Dance? Ou Xiangrong froze, his mind failing to register the prompt for a moment. This supernatural item was actually inviting him to dance.
He sneered. There was no way he would accompany an enemy's dancing shoes in a dance during a fight. He immediately bit his tongue tip and spat a mouthful of tongue blood onto the gleaming white edge of his yanagiba.
As an experienced Spirit Realm walker—and one of an evil profession—he had fought Night Wanderers plenty of times and was familiar with the traits of their skills.
Supernatural items were renowned for being bizarre. Ou Xiangrong had once been hounded by one for days; they were exceedingly troublesome.
Yet their flaw was equally obvious: their actual lethal power was slightly lacking.
Moreover, supernatural items generally feared things rich in yang energy. For an item like this that seemed to harbor a vengeful spirit, a single mouthful of tongue blood was enough to suppress it.
Nothing to worry about.
The red dancing shoes bobbed up and down, waiting a few seconds. Seeing that the human before them was unwilling to dance, they seemed to grow angry. A faint, dark-red glow surfaced on the shoes, and amidst a flurry of rapid tap-tap clicks, they charged toward Ou Xiangrong.
Ou Xiangrong stood firm as a mountain, waiting for the red dancing shoes to close in. When they leaped toward the hood of the car to strike, he calmly slashed with his yanagiba, aiming to deal a heavy blow to the vengeful spirit residing inside.
Yet as the blade swept through the dancing shoes, there was no sensation of striking a physical object. The bizarre red dancing shoes seemed to inhabit another spacetime altogether, existing outside reality.
*Bam! Bam!*
The next instant, heavy kicks slammed into Ou Xiangrong's chest and face.
He experienced the same heart-stopping, suffocating pain Zhang Yuanqing had felt moments earlier. At the same time, a stinging, fiery heat radiated across his face, and warm fluid trickled from his nose.
*This... this isn't an item from the Night Wanderer profession...* Ou Xiangrong was stunned and bewildered, murmuring in shock and uncertainty, "Void?"
The traits of this item looked somewhat like a certain overseas profession. How could a Level 1 Night Wanderer possess an item from a foreign profession?
Before he had time to dwell on it, the bizarre dancing shoes wheeled around in his vision and stomped at him once more.
Without even wiping his bloody nose, Ou Xiangrong crossed both arms over his chest. With two loud thuds, the Bewitching Demon was kicked rolling off the roof of the car.
Lurching forward, sprinting, tumbling, and ducking behind vehicles, Ou Xiangrong dodged and maneuvered through the spacious underground garage, evading most of the red dancing shoes' stomps.
Yet he was still unlucky enough to get kicked several times. Each stomp brought excruciating agony; the wounds from last night's fierce battle flared up, and blood seeped from his internal organs.
*So... so strong. What a useless master I am...* Watching the red dancing shoes fight, Zhang Yuanqing was left dumbfounded.
Once again, he gained a profound appreciation for just how terrifying rule-based items were.
Its pursuit could not be broken or interrupted. The target could only endure it passively unless they cracked its rule—which meant dancing.
But that was entirely unrealistic. Even if Ou Xiangrong swallowed his shame and gave in to perform a tap dance, Zhang Yuanqing would personally step in to disrupt him and make his steps falter.
And the moment the dance steps went wrong, all effort was in vain.
Still, Zhang Yuanqing also gained a clear understanding of the Bewitching Demon's formidable strength. Ou Xiangrong was actually able to endure the sheer force of the red dancing shoes' stomping.
His physical body was terrifyingly tough.
*Ou Xiangrong won't foolishly wait to die. Once he realizes he can only take a beating without fighting back, he'll definitely choose to run...*
Zhang Yuanqing's mind was clear: he had to launch a sneak attack before the man could flee.
He wasn't aiming for a kill, but he absolutely had to stall this murderer.
*Bam! Bam!*
Failing to dodge in time once more, Ou Xiangrong took two kicks straight to the face, sending him staggering back. Darkness swam before his eyes as dizziness engulfed him.
*Opportunity!*
Zhang Yuanqing bounded forward like a cheetah. Gripping the Demon-Subduing Pestle, he sprinted in an arcing path, flanking behind Ou Xiangrong.
He thrust the Demon-Subduing Pestle viciously toward the back of the man's heart.
*Buzz!*
Suddenly, a dense, mist-like white light intercepted the triangular spike of the Demon-Subduing Pestle.
The force originated from an ancient bronze waist token gripped tightly in Ou Xiangrong's left hand—a token covered in cracks and bloodstains, like a relic carried by a seasoned veteran across countless battlefields.
It was Zhao Yingjun's defensive item.
*A defensive item?*
His sneak attack thwarted, Zhang Yuanqing's heart tightened. Shifting his footwork, he circled rapidly around Ou Xiangrong, driving the Demon-Subduing Pestle repeatedly into the barrier of white light, carving out rippling halos of radiance.
This time, with the red dancing shoes providing cover, he wasn't instantly dispatched by the Bewitching Demon, hair-raisingly dodging several blade strikes, punches, and kicks.
*Crack!*
Finally, under the relentless pounding from both the Demon-Subduing Pestle and the red dancing shoes, the bronze waist token shattered into fragments, and the white light collapsed into motes of luminescence.
Right at that moment, Zhang Yuanqing's Night Walk duration expired, and his body materialized.
It was as if Ou Xiangrong had been waiting for this exact second. Crimson surged in the depths of his eyes, giving rise to twisted, sinister runes.
Bewitch!
A roar exploded in Zhang Yuanqing's head, stripping away his ability to think. He seemed to forget he was in the middle of a battle as a voice echoed through his mind:
*Drop your weapon. Don't resist. Drop your weapon. Don't resist...*
Ou Xiangrong broke into a savage grin, sweeping the yanagiba toward the young Night Wanderer's throat.
His purpose in enduring the terrible dancing shoes' attacks rather than activating the defensive item earlier had been to wait for the Night Wanderer to strike.
That item from the Scout profession was already half-damaged. Using it early would only have allowed it to resist the dancing shoes for a brief moment before breaking completely.
So he had chosen to endure, deliberately revealing a flaw to lure the boy into attacking.
Just as he expected, the young Night Wanderer lacked experience and patience. He had taken the bait.
However, just before the edge could slit the young Night Wanderer's throat, Ou Xiangrong watched the boy's body suddenly collapse downward. The yanagiba swept across his scalp, shearing away only a few strands of hair.
The red dancing shoes that had been hounding him so relentlessly had somehow appeared on the Night Wanderer's feet, forcing him into a full split to evade the fatal throat slash.
At the same time, brilliant golden light erupted in the eyes of the young Night Wanderer who should have been bewitched. Instantly breaking free of the dazed stupor, he sprang forward with both legs, violently slamming himself into Ou Xiangrong.
Ou Xiangrong had never anticipated such a turn of events; he never imagined a mere Level 1 Night Wanderer could shake off his Bewitchment.
Still locked in the momentum of his slash, Ou Xiangrong could not pull back his force in time. He could only watch helplessly as the brass pestle stabbed into his chest.
*Squelch!*
Flesh tore as a blaze of magnificent golden light burst from the tip of the Demon-Subduing Pestle, incinerating every trace of life within his chest cavity.
Darkness washed over Ou Xiangrong's vision, the agony nearly causing him to faint. Yet he was a battle-hardened Bewitching Demon after all. Pushing past the brink of death, he unlocked his hidden potential. Pulling his right arm back, he dragged the yanagiba toward the Night Wanderer's throat.
Simultaneously, the muscles of his left arm tautened, and his elbow snapped forward, turning his left fist into a spear packed with explosive power that struck like a crack of thunder against the enemy's shoulder.
Zhang Yuanqing jerked his head back sharply to dodge the throat-slitting blade, only to be hit squarely on the shoulder by Ou Xiangrong's fist, sending him hurtling backward like a tattered sandbag.
*Crash!*
Zhang Yuanqing slammed into a commercial van, spider-webbing the vehicle's window. Before his falling body even hit the ground, it was erased inch by inch, vanishing from Ou Xiangrong's sight.
He had entered Night Walk once again.
Ou Xiangrong didn't even look his way. Instead, he staggered toward Xu Yingying.
His heart was destroyed. The only thing that could save him now was the vital essence of a living human. He needed to kill to enter a berserk state.
Then he would burst out of the underground garage, bathe the campus in blood, and rely on the Bewitching Demon's bloodthirsty trait to mend his injuries and reverse death itself.
Doing so would inevitably plunge his Morality Points below 60, putting a Spirit Realm bounty on his head and inviting every Spirit Realm walker in the city to hunt him down. But he could no longer afford to care.
*Tap, tap, tap...*
Two faint, dark-red lights materialized out of thin air, reforming into a pristine pair of red dancing shoes to cut off Ou Xiangrong's path.
To Ou Xiangrong's ears right now, the tapping sounded like a death knell, a sigh from the Grim Reaper, a final verdict from King Yan.
*Bang! Bang!*
The shoes stomped directly onto Ou Xiangrong's face, turning his features into a mangled pulp. He fell backward uncontrollably, but at the very last second, he flung the yanagiba from his hand.
The forty-centimeter-long weapon transformed into a flash of silver light, rocketing toward Xu Yingying in the distance.
Ou Xiangrong's eyes fixed dead onto the blade.
*Clink!*
Sparks suddenly burst out. The yanagiba was knocked aside by a brass pestle emerging from thin air, and a figure materialized beside Xu Yingying.
It was Zhang Yuanqing.
Witnessing this, the glimmer of hope in Ou Xiangrong's eyes collapsed into despair and bitter defeat.
Right then, the red dancing shoes descended from above, stomping onto his face. The impact crushed his nasal bridge, split his lips, and sent both eyeballs bursting from their sockets.
Ou Xiangrong's limbs spasmed a few times before every trace of life was extinguished.
Zhang Yuanqing collapsed onto the ground beside Xu Yingying, exhaling a long, shuddering breath, completely drained.
Hostility and fury churned in his chest, and his hands and feet trembled uncontrollably.
This wasn't fear, but the intense mental arousal brought on by a massive surge of adrenaline. When a person faced mortal danger and had to fight for survival, adrenaline pumped wildly. In that state, one could truly kill without batting an eye.
Commonly known as seeing red.
The battle plan had worked.
Before launching into this fight, he had thought things through thoroughly. The only thing he truly needed to avoid was the opponent's Bewitch skill, so before deciding to ambush him, he had already performed a sacrifice on the Demon-Subduing Pestle.
Among the pestle's abilities was purification.
Meanwhile, the red dancing shoes' second form was the trump card that gave him the nerve to fight at close quarters, and it had indeed saved him from a lethal decapitation.
Marking, Bewitch, berserk, close combat... He had anticipated every single one of Ou Xiangrong's abilities and prepared counters for each. If he still couldn't win after all that, Zhang Yuanqing felt he might as well quit.
After catching his breath for a few minutes, Zhang Yuanqing settled his racing emotions and heard the Spirit Realm's notification ring in his ear:
*Ding! You have killed a Level 3 Bewitching Demon. You have obtained 30 Morality Points and 15 Reputation points. Reputation is now unlocked.*
Zhang Yuanqing blinked, quickly calling up his character profile to find a new Reputation column added.
*Reputation? Killing a Spirit Realm walker from a hostile faction rewards Reputation?* As a veteran gamer, he was no stranger to reputation systems, but he had no idea what use it served in the Spirit Realm.
After a moment's thought, Zhang Yuanqing decided to leave it aside for now and check the official forum later.
Compared to the Spirit Realm's reputation reward, he cared far more about the real-world spoils of war.
He got to his feet, walked over to Ou Xiangrong's corpse, kicked the eyeballs under a car, and dragged the body into the shadowy corner.
Rummaging carefully through the corpse, he retrieved a phone and a wallet.
The phone was an old-fashioned model that could only make calls. The wallet, however, was stuffed thick. Opening it, he found a stack of hundred-yuan bills and a fake ID.
Zhang Yuanqing counted the cash carefully. "As a wanted criminal, carrying only around fifteen hundred yuan on you—is that proper?"
*Confiscated!* He pulled out the money and stuffed it into his pocket.
Next, he walked over and picked up the sharp yanagiba from the ground.
The moment his fingers brushed the weapon, a prompt appeared in his vision:
*Name: Bloodthirsty Blade*
*Type: Weapon*
*Function: Bleed, Bloodthirst, Armor Piercing*
*Description: A powerful Bewitching Demon nourished this blade with his own vital blood essence. Over time, it grew exceptionally bloodthirsty. Its edge can slice through hardened steel, and wounds inflicted by it are difficult to heal. It absorbs the vital essence of its prey and feeds it back to its master, making them even more powerful.*
*Remarks: A blade that doesn't want to knife its master isn't a good blade.*
*This blade looks pretty awesome. If it had killed Xu Yingying just now, Ou Xiangrong would've received vital essence nourishment from the weapon to heal him... Good thing I stayed sharp and guarded Xu Yingying's side.*
Zhang Yuanqing trotted back to Ou Xiangrong's corpse, unbuckled the scabbard from the small of the man's back, strapped it onto himself, and sheathed the Bloodthirsty Blade.
The blade currently had no master. Binding it was simple—all he had to do was store it in his inventory.
Yet Zhang Yuanqing didn't want to store it just yet, because the remark on the item description made his heart race uneasily.
The Bloodthirsty Blade likely belonged to the category of cost-based items, and that line in the remarks hinted at the cost of using it.
Combining the blade's description, Zhang Yuanqing could roughly guess what that cost might be. There were only two main possibilities: first, anyone who acquired this blade would be cursed and meet a miserable end.
Second, the blade required its master to nourish it periodically with vital blood essence. This was the most likely case.
*Nourishing with blood essence again? One Demon-Subduing Pestle has already left me anemic. If I add this Bloodthirsty Blade on top of it, how am I supposed to survive?*
Just then, Zhang Yuanqing saw the red dancing shoes tap-tap their way in front of him, bobbing up and down. A prompt surfaced:
*Would you like to dance with me? If so, please mark time in place.*
Only then did he remember he hadn't recalled this item into his inventory. Just as he prepared to refuse and dismiss it, a Spirit Realm notification suddenly echoed in his mind:
*Warning: Each use of this item requires one dance. If you refuse, the red dancing shoes will no longer appreciate you and will hunt you down.*
Zhang Yuanqing's jaw dropped open bit by bit in disbelief. This was the first time he had used the red dancing shoes in the real world after taming them, and he had completely failed to anticipate that using this rule-based item carried such a penalty.
*Dance with me or I'll kill you? Isn't this way too scummy...* With a beaming smile, Zhang Yuanqing rose to his feet. "It would be my absolute pleasure."
Soon, crisp tap-dancing clicks echoed through the quiet, cavernous underground parking garage.
This time, Zhang Yuanqing did not trigger any old injuries. Relying on his transcendent physical constitution, he saw the dance through to the end, even though his footwork faltered constantly.
Fortunately, as their master, he suffered no attacks from the red dancing shoes.
Once the dance finished, the red dancing shoes stepped back on the right foot, balanced up onto both toes, and performed a graceful curtsy.
Just after he stowed the red dancing shoes into his inventory, his ears twitched. He heard hurried footsteps rushing down the ramp.
Glancing toward the sound, he saw Li Dongze leading Guan Ya and seven or eight unfamiliar Spirit Realm walkers sprinting headlong into the garage.
Some carried guns, some held blades, and one was even holding a cat... They were armed to the teeth.
*Thank goodness... thank goodness the dance is over,* Zhang Yuanqing thought, feeling utterly fortunate.
Chapter 30