Chapter 370: How Could She Not Have a Few Tricks?

“Thud.”

A muffled impact echoed through the cavernous hall.

The next second, dense scraping sounds rose from the surrounding walls.

The noise was fine and rapid, like countless feet skittering across stone.

Poppy’s gaze swept over. She saw the black fur blanketing nearly the entire wall behind the Remnant Sovereign writhing violently.

One by one, skeletal figures tore themselves free from the black fur.

Some still clung to rotting flesh, tendons pulling between bones with wet, tearing sounds.

Others were nothing but dry bone, their stark white frames stripped of all flesh and blood.

But they were not all human—in fact, most were feline.

Seven in total.

Six feline skeletons, each waist-high.

Their frames were long and powerful, shoulder blades high, spines curved in readiness to spring.

They crouched low like leopards and tigers, bony tails lashing, emitting deep growls.

The growls rose from hollow chest cavities, like wind moaning through dry bones.

There was also one hunched humanoid figure, slightly smaller than an adult, its back curved like a bow.

Its limbs were long and thin, its fingertips tipped with sharp bone claws, and a few strands of withered hair clung to its skull.

It radiated the same dangerous aura.

These were no cute little kittens—they were bone beasts that devoured humans.

Their hollow eye sockets turned toward Poppy in perfect unison.

And the Remnant Sovereign raised its scepter again. The gray gemstone sprayed several streaks of black light that sank into the skeletons’ bodies.

Eerie patterns surfaced across the bone beasts’ forms. Bone spurs sprouted at their joints. Fresh plates of bone grew between their ribs.

Their speed and strength visibly surged a full level!

From the peak of Rank-2, their aura climbed once more, reaching the threshold of early Rank-3.

The six feline skeletons lowered themselves, bone claws scraping harshly against the floor, poised to strike.

“Reinforcement?” Seeing this, Poppy smiled.

“Let’s see whose beasts bite harder.”

She took a deep draw from her pipe and exhaled. The smoke was still blue-gray, but now it was different.

Thicker and more viscous, laced with faint traces of cyan luminescence, flowing with something hotter and more fluid.

The mist, as if alive, burrowed into the smoke fox’s form.

The fox swelled another third in size. Its eyes grew more animated. Its open mouth bared pale, fearsome fangs. Its entire body radiated a heart-chilling cold that sank into the very bones.

Over a year had passed—how could she not have grown?

Now, among the Rank-3 of The Dead City, her strength was absolutely first-rate.

She was not far from the limit where she could begin attempting a breakthrough to Rank-4.

“Bite them to pieces.”

At Poppy’s command, the smoke fox shot forward like an arrow, colliding with the seven bone beasts.

The sounds of impact, shattering, and roaring filled the hall.

The smoke fox’s fangs clamped around the spine of one feline skeleton. With a violent snap, the skeleton shattered into pieces, bone fragments scattering.

But black fur emerged from the fragments, quickly reassembling them.

The skeleton shook itself, then stood up again.

On the other side, two feline skeletons attacked the smoke fox from both sides, their bone claws carving several gashes through the blue-gray smoke.

The smoke fox let out a piercing shriek. Its bushy tail swept horizontally, driving them back, but it too had lost about a tenth of its mass.

The hunched humanoid was the most troublesome. It did not face the smoke fox head-on, but circled the periphery. Its bone claws bore a faint black glow, and each strike left wounds on the smoke fox that were slow to heal.

But Poppy’s gaze remained locked on the Remnant Sovereign the entire time.

Several breaths passed. The battle seemed to be in a stalemate.

The Remnant Sovereign couldn’t handle her, and she couldn’t handle the Remnant Sovereign either... or could she?

As if!

Poppy smiled faintly.

That smile, ordinarily alluring and captivating, was now steeped in cold menace.

Even if an acquaintance were to see it, they would immediately understand it was not charm—it was a harbinger of death.

Poppy’s figure flickered, and she vanished from where she stood.

The power of the Corpse-Plague Acolyte flooded from her core into her legs. Her muscles tensed instantly. The ground cracked beneath her kick.

Blue-gray smoke cleared a path ahead. Her entire body became a blur, charging straight at the Remnant Sovereign!

Cut off the head, and the fight is over!

The seven skeletons were merely controlled secondary Anomalies—shatter them, and they would regenerate.

Only by directly destroying the main body could the battle be ended!

The Remnant Sovereign reacted with equal speed, swinging its scepter horizontally.

The scepter had not yet arrived, but the wind from the blow had already formed into an invisible hammer, smashing toward Poppy’s face.

The air pressure was suffocating. Her hair whipped wildly backward.

Poppy twisted in midair, narrowly avoiding the lethal strike by a hair’s breadth.

Using the momentum of passing by, her right leg lashed out like a whip, her instep slamming hard against the scepter’s midsection!

“Weng—!”

A metallic shriek of vibration rang out.

Cracks appeared in the hand bones gripping the scepter, and the weapon nearly flew from its grasp.

Its black robe churned violently. For the first time, the hollow face showed “emotion”—a certain fury at being provoked by an insect.

Two clusters of dark, faint flames actually surfaced on that empty visage, like eyes.

But to this, Poppy merely responded with a contemptuous sneer.

With her smoke fox occupied, did she have no other means?

As if!

The smoke fox was her Rank-3 ability. But even without it, she had survived perfectly well in a place like The Dead City.

Growing to her current level—how could she not have a few other tricks up her sleeve?

Her body landed lightly. Left leg as the pivot, right leg sweeping out once more.

This low kick had a clear target: the Remnant Sovereign’s supporting leg.

The leg bones, assembled from countless pieces of remains, looked sturdy. But the joints were riddled with gaps.

One successful strike, and she could follow with an endless chain of attacks until she crushed it completely!

However—

Poppy’s plan was sound, but this sweep found nothing.

Her leg wind cut through empty air, kicking up dust and shattering only the floor tiles.

The Remnant Sovereign had actually sidestepped backward, putting distance between them!

That body, assembled from countless bones, moved with a lightness that belied its dead nature. 𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

Poppy’s eyes widened in disbelief.

Since when did Anomalies value their lives?

Every Anomaly she had cleared had fought to the very end!

Either she died, or it did. They never retreated halfway through!

“Since when do Anomalies run?! Keep fighting!”

Her figure flickered, and she immediately pursued.

………………

Outside the building, the support squad members were watching the building’s main structure—over twenty stories tall—through the windows with tense expressions.

Black fur covered every window, blocking their view of what was happening inside.

But that did not mean they knew nothing.

The ground was trembling faintly.

Occasionally, the black fur in some spot would writhe and churn violently, as if something had slammed against the wall from inside.

And the violent aura fluctuations constantly shifting position deep within the building told them—

The battle was fierce.

The movement trajectory of that aura was extremely irregular.

From upper floors to lower floors, then to another level, then deeper still—like a tug-of-war unfolding inside the building.

Each collision of auras was accompanied by a slight tremor in the ground.

Until, at last, everything stopped.

Silence, absolute and complete.