Chapter 36

The little snake in his arms was very obedient, so obedient that Lu Changjun’s heart ached for it. He stretched out his hand above the little snake’s head, and the little snake lifted its head and gently bumped against it, as if trying to push the hand away and tell him that it was fine.

Lu Changjun anxiously searched the mountain forest for shelter from the rain.

He didn’t know how long he searched; time felt endlessly long in his perception, but he finally found it. Lu Changjun spotted a small opening in the mountain wall. He climbed in over the scattered rocks on the ground, using his phone’s light to illuminate the way. Once inside the cave, he discovered it was much larger than it appeared from outside. Most importantly, there were signs of human activity!

Dry grass was spread on the ground, with a half-burned pile of firewood in the middle. Lu Changjun also found a rusty iron box. When he opened it, it contained a lighter and some basic medicines!

“It must have been left by someone who came into the mountains to gather herbs or hunt,” Lu Changjun guessed. He took the little snake out from the pile of wet clothes and placed it on the dry grass pile. Then he shone his phone screen on the iron box to check the usage instructions for the medicines inside.

They weren’t anything special—just some bandages and Yunnan Baiyao Spray, left by people who ventured into the nearby mountains for emergencies.

Lu Changjun aimed the spray nozzle at the little snake’s tail.

But the little snake twisted its body and dodged.

Bai Ying shook his head. He had no external wounds; Xiao Lu had protected him well at the time. He had only fractured a bone, so the spray wouldn’t do much. On the other hand, Lu Changjun’s back wound might not have stopped bleeding—Bai Ying could still smell a distinct metallic scent.

The little snake picked up a bandage in its mouth and slapped it onto Lu Changjun’s hand with a smack. It then stretched its head toward his back, gesturing for Xiao Lu to check himself first.

“I’m fine,” Lu Changjun said, then shivered slightly. “I’ll start a fire. Senior, are you afraid of fire? Move back a bit.”

His soaked clothes no longer provided any insulation and were even drawing heat from his body. Lu Changjun had to get a fire going quickly, or he would pass out from hypothermia before rescue arrived.

Bai Ying scooted deeper into the dry grass pile. Animals were all afraid of fire, after all.

Thanks to the lighter, Lu Changjun didn’t need to drill wood for fire. There wasn’t much remaining wood in the cave, but he figured it would last the night if used sparingly. By then, the rain would ease, and the search team would start looking around the abandoned vehicle—no problem finding them.

Flames rose, and bright firelight illuminated the pitch-black cave. The chill was driven away by the fire’s warmth. The little snake inched closer to the fire, maintaining a neither-too-close-nor-too-far distance to warm itself.

“Senior, forgive the offense,” Lu Changjun said to Bai Ying.

The little snake raised its head in confusion, puzzled by the sudden statement.

The next moment, Lu Changjun unbuttoned his shirt one button at a time. The wet shirt clung to his body, vaguely outlining his physique, but it was still indistinct. Once he removed the shirt entirely, his firm chest and abs were clearly exposed to the air.

Bai Ying felt perfectly calm inside, with no urge to look away. His beady black eyes stared fixedly. Lu Changjun instinctively straightened up a bit, making his muscles even more prominent. But when he fully peeled the shirt off, the fabric tore from his skin, pulling at the wound, and Lu Changjun couldn’t hold back a muffled grunt as cold sweat poured down.

The little snake anxiously lifted its upper body.

Woo, he knew Xiao Lu’s injury was serious.

The intense pain left Lu Changjun dazed for a moment. When he came back to his senses, the first thing he did was reassure Bai Ying: “I’m okay, just some superficial wounds.”

Lu Changjun hung the bloody shirt on a makeshift rack to dry by the fire. He had originally worn a jacket, but it became too heavy after getting soaked, so he had discarded it along the way. Though the shirt’s back was torn to shreds by rocks and glass and stained with blood, it was still clothing for cover. He would wear it once it dried.

Bai Ying wanted to slither behind Lu Changjun to check his back, but Lu Changjun deliberately shifted his body, always facing Bai Ying.

The little snake grew frantic. How bad must it be for Xiao Lu to not let him see!

Lu Changjun coughed lightly. “Senior, I’m going to take off my pants now.”

The soaked pants were unbearably uncomfortable and needed drying too.

Bai Ying figured they were both men, so upper body nudity was no issue, but seeing the lower half would be inappropriate. The little snake turned its back. Before doing so, it snatched the phone lying beside it with its mouth. Its tail hurt too much to coil around the phone like before, so it had to awkwardly grip it in its jaws.

The little snake’s head bobbed up and down, painstakingly typing with its snout.

He kept the message concise. After Lu Changjun hung his pants up to dry, Bai Ying successfully typed out a line. He carried the phone to Lu Changjun’s feet. Lu Changjun propped up his leg to shield his now-naked lower half.

Good thing Senior is a little snake right now—it eased some of the guilt. Otherwise, it would really feel like he was being a hooligan toward Senior.

Lu Changjun picked up the phone from the ground. Bai Ying had only typed eight words, omitting some for brevity, but the meaning was clear.

【Wear mine. Yours as bandage.】

The little snake bit the corner of its own clothes and tugged outward.

The mountain air was cold, and people usually wore two layers: inner and outer. Lu Changjun had lost his jacket, but Bai Ying still had his.

“Then I’ll borrow Senior’s shirt,” Lu Changjun said, planning to leave the warmer jacket for Bai Ying.

The little snake nodded.

The rack was already overloaded with clothes; Bai Ying’s wet ones queued up beside it. After doing all this, the little snake had no strength left. It curled up and lay motionless on the dry grass.

Snakes had no eyelids, so it took Lu Changjun a while to realize Bai Ying had fallen asleep.

He shifted his body again to block the wind blowing toward Bai Ying. Lu Changjun looked down at his phone—no signal still—and the rain outside showed no signs of letting up. The cave was on higher ground, so no worry about floodwater entering, but he could imagine the ground outside was flooded.

In this weather, the rescue team couldn’t start searching.

Lu Changjun anxiously waited for the rain to subside.

***

One phone call after another went out from Wenxiang Mountain.

After receiving Lu Changjun’s distress call, the crew fell into chaos. They hadn’t even had time to ask for more details before the call dropped due to lost signal, and it never connected again. All they knew was that Bai Ying and Lu Changjun had encountered a mudslide halfway, plummeting off the road with the vehicle. When Lu Changjun called, both were alive.

But with the torrential downpour, deep mountains, and no signal, every second before finding them increased their danger.

The crew pulled every connection they had.

Yang Dao called his friend working in the province. Cheng Jie contacted the local town police. Xie Jin and Tan Ming set aside their grudges for now, each using their influence.

The Xie Family hadn’t been in politics since Xie Jin’s father’s generation, but they still had ties. Tan Ming’s mother was the director of a provincial TV station, a department-level cadre. Connections were sometimes more useful than money. They quickly mobilized a rescue team, but the weather was too severe—no conditions for entering the mountains.

The crew and rescuers waited anxiously, but even after Qin Juanshu and the Lu Family arrived with another rescue group, the rain hadn’t eased.

Nature ignored human power and wealth at this moment.

The incident happened at nine in the morning, and now it was nearing three in the afternoon.

Dark clouds pressed down, the sky as black as midnight, with occasional lightning flashing through the layers. Suddenly, a light unlike lightning appeared overhead.

Along with it came a sound like wind and rain being shattered together.

People on the ground wore raincoats, water streaming down their faces, hair whipped wildly by the gale, but through their goggles, they clearly saw the object hovering in the sky. Someone exclaimed: “How is there a helicopter?!”

In this weather, who would risk flying one?!

Zhong Qian, piloting the helicopter, thought to himself that he truly didn’t care about his life anymore.

But when Liu Qingzhang coldly said “Take off,” he had no choice but to sit in the pilot’s seat. Since earning his helicopter license through self-study, Zhong Qian had never flown in such perilous conditions. He even doubted if anyone in history had ever taken off in a super typhoon like this.

Zhong Qian could fly, but he wasn’t an ace pilot.

He had prepared for a crash, yet the fierce winds and pounding rain seemed nonexistent. An invisible force countered nature’s might, keeping all obstacles at bay. Though flying smoothly, cold sweat dripped from Zhong Qian’s forehead. This was his first direct experience of a great demon’s power.

And this was the End of Dharma Era, where demon power had been halved repeatedly. He couldn’t imagine how powerful demons once were— no wonder any family lucky enough to enshrine one treated them as gods, never daring to defy them.

The demon responsible sat quietly behind him, eyes closed.

Liu Qingzhang searched for Bai Ying.

The storm disrupted his tracking of Bai Ying’s aura. Muddy waters, broken vegetation—too many chaotic scents interfered with his judgment.

The usually calm great demon felt ripples in his heart. Liu Qingzhang rarely grew irritable, especially with news that Bai Ying was likely injured. The thought stirred uncontrollable violent emotions.

Suddenly, Liu Qingzhang opened his eyes.

“Maintain hover,” Liu Qingzhang said.

Zhong Qian acknowledged, and Liu Qingzhang fell silent. Zhong Qian suddenly sensed something wrong and whipped around—Liu Qingzhang had vanished from the helicopter at some point.

After giving the order, the great demon had descended to the ground.

He wore a heavy trench coat untouched by wind in clothes or hair; rain evaporated before touching him. Liu Qingzhang was enveloped in an invisible barrier. The next second, it all vanished, replaced by a massive black python over twenty meters long—longer than the extinct Titanoboa. When it landed, vegetation crushed beneath it, leaving a deep gouge in the earth.

The giant python tore through the forest at terrifying speed.

Any obstacle in its path was bulldozed; no sharp rock could scratch its scales. Liu Qingzhang found the bread van Bai Ying and Lu Changjun had abandoned. Not long after they left, it had indeed exploded, flames quickly doused by rain, leaving only wreckage.

Liu Qingzhang caught a faint whiff of blood.

The giant python’s emerald vertical pupils narrowed into dangerous slits. Following the weak scent in the air, it slithered toward one direction.

Meanwhile, two and a half hours earlier, Bai Ying had slowly awakened.