"Since it refused to come out with dignity, I'd help it along."
Li Dan snorted coldly, his black trench coat snapping in the eerie wind.
Without the slightest hesitation, he strode straight through the air barrier blocking Zhang Jingqiang and walked up to Xiaolan as though nothing stood in his way.
He used no complicated Daoist incantations. Instead, he slowly extended his right hand, palm down, hovering it just inches above Xiaolan's swollen belly.
"Ghost Lake, Sever."
At Li Dan's murmur, streams of ink-black water carrying bone-chilling cold seeped from his palm.
This black water was no ordinary substance. It was the physical manifestation of Ghost Lake's supernatural power.
They gently and precisely permeated Xiaolan's skin without leaving a single wound.
Under Li Dan's meticulous control, black threads rapidly wrapped around the restless green mass of light within her womb, like black tides drowning poisonous green flames.
"Aah—!!!"
A shrill, grating scream—neither male nor female—exploded inside everyone's minds.
The Demon Fetus sensed an unprecedented threat. It struggled madly, trying to ignite the mother's life force and perish with her.
But Ghost Lake's suppression was absolute. The black water clung to it like a swamp, firmly restricting every movement and forcibly severing all the nerve-like tendrils connecting it to the mother's bloodline.
"Come out!"
Li Dan's gaze sharpened, and he jerked his right hand upward.
"Riiip—"
With a sound like a soul being torn apart, a grotesque, twisted phantom reeking of rot and radiating green light was violently dragged from the pregnant woman's body by Li Dan.
The phantom was only the size of an infant, yet it had an old, venomous face. Its limbs were long and spidery, and it wildly flailed its claws in midair, trying to lunge at Li Dan's face in one final counterattack.
Li Dan's expression