Chapter 35: A Familiar Face Appears!

The car window was open, and as the cold wind swept in, Xu Jiya felt a wave of dizziness. Though she hadn’t drunk much, the alcohol was starting to take effect. The car sped through the glittering downtown, heading straight for the outskirts. Outside the window, the scenery grew darker and gloomier.

After about half an hour, the vehicle pulled over on a secluded roadside. Xu Jiya blinked in confusion. “Hmm? Why are we stopping here? Where are we?” Anxiety flared in her heart. Glancing back, she saw Xiang Nan and Su Yao sprawled across the back seat, fast asleep and drooling.

The foreign female driver curled her lips in a sinister smile. “There’s a blood donation van ahead. You all look so young and healthy—why not get out and donate some blood?” The glint of malice in the woman’s eyes sent a chill through Xu Jiya. She turned to look outside.

Indeed, not far to the right, a white blood donation vehicle was parked. Four people in white lab coats stepped out, carrying various instruments. Who would collect blood by the roadside in the middle of the night? Such an obvious flaw meant they were acting with impunity. Looking again, she realized all four in lab coats were foreigners, clearly in league with the driver.

Xu Jiya turned back. The female driver had already opened the rear door and was dragging the dazed Xiang Nan from his seat. Xu Jiya panicked. “What are you doing? Brother Xiang Nan, wake up!” But the driver ignored her, hauling Xiang Nan out of the car.

Beside them, the half-conscious Su Yao stirred at the commotion and wrapped her arms tightly around Xiang Nan’s leg. “Don’t run! We’re not done yet—whoever backs out is a coward!” This unexpected move made things harder for the driver, but both Su Yao and Xiang Nan were so drunk that it was only a matter of time before they were dragged away.

Xu Jiya’s heart was pounding with anxiety. She raised her right hand.

“Shhh—shhh—shhh—” Several silver needles shot through the air in rapid succession. The driver had dismissed Xu Jiya as no threat, not expecting any surprises. Even with her quick reflexes, she couldn’t dodge all the needles; one stabbed into her arm.

The needles were coated with a potent poison, and as it entered her flesh, a burning, numbing pain spread. The driver’s face darkened. She was forced to release Xiang Nan and leap aside, swiftly extracting the needle and applying some unknown powder to temporarily suppress the poison.

In that instant, Xu Jiya activated the mechanism in her left hand, aiming at the four approaching figures in white coats. From her device, a swarm of black venomous insects burst forth, swarming toward the group.

She had released both weapons simultaneously, catching the lab-coated assailants off guard. Startled by the sudden onslaught of poisonous insects, they scattered in all directions, their martial skills allowing them to evade immediate harm. The insects slowed them, but their cultivation was at least second tier, making them difficult to seriously injure.

Xu Jiya knew well that her tricks were no match for several martial artists above the second tier; it was like trying to stop a chariot with a mantis claw. Her initial attack missed. If she tried again, the element of surprise would be lost, making it even harder to succeed.

As her weapons launched, Xu Jiya flipped into the back seat, swiftly opened the door, grabbed each of her companions, and dashed out. “Brother Xiang Nan! Yao Yao! Wake up!” Her voice was urgent—her efforts would only buy them a moment.

They had barely exited the car when the white coats rushed over. With no time to spare, Xu Jiya released Su Yao, whirled around, and unleashed a volley of golden needles, forming a dense net. Though she couldn’t hit her assailants, in the blink of an eye, she had already leapt several meters away with the two. For an ordinary girl to show such strength was already remarkable.

At that moment, the driver, having suppressed the poison, sprang from beside the car and closed in on the three of them. “I didn’t expect you to be a master of hidden weapons!” she spat, brandishing a dagger and thrusting it toward Xu Jiya’s back.

Xu Jiya was horrified; with both hands occupied, she had no way to defend herself. The blade was about to pierce her back when, suddenly, Xiang Nan at her right side opened his eyes.

What was going on? He found himself being carried like a chicken by Xu Jiya, his feet dragging along the ground due to his height. Hey, he thought, I only drank a little—do I deserve this kind of treatment? And when did Xu Jiya get so strong?

Perplexed, he suddenly sensed a murderous wind at his back. Xiang Nan snapped his head around.

A flash of cold steel! A surge of killing intent! The fog of intoxication vanished in an instant. Moving purely by instinct, Xiang Nan pushed off with his toes and flipped backward. In a split second, his hand shot out in midair.

The next moment, the dagger in the woman’s hand was seized mid-strike. With a twist of his right hand, Xiang Nan wrenched the blade away from the driver—whose abilities were already at the third tier—by sheer force.

In the same instant, he spun in the air. “Shadowless Kick!” Countless afterimages of his feet swept forward, forcing the driver to stagger back. The ground was left with several deep footprints from the force.

The driver twisted through a series of spinning evasions before finally escaping the attack. Her baseball cap tumbled off, and a cascade of golden waves spilled down her shoulders.

“Golden Waves? So it’s you!” Xiang Nan’s lips curled in a smirk—an old acquaintance. This was the same woman who had once injected him with a mysterious purple poison. Xiang Nan had long since learned from Li Mu that the purple poison was incurable; even if it didn’t kill, it would strip a man of his very nature. Now was the time for revenge.

“Shadowless Kick!”

With full force, Xiang Nan launched himself at Golden Waves. His technique relied on power and speed; with his strength at its peak, the shadowy feet surrounded her from all sides, leaving almost no avenue for escape.

Driven to the limit, she unleashed her third-tier ability.

Beast Transformation!

In a single breath, the seductive foreign woman transformed into a giant bear, her body covered in black fur.

“Bear King’s Shield!”

With a roar, a pitch-black shield materialized before her. Xiang Nan’s fully empowered Shadowless Kick landed on it with a thunderous impact, but the shield remained unscathed. The third-tier power was truly formidable.

Meanwhile, the four in lab coats had evaded the venomous insects and were now charging toward Xu Jiya and Su Yao, moving with bullet-like speed. No matter how quick or clever Xu Jiya might be, without any cultivation, she could not escape.

One of them, a curly-haired man, struck out with his palm. Before it even touched her, the force sent Xu Jiya and Su Yao flying over ten meters, tumbling through the air.

The impact jolted Su Yao from her stupor. As she opened her eyes, she saw a massive fist, the size of a rice bowl, descending toward her. In a blur, she pounced like a wildcat, braving the crushing force of the blow. Her claws slashed across her attacker’s arm, leaving two vivid red wounds. But at the same time, the force of the punch struck her in the abdomen, and she coughed up a mouthful of blood.