This time, she wasn’t so lucky.
Feigning a carefree leap out of the nest, Jiang Ke’er landed squarely on her backside with a thud, falling hard on her bottom.
“What happened?”
Qian Yue’s concerned voice came from within the nest.
“It’s nothing, nothing.”
Jiang Ke’er hurriedly scurried away.
Glancing at the Alchemy Furnace in her hand, Jiang Ke’er’s spirits lifted.
This little furnace truly was a timely boon. With it, she could now produce pills that rapidly absorbed and replenished blood.
There were plenty of materials in the forest. She had already spotted and gathered a few medicinal herbs earlier, and now, with abundant ingredients, all she needed was a place to refine them.
The location for refining had to be far from the nest. During alchemy, a strong medicinal fragrance would waft out, accompanied by a curl of blue smoke rising skyward, instantly exposing her position.
Jiang Ke’er dashed toward the eastern mountains.
Blood-Replenishing Pill was a low-grade pill, easy to make.
In no time at all, Jiang Ke’er turned all the materials at hand into Blood-Replenishing Pills. Once the pills were ready, she didn’t even bother with the heat—she stuffed them all into her mouth at once.
It felt like being revived.
Although these materials were nowhere near enough to restore her vitality completely, at least she could remain conscious and act normally. Moreover, six hours later, Qian Yue would have enough rations again.
Knowing her location was likely exposed, Jiang Ke’er quickly stowed the Alchemy Furnace away, shrinking it and storing it within her consciousness world.
Then she dove into a mouse hole.
The mice inside were all stunned.
A nest of baby mice huddled together, trembling in fear at the sudden arrival of this strange creature, squeaking shrilly.
The mother mouse paid no attention to her children’s cries. She stared at Jiang Ke’er, only a whisker away, her mind briefly blank. But once she came to her senses, she simply and decisively flopped to the ground and played dead.
Jiang Ke’er grinned slyly like a fox, crawled up to the soft, pink baby mice, bared her canine teeth, and stretched out a tiny paw to gently pat their heads.
Seeing their bodies freeze in terror, Jiang Ke’er finally crawled away, satisfied.
Good thing there was no plague in this otherworld, or Jiang Ke’er would never dare play like this.
Boom—Boom—Boom—
Another round of smashing and banging came from above ground. It was that Cao Zhen from the Fireblade Squad, causing havoc again.
He could smell the lingering fragrance of pills, but with no sign of Jiang Ke’er, all he could do was rampage in frustration, tearing up the place hoping for a lucky find.
In this second round of the Trial, Jiang Ke’er’s small fox form showed its true advantage. She could easily slip into holes no human could squeeze through.
Especially the underground mouse tunnels—those dug by mice and moles were labyrinthine, often with multiple exits. Inside, she could perfectly hide her body and leave from any direction.
The mole tunnels were particularly useful. A single mole could dig out over seven thousand square meters of burrow, crisscrossing and interconnected above and below. No matter how fiercely Cao Zhen struck at the surface, the shock couldn’t reach the lower levels she was in.
Jiang Ke’er simply traveled underground, using only her spiritual sense to perceive the situation above.
Who knew how many years these tunnels had existed? Rare fungi and ultra-rare medicinal herbs, unseen outside, grew within. Jiang Ke’er happily gathered them as she went.
Extending her spiritual sense, Jiang Ke’er sensed another tunnel, dug by a mole, not far behind the earth wall. So, she simply dug through and leapt into another section.
“Come out! Stop skulking around—fight me fair and square!”
Cao Zhen’s patience was running thin.
He could sense Jiang Ke’er was nearby, but just couldn’t find a trace of her.
Suddenly, a white blur appeared not far away. A fox’s head shot out of a hole, snatched a medicinal herb from the entrance, and immediately ducked back in.
Boom—
Cao Zhen blasted the spot with a powerful punch, leaving a gaping crater.
But the rustling sounds came from behind him.
At another hidden tunnel entrance, Jiang Ke’er poked her head out again, snatching up another rare medicinal herb.
Boom—
Just as Cao Zhen tried to collect Jiang Ke’er’s corpse, she popped up near a few trees, quickly grabbing a white mushroom at the roots.
Boom—
Cao Zhen’s veins bulged with fury, his rationality slipping fast.
He chased Jiang Ke’er from one end of the mountain to the other, smashing every mouse and mole tunnel he passed to bits.
He felt like the most diligent ox, plowing up every patch of this wild mountain.
Why was this fox-hunting game so hard?!
“Ahhhhhh—!”
Cao Zhen went all out, sprawling on the ground like a bulldozer, using his arms in a freestyle swimming motion to frantically pound the earth.
This time, he didn’t even care where Jiang Ke’er was. His goal was simply to flatten several miles of land, giving her nowhere to surface.
He wanted to bury her alive underground and suffocate her, but he had no idea just how good these subterranean rodents were at digging.
An hour passed. Exhausted and gasping, he lay sprawled on the ground, turning his head with satisfaction to survey the forest he had leveled—when suddenly, a surprised little exclamation sounded by his ear.
“Wah~”
Looking up, he saw Jiang Ke’er standing beside him, somehow, bent over and staring at him with a look that screamed, “Are you an idiot?”
“Not bad~”
“Thank you~”
[Received 20,000 Villain Points from Cao Zhen.]
After Jiang Ke’er’s sarcastic triple combo, Cao Zhen’s composure was completely shattered.
Even worse, Jiang Ke’er took the opportunity to whip out a little dagger and jab him twice.
Though she couldn’t pierce Cao Zhen’s true qi defense, it was still a humiliation, as if her intelligence had steamrolled his.
Enraged, Cao Zhen lunged at Jiang Ke’er, but she shrank and vanished with a swish, bolting a few steps before leaping into a small pond and disappearing.
Beneath the pond was another tunnel entrance—right where he couldn’t reach, no matter how hard he dug.
Cao Zhen snapped.
His whole body flushed red with anger. Bending his knees, he leaped high into the sky.
He soared nearly a thousand meters into the air, then, with gravity and spiritual power, crashed back toward the ground!
Splat—
But the meteor-like scene did not happen. The soil here was loose, riddled with fragile tunnels below.
Cao Zhen’s arms and head plunged straight into the ground, and then his whole body sank deep into the earth.
Though he achieved his goal—collapsing the entire underground network for dozens of miles around—he was now trapped, unable to exert any strength, with no easy way out.
Jiang Ke’er, still a bit shaken, ran to the edge of a tunnel and peered into the pitch-black hole below.
Cao Zhen’s thick legs thrashed wildly, but it didn’t help him escape one bit.
“That’s just tragic,” Jiang Ke’er muttered, curling her lips. After a moment’s thought, she lit a torch and tossed it into the tunnel.
“Ah… ah!!! My butt! You bastard! I’m going to kill you—!”
The scent of roasting fat drifted up from the hole. It actually smelled kind of good.
After a little more thought, Jiang Ke’er pulled out the poisonous herbs she’d gathered earlier and began refining them.
Very soon, those poisonous herbs turned into a scalding, bubbling, green-foamed ominous brew.
She smiled sweetly. “Big guy, try a taste of my cooking~”
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