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Su Cheng patted her shoulder gently. "Once I lure it away, go tell the proprietress and the others right away. You know where they are, right?"
"Yes."
"Be careful, and be as quick as you can."
After giving her instructions, Su Cheng immediately got moving.
She first moved away from the tree where Hao Ruoxue was hiding, then crept closer to the monster and threw a dart.
The Long-Tailed Gecko was large enough that the dart shot straight through the rain and into its back, injecting the liquid beneath its skin.
"Ah!"
The Long-Tailed Gecko let out wild cries, thrashing its long tail as its cochleae expanded, keenly picking up sounds beyond the rain.
The liquid in a single dart was not enough to send the Long-Tailed Gecko into full hallucinations, but it did cause it to bite its own tail in confusion.
Su Cheng backed up a few steps and drew her bow.
Whoosh-
The arrow pierced the largest cochlea on the Long-Tailed Gecko's face with perfect accuracy!
"Ah!"
The Long-Tailed Gecko screamed in pain, enraged by the agony.
It determined Su Cheng's position from the arrow's direction and scurried out of the ticket booth at top speed, disregarding its aversion to rain.
Remembering its nearly two-meter-long tongue, Su Cheng turned and ran.
Once the Long-Tailed Gecko left the ticket office, Hao Ruoxue hurried toward the proprietress. Without stopping to explain, she pulled them along and rushed into the ticket office.
The proprietress also knew how urgent the situation was and searched through the drawer for keys with practiced familiarity.
Their family had rented a little boat here before, and they now had no trouble finding a key that could start a boat among the jumble of keys in the drawer...
Su Cheng lured the Long-Tailed Gecko toward the path on the other side, where she had taken a wrong turn earlier.
"Where are you... mumble... I found you... mumble, mumble... wait for me..."
The Long-Tailed Gecko pursued her relentlessly, its human sleep talk somewhat muffled by the rain.
As the distance steadily narrowed, the Long-Tailed Gecko excitedly opened its mouth and extended its tentacle.
Mu Ling floated out of the bracelet, approached the gecko, and dropped a clear glass bottle.
Clatter!
The glass bottle shattered behind the Long-Tailed Gecko.
The tentacle in its mouth instinctively changed course. Its mind already muddled by □□, it turned without thinking and lashed toward the source of the sound.
At that moment, Su Cheng doubled back to attack.
She lunged onto the gecko's back and viciously drove the two daggers in her hands into the cochleae on its head and the root of its tentacle, thrusting them all the way through!
"Argh!"
The Long-Tailed Gecko thrashed and rolled in pain, trying to throw Su Cheng off its back as she held it down.
The sound vibrations from its cochleae traveled through the daggers into her palms, while the fluid secreted by the monster's skin ate through her raincoat and burned her skin.
The sharp, searing pain did not make Su Cheng let go. Clamping her legs tightly around the struggling monster beneath her, she sliced off its writhing tentacle with all her strength, then stabbed the other cochleae on its head.
The irreversible damage to its head gradually weakened its struggles.
Su Cheng stabbed it twice more and only got up once she saw that it was truly dead.
Most of her raincoat and the clothes beneath it had been corroded away wherever they had touched the Long-Tailed Gecko's body or blood.
The blisters burned into her skin stung even more when rain touched them.
Su Cheng drank a bottle of nutrient solution as she ran back.
As her recovery accelerated, a cool sensation spread over her corroded skin.
After running for a while, Su Cheng quickly noticed something wrong. She glanced to the side, where dozens of eerie green eyes lurked in the darkness.
They were not companions summoned by the Long-Tailed Gecko.
They were five or six Climbing Vine Lizards.
Despite the cover of the rain, the fight had still disturbed them as they lurked nearby, and their aversion to rain was not particularly strong.
Su Cheng steadied herself and sprinted toward the ticket booth.
Once the Climbing Vine Lizards behind her locked onto her direction, they came charging after her!
The Climbing Vine Lizards were just as fast as the Long-Tailed Gecko, steadily closing the gap.
Su Cheng did not look back, only kept running forward.
The Climbing Vine Lizards could see, so the diversionary tactic she had used against the Long-Tailed Gecko would not be much use now.
Fortunately, she was already very close to the ticket office.
She could only hope Hao Ruoxue and the others had followed her instructions and gotten the boat ready to leave at a moment's notice.
The sounds behind her drew closer and closer, as though the monsters only needed to lunge once to kill her in their jaws...
"Sister Su Cheng! Hurry!"
Hao Ruoxue waved anxiously from the boat, swinging a flashlight in her hand as though afraid Su Cheng would not find them.
Su Cheng took a long stride and leaped straight over the ticket office railing into Hao Ruoxue's boat.
The moment she touched the bottom, the boat rocked and started up, shooting away with a whoosh-.
Splash...
Splash...
The pursuing Climbing Vine Lizards jumped into the water too.
Su Cheng watched the surface closely as she steadied her breathing. After bubbles rose to the surface, the Climbing Vine Lizards that had fallen into the water went still...
The two remaining Climbing Vine Lizards on the lakeshore hissed unwillingly, but their wariness of the lake water kept them from advancing.
"Hah, hah, hah... that scared me to death..."
Hao Ruoxue patted her chest, calming her nerves.
"We're finally safe..."
Everyone let out a collective sigh of relief.
Only then did Su Cheng sit down in the back seat with peace of mind to catch her breath.
The proprietor was steering. This sort of pleasure boat was even harder to control in the rain, so he could only concentrate with all his might and follow the route he remembered.
The proprietress sat beside him, holding a flashlight in both hands to illuminate the lake ahead.
Their daughter sat beside Hao Ruoxue.
Rain splattered against the canopy overhead, and there was only one slowly moving point of light on the vast lake.
The rising water had made the current considerably stronger, and the little boat inevitably rocked from side to side as it traveled.
Su Cheng put on another raincoat to keep the rain off her newly healed skin.
After offering the little girl beside her a few reassuring words, Hao Ruoxue moved over to Su Cheng.
"Sister Su Cheng, we really owe you this time. I practically got carried to victory... once we're out of the instance, can I add you on WeChat?"
Su Cheng thought for a moment and did not refuse. "Of course. I'm in Zone E..."
In Su Cheng's eyes, Hao Ruoxue's words and behavior carried the innocence of someone with little experience of the world, but that also made her sincere.
She did not mind making friends with a girl like that.
After roughly ten minutes or so, the pleasure boat gradually approached the island in the middle of the lake.
"We're here, we're here..."
The proprietress called out, her voice somewhat dry. This was the first time she had allowed herself to raise her voice since the fog descended.
Once the boat pulled up beside the island, they jumped ashore one after another.
Worried that the water would carry the boat away, the proprietor bent over and strained to hold on to it after disembarking.
Su Cheng took out a rope, tied it to the boat, and secured the other end to a nearby tree.
The proprietor looked around with his flashlight, somewhat puzzled. "This isn't where you land on the island... I must have steered us to the other side."
As one of the recreational spots where locals went for outings and visitors came to check in, the lake island had a designated landing area for boats.
But on this rainy night, the proprietor had clearly lost track of the correct route.
"It's fine, as long as we can get onto the island."
Su Cheng tightened the rope. "There's somewhere to shelter from the rain on this island, right? Let's find somewhere to rest first and leave everything else until daylight tomorrow."
The proprietress nodded repeatedly, pointing her flashlight to the left. "Of course. I remember where it is... it should be that way..."
The proprietor's family once again walked ahead to lead the way.
After the little island was developed into a recreation area, level paths had been built, with unlit streetlamps and trees arranged at even intervals.
They seemed to be the island's only "uninvited guests." There was nothing but the sound of rain.
In the lightning and thunder, the wooden sign reading "Welcome to Green Leaf City's Lake Island" looked like a standing figure.
Not far behind the sign were oddly shaped ornamental rocks and pots of flowers that had yet to wilt.
"Mom, I remember this sign! We took pictures here before!"
"Yes, yes, I remember too. There's a little pavilion to the right!"
They quickened their pace. Soon after turning right, they spotted the resting pavilion and immediately hurried inside the long structure.
"Phew... we can finally relax for a bit..."
Hao Ruoxue put her flashlight on a seat and took off her soaking-wet raincoat.
Su Cheng took out clean towels and handed them to everyone in turn.
Although they had been protected by raincoats, running through the downpour had still left their clothes and hair somewhat wet.
Everyone dried their wet patches and exchanged a few words, relaxing mentally after the tension.
Su Cheng had already gotten half-soaked while fighting the Long-Tailed Gecko and only now had time to dry herself and change into dry clothes.
She took out water and self-heating hot pots and set them on the stone table. "Help yourselves to these..."
After getting damp, some hot food would clearly be better.
"Thank you!"
The others spoke in unison.
"It's nothing."
Su Cheng shook her head and continued, "We'll sleep in the pavilion tonight, but to be safe, we should still take turns keeping watch..."
After getting everything in order, they sat around the stone table. Steam billowed from the little holes in the self-heating hot pot lids, bringing a spicy aroma to their noses.
Su Cheng assigned each watch in turn.
The proprietress's daughter was too young to take a watch.
It was now 23:35, and each person would take a two-hour turn.
Su Cheng took the first watch. After finishing her self-heating hot pot, she took out bedsheets and screened off the pavilion's other three sides, leaving the entrance open.
The bedsheets could block at least some of the windblown rain.
The proprietor's family quietly shared stories with Hao Ruoxue about their lives before the fog descended.
Even here on the lake island, where the monsters dared not approach, the proprietor's family still did not dare speak loudly at will.
The shadow cast by the monsters would not fade. Only once they felt safe enough would they feel at ease speaking freely again.
Su Cheng sat on the bench beside the pavilion's entrance and turned to look out at the rain, which was still pouring down.