Bian didn't just wait for the ribbon snake to attack him, he had also been busy himself.
He fused all the beast souls he had gathered except for the two glyphs.
Three swords, two daggers and one cestus.
Ordinary Sword + Ordinary Sword = Primitive Sword.
Ordinary Dagger + Ordinary Dagger = Primitive Dagger.
Ordinary Sword + Ordinary Cestus = Primitive Spiked Cestus.
Primitive Spiked Cestus + Primitive Dagger = Mutant Dagger. (With superb hand protection)
Mutant Dagger + Primitive Sword =
Berserk Mutant Weapon: Scornful Bane.
The scornful bane ended up as a katana, thanks to the curved nature of the swords which looked like snake fangs.
The bone-white katana-like weapon had a superb brown crossguard which completely protected the hand wielding it.
Coupled with the body pillar which enhanced his physique and the soul pillar which sped up his perception, Bian managed to deflect the first attack of the Ribbon Snake.
The flimsy looking geno core actually made him take a step back, and circled around him, attacking his back before he could recover.
Bian gave up on correcting his footwork and twisted to deflect the ribbon snake again.
His balance was completely destroyed and he fell to the ground.
The Ribbon Snake didn't give him a moment of reprieve and attacked him again.
This time, it didn't use full force initially but burst forth with speed after its first attack was deflected.
"No!"
Bian yelled and swung his katana again, but it was too late.
The Ribbon Snake had gone past his blade and charged at his body.
At the last moment though, he summoned the Solum Mirror which blocked the snake from attacking the hole in his tunic armor.
Then with his free hand, Bian flipped over and landed on his feet.
He looked at the Scornful Bane, the edge of the blade was holding up well against the Gemstone geno core.
Although it couldn't damage the Ribbon Snake, he was happy it wouldn't be getting destroyed so easily in their clash.
At the same time, in the underground tunnels.
The multi-armed humanish abomination lifted up the Red-furred Cheetah, with several arms holding different parts of its body.
A pitiful cry rang out, and in the next moment, the Cheetah was ripped apart into several pieces.
Blood and organs flew in every direction, riling up the undead army which began pounding on the metal door.
Bian saw the death of the Red-furred Cheetah and to his surprise, he didn't gain the beast soul.
Instead, the soul count on the Solum Mirror jumped by a crazy amount.
Bronze Solum Mirror [1/100] --> [100/100]
[Maximum Soul Capacity Achieved. Advance the Solum Mirror?]
Bian could only quickly register what had happened before he had to divert his attention to the relentless assault of the Ribbon Snake.
Every clang rang out loud, increasing the likelihood of the undead creatures finding him.
The Ribbon Snake assaulted him like a streak of red light, making it impossible for Bian to block every attack.
Thankfully, the Crystal Tunic wasn't a beast soul. This meant that although it couldn't repair itself, it also wouldn't disappear when badly damaged.
The Tunic was riddled with cracks, deep scratch marks and a portion of the chest area had been destroyed, yet it still clung closely to his body.
If the Ribbon Snake wanted to attack him, it had to aim for the exposed chest area, his head or the extremities of his body, not covered by the tunic.
Even if he couldn't always deflect its attack with the Scornful Bane, he could block it with the aid of the Solum Mirror and some foresight.
So far, he managed to stay alive, but he couldn't keep this up forever.
Snap!
A small portion of the Scornful Bane chipped off and a good part of the Solum Mirror was directly destroyed.
Bronze Solum Mirror [100/100] --> [92/100]
The damaged mirror healed in an instant, consuming some souls in the process.
"Let's see who can last longer then!"
Bian shouted while laughing as far away, the iron door was broken apart by the abomination with multiple hands.
BANG!
The three-armed gorilla slammed the abomination with both hands, destroying the area around it and turning the zombies standing too close to a bloody mist.
The force of its power was so great, that even Bian who was a great distance away stumbled and the Solum Mirror had to take another blow on his behalf.
The mirror regenerated its broken parts, consuming more souls, but Bian was not worried that his self geno core would be destroyed.
As he barely deflected the streak of light attacking him, the tree-armed ape was soon overwhelmed and zombies flooded the underground shelter.
Although there were no creatures that could harm the ape yet, it also couldn't handle the thousands of zombified creatures pouring in.
It was still too early to escape, so Ash Princess ordered the arranged creatures to fend off the invading zombies.
Although they were prepared for the zombie attack, many creatures still died in the first wave for one simple reason.
Humanoid creatures are unusually stronger in the same level.
Most creatures who lacked a long-range attacking geno core were taken out in direct confrontation.
Bronze Solum Mirror [64/100] --> [100/100]
[Maximum Soul Capacity Achieved. Advance the Solum Mirror?]
Bian ignored the announcement in his head and continued fending for his life. It was regretful, but he couldn't get any beast souls once the Solum Mirror was around.
What made the matter even worse was that he dared not advance the Solum Mirror, as once it was gone, he probably wouldn't last more than a few seconds.
Bian cursed the snake and Ash Princess, praying for their downfall to be quick as he wasn't enjoying the delicate balance between himself and the Ribbon Snake.
In fact, the only reason Bian was alive was because the Ribbon Snake wasn't a pure attacking geno core.
It was meant to release different types of toxins, venoms and poisons which were useless against Bian. It knew that to perform such an act was futile and would only deplete its strength.
Bian, who had the Body Pillar and Soul Pillar active, barely managed to deflect seventy percent of its attacks.
Any attack to his body was prevented by the crystal tunic, which was of the Sacred variety.
Lastly, an attack to his exposed areas or Bao'er was stopped by the Solum Mirror. Since he had little exposed areas, he always managed to send the Solum Mirror there before the Ribbon Snake reached it.
All it would take is a simple mistake for him to lose his life. Nevertheless Bian knew making this mistake would be very, very hard — but not impossible.
The Tree-armed Ape made sure to prevent Mutant zombified creatures from entering the safe hold.
That way, the inhabitants only had to deal with Ordinary and Primitive creatures, which proved quite difficult for most of the creatures.
Even some mutant creatures found it hard-pressed to survive the onslaught, which said a lot about the welfare of lower-level creatures.
The casualties in the underground tunnels piled up to over a hundred and the zombies just kept on coming.
If Ash Princess needed to make a move, she had to do so sooner rather than later. Once the number of pawns she could use was too low, then it would be game over for them.
Pew!
The Ribbon Snake shot out a dark purple streamlined jet of fluid.
Bian blocked it with the sleeves of the Crystal Tunic, but the force pushed him away.
The Ribbon Snake looked hesitant, but it went back towards Ash Princess and the Ruby Viper.
Now Bian stood alone on the surface, watching intently as the Ribbon Snake retreated.
"Did I do it? I actually lasted long enough," he said with some pride.
It wasn't every day a newly evolved fought off a powerhouse, in fact it never happens due to the power gap.
Bian knew he only survived because his fitness was always abnormal and he had focused on increasing it rapidly.
Yet even that didn't help at all, it was due to the Crystal Tunic, Scornful Bane and Solum Mirror.
The Solum Mirror couldn't even block a single attack without breaking. Thankfully, the influx of souls kept regenerating it.
The bone-white katana now had chips and broken segments. It wasn't severe enough to destroy it completely, so Bian returned it to his soul sea to recover.
The same couldn't be said for the Crystal Tunic. It was utterly devastated with the chest portion completely missing, but it had no way to recover.
"Bao'er, make sure you put your head down, okay?"
Bian told his adorable baby, then he sprinted away with the Solum Mirror revolving around him.
A group of flying zombies with similar features had encircled him from above. His fight with the Ribbon Snake had brought their attention.
Pang!
The Solum Mirror smacked away a brightly glowing ball of saliva. The green liquid landed on the ground, which began dissolving with a sizzling sound.
The Solum Mirror instantly recovered, but Bian wasn't happy in any way.
Although only eight of those flying spitters had surrounded him, for their projectiles to be so hard to dodge, they had to be mutant creatures.