This Damned Thirst for Survival
chapter-44

But madmen do things for reasons that the average person cannot understand.

Jiang Luo and his companions walked for five or six minutes through the cave and came to a fork in a four-way road.

Lu Youyi looked at the four roads in darkness before him and asked in a deep voice, “Which one do we take?”

Jiang Luo chose the fourth path on a hunch, “This one, I guess, is not the most dangerous.”

Lu Youyi looked at him with a complicated face, wanting to say something, ” Jiang Luo , it’s not that I don’t believe you, but this physique of yours …… generally says that whatever is bad, will really be bad.”

Jiang Luo : “…… You’re right, exclude number four.”

The dead ghost pointed to the first road, “I think we can go this way.”

Jiang Luo looked at him as if he had sold out his nest without knowing it, and the corners of his mouth lifted in relief as he patted him on the shoulder and said encouragingly, “Damn, if you have such an instinct, just say so and we’ll follow your lead.”

The dead ghost did lead them down a safe path. They winded their way through the cave and came to a drawbridge.

Chains run across the sides and the wooden planks are crude, making the suspension bridge dangerous. Jiang Luo looks down to see the underground river beneath the suspension bridge, which is still full of water spirits.

The dead ghost said, “Cross the drawbridge and you’re there.”

Jiang Luo asked, “Where to?”

A blank look appeared on the dead man’s face, “I don’t know.”

Jiang Luo was not surprised, he shrugged, “Let’s go.”

The dead ghost led the way, but as they reached the middle of the drawbridge, a man dressed in red and wearing a fox mask came across it.

The fox mask was green-faced, with a long, bulging nose and the word “flower” carved into the side of the mask. The man walked up to the drawbridge and said grimly, “Teng Bi, are you planning to betray your master?”

Jiang Luo and Lu Youyi immediately looked sideways at the dead ghost, who did not react, and only after being looked at by them did he ask in confusion, “What are you looking at me for?”

Lu Youyi reminded, “It looks like he’s calling you.”

So the dead ghost is called Teng Bi? What a strange name.

But if the dead ghosts regained their memories, would they be in danger?

The dead ghost said, “His name is Teng Bi , and my name is Dead Ghost.”

The man in red snorted, “So you’ve even forgotten what your name is, how pathetic, no wonder you’ve become a scouting dog in the hands of humans.”

Jiang Luo lazily interjected, “Oh? Are you jealous that he can be a dog and you can’t even compare to a dog?”

The man in red’s smile faltered, “Seeking death.”

He reached out, his hand like a fox’s claw, his fingers excessively long and slender, the back of his hand sinewy, his nails sharp and pointed, shaped like curved hooks. In moments the man in red was in front of Jiang Luo from across the room, and before he could bring his claws down, they met with the dead ghost’s large sword.

The claws and the knife surprisingly scraped with piercing sparks as the dead ghost shielded Jiang Luo and Lu Youyi behind him and said coldly, “You won’t be able to hurt them.”

The man in red furrowed his brow, ” Teng Bi , you really are out of your mind.”

He unceremoniously increased the force, his claws sliding from the tip to the hilt of the blade, heavily cutting five scratches into the dead ghost’s hand, blood instantly trickling down the dead ghost’s arm, the claw marks bone deep.

The dead ghost looked at the wound on his arm.

The man in red’s claws seemed to have some kind of toxin on them, corroding and causing the dead ghost’s wound to bubble white, a wound that should have healed itself in seconds, but not a single bit of it did.

The dead ghost frowned, ignoring the pain and attacked with his knife, only to have the man in red gouge another bloody mark on his chest. Lu Youyi exclaimed, “Dead Ghost!”

The man in red looks towards Lu Youyi and has just extended his claws when the dead ghost interrupts his attack from behind.

The suspension bridge shook violently, and the dead ghost and the man in red were evenly matched, but the man in red’s claws seemed to be a heavenly grip on the dead ghost, and the wounds on the dead ghost’s body could not heal, and he soon fell behind. The man in red said mockingly, ” Teng Bi , when did you become so weak?”

The dead ghost blocked another of his blows and turned back to Jiang Luo and the two of them, “You go first!”

Jiang Luo wanted to summon the Yin Yang Ring to fight the man in red with the dead ghosts, but they were too quick to fight, and if he summoned the 12 zodiac signs, the 12 zodiac signs would only attack together with the dead ghosts.

Jiang Luo frowned and dragged Lu Youyi across the drawbridge.

Lu Youyi glanced back in disbelief, his heart aching: ” Jiang Luo, will the dead ghost be all right?”

“They are the right and left guardians of the idol, they know each other, the man in red would not have done anything to the dead ghost,” but Jiang Luo’s furrowed brow did not ease for a moment, he did not like to owe people favours, “Never mind, I will go back and see.”

He stopped in his tracks and prepared to go back. Lu Youyi pulled him back, “I’ll go with you.”

As soon as the words left his mouth, Lu Youyi let out a muffled grunt, ” Jiang Luo , it looks like something has bitten my leg.”

As he spoke, his face slowly turned iron blue and he lost the blood on his lips, “It hurts, it hurts.”

Jiang Luo was startled when he looked down and saw a scorpion with a blue tail crawling across the top of Lu Youyi’s shoe. The scorpion was about the size of a hand and its tail stood straight up like a needle. These scorpions grow on blood, and the toxin in each tail can kill a living person within an hour.

Jiang Luo’s face suddenly turned ugly as the golden rune transformed into the bite of a snake, Jiang Luo helped Lu Youyi sit down, pulled off the poisonous stinger and then quickly bled him.

But the scorpion was so poisonous that in a few moments Lu Youyi’s wound had already swollen and he shivered as if he were in the middle of winter.

Jiang Luo’s hands trembled slightly, extreme anger burned into him, and in addition to anger, there was some nervousness and fear that he himself did not understand why it was there.

Jiang Luo doesn’t think he needs friends.

Family and friendships, he respectfully disregards.

In his eyes, the people of Bai Hua University were just a shield to protect him and be used by him.

This should have been the case.

But he could not restrain himself from feeling panic now.

Why panic?

Because Lu Youyi is going to die?

Because he sees Lu Youyi as a friend?

Jiang Luo rises to his feet, clenching his fists. Suddenly remembering something, he hurriedly reached out his hand, the huge golden python wrapped around his arm, a bite of the scorpion still remaining in its mouth. Jiang Luo took the scorpion with his right hand, wrapped in black cloth, and slashed the body of the scorpion without killing this one.

Bright red blood flows from the scorpion’s body.

It is the male scorpion.

Jiang Luo took a sharp breath.

There are two types of scorpion: male and female. The male scorpion can be saved if he is stung, but the female can only wait for death.

If you are poisoned by a male scorpion, if you can find a female within an hour, you can get rid of the male’s toxin by rubbing his sting with the female’s blood.

The blood of the male scorpion is red and that of the female is white. Although the female scorpion is poisonous, its blood has the effect of a great tonic, fixing the soul and guarding the yin, and is useful to both the living and the dead, so it is constantly hunted, resulting in far fewer females than males.

But even if it is less, it means Lu Youyi has a chance of surviving.

Jiang Luo took a deep breath and applied the rune to Lu Youyi’s wound, slowing down the spread of the poison. He hid Lu Youyi in a corner, leaving only a golden rune for himself, and used the rest to shield Lu Youyi.

“An hour,” he murmured, “play it safe and go by forty minutes.”

Time is of the essence.

Jiang Luo looks back at the drawbridge, sorry.

He wondered silently in his mind.

He couldn’t make sure the dead ghost was safe at this point, he had to find the female Poisontail Scorpion first.

Jiang Luo places the injured venom-tailed scorpion on the ground.

Poisontail scorpions are swarming scorpions and will return to their nests as soon as they are injured, with both males and females in the nest.

The poisonous-tailed scorpion that had been put on the ground did move quickly.

Jiang Luo followed the scorpion gingerly, but as the scorpion’s speed increased and the path became more and more rugged, Jiang Luo kept counting the minutes until the road opened up in front of him after almost 20 minutes.

Jiang Luo hears the faint sound of water flowing.

Another branch of the underground river?

And yes, scorpions like dark, damp places.

He tumbled sensitively over the rocks and the next moment after his vision opened up, Jiang Luo caught a glimpse of light. His brow jumped and he instantly rolled behind a stone wall.

Once hidden, he looked carefully into the light.

Ahead is a cave cut out by hand.

In the middle of the cave, a pond has been dug out. The water in the pond was white to a slightly sticky texture, and Jiang Luo recognised at first sight that it was all the blood of a female venomous-tailed scorpion.

With so much blood, even forming a pond, I was afraid that all the female poisonous-tailed scorpions in the entire cave of the earth would be killed off.

Jiang Luo takes a deep look at the pond water before shifting his gaze to the man soaking in the pond.

In the water is a man, his arms resting gently on the edge of the pool in a relaxed and easy gesture.

In this strange and crisis-ridden hole in the ground, he seems to be enjoying himself without any discomfort.

The next moment he saw the man, Jiang Luo’s right eyelid jumped several times.

Chi You.

Fuckin’ Chi You.

He thought with certainty as well as certainty that the earlier incident of being chased by the Buddha statue was not his great omen of evil, but that now was the point at which his great omen of evil took effect.

Shit.

He needs the blood of the female poisonous-tailed scorpion, and the one who soaks in the blood of the female poisonous-tailed scorpion is the evil spirit who wants his life.

How the fuck can this be such a coincidence.

Jiang Luo mentally cursed several times as his mind raced, pondering how he could get to the pond in the shortest possible time and get out in one piece.

The poisonous-tailed scorpion that had brought Jiang Luo here was still crawling forward and hadn’t even crawled a metre when the evil spirit in the pool tilted its head slightly sideways and sketched out a strange, big smile, “Hmm, something coming?”

Jiang Luo’s heart leapt and he held his breath.

The next moment, the poisonous scorpion was nailed to the ground by a black mist. Chi You retracted his head, closed his eyes and leaned back, humming moodily.

The tune runs out of steam, but in the midst of this scene there is not a hint of amusement at all, only a doubling of the weirdness.

Jiang Luo has no time to delay any longer.

He closed his eyes and quickly built a route in his mind that would allow him to enter and exit. After determining the route, he quietly exited the stone wall.

Chi You’s blind spot is directly behind him, so pretend to sneak up on him and steal the water while you can, then run afterwards.

If it goes well.

Jiang Luo is one step closer to Chi You.

The evil spirit did not notice his arrival, still humming a song with an eerie tune. Jiang Luo thought to himself, “Now is the time.

He swung his knife at the top of the demon’s head, but the demon grabbed his hand as if it had eyes behind it, and with a sudden force, Jiang Luo was pulled into the water.

Flutter-

Jiang Luo’s body is drenched in the blood of the female Venomtail scorpion in a flash. The white blood was strangely bloodless, the milky streams of water zigzagging and sliding down his face as if he had taken a milk bath.

The next moment he was pinned against the wall of the pool by the naked evil spirit, who had one hand upwards, clutching his hands to prevent him from using the Yin-Yang ring. The next moment he was pinned against the wall of the pool by the naked evil spirit, who had one hand upwards, clutching his hands to prevent the black-haired youth from using the Yin-Yang ring. With the other hand, it was propped up against the wall of the pool at the side of the black-haired youth.

The evil spirit and Jiang Luo are close together.

The dark-haired youth was forced to bend over and stabilise himself with his right foot on the waist and stomach of the underwater villain.

Chi You lengthened his tone and said, “Well, what’s going on here with a-”

“Lost,” amused eyes scanned Jiang Luo’s body, “bride?”