It was 3-meter tall, green color being and its body was humanoid, and it seemed like it was made of the mire. It had two emerald gemstones in the place of its eyes. Moreover, it was emitting the aura of Empty River Realm!
What made Ace dreadful of this being was it can see through his breathless stealth somehow because he was attacked despite utilizing it to full power just now.
Yet, this wasn't the only bizarre thing because Ace didn't sense this being with his soul sense at all even if it was standing right in front of him. He quickly used his Heavenly Sense and could finally feel this strange being's existence.
But his expression turned instantly ugly because this being was giving off the same feeling as emerald mist like it was a part of it, if not for the strange force coursing through it even Heavenly Sense might've rendered useless.
Ace didn't have time to mull over it because with the heavenly sense he could feel there were three more humanoid beings in a 100-meter zone and not less powerful than this one in front of him.
Without hesitance, he used the lightning steps and dash further away from these humanoid beings, however, Ace was flabbergasted the very next moment because that thing was keeping up with him!
One had to know, Ace's lightning step's speed was on par with a peak-Qi river cultivator and this thing was only had empty river cultivation, but it can still keep up with him and the difference seemed very minimum!
'Why the hell is this thing keep chasing me!' Ace's heart palpitated as this was his first time encountering something that can see through all his sneaky skills.
What truly infuriated Ace as he was in the middle of luring everyone here, and he even sent the 'signal' he can't afford to experiment with this thing, and he needed to get rid of it as soon as possible.
'Fuck it!' Ace cursed as he stopped running and turn around.
The black wristband with silver runes shimmered with silver light, and a transparent silver barrier formed around Ace. This was the same sixth-star runic treasure called Silver Shield given to him by Lan as a congratulation gift when he was posing as Finn. It can block three full attacks of a flowing river cultivator.
The humanoid being didn't stop and throw a decisive punch at Ace's silver shield.
'Bang…'
The silver barrier flicker, but it didn't break, not even a scratch was formed. Ace felt elated when he saw this silver shield working fine or if this being's power was as absurd as its speed he didn't know what to do.
Ace didn't wait and used the first move of the 'Dual Swords Mirage Art' 'Hundred Shadows Mirage!'
'Swoosh…swoosh…woosh…'
A Hundred shadow swords instantly appeared and directly landed on the humanoid being.
Ace instantly become thrilled when he saw the hundreds of deep gushes on the monster. He never fought with a Qi river cultivator before, much less with this monster-like being, if he wasn't forced he wasn't planning to do it either.
But the result was very satisfactory because he could gravely wound an empty river cultivation being. Although it took the attack head-on and didn't dodge, Ace still warbled.
However, the very next moment Ace's eyes constricted as the elated expression was nowhere to be seen because he felt this being was somehow absorbing the emerald mist and as a result, its grave wounds healed at a tremendous pace!
Ace suddenly felt the terror of this mysterious forest for the first time. These beings in the inner circle were too dreadful. He suddenly had a second thought about turning back.
At this moment, Ace felt a deadly threat approaching from below, and with no indecision, he leaped back at full speed.
The very next moment thereafter, a five-meter earthen spike appeared where Ace was standing. The humanoid monster's gemstone eyes twinkle mysteriously, it was clearly his doing.
Ace also suddenly notice those gemstone eyes, and the emerald mist also seemed to resonate with those gemstones. His eyes turn sharp and used the Misperception Steps.
It seemed he was going straight toward the humanoid monster, but it was far from true. Even this monster can't see through this mysterious movement skill!
The monster's eyes glisten again as he punched Ace's incoming figure however the moment the punch hit 'Ace', like smoke he evaporated!
'Boom…'
Abruptly, two pitch-black blades pass through the humanoid monster's eyes sockets from behind and the gemstone also breaks!
The moment the gemstones were destroyed, the humanoid being wiggled and like wax turned into a puddle of green mud.
Ace sigh in relief, 'So these gemstones were its weakness!' He was truly ecstatic because he just killed a Qi river realm, being even though it was stupid, he still killed it!
At this moment, the system's emotionless voice rang,
====
[Host killed an Empty Qi River Realm Speed-Golem. You have earned 10,000 EXP.]
'Speed Golem?!' Ace was astonished because it was the very first-time system took the incentive to name something. Or all the time it would just call demonic beast or human, not even bother to recite their names at all.
'If even you know what this thing is, that this means it was worth it to come here. Now I'm 95% sure there is an elemental orb here!' Ace mused, 'Should I keep going deeper?'
After encountering Speed Golem and killing it and then the system's sudden reveal, he somewhat regained his confidence.
In the end, Ace gritted his teeth and stayed. Besides, this was also an excellent opportunity to farm experience because these Speed Golem had a weakness that Ace can exploit.
However, first, he had to find a way to escape these Speed Golem's detection. His guess was that golem could find him because of the emerald mist.
Since it seemed deeply connected with the mist and even able to heal itself with the emerald mist, this was the only plausible explanation.
'Since this mist can detect my martial Qi, what about soul Qi?'
Ace quickly creates the soul Qi membrane like the HD-Qi around himself. His eyes immediately lit up because the emerald mist started to ignore him, it didn't touch his soul Qi barrier like martial Qi!
'Hahaha, so I just needed to soul Qi barrier.'
Ace was filled with satisfaction since he could find the solution to his problem so quickly. If this method wouldn't work, he was even planning to test the light soul Qi, but it appeared he didn't need to anymore.
Since this concern was out of the way, he used breathless stealth again and blend in surroundings. He was using the heavenly sense this time to find those Speed Golems since soul sense was useless.
Although, using Heavenly Sense and Heavenly Soul Qi also put an immense strain on his physique since his body was still of Heavenly Foundation Cultivator. But it was still bearable because his recovery speed was still fast enough to outmatch the expenditure.
Ace quickly spotted another Speed Golem ten meters away, and this time it really didn't seem to be aware of him. With no hesitation, he sneaked an attack on the back of his head like because and killed it after destroying the gemstone eyes!
====
[You killed an Empty Qi River Realm Speed-Golem. You have earned 10,000 EXP.]
---
[EXP: 10.97 Million/100 Million]
{Elemental Orb:0/1}
====
'Continue!' Ace quickly moved to the next target, which was only a hundred meters away.
He was moving deeper while collecting the EXP, and he wasn't afraid of anyone catching up with him because of these Speed Golems.
Those pursuers will have a much harder time since they didn't know the weakness nor do they have the skills to avoid emerald mist. However, there was also a big chance they would give up after experiencing this dreadful Inner circle.
Besides, Ace was even counting on it because he wanted only the most powerful to pursue him. Only those who can truly 'help' him snatched the Elemental Orb from the guardian if there was any.
After moving ten miles inside the inner circle, he killed twenty-three more Speed Golems of Empty Qi River Stage, and he was now like a professional Speed Golem killer.
====
[EXP: 11.2 Million/100 Million]
{Elemental Orb:0/1}
====
Ace was still far away from the 100 million. However, the deeper he goes, the number of Speed Golems increased and this gave him hope.
Suddenly, Ace's eyes constricted when he reached his next target because it was not like Speed Golem.
This new Golem was 5-meter tall and much bulkier than Speed Golem, Its color was also stony, and its body was also humanoid, this one seemed like it was made of solid rocks.
It also didn't have two emerald gemstones in the place of its eyes like Speed Golem and both of its eyes were vacant, there wasn't any visible gem at all.
Furthermore, it was emitting the aura of the Qi River Depth stage of the Qi river realm!