Miss Witch, even if we're poor, we can't sell ourselves!

After passing through a thicket of bushes, the trees ahead were noticeably sparser than those on the outskirts.

The mud on the ground was replaced by gravel, and the sound of stepping on it changed from a muffled thud to a soft crunching.

Miya slowed her pace, taking each step carefully to avoid making any unnecessary noise.

Then she saw a bear.

It was lying next to a protruding rock, and it was larger than she had expected.

Its fur is grayish-brown, and there is an old scar on its shoulder blade, indicating that it has fought many battles with other monsters.

Its limbs were as thick as four pillars, and its claws gripped the gravel ground, with its nails sinking several centimeters into the ground.

Miya subconsciously held her breath.

This is definitely not something that should appear on the periphery.

Judging from the intensity of the magic fluctuations, this is at least a monster from the mid-level region.

Mi Ye remembered that Bie Chen Ye had told her that there was a barrier she had set up with flesh and blood magic between the outer and middle layers of the back mountain, and most mid-level monsters would not cross the barrier on their own.

But there are always exceptions. For example, the barrier might crack, the bear might rush out in pursuit of prey, or it might simply get lost.

Whatever the reason, it is now less than thirty meters away from Miya.

Miya crouched down, half-hidden behind the bushes, and quickly assessed the situation in her mind.

A head-on confrontation is not realistic.

When she was clearing the outer perimeter, she relied on Contempt to trigger Cripple and then Devour to harvest, but this skill has a fatal weakness: the enemy's health must be less than 10% of her health to trigger Weakness.

The bear's life force is so intense that, let alone 10%, its stats are probably higher than all of her current attributes combined. Touching it wouldn't even apply the Weakness debuff.

Miya's right hand unconsciously clenched, and the two red lines on her wrist trembled slightly, sensing her emotional change.

In the few seconds that she hesitated about whether to just run away, the bear opened its eyes.

It raised its head, twitched its nose twice in the air, then turned to the bushes where Miye was hiding. Immediately afterward, it stood up on all fours with unexpected speed, completely lacking the clumsiness that one would expect from such a large body.

Mi Ye's pupils suddenly contracted.

It looked big enough when it was lying down, but after standing up, I realized I had underestimated its length. Its head was nearly two meters off the ground, and the shadow it cast after standing up could cover its entire body.

Then it rushed over quickly.

The bear's paws stomped on the gravel, making a dull thud. Each step caused the ground to tremble slightly, and the distance of more than twenty meters was compressed to less than five meters in the blink of an eye.

Without thinking, Miya pushed off the ground with her left foot and rolled down the gravel slope to her right.

The bear's claws swept almost across her back, and the resulting wind pressure lifted the hem of her windbreaker.

She rolled twice, half-kneeled, and stood up. With a flick of her right hand, two tentacles shot out from her sleeve, unfurling their dark red petals in the air.

Without pausing after missing her target, the bear braced itself on its forepaws, spun around, and charged at her again.

Miya took two steps back, and the first tentacle reached out from the front and slapped the bear's foreleg.

The moment she touched it, her heart sank.

When fighting the Nightblade Jackal, if its tentacles touch the enemy's fur, the Defiance skill will immediately return a peculiar sensation, like a needle pricking into it. You can clearly feel the life force in the opponent's body being forcibly suppressed by the skill.

But this time it didn't. The tentacle slapped the bear's leg, and the feedback felt like slapping a stone wall with bare hands. The bear's life force didn't budge, and the contempt judgment wasn't even triggered.

The threshold is too high.

The bear was clearly enraged after being slapped by the tentacle. It raised the paw that had been slapped and swept it horizontally towards Miya.

Miya jumped back again to dodge, but she was a little too slow. The fur on the side of the bear's paw grazed her right shoulder with such force that she spun halfway around before regaining her balance.

We must not let it get close.

Miya gritted her teeth and retreated, her two tentacles lashing at the bear's body alternately, constantly changing angles to find an opening.

The tentacles attacked quickly, each lash leaving a faint red mark on the bear's fur, but nothing more.

It can't break the skin or penetrate the flesh; it just leaves a mark on the skin's surface that will soon be covered by fur.

Just then, a burst of white light suddenly erupted in her mind.

flash?

Mi Ye didn't have time to look closely; she only felt a stream of information flowing into the depths of her consciousness.

Her two tentacles suddenly paused in mid-air, and then the dark red silicone texture on the surface of the tentacles began to harden rapidly, turning from a flexible soft material into something like bone.

The dark red petals at the ends taut, becoming as sharp as spearheads.

Within seconds, the entire tentacle transformed from a flexible whip into a spearhead capable of piercing flesh.

【hardening】

Without hesitation, Miya stabbed it the instant the tentacle completed its transformation.

The hardened tentacle tips pierced precisely into the bear's foreleg muscles. This time, the feedback was completely different, like piercing taut leather with sharp fingernails, and something warm seeped out from the opening.

The bear let out a deep roar and swung its front legs, trying to break free of its tentacles.

But the hardened tentacles were firmly embedded in its muscles. Miya used the force to pull herself toward the bear's side, and another tentacle pierced into the bear's abdomen from below, also penetrating deep inside.

It had some effect, but it wasn't enough.

Miya gritted her teeth, controlling one tentacle in each hand, stabbing and pulling it into the bear's body repeatedly.

The dark red wounds on the bear's fur continued to multiply, each one oozing blood, but its movements did not slow down at all; on the contrary, it became more and more ferocious.

She suddenly realized where the problem lay.

These wounds are too small.

Although the hardened tentacles can penetrate the skin and flesh, the penetration depth is not deep enough; they only pierce the surface of the muscle and cannot damage vital organs.

The bear's vitality is too strong. This kind of injury would be fatal to other monsters, but it is probably just a scratch.

She needs to deal enough damage to reduce the bear's health below the threshold for triggering Contempt, but the bear won't stand still and let her slowly whittle it down.

The moment that thought flashed through his mind, the bear suddenly gave up tearing at the tentacles, its whole body suddenly sank, and it pounced on Miya with both of its hind legs.

Miya tried to dodge, but the bear's outburst was too fast.

The tentacles were still embedded in the bear's muscles and couldn't be retracted in time. The bear's gaping maw was already right in front of them, and then it bit down on Miya's left calf.

She instinctively closed her eyes, waiting for the excruciating pain to spread up her calf.

But actually, there isn't one.

I cautiously opened my eyes and looked down at my calves.

The bear's sharp teeth were stuck in her leg; those canines, which looked capable of easily crushing stones, were biting down hard, but her leg wasn't pierced.

There wasn't even a single bloodstain on the skin, only a few faint white marks.

The bear blinked blankly, probably never having encountered this situation before. The sensation of biting down wasn't meat, but more like biting into a solid iron plate.

It tried to bite harder again, but Mi Ye's leg didn't budge, and a small piece of its sharp teeth broke off.

Miya stared into the bear's eyes, then burst out laughing.

"How could I have forgotten that?"

She smiled, revealing her little tiger teeth.

"You can't bite me, right?"

Of course, the bear couldn't understand what she was saying.

It loosened its jaws, probably finding the prey unpalatable, and took a half-step back.

But Miya wasn't going to let it get away like that.

She took a sudden step forward, her right hand outstretched, the hardened tentacles stretching into two straight, dark red spears at her sides, the tips of the spears gleaming coldly in the twilight.

The bear is indeed very resilient. She spent a long time trying to whittle it down, but she couldn't get it to the threshold of contempt. However, that was only because she was only attacking its muscles.

What if it hits a vital spot directly?

The two tentacles thrust out simultaneously, the hardened spear tips tearing through the air with a sharp whistling sound, piercing the bear's chest cavity from the left and right at the same time.

This time, without the obstruction of muscles, the spear tip pierced through the gap between the ribs and went straight into the depths of the chest cavity.

The bear's body suddenly stiffened.

It opened its mouth, letting out a low growl, and tried to raise its forepaws to retaliate, but its strength was rapidly waning as the spear tip pierced its heart.

Mi Ye did not give it a chance to fall.

She pulled out one tentacle, while the other remained inside the bear's chest cavity to maintain contact.

At the end of the tentacle, a small black ball emerged, rapidly expanding and exploding.

The black mist engulfed the entire bear.

It was so large that it took several seconds for the black mist to completely cover its body.

Mi Ye felt a massive surge of life force enter her body, more than all the demons she had devoured before combined.

[Vital Energy +53]

Constitution +7

[Agility +6]

After the black mist dissipated, nothing was left on the spot.

Miya stood there, looking down at her hands, then clenched her fist and then relaxed it.

She could feel her life force numbers jumping rapidly. The exact numbers would require analyzing her sea of ​​consciousness to confirm, but what was certain was that the boost from this absorption was greater than any before.

But something else surprised her even more.

She subconsciously sank her consciousness into her sea of ​​consciousness, and then she stood in that brightly lit ancient city, looked up in the direction of the wishing well, and paused for a moment.

The water in the wishing well is as clear as a mirror, and a few blood-red plants have appeared on the bluestone slabs by the pool at some point.

Seven petals and a dark red stem shimmered faintly in the moonlight, as if they had grown out of themselves after she devoured the bear.

Mi Ye squatted by the wishing well and gently touched the nearest Blood Fairy with her finger.

The petal trembled slightly, as if in response to her touch.

There's no need to collect them yourself; just devour living beings, and the Blood Fairy will grow on its own.

"...This is so convenient."

Mi Ye withdrew her finger, stood up, patted the grass stuck to her windbreaker, and couldn't suppress the smile on her face.

When she withdrew from her sea of ​​consciousness, the back mountain was completely quiet.

As dusk turned from orange to deep blue, the first star shone through the gaps in the tree canopy overhead.

Miya took a deep breath of the cool air, retracted the tentacles to her wrist, and walked towards the wooden house.

Come back fully loaded.