Be flexible
The return journey is often smoother than the journey there.
As the lift platform was rising, Ximu glanced at the man in the bamboo hat on the ground. He felt something in his heart and suddenly raised his foot and kicked his knee mercilessly!
"Hey, hey, hey! You don't have to be like this, right?"
The man with his hands and feet tied suddenly opened his eyes and twisted his body violently. Although he looked embarrassed, he managed to avoid the serious injury that would have most likely caused him to have broken bones.
"Okay, so you've been pretending to be asleep the whole time!"
Morina was filled with righteous indignation, but the elevator was still moving, so she didn't dare to move too much. She could only hit him rudely with the staff in her hand.
"The way you drag it, even a dead person would wake up from the pain."
Since he was discovered, the swordsman simply stopped pretending, sat up, and started complaining to them first.
The road surface here was primitive, rugged, and bumpy. Being dragged all the way out by the feet was indeed not a pleasant experience - but considering that he was ready to kill and rob from the beginning, the other three people present did not feel any guilt at all.
It’s good to wake up.
After all, he is a grown man and has some weight, so it is quite heavy to drag him along.
"If you follow us obediently, I will untie the restraints on your feet." Xi Mu said.
"Alright, three against one, I don't stand a chance of winning anyway. Why don't you just untie the one on my hand? If you encounter any monsters again, I can help you share some of the pressure, right?"
The man agreed readily and his attitude was surprisingly nice, as if there had never been any conflict between them. He was surprisingly thick-skinned.
"To walk, your feet are enough; your hands are not necessary."
Ximu knew very well that this man was cunning and would not fall for his playful smiles at all. His eyes were still wandering over his joints, and it was obvious that he still had great interest in breaking his bones.
"What are you talking about? I'm already in your hands. What tricks can I play? I was wrong about what happened before. I apologize to you, okay? Oh, although I accidentally stabbed this guy, he's fine, isn't he?"
Before Sorens could say anything after being suddenly called out, Molina rushed forward and blocked his way. She tilted her head and started pointing and scolding him on the spot:
"How dare you say that? He's fine because I'm so strong. Otherwise, he would have been ripped open right away with that blow from you! - If Ruixia didn't want to see you, would you still be talking nonsense here? Do you believe we'll kick you off the lift right now?!"
"No. My, my, it's all my fault... Meeting is fate. Now that the misunderstanding has been resolved, let's talk it out."
The man was obviously more flexible than imagined. He even pretended to look outside at the bottomless mine. He seemed terrified, and there were obvious signs of performance, which made people inexplicably angry.
and……
There was no misunderstanding between them. Wasn't it just that he failed to kill her and quickly slid to his knees?!
There is no room for misunderstanding when something is so obvious!
Morina was so angry that her teeth were itching. If it weren't for her limited fighting power and Sorens patting her shoulder to comfort her, she would probably have performed the famous scene of a priest strangling a robber with his staff on the spot.
"Speaking of which, where are you taking me? And who is Ruixia? And where's my knife? Where did you take it?"
Perhaps he had come to the conclusion that he was still safe from his current situation, so he relaxed and asked a series of questions, then started chatting with them leisurely as if nothing had happened.
"It's broken and thrown there. If you don't want to throw it away, you can pick it up yourself later."
Ximu folded his arms and lowered his brows, his tone of voice casual, as if he was just expressing an objective comment like "This mine is so deep."
"Hey, you're going a bit too far..."
Before he could finish his complaint, Ximu interrupted him coldly.
"There's something even more outrageous, do you want to hear it?"
The girl's expression was cold, and there wasn't even any threat in her eyes as she looked at him, as if she was looking at a dead person.
"Okay, tell me about it."
He slightly put away his playful and mocking demeanor, sat up straighter, but still had a smile on his face, and a familiar fierceness flashed across his eyes.
Ximu didn't say anything, didn't move, just looked at him quietly.
Suddenly, a chill surged from his neck and quickly spread throughout his body.
The scene before the man's eyes seemed to be covered by ink, and his physical strength and vision dissolved and disappeared together. It was not until the moment his cheek hit the ground that he realized that he seemed to have lost control of his body.
Something was eating him away.
——It’s “death”.
It was "death" that was devouring him!
"I was wrong, I was wrong! I listened to you in everything, really!
"—It's my fault, I'm blind! Please forgive me this time, heroes. From now on, I'll do whatever you say. I swear! Please, please..."
This time, the plea for mercy finally sounded somewhat sincere.
The man apologized repeatedly while he was still able to speak, fearing that if he spoke too late, even his voice would leave him, which would be a real death.
After all, it was just for deterrence. Seeing that he had surrendered, Xi Mu withdrew his magical powers.
The ups and downs of returning to the world from sudden death made this man, who had been in a state of disarray all the way, extremely panicked. It took him a while to finally regain his sanity and be able to speak normally.
He gasped for a long time, confirming that his five senses were fully functioning, then looked at Xi Mu and asked in shock, "...What is this?"
Ximu did not respond, but just glanced at Sorens beside him.
The brown-haired boy was so frightened that he stood up straight immediately, turned around, and explained righteously and forcefully: "This is a killing curse. If you don't obey, you will die!"
After seeing the horrific scene of the man in the bamboo hat almost dying on the spot, he was now extremely grateful for his honesty and cooperation all along, and had no desire to experience the activation of the death curse.
"Killing Curse? Are you a necromancer?"
These words were closer to complaints and questions than doubts, but after all, the swordsman who cherished his life had just tasted a powerful blow, so he pursed his lips in dissatisfaction, with a resigned expression of "OK, OK, OK", and put away his previous nonchalant attitude, looking a little listless.
But Ximu had no intention of deliberately humiliating him.
His weapon was broken purely for safety reasons, and the phrase "it's useless" was just a simple statement.
This man was brave and capable of fighting. If he found an opportunity to break free from his restraints halfway through, and he had weapons in his hands, it would be difficult for her to deal with him and the other attacking monsters at the same time.
Moreover, the reason they asked him to go back with them was entirely because Ruixia wanted to recruit him into the team.
If he could really be persuaded by Ruixia and agree to fight with them, then in terms of weapon selection, the young mechanic who prepared spare weapons for his teammates would naturally provide him with better options;
If the talks fail in the end and the two sides cannot establish trust, Ximu will directly cast a death curse to eliminate this unstable factor.
No matter which point of view, he really "can't use" his original knife anymore.
However... although Ximu has little experience in negotiations, based on Ruixia's past practices, after showing strength, perhaps he should also give some appropriate benefits.
"Your left hand is a mechanic's hand, right?" Xi Mu asked, raising his hand.
"Yeah, don't you know? And you keep calling out to me."
The man raised his arm, and there was a crackling sound accompanied by the sound of poor connection of electricity. It was obvious that Xi Mu's previous fierce attack had indeed caused great damage to the prosthetic hand.
“It was bad from the beginning.”
"At least it wasn't this bad in the beginning."
The man said something stubbornly in dissatisfaction, but fearing that Xi Mu would be dissatisfied and activate the death curse again, he quickly changed the subject.
"Well... I was being chased by a bunch of annoying guys. It took me a lot of effort to get rid of them. I'm thankful that my good hand wasn't injured."
"Ruixia is a mechanic." Ximu's answer was brief and to the point.
After a moment of hesitation, the man reacted, narrowed his eyes slightly, and confirmed: "...You mean, can you help me fix my arm?"
"That's up to you."
It's not just about the mechanic's arm.
——Whether it is life or death next also depends on you.
People who have experienced life and death can naturally understand this level of hidden meaning. The man snorted coldly, as if he was only truly convinced at this moment.
While the lift was rising, they chatted with each other for a while and got a general idea of the man in the bamboo hat.
The man's name was Zhui Neng, and he claimed to be a bounty hunter. He was being chased all the way because he had offended someone. He accidentally came here while fighting with someone in the forest and fleeing.
"I say, why are you taking me back with you at such great lengths? Are you really going to sell me off?"
I used to think that this guy was the kind of person who was ruthless and didn’t talk much, but now after getting to know him, I found that he is not only thick-skinned, but also a talkative person.
"Don't act crazy or stupid. Can't you see what's going on here?"
Regardless of whether he was genuinely curious or was trying to gather information, Morina never gave him a good look.
"What's going on?"
Unexpectedly, he actually looked puzzled and brazenly inquired, "I was so busy running the whole way that when I came to, I found myself in this awful place. Not only did I not see a single living person, but there were also these weird creatures dressed like humans but with long necks walking around. I'm completely baffled—honestly, whoever made these things has really bad taste."
There is hidden spiritual interference in the dense forest. In order to avoid the patrol of the long-necked monster, the swordsman who has no priest's protection and can't cast the spell of clearing the mind accidentally discovered the entrance of an abandoned mine on the edge of a mountain range, and thought of coming in to hide.
Unexpectedly, the two sides came to the underground mine from different routes, and finally met in the heretic laboratory in the mezzanine.
This experience coincided with what Ximu and the others had encountered in the dense forest before, so it was naturally somewhat credible.
If they had not seen those long-necked waiter monsters with their own eyes, it would be difficult for two groups of people who had never had any contact with each other before to come up with such consistent eyewitness testimony.
Moreover, they were quietly transferred in the forest without anyone noticing, which was basically the same process as how Ximu and the others came here.
In that case, he should have entered this place from a dense forest behind the academy.
After Ximu and the others arrived at the back door of the Magic Academy, they directly chose to open the seal and enter the academy without exploring the dense forests that were similar to each other. This is why they accidentally missed each other with Zhui Ling.
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