Chapter 204: A Desperate Gamble (Part 2)
Centered around Jiang Yan, the rural path under the night has transformed into a sea of storms, with everyone feeling like fragile boats tossed about by the raging winds and waves.
She… she didn’t take the medicine… is she really a viscount?
That intense, boiling blood aura, far surpassing her own—possibly even exceeding that of Nawa—made Deng Baoyi turn pale with fear, causing her to involuntarily take two steps back.
Even though she understood that the opponent was in a desperate frenzy, the moment she encountered someone truly willing to fight for their life, her innate cowardice emerged.
A recluse elder from the Hermit’s Alliance, who climbed to a higher baron rank relying solely on talent, beauty, and opportunistic personality, likely possessed far less real combat ability than her prowess in bed.
Moreover, the unfamiliar black-haired girl in front of her was practically a genuine intermediate viscount from Aletai. If Deng Baoyi did not possess the determination to trade her own life, then in this dark night, the opponent was almost an invincible existence.
“Hehe, what are you afraid of? Almost boiling blood, how long can she hold out? This time the luck is good, maybe I’ve really come across a top-notch one!”
Immersed in the waves of tsunami-like auras crashing against him, Nawa actually laughed, trembling all over from excitement.
Muttering in Siamese, Nawa tore off his outer garment, revealing a bare upper body covered in blood-colored “fur,” like a red, muscular gorilla.
The chaos shattered as the intermediate viscount aura erupted from Nawa, once again shocking the few knights present who could barely shout.
Even among those who had followed Nawa for many years, they could not withstand the high-intensity pressure of two viscount-level boiling blood auras, retreating in panic.
They finally understood that in this life-or-death high-stakes situation, they might not even be qualified to watch the battle.
As for the black-blood clan servant who remained kneeling, he could no longer bear the high-intensity pheromone stimulation and finally had his mind shatter. Grabbing a stone from the ground, he began to smash his own head, causing blood to flow, as if the greatest enemy lay within.
In Jiang Yan’s eyes, the world had turned to black and white, with only two vivid red silhouettes standing meters away, radiating a steamy fragrance like delicious roasted meat, captivating her attention.
Kill you… eat you… I’m so hungry…
With a mad look on her face, Jiang Yan took a few steps forward, dropping her dagger and pistol, then launching herself with an unprecedented explosive speed towards the nearest and most enticing woman.
“Don’t come over!”
Deng Baoyi felt a fear that penetrated to her bones; the rapidly approaching girl bore a wild cruelty akin to a primordial beast. Just a few more glances from the other might leave her flesh torn apart.
Deng Baoyi fled; she even forgot to activate her boiling blood, panicked and chaotically turning away, running into the nearby thicket.
“Don’t run, hold her back!”
Seeing Deng Baoyi actually fleeing without a fight, Nawa turned pale, lifting his gun to fire continuously at Jiang Yan, while the three knights who had long retreated lost their courage to aid in the battle.
Unfortunately, Nawa’s aim was horrifically poor, and the bullets he fired had almost no effect on the high-speed moving Jiang Yan.
After just a few brief seconds, the terrifying aura that Deng Baoyi felt was already less than a meter behind her.
A heart-wrenching pain pierced through her right shoulder blade, as something akin to a burning needle drove into her body, causing Deng Baoyi to scream.
Jiang Yan’s deformed right hand plunged into Deng Baoyi’s shoulder blade, penetrating deep into her torso.
Suddenly, Jiang Yan felt a rapid movie reel playing on her retina, with countless strange grid patterns sliding by, then abruptly freezing. It was as if a key had activated the shackles deep within her genes, unfolding a scene that was both strange and familiar…
Deng Baoyi sensed a wave of familiar pheromones ripple behind her, and her face turned pale as she began to struggle frantically.
A dull and eerie explosion echoed in the night, as Deng Baoyi’s shoulder blade exploded from within.
The unseen shock energy instantly tore her body apart, sending a torrent of flesh mixed with fragments of her spine spewing from her right chest, shattering half of her torso and her entire right arm!
Blood explosion, the signature ability of the Siberian baron, triggering the self-detonation of the opponent’s flesh with one’s own blood as the catalyst.
Deng Baoyi’s mangled body was propelled forward a few meters, collapsing to the ground.
Before the pain from her torso could radiate through her nerves, Deng Baoyi felt another piercing sensation at her lower back. That scalding steel needle cut through her body once more, delving into her abdomen.
“Ah!”
A heart-wrenching scream echoed through the night again. Deng Baoyi was in extreme agony, yet her whole body could no longer muster any strength to struggle, her bloodied mouth barely opening and closing.
In the night, Jiang Yan pressed her weight on Deng Baoyi’s back, her right hand probing into the opponent’s abdomen, stirring the insides.
Nawa’s shooting finally found its mark at this moment, two pulses of charred blood mist erupting from Jiang Yan’s back.
Jiang Yan’s upper body merely swayed slightly, remaining indifferent.
In Jiang Yan’s disordered vision, moving film reels appeared again, fixed after a few seconds, revealing another strange pattern while a wild roar from the depths of her genes echoed in her mind…
In Jiang Yan’s hand, a long sword formed of blood was slowly drawn from Deng Baoyi’s lower back, pulling out a bloody intestine as well.
Blood blade, the signature ability of the Rhine Count, using one’s own blood as a catalyst to craft any human blood into a special condensed state, like a sword blade, as strong as steel.
Deng Baoyi was dead. In less than ten seconds, her body was shredded by two completely different advanced lineage abilities, never even activating the blood explosion before dying.
As Jiang Yan pulled the blood sword from Deng Baoyi’s body, she slowly turned her head, staring intently at the distance where Nawa stood, a cruel smile playing on her lips.
Nawa’s expression was grave, his eyes filled with confusion and panic, slowly retreating.
As a member of the black-blood clan, even as a high-ranking viscount, in essence, he was merely bluster, choosing to retreat.
Jiang Yan stood up from Deng Baoyi’s corpse, holding the blood blade still wrapped with an intestine, swaying as she took uneven steps toward Nawa.
Nawa no longer hesitated. With a swift motion, he leaped toward the nearest incapacitated black-blood clan servant, while a strange syringe appeared in his hand.
At the same time, Jiang Yan charged again, expressionless, like a soulless puppet, her fiery red eyes embedded in a frigid facade, radiating a numbed killing intent.
The speed was too fast; before Nawa could complete the injection, he was crashed into by Jiang Yan, like a bullet, a flash of blood light illuminating the scene.
Nawa’s robust body was thrown backward, crashing into the trees, one of his arms severed from his body, the detached hand still gripping that strange syringe.
Jiang Yan, with the blood blade braced against the ground, half-kneeled, gasping heavily, trembling all over. Her face, neck, and arms, all exposed skin, wriggled with grotesque blood worms.
At the moment of their contact, Nawa had unleashed the blood worms, managing to restrain Jiang Yan’s assault.
“Ugh… Ah!”
Amidst the agonizing cries, Jiang Yan’s boiling blood intensity surged once more, her blood temperature rising continuously, the fluctuations of her aura becoming more erratic, showing signs of losing control over her boiling blood.
Jiang Yan’s skin began to ooze blood, the blood worms, as if scalded by high heat, re-emerged from her skin, frantically fleeing. The black-haired girl, drenched in blood, resembled a demon crawling out from the depths of hell.
“Monster, how much longer can you hold on…”
Dozens of meters away, Nawa covered his severed arm, his face contorting as his cold demeanor intensified. In his perception, Jiang Yan was like a dying fire, that wild boiling blood, taken to the extreme, seemed ready to collapse at any moment.
Nawa planned to continue launching harassment attacks, completely dragging the opponent into despair when suddenly an unexpected aura sensation arose in his mind.
Turning to look in the direction of the night for a few seconds, Nawa’s heart trembled and he immediately turned, fleeing deep into the woods without looking back.
Not only Nawa, but even the previous three knights, having fled without a trace when Deng Baoyi was blood-exploded. In that overwhelming bloodthirsty storm, fear had replaced all other feelings.
As for the other three servants, two had fainted under Jiang Yan’s pheromone stimulation, while the last one, in madness, had smashed his own head with a stone.
Jiang Yan stood up again, coughing up blood, staggering towards Meng Huai’s direction, her aura growing more frantically agitated, like a night-blooming cereus striving to showcase its final beauty.
Meng Huai’s suppressed body finally regained some feeling, using all his strength to hold Jiang Yan, who was collapsing.
“Kill me…”
A glimmer of clarity suddenly emerged in Jiang Yan’s dazed eyes, and she lightly moved her lips towards Meng Huai before passing out. Half a second later, the blood blade shattered, transforming back into thick, viscous blood that poured down from the girl’s hands.
Suddenly, the vigorous aura surrounding the girl retracted violently, like the collapse of a supermassive star, turning into a black hole-like inwardness and oppressive terror.
The nearby change in aura hit Meng Huai like a heavy blow, causing him to spit out a mouthful of blood, his legs giving way as he directly knelt down.
If it weren’t for tightly holding Jiang Yan in his arms, he might have already dropped her body from that sudden impact.
…
At this moment, just over three hundred meters away in the forest, the Guard Army was crouched behind a large tree, holding a sniper rifle, the night-vision scope trained on Meng Huai’s body.
As the scope shifted to the girl in Meng Huai’s arms, the Guard Army slowly released the trigger of the sniper rifle.
“Sigh… why is this happening…”
The instructor of the Blood Dragon Battalion, who had been watching a bloodbath unfold, sat up behind the tree, still looking puzzled. No matter how he viewed it, Meng Huai and the mysterious girl were fighting against the most evil black-blood clan in this world, especially when Nawa appeared.
In nearly a month of reconnaissance tasks in northern Myanmar, the Guard Army had seen too many chaotic situations outside the borders, the threat of the black-blood clan to Huaguo and the world was evident, and he deeply felt how difficult it was to protect Huaguo from the shadows.
Every few years, there would be one or two dark arrow operators fleeing due to blood invasion. Were all of them beyond saving? Regardless of Meng Huai’s current state, the Guard Army could not understand why someone categorized Meng Huai as the “greatest threat.”
In fact, the Guard Army’s biggest doubt was why Meng Huai could utilize the dark arrow air support. This was not an ordinary privilege and could not be described as merely “being in the Cao camp while the heart is still in Han.”
All of these actions seemed quite abnormal—Meng Huai had a significant chance of being one of their own, rather than a traitor.
“No, the Chief must have made a mistake…”
The Guard Army pulled out a special small tablet computer, connected to the satellite network, and opened an overseas website that only had a messaging board feature.
After hesitating for several minutes, the Guard Army typed a message: Mission failed, I have been exposed.
Putting away his weapon, the Guard Army took one last look at a direction a few hundred meters away before turning to leave.
…
…
In the forest, Nawa was running wildly towards the south, even willing to break through the boiling blood threshold, seeking to increase his escape speed.
Behind him, a faint aura was following him persistently, like a ghost, inseparable and impossible to shake off.
It wasn’t the aura of a hellish girl in a frenzied killing state, but it made Nawa even more terrified, as if a natural enemy was focusing on him, chilling him to the bone.
“Who are you?!”
In front of him were three bodies piled together; Nawa’s pupils dilated, stopping in his tracks, panic-stricken as he spun around, hollering into the dense woods.
Except for the chirping of insects and occasional flapping of startled birds, there was no other sound in the forest.
The three corpses were none other than the knights he and Deng Baoyi had brought tonight, who had long since fled but now lay dead, blocking his path.
A middle-aged man clad in black slowly stepped forward, surprisingly wearing a children’s mask.
Nawa felt the other’s aura seemed familiar but couldn’t recall at that moment, only the clear killing intent giving him a sense of despair akin to a sheep entering a tiger’s lair.
This despair arose from the unleashed boiling blood of the other, a black-blood clan count, specifically the Iberian count, the most troublesome enemy for the Ganges blood clan.
“We’ve met before… you’re also of the black blood clan; who exactly are you?”
Nawa realized he couldn’t escape, so he willingly tossed his gun aside, withdrew his boiling blood, and pressed his hand on his severed arm, preparing to face his demise head-on.
At this moment, Nawa’s mind flashed through every baron and above black-blood clan member he had encountered in his life, but still had no clues.
So many were old intermediate viscounts, without even the courage to brawl with a little girl; what right do you have to ask me? Who gave you the Frankenstein serum in your hand?
The middle-aged man in black smiled and slowly approached, raising his boiling blood aura as he came within five meters of Nawa, pulling off the mask.
“You are… Qian…”
Before he could finish, Nawa instantly activated his boiling blood, releasing all the blood worms, and turned to flee!
A ripping pain surged from his back, and Nawa stumbled, collapsing to the ground, feeling as if he had plunged into an ice cave, his consciousness gradually growing hazy…
…
On the rural path, Meng Huai held the bloodied Jiang Yan, making his way eastward with great difficulty.
The girl in his arms was growing weaker, that once-heavy and bizarre, black-hole-like aura gradually evaporating with the passage of time.
“Jiang Yan, hold on…”
Meng Huai halted, crouching down, clasping Jiang Yan’s body tightly, his voice sounding almost like a whimper.
“Meng Huai, are you okay…”
Jiang Yan’s eyelashes flickered slightly, her eyelids parting to reveal a slit, a blood-stained smile appearing at the corner of her mouth.
Zheng Shaolin and the others are coming soon! We are safe.
Meng Huai freed one hand, gently wiping a smudge of blood from Jiang Yan’s face, but hurriedly searched his waist; unfortunately, there was no water bottle.
I’m a bit tired, I want to sleep… can you tell me a story…
Jiang Yan closed her eyes again, lightly shifting her body in Meng Huai’s arms, as if searching for a comfortable position to sleep. As for the intense bone pain radiating from her lower abdomen throughout her body, she had grown numb to it.
Meng Huai pressed his face to Jiang Yan’s forehead, feeling the high fever released from her chaotic blood thirst burning against his skin.
You know my mom, right? Her name is Meng Xiang, she’s Japanese. When I was three years old…
Meng Huai simply sat down with Jiang Yan in his arms, wearing a peculiar smile, and began recounting stories from his childhood.
Jiang Yan’s eyes were half-open, listening quietly, her heart rate slowing to just a few beats per second, leaving behind only the familiar scent of blood and the final trace of weak breath.
The desperate struggle ignited by blood desires far surpassed the typical boiling blood taboo of common black-blood clan women, as if completing a final life gamble with death, guiding Jiang Yan away.
“Don’t, don’t die…”
Meng Huai stared in shock, vigorously shaking Jiang Yan in his arms, displaying a terror that erased his previously cold and rigid demeanor.
Unfortunately, the girl in his arms did not respond at all, as if she were asleep, and even her temperature had dropped below normal. More than ten seconds without a heartbeat, her breathing had stopped, and her body grew gradually cold, her aura extinguished.
Jiang Yan, succumbing to the abnormal blood thirst chaos triggered by the boiling blood taboo, had reached her end.
“Li Huai, Xiao Yan!”
In the distance, an off-road vehicle with its high beams on approached erratically, while a sturdy figure jumped out of the car, rushing toward Meng Huai.
Meng Huai raised his gun, coldly meeting the blinding car lights, his crimson eyes filled with a despairing, ghastly shade.
“It’s me…”
Zheng Shaolin stopped several meters away, raising his hands while staring at the black-haired girl in Meng Huai’s arms, his eyes widening in shock.
…
In C City, S Province, Longquan Mountain, Hyacinth Villa.
Shortly after two in the morning, Wan Yue was awakened by a series of urgent knocks at the door.
Outside the bedroom, coming from the direction of the living room, was a familiar aura—anxious, restless, deeply sorrowful.
“Wan Jie… I had a dream, a dream that my sister was dead… I keep having this dream, every time I fall asleep it’s this dream…”
Jiang Yao’s nightgown was soaked with sweat, her tear-streaked face shivering with bare feet, standing outside the door.
“It’s the middle of the night! Stop talking nonsense!”
Wan Yue crossed her arms, helplessly looking at the pale-faced girl, her tone somewhat cold.
“I don’t know! I called several times, but no one answered!”
Jiang Yao’s bloodshot eyes sparkled with tears, as if she had long since blurred the line between dream and reality.
The phone rang from the direction of the bedroom; Wan Yue felt an inexplicable jolt in her heart, glanced at the incoherent Jiang Yao, and turned to leave.
It was Liang Hao’s number. If nothing unexpected had occurred, he was already with Jiang Yan and Meng Huai.
Several seconds later, Wan Yue returned, clutching her phone, her expression grave as she stood once more in front of Jiang Yao.
“Go change your clothes, we’re going to Y Province… Jiang Yan is in trouble.”
Wan Yue took a deep breath, stepping forward to touch Jiang Yao’s hair.
Jiang Yao’s body went soft, collapsing to the ground, her teeth chattering, terror and dread occupying every inch of her face.
