"Mmph..."
Jiang Ze was held so tightly in the man's arms that he couldn't even feel the cave collapsing around them.
Panic stirred in him, and he hurriedly called out to the system.
"System, is that protective barrier of yours still up?!"
"Beep, beep, beep. The host is no longer in danger. The barrier has been deactivated~"
Jiang Ze: "..." How very thoughtful of you.
The cave collapsed so quickly that it triggered a chain reaction in the opposite rock wall. Holding Jiang Ze, Meng Zhiyuan rolled with the momentum, landing for the moment in a cavern exposed by the collapse on the other side.
Perhaps it was a blessing amid their misfortune. The terrain had left a hollow space behind this rock wall, and the collapse had finally exposed it.
Jiang Ze and Meng Zhiyuan had stumbled into it by accident, but at least their lives were no longer in immediate danger.
"Uncle Zhiyuan?! ...Meng Zhiyuan?"
Jiang Ze struggled out of the man's arms, only to find him completely motionless, as though he had stopped breathing.
"Uncle Zhiyuan... don't scare me..."
The man lay on the ground, his face deathly pale and his chest rising and falling unevenly. Blood had already soaked through the fabric over his chest.
Jiang Ze touched him with trembling hands and felt nothing but sticky blood.
"No, he can't keep bleeding..."
Though he was panicking, he knew he couldn't lose his head. Otherwise, the man really would die here, and he absolutely would not let that happen.
He quickly took first-aid supplies out of his storage space. With shaking hands, he removed the man's blood-soaked shirt, disinfected the wound, and wrapped it in bandages.
"He probably injured his ribs. We can't leave him like this. It'll probably get infected. System, does Spirit Spring Water