Chapter 29: Unexpected Outcome

Xia Wulei did not vanish into thin air.

In plain sight of everyone, she charged toward the Nine-Headed Hydra. Her target was not its body, but that single golden eye, which stood as tall as a man.

Zhu Chen stared blankly, forgetting even to dodge the ghostly shadows looming behind him. "Is Sister Xia... inside that eye?"

A spectral hand, dripping with black blood, reached for Zhu Chen’s neck. Just as it was about to succeed, a torch swung across, searing the hand and forcing it to recoil.

"What are you daydreaming for? Do you not want to live?!" Chu Wei, holding the torch, barked a command that snapped Zhu Chen back to reality.

"Whoa, thanks, Sister Chu Wei. What is that?" Still shaken, Zhu Chen asked curiously, eyeing the torch in her hand.

"A torch that can scorch any non-human creature; I traded points for it. No more talking—I’ll clear a path, you get away from those things immediately."

Zhu Chen nodded and, shielded by Chu Wei’s torch, successfully reunited with the group. Yu Huaiyu immediately pulled out her bandage item to treat the corrosive wounds on Zhu Chen’s body.

"Sister Chu, that’s a great item! With this thing, we don't need to fear these shadows anymore. I just wonder how Sister Xia is doing... sss, that hurts..."

Zhu Chen winced in pain. As Yu Huaiyu bandaged him, she muttered, "This is an item; it’ll heal you before long, and it cost me a lot of points. It’s just a little painful—can’t you be a man and endure it?"

Chu Wei sighed, "This torch only lasts for five minutes; otherwise, I would have brought it out sooner. And besides, we can barely protect ourselves right now..."

Only then did the others realize that the ghostly shadows had surrounded them at some point. Were it not for the faint, deterrent glow of the torch, they would have likely been swarmed and engulfed long ago.

They huddled back-to-back. Yu Huaiyu tried swatting at the shadows with a broom, but it was to no avail. Hong Qi recited verses, but without exception, his attacks missed their mark.

Meanwhile, on Xia Wulei’s side:

She had passed through the golden eye without resistance, finding herself suspended in a sea of gold. The sensation was surreal; her feet dangled in empty space, as if drifting through water, yet she could breathe freely.

Xia Wulei hadn't decided to enter the eye on a whim. The moment the Nine-Headed Hydra approached her and opened that massive golden eye, she had received a system notification:

[Congratulations, player! You have discovered a rare material: Golden Nutrient Solution! One drop can restore soil fertility by 100%. Would you like to absorb it?]

The information stunned Xia Wulei. Golden Nutrient Solution? Where?

At that moment, the light in Xia Wulei’s eyes burned brighter than the golden orb before her. Without a second thought, she threw herself toward the only golden object in sight—the eye.

What she didn't expect to find inside was a human face.

To be precise, it was merely a thin sheet of skin, floating in the center, silently facing her. The eye, nose, and mouth areas were hollow voids. After staring at Xia Wulei for a moment, it suddenly spoke.

The skin around the mouth area flapped open and shut. It was unclear where the sound originated: "To dare to barge in directly... heh heh, it has been a long time since I tasted fresh human blood..."

As the words fell, the face grew larger and larger, drifting toward Xia Wulei as if to wrap her within its folds.

Xia Wulei remained composed and suddenly said, "Goodbye."

"What?"

The face froze, and before it could react, the surroundings suddenly went empty!

The golden nutrient solution vanished completely. Deprived of its support, the face shriveled back to its original size, falling to the ground and writhing in agony.

"Aaaah! This is impossible... you, what exactly did you do..."

The face let out a shrill shriek, twisting and rolling on the ground as if suffocating. Before long, it fell silent.

Xia Wulei leaned in to look; the face had turned a grayish-white, looking withered and hollow.

"Looks disgusting. I’d better not pick it up... Wait, what’s happening?!"

The surroundings suddenly began to shake. Unable to keep her footing, Xia Wulei grabbed onto her surroundings for support. She was still inside the Nine-Headed Hydra, and she wondered if something had gone wrong with the creature. But when she tried to turn back to exit, she found the eye had closed; she was trapped within the hollow socket.

"What’s going on?"

Outside, the players also noticed the abnormality. The shadows crawling toward them suddenly stopped, curling into balls as if in great pain. The Nine-Headed Hydra let out a roar, thrashed its heads violently, demolished the surrounding buildings, and suddenly collapsed.

Simultaneously, the ghostly shadows dissolved into pools of blood and vanished entirely.

Yu Huaiyu asked tentatively, "Is the... Nine-Headed Hydra dead?"

"I’ll go check."

Hong Qi mustered his courage, borrowed the broom from Yu Huaiyu, and stepped over the pools of blood to reach the massive body of the Nine-Headed Hydra.

He poked it tentatively and found that the creature remained completely motionless. He had just breathed a sigh of relief and was about to call the others over when the Hydra’s abdomen suddenly bulged, as if something were about to burst out.

Alarmed, Hong Qi jumped back several steps.

A gleaming hoe thrust outward, and a figure crawled out from the filth-covered abdomen of the Hydra.

"I was suffocating... Hey, Hong Qi, give me a hand."

"Wulei? Oh, oh! I’m coming!"

It took a moment for Hong Qi to associate this blood-stained person with Xia Wulei, and he quickly stepped forward to help. Yu Huaiyu and the others also ran over, relieved to see Xia Wulei was unharmed.

"You scared me to death! How did you end up looking like this?" Yu Huaiyu stomped her foot. She had wanted to approach, but seeing Xia Wulei covered in filth, she thought better of it.

"Did you kill this Hydra?" Chu Wei glanced at the state of the corpse; in such a short time, it had already begun to rot and blacken, emitting a pungent stench.

"Let me wash up first. You wouldn't want to talk to me like this, would you?" Xia Wulei looked down at herself helplessly, then glanced at the group, who were maintaining a distance from her.

Hong Qi conjured a stream of water to rinse her off. Zhu Chen suppressed his impatience, waiting until she looked refreshed before asking, "Tell us quickly, how did you finish it off?"

"Ugh, there was a human face inside its eyeball—it was likely the mastermind behind all this. But that face had no real power; it could only survive while soaked in that nutrient solution. I drained the solution, and the face was destroyed."

Hong Qi remarked with emotion, "Don't let Wulei make it sound easy. If you think about the actual execution of that, it certainly couldn't have been as simple as she says."

Xia Wulei: ...No, it really was quite easy. The system did all the absorbing; I didn't really do anything.

But Xia Wulei couldn't say that out loud, so she gave a vague answer.

Moments later, the system’s voice echoed in everyone’s minds.

[Congratulations to all players! The dungeon has been cleared! Final settlement will commence in thirty minutes!]