Chapter Eleven: Fleeing (Part Two)

  Just after saying that, Xiaoyan's right leg suddenly softened and she knelt down on the spot. The sudden burning pain from her calf almost made her cry out in pain.

  But in the split second before she let out a pained cry, she bit down hard and didn't let out a single sound. After going through so many hardships, Xia Yufei had long since learned to swallow her teeth along with the blood. Although she knew it wasn't exactly a good habit, she still felt rather proud of having this skill.

  After all, sometimes exposing one's weakness is equivalent to handing over one's life to the enemy, and it will directly turn oneself from a knife into a fish on the chopping board, and there is nothing else that can be done except flapping its tail twice.

  In this case, she had no choice but to sit back in the resting place with the support of the cliff wall, and after opening the flashlight that had already begun to flicker, she used a short knife to cut open the fabric at the painful spot on her right calf.

  She woke up to find a large piece of skin scraped off her right calf when she was tied up like a rice dumpling. To this day, she still doesn't understand why Fang Chenye didn't search her but rolled up her pant legs and sleeves to the joints, if it were her, at least she would take away the other person's shoes to prevent them from escaping.

  When Ao Yuan heard Xia Yu Fei muttering these words to herself, he really didn't know what expression to use to face her. Fortunately, he was still like this and didn't have to be really troubled by the problem of expressions.

  He felt that the thoughts of this girl in front of him were forever incomprehensible, although she looked like a gentle and elegant girl, but her words always made him feel as if he was facing a sharp blade forged from the fire of life and death, shining with a cold light.

  But at her age, how could she have gone through all this?

  But Ao Yuan was quietly thinking that this knife would always be too strong, if she couldn't learn to make a scabbard for herself to hide its edge, one day it would break with a crisp sound.

  He had seen too many such sharp blades, but this beautiful knife in front of him shouldn't have ended up like this.

  She deserves the most perfect scabbard in this world, quietly hiding her edge, and once she is unsheathed, it will be a moment when all under heaven will be overturned.

  But it's still a while before Xia Yu Fei becomes the sharp blade sheathed in its scabbard. Now, the originally raven-feather-like soft and long hair of the girl, although tied up with a hemp rope, was already covered in mud and became disheveled. She frowned as she used a short knife to peel off the cloth stuck to her wound by blood.

  On the one hand, she finally couldn't help but let out a hissing sound due to the pain, and without water to moisten the cloth, it was so hard to peel off, always making her feel like she had personally stripped off her own skin.

  After stripping off all the fabric, Xiaoyan was already covered in cold sweat. She didn't have time to care about the sweat that had begun to drip down continuously. Taking advantage of the flashlight's remaining light, she hurriedly and carefully examined the wound that made her legs weak.

  And Ao Yuan also walked down from her body and stood up straight to examine her wound.

  It has to be said that Xia Yuxin is very fair, but this fairness is not the delicate and fragile whiteness of porcelain, on the contrary, she is as white as a warm jade.

  But it was precisely this white that made the wound on her leg even more shocking.

  The calf, which had originally been scratched open to reveal a large piece of skin, now had three deep and visible claw marks that seemed to pierce the bone. And for some reason, the flesh torn open by the three claw marks was not the bright red color of human tissue, but instead revealed a faintly visible dark purple hue.

  "Hmph, as expected, I've been caught by that thing again." Xiaoyan's words seemed calm, but the short knife flying rapidly between her right hand's five fingers revealed her inner unrest. "I'm telling you, Ao Yuan, I won't become one of those things too, will I?"

  Ao Yuan, who could have been asked by her, did not respond at all.

  "Alright, I know. So, is there any way to stop this transformation?"

  "Even if you could, you might not be able to bear it." Ao Yuan finally spoke up, his calm and low voice sounding particularly ruthless at this moment. "Cut off the entire piece of flesh that was scratched by it, even if you managed to do it, do you think you can still walk out of here afterwards?"

  Xia Yanfei leaned back against the cliff, laughing out loud, and the laughter grew louder and louder in the empty space, like a ghost.

  After laughing enough, she wiped away the tears that had been laughed out of her eyes: "You don't think I've never done this before, do you?"

  She picked up the short knife again, took out a lighter from her close-fitting pocket and began to scorch the blade for disinfection: "Honestly, I thought it would be much harder. It's just cutting off, it's really too simple."

  "Are you sure you've thought it through? How are you going to...under such pain..."

  "Spirit Contract."

  Xia Yanfei interrupted Ao Yuan with two words, looking at him seriously and repeating again: "An incomplete spiritual contract can temporarily seal my pain, I've tried it. But it's just sealing the pain, and you can't avoid getting infected or feverish."

  "So, Ao Yuan, if I die here after a long time, you'll help find Lan Ruoxue and Fang Ying. Bring them out, then tell them that I was left behind by Qing Long."

  The moment the words fell, a short knife had already been neatly and efficiently stabbed into her own wound. Xia Yu Fei tightly clenched her teeth to prevent even a hint of a moan from escaping, yet she still involuntarily let out a pained sound due to physiological reflexes.

  But Xiaoyan finally knew that this was not her limit, two years ago she and Zhang Xuan and her own brother had also cut off a piece of skin that had been bitten by a snake.

  What is the limit of pain?

  The extreme of pain is that you basically can't feel what's called pain.

  Ao Yuan was stunned by Xia Yunfei's actions. He finally understood where his feelings came from, the ordinary person in front of him was completely different from those who had begged for his mercy and favors before, her tenacity and determination were all tempered through blood and sweat, Xia Yunfei never sought favors from others, everything she had was obtained by her own hands.

  It was this person who sparked immense interest in him, making him feel that the next three years by her side would not be as dull as he had initially imagined.

  When Xiaoyan finished treating her wound and re-tying her pants with a hemp rope, she was already close to fainting. Fortunately, the incomplete spiritual contract did not require too much repetitive application method, only her heart's blood and that strange and awkward hymn were needed.

  She wiped the sweat from her face and motioned to Ao Yuan to climb up, ready to continue forward - for some reason she had adapted to this method in a short period of time - completely disregarding her pale and frightening complexion.

  The flashlight finally went out completely after flashing twice, but Xiaoyan still put it in her pocket. She touched her cracked and bleeding lips, knowing that her condition was extremely bad and she had to find a water source quickly to replenish the large amount of lost water.

  At this moment, a dazzling beam of light suddenly lit up in front of her, and she reflexively raised her left hand to block her eyes from the strong light, while keeping the short knife in her right hand in a state of readiness to attack at any time.

  Then she heard a male voice that was all too familiar ——

  "Ayuan, what brings you here too?"