Chapter 72 VS. Monster 3 (Fourth update, please subscribe!)
The opponent's sudden counterattack did not cause Zhu Shi to panic.
On the contrary, as if she had foreseen it, she used her agile and fast movements to duck and avoid the shadowy hammer, while spinning her body to unleash another slash.
The sweeping sword light seemed to transform into a silver fan, instantly severing the opponent in half at the waist.
However, against that strange creature's inexplicable immortality, both decapitation and dismemberment were futile. Even my initial attempt to cause it to explode from the inside had no effect, let alone such a simple and swift fatal wound. Perhaps it was precisely because of this immortality that the creature showed no intention of dodging or blocking the attacks it received.
Sure enough, the strange man inexplicably recovered. He didn't even glance at Zhu Shi, and just charged at me.
His plan is crystal clear: kill me, with my superior firepower, at all costs. The question is, what's the logic behind his resurrection? If we can't kill him, perhaps our only option will be to try capturing him alive. We also don't know if his immortality can withstand the self-destruct mechanism inherent in monsters.
I want to test his resurrection mechanism. Does his immortality come with conditions and costs? Does he only resurrect after suffering fatal injuries, or can he even heal from ordinary wounds?
I pointed my palm towards the strange man, signaling that I was about to attack. It wasn't a signal to the strange man, but to Zhu Shi. We hadn't coordinated at all; this "unnecessary movement" was necessary. Seeing this, Zhu Shi immediately retreated.
In the blink of an eye, my gaze fell upon the strange man's legs. With a deafening explosion, the man's legs shattered into pieces, and he collapsed to the ground.
Before his body hit the ground, he regenerated again. It was the same kind of regeneration that appeared seamless, like a scene from a movie, with no discernible process. Clearly, his resurrection wasn't only triggered at the moment of death.
He quickly resumed his charging stance. But this time, I no longer had time to make another move.
The monster's speed was lightning fast. Even with Zhu Shi holding me back, I only had time to unleash that one attack. And the moment I realized my attack was ineffective, the monster had already charged in front of me, while my vision suddenly receded rapidly.
At first, I thought I had been knocked away, but no. It felt like my throat was ripped apart by sharp claws, and then my head was torn off. The process was so fast that I didn't even have time to feel any pain. My headless body was still standing there, gushing out dark red blood like a fountain.
"Zhuang Cheng!" Zhu Shi's voice cracked as he called out from afar.
"Hahahaha!" The strange man raised my head high like a victorious general and let out a wild laugh.
This was the first time he had spoken: "What good is strong firepower if you're vulnerable?"
Upon hearing this, I also exclaimed, "You're right."
As the other party said, without Zhu Shi's restraint, I might not have even had time to unleash that attack during his charge. The difference in speed was simply too vast. If it was the same for me, other fire-element users would only meet the same fate in a one-on-one fight.
The monster was astonished to see me, now just a head, suddenly speak. I then detonated my own head.
My body is a mimicry of flames, and so is my head. After the explosion, my vision went completely dark. However, through the scattered flames, I could still perceive my surroundings. The monster's arm was blown off, and he reflexively let out a shocked scream. If I wanted to, I could have pulverized him on the spot, but I needed to keep his head intact, so I had to minimize the blast radius.
The explosion was instantaneous and caused me little pain. Under my control, the scattered flames flew back to my headless "corpse" like birds returning to their nests, reforming my head. My vision returned.
The strange man's arm had also recovered. He stared at me in disbelief, then turned around and ran away.
When faced with an opponent who also possessed immortality, his first reaction wasn't to continue fighting, but to flee. Was it because he felt that fighting two against one was disadvantageous? Or was it because he lacked confidence in his immortality? In any case, I couldn't just sit by and watch him escape.
At the same time, Zhu Shi appeared in front of his escape route and waved his longsword in the air.
A sword light, shaped like a bolt of lightning, shot out and once again cleaved the monster in half at the waist.
"Zhuang Cheng, I know the principle behind his immortality!" She shouted to me from afar as she attacked, "He can only revive a limited number of times, so we just need to keep attacking him repeatedly!"
"I see."
Although I don't know what the "principle" Zhu Shi was talking about is, this idea of depleting the opponent's regenerative power is actually quite common sense.
I heeded her advice, focused my attention again, and detonated the monster's torso.
After his body exploded, before he could recover, I conjured a fireball the size of a soccer ball in my palm and fired it at his location.
One after another, fireballs rained down on his location like a barrage of cannonballs. Explosions followed one after another, the grass on the playground churning and billowing like a pool of water with constantly falling rocks, from which the terrified screams of strange men could be faintly heard, and the ground trembled incessantly.
The scene inside the mud and dust is invisible to the naked eye, but my perception, mediated by heat, allows me to clearly grasp it and manipulate the fireball to avoid damaging his head.
Then it was just a matter of repeating the task, just as Zhu Shi had said, killing him until he could no longer be resurrected.
However, I'm quite concerned about the "principle of immortality" that Zhu Shi mentioned. At the very least, his resurrection shouldn't be due to time reversal. Although his injuries have indeed fully healed, the residual heat from my attack still lingers on him. If it were time reversal, wouldn't that residual heat also be reversed?
Just as I was thinking this, a strange, curse-like voice came from within the mud and dust.
"You forced me to this..." he cried out frantically, seemingly disregarding everything, "All of you, get in here!"
For a moment, I thought he was planning to use shadow powers to banish us to the world of shadows, just like Agent Kong had done in the past. I was prepared for that kind of move from the start, and I was constantly watching the shadows' movements. Even if Zhu Shi didn't know how to deal with it, I was confident I could protect him.
However, the moves he used exceeded my expectations.
Within the dust and grime, one of his shattered remains suddenly released a massive, expanding black mist. In the blink of an eye, this black mist broke through the dust and grime, engulfing me entirely.
My vision suddenly went completely black, and a strange feeling of dizziness and nausea welled up inside me.
Is this poison gas? I immediately held my breath. Although toxins have no effect on me, if it's a strange type of toxin, I can't afford to be careless. And right now, I should be more worried about Zhu Shi. Has Zhu Shi inhaled this black mist?
Contrary to my expectations, the black mist faded and disappeared in just one second, and the dizziness and nausea also disappeared immediately after they appeared.
What surprised me even more was that the scene before me had undergone a complete transformation.
Just a moment ago I was on the playground of the sports park, but now I'm surrounded by a gray, old indoor corridor. It looks a bit like a corridor in an office building, except there are no doors or windows on either side, just very unsightly walls.
Not only was I transferred to this place, but Zhu Shi was also transferred here.
She was standing about twenty meters away, the same distance between us as before we were moved. She seemed a little dizzy, pressing her head for several seconds before finally raising it, then seeing me, she quickly ran over.
I decided to ask her for advice first: "What's going on?"
"This isn't a real space. We've been trapped in another dimension." She frowned, observing her surroundings. "That black mist wasn't poisonous; it was a force created to transfer us to another dimension. I didn't expect him to have such methods..."
"A space that doesn't belong to reality?" I immediately tried to sense the flames I had left behind elsewhere.
Soon, I felt a connection with the flames.
The "fireflies" I had scattered throughout Saltwater City were still there, and I could still feel the heat emanating from when I bombarded the monster. The image of the playground in the real world then surfaced in my mind. Of course, Zhu Shi and I were no longer there, but the monster was also gone.
Could it be that he escaped immediately after being resurrected while we were locked in another dimension? No, I didn't feel any residual warmth from him in the real world.
Rather, I feel like he's also in this so-called alternate dimension... only this feeling is quite vague. I can only confirm its existence, but not its location. It seems to be in front of me, and behind me... it even feels like it could be in any direction.
Just then, a piercing, monstrous laugh came from all directions.
It was that strange man's voice.
He didn't seem to be here; instead, he was speaking to us remotely through a device that looked like a loudspeaker. The incongruous thing was that a quick glance around revealed there was no loudspeaker in sight.
"I'll give you credit for forcing me to reveal my last trump card." He seemed completely certain of his victory.
"Is this also your power?" I asked, "To transfer the enemy into this alternate dimension?"
“That’s right, that’s my true power,” he said confidently. “And once you’re locked up inside, you’ll never be able to escape.”
Upon hearing this, Zhu Shi let out a disdainful laugh.
This was clearly not the kind of laughter she would make when she was with me; it was an aggressive stance she only displayed when facing an enemy.
She held her sword high, head held high, looking around fearlessly.
The strange man's voice turned cold: "What are you laughing at?"
"You're lying." Zhu Shi seemed to have seen through everything. "Putting aside the immortality just now, this phenomenon of transferring the enemy into another dimension is not your own power at all."
(End of this chapter)
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com