Forge a path to success.

Chapter 220 The Trap of the War Demon (3)

"Chongming, has your brain been fried by this fire too?" Du Lanbai asked, his face pale with anxiety. "You still have a chance to live on your own. Take me with you, let's die together!"

"So you're willing to die here?" Chongming said lazily. "We've killed the Nightmare King, you know. When we get back, you'll be a legend in the Dark Realm. The girl you like will never ignore you again. She'll pester you to tell her stories of fighting the heretics, and she'll pass on your message to the bards to write a new epic for you. With such a bright future, are you really willing to rot here?"
After that, I was speechless. At the funeral, they asked me about the heroic end of Knight Duran, and I could only say he turned into ten or so pieces, lining up to be digested inside a goblin's stomach. It was probably going to be an unprecedented funeral, because everyone was laughing so hard they were vomiting, and nobody had time to cry for you.

Duran rolled his eyes up; he wanted to roll his eyes back but didn't have the strength.

"For the sake of your own lungs, can you shut your mouth?" Du Lanbai said with a wry smile. "Legendary, my ass. You're already at point 7 while I'm only at point 5. While you were fighting Vansalal, I was fighting two Rainbow Abominations. What a load of bull, a legendary title."

Chongming took several steps forward, remaining silent for the time being. Conversation was tantamount to torture for him, especially since he was currently dragging Du Lanbai along.

From an angle unseen by his friend, the ropes woven from the cloak chafed his muscles and became stuck in his half-damaged shoulder joint. Chongming's remaining strength was insufficient to carry another adult, so he used his own bones as a restraint, forcing the body forward with his willpower.

Chu Hengkong was filled with admiration just watching from the sidelines. Even Xiangyu Yao was amazed by the creativity of such cruel torture. Chongming, on the other hand, remained unfazed and was even talking to his buddy.

“Whether you like it or not, they’ll talk about you a lot when you get back,” Chongming said. “They’ll say you’re the hero who defeated the Demon King, the brave paladin Duranbai, just like they did in Volcaso.”

"What nonsense are you talking about?" Du Lanbai laughed as well. "Such great achievements just fell on my head for no reason?"

"Because they don't want to believe that the one who defeated the Demon King was a wild samurai. Because they think that the hero who slays the evil god should be a knight!" Chongming sneered. "What you say is irrelevant to the 'truth.' They'll say you deliberately gave up the credit so that your friend could get ahead, and they'll even weave that generosity into a song and sing it loudly in the story they want to hear!"

Du Lanbai's expression changed drastically; his handsome face turned incredibly ugly.

"Don't save me!" he whispered in terror. "Let go! Let me die here! Die here!"

Chongming suddenly kicked Du Lanbai aside and kicked him out. He cursed, "Go to hell! Is your life more important than your reputation?"

"Reputation is important!" Du Lanbai shouted. "We've fought this far precisely to let them know you're not a heretic!!"

"After fighting for so long, how come you still don't understand?" Chongming said with a half-smile. "What nonsense about righteousness and heterodoxy? If they like you, you're on the righteous path. If they don't like you, you're on the heterodoxy!"

Du Lanbai struggled desperately to get closer, but having lost both his legs, he could only remain in place like a useless burden. The narrow cave further restricted his vision; he could only see Chongming's back, but not the ugly dwarfs that were silently approaching.

A decaying short arrow was stuck in the ground. The strange ghosts had caught up. If Chongming hadn't thrown Du Lanbai aside earlier, Du Lanbai's throat would have been pierced by that short arrow by now. The rescue knight's actions left Chongming momentarily exhausted. He sat down on the ground with a thud, leaning on the murderous knife like a cane.

Control returned to Chu Hengkong.

Chu Hengkong stared at the approaching dwarfs, and for a moment he felt an urge to laugh. He had finally figured out the pattern of this longing; this wasn't a game created by the murderous blade, but rather a movie it was replaying. Those people and events that Chongming valued were the inevitable actions that would happen, and you, being in the midst of it, could not interfere. All you could control were the insignificant battles and suffering.

This knife resists interference from others at its core. It crafted this trap from the lightest yet most malevolent part of longing, mocking everyone who attempts to awaken it.

"Alright," Chu Hengkong chuckled, "then I'll show you."

He sat motionless, his left thumb pushing forward, inching his blade inch by inch under the watchful eyes of the strange demons. The murderous blade was drawn two inches from its sheath, unleashing a terrifying killing intent that instantly froze the demons' movements. But this time, the leader of the pack shouted, using a pale purple energy shield to defend against the murderous intent. Its power spurred the strange demons to fight.

The crowned leader leaped up first, its sharp claws reaching for the scabbard. A greedy glint shone in its eyes; it knew the sword's power, and its past experience of plundering told it that to kill the crippled, it must first seize the sword. At that moment, Chu Hengkong stretched out his right hand and grasped the scabbard. With all his might, he pulled sharply, the sword remaining still while the useless scabbard was pulled from its sheath.

The sharp blade slammed straight into the leader's claws!
The leader was torn in two mid-air, the wound so clean it seemed the surrounding world had been severed as well. It lost its life the moment it touched the blade; the ferocious blade wouldn't allow it to be touched. The other strange demons shrieked and retreated. Chu Hengkong rose leisurely, casually grabbing the leader's corpse and stuffing it into his mouth. He dragged the blade forward, making no attempt to strike, merely moving the blade carelessly. The demons' weapons and bodies collided with the blade on their own. Before the ferocious blade, the beasts' bones were no different from air; anything that touched the blade was obliterated by its killing intent, leaving only a pile of corpses half a second later.

The corpses of the strange ghosts fell to the ground, but no blood was seen. Their blood had been drained by the murderous blade, leaving a trace of crimson on the ash-black blade, like a flower petal fallen upon it. To conserve his strength, Chu Hengkong sat down on the spot and began to tear at the bloodless corpses.

Duranbeth then realized what had happened, and he groaned, "The Strange Demon is intelligent... Many Dust Isles consider it a demi-human..."

"They were just eating you," Chu Hengkong said coldly. "Aren't you going to eat them?"

"I'm not a demi-human!" Duranbai said, sounding unsure of himself. "Besides, I don't have your teeth... You can even swallow a magic bullet..."

Chu Heng chuckled, then grabbed the useless knight again, dragging him forward with one hand. Their earlier conversation had exhausted them, and they both fell silent, listening to the distant tremors. The epicenter was getting closer; whatever it was outside, they were almost face to face with it.

“Have we taken the wrong turn?” Duran broke the silence. “I feel like we’re… sinking.”

Chu Hengkong also sensed it; the texture of the ground had subtly changed. With each step, he felt a slight elasticity, unlike the sticky feeling of stepping into a swamp, but rather like crawling on a soft, warm mat. The mountain walls were covered with a layer of translucent slime, and strange mushrooms and fine grasses were appearing more and more, with small pebbles scattered everywhere that resembled fleshy tumors.

He quietly lowered the murder weapon, and the blade pierced the ground without any resistance, gushing out a black liquid.

“There is plenty of groundwater here,” Chu Hengkong said.

"You insist on calling this groundwater, is that it?" Du Lanbai struggled to look up. "This cave is alive."

"Correct."

You've fallen into a trap.

"It seems so."

Duran took a long breath. The noise of rats running flashed by.

“I’m reminded of a really awful story that adults used to scare kids when I was a kid.” Duranbai slowly adjusted his breathing. “It’s said that deep in the First Abyss, there exists an unusually huge creature. When it flies over Dust Isle, the entire sky turns black, and people think it’s the light of a mad moon.”

This creature is enormous yet adept at concealing itself; you can unknowingly wander into its belly. It's so large that a complete ecosystem exists within it. Those strange beasts you rarely see on Dust Island… like the Strange Walker and the Eyeless Stone Demon… live inside that creature, like its cells.

"Are there any things that look like mice in these cells?" Chu Hengkong asked. He saw a small mouse running past on fluorescent grass.

“There’s a particularly insane beast called the ‘Black Rat.’” Duranbai closed his eyes. “They have no emotions, no intelligence, but they are always hungry. When that creature flies over Dust Isle, the Black Rats will silently descend, and when it leaves, the Black Rats will fall into the Sea of ​​Illusions, because by then there will be no more Dust Isle, and all the matter will have been eaten up by the Black Rats. When I was a child, my parents used this story to scare me, telling me not to go out alone at night, because you never know if what you see is the darkness or a hungry Black Rat.”

"A very interesting bedtime story." Chu Hengkong stared at the mouse, and the black mouse looked back at him. "That thing has a few points."

“Point mass 6,” Duran said, “is an immortal ‘ghost.’”

(End of this chapter)