“Watch out, Ju Tu!” Rao Wu shouted as he dodged a Bugbear’s enraged blow, and then swiftly retaliated by driving his makeshift spear through the creature’s throat.

Nearby, Ju Tu, surrounded by ten Bugbears, roared in anger and then clapped its hands in fury. A massive shockwave burst out from the Steelback Ape’s hands, sending the Bugbears flying. Frothing at the mouth, most Bugbears instantly fainted from the shock.

“Guo! Guo!” Ju Tu, filled with the adrenaline from a stimulating battle, picked up a club he seized and then descended upon the surviving Bugbears. Bang! Crack! Ju Tu mercilessly caved countless skulls, inadvertently smashing some Bugbears to paste.

“Hey! Be careful! You’ll crush the cores too!” Admonished Rao Wu as he danced around his attackers. Unlike Ju Tu, Rao Wu did not have any AoE skills that could take care of multiple enemies at once. So, the child resorted to running around the battlefield, using the trees as cover to launch surprise attacks and prevent his enemies from surrounding him.

Rao Wu also swapped out his dagger for the makeshift bone spear, which gave him more reach and allowed him to dispatch his foes before they got too close.

“Guo~” Ju Tu sheepishly scratched the back of his head, and then returned to strike his foes. However, this time he was more careful in its approach, ensuring he did not overdo it and waste the soul cores also.

Rao Wu, meanwhile, paid attention to Ju Tu’s battles even as he fought off his attackers. As a soul trainer, he needed to always ensure his soul pets fought optimally, as that was the quickest way for them to improve. Watching Ju Tu fight, Rao Wu’s brows creased somewhat.

Steelback Apes fundamentally fought differently from humans and wolves. The latter two tried to minimize the damage they received while fighting. In contrast, Steelback Apes put their body on the line to decimate their foes.

A Steelback Ape’s fighting style mostly worked because of their robust defenses. Still, Rao Wu could not help but wonder: What if Ju Tu met a foe who could easily pierce his tough skin and back? How would he adapt then?

‘He wouldn’t.’ Rao Wu came to the conclusion that Ju Tu would most likely die since he only had one way of fighting. ‘I need to fix that.’ Rao Wu had no intention of telling Ju Tu to fight like him and Xian Da. However, he would teach Ju Tu how to fight against a much stronger opponent, or else they would definitely have regrets in the future.

“Nwaa!”

“What!?” Rao Wu’s eyes widened in shock when a Bugbear suddenly leaped from a tree, arms poised to strike him with a club. “When did it—” Although Rao Wu had a mountain of questions, he suppressed his shock and reacted swiftly, raising his spear shaft over his head. However, at that very moment, the Bugbears in front of him sucked in a lot of air.

“These little!” Rao Wu’s brows furrowed, but he could not help but admire the soul monsters’ tenacity. The Bugbears had set up such an elaborate trap. Rao Wu needed to jump to evade their venom, but doing so would remove his foothold. Therefore, the Bugbear above would be able to strike him down with even more momentum.

It was a good plan. So good, in fact, that Rao Wu added it to his long list of viable traps. Unfortunately, the Bugbears were going up against Rao Wu, the undisputed king of traps in Elder’s Forest.

“Dryad! Now!” Rao Wu suddenly shouted.

Boom! “Nwaa!”

The Bugbears crashed into a wall of vines that suddenly sprung up from the ground, separating them from Rao Wu. Rao Wu, then, with a mischievous smirk, switched his spear from a defensive position and then stabbed upward.

“NWAAA!” The unfortunate ambushing Bugbear drove itself right into the spear. The force was too much for Rao Wu’s little hands to handle, so he pulled the spear down to the ground right after stabbing the Bugbear. “Ungh!” In doing so, Rao Wu forced the earth to counterbalance the Bugbear’s weight, which caused the Bugbear to slide even deeper down the shaft.

Splurt!

The Bugbear’s blood splattered all over Rao Wu, but it barely made a difference to the already bloodsoaked youth. Rao Wu set the spear down, so the Bugbear dropped to the ground, retrieved his spear, and then turned his attention to the vine wall.

As expected, the vine wall did not hold the Bugbear’s long. Some ran around its sides while others worked to tear through the center. Rao Wu, however, was satisfied. The wall had completed its purpose by splitting the Bugbears into three groups.

Whoosh. Tak!

Gripping the wooden shaft, Rao Wu spun on his heels and then ran to the vine wall’s right side, where he unleashed an evil slaughter on the Bugbears that took that path. By the time those who took the left side made it to Rao Wu, he had completely decimated the right wing. Rao Wu grinned as the newcomers approached. “Right on time.”

Puchi! Puchi! Puchi!

Rao Wu, relying on his savage instincts, dodged and slaughtered the Bugbears. He then dashed around the bend and finished off the few who were trying to tear a path down the middle. “Hooo…” Having completed the fierce battle, Rao Wu allowed himself a breath of fresh air, and then flashed a thumbs up towards the forest’s depths.

A few meters away, watching from a treetop, the elated Dryad beamed with pride. That vine wall was one of hers, grown using her Growth skill. Over the past ten days, Rao Wu had taught her various ways to use her skills in combat should the need ever arise. Of course, he primarily relied on her to provide backup, but those lessons still aided in her backup role.

“Guo! Guo!”

Ju Tu’s excited shout drew Rao Wu’s attention to the Steelback Ape’s battlefield. Ju Tu had successfully slain all the Bugbears save for one. The final Bugbear was slightly bigger than the rest and had a much more ferocious glare. The vague hints of intelligence in its eyes gave off its identity as a Bugbear Lord.

However, unlike the first one Rao Wu saw, this Bugbear Lord was still in its first Phase, albeit as a seventh stage.

Rao Wu, knowing why Ju Tu did not kill this lord, said, “Good work, Ju Tu. You can come back.” After recalling Ju Tu, Rao Wu summoned Xian Da as he approached the Bugbear Lord.

Woong!

“Rraff!” Xian Da emerged from the summoning circle with an excited bloodlust. The little wolf cub was surprisingly in the fifth stage, having experienced explosive growth after hunting, fighting, and eating numerous cores.

“Alright, Xian Da. This is your big test,” stated Rao Wu as he looked at the Bugbear opposite. “Ten days of hard work come down to this. GO!”

“Rraff!” Xian Da barked and then charged at the Bugbear Lord.

“Nwaa!” The Bugbear Lord, enraged by the cub’s challenge, roared and then spat out a large globe of poison. The football-sized globe smashed against the ground, and then splashed outward, several droplets bound for the incoming Dusklight Wolf.

“Dodge it!”

Xian Da, refusing to be struck by an attack he had seen before, jumped and then kicked off against tree bark.

Splat!

The poison vat completely missed the cub as a result, as he skipped high above the splash zone. The Bugbear Lord, refusing to lose, switched to a rapid-assault style, shooting off several small venom bullets in quick succession.

Surprisingly, rather than fall to the ground, Xian Da’s momentum carried him to another tree, which he pinged off again, utilizing the Dusklight Wolf’s powerful leg muscles. He then continued to ping-pong off the trees, drawing an intricate pattern as he dodged the Bugbear Lord’s seemingly endless barrage.

“Nuuu~” However, all things must come to an end. The Bugbear Lord’s venom ran out after a few dozen seconds, rendering it somewhat pale and exhausted.

Rao Wu, not one to waste such an excellent opportunity, shouted, “Xian Da! Lethal Strike!”

Lethal Strike was Rao Wu’s personal variation of Punishing Claws. Just like Punishing Claws, Xian Da strengthened his nails with ki, but unlike Punishing Claws, Xian Da poured all of his weight behind this attack, shooting off like a bullet toward the groggy Bugbear Lord.

“Nwaa!” At the seemingly worst possible moment, the Bugbear Lord regained its senses. It instantly swung its club upward, aiming to strike the onrushing Rao Wu square in the face.

Any other trainer might have panicked, but Rao Wu, knowing Xian Da’s capabilities over the past ten days, did not. Instead, he grinned and said, “We won.”

Meanwhile, faced with the incoming club, Xian Da did not panic but instead curled into a ball. Just before the club reached him, Xian Da stuck out his paws and then from above the club, pushed upward, accelerating himself over the stunned Bugbear Lord.

Swipe! Splotch!

The ruthless Xian Da spread out as it flew over the Bugbear Lord’s head. Its claws dug deep into the Bugbear’s eyes and then scraped upward as Xian Da used the head as an anchor. With his momentum stopped, Xian Da latched onto the Bugbear Lord’s back with his hind legs, and then bit out a large chunk of its throat.

The Bugbear wanted to throw Xian Da off, but its brain temporarily went offline after having suffered severe trauma to its throat and neck. Xian Da took advantage of the pain-induced blackout to once again bite into the Bugbear’s throat. This time, he tore out the beast’s trachea, and then jumped off as the Bugbear Lord collapsed to its death.

Pa! Pa! Pa! Pa!

The bloody Xian Da turned to see Rao Wu clapping profusely with a wide grin on his face. “Excellent, Xian Da! Perfect points all round!” Rao Wu’s pride was clear to see as he approached and then ruffled the cub’s fur. “Hehe. You’re a genius. Incorporating the Small Dipper Step into the trees. Even I never thought of that.”

Xian Da happily barked with pride and wagged his tail as he basked in Rao Wu’s praises. “Rao!” Sensing a familiar presence, he looked beneath Rao Wu’s legs and let out a friendly bark.

Rao Wu turned to see the Dryad walking towards him with a beautiful smile. “Heh. Thanks for your help back there. That was a close one.”

The Dryad, however, shook her head. “No. I should be the one thanking you. I would never have imagined we were capable of defeating a single Bugbear, let alone wiping out an entire clan.”

That’s right. Rao Wu had just entirely wiped out one of the Bugbear tribes! The child spent the first two days scouting the small island forest. During that time, he found out that there were five Bugbear tribes. Two large ones, and four relatively small ones. The larger Bugbear tribes each had about five hundred Bugbears each, while the smaller ones varied between 100 – 200.

Through careful planning, Rao Wu slaughtered several groups of one of the smaller tribes until the remaining fifty or so members banded together to make a last stand. Then, with Ju Tu, he launched a frontal assault to clean up the rest.

Ju Tu took the lead since the Phase one venoms could not easily pierce his skin, while Rao Wu sneakily picked off the rest. Through their teamwork, they finally eliminated an entire tribe, freeing up, even more, watering holes for the Sprites to use.

However, this was far from enough for Rao Wu, whose goals were much loftier.

“Don’t worry about it. We’ve only just begun.” Rao Wu laughed as he sliced open the Bugbear’s chest to retrieve its core. However, to his surprise, rather than a squishy feeling, he felt a hard crystalline object. “Could it be?” Elated, Rao Wu pulled out his hand, which, as expected, was clasped around a shimmering soul crystal.

Rao Wu’s excitement only lasted a moment, as he identified the crystal to be a beast/bug soul crystal. Rao Wu, who had been hoping for a pure beast-type soul crystal, could only feel disappointed. He did not dare use this soul crystal on Xian Da as he was not sure if it would force the bug-type onto the wolf cub.

There was nothing worse than blindly adding attributes to a soul monster, especially if the soul monster did not have a natural affinity to it. An elemental type like fire or ice was more suitable to add to a monster with a specie attribute. There was a much smaller chance of a negative backlash.

‘I don’t want to give it to Ju Tu, either.’ Ju Tu was a pure beast-type soul monster. He had a higher chance of readily accepting the bug-type attribute. However, Rao Wu was hesitant. If he obtained the soul crystal from a particularly dominant species, he would not have hesitated so much. However, the Bugbears only had their venom and high-reproductive rates as famous skills. These were the skills Ju Tu was most likely to inherit from their soul crystal.

The thought of Ju Tu spitting out venom made Rao Wu’s skin crawl. No way in hell would he consign Ju Tu to that fate. Just like now, in the future, Ju Tu would remain his frontline general, clearing out waves of enemies and standing tall and proud on the battlefield. Rao Wu would only consider crystals that boosted that image.

It wasn’t that Rao Wu hated venom-spitting soul monsters. On the contrary, the child would love nothing more than to have such an underhanded ally. Unfortunately, it did not fit his image for Ju Tu, so he could only shelve the soul crystal for a future date.

Rao Wu sighed as he put the crystal in his ring, and then turned to look at the Dryad. “Hey, how do Dryad’s evolve, anyway? The encyclopedia says you’re a plant-type. Is that true?”

“Yes, it is.” The Dryad nodded and then said with a smile, “We might have evolved over centuries to take on this form, but originally, Dryads were also trees in the forest.”

“Oh? So, you need plant-type soul cores and soul crystals to grow?”

The Dryad shook her head. “I have never consumed a soul core, so I do not know. However, I do grow on my own, albeit much slower than your soul monsters. I would not know the difference in growth speed until I’ve consumed a soul core.”

“So that means my guess is true. There are no tree-type soul monsters on this island?”

“I haven’t come across any in my many years here.”

Rao Wu scratched his head as he looked at the still forest. “I thought this before, but this island is seriously strange. I wonder what happened in the past.”

The Dryad listlessly shook her head, and then replied with a sigh, “So do I.”

Rao Wu, realizing he had brought down the mood, sped up his soul core retrieval and then swiftly switched topics. “The big tribes. Did they receive my gifts?”

“Gifts?” The Dryad’s mouth opened wide with disbelief. “You slaughtered their groups and then staged dead bodies from the opposing side.”

“Yes. Gift. They must have been hungry these past few days since the Sprites have been avoiding their watering holes. I just delivered some food free of charge.”

The Dryad rolled her eyes, refusing to debate with someone who could say something so hideous with such innocent eyes. “The Sprites said there have been small skirmishes between their groups since this morning.”

Rao Wu licked his lips. “Good. We’ll stoke the fires a little more, so they don’t notice us while we take out the other tribes.”

The Dryad stared at the blood-soaked child humming as he tore open a Bugbear’s chest to draw out its core. Her gaze traveled to the pair of fluffy ears that peaked out of his matted down hair, flickering with delight whenever he pulled out a core. “Seriously, how did you grow up?”