Chapter 423: The Value of the Sand Demon Worm
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Xu Yuan swiftly retreated, watching as the hundred-thousand-year Sand Demon Worm's dark green shell rapidly turned black.
He canceled the Blood Essence Dharma Image.
"A hundred-thousand-year Sand Demon Worm—its energy-devouring ability has evolved to such an extent!"
At this moment, Xu Yuan's expression was as serious as it could be.
Simultaneously, after witnessing how the Sand Demon Worm devoured his Blood Essence energy, a thought immediately formed in his mind.
"If this Sand Demon Worm were to target Abyss creatures, would it have the chance to completely devour Abyss energy?"
The Sand Demon Worm was a unique type of soul beast native to the western desert. As the desert expanded, it gradually came into the view of human soul masters.
And the expansion of the western desert had only occurred over the past few thousand years.
"Not far ahead is the Lava Basin, the last human settlement before entering the Blood God Legion. This western desert is also where the Abyss passage lies."
At this moment, Xu Yuan could only sigh.
The ancients were truly wise.
For every poisonous substance, there was an antidote within a hundred steps.
Xu Yuan couldn't be certain whether the Sand Demon Worm's abilities could perfectly devour Abyss energy, but he was confident that its mechanism was a perfect template for consuming Abyss energy.
"Transformation and absorption."
What was called "devouring" had been perfectly divided by the Sand Demon Worm into two stages.
Since the hundred-thousand-year Sand Demon Worm was no longer limited to using its proboscis to consume energy, Xu Yuan naturally stopped forming the outer layer of the Dharma Image. Not only did he stop maintaining the Dharma Image, but he also ceased sustaining the Blood Essence Armor.
His battle armor and mech suit tightly enveloped him, and outside the two layers of armor, an energy shield flickered faintly.
"The Sand Demon Worm's devouring ability likely fears the quality of energy most."
The Sand Demon Worm's fluid could convert matter into energy suitable for it to consume. Similarly, if it encountered an energy body, its fluid could transform that energy body into energy suitable for consumption.
It seemed that energy bodies were more vulnerable to this ability, but in reality, they were only restrained under normal circumstances.
To resist the Sand Demon Worm's corrosion, one only needed to elevate the energy's grade to effectively counteract its transformation ability.
Perhaps it couldn't completely negate the effect.
But at the very least, all energy defenses wouldn't be corroded away in an instant.
This was one major flaw in the Sand Demon Worm's devouring ability.
However, even with this defect, its mechanism still held significance.
The quality of Abyss energy went without saying—it was still energy.
Even if the corrosion was slow, it was still corrosion.
As long as it could erode, meaning converting Abyss energy into another form suitable for absorption, then even if the speed was slow, it was still acceptable.
"The recovery speed of its shell is incredible." Xu Yuan watched as the shell he had shattered quickly regenerated, leaving him secretly astonished.
This was all fueled by his Blood Essence energy.
"I can't keep fighting it anymore."
Originally, being intercepted halfway, Xu Yuan had planned to rely on brute force to deal with this creature and enjoy the satisfaction of a direct confrontation.
Now that this thing was so unreasonable, Xu Yuan saw no need to waste any more time.
"Dreamspace!"
The dreamspace descended. Xu Yuan's spiritual power enveloped the Sand Demon Worm, quickly locating its spirit and pulling it into the dreamspace.
The massive corpse of the Sand Demon Worm collapsed heavily to the ground, and the surrounding smaller Sand Demon Worms scattered, losing their core leader and no longer daring to attack Xu Yuan.
Xu Yuan slowly approached.
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Energy from heaven and earth surged.
Crimson energy gathered, forming a ring of soul rings.
A powerful intent imbued with intense devouring force erupted from the soul ring.
Xu Yuan rummaged through his storage-type soul-guided device for a long time before finally finding a multifunctional soul-guided device capable of storing soul rings.
Activating the device, the crimson soul ring was pulled by a force, rapidly shrinking and fusing into the disk in Xu Yuan's hand, forming a crimson soul ring pattern on the disk.
At the very least, this was a hundred-thousand-year soul ring—it couldn't be wasted.
The abilities of this Sand Demon Worm were quite suitable for Xu Yuan since it possessed a devouring mechanism. However, unfortunately, the Martial Soul that needed devouring abilities was his Heavenly Origin Five Elements Spear, which didn't require external soul rings.
Since Xu Yuan himself couldn't use it, this soul ring naturally had to be left for someone else in Shrek Academy's inner court.
Though those with devouring attributes were rare, many were suited for them.
Yuanen Yehui might be able to use the Sand Demon Worm's mechanism to gain the ability to convert targets into demonic plane energy, creating the most suitable environment for her combat and providing her with endless endurance.
Wu Siduo might also have the chance to convert ghostly energy.
Of course, these possibilities were slim and relied on luck to obtain.
After all, this wasn't a simple inheritance of the Sand Demon Worm's abilities—it was about relying on its mechanism for transformation.
Such soul skills were the rarest and hardest to artificially intervene with, requiring sheer luck.
Aside from these two, there was also Xu Lizhi.
Xu Lizhi's Bun Martial Soul was exceptionally compatible with the Sand Demon Worm's mechanism.
Turning the enemy's energy into meat filling and incorporating it into buns to replenish his own energy—this actually made a lot of sense.
In fact, aside from these three, there was another person among the Seven Treasures of Shrek who was suitable.
Xu Yuan didn't know Fang Yuan's Martial Soul mechanism, so he didn't think of it at the moment.
Fang Yuan's Divine Suppressing Stele's innate abilities were highly compatible with the Sand Demon Worm's mechanism. Even if he couldn't directly obtain a soul skill, the passive enhancement from the Sand Demon Worm's soul ring alone could strengthen his Martial Soul's innate abilities.
With the soul ring stored, Xu Yuan didn't waste the hundred-thousand-year Sand Demon Worm's corpse either.
He carefully collected the Sand Demon Worm's body.
To prevent any reactions between the internal fluid and the corpse after it lost vitality, Xu Yuan extracted the internal fluid and stored it separately.
"Not far ahead is the Lava Basin."
Xu Yuan looked toward the distance.
Several black dots flickered on the distant horizon.
Soul masters near the Lava Basin had already sensed the energy fluctuations here and were currently rushing over.
Xu Yuan had no intention of dealing with these soul masters. His battle armor transformed back into a mech suit, and he maneuvered the mech to circle around and arrive at the Lava Basin.
He was eager to find the Blood God Legion and make contact with Abyss creatures, then drip the Sand Demon Worm's fluid onto them.
At that point, he would be able to determine whether the Sand Demon Worm's fluid was effective against Abyss energy.
If it proved useful—
"The root cause of the western desert's expansion might also be resolved along the way."
These Sand Demon Worms were practically impossible to eradicate due to their extremely rapid reproduction rate. If one wasn't careful, they might even accidentally provide energy to these worms, so the Federation had never organized a large-scale cleanup operation against the Sand Demon Worms in the western desert.
The cost-to-benefit ratio was too low.
But what if the Sand Demon Worm's fluid could be used to counteract the problem of Abyss energy reflux?
"Overthinking is useless. Everything depends on practical results."
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