Fwoooo! Fire evaporated blood once more...

Once the flames died out, Bubai came face-to-face with a face now paled from anemia.

That distorted face was now fiercely glaring back at him as if accusing: “You’re cheating! You must be!”

And Bubai wanted to so badly admit: “Yes, I am, and I even stopped pretending! So what? Bite me!”

But he didn’t. Instead, he acted like a desperate defender at the end of his ropes and looked like he will collapse after one more round of “I spit, you spit”...

Welp, gotta keep stringing the man along, right? Haha.

Truth be told, Bubai felt pretty relaxed. No pressure at all, even.

In fact, this was actually pretty good practice for his fire breathing, even if he’s stuck on the passive side.

Best part? If all else fails, just forfeit. No shame in that!

Still... if possible, he preferred dragging this farce out till the very last minute for the nice little bonus of 250 spirit stones that were on the line.

That’s worth every penny of his effort!

Of course, profit wasn’t the only reason Bubai decided to stay.

A more important reason?

The threat of the curse was real! Even if he bowed out, it won’t go away!

What if the other finds a way to curse him after he leaves the arena? What if they secretly curse him during another fight and become the last straw that will seal his death?

This was like a guillotine hanging above his neck!

Gotta get rid of this hidden danger or he won’t even be able to sleep at ease! Not that he actually sleeps because he’s too busy exploring the mysteries of life—Ahem.

But that’s besides the point.

The point is: Bubai knew there is no such thing as invincibility at this level.

If something looked unsolvable, it meant one of two things—either your strength was lacking, or your wit!

In this case, his strength clearly wasn’t lacking at all.

Though one of his arm and leg were technically disabled, the same applied to the enemy!

Even if the other was at his peak, Bubai was still sure he got the upper hand in this aspect!

Not only that, Bubai even noticed a strange phenomenon.

In his mysterious space, those holes on his illusory internal insight character model were unmistakably re-solidifying and regenerating in real-time!

He even sensed the feeling in his arm and leg slowly restoring over time!

This was a sign that his spirit was being healed!

There’s no need to spend too long puzzling over the “why.”

Of course, it can only be attributed to the mysterious power of his plot-armor-masquerading-as-a-cheat!

Or to be more exact—the green dew he painstakingly gathered like a squirrel stockpiling nuts for winter.

That dew was refined drop by drop by his mysterious seed at the cost of Qi and his own spiritual power.

Whenever he uses these drops of essence, not only did it heal his physical body, but it can also buff and refresh his mind.

Not only that, using these dew was like re-merging his own spiritual power. If enough drops are used together, even the spiritual power expended in casting spells could be restored!

The key point of all this was obviously restoration. Thus, it wasn’t too surprising that it could actually restore his own damaged spirit.

The truly astonishing part was that his dew drop still worked wonders even if he didn’t bring it to reality!

To heal his physical body, that was a must.

But healing the spirit? Apparently, this effect was automatic!

What does this mean? It meant...

Even if his spirit gets damaged beyond repair such that he falls into a coma one day, this passive healing will be his ticket to reawakening on his own!

His own resurrection timer, basically. How cool is that?!

But enough about this plot armor that any author can just pull out from their hat.

Even if he has plot armor, there’s an undeniable truth: no matter how much armor he wears, it’ll be useless if he can’t solve the root of the problem!

So what if his limbs recover?

Even if he has eight arms and legs, it’ll be useless if the enemy decides to commit suicide to drag him down to hell!

That’s why, he must find a way to deal with this mysterious curse, and to do that, he just gotta find the source of everything!

Then… what’s the source?

After pondering for a while, Bubai determined that: at this stage, if something wasn’t some skill, then it must be a prop!

That much was obvious.

The real riddle was: in what shape and where could this mysterious magic prop be hiding?

Bubai’s first guess? The mouth. Mainly because his blood must’ve went somewhere to trigger the curse and the blood-licking action was way too obvious.

There’s a pretty likely chance that the mysterious curse prop was lodged in the mouth or replaced a tooth.

That’s like the basics in the Demonic Disciple: Ways to Hide Things 101 handbook. If it’s not human skin, it’s a tooth, a finger, an eyeball, an organ… well, ya get the point.

Of course, since he can’t rule out the other possibilities, his hunch could be wrong.

Alas… Bubai can only take the gamble!

Anyways, even if this fails, it won’t be a wasted move.

For all he knew, it’ll at least stop this bloody sicko from vomiting out more blood like this was some idol drama competition on spitting blood!

Bubai would rather play stare-eyes till the very end instead of keep wasting Qi!

Alright, may Merlin bless me!

Since the target has been set, Bubai’s mind quickly drafted up a steady battle plan. Then… put it into action!

Sensing that both his disabled limbs have recovered for the most part, Bubai was ready to be cruel!

Poor Jin Tiemo was still stuck in a gambler’s mentality and was about to pay out more blood, but before he could repeat the cycle—

The hand cuffing his wrist suddenly twisted—crack! His wrist got snapped!

“??!”

Naturally, the damage to the spirit got reflected…

Bubai’s own hand went limp and it could no longer lock down the enemy’s weapon-wielding arm!

But that didn’t matter anymore because with the wrist snapped, the most dangerous scythe had nowhere to go except to take a nap on the floor!

Clang-dang!

That jarring landing sound was like a gong that broke both fighters out from their trances!

Jin Tiemo almost couldn’t wait to start cackling like an evil villain. “Zehahaha! I knew you can’t hold on for much longer! Getting desperate, are we? But whatever you do is futile! Prepare to die!”

Just when Jin Tiemo’s working foot wanted to flip the scythe back up to stab him own heart…

A foot nailed that scythe to the floor and a dagger buried right into his thigh, its toxin quickly paralyzing that leg!

“Wh-What?!” Jie Tiemo was completely shocked by the dagger that came out from nowhere!

It was then that he finally noticed…

“You can actually use your other hand?! How is that possible?!!!”

Before the shock could even blow over his head, that same hand clenched into a fist and socked Jin Tiemo right in the jaws!

POW! The powerful punch hammered Jin Tiemo so hard that not only did blood and teeth fly out, but even his body got sent flying like a rag doll!

Such a punch could knock a man out cold and Bubai already fully braced himself for the spirit damage that’ll get reflected!

Like he expected, the numbness immediately hit his jaws and every teeth, but just when he thought the backlash will spread further, it... abruptly cut off!

Bubai was so stunned that he froze there in a daze before quickly realizing: the curse got broken?! How?!

He wasn’t sure, but there’s only one way to find out! And what better test subject is there for verifying the truth than the perfect sandbag in front of him!

Bubai’s retreat braked and a stomp of the recently-recovered leg launched him forward!

In a single bound, the three-legged wolf rocketed over to the dazed prey on the floor!

The stunned Jin Tiemo barely suppressed the poison and sat up when the beast pounced on him!

Instinct overrode thought and his sole working arm jerked up, trying to block the incoming palm—only to get swatted aside like paper!

The palm then directly slapped his temples!

This time, the power behind that slap wasn’t even close to being enough to knock him out, but Jin Tiemo suddenly felt his vision spin then the arena turned into a bedchamber…

He blinked—and found himself laying on a strange bed that wasn’t his while a young enchantress rode on top of him, giving him the ultimate pleasure he always yearned for!

Every nerve screamed to drown in those seductive, demonic-red pupils and he felt his little thing completely filling up every inch of that tight hole!

Ugh… this heavenly feeling…

It has been a long time since he’s ever felt this good and that tight squeeze was just begging him to let everything out, just like the intoxicating cry of this enchantress...

“...Hah… don’t stop… let out more… pump it all out inside Weiwei… ah love me more, Brother Bubai”

Weiwei? Bubai? Those unfamiliar yet familiar names snapped Jin Tiemo awake!

Not good! This was an illusion!

But before he could even think about breaking it, he felt a sharp pain piercing his lung, followed by another sharper pain stabbing into his eyes and skewering right through his brain!

The world shattered like a mirror and Jin Tiemo came face-to-face with the grinning grim reaper.

“Goodnight.”

Then the executioner’s sword pulled out and blood painted the air like liquid fire.