the twelve of us working together, even without Elder Xuan, we can easily deal with ordinary ten-thousand-year-old soul beasts."

Wu Ming chimed in, "Don't worry, you're probably overthinking it."

Looking at her companions' relaxed expressions, Zhang Lexuan could only sigh inwardly, hoping that she had really been overthinking things. After joking around for a while, the group began to set up camp, preparing to rest there.

Just as the camp was taking shape, a piercing hissing sound suddenly tore through the air, followed by an immense pressure that descended like dark clouds, making it difficult for everyone to breathe.

Everyone's expression changed drastically. Looking in the direction of the sound, they saw a giant snake, thirty meters long, slowly crawling out from the depths of the dense forest.

It has a dark red, blood-red snake body with scarlet shimmering scales, a triangular head with short, dark gold horns, crescent-shaped gold patterns embedded in its blood-red vertical pupils, strange lunar eclipse black spots on its belly, a forked tail like a blood-quenched scimitar with three blood-red beads hanging from its tip, and a thick, ominous red mist surrounding its body.

This is the Blood Moon Shadow Serpent, which was driven out of the Star Dou Great Forest for its rampant predation on soul beasts.

Because its frenzied and unrestrained hunting behavior caused serious damage to the inner circle of the Star Dou Great Forest, it escaped from the inner circle under the siege of many soul beasts and came to the mixed zone to heal its wounds.

More importantly, it continues to hunt soul beasts even after it has eaten its fill, and it remains unrepentant. Now, it is a soul beast that has been ordered to be killed.

"A ten-ten-thousand-year-old soul beast!" A girl trembled with fear, her words stuttering.

"Master Xuan! Where is Master Xuan?" The boy who had been comforting Zhang Lexuan earlier was now panicked and looked around for Master Xuan.

"Everyone calm down! All of you, enter battle mode!" Zhang Lexuan suppressed her fear. As the senior disciple, she knew she couldn't afford to panic. "Elder Xuan might be observing us from the shadows. This could be a test for us! Believe in yourselves!"

However, the Blood Moon Shadow Serpent will not give them time to adjust.

It let out a deafening screech and charged towards the crowd like an arrow. It opened its blood-red maw and spewed out a cloud of pitch-black poisonous mist. Wherever the mist passed, the grass and trees withered and turned black instantly, emitting a pungent, corrosive smell.

"Silver Moon True Form! Moonfall!" Zhang Lexuan activated her soul skill first, and a bright silver moon phantom appeared, pressing down on the poisonous fog.

"Golden Crow True Fire!" Wu Ming unleashed a raging inferno, attempting to burn away the poisonous mist.

"Chaos Lock!" Several golden chains flew out, attempting to restrain the Blood Moon Shadow Serpent's movements.

Everyone unleashed their strongest soul skills to work together to resist.

However, the strength of the 100,000-year-old soul beast far exceeded their expectations. The group's attacks barely broke through the poisonous mist, and only Zhang Lexuan's Silver Moon attack left a shallow wound on the snake's body.

This attack thoroughly enraged the Blood Moon Shadow Serpent.

It lashed its forked tail, creating a whistling sound, and struck the boy closest to it hard.

The boy had no time to react before he was struck by the snake's tail and instantly turned into a pool of blood mist, without even being able to scream.

"Someone died! This isn't a test at all! Where is Elder Xuan?!" A girl screamed in despair, her eyes filled with hopelessness.

The Blood Moon Shadow Serpent spewed out another large cloud of poisonous mist. In the chaos, the three students were unable to dodge in time and were swallowed by the poisonous mist.

A piercing scream came from the poisonous fog, chilling to the bone, and then fell silent after a moment, clearly indicating that the victim had died.

Watching her companions fall one by one, Zhang Lexuan's heart sank to the bottom, but she still refused to give up. "Elder Xuan must have encountered an emergency; he'll be back soon! Everyone, stay close to me, don't scatter!"

However, the shadow of death and the oppressive aura of the 100,000-year-old soul beast had completely broken most people, and no matter how Zhang Lexuan shouted, it was difficult to organize an effective resistance.

A hint of mockery flashed in the Blood Moon Shadow Serpent's eyes as it began to hunt down the remaining students one by one, like a cat catching mice.

Meanwhile, Xuanzi, who was enjoying a meal deep in the forest, finally felt the familiar pressure of the 100,000-year-old soul beast, as well as the soul power fluctuations of the students mixed in with the pressure.

His expression changed drastically. He abruptly dropped the half-eaten roasted pig leg in his hand, and his figure transformed into a streak of light as he sped towards the camp.

"Damn it! How could a 100,000-year-old soul beast appear in the mixed zone? Kids, you have to hold on!"

Meanwhile, Shi Yu was bored out of his mind.

Tang Ya and Shi Qiu'er were both in seclusion digesting the energy from the previous feast, while Tianmeng Ice Silkworm was also cultivating to break through the bottleneck of cocooning. He simply went to wander around the mixed zone, while the Crimson King secretly followed and protected him from a distance.

Sensing the intense energy fluctuations and the familiar pressure of the soul beast emanating from afar, Shi Yu's eyes lit up: "What's happening over there? It's not far, let's go check it out."

When he arrived at the scene, he found that the original twelve-person Soul Hunting Team had been reduced to only Zhang Lexuan, Wu Ming, Han Ruoruo, and an unknown male student.

The four were almost exhausted of their soul power, all of them were injured, and their faces were as pale as paper. Although the Blood Moon Shadow Serpent also had many wounds, most of them were just superficial injuries and did not affect its combat power at all. On the contrary, it made it even more ferocious.

"Sister Lexuan, run! We'll stop it!" Wu Ming gritted her teeth, forcibly urging her remaining soul power to prepare for a final attack.

"No! You'll all be throwing your lives away!" Zhang Lexuan said, tears welling in her eyes, resolutely refusing to leave.

"Sister Lexuan, as long as we're alive, we can always fight again!" Han Ruoruo pushed Zhang Lexuan. "You need to go quickly; at least someone needs to get back alive to report!"

"I'm not leaving! We'll die together!" Zhang Lexuan stubbornly shook her head. The four of them looked at each other and saw the determination in each other's eyes. They prepared to detonate their soul power and perish together with the Blood Moon Shadow Serpent.

Just then, the Blood Moon Shadow Serpent rushed forward, opened its blood-red maw, and prepared to swallow the four of them whole.

At the critical moment, a clear boy's voice suddenly rang out: "Second Soul Skill, watch me!"

The Blood Moon Shadow Serpent abruptly stopped moving. Its pair of ferocious, blood-red vertical pupils instantly lost focus and turned to look in the direction from which the sound came. Then, it turned its head and shot towards Shi Yu.

Zhang Lexuan and the other three were stunned, staring at the suddenly appearing little boy, unable to react for a moment.

Shi Yu watched the giant snake rushing towards him and nimbly dodged to the side.

The Blood Moon Shadow Serpent, being a 100,000-year-old soul beast, reacted extremely quickly. Seeing that its attack had missed, it immediately swung its forked tail, whipping towards Shi Yu with a sharp gust of wind.

Shi Yu lightly touched the ground with his toes, his body leaping into the air. As he dodged the snake's tail, he looked down and saw the Blood Moon Shadow Serpent opening its mouth and biting down from below.

He remained calm in the face of danger, stepped on the snake's fangs and pushed off with all his might, his body rising again, creating distance before landing steadily on the open ground beside him.

Turning to the four still bewildered people, Shi Yu shouted, "Can you still move? If you can, come and help. Do you expect a child like me to deal with a 100,000-year-old soul beast?"

Zhang Lexuan and the other three seemed to snap out of their daze and quickly nodded, "Yes!"

Shi Yu noticed the Shrek badges on their clothes and realized: they were from Shrek Academy, Zhang Lexuan, Wu Ming, Han Ruoruo, and a random passerby... It seemed they had encountered a side story.

If I hadn't come, these four people would probably have really died here.

"Its weakness is its eyes, attack its eyes!" Shi Yu said, then charged forward again to fight the Blood Moon Eclipse Serpent.

His first soul skill, "Roaring Loudly," was continuously activated, constantly reducing the energy attack of the Blood Moon Shadow Serpent. At the same time, he used his exquisite movement skills to constantly harass and restrain the giant serpent.

Zhang Lexuan and the other three also realized what was happening. Although they had very little soul power left, they still tried their best to release their soul skills to interfere with the Blood Moon Shadow Serpent's actions and create an opportunity for Shi Yu.

The two, one human and one snake, fought for a long time. The Blood Moon Shadow Serpent was increasingly annoyed by Shi Yu's harassment, and its weaknesses began to emerge. Zhang Lexuan seized the opportunity and fully activated her sixth soul skill. The silver moon phantom reappeared, carrying a world-destroying aura, and slammed into the Blood Moon Shadow Serpent's left eye.

"Hiss—!" The Blood Moon Shadow Serpent let out a shrill scream as its left eye was shattered, and black blood gushed out.

Exhausted to begin with, it suffered this severe injury, and its massive body could no longer support it, slowly collapsing down, crashing right towards Shi Yu.

Shi Yu flashed away, easily dodging the giant snake's corpse, and walked to Zhang Lexuan and the other three.

"Are you all alright?" Shi Yu asked. "Don't you all have elders with you when you go out to hunt souls?" He knew, of course, that Elder Xuan was the teacher leading the group and that he was saying this on purpose.

Zhang Lexuan looked embarrassed and said softly, "We're fine, we just ran out of soul power. Thank you for saving us. Without you, we would probably have been killed by the snake." She couldn't bring herself to say that Elder Xuan had accompanied them, since Elder Xuan hadn't appeared at all.

"Little brother, why are you alone in the mixed zone? It's so dangerous here," Wu Ming asked curiously, panting heavily.

Han Ruoruo was a boy-lover. She looked at Shi Yu with eyes full of affection and worry: "Yes, it's too dangerous here. Once we recover our soul power, you can leave with us."

"I have an elder with me. He's nearby and will help if there's any danger," Shi Yu said calmly.

"Wasn't that dangerous enough? Why didn't he intervene?" Han Ruoruo thought of Elder Xuan's inaction and really didn't have a good impression of these "elders".

Shi Yu shrugged: "Do you see me injured?"

The four of them looked at Shi Yu and found that apart from some dust on his clothes, he had no injuries at all. He was even breathing steadily without panting, which was in stark contrast to their disheveled state.

"Pervert..." Han Ruoruo finally managed to utter the two words after holding back for a long time, her eyes filled with shock.

"Hey! I'm your savior, why are you cursing me?" Shi Yu said helplessly.

"I'm so sorry!" Han Ruoruo quickly apologized. "I didn't mean to, I was just so surprised."

"Alright, I should go now. You can handle this snake." Shi Yu turned around and prepared to leave.

"Wait!" Zhang Lexuan quickly called out to him, "Don't you need its spirit ring and spirit bone? These are 100,000-year spirit rings and spirit bones!"

"I don't need it, it's not suitable for me," Shi Yu said without turning her head.

"Doesn't your family need it? This is a rare 100,000-year-old soul bone!" Wu Ming asked anxiously.

"We don't need this at home." Shi Yu's tone was nonchalant, as if he were talking about a trivial matter.

At this moment, the unknown male student walked to the corpse of the Blood Moon Shadow Serpent, summoned his weapon spirit, carefully took out the serpent gall, walked up to Shi Yu, and handed it over with both hands: "Benefactor, this serpent gall should be useful to you. Please accept it. We cannot keep it all to ourselves."

Seeing the expectant looks in the four people's eyes, Shi Yu couldn't refuse and took the snake gall: "Thanks."

"You'll come to Shrek Academy, right?" Han Ruoruo looked into Shi Yu's eyes with anticipation, and the other three also looked at him with longing in their eyes.

Shi Yu pondered: Shrek Academy does indeed have places worth visiting, such as the Golden Ancient Tree. That is an important resource of the Douluo Continent, and it cannot remain under the control of Tang Shenwang forever.

Moreover, although Shrek Academy's research on soul tools is not as advanced as that of the Sun Moon Continent, it has its own unique features, so it would be worthwhile to go and see for yourself.

After a moment's hesitation, Shi Yu looked at the four of them, nodded, and said what they most wanted to hear: "Yes, I will go."

Upon hearing this, Zhang Lexuan and the other three smiled with delight, finally putting their minds at ease.