Two corpses lay in the desert.
Su Su wiped the corners of her eyes, realizing that the tears she had imagined didn’t actually fall. She took a few deep breaths, calmed herself down, and intended to have Xuan Mang burn the bodies of Qi Huiling and Lin Weiran.
However, when she looked up, the space before her was empty.
Where were they?
Su Su abruptly turned around, her gaze anxiously sweeping the surroundings… Still, there was no one in sight!
“Ah Xuan?”
“Xiao Hei!”
They had been right here just moments ago—how could they have disappeared so suddenly? Had they been attacked again?
Su Su called out into the vast desert more than a dozen times, but there was no response. She even examined every inch of the surrounding sand, trying to determine if they might have burrowed underground.
There was nothing.
Just as she stubbornly decided to drive around in search, a limping cheetah approached her side and let out two low growls toward a sand dune.
Thinking of its keen sense of smell… Su Su hurriedly climbed up the dune. There, on the sand below, she saw a long drag mark stretching far beyond the limits of her vision.
Without hesitation, Su Su slid down the dune. As she reached her car, she lowered her head to look at the utterly silent cheetah beside her.
Its master was already dead.
She took a deep breath. “Come with me. I’ll take you back to the Northern Base. After that, wherever you want to go is up to you.”
The cheetah raised its head and looked at her a few times, then let out a soft cry.
“Meow—”
Then, it shrank its body and leapt into the passenger seat.
Su Su hesitated no longer. As she drove past the two corpses, she raised her arm—sharp iron nails once again pierced into the hearts of the bodies.
Eliminating any possibility of future trouble, the off-road vehicle followed the drag marks behind the sand dune and chased forward.
During the pursuit, Su Su repeatedly recalled what had just happened.
First, Lin Weiran and Qi Huiling were controlled at the same time. Then, the cheetah lunged forward for revenge. Qi Huiling pulled Lin Weiran in as a shield and, just before her throat was about to be bitten through, finally revealed the emotion-based ability she had been concealing all along… From that moment on, Su Su hadn’t seen Xuan Mang again.
There had been no sudden ambush, no unexpected enemy appearing out of nowhere—yet he had simply vanished without a trace.
One incident after another, each more unexpected than the last, had stretched Su Su’s nerves to the breaking point.
She stared ahead at the path, but her heart felt as if it had been squeezed into a box, waves of tightness and unease surging through her chest.
Did he leave on his own?
Why did he leave?
The off-road vehicle had driven for several kilometers, yet there was still no sign of Xuan Mang—only that long drag mark lying ahead, like the last fragile straw holding her together. If it disappeared, her heart would finally shatter.
Then—
A sudden earth-shaking roar erupted in the distance!
In a low-lying area surrounded by sand dunes, countless grains of sand were flung into the air. Something massive was striking the ground without restraint, sending tremors through the sand layers that could be felt even from the approaching vehicle.
Boom!
A small sand dune was violently smashed in half by a bloodstained serpent tail, sending piles of sand and stone tumbling down. Amid the collapsing debris, the most striking sight was the frenzied serpent-man.
Su Su slammed on the brakes.
The heart that had been weighed down with worry finally eased a little. She jumped out of the car and shouted, “Ah Xuan!”
Her hoarse voice carried undeniable anxiety and panic. The moment it reached the serpent-man’s ears, the wildly thrashing serpent tail suddenly came to a halt.
Beyond the severed sand dune, a pair of dark green vertical pupils swept over coldly.
He saw the female standing in front of the vehicle.
The pupils shrank slightly.
That fierce, half-human, half-serpent being almost instinctively turned around, about to flee.
And it was precisely this movement that confirmed Su Su’s worst suspicion—he had left on his own.
Anger, frustration, and panic surged within her all at once. She bolted up the sand dune like an arrow.
“Ah Xuan!”
Xuan Mang, who had originally intended to leave, ultimately did not move forward.
The serpent tail, which had been rampaging just moments ago, now lay still in the bloodstained sand, covered in serpent scales.
Hiss…
Give him a little time.
Just a little more time.
Su Su refused to give him time.
She had to understand why he kept leaving, again and again. It was already midsummer—there was no way he was going through another molting period!
“Ah Xuan, turn around.”
Xuan Mang had never been able to refuse her calls. After a moment of stiffness, he finally shifted and slithered straight toward the sand dune where she stood.
“Why did you run here?”
Su Su’s reddened eyes hadn’t yet returned to normal. Looking at her like this, anyone—absolutely anyone—would feel as if they had committed an unforgivable mistake.
Her voice even trembled slightly.
“Right now, the last thing I can…”
Facing that particularly cold and fierce yet strikingly handsome face, Su Su closed her eyes for a brief moment before softly finishing her sentence.
“The last thing I can do is leave you.”
“If it’s because of what happened in the lab, then I…”
—Apologize.
But before she could even say the last word, she was pulled into a wide, icy embrace.
“Hiss—”
A forked serpent tongue flicked against her cheek again and again.
The overwhelming negative emotions from before were suddenly soothed, as lightly as a feather.
He hadn’t intended to leave her.
He was only afraid of hurting her.
The ability unleashed by that human earlier had affected him even more severely, despite both of them being at the Tier 6.
Everything that had been suppressed in the laboratory had completely erupted.
He had just endured the near-death of his female and the frustration of her unwillingness to approach him after he took on his humanoid form. If he had allowed those emotions to explode, he feared he would lose control again and pounce on her—hurting her once more.
If—just if—Su Su had arrived even a little later, he would have been able to shake off the influence entirely and track her down again.
Xuan Mang’s affectionate closeness, at the very least, proved that he hadn’t left because of that.
The heart that had been pulled back and forth inside Su Su finally settled a little.
She pressed against his arm, tilted her head up, and asked, “Why?”
Xuan Mang looked at the devastated low-lying sandy ground.
His tail coiled around her waist and pulled out the handgun he had taken from Qi Huiling.
For a fleeting moment, the suspicions from before surged up again.
Su Su and Xuan Mang locked eyes.
Recalling what had happened in the southern base’s hunting grounds, her voice trembled slightly.
“Qi Huiling’s ability affected you. You didn’t want to hurt me, so you left for a short while. Isn’t that right?”
“Hiss—”
Tears streamed down.
All the emotions that had built up until now—Jiang Hong’s death, Lin Weiran’s death, the unnecessary misunderstandings she had after Xuan Mang took on his humanoid form—finally poured out all at once.
Su Su wrapped her arms tightly around his neck, burying her head into the curve of his shoulder.
It was still her Xiao Hei.
The same Xiao Hei who had never changed.
The deepest, most hidden fear in her heart vanished in an instant.
The skin beneath her palm was cold, yet carried the residual warmth of being baked under the sun.
On impulse, Su Su lowered her head and bit down lightly, leaving a small mark.
Xuan Mang seemed to sense the subtle shift in the female’s mood. He roughly lifted her face, wanting to get a clearer look.
Su Su followed his movement, lifting her head willingly. Through misty eyes, she gazed at those slightly drooping dark green pupils.
Still so fierce.
But she no longer misunderstood. No longer feared.
“Can you smile for me?”
Xuan Mang had originally wanted to lick away her tears, but hearing this, he froze.
Smile?
In his memories, there were only three kinds of smiles—
The one that made the female’s snakes dizzy with infatuation.
Pang Cancan’s scheming, up-to-no-good grin.
And Lan Jing’s pitying smile.
The rigid muscles on Xuan Mang’s face began to move.
He believed he had managed to produce the most standard smile.
But in Su Su’s eyes, his expression had merely shifted from fierce to fierce max.
She burst into laughter through her tears, burying herself back into his embrace and mumbling, “Alright, alright, no need to smile anymore.”
After all, the one she had raised was a savage venomous serpent—expecting docility was nothing but a fantasy.
“Ah Xuan…”
“Hiss?”
“Even if there’s another Qi Huiling, I won’t let an ability like that affect you again.”
Xuan Mang might not know how to smile, but he wasn’t dumb.
He understood the female’s underlying meaning almost instantly.
That lingering, violent, bloodthirsty emotion completely dissipated.
In the vast desert, a towering half-human, half-serpent figure carried a small human female, their silhouettes slowly vanishing into the low sand dunes.
—
The orange-red firelight cast a soft glow on Su Su’s cheeks, making them appear flushed.
Lowering her gaze, she carefully and attentively bandaged the wounds of the small, brownish-yellow cheetah.
By the time she finished, aside from the right side of its head where its eye was, nearly its entire body was wrapped in bandages.
“All done.” Su Su reassured it. “Once we leave the desert, I’ll find a high-tier healing ability user. You’ll definitely recover completely.”
“Meow.”
The cheetah showed no sorrow over its injuries, nor did it find comfort in Su Su’s words.
It merely cooperated, allowing itself to be wrapped in the “useless” bandages—because it was happy for this human.
Once the bandaging was done, it didn’t wait for the half-serpent lingering nearby to urge it along. It leapt out of Su Su’s arms on its own, curled up in a corner, and lay still.
Seeing this, Su Su’s gaze dimmed slightly.
The wounds on the cheetah’s heart were far deeper than those on its body.
Thinking of Jiang Hong’s death…
A serpent’s tail suddenly curled onto her lap, followed by the cool presence of a familiar body pressing close. Unlike in his original form, where he coiled around her, Xuan Mang in his humanoid form directly hugged Su Su from behind as she sat cross-legged. His strong arms wrapped tightly around her waist.
“Hiss—”
His serpent tail lightly patted her thigh.
The thick white bandages wrapped around him had already begun to seep blood.
Su Su had no time to dwell in sorrow.
Without pause, she busied herself changing Xuan Mang’s medicine and rewrapping his wounds. Just as she tied the final knot, a long, slender hand suddenly covered the back of her hand.
Su Su turned her head. “What is it?”
Wearing his usual fearsomely savage expression, Xuan Mang lifted his hands and clumsily mimicked the shape of a bowknot.
Su Su: “…”
Su Su silently replaced the simple knot with a delicate and elegant butterfly bow.
Xuan Mang flicked his serpent tail.
Under the flickering firelight, Su Su unexpectedly caught a trace of joy in those vertical pupils.
Delighted, she reached out to touch his brows, about to praise him. But before she could say a word, Xuan Mang suddenly grabbed her hand and pressed it against his chest without warning…
Su Su’s eyes widened in surprise. The moment her palm touched the unnaturally firm and springy flesh, she instinctively tried to pull away as if electrocuted.
“L-let go!”
“Hiss!”
No.
Xuan Mang lifted the female and tucked her into the coil of his serpent body.
He wanted to touch her.
But the female might not agree… so he figured there should be an exchange.
A half-serpent’s desire was terrifyingly straightforward.
Su Su scrambled wildly on the ground for anything to use as a barrier. She grabbed a blanket, immediately throwing it over Xuan Mang’s body, covering his perfect physique that, until tonight, she hadn’t truly paid attention to.
Xuan Mang was very disappointed.
But Su Su’s face turned utterly red.
Flustered, she hurriedly changed the subject. “We’ll stay in the desert for one more day to search for the others. If we can’t find anyone, we’ll return directly and see what’s going on at the Northern Base.”
Jiang Hong had died because of the Research Guild.
Si Zhe was still in the Research Guild.
And before Qi Huiling died, she had said those words…
A heavy cloud loomed over Su Su’s heart.
Perhaps—she really was going to follow in Jiang Hong’s footsteps.