Su Yue lunged forward.
Her knees and palms scraped across the rough ground as she crawled over to Su Nian.
She slammed her smooth forehead against the ground... blood spilled out instantly.
"Please... Su Nian, please save my husband. I'll pay any price, do anything."
"Please!"
She struck her forehead against the ground again, harder and more urgently.
"Get up. Let me take a look first," Su Nian said calmly.
Hao Ren rubbed his chin, watching in confusion. Instead of begging him, she had gone to Su Nian. How strange.
Zhang Ping had not yet had the chance to tell him about Su Nian removing a killing rule earlier, so Hao Ren naturally knew nothing about it.
In Hao Ren's eyes, Su Nian was merely a student who had just started school and had not even received his textbooks yet.
On the stretcher, pain filled the one-armed young man's face. He endured it, afraid of worrying his wife.
He also knew he was doomed. A useless ordinary man had nothing to offer in exchange for saving a life.
His eyes filled with anguish at the wound on his wife's forehead, and he raised his hand shakily.
The greatest success of his life had been marrying such a wonderful wife without paying a single cent in bride price. His only regret was that he had lacked the ability to take good care of her.
Damn it! I'd already worked so hard! A tear slid from the corner of his eye.
"Don't be scared, honey... It'll be all right." Su Yue pressed Fang Cheng's hand against her cheek.
"Yueyue, could you promise me something?"
Fang Cheng's voice was faint, every word a struggle, his eyes brimming with tenderness.
Su Yue shook her head repeatedly. "Don't talk..." Then she looked at Su Nian with hope.
Through Su Nian's Blood Eye, Fang Cheng was practically a "blackened man." His bones, meridians, muscles... his entire body was black.
What was I supposed to do here, cut him all over with the Sin-Cleaving Butcher's Knife? Even if that removed the killing rule, he'd bleed to death afterward.
These Survival Points weren't worth earning... unless it was 100 points.
Hao Ren shook his head.
"This is the Poison Wraith's killing rule. He's in the first stage now, which is only intense pain. The first stage ends after about three hours, and then his skin will start to rot. In the third stage, his internal organs will dissolve... poisonous mist will seep from his entire body, and he'll become a Poison Puppet."
"The Poison Wraith's killing rule is the easiest to avoid, but once you're afflicted, death is certain. There's no saving you unless a healing Sequence Transcendent is here right now, and they'd have to be a high-ranking one with an Evil-Repelling Purification Wraith Artifact. Otherwise, there's no solution."
Naturally, Hao Ren was explaining this for Su Nian's benefit. A Sequence Transcendent needed extensive knowledge of the supernatural to survive.
Su Nian also shook his head, indicating that he could not treat him.
He did not offer to try, either. Killing was one thing; torturing the living was another. The man had done nothing to him.
"Please..." Seeing this, Su Yue moved to kowtow again.
Su Nian raised a hand to stop her.
"Your husband's condition is different from the killing rule affecting that man at noon. I can't resolve it."
Surprise crossed Hao Ren's face. Su Nian had actually removed a killing rule? How had he done it? No wonder Su Yue had begged Su Nian instead of him.
Su Yue's face instantly turned ashen, and she slumped to the ground. Everything in her vision dimmed... the golden sunlight looked no different from the shadows enveloping her.
"It's all right, honey. It's just... it looks like I'm going to break my promise. Take good care of yourself, and live a good life."
Fang Cheng gave a feeble smile. In the end, even his words of comfort caught in his throat.
"A friendly reminder: nine hours from now, when your organs are rotting, the Poison Wraith's killing rule will truly take effect."
"Your wife will hallucinate that transferring the poison to herself will let you live, and she'll do it. Then the killing rule will transfer to her, and she'll die too."
With that, Hao Ren walked away. Every time, he ended up looking like the bad guy.
But keeping quiet would only bring trouble to the convoy. If Fang Cheng understood, he should go die on his own.
In this world, one had to be prepared to die at any moment.
If his turn came one day, he could only die too. There was no resisting fate.
Gong Qing leaned against the front of a vehicle some distance away. He had seen so many moving scenes that he had grown numb. Humans were creatures of complicated emotions, bound by too many feelings and desires.
Yet those were precisely what made someone human.
"Come find me if you need me. My knife is the sharpest in the convoy. I guarantee it'll be quick."
Su Nian looked utterly sincere. He knew saying this made him sound like a monster, but he genuinely wanted to help. It definitely was not for the 100 Survival Points.
With that, Su Nian turned to leave.
"Wait!" Su Yue choked on her sobs. Looking at her husband as he struggled to endure the pain, she made a difficult decision.
"Make it quick for him."
Su Nian was somewhat surprised. He had thought Fang Cheng would be the one to make that request, not this devoted woman.
Despite himself, a trace of admiration appeared on Su Nian's face.
"I know everything you want to say. I'll live a good life and take care of our child... I promise!" Resolve settled over Su Yue's face.
Fang Cheng smiled and nodded. His last lingering concern vanished.
"Stay strong!"
[Ding! Gained 100 Survival Points.]
Su Nian turned away, leaving anguished wails behind him.
With the help of a thin, dark-skinned man, Su Yue buried Fang Cheng in the roadside planting strip. There was no headstone.
Even that was better than being eaten by a supernatural creature.
"Thank you... Uncle Li. Without you, I wouldn't have known what to do."
"My condolences." Li Wu sighed. "Come find me if you need any help."
With that, Li Wu turned away to organize his supplies.
"Su Yue, your husband's dead, but you can always find another man. What do you think of me...? I don't mind the kid in your belly."
A thuggish man with tattoo sleeves raised his eyebrows at Su Yue.
Su Yue was reasonably attractive. A woman who had just lost her husband would feel emptiest inside, and she was pregnant too... bonus points.
"You bastard! What did you just say?!" Li Wu flew into a rage and snatched up the woodcutting machete from his three-wheeler.
Fang Cheng had saved his life. If he did not step in now, he would be worse than an animal.
"Oh, Li Wu, why so angry? You like her too...? Afraid I'll steal her from you, you dirty old man?" The tattooed man sneered and grabbed a length of rebar nearby.
Why would he fear an old man with one foot in the grave? If the old man dared attack, he could beat him to death in self-defense, and even the awakened would have nothing to say about it.
"Uncle Li! Forget it." Su Yue clenched her fists tightly. There was nothing she could do now, and the injustice only hurt all the more.
But she had to stay strong.
"Su Yue, think it over. You're pregnant, and you used the supplies in your truck to save Fang Cheng. You don't have much left, do you? Are you going to go in there scavenging with that big belly?"
"If you don't want your child to live..."
The tattooed man licked his dry lips, looking utterly certain of victory. That mix of strength and brokenness... made her even more tempting.
An hour passed quickly, and the convoy set off again.
A cloud of grief hung over the entire convoy. It would take time to dispel.
Su Yue climbed into the driver's seat of her pickup and started the engine, tears streaming uncontrollably down her face.
Su Nian drove the Raptor behind the third vehicle in the convoy, thinking about how to spend his Survival Points.
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