Chapter 42: Killing the Bat

  The red lights flew closer, and under the illumination of the Night Pearl, Li Muran finally saw the true face of these red lights.

  It turned out that the flying creatures were a group of pitch-black bats, each with a size of several feet, more than ten times larger than ordinary bats. The red glow was the blood-red eyes of these bats.

  "Sanguine Bat, a first-class demon beast, only active at night, often inhabiting dark places, fond of feeding on the fresh blood of humans and livestock." Li Muran's mind immediately recalled relevant records from ancient books.

  Although the Blood Bats were only first-class demon beasts with relatively low strength, if Li Muran had only encountered a single Blood Bat, he wouldn't have taken it seriously. However, there were at least twenty to thirty Blood Bats here, and being surrounded by them would be extremely troublesome.

  Li Muran's dozens of zhang-long talismans transformed into numerous fireballs the size of a chi, exploding in mid-air with deafening roars, illuminating the entire mountain valley.

  Some blood bats that failed to dodge were instantly engulfed in the flames of the explosion, vanishing into nothingness in an instant. However, most of the blood bats managed to narrowly avoid the flames by flapping their meaty wings and each opened their mouths to emit a wave of invisible sonic waves, blocking the splashing flames from getting close.

  Not only that, these blood bats also sprayed a series of sound waves at Li Muran. This invisible magic hit the golden canopy on Li Muran's body and shook it slightly, although it couldn't break through the golden canopy, but it made the yuanqi of the golden symbol lose a lot.

  This is "Sonic Wave", the only spell that Blood Bats can use. For Li Mu, one Sonic Wave was negligible and not a threat at all; but if these twenty or so Blood Bats kept spitting out sonic waves to attack him like this, he wouldn't be able to withstand it!

  "We must end this quickly!" Li Muran's mind moved, and his two hands simultaneously cast the Flame Explosion Technique. In an instant, four or five fireballs shot out from his fingertips, striking one of the Bloodthirsty Bats.

  If other disciples saw this scene, they would be shocked. Among the disciples who have been cultivating for more than a year, those who can skillfully cast the Flame Explosion Technique and successfully cast it in an instant are already rare; Those who can continuously cast two or three Flame Explosions are considered geniuses, enough to be proud of; And someone like Li Muran, who can actually cast with both hands simultaneously, casting Flame Explosions non-stop, can be said to be unparalleled!

  However, Li Muran can only achieve such smooth spellcasting in a nighttime environment. In daytime environments, he is unable to do so.

  The bloodthirsty bat hastily spat out sound waves to block in front of it, but several Flame Explosions struck continuously, immediately shattering its formless sound waves. The bloodthirsty bat also turned into flying smoke amidst the flames.

  Li Muran's rapid casting of Flame Cannon again, several blasts of flame shot out, and another bloodthirsty bat was instantly killed.

  However, as he killed the two blood bats, the other blood bats suddenly spat out a sonic wave technique, attacking Li Muran in front of him.

  Li Muran's golden aura was violently shaking under the invisible sonic attack, and the golden light was also gradually dimming, in a precarious state.

  "This is still too slow to kill the demon!" Li Muran's mind moved, his arm stretched out, and he aimed at the most densely packed blood bat. He triggered the hidden Dark Moon Crossbow in his sleeve.

  At that moment, the three spirit stones inlaid on the Dark Moon Crossbow suddenly turned to flying ash. The three pure heavenly and earthly primal energies were absorbed by the Dark Moon Crossbow, converging onto the three short arrows. Instantly, the three short arrows shot out simultaneously, swift and urgent, accompanied by a sharp whistling sound.

  Although the Blood Bats fly very fast, they are far inferior to these short arrows; the Blood Bats dodged in vain and could only spit out sound waves to protect themselves.

  "Pffft! Pffft! Pffft!" A few soft sounds, three short arrows easily pierced the invisible sound waves, penetrating the bloodthirsty bat's body.

  Each short arrow killed at least one blood bat, and one of them even pierced two blood bats in a row.

  "This Dark Moon Crossbow is indeed invincible! Unfortunately, it can't be used continuously!" Li Muran thought to himself, the Dark Moon Crossbow only had three arrows, and if he didn't retrieve the short arrow after shooting, he couldn't continue with the next round of attack.

  Li Muran reached into his bosom and retrieved nine thin, black flying knives as thin as a cicada's wings. He then flicked both hands in all directions, and amidst the whooshing sounds, several bloodthirsty bats were struck by the flying knives, instantly either dead or injured.

  These flying knives are razor-sharp and unmatched, and even a Blood Bat, which is only a first-class demon beast, cannot withstand them head-on.

  However, Li Muran is not a divine cultivator, and after the flying knife is released, it cannot be recalled on its own.

  Although Li Muran killed more than a dozen blood bats in an instant, there were still over ten blood bats that refused to leave and continued to attack Li Muran.

  "We have no choice but to use a higher-level talisman!"

  Li Muran took out a stack of over ten palm-sized talismans from his bosom, and a hint of regret flashed across his face. However, this expression only lasted for an instant before he resolutely cast out all the talismans, each one striking a bloodthirsty bat.

  These talismans' seals were activated by Li Muran, immediately turning into a thin and long green light. The green light rushed towards the Blood Bat, instantly transforming into countless vines that tightly entwined the Blood Bat.

  This is a wooden attribute spell, the wrapping technique, which Li Muran only learned to use after advancing to the middle stage of his meridian. It can only be cast at night when his spiritual power is particularly smooth; with the help of the mysterious copper mirror light, Li Muran used the wrapping technique and three-level talisman paper to make some wrapped talismans. The cost of the talisman paper alone was ten spirit stones per sheet, while in the market, a wrapped talisman would sell for fifty spirit stones!

  Creating a binding talisman requires drawing the Binding Struggle Script, which is extremely difficult and is considered one of the most challenging scripts among the Five Elements' beginner-level scripts. Even disciples in the later stages of their Qi training find it hard to master the drawing of this script, resulting in a low success rate for creating talismans, which naturally drives up the price of binding talismans. However, Li Muran has the assistance of the mysterious copper mirror, rarely making mistakes, and almost always able to create the corresponding talisman as long as he can successfully cast his spell.

  Under the restraint of the entwining symbols, each and every blood bat was tightly wrapped by the green vines, their meat wings unable to unfold, one by one falling onto the ground.

  Some blood bats desperately sprayed invisible sound waves, wanting to shake off the constraints of the green vines, but the green vines had strong tenacity and were almost unaffected by the invisible sound waves.

  This is also a case of one thing overcoming another. If the Iron Winged Eagle were to face this entwining symbol, it would not be intimidated in the slightest. It only needs to fan out its razor-sharp wind blades to cut down the Qingteng Fast Knife conjured up by the entwining symbol like a tangled mess. As for these bloodthirsty bats, although there are many of them, none of them have the means to instantly break through the Qingteng, and they are greatly restrained by this entwining symbol.

  Li Muran took the opportunity to raise a golden knife, and approached those motionless blood bats. With one slash of his knife, he killed most of the blood bats on the spot. Only two or three managed to escape by struggling free from the Qing Teng vines that had not fully entwined them, flying far away into the darkness.

  "Finally solved!" Li Muran felt a sense of relief in his heart, he retrieved the short arrows and flying knives one by one, then used the golden knife to cut open the corpse of the bloodthirsty bat, finding the essence within their bodies.

  A total of eleven intact Blood Bat Essence were found, which are the essence of a first-class demon beast. They are not very useful for the cultivation of mid-term disciples, but they also have some value and can be sold at a good price in the market. Moreover, such materials do not need to be handed over to the sect.

  Li Muran thought to himself, "A first-class demon beast's essence core has limited effect on increasing my magical power. However, these blood bats are nocturnal creatures that have been living in this underground tomb city for so long without seeing the light of day. They must have some special properties. My divine light also has a special property, which is that it can only be fully displayed in a night environment. I wonder if these blood bat essence cores will be useful to me?"

  Li Muran temporarily stored these jingyuan in a jade box, waiting for another day to test their effects.

  "The demon beast chooses a nest, generally choosing the most beneficial place for its own cultivation. Either it is a place with exceptionally rich heaven and earth yuanqi, or there are other rare treasures! For example, that iron-winged eagle, its nest was set beside the thousand-year-old spiritual medicine, Mo Lingzhi." Li Muran thought of this, and held back the stench, carefully searching in the mountain valley.

  Not long after, he discovered a vein of Dark Golden Stone - this is also a common natural treasure in the underground tomb city. The Dark Golden Stone is widely used for refining equipment, but its output is not small, so the price is not very high. Li Muran used his Golden Blade artifact to dig out more than a dozen fist-sized high-quality Dark Golden Stones. As for the other scattered small pieces or inferior quality Dark Golden Stones, he didn't bother with them. Anyway, these treasures were originally of ordinary value and had to be handed over to the sect, so even if he spent a lot of effort digging up more, the reward wouldn't be much.

  Li Muran searched through the mountain valley and found nothing else, so he left this place and continued to explore other places.

  An hour later, Li Muran, who was carefully picking a hundred-year-old Dark Night Grass, suddenly changed his expression. He put the Dark Night Grass aside and took out a jade token from his pocket.

  This was the transmission talisman that Master Zixia had given to him and his fellow disciples. At this moment, the talisman was constantly flashing with light and slightly trembling, which was its reaction when there were messages being transmitted.

  Li Muran inserted a spell key, opened the seal on the transmission talisman, and immediately a familiar middle-aged man's voice came through, which was indeed Zi Xia Dao Ren.

  "Master has urgently summoned us, I wonder what's going on?" Li Muran's heart skipped a beat, but he still followed the master's orders and rushed to the designated location at the first time.

  Li Muran did not use the talisman crane, when he rushed to the designated location, but saw Qingfengzi, Muli and other disciples who had arrived before him.

  "Other senior brothers might have talismans to speed up their journey, so they arrived faster. But how did Mu Yan come so quickly? Was he just nearby?" Li Muran thought it a bit strange, but didn't pay much attention to it.

  "Zhao Shixiong, you've come just in time!" Mu Li exclaimed loudly as soon as he saw Li Muran, and excitedly shouted: "Today we're going to witness something incredible, Master will personally cast a spell to exterminate the demon!"