Wang Meng threw another punch at the eagle's head, tears springing to his eyes from the sheer pain. His fists could only stun the eagle without breaking through its defenses at all. Instead, his own right fist had become a mangled mess of flesh and blood. Every one of his punches was delivered with his full might, and under such impacts, each strike brought him piercing, agonizing pain. Tears were merely an outlet for the pain, not a sign of cowardice.
"Take this!" Ding Shi brought the stone he held in both hands smashing down violently onto the eagle's head.
A ringing sound like metal striking iron resonated out. Wang Meng yanked up the bird's head, revealing a crater shaped like an eagle head beneath it. What kind of material was this creature made of? Wang Meng flattened the eagle's head back down and said, "Again."
Ding Shi roared and smashed the rock down again. This time, the metallic ring was accompanied by the sound of stone shattering, and the rock in Ding Shi's hands broke apart.
For a moment, the two of them were stunned.
Rage surged in Ding Shi's heart, and ruthless desperation flared. "Hold it down!"
Grabbing a long, needle-shaped stone with his right hand, he drove it straight into the eagle's eye. With a squelch, the stone pierced through the eye, but became lodged in bone, unable to penetrate any further.
The sharp pain snapped the stunned eagle awake. With a sweep of its wing, it swatted Ding Shi aside. Wang Meng grabbed the eagle's neck, let out a mighty roar, and threw all his brute strength into swinging the 170-kilogram body around, slamming it violently into the ground. The entire mountain seemed to shudder with the impact. With another roar, he swung it up again and smashed it into the earth once more.
Amid Wang Meng's roars, the eagle was thrashed from side to side like a rag. After over a dozen consecutive slams, Wang Meng's strength finally gave out. His hands went weak, and he hurled the eagle several meters away.
Wang Meng collapsed onto his backside. "If it doesn't die, we will."
But how could they kill it? Even stones imbued with Origin Force couldn't break open its skull.
Blunt force was useless; only an edged weapon would work, but the throwing knives were too thin to exert enough leverage.
Ding Shi, stepping in, resorted to a primitive weapon: his Origin Force-enhanced teeth. He clamped his jaws onto the eagle's neck, grinding down with all his might. His sharp teeth punctured the eagle's hide, and rank, coppery blood sprayed from the puncture wounds straight into his mouth, quickly filling half of it. Ding Shi dared not—and could not—let go; once he released his hold, breaking the hide a second time would be far too difficult. All he could do was clamp his jaws down desperately, gulping the blood down into his stomach in great swallows.
When its stupor wore off, the eagle—now blinded in one eye—thrashed and rolled. Ding Shi used jujitsu grappling, locking his legs around the eagle's neck while pinning its head firmly with both hands. With dozens of kilograms suddenly weighing down its head, the eagle could not adjust quickly enough and was unable to take off. Its talons couldn't reach him, and its beak couldn't touch him, so it could only thrash and roll unceasingly. But Ding Shi stuck to it like a plaster, refusing to let go no matter what.
Ding Shi couldn't drink another drop, and eagle blood continuously spurted out between his teeth. Along with the massive blood loss, the eagle gradually stopped thrashing, finally becoming a lifeless corpse.
Ding Shi let go of the eagle, staggered to his feet, and let out a loud, full burp. His eyes were hazy, as if he were drunk. Even so, he did not forget to quietly slip two trophy eagle feathers into his inventory slots.
Bloodthirsty Eagle Feather: Grade-A material. The feather of a Bloodthirsty Eagle raised by Zeus of Olympus. Can be crafted into a certain type of weapon.
Su Su, who had coasted through the entire fight, had her mouth hanging wide open. The two maniacs before her completely overturned her perception of the world—these guys were the real ruthlessly hardcore badasses.
Ding Shi, soaked in blood over half his body and aching everywhere, said, "Check me over."
Wang Meng walked over, kneading, thumping, and tapping across Ding Shi's body, before saying, "Bones are intact. A few dozen superficial injuries." Superficial injuries generally referred to external trauma from blunt impacts rather than bladed weapons. For a boxer like Wang Meng, such injuries were par for the course.
Ding Shi said, "Go cut out the liver and use it as a container. Su Su, come give me a hand." His entire body throbbed, feeling as though he had been run over by a compact car. Walking and jumping weren't hindered, but it hurt like hell.
Su Su saw it clearly: Ding Shi had seven bruises on his face alone, a bump on his forehead, and a purple-black shiner around his right eye. Because he wore only large beast-hide shorts, his entire body was visibly swollen and bruised.
Supported by Su Su, Ding Shi walked a dozen meters and began sensing changes in his body. Previously, the Origin Force within him had been faint and elusive, like a tiny mountain spring trickling down a rock face. Now, not only had that tiny spring widened into a small stream, but a sensation like drinking hot cocoa outdoors in the dead of winter washed over him. Every pore felt invigorated, and he felt as though he could take on ten Bloodthirsty Eagles right now.
Pointing at the eagle corpse, Ding Shi kindly offered to Su Su, "Go take a swig."
Having no idea of the miraculous qualities of eagle blood, Su Su shook her head so violently it looked ready to fly off. "Do you guys always go this hard?"
Ding Shi paused, realizing what she meant, and replied, "It was a fight to the death. Not something we do every day, but when backed into a corner like that, putting your life on the line is the only way to survive." For the Dragon Gang to grow from a small outfit into the undisputed top dog of A City, force had been required in virtually all their business, and attacks by rivals were hardly rare.
When Wang Meng started out, he had only about thirty men, and Ding Shi was merely an outer flunky. That Ding Shi managed to become the second-in-command was inseparable from the massive intelligence and support provided by his superior, but there was another crucial reason: of all the men who had fought to carve out their territory back then, only Ding Shi and Wang Meng were left alive.
After the Dragon Gang came to rule A City, they restructured their businesses and made certain compromises with morality, which in some respects benefited A City. For instance, all working women under their banner had to be at least eighteen years old and undergo a physical checkup every six months; while this was meant to protect their clientele, it was still a positive measure. In addition, anyone under sixteen was forbidden from becoming a street thug, and they established grassroots social work initiatives to support the elderly and vulnerable, among other measures.
Wang Meng cut out Little Pro's liver. The earth began to quake, and the 85-minute countdown abruptly sped up. At the same time, a section of the cliff collapsed into a flight of stairs.
Wang Meng stored the liver into an inventory slot and roared, "Move!"
The three raced down the stairs, instantly entering Temple Run mode.
There were many branching paths, each leading to the exit, but their lengths varied. Floating along some of the paths were Yita banknotes.
Ding Shi leapt up and snagged a banknote floating 2.3 meters in the air.
System notification: Received 1 dao.
The ground shook as three massive black spheres dropped from the sky and began chasing the trio. Amid the rumbling, Zeus's roar echoed: "I am Zeus, King of the Gods of Olympus! I command you to surrender the fire seed!"
Ding Shi shouted at the top of his lungs, "The fire seed is on that big idiot over there! It has nothing to do with us!"
Wang Meng, fleeing for his life along the adjacent path, wanted nothing more than to slap Ding Shi into next week.
"Judgment upon you!"
Bolts of lightning cascaded from the heavens. Su Su, running ahead, was struck by a lightning bolt and tumbled through several rolls, paralyzed for three seconds. The lightning itself dealt no damage. Three seconds later, Su Su sprang up and kept sprinting wildly, narrowly dodging another strike as she wailed, "Zeus, you bastard, you think I'm an easy target?!" She couldn't die here—she had to gossip with her girlfriends and tell them all about the utter madmen she had met today.
Indeed, the seemingly carefree Su Su was actually an avid gossip monger who loved both hearing rumors and spreading them. After entering Yita World, that passion had been severely curbed. Less than a day after the Primitive Era instance opened, she had already befriended several girlfriends, and she was planning to find time to talk with Yu Yuan about transferring from the scouting team to the gathering team.
The gathering team had forty members, eighty percent of whom were women. When sign-ups opened for Little Pro's instance, Su Su had still been chatting away in the cave with her gal pals.
Chapter 72