Chapter 277 – [Elephant Deity: Ming King Stance!]

Two gigantic hearts, as if carved from stone.

Each one as large as a human head.

Covered with demonic patterns and numerous grooves.

At the very center of the hearts, there lies a deep, mysterious light.

Lu Yuan squints his eyes, examining the two hearts closely, as if trying to glimpse the true appearance of the legendary demon mountain where the ancient elephant deity resides.

“Crack-“

One of the hearts is crushed by him.

The black-red flesh shatters into tiny pieces and flows down his hand like fine sand.

The mysterious light at the center silently merges into Lu Yuan’s body.

The [Elephant Deity: Emissary Stance (Extraordinary)] panel begins to glow.

The progress bar behind it, originally at 45%, surges to 95% with the infusion of the light, then finally halts.

Lu Yuan is momentarily stunned.

He glances at the other heart in his hand and without hesitation, crushes it.

With the continuous infusion of the mysterious light, the progress bar shoots up to 100%.

Then, the entire Elephant Deity panel begins to transform.

In no time, the original [Elephant Deity: Emissary Stance (Extraordinary)] lettering changes to-

[Elephant Deity: Ming King Stance (Extraordinary)].

The progress behind it is now: 5%.

“Advanced Profession!”

Lu Yuan suppresses the excitement in his heart, lets out a long breath, and his eyes shine with uncontrollable joy.

The professional panel advancement he has longed for happens so unexpectedly.

“Ming King Stance… let’s see what effect it has!”

Lu Yuan silently activates the panel.

In an instant, a grand and imposing strength, inherited from the demon mountain, emerges out of nowhere.

“Crack, crack-“

The bones in Lu Yuan’s body emit a series of cracking sounds, his bones thicken, and his muscles swell.

In just a few breaths, his body grows to five meters tall.

Then, it continues to enlarge.

Six meters…

Seven meters…

“Boom-“

Lu Yuan’s head pierces through the ceiling, and his eight-meter-tall frame spans two floors of the yacht, standing like a giant in the center of the vessel.

Suddenly, he feels an itch under his armpits and at the back of his neck, with the flesh bulging.

It seems that something is trying to grow out.

A terrifying power circulates, accumulates, and brews within his enormous body until finally…

“Boom!”

A colossal, visible shockwave erupted from the center of the yacht, spreading outward.

The luxurious yacht, cruising smoothly, suddenly jolted to a halt. The surrounding sea surface was violently indented, sending water waves several meters high in all directions, causing turbulent swells.

On the yacht, the Protector level members of the evil martial alliance, who were all busy with their respective tasks, all froze simultaneously.

Without any prior agreement, they all stood up, their faces shocked and horrified, looking in the same direction.

In their senses, the location around the third deck of the yacht was emanating waves of evil energy as if a small star were releasing them recklessly.

The aura made them shudder with fear…

Some even had the impulse to kneel and worship on the spot.

“He… just how much has he been hiding?!”

Meanwhile, the elephant protector, who stood loyally guarding the door to the third deck room, had already knelt to the ground, his forehead touching the floor, in a posture akin to a devout follower.

Inside the room,

Lu Yuan stood quietly, surrounded by a large area of distorted air.

At this moment, he had four arms.

A grimacing head grew out from the back of his neck, devoid of thought, yet giving him a full view of his surroundings.

An indescribable strength filled his entire body. Now, Lu Yuan only felt an overwhelming sense of invincibility.

“So this is the so-called… Ming King Stance?”

Lu Yuan murmured, looking at the demonic patterns resembling the outline of the demon mountain on his body.

Beneath him, the specially reinforced floor was cracking under his terrifying weight, on the brink of collapsing to the level below.

He quickly reverted to his normal stance.

“Whew-“

Returning to his usual form, Lu Yuan exhaled a breath of impure air, his chest filled with immense joy.

“Double-headed four-armed Ming King Stance.

In terms of pure strength and defense power, it far surpasses my [Demon] form.

It’s my strongest trump card now!”

“In this form, I might even withstand a nuclear bomb.”

“So, the plan for the Penglai trip… might need some adjustments.”

Lu Yuan’s eyes flickered with thoughts.

This time going to Penglai, Lu Yuan’s main objective is to quickly break through to the Grandmaster Realm.

To achieve the complete advancement of his [martial artist] professional panel.

As for overthrowing Penglai… it has always been just an idea.

After all, Penglai has many Grandmasters, and from the information currently available, there are dozens of Grandmasters at level SSS.

Even if he is confident in defeating Penglai’s top combatants, his [demon] form can only be maintained for one hundred and ten seconds in total.

Without the boost from the [demon] form, even if he goes all out and combines forces with a bunch of average fighters from the evil martial alliance, it’s still uncertain whether they can withstand the siege of dozens or more Grandmasters.

He has no compelling reason to eradicate Penglai, so there’s naturally no need to put himself in such a risky position.

But now, things are different.

With the Elephant Deity panel advanced to Ming King Stance, he genuinely possesses SSS-level combat strength for extended battles.

If he really wants to turn Martial Saint Island upside down in one go… it’s not impossible either.

“Last time, because of killing the Penglai Holy Envoy, I caused Lord Tong to lose face. This time, I’ll help her regain it and give her a big surprise!

Lord Tong will definitely praise me.

If she’s happy, she might even clear my shopping cart at the merit shop…”

Lu Yuan touched his smooth chin, secretly making his own plans.

“The Ming King Stance is this strong, and it’s just double-headed four-armed. How powerful must that three-headed six-armed figure in the elephant deity dreamscape be?”

He touched the cursed mark on his right chest and couldn’t help but feel a bit heavy-hearted.

But looking at it from another perspective, this curse is also a good thing for him.

As long as that three-headed six-armed elephant man doesn’t come to kill him directly, any other elephant man who comes is just delivering resources for his upgrades.

If not for this curse, his strength wouldn’t be growing so swiftly.

“If that three-headed six-armed elephant man comes after me, I’ll go straight to Yuwen Tong.

You think you’re so tough? Try taking on the brilliant starry river inside Lord Tong’s body…”

With this thought, Lu Yuan’s mood immediately relaxed.

Benefits, only benefits.

This isn’t a curse from the elephant deity; it’s practically a blessing from the demon mountain!

“The True Intent of the elephant deity can be upgraded as well. If the double-armed True Intent of the elephant deity is upgraded to the double-headed four-armed form, the power of my divine elephant style within the pure martial artist system will also greatly increase…”

With this in mind, Lu Yuan closed his eyes, releasing his mental power to start constructing the new outline of the True Intent.

This process lasted for a good part of the day.

During this time, no one disturbed Lu Yuan.

It wasn’t until he had finished upgrading the True Intent of the elephant deity that his growling stomach reminded him that he hadn’t eaten for more than six hours.

Just as he was about to call for someone.

At that moment, there was a knock on the door.

The burly figure of the elephant protector stepped in from outside.

“Emperor.”

Among the eight Protectors, the elephant protector was the most respectful and loyal to Lu Yuan. Now, his respect and loyalty had ascended to a near-fanatical and devout height.

“The person you’ve been waiting for has arrived.”

Upon hearing this, Lu Yuan’s eyes flickered, and then he nodded.

“Accompany me to meet them. Everyone else… follow the instructions I gave earlier.”

“Yes.”

Fifteen minutes later.

The five-story luxury yacht docked at a pier.

Lu Yuan, leading the elephant protector shrouded in black robes and the grinning hawk protector, disembarked and stopped in front of a skinny, arrogant-looking old man.

“Teacher.”

Lu Yuan greeted Liu Daoyuan, signaling with his eyes for the hawk protector, who had specifically changed into new clothes and made an effort to suppress his fierce aura, to hurry up and take the suitcase from Liu Daoyuan’s hand.

“I thought you weren’t going to come.”

“I was bored at home, so I decided to come out for a walk.”

Liu Daoyuan’s eyes lingered briefly on the elephant and hawk protectors, frowning slightly before relaxing and saying nothing more.

He was escorted onto the yacht.

On Lu Yuan’s orders, all the Protector level members of the evil martial alliance had disguised themselves as crew members, smiling obsequiously at Liu Daoyuan.

These guys all looked quite out of the ordinary.

They were already intimidating enough on a regular basis, but dressed in mismatched crew uniforms and forcing smiles, each one looked more unsettling than the last.

First up was Protector Rou.

This guy stood over four meters tall, a mountain of flesh, and his smile made him look like he was ready to devour someone.

Old Liu was so “scared” that he stiffened completely.

Honestly speaking, on this entire ship, Old Liu was probably the weakest one in terms of strength.

Noticing Old Liu’s discomfort, Lu Yuan quickly signaled for the Protectors of the evil martial alliance to disappear from sight.

Only the groveling hawk protector was left by his side.

When it came to playing the lackey, the hawk protector had an extraordinary talent and incredible insight.

“Eagle lackey” indeed had some truth to it.

Sure enough, once the group of demons and fiends vanished, Old Liu became much more at ease.

“Hang this up.”

After the others left, Liu Daoyuan pulled out a neatly folded piece of cloth from his pocket and handed it to Lu Yuan.

Lu Yuan unfolded the cloth, and instantly saw that it had a pattern on it-

A Spirit Crane and a black snake, encircling and guarding a stream of white water descending from the sky.

“Sky water stream…”

Lu Yuan blinked and then turned to Liu Daoyuan for clarification.

“This is a flag.”

“Yes.”

Liu Daoyuan nodded and said nonchalantly, “In order to get onto martial saint island, you must raise a flag. The people on the island need to know your sect or faction before they allow you to enter. If not, they’ll just expel you from the island right away.

You didn’t even know that, imagine if I hadn’t come.”

Lu Yuan chuckled, casually passing the cloth, which was slightly yellowed at the edges-who knows how many years Old Liu had stored this token flag-to the hawk protector to go hang it up. At the same time, he said to Liu Daoyuan, “Teacher, members of the Snake Sect will probably be there too this time. Let’s hope we don’t clash flags.”

“Don’t worry.”

Liu Daoyuan replied calmly, “Even if we do clash, they’ll still let us on. It’s just that the Snake Sect will come looking for trouble first once we’re on the island. Perfect, we can settle old and new scores together.”

“True.”

Lu Yuan nodded, “I’ll help you reclaim the rightful banner of the sky water stream fair and square.”

Much to his surprise, Liu Daoyuan shook his head and said, “You don’t need to step in. I’ll handle it personally when the time comes.”

“Hmm?!”

Lu Yuan looked at Liu Daoyuan with a bit of surprise. “You’re going to handle it yourself?”

“Don’t overexert yourself, Old Liu. As far as I know, Cai Huazhang, the current sect leader of the sky water stream and the president of the Xiabang Martial Arts Association, has already advanced to Grandmaster level?”

Lu Yuan had thoroughly investigated the Snake Sect’s background, so he was well aware of their inner workings.

Despite Lu Yuan’s words, Liu Daoyuan’s face showed little reaction.

He gazed at the sky water stream’s martial arts banner gradually rising on the mast and murmured, “Grandmaster? So what if he’s a Grandmaster…”

Lu Yuan sensed the profound meaning in Liu Daoyuan’s words and, considering all of Liu Daoyuan’s unusual behavior up to this point, began to feel increasingly uneasy.

Using his mental power, he quickly scanned the area…

Everything suddenly became clear, and he was momentarily at a loss for words.

“Old Liu, you… you really are something else.”

Lu Yuan sighed deeply, his expression a mix of emotions.

He said nothing more.

The five-story yacht, now flying the sky water stream banner, swiftly sailed into the depths of the ocean in the silence shared by the two men.