Chapter 46
Chapter 46: Begging for Mercy
Jiang Li Sheng already knew her sword couldn’t pierce that thing, and her sleeve arrows couldn’t either. Its hide was tougher than iron.
She yanked out a rope, eyes blazing. “Senior Brother Chen, do you still have a water-dousing talisman? Put out its fire first!”
“I do.”
Chen Liu An slashed with his sword and flicked a talisman at the same time. A torrent of water poured down like a sudden storm, drenching Shan Gao—
And the flames didn’t go out.
Jiang Li Sheng’s stomach sank. “Senior Brother Chen… your water-dousing talisman isn’t working.”
Chen Liu An’s expression tightened. “It advanced. Low-grade water-dousing talismans won’t work on it now.”
Jiang Li Sheng didn’t have anything stronger. She threw up her protective barrier again, then lunged with the rope, aiming for its neck.
Chen Liu An stabbed and slashed again and again. None of it pierced. He saw what she was trying to do and stared. “Junior Sister Jiang, what are you doing?”
“Strangling it,” Jiang Li Sheng snapped, dodging its fire-spewing eyes as she whipped the rope forward.
Chen Liu An darted in to help, using his sword to guide the rope past the flames. “Will that even work?”
“In ancient times, Pan Hu—raised by Di Ku—bit one of these things to death,” Jiang Li Sheng said through gritted teeth. “Where do you think it bit? It wasn’t the butt. It had to be the neck.”
“That makes sense,” Chen Liu An said, and he helped her flip the rope over Shan Gao’s head.
The rope cinched into place.
They pulled from opposite sides, digging in with all their strength. Jiang Li Sheng’s arms shook from the effort. Chen Liu An’s face went taut and red as he hauled.
They pulled until their muscles screamed.
“It’s bleeding!” Chen Liu An shouted, sudden joy flashing across his battered face. “Junior Sister Jiang, your rope works. Under the neck—right at the throat—that’s its weakness!”
Jiang Li Sheng’s voice came out strained. “Senior Brother Chen, hurry—my talisman is about to fail!”
Still pulling, Chen Liu An drew his sword and stabbed hard into the exposed weakness.
Squelch.
The blade sank in—
And in the same instant, Jiang Li Sheng’s talisman failed. The rope snapped with a sharp crack.
Shan Gao erupted.
It reared up, roaring, and swung both massive paws.
Two brutal slaps, two bone-shaking thuds.
Jiang Li Sheng and Chen Liu An flew like rag dolls, smashing into the ground far away.
Chen Liu An hit hard and spat a mouthful of blood.
Jiang Li Sheng’s entire body screamed with pain, her mind spinning—but when she saw Shan Gao lunge for Chen Liu An with its jaws wide, the pain vanished under pure panic. She forced herself up and fired her sleeve arrows straight into the bloody hole at its neck.
Three sharp impacts in rapid succession.
The arrows drove deep into the wound.
She seized Chen Liu An and yanked him up just in time, dragging him away from those snapping jaws.
Shan Gao howled, but it didn’t slow. Even with a sword wound and three arrows buried in its throat, it still charged like a living disaster.
Chen Liu An tried to lift his sword again. The moment he gathered strength, pain tore through his chest and his power collapsed.
“We can’t win,” Jiang Li Sheng hissed.
She hauled him onto her sword and fled—but carrying another person slowed her, and Shan Gao closed the distance in the blink of an eye.
Jiang Li Sheng’s heart nearly stopped.
She tore open her storage pouch and threw talismans—whatever she grabbed, she threw—hurling them at Shan Gao in a frantic barrage.
Boom. Boom. Boom.
Explosions hammered the dead forest. Smoke and debris swallowed Shan Gao.
Jiang Li Sheng sucked in a sharp breath, eyes fixed on the cloud, praying she’d bought them more than a heartbeat.
When the smoke thinned, Shan Gao shook itself like it had been pelted with rain and charged again.
Jiang Li Sheng’s face hardened. She’d never expected it to die from blasting talismans alone. Teeth clenched, she pulled out the treasure Jin Wang Chou had once given her as an apology—the Universe Bangle.
Back then, Jin Wang Chou had told her it could be used to leash anything that escaped from Spirit Beast Peak and send it back. She’d never needed it afterward. Even in the secret realm, she’d been reluctant to use it.
Now she had no choice.
She spat out the incantation. The Universe Bangle flew out, expanding as it went, and snapped around Shan Gao’s neck.
It tightened in an instant.
Jiang Li Sheng didn’t blink. It was her first time using the Universe Bangle. She didn’t know if it would hold.
Shan Gao thrashed and slammed its paws against the ring.
Crack.
Fractures spidered across the Universe Bangle.
Jiang Li Sheng’s heart twisted. A mid-grade treasure… cracking in only a few hits.
Chen Liu An, forcing himself upright, pulled out his own weapon—another ring, but this one was lined with barbed hooks. He chanted, and it shot forward.
In the moment Shan Gao cracked the Universe Bangle, Chen Liu An’s ring replaced it, locking around Shan Gao’s neck and tightening with vicious force—stronger by far.
Jiang Li Sheng didn’t waste time mourning the shattered treasure. She swallowed spirit-replenishing pills by the mouthful, forcing her drained body to keep moving.
Chen Liu An swallowed a pill as well, didn’t dare sit to recover, and rushed in again, stabbing at the bloody hole under Shan Gao’s jaw in relentless succession.
Jiang Li Sheng watched, trying to find anything—anything—to tilt the fight.
Then she saw it.
“Senior Brother Chen!” Her voice snapped like a whip. “Its wounds are healing—fast!”
Chen Liu An looked and went pale. The torn flesh was knitting back together, right in front of them.
Terror flashed across his face. “It can self-heal?”
Jiang Li Sheng lunged in, slamming her spiritual power into the wound to suppress the healing. “Keep stabbing,” she ordered, voice raw. “Don’t stop!”
Chen Liu An didn’t understand how her power worked, but he trusted her. He drove his sword again and again into the same place.
Seconds later, it was obvious. The healing slowed, then stalled.
Chen Liu An’s eyes widened with fierce relief. “Junior Sister Jiang—it works!”
Jiang Li Sheng’s face turned pale as paper, but she forced herself to hold her power steady. “Good,” she whispered, more to herself than to him.
Shan Gao’s eyes finally stopped spitting fire. Fear flooded them as the strangling ring tightened and the sword kept finding the wound.
“Let me go,” it begged, voice breaking. “I won’t curse you anymore, I won’t steal your things again. Let me go and I’ll let you out of the Bitter Mountain Grand Array.”
Chen Liu An didn’t even glance at it.
Jiang Li Sheng didn’t either.
“When I stole your things, I didn’t kill you,” Shan Gao pleaded, staring at Jiang Li Sheng. “Spare me once.”
Jiang Li Sheng’s hands faltered.
It was true.
When she first fell into this place, she’d been dazed and clueless. Shan Gao had appeared behind her without a sound, and she hadn’t sensed it at all. If it had wanted to eat her then, it would have been effortless.
It hadn’t.
It had only wanted her snacks. And when she refused, it had snapped and chased her ever since—cursing her, threatening her, trying to eat her.