And this so-called "mouth" was none other than a narrow slit lined with fangs that had split open out of thin air beneath the small figure's face.
The headless body of the Blood Glow Snake thrashed wildly inside the small figure's mouth as black venomous blood sprayed several feet into the air from the wound.
A layer of crystal light rippled across the surface of the golden small figure, and an invisible force deflected every last drop of blood.
The tall elder's heart seized with genuine horror when he saw this.
But before he could formulate any concrete thought, the golden small figure's eyes suddenly flashed cold, and it turned its gaze toward the distant elder.
In that instant, the tall elder felt his skin go ice-cold. Two crystalline sword lights shot out of the void barely an arm's length in front of him without the slightest warning.
The two sword lights looked utterly unremarkable, yet with a single swirl they slashed into the elder's protective barrier at an inconceivable speed.
Crack.
The cyan barrier trembled violently the moment it was struck, then shattered with a crisp snap.
The crystalline sword light flashed again. The elder felt an intense chill race toward his face, and in his panic he held nothing back. A five-colored radiance condensed between his brows and suddenly transformed into a five-colored shield that swelled in the wind to several zhang in size, covering his entire body behind it.
The surface of the massive shield was covered with layers upon layers of intricate spirit patterns, and countless brilliant runes flickered in and out of visibility.
Pfft. Pfft.
The two crystalline sword lights struck the shield one after the other.
The first sword light met the shield, and between them erupted a blinding radiance accompanied by violent waves of fluctuation. Though the sword light dissipated and vanished into thin air, the shield instantly sprouted a thick crack.
When the second crystalline sword light arrived in the blink of an eye and struck the exact same spot, the five-colored giant shield could resist no longer and was cleaved cleanly in two.
With nothing left to obstruct it, the second sword light swept downward without hesitation.
All of this seemed complicated, but in truth it unfolded in the span of a single heartbeat.
In the tall elder's perception, he had barely raised the five-colored shield before it split apart amid a burst of explosions, and then a flash of cold light passed — and his world went dark.
To outside observers, a streak of crystalline light simply coiled once around the elder's neck, and his massive head rolled free.
Almost at the same instant, the crimson giant flood dragon phantom behind his body exploded, and bolts of lightning raged outward into the surrounding void.
Whoosh.
A ball of crimson light burst from the elder's headless body and, with no fanfare whatsoever, slipped into the storm of lightning, hurtling off in a certain direction.
Boom.
The golden small figure vanished from its spot in a swirl of golden light. The next moment, with a ripple in the air, it materialized directly in the crimson light ball's path.
It merely raised an arm and smashed the ball unceremoniously into the ground.
Below, in the crater, the crimson glow faded to reveal a Nascent Soul roughly the same size as the golden small figure. Its face was twisted in a savage expression, though far more prominent was the terror writhing beneath it.
The Nascent Soul gritted its tiny teeth, formed a hand seal, and a torrent of blood mist suddenly billowed from its body. At the same time, crimson arcs of lightning crackled around its form — it appeared to be on the verge of unleashing some manner of secret technique.
But at that very moment, a massive crystalline sword light materialized behind the Nascent Soul without the slightest warning and slashed down in absolute silence.
Pfft!
The blood mist parted, and the elder's Nascent Soul within was revealed, its face frozen in utter disbelief. A scream followed as its body was bisected from top to bottom, dissolving into motes of spiritual light before fading into nothingness.
The renowned Red Thunder Ancestor had perished thus — effortlessly — at the hands of the Gold Devouring Beetle King.
At this point, Blood Soul, who had already retreated to the side, let out a long breath. She stepped forward, bowed to the small figure that the Gold Devouring Beetle King had become, and said with a face full of joy: "I thank Senior for saving me. Without your help, I truly might not have escaped that man's clutches."
"I was merely carrying out my master's orders. That said — go on with what you were doing. I'll be watching from the shadows." The golden small figure's thin, reedy voice spoke, then it waved a hand and drew the storage bracelet from the elder's remains into its grasp. With a flicker of its body, it blurred and vanished without a trace.
The Gold Devouring Beetle King had grown markedly more intelligent since first taking human form.
Blood Soul bowed once more toward the spot where the small figure had disappeared, then cast a somewhat regretful glance at the two Body Integration stage puppets before letting her slender form drift away from the area.