Ning Rongrong: Why is this so full of twists and turns?

Ning Rongrong was slow to recover her senses, until the man with the gloomy face and a scythe in his hand rushed before her. He swung the scythe, which stood taller than she was, high above his head. The blade reflected a purple, fiery light, paused for a heartbeat, and then descended with a heavy, whistling force that cut through the air with chilling clarity.

Many images flashed through Ning Rongrong's mind: from the day her innate soul power was awakened at level nine, to her cultivation progressing faster than others, to her father recently considering sending her to the Royal Academy, and finally to the moment she realized her body was no longer under her control, leading to her separation from Sword and her imprisonment in this cave.

It felt as if she had accomplished nothing in her life. She closed her eyes and shut off her senses, intending to quietly accept her death...

One second, two seconds...

Am I still alive? Ning Rongrong cracked one eye open and peeked outside.

She saw that everything around her had come to a standstill. The blade not far from her, the struggling girl in the distance, the burning flames—everything was frozen!

"No rush, let's save the game first."

The moment Lu Ma saw the opponent raise his scythe, he immediately pressed ESC, located the save function, and created a save file.

Then, he rapidly reviewed the combat controls, terrified of failing the tutorial level and having to start all over again.

In a game called NieR, he had actually died in the tutorial level.

"Alright, done. Watch me perform a perfect dodge."

What is he saying now? Ning Rongrong was baffled, but she vaguely guessed that the time stop was also the work of this big shot who was controlling her.

The opponent's strength... was likely on par with Sword.

Before she could think any further, her body began to move, and the world resumed its flow.

She crouched, tilted her head back, and her Seven Treasures Glazed Pagoda radiated brilliance as she softly uttered the familiar words:

"Seven Treasures turn, glazed light. Seven Treasures has a name, the first is Power, the second is Speed."

The scythe grazed the tip of her nose and slammed heavily into a nearby cargo crate.

The man in front of her was stunned. Because his martial soul possessed a trait that prevented him from killing, he had used his full strength just now and now needed to exert his full strength to pull the scythe back out. But in that window of time, Ning Rongrong had already moved; she struck his hand with her iron rod. The man couldn't dodge in time and, after three heavy blows, was forced to let go.

Taking advantage of the man's loss of balance, she smashed the iron rod hard against his head, knocking him unconscious.

The man collapsed heavily to the ground, and Ning Rongrong stepped over him, looking at the remaining eleven soul masters.

The Soul Elder was still presiding over the ritual and could not yet pull himself away.

The atmosphere was somewhat stiff; the opponents clearly had not expected a little noble princess to be capable of such a feat.

Ning Rongrong herself had not expected that she could pull off a counter-kill under the augmentation of her support-type martial soul.

"Attack! For the Holy Spirit!"

Someone shouted this, and the eleven soul masters continued to charge at Ning Rongrong.

A stone was fired from a slingshot, but she dodged it with a slight tilt of her head. A venomous snake flew toward her, but she swatted it away with a single strike of her iron rod, then turned to block an axe attack. Following that, she leaped, stepped onto the attacker's back, and took down another person.

Such scenes repeated themselves with the others. Every attack brushed past her body, yet every single one was perfectly avoided.

As the number of opponents gradually dwindled, her pressure lessened, and the speed at which she took people down increased. Finally, she knocked all twelve of them out.

Although the twelve soul masters all radiated varying degrees of black mist, this did not mean their martial souls were all evil.

In fact, their martial souls were common things like scythes and axes; only a very small number were visibly sinister, and for those, Ning Rongrong hadn't given them any chance to use their soul skills.

"One left."

Ning Rongrong finished her work and looked up at Donald.

Although Donald was looking this way with an expression of astonishment, his mouth continued to chant prayers she couldn't quite understand.

Something about the Holy Spirit being wise, the Holy Spirit being great, and the path taken by the Holy Spirit being the Great Dao.

There were two reasons why Donald wasn't panicking.

First, he felt that the person before him, even if her martial prowess was a bit different from what he had imagined, definitely did not possess the spiritual power to interrupt the Saintess Ritual. In other words, if she wanted to stop the ritual, she had to defeat him.

Second, although he was a "Ninth Elder" of the Holy Spirit Sect, he actually didn't want the Saintess to be born. Because if the Saintess were born, it would mean his status within the Holy Spirit Sect would drop another level.

The prayer could not stop. If it stopped, all the preparations the Holy Spirit Sect had made for the Saintess Ritual would be for nothing. If he stopped voluntarily, he would be seen as the culprit and would have his tendons pulled and bones removed to feed the soul beasts.

Just as he accelerated his chanting, Ning Rongrong had already walked up to him with the iron rod and swung it heavily toward his head!

"Ding!"

A needle condensed beside Donald and deflected the iron rod.

"I can even parry a scythe, and you parried me with a needle?"

Watching his character stumble back a few steps due to the iron rod, Lu Ma slammed his mouse onto the desk in disbelief.

Ning Rongrong heard the angry shout and shrank back.

Why are there so many twists and turns? I was just celebrating the fact that I survived.

And what was that clashing sound?

Then, she heard a realization.

"So it's the opening CG for a mini-boss fight."

Lu Ma looked at the darkening screen, which displayed the text [Leader, Donald, Level 31 Soul Elder], and nodded in relief.

The previous soul masters also had levels marked above their heads, but he hadn't looked closely because the text was small, and the screen was full of execution QTEs he was busy pressing.

"Then come."

The animation ended, and Ning Rongrong gripped her iron rod once more, continuing her charge toward Donald.

"Clang!"

The iron rod struck again.

Donald smiled, mocking the lack of brains in the person before him; knowing full well she would be deflected, she still insisted on this futile effort.

The next second, his smile froze. Before the iron rod had even descended, needles had already flown out to attack, only to miss. At that very moment, the iron rod swung in from a different angle, slamming heavily into his face.

"Urgh."

Donald retreated half a step, wiping the nosebleed away with the hem of his robe.

His Martial Soul was powder, capable of transforming into anything and manifesting as multiple objects, but it had a fatal flaw—

Only one of them possessed actual physical force.

For instance, if he created two axes to chop down a tree, only one could inflict damage, while the other was merely an illusion.

Donald could not fathom how the girl before him had figured that out so quickly.

Then, he realized his incantation had ceased some time ago.

Glancing toward the girl, he saw the purple flames gradually fading, the Dark Blue Silver Grass retracting, and the girl's expression easing.

The Saintess Ritual had failed.

The Saintess Ritual had failed...

Failed...

His eyes turned bloodshot, his expression twisting into a savage snarl.

"You ignorant brat, I will tear you into ten thousand pieces! First Soul Skill, Smoke!"

Donald roared, and powder continuously manifested in his hands, filling the entire interior of the cave.