Chapter 572: Training Forest
A single mountain stood in the middle of Tianhun Academy and the giant forest behind it. Plenty of ‘entrapped’ soulbeasts lived within the forest and served as a way for the students of the academy to train in.
As such, this forest was usually dubbed the ‘Training Forest’.
In the hearts of many of the students, the Training Forest was a very mysterious place. Only fifth years—Soul Ancestors—had the prerequisites to enter the Training Forest. All of the lesser years of the academy were prohibited from entering, so they had only rumors of what it was like and feared it.
Even the fifth years weren’t allowed entry into the forest so easily. They could only go in at certain times or with an instructor. Experiencing the ‘dangers’ here and the primal nature of the beasts here was good for many of the students to learn from when they fought the soulbeasts.
In general, it was pretty hard for most students to come across a potentially dangerous situation. But that wasn’t always for sure. In the many many years of history, there had been plenty of accidents that happened within the forest.
……
“Hissss!!!”
A snake hissed from somewhere in the forest. Normally, the hissing of a snake would be quite low and deep, but this one was very high-pitched and resounding for kilometers around.
This place was a small lake within the forest. Only two hundred meters in length, countless trees covered the lake from above. What normally should’ve been very clear waters had been instead churning wildly with violet light. With the banging going around, there was definitely a violent battle taking place.
In the middle of the lush trees and foliage, a hundred meter long snake the width of a vat of water arose from the lake. Elemental water rose up with it like a barrier, and with a hiss, another ball of water was spat out.
A peak late-stage class five soulbeast, a two-tailed watersnake!!
Around the giant snake, the figure of five flitted around it like butterflies in the air. They were all water-type soul cultivators: two of them were male and the other three female. They were in their twenties around and were averaged to be around mid-stage Soul Ancestors. With their ability to stand on top of the lake by surrounding themselves with elemental water, they were able to fight the giant snake.
“Xiao Yun, pay attention to the snake’s tail attack! Zhao Yu, you and Cui Ming try to catch the watersnake’s attention! Xiao Lan and Xiao Cui will try to immobilize it!’
A voice called out from a nearby cliff to point at the giant snake the five were fighting. A sixth person stood there, a beautiful woman in thirties.
She wasn’t taking part in the battle. She was only there to give guidance to the five. With how her lips were curled slightly upwards in a smile, she was clearly not worried about the five being in danger. A blue-colored squirrel with a fluffy tail sat on on her shoulder, its tail twitching every so often. With how its eyes were shining bright, the squirrel looked ready to leap into battle as well.
……
This group was one of the groups there in the forest to train.
They were clearly fifth year students from the water section. And the woman standing on the cliff was the instructor here to help them train.
Under her guidance, the five students were fighting as one cohesive unit with a soulbeast that was stronger than any individual one of them. And they were even winning!
……
A short moment later, the two-tailed watersnake let loose a shrill cry before it toppled to the ground and moved no more. But it wasn’t dead—it was just unconscious.
The woman there smiled when she watched the snake fall. “Haha, not bad. Let’s take a breather.”
The five returned to the cliff, their faces all weary, but filled with satisfaction.
“Very good. You all did well. I hope this will be a good learning experience for you all. You’ve all gone from being flustered with a soulbeast the same level of you to being able to win against a soulbeast even stronger than you all. Not bad at all….”
Not even bothering to stifle her praise for the five students, the young woman continued to speak, “But there were a few places of possible improvements. Some of you used a soul skill when it wasn’t optimal, and there were a few times you wasted more soulforce than you needed. Xiao Yun, I noticed when you were attacking the snake’s tail from the left, you should’ve….”
The woman continued to give a post-battle analysis to the five students, breaking down areas for improvement for the five students to listen intently.
After a few minutes, the woman clapped her hands, “Well, this should conclude our time here in the forest. This should be long enough, we can return to the academy today.”
As they were preparing to leave, the blue squirrel on the young woman’s shoulder perked its ears. Standing up, it began to squeak incessantly!
And at the same time, the ground beneath them started to tremble!
“Boom!!”
Stone and dust started to kick up into the air, and right under the amazed eyes of the six people there, a hole opened up on the cliff there. A claw shaped like a drill extended out from the ground before shooting out towards the watersnake. In one fluid motion, it extracted the two-tailed bluesnake’s soulgem!
And just like that, the two-tailed bluesnake died!
The soil around the dry land started to churn before a lobster-shaped soulbeasts the size of bisons came erupting from the ground!!
“Giant underground lobsters! And late-stage class six!! We have to leave right away!”
The woman cried out. Revealing herself as a mid-stage Soul Exalt, she leapt forward with her squirrel, who flew into the air to grow several times its normal size. Falling back down to the ground with the power of a mid-stage class six, it gave a menacing cry.
Stunned by the arrival of the three soulbeasts, it took a while before any of the five could respond. It was the woman who snapped out of it first. Flustered, she took one quick look at the two giant pincers before taking off towards the academy.
A giant underground lobster was a earth-type soulbeast that specialized in hiding underground and was one of the more aggressive ones!
Like the Soulbeast Forest, the Training Forest was split into several areas. This area the six were in was a gathering place for class five soulbeasts, and very rarely did any class six soulbeasts come by. Today it seemed, was an unlucky day for the six if a late-stage class six soulbeast was here now.
“Ah!!”
“Xiao Yun!!”
Having been caught up with trying to fight the lobster in front of it, the instructor suddenly heard several cries from behind. Whirling around, she saw yet another giant underground lobster blocking the way of the five students!
There were two of them!!
The lobster’s right pincer had been raised in the air before the five students cried out, and with frightening speed, the pincer came down onto the young girl at the front!
The other four students had been knocked a few meters back the upturned dirt when the lobster emerged from the ground. With the distance increased between them and the fifth, none of the students were close enough to come to her rescue in time!
“Chirp!!!”
At that moment, there was a loud chirp before a giant bird draped in purple light came shooting down like a meteorite. Latching onto the lobster’s pincer with its clawed feet, the bird took back off into the air. There was a loud tumultuous sound when the giant lobster was forcibly dislodged from the earth and sent airborne by the claws of the giant bird!!
The bird took the giant lobster a hundred meters up into the air before spinning around. Picking up rotational speed, the bird let go of the pincer, allowing the lobster to go flying off into the distance and disappearing from sight….
“Houu!!!”
Not even seconds after the bird appeared, a loud draconic-sounding voice erupted through the air along with the exploding of ground. A nearby hill shook slightly before a giant figure leapt up into the air. It remained there for several seconds before smashing back down into the ground onto the remaining lobster there!
The instructor, who had been looking in the direction of her students at first, turned back around to where the giant figure landed. The only thing she could see was a terrifyingly large blue-colored soulbeast pressed into the ground where the lobster had been. It opened its jaws wide and then clamped down onto the lobster’s head!
Then under the stupefied eyes of everyone there, they watched as the late-stage class six soulbeast was eaten by the new soulbeast in three bites….