It seemed that the Devil White Phosphorus Serpent bloodline carried by Leilin and his group caused the giant serpents they sensed to avoid them, so the journey across the Plain of Ten Thousand Serpents had been remarkably smooth.
As for those utterly mindless creatures, any that emerged to harass them or treated Leilin's party as prey were coldly eliminated by Belinda, watching which even Leilin felt a chill run through him.
Perhaps, in her eyes, only those among the Ten Thousand Serpents bloodline who had awakened spiritual intelligence counted as "kin." These serpents, devoid of any capacity for thought and driven purely by instinct, could not truly be considered companions.
Even more striking was the fact that among the Ten Thousand Serpents bloodline, the different clans still engaged in bloody struggles and even cannibalism against one another.
Most of these irrational serpents were only first or second rank in strength—even Sophia could handle them with ease, so there was little need for Belinda to worry.
As time passed, Leilin and his party gradually ventured deeper into the heart of the Plain of Ten Thousand Serpents.
Under the purple moonlight, the entire prairie appeared tranquil and still. A few glowing red embers occasionally flickered atop the extinguished charcoal, carrying lingering heat.
Suddenly, a flash of light appeared on a tent near the charcoal, and Leilin's figure materialized directly before fading back into a phased state.
"The distance is just right—this is the spot!"
Leilin murmured to himself, gazing at the moonlight high above, then departed from the campsite.
He had left behind a puppet and a Chip intelligence agent there, which should be more than enough to handle any emergencies.
Before long, a stretch of marshland appeared before Leilin, its surface dotted with pools of water scattered like pearls, strung together across the prairie.
In the vicinity, Leilin sensed a great deal of lurking life energy, and from time to time, the hisses and roars of giant serpents echoed through the area.
To compete for water sources, the animals of the natural world would often engage in savage battles.
Leilin and Belinda had passed near this region a few days ago, but at the time, to avoid pointless conflict, they had given it a wide berth. Leilin, however, had quietly committed its location to memory.
"Hiss hiss..."
A black serpent as thick as a water vat burst straight out of the marsh, its massive maw gaping wide as if to swallow Leilin whole in a single bite.
"Get lost!" Leilin's brow furrowed, and the creature was immediately sent flying backward, wailing as it scrambled away into the distance.
"These fool creatures that don't know when to stand down are a nuisance too!"
Not all low-ranking serpents obeyed the bloodline authority that resided within Leilin. Like the grey serpent Sophia had once encountered, those that were too weak in strength had no choice but to submit before the aura of a superior being.
But once a second-rank or third-rank giant serpent appeared—one that lacked sufficient intelligence—Leilin would become a tempting morsel of prey in their eyes.
"Since they all share the Ten Thousand Serpents bloodline, the pressure exerted by a superior serpent has very little effect on them, then?"
Leilin suddenly smiled. "Now *these* are exactly the specimens I want to experiment on!"
BOOM! A terrifying phantom of a colossal white serpent tens of thousands of meters long erupted from behind Leilin. Its pair of crimson slit pupils blazed like stars as it unleashed a horrifying hiss.
And a faint, barely perceptible aura of royalty emanated from the phantom serpent.
Even those mindless giant serpents scrambled from their hiding places, scrambling over one another in a desperate stampede to flee the area.
Leilin was no mere hybrid—his bloodline alone could not suppress the greed of these giant serpents. But the regal majesty he carried, even just a faint trace of it leaked out, was more than enough to fill these mindless serpents with abject terror.
"Hiss hiss..." Wave after wave of giant serpents retreated from the marsh, forming a terrifying serpent tide. Countless hybrid breeds, species Leilin couldn't even name, surfaced among the mass.
"Mm! They really are all quite weak—almost no fourth-rank serpents among them! That makes sense. Once a serpent advances to the Morning Star realm, even one that was originally utterly lacking in intelligence undergoes a fundamental transformation..."
Leilin's gaze swept continuously across the serpent horde until his eyes suddenly lit up. "You—right there!"
A black giant serpent, wailing in misery, was seized by Leilin and dragged into midair.
The creature bore black scales, and its two slit pupils were filled with terror and desperation. Its energy fluctuations indicated third-rank strength.
"A Horalar Black Serpent—a subspecies of the Komoin Giant Serpent. We meet again!"
A flicker of nostalgia passed through Leilin's eyes as he regarded the massive black serpent before him in silence.
Back then, his own Komoin Giant Serpent bloodline had been extracted from a Horalar Black Serpent. Looking back now, the Great Crimson Wizard had left behind his legacy, but had not made a great show of it, nor had he any intention of passing on his own Komoin bloodline.
Perhaps, from his perspective, a third-rank warlock's bloodline was already sufficient to roam the South Coast freely, and he had no wish for his successor to become entangled in the troubles of the Central Continent.
But what was truly unfortunate was that even the Great Crimson Wizard had not foreseen that Leilin, who inherited his legacy, would prove so extraordinary—obtaining the blood of the Komoin Giant Serpent directly from a Horalar Black Serpent, laying the foundation in one fell swoop for the powerhouse he would become.