Resolute in Adversity Along Perilous Paths
Inside the Spike Labyrinth, cold light flickered, and a dangerous aura permeated the air, making one's hair stand on end.
Looking at the enormous maze covered in spikes before her, Lu Yao felt her heart skip a beat. Was this definitely not some kind of sick joke being played on her?
The surrounding air seemed to freeze, oppressive enough to make breathing difficult.
Suyi and Lin Yue also wore troubled expressions; this labyrinth clearly was not to be trifled with!
The structure of the maze was immensely complex, resembling a giant, scrambled Rubik's cube.
Soaring walls intersected to form countless winding paths. Some passages were so narrow they only allowed a person to squeeze through sideways, while others abruptly ended in dead ends.
The walls were built from a grayish-blue stone covered in moss, feeling slippery and cold to the touch.
The shapes of the spikes were bizarrely varied. Some resembled sharp wolf fangs, their tips gleaming with a chilling light as if they could easily pierce anything; others were like spiral drills fitted with barbs, which, once embedded in flesh, would likely be extremely difficult to pull out; still others were triangular pyramid spikes, their three facets as smooth as mirrors, refracting the faint surrounding light and adding an even greater sense of danger.
"Oh, if it isn't the good-for-nothing Lu Yao? What, losing your nerve already?" Murong Feng sneered as he walked over with his lacklings, blocking their path.
Upon hearing this, Lu Yao was instantly displeased. "Who's losing their nerve? You're the one losing your nerve! Your whole family is losing nerve!"
"Hah, you actually think you can make it through this labyrinth? Keep dreaming!" Murong Feng said with a look of utter contempt.
The atmosphere instantly turned tense and bristling, the air thick with the scent of gunpowder.
Ma Lin stepped forward, staring coldly at Murong Feng. His formidable aura caused the surrounding temperature to drop by several degrees.
One of Murong Feng's lacklings suddenly lashed out, a fierce attack heading straight for Suyi!
Suyi scrambled to dodge, but was hit nonetheless, stumbling back a few paces.
Taking advantage of the moment, Murong Feng launched a sneak attack while his guard was down!
Suyi let out a muffled groan and crashed to the ground.
"Suyi!" Lu Yao and Lin Yue cried out in alarm.
Consumed by rage and forgetting all fear, Lu Yao recalled flashing images in her mind of countless sleepless nights spent bitterly practicing her newly learned moves. All those sweat-soaked tears transformed into strength in that very instant.
With a sudden dash, she unleashed her new techniques, launching a ferocious assault on Murong Feng.
Every punch Lu Yao threw whistled through the air, landing heavily on Murong Feng. Murong Feng tried to counterattack, but in Lu Yao's eyes, his blows were effortlessly neutralized like a child's tantrum.
With every strike that landed on Murong Feng, Lu Yao loudly repeated the insults he had once hurled at her. "Who's the good-for-nothing? Let's see who the real good-for-nothing is now!"
Murong Feng had not expected Lu Yao to be so tenacious, and for a moment, he found himself utterly unable to fend her off.
"You dare launch a sneak attack with this pathetic skill! See how I beat you to a pulp!" Emboldened by battle, Lu Yao's moves grew increasingly fierce.
Her attacks sped up as if she had locked onto Murong Feng's weakness...
"I see your weak spot!" Lu Yao shouted, her figure flickering like a ghost while the surrounding Spike Labyrinth seemed to serve merely as her backdrop.
Her form moved like agile lightning, each flash kicking up a gentle breeze.
As she moved at high speed, the wall spikes cast mottled light and shadow across her body, making her look as though she had donned a suit of battle armor.
Her fists carried an unstoppable momentum. Every time a punch connected with Murong Feng, a look of terror and disbelief crossed his face, his hair whipped up by her punch's wake like stray grass in the wind.
Everyone around held their breath as if time itself had stopped, leaving only Lu Yao's onslaught raging like a storm.
It completely dazed Murong Feng.
"Th-this is still that good-for-nothing?!" Murong Feng's lacklings stared with jaws nearly dropping to the floor; the contrast was simply too immense!
Lu Yao had no time to spare for them. With a single glance, Lin Yue understood her intent. While driving the lacklings toward the corner of the maze, Lin Yue deliberately confused them with playful words, making them think she was just joking around, when it was actually a meticulously designed trap.
Lin Yue accelerated straight toward the lacklings, herding them directly into the corner of the labyrinth.
"Hehe, boys, playing hide-and-seek?" Lin Yue smiled like a little demon.
"Ah—" A miserable scream shattered the quiet of the maze as Murong Feng's lacklings found themselves trapped in a mechanism-filled corner, completely unable to move.
Seizing the opportunity, Lu Yao delivered a heavy punch straight at Murong Feng, sending him flying backward to roll ignominiously across the ground like a tumbling gourd.
"Is that it? And you dared act arrogant in front of me?" Lu Yao akimbo, surveyed Murong Feng and his lacklings with a haughty expression.
Though injured, Suyi gritted his teeth against the pain and encouraged Lu Yao to keep fighting. Suyi and Lin Yue cheered from the sidelines, "Lu Yao, you were amazing!" The surroundings instantly filled with the joy of victory.
Just then, a pair of large hands gently steadied her arm, radiating a wave of warm heat.
Lu Yao looked up to see the poker-faced god, Ma Lin.
Watching Lu Yao's fighting posture, Ma Lin felt secretly astonished; this girl was far stronger and braver than he had ever imagined.
A trace of hard-to-detect appreciation flashed through his usually indifferent eyes.
Beneath his habitual poker face lay a heart that had once been wounded and thus closed off, yet Lu Yao's bravery was gradually melting those walls.
His gaze carried a hint of worry as his palm gently stroked her arm, seemingly checking whether she had been hurt.
Lu Yao missed a heartbeat, her cheeks burning slightly as pink bubbles seemed to float up all around them.
"I'm fine, just a minor scrape." Lu Yao quickly averted her eyes from Ma Lin, feeling as though her face was about to catch fire.
Suyi and Lin Yue snickered nearby. Hehe, something is definitely going on between these two!
Before they could finish laughing, however, the labyrinth underwent a sudden transformation—the walls began to shift, and the spikes multiplied.
"Good grief, is this maze trying to roast us alive?!" Lin Yue exclaimed.
Lu Yao frowned deeply, sensing danger rapidly closing in.
They had to find a way out as soon as possible, or they would genuinely perish here.
The group searched everywhere, but moving spikes constantly blocked their path, while exhaustion and despair began to spread among them.
Just then, Lu Yao's gaze was caught by a strange symbol carved on the wall, emanating a mysterious glow.
Her intuition told her this might be the key to the exit, yet she had no idea how to decipher it.
As Lu Yao focused intently on the symbol, the others gathered around as well, hoping to see if some secret lay hidden within.
Staring at the strange symbol on the wall, Lu Yao racked her brains while the surrounding spikes relentlessly closed in.