“Lin Fang?”

Bu Mokong looked just as surprised.

Ryan’s eyes narrowed the moment he heard Lin Fang’s name slip from Li Ying’s lips.

Lin Fang didn’t care about their expressions or their surprise. He looked straight at Li Ying and said quickly, “Sister Li, help her. She needs CPR.”

Li Ying hesitated only for a heartbeat, but Mokong’s hand shot out and clamped around her wrist. “Don’t,” he said sharply. “We’re not obliged to help them.”

Ryan pointed with his sword, distrust written all over his face. “Isn’t she the werewolf from earlier?”

Lin Fang didn’t dodge it. He nodded once.

Mokong tightened his grip on Li Ying and scoffed. “Then this is even more obvious. This is a trick. He’s trying to use sympathy to pull us closer, then take you out first. You’re the one with the wyvern, after all. He’s afraid you’ll steal the kill and the core.”

Those words hit harder than any beam earlier. Lin Fang slowly stood up, eyes cold as water. “Don’t be ridiculous,” he said flatly. “If I really wanted to kill you three… I wouldn’t need a trick.”

Ryan’s grip on his sword tightened, lightning faintly crackling around the blade. The air tensed.

Lin Fang ignored him and turned back to Li Ying, voice urgent now. “There’s no time. Will you help her or not? I’m asking you because she is a girl. Nothing more and nothing less…”

Li Ying wavered, then clenched her teeth and tore her arm free from Mokong’s grasp. “Move,” she said and rushed forward.

Lin Fang immediately knelt again and placed a hand over Nianxi’s stomach, mana flowing outward in a warm, steady layer to shield her organs.

Meanwhile, Li Ying leaned down, sealed her lips over Nianxi’s, and began CPR without hesitation. The first breath brought nothing. The second made her chest rise weakly. On the third, Nianxi’s body shuddered violently, and she coughed, water spilling from her mouth in rough bursts.

Her eyes fluttered open. She dragged in a broken breath, then another, coughing hard as the last of the water cleared from her throat.

Lin Fang finally let go of the breath he didn’t realize he had been holding and dropped back onto the wet ground, exhaustion crashing into him all at once.

Li Ying supported Nianxi’s shoulders and helped her sit up. Nianxi coughed a few more times, then slowly lifted her head and looked at Lin Fang with unfocused eyes. “Mister… Alpha?” she whispered weakly.

Lin Fang smiled, tired but real. “Lin Fang,” he said gently. “My name is Lin Fang.” Then he glanced at the woman beside her. “And this is Li Ying. She’s the one who just saved you.”

Nianxi turned her head weakly toward Li Ying, her lips pale but steady. “Thank you, Sister,” she said.

Li Ying waved it off, still crouched beside her. “I didn’t do much. It’s just CPR.”

Nianxi shifted her gaze to Lin Fang, guilt clear on her face. “I’m sorry. I left your side and got myself into trouble. I thought using the artifact would protect me. Instead… I dragged you into it, too.”

Lin Fang let out a slow breath and shook his head. “It’s fine. You’re alive.” Then he stood and looked at Li Ying. “As thanks, you can keep the monster’s head and take the kill. I’ll take the spirit core and leave.”

Li Ying was just about to respond when Mokong’s voice cut in, sharp and full of mockery. “Why do you think we’ll let you take it?”

Ryan followed immediately, his tone cold. “That monster was our prey. We did most of the damage. You’re the one who stole the kill.”

Lin Fang looked at them as if he had just heard something ridiculous. He shrugged lightly. “No one owns any monster in this place. Just because you found it first, I was supposed to bow and walk away? What kind of logic is that?” His eyes hardened. “You should be glad I didn’t take offense earlier when your black lightning hit us in the lake. You almost killed my friend.”

Mokong sneered. “Look at this guy. A moment ago, he was begging for help. Now that he got it, his true colors show.”

That was enough.

Lin Fang’s gaze snapped to Mokong, cold and sharp. “I haven’t forgotten what you did to me, Bu Mokong,” he said quietly. “Back in the stellar rift, you pushed me toward death just because I talked back to you.” His voice dropped even lower. “And just now, you tried to stop Li Ying from saving my friend when it was a life-and-death moment.” He took one step forward. “Before I really lose it… Get out of my sight.”

The air around them tightened.

The lake still rippled behind them, the corpse of the Green Anaconda drifting slowly at the surface.

Nianxi clutched her chest, watching in silence.

Li Ying stood frozen between both sides, her face clouded with conflict.

Ryan’s sword crackled faintly with black lightning again, ready to fight.

And Lin Fang stood there without raising a weapon, calm on the outside, fury boiling just beneath his breathing.

Mokong’s face twisted with anger, his voice cracking as he stepped forward. “A fu*king unlicensed nobody who needed protection in a second-rate stellar rift a few months ago is telling me to get lost?” He laughed harshly. “Looks like you got really arrogant after inheriting Master Li’s legacy.”

Lin Fang didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t even look directly at Mokong. His lips moved quietly. “Activate, Rise of the Undead. Select Green Anaconda.”

The air trembled in the surroundings. A colossal shadow rose from the earth, higher and higher, peeling free of the ground with a grinding sound.

The body followed, hundreds of feet long, its torn flesh stitched with dark energy, scales half-rotted, half-renewed. The undead Green Anaconda reared up, blocking out the moon and casting a lengthy shadow over Ryan and Mokong, with its pair of large eyes staring at them.

Li Ying instinctively lifted her head, then lifted it more, and still couldn’t see the full shape.

Nianxi froze beside her, breath caught in her throat as the pressure of its aura crushed down on her chest.

Mokong’s mouth fell open without a sound.

Ryan’s grip tightened around his sword until black lightning crawled wildly along its blade, his pupils shrinking as he stared upward.

Lin Fang finally looked at Mokong. “Now,” he said calmly, “do you believe me if I tell you that if I wanted to, I could kill you right here?” His eyes were steady. “And I had this power even before I inherited anything from my master?”

Silence swallowed the lakeshore. The undead serpent loomed like a nightmare given form, its hollow eyes glowing faintly as it breathed out cold, rotten air.

Lin Fang glanced at it briefly, then away, already losing interest.

In his mind, numbers and calculations flickered past. This summon didn’t cost him mana.

He could keep it as long as it wasn’t destroyed. He couldn’t heal it, but as a moving wall of death, it was more than enough. A slow exhale left his lips. Farming with this wouldn’t be too bad.

He lifted his hand. “Get down.”

The undead anaconda obeyed at once, lowering its massive head to the shore. Lin Fang turned to Nianxi. “Get on.”

She snapped out of her shock, swallowed hard, and nodded. Her legs trembled as she climbed onto the ridged, rotten scales, carefully finding balance atop the enormous skull. When she was seated, Lin Fang stepped forward without another word.

Mokong and Ryan both tensed.

Their eyes flicked between Lin Fang and the towering undead again and again.

Ryan could still fight.

He knew that.

But not like this.

Not with that thing looming behind Lin Fang like a moving execution ground.

Mokong, on the other hand, felt something sink deep into his stomach. Whatever remaining will he had to provoke a fight collapsed under the sheer weight of what he was facing.

Lin Fang walked past them, slow and unhurried, the undead queen moving with him, its colossal body sliding forward with a low, scraping roar. The night parted around them. No one dared to step into their path.

Upon reaching the shore, he bent his knees and jumped. He shot forward in a clean arc and plunged straight back into the lake. Water exploded upward as he disappeared beneath the surface.

He dove deep, body cutting through the cold darkness until the massive corpse came into view, drifting like a drowned mountain.

Twin daggers flashed in his hands.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep