Chapter 92: The Horse is Dead
Ji Ma was in a daze, half-conscious, and vaguely saw Jenna’s hand glowing as she healed her. In a haze, she also saw her treating Eve Frostleaf.
The tremor of the stone door echoed throughout the tunnel, creating a strange sound that reached Ji Ma’s ears.
In another moment of confusion, she saw Eve Frostleaf and Jenna doing something unknown, with light pollution and flames shooting from their palms, shaking the entire tunnel.
A dwarf was shouting at George with his mouth wide open and fists clenched, but Ji Ma didn’t understand anything.
It felt as if a membrane was wrapping around her, making everything unclear and incomprehensible, rendering the outside world meaningless.
What happened? Who am I? Where am I?
In her muddled mind, the words “personal system” barely popped up. She glanced at the personal system; her magic power was down to nineteen percent. I must be going through an episode, ah, it must be, otherwise, my brain wouldn’t be so dumb.
Suddenly, sounds regained meaning.
The dwarf engineer shouted, “No! No! You can’t blow up the ancestral tunnel!”
George’s originally calm face was filled with anger as he shouted, “I must protect the safety of my team!”
Ji Ma shook her head, completely shaking off the strange state from before. She was experienced and knew that this was a side effect of soul injury, known as heart demon—something that transcendent beings hated the most.
At that moment, the stone door cracked.
Ji Ma suddenly understood what was happening.
The heavy stone door could block an entire green-skinned army, but it could only hold back the fire horse for a short time. The best solution was to collapse the entire tunnel.
The dwarf engineer shouted so loudly that his glasses rattled, “We can escape! There are many paths below!”
“No! My team needs to recuperate,” George said firmly. “They can’t be injured anymore.”
“You!” The dwarf engineer swung his fist and charged at Jenna, who was using a “laser” to scorch the rock layer.
Without hesitation, George grabbed his hair and, like throwing a basketball, hurled him backward onto a dwarf who was just getting up—he wasn’t the first dwarf to be thrown.
A crack opened in the stone door, and flames gushed out, like a jumping fire tongue. From behind came indistinct voices, seemingly four people speaking together:
“Rats!”
“Come out!”
“I know you’re in there.”
“Have some fun.”
A sharp pain shot through Ji Ma’s chest.
Eternal Chosen Marus, that despicable little man who backstabbed me! He merely sent a horse, and it made me so miserable. Fox pretending to be a tiger! If he hadn’t been followed by his master, I would have chopped this dog up long ago!
A surge of anger rushed to Ji Ma’s head, and she looked at the paladin, shouting, “George!”
“Ah?”
She shouted, “Kill Marus’s horse!”
“Marus could come at any time.”
Again, him! If he hadn’t been behind, his horse would have been dead long ago.
Ji Ma was furious and casually drew a divination, looked at the result, and joyfully shouted, “Great advantage divination! That little man Marus is only seven minutes away from here!”
“You are not in a good mental state; you need to rest.”
Debris was already falling from the tunnel.
If they didn’t hurry, the tunnel would collapse, and she wouldn’t be able to vent her frustration.
A breath stuck in Ji Ma’s chest made her uncomfortable, and she shouted, “So what if it’s wrong? Isn’t it good to kill him? I can provoke it and make it lose its mind!”
“What kind of power does it have?”
Ji Ma replied, “I’ve seen many arrows stuck in it!”
Even Eve Frostleaf could inflict effective damage on it, showing that it wasn’t a monster that the team couldn’t challenge, and the terrain was in their favor.
But George thought it was a futile effort; he was experienced and immediately spotted the key issue: the fire horse ran fast and couldn’t be beaten. If it fled, nobody could stop it.
“Six minutes!” Ji Ma was now unable to control her emotions. “Kill it!”
Saying this, Ji Ma picked up her axe spear, preparing to charge the damaged stone door.
George grabbed her horn and yelled, “Everyone prepare! Surround and kill the fire horse! The tunnel’s collapsing too slowly!”
A water dragon sprayed onto the scorching rock wall, and with a hissing sound, steam filled the entire tunnel, causing the rock wall to weaken. Eve Frostleaf put down her hand and said, “I’ll do my best!”
The supporting structure of the tunnel, the stone columns carved with dwarf statues, had already been damaged severely. Debris was continuously falling from above; this section of the tunnel was at risk of collapse. But Ji Ma didn’t care; her blood was boiling as she nimbly dodged the falling debris.
The stone door shattered, and a horse head poked in just as a falling rock struck its head. Four voices rang out:
“Kill! Kill! Kill!”
“The succubus, I like her, she must sound wonderful when she screams.”
“That white woman is a good friend; she has a father’s aura about her.”
“Don’t go into the tunnel; it’s going to collapse, and it’s useless for us to go in! The master can’t clear the collapsed tunnel; if we can’t get out, the four of them will eliminate us.”
Whoever spoke more was more powerful. The part of the fire horse that belonged to the Master of Deception successfully kept it in place, preventing it from rushing into the tunnel.
Ji Ma extended her middle finger and yelled, “Come on!” With her other hand, she used the “wish compass” for a divination.
“Come kill me!”
At the same time, she provoked the anger and desires within. As for her magic power dropping below twenty percent, oh well, she didn’t care at all right now. She even rubbed her finger against the “lucky gold ring” for a brief stroke of good luck.
As for the bad luck coming up, she didn’t mind, letting her future self regret it.
The fire horse snorted flames, roaring, “Kill, kill, kill!”
The part belonging to the Master of Deception despaired and shouted, “No! Could such a simple provocation work?”
It raised its burning front hooves and smashed through the stone door, fire gushing from its nostrils and scorching the adjacent stone wall red. A red-hot blade tip on its forehead pointed directly at Ji Ma, rushing like an exploding flame.
Jenna’s shield held off the falling debris, and the tower shield slammed down, causing the image of White City on its shield surface to become blurry. Immediately, semi-transparent shields sprang forth from the shield surface. Suddenly, semi-transparent shields blocked the fire horse, cutting off the magical fire.
The fire horse angrily roared, “Magic!”
“It’s divine magic! You mindless creature.”
“White sister has a father’s aura; let’s have some fun together.”
“Ah, so thrilling.”
The fire horse smashed through shield after shield, and Eve Frostleaf’s cerulean arrows flew in from the gaps in the debris, grazing past Ji Ma’s head and striking the fire horse. The fire horse slowed down, being wounded, steel-like liquid dripping from its injury.
Ji Ma heard the whistling of arrows, dodging increasingly dense falling debris, adjusting her grip on the branch axe spear, shouting, “Come on! Come on!”
The fire horse, furious, smashed through the last semi-transparent shield, charging towards Ji Ma.
But a flash of light appeared; George instantly appeared beside Ji Ma, with radiant wings on his back swinging down his “light sword,” striking the fire horse’s neck. Under the immense force, the armor buckled and smoked, severing half of the horse’s neck.
The fire horse still charged forward, the heated blade tip piercing Ji Ma. In the next moment, Ji Ma vanished; it was merely a silent illusion.
The four voices of the fire horse said respectively:
“I knew it; even maggots wouldn’t fall for such a boring trap.”
“So exciting! So liberating!”
“Ouch, that hurts.”
“Kill…”
The part belonging to the Master of Deception regained control, bracing against George’s sacred slash. Pink mist gushed from its wound, and it swiftly blinked backward, creating distance of over ten meters, following the flames it had come in on, racing towards the stone door at an untraceable speed.
Even boulders the size of millstones couldn’t stop it.
George couldn’t keep up; only Eve Frostleaf’s arrows could reach it.
The night sky outside the shattered stone door fell into the eyes of the fire horse, which gleefully picked up speed. The part belonging to the Lust Demon controlled its mouth, shouting:
“Exciting! Exciting! Narrowly escaping death! Let’s do it again!”
Suddenly, a blue light flashed in front of the fire horse, and a block of icy blue ice obstructed its path, sealing the tunnel tightly, with ice columns connecting top to bottom. Inside the transparent ice mound was a black-haired beauty, her face full of madness, grinning and even giving it the middle finger.
It was the “Icebox.”
The fire horse did not retreat, lowering its head to aim its fiery blade tip and charging at full speed. The supernatural toughness of the ice made the blade tip skew, and the horse’s face twisted along with it, causing the entire horse to crash sideways into the “Icebox.”
“Bang!”
This sound was several levels louder than the collapsing tunnel, shaking the entire tunnel multiple times, causing more debris to fall.
No one expected that Ji Ma would use the “Icebox” to block the enemy’s escape route, and she held it so firmly.
She completely severed the fire horse’s path to survival.
The fire horse fell to the ground like a mosquito squashed against the wall, and before it could stand up, George charged up from behind, slamming down a massive boulder.
One sword down.
Marus’s horse was dead.
This Eternal Chosen personally dug for over twenty minutes before unearthing his horse’s corpse.
Only after seeing the horse’s body did he confirm completely.
His horse was indeed dead.
Marus dragged its shattered body to the surface, dug a grave, and buried it.
Although it was a horse that couldn’t fly, although it often caused trouble, it at least served under him for one day.
Eternal Chosen Marus was not a cruel demon lord to his subordinates.
However, he couldn’t help but think.
You four great demons managed to hold out for at least a quarter of an hour under my command, but how is it that when combined, you disappeared within just a few minutes of entering the cave?
Eternal Chosen Marus gazed up at the night sky, as if he saw his black dragon mount, Mavor, soaring through the skies, and couldn’t help but miss her.
She was loyal and could fly. If she had been the one to charge, she would have caught up with the hero team and killed that despicable and cunning succubus. Then, the Order wouldn’t have the capital to compete with him for the crown fragments.
“Quack quack quack! Noble Eternal Chosen, Lord of the End!” the three-eyed penguin scampered over, making noise. “Congratulations! Successful teleportation! It’s a pity your horse is dead, so tragic, its sacrifice—”
Eternal Chosen Marus kicked it away; flapping its wings in the air, it shouted, “—Your horse made a humble contribution to your world destruction efforts—ah, ah, ah, I can’t fly.”
Eternal Chosen Marus glanced at the blocked tunnel; digging it was pointless. They had long disappeared into the winding underground passages. But that merely delayed their failure.
He turned and left.
