"Little girl, are you lost? Do you need help?" One of the men asked her, striding towards her with the intention to seize her. Since she had seen what they had done to Zhao Yichen, then they couldn't allow her to continue living.
Who knew what she would say to the police once they helped her get out of this maze-like mountain range of Qingqiu. It was better for them to silence her for good than give her a chance to jeopardize their mission. It was a pity that her beautiful face would be put to waste, but she could only blame herself for sticking her nose into someone else's business.
The fox spirit, who now possessed the body of the dead girl, Shen Minyao, looked at him through her eyelashes. The rain continued to pour, causing her clothes to clung tight on her body.
As a fox spirit who had lived for centuries, she could sense the malintent aura swirling around the four men near her Contractor. Ah, as expected, humans were as fickle as she remembered. They were stupid beings with great ability of self-destruction.
"You are mistaken. I'm here for that man, mister." Shen Minyao lifted a finger and pointed to the almost lifeless body of the man who broke her seal. "That little one is mine."
The man stopped on his tracks and looked at her with contempt.
"You want me dead?" Her seductive, alluring voice reached their ears. "Then let me see if you are capable of killing me." The young woman licked her lips, her eyes turning golden yellow with vertically slit pupils.
She flexed her right hand again, showing her sharp, long nails to her willing prey. The men froze still, finally sensing danger emanating from the young woman in front of them.
"Hmm, Contractor. Do you mind if I get a quick snack? I promise this will be a quick one." She told Zhao Yichen, who was almost at his limit now. He couldn't possibly hear what she was saying as he had already passed out from too much blood loss. A few more minutes and he would surely depart from the world of the living.
Since the fox spirit had been sealed for ages, her hunger for human's life essence was at its peak. While others of her kind preferred to consume infants' and priests' livers, this fox spirit wouldn't mind preying on this kind of scumbags.
Their livers might not have the quality of taste she was accustomed to, but it should be safe enough to satiate her hunger for now.
"M-monster!" The nearest man in front of her stuttered and stepped back, but it was too late for him as Shen Minyao leapt forward, slashing her sharp claw through his middle section in one move.
Blood spurt from his stomach as he fell unconscious on the wet ground. The three other men watched with wide eyes, that had an obvious sense of terror, as Shen Minyao dug her right hand into the large wound on his stomach and fished out his large liver from it.
She took a bite from it and her beautiful face contorted with disappointment. What kind of lifestyle do people have these days? His liver tasted terrible. Although she had eaten livers of alcoholic men in the past, she had no idea that people's quality of life would degenerate over time.
The three remaining men wondered if they were hallucinating or not. The person who should be dead tonight was supposed to be Zhao Yichen, but why did they feel that they were the ones being hunted instead?
No matter what, they cannot allow themselves to suffer the same fate of their fallen comrade. They took their guns and fired, aiming at the young woman, but she was too fast… way too fast for their human eyes!
Shen Minyao's body was like every human's, but because it was now being possessed by the fox spirit, her basal instinct as well as her physical attributes were heightened. She easily dodged the bullets and leapt forward to attack the remaining men.
Once they realized that they had run out of ammunition, they threw their useless guns and ran for their lives. They never thought that they would encounter such a dangerous creature in these woods. They all thought that the legend surrounding the area was just a trick to keep people away from the mountain.
"Oh, do you want to play hide and seek? Now, that's more like it!" Shen Minyao's face broke into a wide grin as she chased the three men in the thick jungle of Qingqiu. She had to admit these men were good as they knew where to go. They certainly did not run like headless chickens.
Too bad though, she knew Qingqiu like the back of her hand. There's no place here that she was unaware of. Every trail, every cave, even the stream that ran through the mountain range, she knew them all by heart. As the mountain's guardian, how can she not know the secret passages to reach certain areas?
So how could they think that they could outrun and outwit her? They must be deluding themselves to think that they could get away from her so easily. Anyway, since they brought her Contractor here, allowing his blood to break the seal that had trapped her for ages, she should at least give them some credit.
Shen Minyao narrowed her eyes and caught a slight movement to her right. Even if the rain was able to wash away their scent, she was still able to find out where they were hiding.
She slashed her claw behind the thick bushes, impaling the second man's chest with it. A shrill scream echoed within the forest, informing his other comrades that he was found and killed. His lifeless body hit the ground as the young woman pulled out her second meal of the night.
She then found the other two just as fast as she did the second one. Sighing to herself, Shen Minyao finished her snack swiftly, knowing that her Contractor was waiting for her return.