Show Me the Money

Chapter 288 - Crimsontail Fire Luan

Pain, pain that went deep into the bone marrow. Fatty never thought that a bite from this monster that didn't do much damage, could inflict a pain so unbearable.

A high-rank Yao inner core was not an easy thing to get. Fatty's level was still low and the current Elemental equipment was still adequate, but if he wanted to upgrade them in the future, high-rank Yao inner cores were a must.

The Firesource Fruit that contained the dense energy of fire element could be considered a help provided in the hour of need. How could Fatty be satisfied if he didn't pluck off all of the Firesource Fruits on this tree?

Trying to endure the pain, Fatty tossed a red pill in his mouth. Then, he threw Harvest like mad at the tree.

Whoosh whoosh… One fruit after another went into his inventory amidst the ceaseless and furious roaring of the fire python. It gave up on fighting him and opened its jaw wide, swallowing a Firesource Fruit in one gulp.

Hooo! Scorching fire erupted from the fire python's mouth before it pounced on another fruit. With one quickly plucking and one devouring, in less than ten minutes, all of the Firesource Fruits were gone.

"Go!" Fatty instantly Earthwalked two kilometers away, then climbed onto the Violent Ox King and quickly flew away.

The fire python viciously glared at the direction where he escaped. It wanted to pursue, but its belly rumbled. The creature had no choice but to lie down and digest the fruits it had swallowed.

Fatty quickly glanced inside his pack to see seven or so Firesource Fruits, roughly half of the total number on the tree. This was equivalent to picking up seven or so high-rank Yao's inner cores for no reason.

"Go, let's go find the Fire Paulownia Wood." Fatty steered the Violent Ox King to fly further into the Mountain of Flames.

The deeper he traveled, the more cautious Fatty became, until he had to pocket the Violent Ox King and kept going in using Stealth. Although the majority of the monsters here hadn't reached the 9th class enhancement, all of them had the strength of a high-rank Yao boss. Even monsters within the same realm were divided in power. The Violent Ox King belonged to the fairly weak amongst the high-rank Yao bosses, that was why it resided in the periphery of the Mountain of Flames.

Fatty's heart ached with reluctance as he looked at all sorts of high-ranked beasts on the way. Even the Violent Ox King had over 6000 Fire Crystal Stones in its lair and 1000 magic stones, let alone these even more powerful bosses. If it wasn't for his current strength limiting him, Fatty would have swept his way and robbed all of these monsters.

According to West's information, the Fire Paulownia Wood was most likely to grow in the middle part of the Mountain of Flames, where a monster named Crimsontail Fire Luan resided. Legend had it that this bird was related to the mythical beast Fire Phoenix, and also liked to perch on fortune paulownia trees, and month after month, year after year, the birds' fire energy slowly merged with the trees to birth Fire Paulownia Wood.

"Screeeech!" A shrill scream resounded from the mountains far ahead, where a patch of red trees could be seen. Those trees were over seven meters tall with luxuriant branches and leaves that looked like fire. Within this red patch were numerous nests, obviously built by the several hundreds of birds with long red tails lying inside.

Crimsontail Fire Luans. Fatty recognized at a glance that those were indeed the monsters he was looking for. As a result, the red trees must be the Fire Paulownia Wood required by the mission.

The red patch covered an area of several thousand square meters. The tree leaves were like burning flames, the branches that were also red and looked like small twisted dragons. On the trees, each nest was over three meters in diameter. Fatty estimated that there were roughly four to five hundred nests in total.

Appraisal.

Fatty approached the trees and tossed the skill. The details were displayed before his eyes.

Fire Paulownia Tree: A fire-attribute tree that produces Fire Paulownia Wood. Light and solid, it's suitable for crafting various tools.

Immediately, Fatty cast Harvest.

Whoosh. A three-meter long, straight and fiery red branch the size of an arm appeared in his hand.

Rustle… Not waiting for Fatty to check the details of the Fire Paulownia Wood, the tree that he harvested from suddenly emitted a series of rustles and quickly withered. In the blink of an eye, it turned into a dry tree that seemed to have been dead for hundreds of years.

"This?!" Fatty paled in shock. The Fire Paulownia Wood was actually the essence of the tree. Once a Fire Paulownia Tree lost its essence, it would wither and die immediately.

"Screech!" Shrill screams echoed as five Crimsontail Fire Luans flew out from their nests at the same time and dived over at Fatty.

"Ahh!" Fatty screamed and disappeared with Earthwalk.

Boom! Several fireballs hit the spot where Fatty had just stood, blasting the ground along with the withered tree to bits.

"Screech…" One Crimsontail Fire Luan after another flew up in the air and keenly scanned the surroundings. As the place where they built their nests, each Fire Paulownia Tree was extremely precious. The luans could not allow anyone to harm their trees.

"F*ck!" swore Fatty who appeared in the distance. He originally thought that he could harvest 100 logs of Fire Paulownia Wood in secret, but who would have known that these trees were so fragile and would die at the first harvest?

However, this was only a bit of trouble, it wasn't enough to make things difficult for him yet. The remaining uses of the Elemental Movement Arts for today should be enough to support him in gathering 100 logs of wood.

Fatty crept over in Stealth. The Crimsontail Fire Luans had gone back to rest after the alert, and only a few were still flying in the air.

Whoosh. Fatty tossed another Harvest and gained one more log, but this also broke his Stealth.

"Screeeech!!" At least ten Crimsontail Fire Luans flocked over this time and launched attacks at Fatty.

"Elemental Guard!" Fatty shouted. A five-color screen appeared and shielded him from the attacks.

Pop pop pop! With a sound like raindrops hitting banana trees, several dozen fireballs hit the Elemental Guard screen. Even though the 80% damage reduction was in effect, the number of attacks was large enough to shake Fatty.

Swallowing red pills like crazy while casting Harvest, Fatty extracted several more logs, and as a consequence, several more trees withered and died.

During the 10 seconds of Elemental Guard, Fatty harvested 5 logs of Fire Paulownia Wood. Counting the previous two, he now had 7.

"I run!" Fatty Earthwalked to a distance and returned to Stealth, then he kept running further outside. The Crimsontail Fire Luans still didn't give in. They bombarded the empty spot where he disappeared from for ten minutes before begrudgingly stopping.

"Heheh." Fatty crept back again with his same old trick: Harvest and Elemental Guard. After forcefully enduring the opponents' attacks for 10 seconds and acquiring five logs of wood, he vanished with Earthwalk.

"SCREEEECH!!" The Crimsontail Fire Luans had virtually lost their sanity. After several times like this, not only did they fail to hurt a single hair on Fatty's body, but several dozens of Fire Paulownia Trees had also been lost.

Boom boom boom! All of the luans in the area were mobilized. They surrounded the red patch and indiscriminately bombarded the area. Watching from afar, Fatty clicked his tongue, feeling lucky that he had the Elemental Movement Art. Among the Crimsontail Fire Luan pack, at least ten were high-rank Yao bosses, while the low-rank and mid-rank category each should have at least over a hundred. Not to mention him, but even a Celestial boss would suffer in the hands of these birds.

It was a long time later that the Crimsontail Fire Luans finally calmed down. Fatty hesitated for half a day without making a move. At this moment, a huge Crimsontail Fire Luan over ten meters long slowly arose from the center of the woods.

The Crimsontail Fire Luans were so named because their tails were deep red, like intensely burning fire. However, the tail of this big one wasn't just red, but more inclining to purple, with a trace of white.

A tri-colored tail meant this monster had reached the peak of high-rank Yao realm and half a foot into the Celestial tier. One chance was all it needed to become a true Celestial boss.

"Half-Celestial boss." Fatty suddenly recalled Demigod Chief of the Holy Unicorns, Amedick. While titled 'demi,' its true power was already at least three times higher than a high-rank Celestial boss.

In actuality, Fatty didn't care what rank it was, because he couldn't win against so many Crimsontail Fire Luans in a fight anyway. The really dangerous thing was that this Half-Celestial boss might have a skill able to restrict him.

After much deliberation, Fatty sent out his suicide squad. Wheat drilled underground while Inky slowly flew in the air, and lastly, the Violent Ox King followed from far behind.

Fwish. Fatty once again approached the woods. He had just raised a hand, about to toss Harvest, when a high-pitched screech resounded and huge scorching fireballs smashed down.

"Firewalk!" Fatty shouted and vanished.

BOOM! The fireballs struck the ground and dust mixed with stone shards burst out in all directions.

Hooo… A gust of wind blew away the clouds of dust, revealing a crater five meters deep and ten meters wide. In the center of the crater, Fatty stood with slightly disheveled hair.

The boss looked at Fatty with surprise. It didn't expect that its well-prepared attack couldn't one-shot this human.

After using Firewalk to dodge the fireball, Fatty immediately fled.

The Half-Celestial luan's eyes flashed with condescension. It didn't pursue, and instead gently fluttered its wings. Two fire tornadoes roared as they charged towards the direction where Fatty had run.

The attack still hadn't neared him when Fatty already felt overwhelming heat. Fatty howled and leaped onto the Violent Ox King, ordering the mount to fly up.

Hooo! The two fire tornadoes whirled past right under the Violent Ox King. The billowing heat alone nearly roasted Fatty alive.

Rumble…

Giving Fatty no time to relax, a fiery cloud parked itself right above his head. Seeing this, a familiar fire python on a distant hill flicked its tongue and smacked its tail on the ground in excitement, as it directed what seemed like a vicious grin toward Fatty.

"Fudge!" Fatty only had time for a brief curse when the fiery cloud descended upon him, shrouding him inside.

"Elemental Guard." Fatty helplessly activated Elemental Guard again. Forcefully enduring the fire cloud attack, he controlled the Violent Ox King to escape.

Whoosh! Just as he broke free from the fire cloud, Fatty saw a wing which blotted out the sky with the fire energy seeping out from it, sweeping both him and the ox back into the fire cloud once again.