The massive tail actually wrenched itself free from Lin Yi's embrace! The tremendous friction scraped his palms raw, leaving them burning red, while several torn scales scattered at his feet.
But Lin Yi merely shook his hands, tossed the shattered scales to the ground, and did not pause for even a moment. He kicked off again and charged forward.
His voice came out rapid as he ran, rage suppressed but his mind still clear. "Brother Biao! End this quickly! Falcon is still in its stomach—he might still be saved!"
At the words "still be saved," the bloodshot veins in Biao's eyes deepened further.
Without another word, he raised his blade and lunged again. This slash was faster and fiercer, cutting diagonally toward the giant python's vital spot.
But the python was incredibly fast. Its head jerked aside, and the blade slid across its scales, leaving only a pale mark.
"Fuck! What the hell are you dodging for?!" Biao cursed wildly, panic making him lose his composure.
Lin Yi was attacking fiercely as well.
He closed in and drove a fist wrapped in vital energy toward the python's flank, but the snake's body twisted with an unimaginable flexibility. His punch struck empty air, and the force of his fist sent several chunks of gravel flying.
No. This thing was too slippery. It was powerful, heavily armored, and not slow either. Ordinary attacks could not pin it down at all.
"Brother Biao! We have to restrain it!"
Though Biao was furious, the instincts honed through years of hunting remained. At Lin Yi's words, lightning flashed through his mind. He simply hurled his broadsword to the ground and pounced forward barehanded! He was going to seize the beast's head!
A near-mocking cold gleam flashed through the giant python's vertical pupils. Its enormous body swayed, and it nimbly slipped past Biao's charge.
But Lin Yi had already calculated it.
After his previous punch missed, he had not withdrawn his momentum. Instead, he used the rush of force to circle around to the python's side. At the very instant Biao missed, he closed in from the other side as well!
The giant python dodged Biao, and its center of gravity happened to shift toward Lin Yi.
Lin Yi brought both arms together and locked them tightly around the giant python's tail once more!
This time, he held nothing back.
Fifty thousand jin of vital energy, enhanced to the fullest by the Savage Bull Diagram, gave him a full hundred thousand jin of strength. It surged into his arms as his ten fingers pierced straight through the scales and dug into the flesh of the snake's tail!
Dark python blood streamed from between his fingers. The searing pain made the giant python's scales stand upright all over its body, and its tail lashed madly, whipping shattered stones and dirt into the air.
But Lin Yi did not let go.
His feet sank deep into the earth. The snake tail dragged him across the ground, plowing out a long furrow, yet the hands buried in flesh did not budge in the slightest.
"Brother Biao! Now!"
Seizing that fleeting opening, Biao sprang forward, his heavy body crashing directly onto the giant python's head.
He straddled the back of its head, both hands pressing tightly against either side as he pinned that huge maw before him. The python's tongue hissed frantically, but it could not move an inch.
Biao leaned close to the tightly shut jaws, then suddenly reached for both sides of its mouth and tried to wrench them apart.
But with his strength alone, even the eighty-five-thousand-jin power of the Mountain-Sinking Realm could hardly contend against the giant python's jaw-closing force.
Lin Yi released the snake's tail and sprinted from its rear to its head, taking position opposite Biao. Their gazes met, and no unnecessary words were needed.
"Take the upper jaw."
"Leave the lower jaw to me."
Two pairs of hands simultaneously gripped the upper and lower edges of the giant python's mouth.
Lin Yi drove the Savage Bull Diagram to its absolute limit. Blood-gold patterns seemed ready to burst from beneath his skin, while the phantom of a Savage Bull behind him solidified until it was nearly real. A hundred thousand jin of explosive force poured forth in full force.
Biao let out a muffled roar as well, pouring all eighty-five thousand jin of Mountain-Sinking strength into his arms without reserve.
"Open the fuck up—!"
Two furious roars exploded at once!
The giant python twisted wildly, its blue-black body lashing across the ground like a whip set ablaze, but the two men's strength clamped its head in an iron grip.
Scales shattered. Flesh tore. From the joints of its jaws came the teeth-grinding sound of bones wrenching out of place—
Riiip—!
Gray-black python blood erupted, and the entire three-zhang giant python was forcibly torn in half from its mouth by the two of them!
The snake's body convulsed and thrashed on the ground, its thick tail slapping the rocky shore with deafening cracks, but it soon lost all strength completely.
And tumbling out together with the snake blood and entrails from its split belly was a humanoid figure covered from head to toe in slime and blood.
Falcon.
Lin Yi and Biao let go at the same time, tossing the halves of the snake carcass to the ground.
Both men panted heavily, splattered all over with dark python blood. They looked as though they had just been fished out of a pool of gore.
The tribesman who had partnered with Falcon was the first to rush over, trembling fingers reaching toward Falcon's nostrils.
"...He's still breathing!"
When he shouted it, his voice was already choked with tears.
But then his expression abruptly darkened again. Lin Yi stepped closer, and his heart tightened.
Falcon's entire body was limp. His limbs and torso hung at unnatural angles, and the displaced protrusions of bone could be clearly felt along his arms and thighs.
They were the marks left by the giant python's constricting force, crushing him mercilessly. There was scarcely a single intact bone left in his entire body.
Biao crouched beside him. His eyes, still blazing red, stared fixedly at Falcon's face, pale enough to be nearly blue-gray. His fists clenched until his knuckles turned white.
He turned and swept his gaze across the other tribesmen who had gradually arrived, his Adam's apple rolling several times before he forced out two words in a low voice.
"...Carry him back."
The surroundings were deathly quiet, leaving only harsh breathing and the mournful howl of wind sweeping over the rocky shore.
The hunting party members who had rushed over silently formed a circle around them. Someone removed his outer robe and gently covered Falcon's body.
From the moment Lin Yi and Biao arrived at the whistle, through the struggle and the tearing apart of the python, to Falcon being pulled from its belly, the entire process had seemed long—but in truth, only a little over two minutes had passed.
Lin Yi rose to his feet. He looked down at his palms covered in python blood, then at the snake corpse lying utterly still on the ground, then at Falcon, whom the tribesmen were carefully lifting level in their arms.
In silence, he walked to Falcon's side and gently placed his hand on Falcon's wrist.
The pulse was so weak it felt like a thread about to snap, one that might break completely at the slightest touch.
He withdrew his hand, his gaze sinking like a pool of stagnant water.
"...Back to the tribe."
Before you continue