This was a dense rainforest.
The scorching sunlight pierced through layer upon layer of leaves in the rainforest and shone down. The air was hot and humid, and the lush vegetation had grown exceptionally thick and flourishing from the abundant rainfall. Vines twisted together, roots tangled into knots, forming obstacle after obstacle.
The young girl Zi Di ran through the rainforest with all her strength.
She had curly black hair and wheat-colored skin. Her delicate features outlined a face of extraordinary beauty. Most captivating of all were her large purple eyes, clear and bright as amethysts.
But at this moment, those eyes were filled with terror and panic.
Huff!
Huff!
Her mouth hung wide open as she struggled to breathe with all her might, while a dull pain had already begun spreading through her chest.
She was drenched in sweat, with wounds wrapped in bandages all over her body. From the intense running, patches of bright red blood had seeped through the white Bandages.
"Faster, even faster!"
"I have to get away from here as quickly as possible!!"
Zi Di encouraged herself, but her speed remained severely limited.
A thick Hemp Rope lay across her shoulders, and something heavy seemed to be dragging behind it, greatly slowing her down.
"Ah—!"
A shrill scream suddenly came from afar.
Then came the sound of a wolf's howl.
The girl's entire body trembled as though struck by Electric Shock.
Then, the sense of danger and urgency seized her heart like the massive claws of a beast.
In that instant, only one voice remained in her mind: Run! Run! Run! Leave everything behind and stop caring about anything else. Otherwise, that vicious wolf will kill you, just like those guards. It will tear you apart, chew you to pieces, and finally swallow you whole!
The girl's face turned deathly pale and her gaze became frantic, but when her eyes fell behind her, she steadied herself again.
She dragged a Hemp Rope, its far end firmly tied to a Stretcher. A young man lay upon it.
For some unknown reason, the young man lay unconscious with his eyes tightly shut. Yet he had dazzling golden hair and remarkably handsome features, carrying an innate air of nobility.
The young man was undoubtedly a burden to her.
At such a critical moment, where life and death hung in the balance, dragging along a burden heavier than herself was no different from offering up her own chance of survival.
Looking at the young man on the Stretcher, Zi Di clenched her teeth.
Then, suppressing the panic and tension in her heart, she continued dragging the Stretcher forward, resisting the terrifying pressure of death drawing ever closer.
She pushed aside the vines before her and slammed her slender body through the wall-like thickets. The dense jungle ahead suddenly became unusually sparse, revealing the deep blue sky.
The sound of flowing water gradually became clearer. Before long, a small river appeared in the girl's field of vision.
After a quick estimate, the girl knew the water would probably reach only to her waist.
But she did not dare step into the river lightly!
This isolated island is filled with danger. I absolutely cannot judge it by common sense. I can almost be certain that vicious crocodiles or large schools of piranhas are hiding in this little river!
Originally, she had been accompanied by as many as sixteen guards. Now, only she and the young man remained. Along the way, her companions had died one after another, using their lives to demonstrate the terror of this jungle island.
"Damn it, if only I could still use magic..."
After observing for a while, the girl bit her lip and still decided to cross the river!
The Giant Wolf behind her was like a grim reaper coming to claim her life, perhaps already following her scent as it hunted her down.
Though panicked, the girl had never completely lost her reason. She still maintained a clear understanding and judgment of her circumstances.
She dragged the heavy Stretcher and moved along the river.
A moment later, a glimmer flashed through her eyes.
She saw a small tree growing at a slant. Its trunk extended from this bank, arching through the air until it reached above the opposite shore.
The girl examined it carefully and discovered that no venomous snakes or thorns were hidden in the brush. However, the trunk was covered in moss and extremely slippery.
Even if she climbed such a trunk alone, one careless mistake could send her falling into the river.
Not to mention... she had a burden with her.
The young man on the Stretcher had his eyes closed tightly and was completely unconscious.
Perhaps... she should abandon him.
Taking an unconscious young man across the river was simply too difficult, too risky.
But gritting her teeth, the girl quickly untied the Hemp Rope from the Stretcher, then carried the young man onto her back and tightly wrapped the rope around both their bodies.
After doing all that, the girl directly removed her boots and stuffed them into the gap between the rope and her body.
Finally, she took a deep breath and, carrying the unconscious young man on her back, began the dangerous climb up the trunk with both hands and feet.
The moss on the trunk was scraped away, making it even more slippery.
I can do this. I can make it!
Zi Di, Zi Di, you absolutely cannot fall here.
You are the president of the Purple Vine Merchant Guild. You still have to avenge Father!
The brave girl kept encouraging herself.
She clung to the trunk with all her strength, inching forward again and again. Her purple eyes stared ahead, filled with determination.
In the end, she successfully climbed across.
The weight of the two of them bent the slender trunk down, and by the time the girl reached the opposite shore, the trunk had been pressed all the way to the ground.
That made it easier for the girl to land.
Once freed from their weight, the trunk sprang upward again. Its branches and leaves whipped about, stirring up a gust of wind.
Carrying the young man on her back, the girl had reached the limit of her stamina. For a moment, she was nearly collapsing and lacked the strength to stand, able only to kneel on the ground with both hands braced against the earth.
Her face was pale, and her head swam faintly. Sweat dripped rapidly from the tip of her nose and chin onto the dense grass below.
After resting for a moment, the girl's dizziness gradually faded.
Intense joy spread through her heart.
"Unbelievable! I did it!"
"I really made it across."
But immediately afterward, she felt numbness beginning to spread through her limbs.
This was the aftereffect of exhausting all her strength.
Roar!
A wolf's roar suddenly rang out, followed by a figure bursting from the dense grass.
The girl's body and mind shuddered. She instinctively turned around and saw a dark-blue Giant Wolf.
At that moment, her pupils contracted sharply, as if she had fallen into an icy abyss!
The Giant Wolf was as large as a calf, radiating murderous intent.
It bared its teeth, with scraps of fresh flesh still caught between them.
Its wolf eyes were bloodshot as it stared fixedly at the girl, overflowing with savage killing intent.
The girl turned pale with fright and fell into the grass by the riverbank.
She had turned too abruptly, forgetting that she still carried the young man on her back.
The young man's weight created a powerful inertia, dragging the girl to the ground.
Her weakness and disheveled state only further provoked the Giant Wolf's ferocity.
Yet the Giant Wolf remained on the opposite bank.
It hopped and paced in place, looking at the babbling river with obvious wariness.
Seeing the Giant Wolf behave this way, the girl immediately understood how wise her earlier actions had been.
But the next moment, the Giant Wolf spotted the tree trunk as well. It actually imitated the girl and began stepping onto the trunk connecting the two banks!
Without question, this savage and brutal Giant Wolf possessed terrifying intelligence as well.
Though the Giant Wolf had a powerful body, its sense of balance was excellent. It was actually several times faster than the girl.
As though struck by Electric Shock, the stunned girl hurriedly pulled a dagger from her clothes, cut the rope around her body, then sprang to her feet and slammed with all her strength into the trunk arched overhead.
The trunk immediately began to sway from the impact.
Though the swaying was not especially violent, it was enough to cause the Giant Wolf considerable trouble.
The Giant Wolf lost its balance and nearly fell into the river, forcing it to leap back to the bank in a miserable state.
Roar!
It roared at the girl and bared its sharp fangs, growing even more agitated.
The girl had successfully stopped the Giant Wolf and was initially overjoyed, but regret quickly followed.
"I should have waited until that beast reached the middle of the trunk before striking, so it would fall into the river!"
The girl and the Giant Wolf faced each other across the river.
The Giant Wolf kept roaring without retreating.
The girl stared at the Giant Wolf and did not dare relax for even a moment. Whenever it made the slightest move to climb onto the trunk, she would ram the trunk and make it sway.
After a while, the girl understood.
What she had done in her panic earlier was correct.
Because she could not accurately estimate how far the Giant Wolf could jump.
After climbing only a short distance, the Giant Wolf might have been able to leap directly onto the opposite bank.
Even if she had shaken the Giant Wolf into the river, whether the hidden danger in the water would erupt, and whether it could stop the Giant Wolf even if it did, remained unknown.
Therefore, the safest course was to give the Giant Wolf no opportunity at all. As long as it stepped onto the trunk, she would interfere with all her strength.
Time continued to pass. The Giant Wolf tried many times but failed every time.
Finally, at one point, it abruptly turned around, slipped into the undergrowth, and vanished.
The girl stood there in a daze. Only after several breaths did she react and collapse onto the ground.
The tense numbness on her face gradually eased, like melting ice, and two streams of tears ran down her cheeks.
She had finally escaped with her life!
The girl began to sob softly.
Her legs were curled up, and her feet were still bare. She had not yet had the chance to put her boots back on.
From climbing the tree earlier, the insides of both her feet were badly scraped. All ten of her fingernails were damaged, blood seeping from them.
She buried her head in the bend of her knees. Her shoulders trembled faintly with her sobs, like those of a fragile little kitten.
After crying for a while, the girl suddenly raised her head as though struck by Electric Shock.
Her eyes were red, clear tear tracks streaked her face, and her expression was complicated—shock, doubt, and fear.
"Did that Giant Wolf really give up just like that?"
"That is certainly possible. But..."
Remembering the horrifying experiences of the past few days, the girl increasingly felt that it was more likely the Giant Wolf had not given up.
"Perhaps it suddenly turned and disappeared into the brush just to lull me into lowering my guard."
"It may be following the river right now, searching for another shortcut to reach this bank!"
"Perhaps it has already crossed over and is rushing toward me at full speed!!"
At that thought, the girl felt as though she had suddenly plunged into an ice pit, the chill piercing her to the bone.
What should she do?
Carry the young man back across the tree trunk?
Not to mention that the raised trunk stood some distance above the ground, making it extremely difficult for her to climb onto it with the young man on her back.
What if the Giant Wolf was still waiting on the other side?
Stop halfway along the trunk?
That was even more impossible.
It would consume far too much stamina.
The girl knew her current physical condition well. She had no confidence that she could climb the trunk again. Recalling the crossing she had just made filled her with relief and lingering fear.
Continue onward with the young man on her back?
If the Giant Wolf caught up, that was clearly a dead end.
Even without carrying anything, the girl was far slower than the Giant Wolf.
"Then there is only one final choice!"
A resolute gleam flashed in the girl's eyes.
She hurried to the young man's side, knelt on one knee, and took a milky-white cylindrical crystal from her clothes.
The girl focused her mind and used all her strength to activate the White Crystal Pillar.
She gripped the crystal tightly. It hovered only a hair's breadth above the young man's forehead, remaining motionless for a long time.
"Is it really not going to work?"
"No, this is my last hope. Even if it is faint, even if there is only the slightest possibility..."
Growing ever more anxious, the girl murmured softly, "Hurry, hurry! Please, take effect."
As though it had heard the girl's plea, the milky-white crystal finally began to emit a faint thread of light, so subtle it was nearly impossible to detect.
Yet the moment the girl noticed that faint glimmer, her face immediately lit up with joy.
"Although most magic is forbidden on this island, that is only relative. As long as its rank is high enough, it can still be used. Its power and effects are merely greatly reduced..."
The same was true for magical items.
The light emitted by the White Crystal Pillar gradually intensified, then gathered like droplets of water into a stream glowing with a milky white radiance.
A small stream dripped onto the unconscious young man's forehead, then miraculously seeped into his skin.
In only a short while, Zi Di, struggling to activate the crystal pillar, had turned pale all over. Cold sweat covered her forehead, and her body swayed as though she might collapse at any moment.
The crystal pillar also began to lose its color, gradually turning into gray stone from its upper end.
"Hold on. I must hold on. I cannot give up halfway!" Zi Di squeezed every last bit of strength from her body, almost hypnotizing herself as she repeatedly pushed beyond her limits.
When the crystal pillar had nearly lost half its color, Zi Di had already slipped into a half-conscious state, supported only by a single stubborn obsession.
"I have to wake him..."
Awoo!
A wolf's howl suddenly rang out. The vanished Blue Giant Wolf moved with astonishing speed, suddenly charging out of the dense grass.
At that moment, the Grim Reaper descended!
Zi Di shuddered in fright. She instinctively looked up, her lovely face already engulfed by the shadow cast by the Giant Wolf's body.
She saw the Giant Wolf leaping into the air and diving down at her.
At that moment, time seemed to slow.
The wolf's jaws gaped wide, exposing savage fangs, with saliva even spraying from its mouth.
Am I going to die?! Zi Di's will struggled, but her body no longer responded. She had exhausted all her strength.
I'm so unwilling... The thick aura of death rushed toward her. With her final hope in her violet eyes, the girl looked at the crystal pillar in her hand.
Two-thirds of that crystal pillar had already lost its luster and turned into gray stone, but one-third still remained.
"There's no hope left."
In an instant, the girl's face turned ashen. All strength left her as she lowered her head slightly and closed her eyes.
But just as she was about to resign herself to death, a violent tremor suddenly came from her hand.
Bang.
With a soft crack, the crystal pillar exploded into countless fragments.
What was going on?
The girl opened her eyes in alarm and confusion.
Then she saw that the unconscious youth had finally awakened!
The handsome blond, blue-eyed youth suddenly rolled to the side, then raised his leg in a backward kick.
The movement was graceful and nimble, yet clean and decisive.
His body looked frail, but at that moment, it displayed savage power!
Vigorous Leg Gale!
The Giant Wolf had no time to dodge and was struck by the kick.
The wolf's howl cut off abruptly. Hit by the tremendous force, the Giant Wolf was hurled far away.
The youth pushed himself off the ground with both hands and rose to his feet, glaring furiously.
The girl's pupils contracted, and her breath caught. Looking at the youth's thin back, she felt as though she were seeing a mountain rise.
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