Dead Leg, Run Fast!

Xiao Xi sensed her thoughts. Vines shot out abruptly, coiling tightly around the edges of the burrow to stop the Gray Rat from digging another escape tunnel.

The Gray Rat seemed to feel its end was near. Its blood-red eyes swept sharply over Ji Xinghe, then it let out a screech.

The remaining small Gray Rats heard the call and lunged at her all at once.

Though small in size, their mouths glowed blood-red as they spat at Ji Xinghe and Xiao Xi.

Ji Xinghe snorted coldly, sidestepping and leaping to dodge the bloody spittle.

She then activated the Small Light Ball Technique. The Gray Rat and its litter of young all went limp, lifeless.

[Killed: First-order Level 5 Gray Rat (Semi-Deformed), Small Gray Rats (Semi-Deformed) ×9. Rewards: Experience +12, Wow Coins +9, Raw Wood Treasure Chest +3.]

Ji Xinghe pulled up Xiao Xi's vine and saw a massive corroded hole in it. She frowned in displeasure.

"Xiao Xi! Don't do that again!"

Seeing Ji Xinghe angry, Xiao Xi quickly hooked a vine around her finger. "Master, Xi wanted to help you..."

Ji Xinghe sighed. "I know. It's my fault for being useless, making you hurt yourself to hold them back."

Xiao Xi hurriedly waved its vines. "No, I... I just sensed Master didn't want to let them go..."

"Then let me tell you now: nothing is more important than Xiao Xi's safety. Got it?"

"I know you can recover by eating meat, but you're not a machine. You feel pain too."

You're not a machine. You feel pain too...

Xiao Xi's mind echoed Ji Xinghe's words, touched.

No one had ever said that to it. As far back as it could remember, they had always drilled into it:

As long as you don't die, don't fear injury—you recover fast... You're the most talented in our Bloodthirsty Vine Clan... You'll go far someday, so what's a little pain?

So much of that, so much that it had grown used to pain.

Master... really seemed to have changed.

It remembered when it was first born, sensing that Master didn't want it. So it deliberately acted obedient, just to stay.

Even just now, it had purposely not dodged the flying bloody spittle, wanting Master to feel guilty.

It didn't want to be sent back to that terrifying place.

But now Master was truly different. It could feel that what Master just said came from the heart. She was slowly starting to like it. That felt good...

"Xiao Xi really likes Master."

Caught off guard by the sudden confession, Ji Xinghe's ears turned red.

She took fresh meat from her backpack and fed it to Xiao Xi until it was fully healed. Only then did she Drain the attributes from the ten monsters.

Total attribute points gained: Agility +0.8.

She fed the Gray Rats' corpses to Xiao Xi, wasting nothing.

Just as she stood up to leave, Ji Xinghe suddenly spotted a patch of white in the burrow.

Her heart stirred. She crouched down and scraped away the surrounding dirt.

When she saw the several White Ground Orchids in the soil, her face lit up.

"Jackpot, jackpot."

She counted. There were three White Ground Orchids, sixteen Purple Raven Grass, and five green herbs.

She stowed all three types of herbs into her backpack.

Then she quickly left this dangerous spot and headed toward the Red Route.

Along the way, she checked the green herb's details.

"Green Heart Grass (Herb Class): Non-toxic. One of the auxiliary ingredients for crafting Deformation Treatment Potions."

"Effect: Eating Green Heart Grass raw restores 10% Deformation value."

"Note: One of the rare herbs of the Nine Yuan Continent. Due to its special growing environment, its numbers are relatively scarce."

On the road, Ji Xinghe ate five stalks of Purple Raven Grass, bringing her Deformation value back to single digits.

As for Xiao Xi, she checked its panel—no change at all.

Maybe the concentration here wasn't high enough, or maybe plant types couldn't be Deformed.

She didn't recall encountering any Deformed plants in her past life either.

She rubbed Xiao Xi's vine, then continued toward the Red Route.

After walking just a few minutes, Ji Xinghe's ear twitched.

From the earth behind her came a pounding thump-thump-thump. The ground beneath her feet began to tremble, like the thunder of thousands of troops charging into battle.

A bad feeling hit her. She turned around—and her pupils instantly dilated.

"Kao, they're chasing this fast!"

She bolted.

Behind her, a horde of Deformed Monsters shambled after her like walking corpses.

When she glanced back, they roared at her.

Ji Xinghe really wanted to complain: "Never again will I say no one's chasing me—look at this, a whole crowd coming for me!"

The Flying Broom still had thirty-six seconds left; she'd save it for emergencies.

At least the Deformed Monsters were still a bit of a distance away.

The sounds behind her grew closer, and Ji Xinghe pumped her arms wildly: "Damn legs, run faster!"

Good thing she'd worn Swift Boots today, or she might've really been done for here.

On the way, Ji Xinghe's sharp eyes spotted another White Ground Orchid. She had no time to stop, so she ordered Xiao Xi to yank it out with vines—whether it came out intact or not was another matter.

Better than nothing.

Xiao Xi was small but quite careful, managing to pull out a complete White Ground Orchid even in such a tense situation.

Stashing the herb in her backpack, Ji Xinghe steadied her breath and sped up again.

"Roar roar roar!"

Crack...

Nearby deadwood was smashed by the Deformed Monsters, and new ones crawled out of the gray mist.

Instead of attacking the monster that broke the trees, they joined the chase after her.