Just as the enormous wolf-tooth club was about to crush the wolf's skull to pulp, a startling sight occurred.
The wolf beast suddenly emitted a faint cyan glow from its body, then twisted its form, and its size shrank dramatically in an instant to that of an ordinary blue wolf.
The wolf-tooth club scraped past the top of the wolf's head, striking empty air, while the blue wolf's emerald eyes flashed with an eerie light. With a flick of its tail, its speed abruptly doubled as it shot past the giant man, its claws lashing viciously toward the officer across from it.
"Demon wolf!"
The officer's face changed at the blue wolf's bizarre transformation, and he cried out involuntarily. Without a moment's hesitation, his arm moved, and the longsword hanging at his waist somehow found its way into his hand.
Then a spirit tool ring on his hand flashed with a hazy white spiritual light, and the longsword transformed into layers of sword shadows that shielded him within.
This unremarkable officer, as it turned out, also possessed a low-grade spirit tool.
The wolf demon that had merely shrunk to the size of an ordinary wolf showed a flicker of disdain in its eyes at the sword shadows formed by the low-grade spirit tool. Its two front paws simply swiped through the air a few times with blinding speed, and instantly, "pfft-pfft" sounds filled the air as cyan claw marks materialized across the sky, descending to engulf the officer.
The moment those sword shadows made contact with the claw marks, they shattered and dissipated in a burst of explosive sounds, utterly incapable of putting up even the slightest resistance. The net of cyan light merely paused for the briefest instant before contracting downward.
Though the officer, trapped inside, raised his sword in one hand and slashed upward once more, it was nothing more than a final death blow — his face had already turned an ashen gray.
But at that very moment, the officer suddenly sensed a figure flash before him, and another person had somehow charged straight into the claw net. Then came a cold snort — quiet, yet the moment it reached his ears, it boomed like a great bell tolling right beside him, leaving him dizzy before a jolt of shock ran through his heart.
The figure then appeared to move a single hand, and a swath of golden light surged to meet the claw marks.
With a thunderous, heaven-shaking roar, the cyan claw marks cracked apart within the golden light and utterly ceased to exist.
The officer's heart surged with joy, and straining his eyes to look, he finally made out the person before him — none other than the man assigned to protect him, Han Li.
Han Li was calmly withdrawing a pair of fists still glowing with golden light back into his sleeves, his expression utterly blank as he stared at the cyan wolf demon hovering in midair before him.
The wolf demon, having halted its pouncing momentum, was studying Han Li with a gaze of suspicion and alarm. The cyan bristles along its back had bristled upward, the great majority of them standing on end, as though it harbored extreme wariness toward Han Li.
Though the demon beast could not discern the depth of Han Li's cultivation, its acute instinct for danger faintly whispered to it that this human before it was extraordinarily perilous — seemingly capable of threatening its very life. It could not help but hesitate.
After the giant man's missed blow, upon seeing the wolf demon's transformation, he too was badly startled. He hastily turned back around, facing the demon again as though confronting a formidable foe.
In this way, he and Han Li had fallen into a pincer position, front and back. Other body refiners from the Tiandong Trading Company were also rushing over from nearby, and it looked as though the demon would be surrounded in moments.
The wolf demon's gaze swept left and right. After giving Han Li one long, deep look, it suddenly jerked its head around, abruptly transforming into a streak of cyan light and hurtling straight back toward the giant man.
Du Xiao, startled, swung the wolf-tooth club horizontally in front of him and instinctively stepped aside.
But the wolf demon had merely feinted. Its light streak flew over the giant man's head, shot straight off the edge of the city wall, and plunged downward. The mutant wolves that had attacked alongside it — all but the one killed on the spot — also leaped off the wall and fled.
Han Li stood rooted in place with no intention of giving chase.
Even though his Magical Power was entirely depleted, facing this sort of low-grade demon beast — one he wouldn't have spared a single glance at in the past — he simply could not muster the slightest interest in hunting it down.
The officer who had barely escaped death, having finally regained his composure, was profoundly grateful to Han Li and thanked him repeatedly.
"Many thanks for saving me, brother. Without your help, this Officer Xiao's life would truly have been forfeit."
Hearing this, Han Li sighed faintly and waved his hand dismissively.
"Though I've saved you, other wolf demons have appeared elsewhere too. It seems things are looking grim."
"That can't be — how could there be so many wolf demons?" Officer Xiao's face stiffened, and he hurriedly looked toward the other sections of the city wall.
His face drained of color once more.
Four or five adjacent sections of wall nearby had, somehow, all descended into chaos. Thousands upon thousands of blue wolves had already surged onto those walls, and above them, several wolf demons — their bodies radiating light — hung suspended in the air. They were identical to the one that had just fled from their position.
At this sight, not only Han Li and Officer Xiao, but the members of the Tiandong Trading Company and the ordinary soldiers all witnessed the scene. Watching the endless stream of blue wolves pouring through the breached walls, every heart sank. A chill thought flashed through each and every mind: