Scourge Messenger

Chapter 348: At most, you can only taste the original flavor.

Blood Sacrifice!
As the demon "Bai Ze," with its tiger-headed, red-haired, and horned auspicious cloud dragon body, was violently sucked into the puppet, its size also exceeded ten thousand, and Yan Qing only used two [Blood Sacrifice] cards.

After being enhanced by "Bai Ze", the effect of [Blood Sacrifice] has now been increased to 200/200. Now, even the weakest puppet card will definitely have a stat total of over 2000/2000. Combined with the double absorption of "Ascension Six Ears", the benefits of Yan Qing using [Blood Sacrifice] have reached a level of numerical collapse.

If this were a game, Yan Qing's opponents would no longer be demons, but other players. The most important resource in the Demon Gathering Land is demons, and there are quite a few high-level demon teams, but they are still far from enough compared to the vast number of players.

At first, players had to cooperate to deal with the high-level demon teams. What will happen next once the players have wiped out the Demon Gathering Land?
Finally, we can fight each other without any scruples, my friend.

Yan Qing was quite certain that there would be rewards for defeating other players, but unfortunately there were only two players in the Demon Gathering Land, and the other one was his alt account. He couldn't very well wait for Ye Si to come out and beat him up, could he?

With the current puppet lineup, it is possible to achieve infinite battles. Even if "Qiongqi" and "Baize" lose health, they can immediately recover more than 4000 health by absorbing a puppet's health. Their health will increase instead of decrease. This is the strength of snowballing.

In normal gameplay, there would be no such opportunity. Other players would also try to steal monsters, but he monopolized all the resources of the Guiding Lands, which is equivalent to one person monopolizing all the minion waves and all the jungle in a MOBA game. It would be strange if he didn't get rich.

But at this rate of development, can we defeat the Demon of the Free and Easy Realm? This is a world boss that requires all players in the Demon Gathering Land to attack together. It is an underestimation to call it a sixth-level demon king. Apart from lacking the formation, existence, decay and emptiness mechanism, its attributes are likely comparable to a seventh-level golden core immortal lord!

We still need to speed things up!
"Yellow Dog, I want to eat your thing!"

"If you want some, come and get it yourself."

In the cake shop, Yan Qing glanced at Murong Hui, picked up a cream puff, and handed it to her.

Strangely enough, while the Guiding Lands have many shops, most of the food-related ones are snack shops, dessert shops, and cake shops; I've never seen hot pot or barbecue shops, even though the latter are quite common. However, Yan Qing later realized that male players come here either to kill others or to be killed, and then quickly log off to switch to other games. No matter how well-designed the shops are in the game, they don't have computers that can smell the aromas. Therefore, most of the players who have the leisure to pay attention to the shops and facilities in the Guiding Lands are female players, so the official design naturally leans towards female players.

Having just finished defeating a team of six demons, although we weren't hungry yet, the aroma of eggs wafting from the cake shop drew us in as we passed by.

Murong Hui opened her mouth wide, and Yan Qing stuffed the cream puff into her mouth. She bit through the crispy outer shell, and the snow-white cream flowed out. She was so happy that her eyes narrowed. Yan Qing could almost see a tail wagging behind her.

"It's delicious." Murong Hui also stuffed a piece of cake into his mouth: "Mine is delicious too, you should try it."

Yan Qing took a bite, nodded, and said, "The wife cakes here are pretty good."

"Wife cake?" Murong Hui looked at the half-eaten cake in her hand with a look of horror. "But...but...I can't taste any meat!"

Yan Qing almost spat out his drink: "Wife cake is a cake made by the wife herself, not a cake made by turning the wife into a cake!"

"Why is it an old woman making the pancakes? Can't a young woman do it?"

"In other places, 'wife and husband' means the wife's husband, not the mother-in-law," Yan Qing patiently explained.

Murong Hui tilted her head curiously: "But why do you call your partner that? Don't you feel uncomfortable calling them old? Husband and wife, it sounds like you're so old at such a young age. We usually call them young wives and young ladies."

Yan Qing was momentarily stumped by the question. After thinking for a moment, she said, "But people always get old. If you call each other 'husband' and 'wife' from the beginning, don't you think it's like wishing your relationship would last a lifetime and never fade?"

Murong Hui nodded thoughtfully, then suddenly clapped her hands: "I understand!"

She patted Yan Qing's shoulder hard, her face full of sincerity: "From now on, I'll call you Old Dog!"

Watching Yan Qing rub, pinch, and squeeze Murong Hui's face, Ying Rushi rolled her eyes, thinking that last night's hallucination was really too surreal. The real Murong Hui would never be so obedient and considerate.

Last night, after she realized that [Murong Hui] was a hallucination, when she opened her eyes again, it was already time for her night shift to change. There was no such thing as [Murong Hui] talking to her; it was all a hallucination from the beginning, just like that sudden, frank encounter at the thieves' house—it was all wishful thinking, her longing, her cowardice, and her desires.

A dream of wealth and glory on the pillow reflects the mortal world in my eyes.

Because she fantasized about being accepted by her teammates, the yellow dog, black wolf, and red snake suddenly appeared in her room to care for her; because she disliked Murong Hui getting too close to Yan Qing, Murong Hui suddenly said she would keep her distance from Yan Qing… It was all an illusion, a pie in the sky. If she had actually believed it, seeing Murong Hui and Yan Qing still so affectionate would probably make her heartbroken. Ying Rushi was able to see through it not only because she had a vague feeling about it but also because Yan Qing had reminded her.

Yan Qing, that guy, is a perverted lecher who would bring up Black Wolf and Red Snake in front of her; he's so honest it's almost shameless.

Even lying to her would have been fine, but he actually said something like, "I will try my best to make you get used to it," as if he were talking about a dream. If Ying Rushi hadn't defected, she would have wanted to complain to Ying Le.

This inherently evil lecherous dog is beyond redemption, but precisely because of that, he has no reason to lie. The pure-hearted Yan Qing who muttered to himself the night before, "I can only choose one," never existed in the first place.

She should have realized it long ago. How could someone who could have such an ambiguous relationship with Black Wolf and Red Serpent possibly have such pure and kind resolve? It was just that she hoped the person she liked would be as loyal as she was, so her illusion wove this possibility.

The more beautiful and hopeful her fantasies, the more disappointed and even desperate she will be in reality.

In his hallucination, Yan Qing would want to confess his feelings and give up the Black Wolf and Red Serpent, willing to be with only one person for life. In reality, Yan Qing was completely unaware of her thoughts and would never say he would only choose one person in front of her. The only point of overlap between the hallucination and reality was... he would never let go of her hand.

With the precedent of the illusion of Yan Qing, it was only natural for Ying Ru Shi to see through the illusion of Murong Hui. In fact, Ying Ru Shi didn't see anything wrong. The illusion was all based on her own perception, which is why she suddenly woke up—it was too blissful, too satisfying.

She doesn't deserve it.

The reason she was deceived before was because she wanted and desired too much, so she fell into the trap without realizing it. After establishing a preliminary relationship with Yan Qing last night, Ying Ru felt that the emptiness in her heart was filled—although half of it was anger and grievance—like a wild beast that was about to starve to death and had barely eaten its fill, it naturally wouldn't pounce on the bait as soon as it saw it, and its IQ returned to its high level.

Besides that, there is another flaw that is not actually a flaw.

Ying Rushi glanced at Murong Hui, who was chatting with Yan Qing. In the illusion, most of what Murong Hui said was false, except for one sentence: Murong Hui probably really did like Yan Qing.

That's how she likes people—clinging to you, smelling your scent, actively trying to get your attention, like a child, innocent and passionate. And that's why, when Ying Rushi heard Murong Hui say she would actively keep her distance from Yan Qing, she was gently touched.

While Murong Hui's close relationship with Yan Qing displeased her, it was the thought of Murong Hui compromising herself that saddened her even more. Before Murong Hui spoke up, she thought she hoped her sister would give up voluntarily; after Murong Hui spoke up, she would rather her sister fight with her, since someone like Yan Qing would at most break apart, not be taken away.

The illusion was not wrong; it's just a pity that women are so fickle.

However, Ying Ru wasn't too nervous. Although her older sister was a smooth talker, she was actually quite oblivious. If she really realized that her feelings went beyond friendship, she would be shy by now.

Murong Hui isn't very bright, but Yan Qing, are you not? I could let it go before, but you were whispering sweet nothings to me last night. Shouldn't you be taking the initiative to keep your distance from Murong Hui now? I'm watching!
Ying Ru stared intently at Yan Qing, conveying moral pressure through her gaze. At this moment, Murong Hui went to get some cake for a snack. Yan Qing turned his head and noticed Ying Ru's unfriendly gaze. He first glanced at Murong Hui to make sure she wasn't looking at him, then reached out and wiped the cake off Ying Ru's lips with his finger, put it in his mouth, and ate it.

He glanced at Murong Hui again before reaching out to squeeze Ying Rushi's hand. When Murong Hui returned, he immediately pretended nothing had happened, occasionally winking at Ying Rushi, making it seem like an exciting affair.

Yingru tried very hard to glare at him fiercely, but the corners of her mouth couldn't help but curl up. She glared at him and turned her head away.

I'm truly unworthy of sweet love; at most, I can only savor the taste of this scoundrel's original flavor.

"Aren't we close to the other eight demons?" Yan Qing asked.

"We'll be there soon, but should we fight now?" Murong Hui asked. "Shouldn't we develop a bit more?"

Yan Qing shook his head. Although it would be safer to fight later, the sooner he got the reward, the faster he would develop. Right now, what he lacked most was time.

Along the way, they passed a claw machine with a puppet cage. Murong Hui rushed to play and drew a three-turn puppet card. Yan Qing saw that Ying Rushi seemed interested, so he simply took out a puppet card for them to play with. As a result, the puppet cards were reduced by one turn on average. However, with the blood sacrifice bonus of up to 2400/2400, the number of turns of the puppet cards was about the same.

Two quarters of an hour later they arrived at a large square, where a huge white-haired lion demon was bathing in a fountain. It wore a beast bone mask, with two fangs protruding from the corners of its mouth. Even when sitting, it was over ten zhang tall, and a huge spear stood beside it, reaching to the sky.

With its long, drawn-out breaths, it steams with heat, turning the fountain water into mist.

One of the Eight Demons, the White-Haired Lion King!
(End of this chapter)