Zang Xu was slightly startled, not believing Xiao Man's words. How could he, a peak Golden Core master, be outsmarted by a mere Foundation Establishment novice? Besides, the demon race were the ancestors of poison. To show off their skills before the ancestors was ridiculous.
"Does Sect Master Zang not want to examine his Golden Core?" Xiao Man saw Zang Xu's indifference and kindly reminded him. She noticed that people of the Five Poisons Sect had a strange confidence when it came to poison.
Zang Xu's expression remained unchanged as he secretly checked his Golden Core. To his surprise, he found a black mist coiling around it.
"What did you do?" Zang Xu instantly appeared before Xiao Man, grabbing her by the neck and lifting her up. "You should know, it's as easy for this Venerable to kill you as it is to crush an ant."
"I know you can kill me like an ant," Xiao Man said with difficulty. "In your eyes, I am but an ant, yet it is precisely this ant that will take your life!"
"To take my life, how naive!"
"Naive?" Xiao Man smiled. "This poison once incapacitated Yan Ze, the former City Lord. After my modifications, it has become another potent toxin. The antidote you hold will not only fail to cure your poisoning but will also accelerate its onset. Now, do you still believe I have no value in living?"
Zang Xu was furious, wishing he could snap Xiao Man's delicate neck. However, he had tried and failed to expel the poison from his body. This meant that if he wanted a cure, he could not kill her!
"Kid, you're quite something!" Zang Xu gnashed his teeth ferociously. "I hope you won't end up crying and begging me to kill you!" Su Dan Novel Network
In the dark secret chamber, a person hung from a rack, head slumped, fate unknown.
Deep wounds marked this person's wrists, not like a single cut, but like repeated slashes over time to create such depth.
"A'Yu."
The person on the rack suddenly looked up. Unkempt, with sunken eyes, their appearance, long neglected, gave no clue to their former self.
Their eyes were filled with a vacant gaze, as if looking through the darkness to a distant place where the person they yearned for lay on the ground, blood gushing from their mouth, yet their enemies showed no mercy.
"Let her go!" a low, hoarse voice echoed eerily in the dark chamber. Moments later, the person on the rack fell silent, head bowed once more, as if their breath had faded.
At that moment, the door to the secret chamber opened, and two men entered. One carried a tray, on which sat a small jade bowl and a sharp dagger.
"His blood seems to be losing its efficacy," they spoke as they entered. "The batch of medicine developed recently isn't as potent as the initial ones."
As they spoke, they reached the rack. Looking at the person suspended, one man grabbed the prisoner's hair. Normally, this would have incited the prisoner's rage, but today, the prisoner was remarkably quiet, so quiet it was as if they were already dead.
The man felt a jolt of alarm and quickly checked the prisoner's pulse, only to find no trace of it. His expression changed drastically: "He... he's dead."
"Dead?" The other man hastily put down the tray and went to examine the prisoner on the rack. Indeed, there was no pulse, no heartbeat. The two exchanged a glance and quickly took out keys to release the prisoner.
"Could it be that he lost too much blood and his body couldn't withstand it? Quickly, get the Blood Reviving Pills and give him a few more."
The other man scrambled to fetch the Blood Reviving Pills, knowing that if this human experiment died, their responsibility would be over.
"Did you bring the Blood Reviving Pills? I don't see them," the one searching for medicine asked, but received no reply from his companion.
"I asked why you're not speaking..." The man turned around and saw the prisoner, who was supposed to be lifeless, standing behind him. He grabbed the man's neck and with a forceful twist, heard a bone crack. The man's body slumped to the ground, lifeless.
The prisoner stripped off the clothes of the other man he had knocked out, swapped them, and tied the unconscious man onto the rack. He then hid the other man's corpse in a corner. After a brief tidy-up, he sauntered out.
By the time others discovered something was amiss, the prisoner had long since escaped their control.
Within the secret realm, Zang Xu held Qi Hong in one hand and Xiao Man in the other, tossing them onto the ice plain. Qi Hong cried out in pain and awoke from his stupor. Seeing Zang Xu, he breathed a sigh of relief.
"Thank you, Sect Master, for saving my life."
Zang Xu toyed with a dagger in his hand. It was Xiao Man's "Ask Heaven," a blade of such sharpness that it had piqued Zang Xu's interest, leading him to snatch it from Xiao Man.
"Do you hate her?" Zang Xu asked without looking up.
Qi Hong looked at Xiao Man, lying on the ground with blood seeping from her lips. His gaze was complex. If he said he hated her, Xiao Man hadn't done anything to threaten his life; in fact, if not for her, he would still be struggling to survive at the bottom of the cliff. Yet, if he didn't hate her, Xiao Man had used him as a pawn to threaten the Five Poisons Sect.
"Yes, I hate her!" Qi Hong quickly answered.
"Since you hate her, I shall leave her to you for disposal," Zang Xu said, showing no regard for the severely wounded and dying Xiao Man. No matter how capable she was, she was gravely injured and could perish at any moment.
Qi Hong was taken aback. "You mean, I decide whether she lives or dies?"
Zang Xu looked up at Qi Hong, his voice a low murmur, "You can only decide the manner of her death."
"You want me to kill her?" Qi Hong asked cautiously. He disliked Xiao Man, but that didn't mean he wanted to kill her. His dissatisfaction stemmed from Shan Yun's greater trust in Xiao Man than in him, a matter of wounded pride leading to resentment. But to actually kill Xiao Man, he was still hesitant.
"What, you don't want to kill her?" A cold smile played on Qi Hong's lips. After being treated this way, did he still intend to show mercy?
"No, I wanted to kill her a long time ago. But I don't want her to die too quickly. I want to torture her, to make her wish for life, but be unable to live, and wish for death, but be unable to die." Qi Hong said with a sinister expression. "To kill her just like that would be letting her off too easy."
Zang Xu raised an eyebrow. "How do you want to torture her?"
"First, let her taste all the poisons!" Qi Hong said fiercely. "Let her endure the torment of the toxins, turn her into a poison person, and let her suffer the agony of poison outbreaks every day."
Zang Xu nodded slowly. This was indeed an excellent method of torture, and turning someone into a poison person was quite a challenge. However, Qi Hong likely wouldn't have the chance to learn how to make a poison person. But he could fulfill this wish for him.