Chapter 48: The First Battle

"Hum—" The two of them accelerated at almost the exact same time, sprinting toward each other. They kicked up fierce gusts of wind that swept across the entire platform.

A metallic clash rang out.

Intense sparks erupted the instant the Thorn Spear collided with the baseball bat.

Weird Energy rippled outward in concentric circles from the point where their weapons met.

Dust billowed into the air. With a muffled groan, Li Ya's body jolted, and she stumbled back several steps.

She stared at the baseball bat in her hands in disbelief.

A visible chip had appeared right where it had struck the spear.

The chip wasn't large, but this bat was a Green-quality weapon. A single strike from her opponent had directly damaged it.

'He's a strength type, and his weapon's quality is extremely high.'

Li Ya made her judgment instantly.

The power and speed that man had just displayed were far beyond her own.

But he wasn't without flaws.

She shifted her stance, switching her one-handed grip on the bat to a tight, two-handed hold. Her cold eyes locked onto Yan Jing.

She could easily tell his combat experience was lacking. Even his exertion of force didn't come from the optimal point of leverage.

With the next strike, she would make him pay in blood.

Meanwhile, Yan Jing stood across from her, gripping his Thorn Spear. As he watched her, he mentally reviewed their clash.

'My strength... is greater than I thought.'

His First Tier physical attributes, boosted by his Fear Stance, had clearly reached an entirely new level.

He hadn't felt it so directly when he killed the Fear Spirit earlier. But from that strike just now, he could clearly feel he was much stronger than her.

And he hadn't even used his full strength just now.

'So what would happen if I went all out?'

With that thought in mind, Weird Energy surged wildly throughout his body. He lunged forward, clashing with Li Ya once more.

Having finished their initial probing, they immediately launched into rapid combos. Both were aiming to draw blood.

Spear thrusts and bat swings crashed like tidal waves in the air, forcefully clearing out an empty zone in the plaza meant only for the two of them.

Except, this clash didn't give Li Ya the upper hand she had imagined. She couldn't even call it an even match.

The moment her baseball bat met the spear again, her pupils shrank. She knew something was wrong.

His strength was even greater than before.

Overpowered by this unexpected force, she had absolutely no room to execute the techniques she had planned. All she could do was grip her bat tightly to keep it from flying out of her hands, forced back step by step by Yan Jing's three heavy, overwhelming strikes.

An upward sweep, a horizontal press, a direct thrust. She had been completely dragged into Yan Jing's rhythm, reduced to passive defense.

After those three strikes, the webbing between her thumbs and forefingers tore open. The hands gripping the bat trembled violently, her muscles screaming in pain.

In stark contrast, Yan Jing's momentum only grew stronger.

He gave Li Ya no chance to catch her breath. Stepping forward heavily, he thrust his spear straight toward her chest.

Li Ya frantically raised her bat to block, but her numb hands were a beat too slow.

Seeing the spear about to plunge into her chest, she dropped the bat at the very last second, leaning backward before throwing herself into a sideways roll.

"Rip—"

The spear grazed across her chest.

A string of bright blood sprayed out, scattering through the air.

Li Ya clenched her jaw but still couldn't hold back a low groan.

There was nothing she could do. That spear was definitely no ordinary item. The moment it pierced her flesh, she hallucinated a horde of ghosts materializing before her eyes, tearing into her flesh with agonizing shrieks.

Yet, she endured the pain and scrambled to her feet. The corners of her lips even curled up into a faint smirk.

Because she had finally caught Yan Jing's flaw.

In Yan Jing's hands, the dark, ghost-like spear was already dissolving into motes of light.

Just as she had guessed, the weapon had grown more translucent with every strike. It clearly wasn't an ability he could sustain for long.

At that exact moment, Weird Energy surged within her. The battered phantom of the Gachapon Machine suddenly radiated blinding light.

The yellow casing of the machine was noticeably faded and aged, its coin slot covered in rust. Through the glass, various capsules were visible, each containing bizarre and horrifying toys.

A Water Gun, stuffed animals, figurines...

In Li Ya's palm, her Weird Energy coalesced into a copper coin, which she flicked right into the slot.

"Go to hell," she whispered, her smile twisting into something savage.

Suddenly, her scalp went numb. Her sixth sense forced her to blindly dodge to the side.

A spear thrust that should have impaled her neck grazed her shoulder instead, tearing through her shirt and leaving a gruesome gash.

Blood sprayed across the air!

"Aaaargh—!"

This time, Li Ya couldn't withstand the phantom pain of malicious spirits tearing her apart. Her miserable screams echoed over the plaza.

Yan Jing's expression remained perfectly calm. With a newly manifested spear writhing like a dark dragon in his grip, he pushed off the ground, charging right into Li Ya's face.

The spear tip flickered, stamping onto her body like a cluster of dark stars.

Even as Li Ya dodged for her life, three bloody holes burst open across her flesh.

Crimson blood gushed out like a fountain.

Amidst the blinding agony, Li Ya pushed herself to the limit and reached out, finally catching the capsule that dropped from the machine.

Accompanied by an explosive surge of Weird Energy, the capsule cracked in half.

A hideous cloth doll appeared in Li Ya's hands.

The moment she saw it, Li Ya's pupils shrank, and she burst into maniacal laughter.

Tears of pain welled up in her eyes, but her smile only grew more unhinged. The cloth doll in her hand, its body pierced through with needles and thread, was the machine's "grand prize"—an item with a mere 0.5% drop rate.

The stronger the toy inside the Gachapon Machine, the lower the chance of drawing it.

She could only use the machine three times a day.

She had used it once today while killing Sun Lei, and a second time against Zebra and Hippo. This was her final use.

This was one of the reasons she hadn't activated her Day Selection Ritual right at the start of the fight.

Over the past three years, this was only the third time she had pulled the doll.

Both previous times, her opponents had been players ranked far higher than her on the Hidden Moon Leaderboard. They had ruthlessly crushed her in the early stages of their battles, but the moment they faced the Terrifying Doll, both were instantly defeated. In the end, they could only kneel on the ground, weeping bitterly as they begged her to spare their lives.

Just picturing Yan Jing dying a miserable death right in front of her made Li Ya's heart race in ecstasy.

All these thoughts flashed by in an instant.

Violent Weird Energy poured out of her. Without a shred of hesitation, she activated the hideous doll in her hand.

The Terrifying Doll had a one-second activation time.

Even if Yan Jing landed one last strike with his spear right now, as long as she shifted her vitals to avoid a fatal blow, the Terrifying Doll would successfully revive once he closed the distance. After that, he would have nowhere left to run.

And she was entirely confident she could avoid a fatal blow.

Because this Cameraman's combat experience was simply abysmal!

Take his recent close-quarters thrust, for instance. He had completely misjudged the distance and closed in way too far, causing his spear retraction to be clumsy and slow.

Right now, Yan Jing's best option seemed to be turning tail and fleeing.

Sure enough, in the very next second, exactly as Li Ya predicted, Yan Jing pulled back to create distance.

A vicious smile twisted across her face.

The exact same stupid choice as the first guy.

Once the Terrifying Doll locked onto a target, it would hunt them down to the ends of the earth.

So, in reality, the moment she pulled the doll, this battle had already been decided!

"Snap—"

Suddenly, the crisp sound of a finger snap rang out across the open ground.

The snap was faint, instantly drowned out by the ambient noises of battle, but for some inexplicable reason, Li Ya felt a chill run down her entire body.

In disbelief, she slowly turned her head, staring in sheer terror at her right hand holding the doll.

It had already been pierced through by several thorns, dripping with blood.

Sharp barbs tore through the back of her hand, and from the pool of blood in her palm, withered, rotting flowers bloomed one after another.

"Aaaaargh!!!!"

The bone-deep agony made Li Ya's eyes bulge as tears poured down her face.

But this was only the beginning. There wasn't just one thorny vine. Surrounding her were three Thorn Seeds that Yan Jing had secretly dropped during his earlier close-range attack. Nourished by his Fear Power, they had taken root and sprouted, trapping her inside a cage of rampant, wild overgrowth that immediately blossomed into decayed flowers.

Squelch—

Squelch—

Squelch—

The wet sounds of barbs driving into flesh echoed continuously, while the screams from inside the cage grew weaker and weaker.

Yan Jing watched the thorn cage he had built with a tranquil gaze. At the same time, he absorbed the ambient Fear Power in the air, reconstructing new Fear Seeds within his body.

Setting all this up hadn't been difficult.

He just needed to form the seeds less than ten minutes before the battle began. By exploiting the time gap—a ten-minute window before a seed withered versus a one-minute cooldown to replenish one—he could stockpile multiple seeds outside his body.

Then, by using his spear thrusts as cover to intentionally close the distance, he planted the seeds right next to his opponent. The trap was set.

He had no idea what kind of effect that cloth doll in her hand actually possessed. But seeing how happily she was smiling, he knew for a fact that letting her activate it would end very badly for him.

"Phew—"

As his very first true battle since arriving in this world, the results were quite satisfying.

At the very least, he hadn't needed to rely on the Cameraman's freeze ability. He had won purely by using his Day Selection Ritual.

"Bang!!"

Right at that moment, from within the thorn cage, the cloth doll exploded into a flurry of black rags. Immediately afterward, a blood-soaked figure materialized outside the cage and scrambled frantically into the distance.

'A substitution?'

Yan Jing watched the fleeing figure, his eyes narrowing slightly.

He felt a faint surge of annoyance.

It was like playing a game and achieving a perfect clear, only for some brain-dead developer to jump out and announce you missed an easter egg that had absolutely zero hints attached.

So you lose a point for it.

Faced with a situation like this...

The only solution was to turn on the cheats.

With that thought, he pushed off the ground and gave chase.