My Arts Evolve When Perfected

With that thought, Jiang Qiu said no more, simply waving them over. "One-tailed, Ah Xiong, let's go. We're heading north to Tai Lake."

"Okay."

The two young girls, one tall and one short, nodded. With a PITTER-PATTER, their delicate, rosy feet trod over the muddy path as they ran over, looking for all the world like naive, innocent children.

Moreover, although Ah Xiong was more reserved and smaller in stature, she was impeccably clean. Like One-tailed, she had a body like jade porcelain; her smooth, tender skin didn't gather a speck of dirt even when she walked on the earth.

However, she was still too small. If the Nine-tailed Fox's toes in her human form were pink pearls, then hers were the tiniest crystal grapes. Jiang Qiu could probably cup both her feet in a single hand.

Furthermore, Ah Xiong only came up to a little above his waist; she was truly short. Was she only five or six years old?

He wasn't sure. Jiang Qiu had already forgotten most of the common knowledge about the Human Race in the Primordial world-cluster. He had never paid much attention to such things, and even less so after he began his Cultivation, as he rarely ever looked at children.

In short, Ah Xiong's Transformation body was very childlike, even more so than One-tailed's, which made him feel a bit too embarrassed to ride her. "Ah Xiong, you carry One-tailed. I'll ride the Nine-tailed Fox. Let's go."

He casually patted Ah Xiong's head, then One-tailed's, before mounting the giant Nine-tailed Fox, who had already reverted to her true form. Her fluffy white fur was incredibly comfortable, like lying on the softest, most luxurious mattress that also kept you warm.

However, Ah Xiong lifted her small head, a flash of loneliness flickering in her eyes before vanishing. She wanted so badly to be the one to carry Jiang Qiu, but her master was unwilling. There was nothing she could do.

She thought, 'Master probably looks down on me, thinks I can't compare to the Nine-tailed Fox. But I've worked so hard these past five years! I've devoured many from the Demon Race, and my Realm has advanced quickly.'

'Of course, I've also absorbed many Talents from the Demon Race. My speed and strength have reached a whole new level. Even if I've only mastered a few Secret Techniques and I'm a slow learner, my basic attributes are very strong. I have a lot of passive ones, too.'

'Take my defense, for example. After I absorbed the King Kong Ape's Talent, my whole body became unbelievably tough. I might look like a delicate little doll now, but my physical fortitude should have already surpassed the Nine-tailed Fox's.'

'After all, I'm at the Perfect Transformation Realm. My physical body is already at a high level... but Master just favors the Nine-tailed Fox.'

In a way, her strength, speed, and defense should have all surpassed the Nine-tailed Fox's. Her only weakness was her comprehension of Secret Techniques. The ones One-tailed taught her were difficult to learn, making her seem a bit slow and leaving her without any long-range attacks.

'Still, if Master doesn't want to ride on my back, I can't do anything about it. I have to obey him...'

With that thought, she transformed into a bear and lowered her head, extending a paw toward One-tailed. "Sister One-tailed, climb on."

"Mm," One-tailed beamed, walking over to the large paw. With a soft PLOP, her bottom landed on the paw pad. As the massive paw lifted, her slender legs were left dangling, swinging back and forth like on a swing set. "It's always so comfy with Ah Xiong."

Ah Xiong was very fast. Even when not going all out—sacrificing the use of one paw to hold One-tailed instead of for acceleration—she could still burst forth with incredible speed, which was why One-tailed liked it so much.

The main reason, really, was that One-tailed disliked having to hold on to things with both hands while riding. 'Isn't it so much better to be cradled safely in a palm? My legs can even swing freely.'

As for the wind being too strong?

She wasn't concerned about that at all. Having mastered the manipulation of Heaven and Earth Spirit Charm, she could conjure a protective shield similar to a wind field, which greatly protected both herself and Ah Xiong, allowing them to move even faster.

Without another word, the two saw Jiang Qiu set off on the giant Nine-tailed Fox and immediately gave chase.

At this stage, the Nine-tailed Fox's acceleration was incredibly fast. Despite its massive size, it moved as ethereally as a phantom. A white shadow streaked past flowers and trees, leaving afterimages in the air and opening up a gap of several thousand meters in an instant.

If the Ah Xiong of the past had seen such speed, she would have been shocked, envious, and even felt a little inferior. But for the her of today, it was not entirely impossible to keep up!

That's right. Even though the Nine-tailed Fox seemed to have mastered some kind of Body Technique to rapidly increase its speed, while she knew nothing of the sort and relied purely on brute strength and her own limited grasp of Heaven and Earth Spirit Charm...

...her speed was also incredibly fast!

RUMBLE—

One earth-shaking roar after another erupted, the sound waves rolling out like a tidal wave. A black phantom shot forward like a missile on a set trajectory. The flowers and grass along its path were pulverized by the intense wind pressure, and even towering, ancient trees trembled!

The massive roar reverberated through the forest path beneath the dense canopy, each echo layering upon the last, like the bellow of an angry Tiger.

When wild members of the Demon Race heard the sound from afar, a sudden gale would blast them, flinging them into the air. The unlucky ones were shattered or crippled on impact.

Of course, she generally didn't run into them. Only if something was directly in her way would Ah Xiong cast aside all restraint and simply plow a path. Besides, such creatures usually had a weak sense of danger and had not undergone their Spiritual Awakening. They were, in a word, Food.

And as she traveled with these sonic booms, Ah Xiong quickly saw the afterimage of the Nine-tailed Fox's nine great, swaying tails begin to fade. She had already matched its speed, to the point that the afterimages vanished; from her perspective, the fox was now relatively still.

This was not the first time One-tailed had experienced such speed. She braced herself on the fleshy paw pad with her hands, her little feet swinging back and forth. An invisible current of air formed a barrier that sheltered them both. Outside the barrier, she could see the wind raging like a tsunami, and it was filthy—a mix of shattered plants, wood, and soil flew past like a mudslide.

One could imagine that even a Super Great Demon at the Grand Dominator Level would be instantly crippled by a mere graze from the outside. But within the barrier, One-tailed's hair barely fluttered. "A little faster, Ah Xiong," she teased, "my main body is very strong, you know~"

As a clone of the Nine-tailed Fox, her memories were naturally shared with the original. The fox knew that Ah Xiong was fast and had undergone a huge transformation over the past five years. But One-tailed also knew that while her main body hadn't fully condensed its third clone, it too had undergone a great metamorphosis. It was practically beyond the Half-Step Transformation realm now and still wasn't using its full strength.

Such a gap was only to be expected. The Nine-tailed Fox, after all, possessed a peerless, monstrous talent for comprehending Heaven and Earth Spirit Charm and had naturally mastered many Body Technique Secret Skills. It was perfectly normal that Ah Xiong, who relied purely on her base stats, couldn't compare.

It would be strange if she *could* measure up.

However, when Ah Xiong heard One-tailed's words, she subconsciously activated her bloodline. A golden light streamed from her dark, round eyes, and her speed exploded once more!

[Divine Speed]. This was the Talent she had acquired after her first Opening Spirit Veins, which happened when she devoured the giant wolf. But through continuous consumption and Cultivation, it had already evolved to an unimaginable level.

When she activated this Talent, she entered a state of total power output. It was an explosion of not just speed, but strength as well—just like Unrivaled!

As a result, the distance between her and the Nine-tailed Fox closed in an instant. In the blink of an eye, she was about to pull up alongside it!

This was a state of relative acceleration; her increase in speed was simply terrifying. The sudden blast of wind threw One-tailed's head of snow-white hair into disarray, and she narrowed her peach-blossom eyes slightly. "Woohoo~"

'The speed is too much; the simple barrier can't handle it.' But she had no intention of reinforcing it. The feeling of the rushing wind was nice. 'It feels like every tiny hair on my body is being blown back.'

It was her first time feeling Ah Xiong in this full-power state. It was a little unexpected, but... it was still far from enough...

SWOOSH. In a single, fleeting thought, the Nine-tailed Fox, which had been right beside them, burst into a stream of water that dissipated into the air like a block of melting Ice. When they looked up again, a white shadow was already twinkling a thousand meters away—impossible to catch, no matter how hard they chased.