Chapter 732: Too Strong

She brushed her chin, her muttering voice tinged with three parts helplessness and seven parts resignation, "All the variations stay true to the same principle; no matter how you put it, it's still the same old routine—draw, play, win. It's just that today's hand, the stakes are a little bit higher."

She lifted her eyes and scanned the approaching horde of monsters.

Those twisted faces are now clear down to every detail—saliva strands on the fangs, barbs along the edges of the golden flower‑shaped blades, and the constantly writhing vascular patterns on the distorted bodies.

Their speed is extreme; the few beast‑shaped monsters at the front have already smashed through the outermost layer of Bubbles defense, and the pop‑pop sound of the Bubbles shattering is swallowed by the monsters' low roars.

The giant serpent at the front, bearing seven or eight heads, opened all its mouths, each spitting out a barbed tongue, all pointing directly toward Qingque.

Qingque slightly curled the corner of her mouth, her tone as leisurely as commenting on an opponent's newly played card at a table.

"The mouths are opened too wide."

She raised her right hand, curled a finger and flicked the outermost floating jade tile.

Ding.

A light, crisp sound.

The jade tile instantly transformed into a streak of azure light that shot outward.

Its speed was such that the naked eye could only catch a filament of light it left in the air; the distance of several hundred meters from in front of Qingque to the monster horde was crossed in a flick of the finger. It slammed into the mouth of the foremost serpentine monster, pierced out the back of its skull without pausing, then barreled straight into the chest cavity of the second monster, penetrating it. The azure streak ricocheted wildly through the monster swarm, each impact striking a monster's vital spot with pinpoint accuracy.

The beam leapt repeatedly among the golden bodies, weaving an ever‑expanding net of light; wherever it passed, limbs were flung sideways, golden ichor and broken tendrils danced wildly in the air.

Its penetrating power was such that the number of monsters it pierced was too many for Qingque to bother counting; looking out, the trail of the azure light showed no whole monsters left, only a floating debris ribbon of fragments and slime, slowly drifting apart under the glow of the azure light.

And the remnants of the pierced monsters, before they could hit the ground, were swarmed by surrounding Bubbles, which enveloped them and, within a few breaths, disintegrated them cleanly: solid turned to liquid, liquid to foam, foam merged into the Bubble mass, silent and unseen.

The blue fish beneath Qingque's feet leisurely flicked its tail fin.

The fish seemed to swim slowly, its movements lazily reminiscent of a koi basking in a pond on an afternoon, yet in reality its speed was absurdly fast; a flick of its tail fin propelled the entire fish, along with Qingque perched on its back and the surrounding Bubble swarm, hundreds of li away in a smooth glide.

In a few breaths it had already weaved countless times through the gaps of the monster horde, each pass sliding along the edges of the monsters' fangs, so close that the slime on the monsters' tongues could splash onto the blue fish's scales; yet the blue fish somehow managed, at the very last instant, to flick its tail at an angle that defied all physics and evade.

It swam through the Bubble‑formed sea, as agile as a fish truly in water, even more so, because it was not bound by currents; the Bubble mass would actively clear a path for it, then close again after the fish passed, sealing the pursuing monsters on the opposite side of the Bubble wall.

The pressure from heaven and earth continued.

The new sky above, once hundreds of meters overhead, has been pressed down to under a hundred meters; the fine roots hang down, almost touching the uppermost Bubbles.

The new earth below has also risen, and the human faces on the golden branches now reveal the teeth in their mouths.

The middle space is being continuously compressed; the upper and lower layers of the Bubble sea, under the squeeze of heaven and earth, begin to deform, and the outermost Bubbles that serve as buffers are being crushed in countless numbers, their crisp explosions echoing incessantly.

Qingque didn't even lift an eyelid.

She still rested one hand on her head, while the other toyed back and forth between two jade tiles, like a player agonizing over which card to play.

The seated Qingyun supported her body and drifted together with the blue fish, her crossed‑legged posture remarkably steady.

In the first wave of monsters breaching the Bubble defense, the azure streak was finally overwhelmed by the surge of additional monsters; its speed waned through repeated penetrations, and after piercing an indeterminate number of monsters, the light faded, reforming into a wisp of azure smoke that drifted back to Qingque, circled her fingertip, and slipped into her palm.

Yet the monster horde did not diminish much from that strike; the gap the streak tore open was filled by the following monsters within a few breaths.

They resembled a pack of hunting dogs starved for centuries that caught the scent of blood, tearing at the Bubble defense madly; one layer of Bubbles was shattered, another surged up, but the Bubbles' regeneration could no longer keep pace with the monsters' tearing.

The few beast‑shaped monsters at the front broke through multiple layers of Bubbles; the slime dripping from their gaping mouths trailed long golden threads through the void, lashing straight at Qingque's face.

Qingque's expression remained unchanged.

She even switched the hand supporting her head, shifting her weight from her left elbow to her right, and the crossed leg changed direction while remaining raised.

Her idle left hand casually scooped up a jade tile, flipping it on her fingertip; as the tile turned between her fingers, it reflected flickering azure specks.

She squinted at the monsters that had finally breached the outer defense, the curve of her mouth deepening a few more degrees.

The seated blue fish moved before she issued a command.

Its tail fin gave a minuscule flick, and the fish, carrying Qingque, slid sideways dozens of meters, just slipping through the gap between two attacking monsters.

The monster that missed its target couldn't curb its speed and plunged headfirst into the Bubble mass below; the Bubbles swarmed over its entire body, and before it could even struggle, it was broken down into a larger azure Bubble, drifting away with the current within the Bubble sea.

The second monster forced a mid‑air turn to pursue; the blue fish again flicked its tail for a sideways shift, and the monster's claw brushed past the mist‑green flowing‑light cloak draped over Qingque's left shoulder, not even grazing a single thread of the cloak.

The third, fourth, and fifth— the blue fish, at a lazily precise to perverse rhythm, threaded through the monster swarm; the Bubbles actively cleared a path for it and then closed again after it passed, blocking the pursuers.

From afar it looked like a blue fish toying with a pack of clumsy hounds; the hounds chased desperately, always falling short by an inch, and that inch was controlled to perfection by each flick of the fish's tail fin.

Of course, that doesn't mean the monsters are weak.

Judging by the impact they unleash when breaking through the Bubble defense, tossing any one of them onto Luofu's main street could demolish the entire block.

It's just that Qingque is too strong!