Lin Chuan seemed to have snapped out of his daze.
He cast a deep glance at the now completely unrecognizable White Spirit.
Meng Chao did not know whether he was imagining things, but he seemed to have seen the White Spirit nod lightly.
Lin Chuan gritted his teeth, cried out, and threw his chain spear forward.
The Blood Spirit should have been able to dodge it, but the White Spirit held it back and just let the burning chains from the spear strengthened by the Undying Bird bind it.
Lin Chuan yanked at the chain, and each runic symbol on the chain spear shone and screeched. They dug deep into the Blood Spirit’s body and burned it until the countless tentacles started screeching.
The Blood Spirit kept struggling and jumping around.
Lin Chuan used all his strength to tighten his hold over the chain spear. His feet sank into the ground. Even if the flesh, blood, and bones in his arms and spine started exploding, he did not care.
Meng Chao shouted at Qin Hu and Lu Siya. “Big Brother Lin won’t be able to last for long! We have to help him!”
They all pounced forward.
The bloody flower above the Blood Spirit’s left eye opened up to its widest like a mouth. It let out a piercing screech and spat out three murky, rampaging, and crazed red lights.
The three people were stunned. It felt like their brains were struck by an invisible blade. That feeling went from the top of their head to their coccyx, and each of their muscle fibers and nerve bundles started screaming. They could no longer move forward and fell to the ground face first.
The undead Blood Spirit’s ability to create illusions and control minds had turned into a simple and crude mind attack. It became much stronger because of the magnetic field from the Red Radiance Jades, and it almost burned their cerebral cortexes.
Lin Chuan also faced the Blood Spirit’s mind attack.
His body swayed, and the Blood Spirit dragged the chain spear away. It tossed him against the wall of the mine, but he refused to let go.
Meng Chao heard Qin Hu’s screams, Lu Siya’s moans, and Lin Chuan’s grunts.
He could also hear his own breathing. It sounded like he was suffocating.
There was no other choice.
He went to touch the two tough objects at his thighs.
One of them was the self-destruct gun that once belonged to Li Xin, the solo gunslinger who was at Heaven Realm, and an item that he had not dared to use.
Meng Chao sucked in a deep breath with great difficulty. With a twist of his thumb and index finger, he opened the bottle containing the bullet made of a meteorite shard.
At the moment the bullet left the mithril-based stabilizing solution, it let out a screech stronger than even that of the Blood Spirit.
Meng Chao used two of his fingers to grab it, and his fingerprints were immediately wiped off by the destructive power contained in the bullet.
And since the finger nerves were the most sensitive, he felt a pain that seemed to creep straight to his heart.
But he endured it and slotted the bullet into the magazine of the self-destruct gun.
With a light click, the magazine was pushed into the gun. The profound and complicated runic symbols on the gun shone with an incredibly dangerous light.
That light was like a slithering snake. It went from the grip to his arm and fused with his vitality magnetic field. Then, it went further up, and like a rampaging monster from hell, it charged straight to the depths of his mind.
Meng Chao’s pupils narrowed into two dots.
He felt as if even before he fired the gun, the top of his skull would be blown off by the destructive power from the meteorite shard. His brain was about to be blasted to high heaves.
He placed his trembling finger over the trigger and aimed at the Blood Spirit. He continued activating his brain cells so that his brain waves would resonate with the destructive magnetic field contained in the meteorite shard. It would allow its destructive ability to reach the maximum.
At the same time, he continued comforting himself.
‘I’ll be fine. I’m someone who returned to the past. I’m bound to change the future. So, this self-destruct gun that can even blow up the head of a Heaven Realm elite will definitely NOT be able to hurt me, even though I’m JUST a one-star superhuman. Yup.
‘It might even be able to help me activate some mysterious region in the depths of my mind that will release an ancient power or some sort of strange bloodline. Then, I’ll be able to awaken to hundreds of supernatural abilities.
‘In fact, it might even be able to push me straight to Deity Realm. It’ll make me stronger and make me live longer. Yes, that’s right. That’s definitely the case!’
He narrowed his eyes and took aim at the bloody flower on the Blood Spirit’s left face.
Before the bullet left the chamber, Meng Chao’s unstoppable mental strength had already turned into an arrow that burned the bloody flower so much that it shrank.
Right when he was about to fire, he heard a clang, and the chain spear that had been binding the Blood Spirit reached the limit of its metal fatigue. Under the Blood Spirit’s monstrous strength, it shattered.
Lin Chuan coughed up blood and fell back.
‘No!’
Meng Chao was shocked. His vision blurred, and pain flared around his wrists. The Blood Spirit flung the self-destruct gun to the side and pounced on Meng Chao again. It pushed him to the ground, and bloody tentacles spilled out of its mouth. They were sticky, covered in barbs, and extremely smelly. It seemed like the creature wanted to lick, rip off, and eat Meng Chao’s head.
‘Why am I always stuck in such a terrible position?’ Meng Chao’s mind went blank.
At that critical moment of life and death, he heard Lin Chuan cry out, “Whitey!”
The Blood Spirit shuddered. Its right eye instantly regained clarity and looked over.
Lin Chuan grabbed the self-destruct gun and took aim at its head. His eyes shone with tears, and an incredibly gentle smile rose to his lips. He called out to his friend once more, “Whitey…”
Meng Chao did not know whether his mind was playing tricks with him, but he could clearly see the Blood Spirit— no, the White Spirit hesitate for a moment before its face morphed into something that closely resembled a human smile.
Bang!
Lin Chuan fired.
The recoil was like an invisible hammer that rammed into the top of Lin Chuan’s head.
Even the strength of a Heaven Realm fighter’s brain was unable to fight against the side effects of a self-destruct gun. Blood gushed out of Lin Chuan’s orifices. He fell back, and the back of his head crashed against a cluster of Red Radiance Jades.
The meteorite shard bullet drew a brilliant trajectory. It never diverted from its path, and it pierced the bloody flower on the left side of the Blood Spirit’s face. It ran straight into its brain, and created an unstoppable explosion in its brain.
“Screeech!”
The Blood Spirit let out its final screech.
All the bloody tentacles of flesh on it stopped rampaging monstrously. They straightened out and shuddered in great fear.
But the right side of the Blood Spirit’s mouth remained curled up, forming something that still closely resembled a human smile. Or more accurately, it was the same smile as Lin Chuan’s. It seemed frozen on its face and did not fade away even after a long time had passed.
Boom!
The beast’s head and the top half of its body were blown to smithereens.
Countless Blood Flower bacterial flora fell all over the ground. They struggled and squirmed in the face of death while screeching loudly.
Lu Siya gritted her teeth and climbed up. She grabbed the Blood Flower suppressant and sprayed the liquid over it. She also splashed Meng Chao with the solution.
The Blood Flower bacterial flora that came in contact with the suppressant shrank rapidly, as if they had come in contact with fire. They shrivelled, stiffened up, and turned into pools of dried up blood.
The notification telling him that he completed the mission popped up at the corner of Meng Chao’s eye.
It finally ended.
“Big Brother Lin!”
Meng Chao was stunned for a long time, as if he had turned into a statue. Then, he struggled up with his hands and feet and crawled to Lin Chuan. It was only then that he noticed that the recoil from the self-destruct gun had turned into spirit flames that could tear through everything effortlessly. They tore through everything so effortlessly that they burned Lin Chuan’s brain and blinded his eyes.
Even with the mental power and strength of a Heaven Realm elite, Lin Chuan had to pay a devastating price for using the self-destruct gun.
If Meng Chao had been the one who fired the gun… his brain would have exploded with the Blood Spirit.
When he came to this realization, all sorts of complicated emotions rose in his heart.
Lin Chuan could not see anything and groped around. When he touched Meng Chao, he suddenly trembled. Indescribable shame, regret, pain, joy, and relief appeared on his face.
“I’m sorry, Meng Chao,” he mumbled. “I was wrong. I brought death to so many people. And Whitey’s death…”
“But you also saved a lot of people, Big Brother Lin,” Meng Chao whispered. “You will never know just how many people you saved.”
“Did I? Did I truly save—cough—a lot of people?”
Lin Chuan coughed up blood with a stark pale face. His features sometimes relaxed, while at other times twisted together. He mumbled as if he was tormented by a nightmare, “I don’t know, Meng Chao. I often dream of something. I dream of a warm and calm ocean with us in it. We’re all cells that have no difference between us, and we’re all equal.
“Later though, a ray of light shines on us, and a mighty and incredibly tempting voice says ‘Evolve. Evolve nonstop. Create your own civilization!’”
“So—cough—so we continue evolving madly and endlessly. We evolve and evolve… and slowly, some of the cells evolve into Crystalline Nine-headed Dragons, who stand above others and can fly freely, while some of the cells evolve into Demonic Halberd Pigs that roll about in the mud. Some of the cells are even worse than that. They evolve into weeds that can do nothing but wait for their deaths.
“Everyone seemed to have become greater, more advanced, and more powerful. But none of us know each other anymore, and we’re no longer kindred!
“Tell me, Meng Chao, how are we supposed to evolve next? Will the Crystalline Nine-headed Dragons, Demonic Halberd Pigs, and weeds be able to fuse into one again and be like the cells who helped each other in the warm ocean? Will our civilization become more beautiful? Just what is us and what is civilization? What is considered to be a truly beautiful life? I’ve been thinking about the answers to these questions, but I never found any.”
Meng Chao was silent for a while before he said firmly, “It will, Big Brother Lin, our civilization will definitely become better. I will search for an answer to all your questions. Trust me, we will save Dragon City and our civilization!”
“I know. You mentioned it before. You want to use the Ultimate Style to save Dragon City.”
Lin Chuan shut his eyes and smiled in a tragic manner. “But you don’t understand. The Ultimate Style won’t be able to save Dragon City. If we don’t understand just what civilization is, Dragon City is destined for destruction. I feel like I can see it. I can already see it—”
“Then we’ll think of another way!” Meng Chao interrupted him in agitation. “If the Ultimate Style can’t do it, we’ll think of another way. If this path doesn’t work, we’ll find more friends who share the same ideals as we do. We’ll use our feet to tread down other paths made of thorns and flames. There’s definitely a way. Our civilization will definitely find a way!”
His vitality magnetic field shone at full force. It was as bright as the light from a lighthouse.
Lin Chuan might not have been able to see it, but he could sense Meng Chao’s will, and it was even more brilliant than a Red Radiance Jade.
In an instant, the nightmare that had been bothering him for years shattered and disappeared like the wind.
“Meng Chao, you’re just so much stronger than I am. Perhaps… I am the one—cough—who should treat you as my idol…”
Lin Chuan exhaled and smiled from the bottom of his heart.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
Chain explosions rose from the depths of the Red Radiance Jade mine and rampaging spirit energy charged at the four people like an avalanche.