Massage

"After hunting so many Honkai Beasts with Brother Xu, how could my strength not grow?"

When his strike missed, Lianshan stepped on Xu Yanwu's shield and performed a graceful midair flip, dodging Xu Yanwu's sweeping axe blow.

After landing steadily, Lianshan could not help complaining, "Also, Brother Xu, isn't your shield counter way too good? I can't hit you at all..."

Shield counter, way too good—two phrases Lianshan had learned from Xu Yanwu...

"Defense is necessary. To someone who knows how to use it, a shield is not a burden, but a chasm that completely separates them from their enemy."

Xu Yanwu glanced at the Shennong Ruler in Lianshan's hand and shook his head. "You were already at a disadvantage fighting me with the Shennong Ruler. Its poison does nothing to me, after all, and I'm its creator... How much weight did you set it to when you chopped at me just now?"

The Shennong Ruler was a weapon Xu Yanwu had forged only after much deliberation. The effort that had gone into making it had been anything but simple...

Xu Yanwu had scratched his head raw trying to figure out what weapon Shennong had used. In his impression, had Shennong not simply carried a cauldron around the world, brewing herbs?

Xu Yanwu had originally planned to have Lianshan carry the Shennong World-Creating Cauldron around and smash people with it. But fortune favored the persistent. When he saw Cang Xuan introducing units of measurement to the tribe with a stone ruler in hand, his eyes lit up as he recalled a childhood memory.

Had he ever watched Divine Weapon Boy?

The one with that forgiveness-green color, whose entire beast form looked like a flat board, yet ran around everywhere!

The Divine Weapon Beast of Beiming Xue, the second young lady of Beiming Snow Manor in Yulong Kingdom: the Shennong Beast, Beiming Snowfield Dog. In its sled dog form, it bore the markings of the Shennong Ruler; it could transform into the Divine Weapon Shennong Ruler and cure all manner of illnesses and injuries!

Did that not settle the direction for Lianshan's weapon?

Filled with excitement, Xu Yanwu immediately rushed into his room and created this Shennong Ruler for Lianshan.

Of course, this Shennong Ruler could not turn into a Shennong Beast, nor did it look like that golf club... A complaint from the author that had lasted from childhood to adulthood.

Unlike the Shennong Cauldron, which could neutralize all poisons and brew spiritual medicine on its own, the Shennong Ruler possessed more offensive power.

As for exactly how much power it held, Xu Yanwu did not know either. He had merely manifested some of his own understanding and concepts of the Shennong Ruler from his mind.

To put it this way: if Xu Yanwu believed that the Shennong Ruler could truly become a Shennong Beast, then it could be made possible in the future.

Unfortunately, Xu Yanwu had specifically removed that possibility.

Although Xu Yanwu had created the Shennong Ruler and the Shennong Cauldron this way, he had not been able to fully grasp their functions himself. Still, after two years of use, Lianshan had developed quite a few abilities.

The first was poison.

It was currently one of the Shennong Ruler's strongest abilities. Though it would not harm Xu Yanwu, its creator, or Lianshan, its master, against others, the poison Lianshan had developed had reached a terrifying level.

Even Honkai Beasts renowned for their physical toughness could not endure for long once the Shennong Ruler's poison entered their bodies.

Xu Yanwu and Lianshan had discovered this ability when they accidentally dropped the Shennong Ruler into a large lake they were passing by. Then, fish had started surfacing nonstop throughout the lake...

The two of them had eaten until they were stuffed that day.

The second was weight.

The Shennong Ruler's weight limit rose along with Lianshan's own limits. Within that range, Lianshan could adjust the Shennong Ruler's weight in an instant.

Quite a few Honkai Beasts had had their skulls split open by Lianshan's direct blows.

The third was its protection of Lianshan, its master.

Xu Yanwu had actually been troubled all along by whether Lianshan could be implanted with Stigmata, granting him resistance to Honkai Energy throughout his body aside from his stomach.

After all, Honkai Energy was highly corrosive to the human body. And Stigmata, something developed by MIE, a scientist at the pinnacle of her field, specifically for girls, could not easily be replicated on Lianshan.

Dr. MIE was a genius seen only once in many years, while Xu Yanwu was merely an ordinary shut-in who had graduated from college...

It was certainly unrealistic to expect Xu Yanwu to thoroughly master Stigmata research within two years.

Fortunately, Xu Yanwu discovered that after the Shennong Ruler had bonded with Lianshan, it was actually protecting Lianshan's body from Honkai Energy corrosion!

Heaven knew how depressed Xu Yanwu had been when he learned this.

He silently canceled his plan to sneak a look at Cang Xuan, Danzhu, and Chi Yuan's Stigmata...

Why not sneak a look at Ji Xuanyuan's?

Lianshan called him big brother, after all. Xu Yanwu had no interest in peeping at his brother's wife.

With the explanation over, let us return our attention to the battle between the two.

"I used thirty thousand jin."

Lianshan puffed out his chest, his face full of pride.

That number meant the force Lianshan could wield with one arm had reached thirty thousand jin. Now, with brute strength alone, he could pin down a Tank-class Honkai Beast.

Though it was only brute strength...

"Thirty thousand jin? Not bad..."

Xu Yanwu planted his axe into the ground, raised his right hand, and rubbed his chin. "Come on, keep attacking... Your strength is still not enough."

Brute strength was ultimately only brute strength. Although Lianshan possessed physical abilities far surpassing Ji Xuanyuan and the others, Xu Zifu would bet fifty cents that Lianshan would still get beaten senseless by them.

If Lianshan cast aside all that brute force and put down the Shennong Ruler, whose capabilities he had only begun to develop, he would merely be about on par with the tribe's ordinary but valiant warriors.

If he did not hurry and grow stronger, how would Lianshan face... Chi You?

Xu Yanwu's right temple twitched, giving him an ominous feeling, as though something would happen in the future.

"Got it, Brother Xu! Here I come!"

Lianshan shouldered the Shennong Ruler and charged at Xu Yanwu again with a solemn expression.

I hope I'm just overthinking it, Xu Yanwu silently said to himself.

---Nightfall---

"Brother Xu... Can't you be a little gentler...?"

Lianshan, who had spent the day hunting with injuries Xu Yanwu had inflicted on him, lay on the ground with a wronged expression. He exposed his bruised back for Xu Yanwu to massage.

"I'm promoting blood circulation for you. Bear with it. There isn't much of this medicinal paste brewed by the Shennong Cauldron, and it would be a shame to waste it."

Xu Yanwu said this with a straight face as he spread dark green ointment across Lianshan's back. Yet judging from his technique, he was clearly just randomly kneading and pushing.

The only thing that worked was the ointment.