Chapter 30: Killing the Zombie Again

After obtaining the Devil Fruit, Ao Xin added Li Hui as a friend and transferred ten thousand points to him.

"I knew you must have ten thousand points!" Although Li Hui had suspected it, seeing Ao Xin actually transfer the points still came as a shock. This meant that Ao Xin had already slain ten thousand zombies. Since it was impossible for him not to have spent any points on upgrades, the true number of points he had earned was even higher. Having considered himself invincible, he was stunned to encounter such a prodigy.

"Let’s go. I’ll help you kill that zombie." Ao Xin and Ao Chen climbed back into the car, and Li Hui transformed into a gust of yellow sand, settling directly into the backseat.

"You’re certainly thick-skinned," Ao Xin remarked while driving. "Is your arm alright? Can you still fight?"

Li Hui kept his arm hanging limp. As a practitioner of ancient martial arts, his mental fortitude was indeed exceptional; despite having his bone shattered, he had yet to let out a single groan of pain. "My hand-to-hand combat ability is compromised, but I can still use my Devil Fruit powers. Let me recover for a bit; fighting you was truly exhausting."

Ao Chen scoffed, "It was more like you getting beaten one-sidedly!"

Li Hui gritted his teeth in frustration; these siblings were a real handful.

Ao Xin gave Ao Chen a thumbs-up. "Well said!" He then asked Li Hui, "Why were you so insistent on killing that zombie? With your Logia-type elemental intangibility, it couldn't threaten you. Couldn't you have waited until you were stronger?"

Li Hui sighed. "Once a zombie evolves into a Jiangshi, it’s practically a different species. Conventional firearms are useless against it, and its strength is terrifying. No vehicle or building can withstand its attacks. I spent a great deal of effort luring it out of the city. I stumbled upon you while I was catching my breath; I originally wanted to recruit you, but ended up losing a Devil Fruit instead."

"We’ve noticed that zombies are naturally drawn to human settlements. Even if I lured this one out, it would return within two days, and humans currently have no way to stop it. Killing it is the only viable option."

That was why, upon realizing Ao Xin was the "Azure Dragon" tycoon rumored in the God’s Shrine space, he had conceived the idea of luring him to the creature—using the dragon to slay the corpse.

"We’re here. It’s in the vicinity."

The three exited the car and soon spotted the Jiangshi hopping aimlessly, though its trajectory was persistently aimed back toward the city.

"Be careful," Ao Xin cautioned Ao Chen. "If there’s danger, run. A Jiangshi is not something you can handle at your current strength." With that, he and Li Hui moved to flank the creature.

A dragon’s roar echoed as Ao Xin shifted into his human-beast form, wielding a bamboo-joint steel whip that crashed down toward the creature’s forehead.

Li Hui summoned a surge of yellow sand to entangle the Jiangshi’s ankles, obstructing its movement. With its feet buried in the sand, the creature lost its balance and toppled forward.

Ao Xin did not waste the opportunity. Intense electricity crackled around the steel whip as he brought it down violently onto the Jiangshi's crown.

*Bang!*

The impact was deafening. The creature’s fontanelle cracked, and green brain matter seeped out. Not stopping there, Ao Xin unleashed a torrent of dragon fire, scorching the creature’s hair and clothes into ash.

The Jiangshi, however, forcibly broke free from the sand’s grip and lunged at Ao Xin. Its razor-sharp claws struck the steel whip, producing a sound like clashing metal. Ao Xin swept the whip horizontally, aiming to shatter the creature’s arm bone, while his dragon tail lashed out to strike the back of the Jiangshi’s knee.

The Jiangshi tried to defend itself, but more yellow sand surged from behind, forming a blade that descended toward its head. With Ao Xin suppressing the creature, Li Hui was free to unleash his full power.

"Can’t your Sand-Sand Fruit absorb water?" Ao Xin suggested helpfully. "If you drain the moisture from its body and turn it into a desiccated corpse, it might weaken its fighting capacity!"

Li Hui had no desire to try, suspecting that some villain was trying to harm him. "What if I end up absorbing the zombie virus into my own body?"

*Tsk, tsk.* This guy was certainly cautious. Since he couldn't lure him into a trap, Ao Xin focused on the battle.

The steel whip descended again, the high-voltage current coating it filling the air with the stench of charred flesh. As the sand restrained the creature's limbs once more, Ao Xin hammered the same arm repeatedly. Having been struck several times already, the bone was riddled with cracks; this final blow shattered it completely.

The arm fell limp. The dragon tail slammed into the Jiangshi’s abdomen, knocking it to the ground. Then, the steel whip fell like a torrential rain, snapping both of its femur bones. The Jiangshi roared in rage, but with its legs broken, it couldn't stand.

Ao Xin stepped on the creature's last functioning claw, pinning it with immense force, and brought the whip down one last time to dismember the final arm.

"The limbs are broken. Go ahead and take its head," he said, stepping back.

Li Hui nodded. His left arm transformed into a sand blade, and he swung it at the zombie’s neck.

*Bang!*

The sand blade was sharp, and despite the creature’s tough hide, its throat was its most vulnerable point—especially after Ao Xin’s repeated fire and lightning attacks had already weakened its skin. Even so, it took over a dozen strikes from Li Hui before the Jiangshi’s head finally rolled away, and it ceased its struggle.

"That steel whip of yours is truly brutal," Li Hui said, pleasantly surprised to see his points balance increase by ten thousand. Because he was currently below the Copper Skin Realm, killing this zombie counted as a two-tier leap, granting him a hundredfold bonus.

He knew from experience that he couldn't have breached the creature's defenses on his own. Yet, Ao Xin had shattered its toughest limbs with nothing but a steel whip. If not for the fire and lightning weakening it, he wouldn't have even been able to decapitate it. Remembering how his own arm had been shattered by that very same whip, he silently cursed the man as a freak.

*Are all Mythical Zoan users this strong?* he wondered, suddenly feeling that his Sand-Sand Fruit was far less appealing.

Ao Xin shrugged. He had left the final blow for Li Hui; otherwise, he would have crushed the creature’s skull long ago. Walking back toward the car, where Ao Chen had been watching the battle, she asked curiously, "Brother, why didn't you just kill it directly? Why go through the trouble of dismembering it?"

"To let Li Hui take the kill," Ao Xin explained.

"But," Ao Chen frowned, as if something didn't add up, "if the point is just to get the points, why not just kill it yourself and give the points to Li Hui?"

Ao Xin and Li Hui exchanged blank stares.

*Right. Why did I go through all that effort?*

Wait—a second thought struck him. Li Hui was a lower level than him, meaning the points earned for killing the zombie were ten times higher than what he would receive.

*Is this a path to wealth?* If he crippled the zombies and let Ao Chen finish them off, wouldn't the rewards be multiplied by ten?