This life-changing talisman was one of Qi Tian's most adept evil arts, able to change one's fate.
For example, if someone was destined to be a lone star of heavenly disaster, with their parents, relatives, wives and children all dying because of them, by changing their fate they could pass this misfortune onto someone else, letting others bear these burdens.
Before going abroad, Qi Tian had used this to change the fate of a wealthy man, very successfully.
He was confident in his abilities, but halfway through burning the talisman paper, it went out.
The inability of the paper to burn showed that the fate-changing ritual had failed, but it going out halfway showed that the person whose fate he was trying to change did not exist.
Jian Jing must already be dead.
How was this possible? After blurting out the words "dead person", Qi Tian did not even believe it himself.
He thought of a more "reasonable" explanation - her publicly known birth date and time were wrong.
In that case, the hair was not enough. He had to capture her and bleed her. Qi Tian patted the roots beside him and they slowly moved, following the path Jian Jing had escaped along.
Qi Tian followed closely behind.
He was not badly injured and his speed was not slow. However, after chasing for a while, there was no trace of her.
No, that wasn't right. She hadn't eaten the tree roots so she wouldn't have been able to see the way through the caves. It wasn't possible for her to have escaped so quickly in such a short time.
She must still be in the caves.
Or perhaps, right behind him.
Qi Tian prided himself on seeing through Jian Jing's tactics. He quietly started to double back.
However, a few minutes later, there was another huge roar from behind. Large amounts of dust like white waves gushed out and the ground shook continuously. Rocks broke off from the ceiling and clattered down.
It was another explosion.
Caught off guard, Qi Tian was affected. If not for the roots swiftly covering him, he would definitely have fallen over.
Blood rushed to his head and he almost gritted his teeth out.
How shameful! When had the great master Qi Tian ever suffered such humiliation?
Only when wealthy nobles begged him for help, money in hand, had he never been played around by others like this.
She was dead for sure.
Qi Tian was furious and immediately took out a paper cut-out shaped like a person. He bit his finger and hastily drew on it, taking out the unused hair from earlier and sticking it on with blood.
Then he took out his gun and pulled the trigger at the paper figure.
Bang, there was just a faint hissing sound.
Not far away, Jian Jing froze in the middle of taking out her gun.
[Warning: The host's heart will have severe discomfort, countdown 10, 9...]
Her: "???"
System, make yourself clear. Is the severe discomfort because of poisoning from the tree or does harming the voodoo doll really work?
[System: 8, 7...]
Forget it.
Jian Jing took out her gun, aimed at Qi Tian, opened the aim assist, and decisively fired.
Bang.
It wasn't that the roots did not react, just that the main body had already been injured by the first bomb and its reactions were much slower than usual. Along with the bonus from the aim assist, it simply could not block the shot.
The bullet tore through the air, breaking the sound barrier, spinning as it hit Qi Tian in the abdomen.
Blood spurted out.
Qi Tian turned his head and gave a cold laugh: "You think you can kill me with..." Before he could finish speaking, he suddenly collapsed. One hand clawed at his throat while the other clutched his stomach. His expression was hideous as he violently threw up. His back arched and sour liquid, stench and murky fluids instantly poured out. His stomach convulsed and was lifted up, forcing his throat wide open, as if something was crawling up his esophagus and out.
[System: 6, 5...]
Jian Jing: Is there anything that can resolve this?
[System: Special instance, curse cannot be removed]
"Gulu - ugh -" Qi Tian's eyes bulged red. His fingers dug into his throat, blocking his gullet, clearly not wanting what was in his stomach to come out.
He knew very well that with such heavy injuries, if the fruit came out now, the gunshot wound would not heal so easily.
Wait, wait a little longer.
But the fruit did not listen to him. Like a baby at full term, regardless of whether the mother was willing, it insisted on coming out. If it did not come out, they would both die.
Jian Jing: System, think of something.
[System: Draw a combination card, consume one cursed item and 10x2 special contribution points to create an item that suppresses curses]
It still wants me to draw cards at a time like this. This must be a gacha system.
"Draw draw draw."
[Card draw in progress (Courage x2)]
[Draw complete]
[Name: Combination Card - Item Creation (Special)]
[Content Description: Special type card that can be used to create special items, for use only in special instances]
[Note: The more complex the item, the higher the failure rate]
Jian Jing: There's still a probability, it's getting more and more of a scam.
But she had no choice and could only try. Fortunately, she had thrown the Salis family ring into her storage space just in case. Otherwise where would she find a cursed item now?
[System: Countdown 4, 3...]
"Combine! Quick!"
[Item creation in progress]
[Creation complete]
Jian Jing's palm grew heavy as a green emerald ring suddenly appeared in her palm. It looked exactly the same as the red ruby one, only the color was completely different.
She immediately put it on without hesitation.
[System: 2——]
The countdown stopped.
At the same time, Qi Tian's vomiting reached its critical point. His neck swelled up. Something in his throat shifted and squeezed towards his mouth. His jaw could not take it anymore and dislocated with a crack.
His mouth stretched to its limits. Yellow mucus dripped down as an apple-sized object rolled out and fell to the ground.
This was less like a fruit and more like an egg. The surface was smooth and semi-transparent. One could vaguely see a red core inside pulsating, extremely similar to a heart encased in the rib cage.
Qi Tian reached out to grab it. "Come back!"
Jian Jing did not know what it was but seeing how much Qi Tian valued it and its bizarre appearance, she unhesitantly fired at it again without a second thought.
Precisely hitting it.
There was a faint cracking sound from the fruit.
She had not expected such an egg-like fruit to be so hard that bullets could not shatter it, and hurriedly fired again.
But just as her finger was about to squeeze the trigger, the hair on her nape stood up. Her body reacted faster than her brain, immediately flattening down onto the ground. At the same time, something extremely cold and sharp whizzed past the back of her head.
Jian Jing believed that if she had been a second slower in lying down just now, her neck might be broken already.
What was that thing?
"Gulu -", a patch of black cloud landed on the ground.
It was not a flying dagger or a brick, but an owl...
That iconic appearance would let even a grade schooler recognize it at first sight, but it was so big and tall. Its size was completely unlike normal owls. It was more accurate to call it a divine eagle or an eagle deity.
It coldly glanced over Jian Jing and Qi Tian with aggressive intent clearly hidden within its imposing gaze, obviously weighing whether it was worth attacking the prey.
One must not show weakness when confronting wild beasts.
Jian Jing aimed her gun at its heart, keeping her breathing calm and concentrating fully. Meanwhile, Qi Tian tightly clutched at his stomach wound while also aiming his gun threateningly. "Piss off! I will never return it to you."
The owl turned its yellow eyeballs in a human-like display of contempt, as if asking: In your current state, can you stop me?
Qi Tian fired his gun in demonstration.
Swoosh, despite the owl's huge body, its movements were extremely agile. It flapped its wings and dodged the attack, diving straight at Qi Tian.
Their distance was very close. The owl only needed to swoop down before landing right in front of Qi Tian's face. Brown feathers brushed past his cheeks, instantly drawing blood. They were clearly very sharp.
But it did not take the chance to peck Qi Tian to death. It only lowered its head to pick up the fruit in its beak
before raising its head to swallow it.
"Damn it!" Qi Tian failed to seize back the fruit and fired wildly in frustration .
Having obtained the fruit, the owl had no intention to fight. It immediately spread its wings spanning a few meters and took off through the still uncollapsed cave passage leading to where the giant tree was deep inside.
Leaving behind only a particularly long, high-pitched cry of "Wu".
Jian Jing sensed something wrong intuitively.
This long call seemed to be summoning some companions. She did not dare linger and grabbed Qi Tian. "You have no regenerative abilities now. Behave."
Qi Tian said: "You don't dare kill me. Without me, you cannot get out of this cave."
"That's not necessarily true." She replied. "If you don't behave, I'll have no choice but to finish you off. We just have to spend a few days walking around this tiny place and will eventually find the way out."
Qi Tian sneered. "The White Kingdom is a large underground cave system the natives spent hundreds of years excavating. Do you think..."
The gun muzzle silenced him.
He swallowed bitterly. "Go left."
Jian Jing quickly withdrew.
She could use "borrowed vision" to check the route and was not afraid that he would cheat, and if he dared to use tricks, there would naturally be suffering waiting for him.
Qi Tian sensed her murderous intent. He was certain that this was the ferocity that only those who had blood on their hands would have, and only then extinguished the misleading thoughts in his mind and temporarily cooperated.
However, it wasn't long before he became anxious as well.
The red light in his field of vision was fading, once the fruit left, he would be no different from an ordinary person. Not only would he grow old and die, but he would also lose the qualification to enter the white cave.
"Hurry up," he didn't care about the bleeding wounds, anxiously urged, "it's almost gone."
Jian Jing knew what he meant and quickened her pace.
The red light dimmed. The cave no longer had the eerie double image, at some point it reverted back to an ordinary flat natural rock, but all the rocks were the same.
Without the guidance of the red light, every fork in the cave looked ninety-nine percent similar, unable to discern which one led outside and which one led to hell.
Ten minutes later, the red light was almost non-existent, a faint light appeared at the end.
The exit was here.
However, before the two could become enemies, gunshots sounded from the mouth of the cave. Old William appeared at the bend, his face hideous, holding a gun, obviously intending to trap them.
"William?" Jian Jing felt something was wrong and immediately shouted for him to stop, "Put down the gun, what are you doing?"
"Die! You will all die!" Old William sprayed bullets at the wall.
Bullets came down like rain, dense and overwhelming. Qi Tian and Jian Jing simultaneously dropped to the ground, quickly looking for cover.
Luckily Old William only had a semi-automatic rifle, not a machine gun, otherwise even White Kitten form wouldn't have been able to hold on.
After a round of gunfire, the shots slowed slightly.
Jian Jing leaped forward, her arm clutching Old William's neck while her body twisted midair to land behind him, avoiding the stray bullets from the gun.
Old William used the gun as a weapon to strike Jian Jing behind him.
Jian Jing employed her abdominal muscles, her legs twining around Old William's body to control his movement while her arms continued to choke his windpipe with force.
This seemingly simple move required immense physical exertion. An average person could only last one or two minutes before their strength dropped dramatically.
Jian Jing was grateful she had increased her endurance stat.
At this time, endurance played the most crucial role, allowing her to grit her teeth and persist without being thrown off by the frenzied Old William.
Gradually, Old William's breathing became ragged.
After all, he was no longer young and could not compare to Jian Jing who was in peak condition. His arms slackened and the gun slipped out. His hands firmly grabbed Jian Jing as he tried to wrench her off.
Jian Jing did not persist. She relaxed her hold and at the same time drew out her dagger, slashing Old William twice.
Unlike Qi Tian's formidable healing ability, blood flowed freely from Old William's wounds. His movements slowed increasingly.
Only then did Jian Jing ask, "Why did you attack us?"
