Chapter 9: Battle Between Monsters

"Hisssss..."

The next moment, a painful hissing wail reverberated around the place. Tang Mu mustered his courage and peeked through the grasses. His eyes widened in alarm as he witnessed what was happening.

An enormous pitch-black crowned hawk eagle, as tall and as massive as a horse, had just picked up the colossal serpent that had chased him until he was almost at the end of his wits.

However, the cobra was also not to be outdone. It continued wriggling and emanating a dark sheen as it tried to escape the powerful talons of the ferocious eagle.

The war between the two abnormal beasts continued as Tang Mu watched.

The eagle was trying to utilize its beak and talons to tear the cobra into pieces. Its movements were bizarrely fast and untraceable. At times, it would also attempt to fly off into the air, possibly to employ its aerial advantage against the snake.

The two beastly combatants battled as they destroyed a large part of the grassland. They continuously overturned trees and flattened bushes.

Fortunately for Tang Mu, they were heading away from his position while launching lethal attacks intent on taking the other's life. But from the very beginning, the eagle had remained with the advantage.

A few more seconds passed, and just when Tang Mu thought that the eagle had won, the patterned scales of the oversized cobra once again exuded an eerie dark luster. Its colossal body seemed to phase out of existence for a moment, and just as abruptly, it vanished and broke free from the giant bird's talons.

The cobra then went on the offensive without giving the ferocious bird of prey a chance to react.

Its serpentine body first coiled like a tire on the ground, and then just like a spring, it uncoiled itself in one swift motion, moving like a dark bolt. Like an untraceable phantom, it seemed to cut through space itself, and its menacing and abnormally-sized fangs sank into the base of one of the eagle's wings.

The eagle let out a high-pitched cry filled with agony as its colossal body tumbled to the ground. The timely counterattack from the cobra had likely robbed it of its ability to fly. Nonetheless, it hadn't lost its ability to fight, and it continued thrashing about while trying to use its sharp beak to tear apart its enemy.

But all those struggles were meaningless under the gripping and poisonous bite of the ferocious cobra.

The colossal snake's powerful jaws didn't let go, no matter how the eagle thrashed about or attacked. Its sharp fangs remained embedded within the base of the ferocious bird's wing, assumably injecting more and more venom into its body.

Finally, after a few more minutes, the eagle's huge body ceased all movements and lay lifelessly in the bushes. It had dived in to hunt the snake, but in the end, it had perished under the counterattack of the colossal cobra.

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Tang Mu, who had watched everything from the side, felt his heart sink. He feared that since the cobra had dealt with its enemy, it would begin hunting him again.

He swiftly rose from the grasses, hoping to escape before it was too late. But just then, he realized that something was weird.

Why isn't the snake chasing after me already?

Tang Mu mustered his courage and stopped dead in his tracks.

Turning around, he saw the colossal serpent lying powerlessly beside the dead bird of prey. Its body was still twitching, but aside from that, it was not making any other movements.

"Maybe it's close to death..."

Tang Mu's eyes lit up as he continued observing the scene. However, he dared not to go so close to the ferocious serpent.

He had often heard that vicious wild animals like snakes could exert one last bout of strength to take down their enemies before their deaths. As such, he knew better than to approach the serpent, even if it appeared close to death's door.

I shouldn't give it any chance to recover.

The gears in Tang Mu's mind turned, and his eyes landed on the pile of rocks a few meters ahead. He went into action immediately and picked up a huge rock, the size of a human's head, from the pile.

He carried the rock and stopped a 'good' distance from where the two beasts had fallen. Then, flexing and relaxing his biceps, he tossed the rock at the presumably dead snake with all the power he could muster.

"Bang!"

The sound of the rock hitting the ground reverberated around the area as the snake barely managed to dodge the attack.

"So, you're still alive and kicking..."

Tang Mu narrowed his eyes, inwardly rejoicing at not approaching the serpent. He wasn't discouraged in the slightest, even after realizing that the cobra was still alive. He continued operating mechanically, carrying and tossing rocks at the serpent's body, hoping to end it for good.

At first, the serpent managed to dodge a couple of attacks. But later on, as Tang Mu increased the intensity, a few rocks continued landing on the colossal snake's body, slowly sapping its remaining traces of life away.

Encouraged by the success, Tang Mu remained careful and continued attacking from a distance. He tossed projectile after projectile and only stopped when a mysterious voice abruptly sounded in his mind.

"Congratulations to the host for passing the trial to become an apprentice of the Star God Pagoda," a mysterious feminine voice reverberated within his head.

"An apprentice of the Star God Pagoda?" Tang Mu stood rooted in place, with a rock in hand, wondering whether he was imagining and hearing things. The new development had come so suddenly, leaving him no time to adjust.

"Yes," the mysterious feminine voice emphasized. "After slaying the first beast within one of the dimensions of the paintings in the Celestial Gallery, the host has gained the qualifications to become an apprentice of the Star God Pagoda. Congratulations!"

Tang Mu's heart skipped a beat. "Who are you?"

"Me!" The mysterious voice said. "I'm an artificial intelligence management system responsible for the Star God Pagoda."

"Host! You can refer to me as Little Green! I'll be at your service, helping you with miscellaneous matters and controlling the Star God Pagoda until the day you die. You don't need to thank me since that is my role."

"Little Green... Star God Pagoda!" Tang Mu mumbled with widened eyes.

He could barely contain his excitement as he felt he had finally gotten his own cheat to help him become more powerful in the intergalactic era. "Are you related to the mysterious orb I picked up beside the fallen Vegroid ship?"

"Yes," Little Green answered. "The star orb you picked up is the vessel for the dimensional space containing the Star God Pagoda."

"But host! Before you continue asking more questions, let me remind you that you are standing beside the corpses of two relatively powerful beasts. The bloody smell they exude will easily attract other equally fierce beasts that can threaten the host's life."