He Jiulu shot out like an arrow, carrying **Dictatorship** as she darted through the gap between two momentarily paralyzed monsters, charging straight at the composed Zhenyuanzi.
She bit down on **Dictatorship** with her mouth. She was about to activate her trait, which would make it difficult to hold the weapon with her hands, and she did not want to waste time or energy summoning it again later using a False Word.
Her hands rose simultaneously, flesh writhing frantically as scars tore open—
Countless blood vessels and nerve bundles surged out, instantly condensing into a crimson blood spear. It was even more refined than before, its tip shimmering with a cold, murderous light.
At the same time, with a mere thought from He Jiulu, the fingernails on all ten of her fingers flew backward, sending crimson blood splattering a great distance.
Ten bloody bone spikes erupted rapidly from where her nails should have been, tearing through her flesh as they protruded outward.
A flash of surprise crossed Zhenyuanzi’s face, which quickly melted into a sneer. “An ant trying to shake a giant tree!”
With a flick of his wide Taoist robes, it was not magical treasures that flew from his sleeves, but more tiny Ginseng Fruits that let out miserable, bitter laughs.
These Ginseng Fruits shot toward He Jiulu like living bombs, expanding rapidly in mid-air.
He Jiulu did not dodge. Under the influence of a False Word, the blood spear flew straight forward. **[PIERCE]**
The blood spear accurately struck the foremost expanding Ginseng Fruit, instantly piercing and detonating it.
Stinking flesh and juices splashed everywhere, but even more Ginseng Fruits swarmed toward her.
Facing the incoming horde, she crossed the bone spikes on her hands in front of her, the ten sharp spikes interlocking to form a pale barrier.
*Bang! Bang! Bang!* One after another, the Ginseng Fruits slammed into the bone spike barrier and exploded violently.
The foul, viscous flesh and juices splattered everywhere. The powerful impact made He Jiulu’s arms go numb, and the sleeves of her military uniform were instantly corroded and torn.
More bizarrely, the finger-shaped heart-eating insects that made up the Ginseng Fruits did not die in the explosion. Instead, they used the force of the blast to burrow like living arrows into the tiny wounds corroded onto her arms.
A piercing pain and itching sensation spread instantly. He Jiulu let out a muffled groan, clearly feeling those tiny insects frantically trying to tunnel into her blood vessels and crawl up her arms.
Everywhere they passed, her muscles felt a slight gnawing pain, while a cold, alien energy that sought to twist her flesh began to spread.
“It’s parasitism and transformation! Use your Elements to repel them!” Chiwutu’s voice carried a rare sense of urgency.
He Jiulu immediately surged the Elements from the Skeleton Core within her main body, and a cold torrent flooded into her arms.
The heart-eating insects burrowed under her skin froze instantly, as if encountering a natural predator. They became frantic but could no longer penetrate deeper.
However, Zhenyuanzi’s attack did not stop.
“Obstinate fool! I summon the righteous Qi of heaven and earth to slay this evil!” The old Taoist’s hair and beard flared out as he formed hand seals and pointed toward the sky.
The sky, which had only been covered in dark clouds, suddenly lit up with a blinding white light. Several thick bolts of lightning tore through the clouds, striking down with unavoidable speed.
*Boom—!!!* The lightning struck He Jiulu with precision.
The dazzling electrical light instantly swallowed her figure, and a violent current coursed through her entire body.
He Jiulu didn’t even have time to scream. Her vision went white, and every inch of her flesh and every nerve transmitted the extreme agony of being torn apart and carbonized.
She simultaneously felt her main body back at the construction site twitch violently, a burnt smell emanating from her nose and mouth.
The electrical light dissipated, leaving He Jiulu standing frozen in place.
Wisps of green smoke rose from her body. Her once-sharp military uniform was now charred and tattered. Large areas of her exposed skin were carbonized, her face was covered in a layer of black ash, and her red pupils seemed to have dimmed.
“Humph, nothing more than this,” Zhenyuanzi snorted coldly, his figure closing in like a ghost.
Taking advantage of the moment she was paralyzed by the lightning and unable to move, Zhenyuanzi’s withered yet powerful hands reached out like iron pincers. He death-gripped He Jiulu’s wrists at the very spots most weakened by the electric shock.
A powerful force bore down, nearly crushing her charred wrist bones.
Zhenyuanzi gave a forceful yank, pulling the charcoal-like He Jiulu toward him.
He Jiulu was powerless to resist. Her body lurched forward, her charred chest nearly touching the old Taoist’s seemingly simple robes.
Zhenyuanzi lowered his head. “Let this poor Taoist see what the roots of an evil creature like you truly are…”
Before he could finish his sentence, He Jiulu decided to go all out. Enduring the intense pain, she forced every single one of her ribs to pop out of her chest like folding knives, slashing into Zhenyuanzi’s chest and turning it into a bloody mess.
It wasn’t that He Jiulu didn’t fear pain; it was because if she didn’t hurry and take down the enemy, she couldn’t return her consciousness to her main body to work and earn money.
The thought that she was suffering so much just for a bit of salary to pay for food and housing made her let out an involuntary, bitter smile.
As He Jiulu’s ribs slashed into his chest, blood sprayed everywhere, staining Zhenyuanzi’s Taoist robes a bright red. He involuntarily loosened his grip on her wrists due to the searing pain.
He Jiulu seized the opportunity to break free. Forcing her charred body to move, she performed several backflips in quick succession, intending to put some distance between herself and Zhenyuanzi.
However, in her frantic state, she forgot there was still a group of human-shaped Ginseng Fruits behind her. By now, they had long since shaken off the negligible influence of **Dictatorship**.
One of the Ginseng Fruits suddenly reached out with a massive hand and grabbed He Jiulu’s body. With a single squeeze, the sounds of snapping bones and crushing internal organs rang out clearly. The ten bone spikes on He Jiulu’s hands instantly shattered.
He Jiulu nearly fainted. From the insect-waste-laden silk newly expelled from the holes in her body, she could tell that the heart-eating insects she had forcefully suppressed with the Skeleton Core’s Elements were gradually recovering.
Zhenyuanzi clutched his bloody chest, the mask of kindness on his face completely shattered, leaving only ferocity and pain.
He looked at the nearly deformed He Jiulu, a flicker of doubt and shock crossing his eyes.
“You evil thing… you can still move?!”
He Jiulu did not answer, nor could she. The intense pain was nearly tearing her consciousness apart.
Her powerful survival instinct and her obsession with money acted like final drops of fuel, injecting themselves into the Skeleton Core within her.
**[REPEL… REJECT…]**
The broken False Words no longer came from her throat, but vibrated out from deep within her carbonized torso, from that coldly burning Skeleton Core.
*Hum—!* An invisible repulsive field expanded violently with He Jiulu at the center.
The heart-eating insects that had burrowed into her arms were instantly forced out by this power, exploding into disgusting mists of blood in mid-air.
The giant hand of the Ginseng Fruit gripping her was also shaken loose by this sudden force.
Ignoring her body that was nearly falling apart, the flesh of her right hand began to writhe frantically once more—
This time, it did not form an offensive spear or spike. Instead, it began to rapidly corrode and liquefy like powerful acid.
For the money!!!!!