Luo Xun found a vantage point up a nearby oak tree, raised his bow, and looked through the sight.
Then he drew a sharp breath.
Seven or eight skeleton soldiers stood on the terrace, along with two specters floating in midair.
Their semi-transparent bodies drifted like coils of mosquito incense, giving him goosebumps.
And at the center of the undead encirclement…
Was a person with pointed ears.
The figure wore a dark gold robe embroidered with sun motifs.
The robe was torn in multiple places, revealing a blood-soaked undergarment.
A white veil covered their face, leaving only a pair of eyes visible.
Even from this distance, the sight struck a chord in Luo Xun.
Slender and graceful, every movement carried an innate elegance.
Judging by his years of scrolling through Douyin, this was beyond a doubt a stunning beauty—the kind that didn’t need a filter.
Unfortunately, the veil hid half the face, but the pointed ears poked out from both sides, and those golden eyes flickered with a soft, radiant light.
An elf?
The word flashed through Luo Xun’s mind, summoning scenes from *The Lord of the Rings* he had watched as a kid, before he shoved the thought back down.
Cut the crap.
Elves didn’t exist in reality.
Oh right.
He wasn’t in fucking reality anymore.
The figure raised a right hand.
Golden sparks gathered in the palm, spinning into an intricate array.
An ethereal chant echoed through the air, melodic and haunting, every syllable pulling ambient energy straight into the palm.
Sensing the threat, the two specters swooped in first at breakneck speed, tearing through the air with a shrill screech while the skeletons surged forward, swinging their weapons.
The pointed-eared figure didn’t dodge.
A massive wound gaped at her left shoulder; besides blood, black haze billowed out.
Severe blood loss had stiffened her movements, every breath accompanied by a tremor.
Even so, her chanting never wavered.
With a subtle flick of her wrist and a fluid dance of her fingertips, she drew rounded circles in the air, completing the final stroke of the golden pattern.
Then, she shoved her palm forward— Golden light erupted from the array, twisting into a dazzling spear.
The tip impaled the specter directly ahead, drove through several skeleton soldiers behind it, and finally pinned itself into the stone balustrade, bursting into golden flames.
The spear moved so fast that the specter dissolved with an agonizing wail only after the blast.
Yet the fight was far from over.
Several skeletons were still shuffling closer.
That last attack had clearly drained the elf’s remaining strength.
Her body swayed, and she dropped to one knee, propping herself up with her right hand to keep from collapsing.
Her breath came fast and heavy beneath the white veil, and dark vapor poured even more fiercely from her shoulder wound.
Seeing the remaining undead close in again, The elf strained to lift her left hand.
Golden light gathered in her palm once more, but it was far dimmer this time—flickering unsteadily like a flashlight on its last breath.
She slammed the dying glow toward her chest.
The faint gold flared sharply, light and shadow wildly warping around her as her entire body began to glow.
Going for a mutual destruction spell?
The thought flashed through Luo Xun’s mind.
No time to hesitate.
Almost instinctively, he raised his bow.
The moment he drew the bowstring taut, only one image filled his mind: the absolute, desperate finality in her gesture as she slammed that fading light toward her chest.
His arrowhead lined up with the back of the nearest skeleton’s skull, and he released.
Before the whistle of the flying arrow could dissipate, he had already nocked another, drawing and releasing in a movement so smooth it seemed hardwired into his muscles.
The next arrow slammed into another skeleton’s eye socket, shattering bone.
The two skeletons wobbled before collapsing into a heap.
The elf froze, her hand stopping before pressing the unstable gold light into her chest.
She snapped her head up, her golden eyes locking onto the direction of the arrows.
Luo Xun leapt down from the tree, landing and rolling twice.
His back slammed against a rock, making him grimace in pain.
Fuck.
Forgot to check the landing.
Scrambling up, he charged toward the tower.
Only one thought echoed in his mind: he had to save this person.
Two rot-infested corpses ambled out from the ground level door, covered in putrid meat, swaying like drunks.
Luo Xun swept his hunting knife across—the first head hit the ground.
The second was half a beat too slow, but that half-beat cost it its head all the same.
Dead brains really were half a beat slow.
The tower’s stone steps were broken as if blasted by artillery.
He bounded up two at a time, almost slipping on a missed footing, saving himself only by grabbing the balustrade.
The balustrade was crumbling too, falling apart at a light touch.
Luckily, Luo Xun was agile enough to vault up onto the landing with a single hand press.
Which cheap contractor built this crappy tower?
Total shoddy construction.
Just as he reached the second floor, he ran headfirst into a skeleton getting up around the corner.
Before it could turn, Luo Xun delivered a hard kick—only for his foot to slide.
Instead of snapping its spine, he merely kicked off two ribs.
The skeleton turned its head, blue fire dancing in its eye sockets as if asking: “That all you got?” Damn it, don’t rush, stay composed, Luo Xun told himself.
This time he landed a solid kick.
Bones scattered across the floor with a crash, and without looking back, he kept charging upward.
As he burst onto the terrace doorway, the last specter was pouncing toward the elf from behind.
She didn’t even have the strength left to turn her head, kneeling on one knee with slumped shoulders, her ragged breathing audible even from a distance.
No time to pull an arrow.
Luo Xun swung his bow like a club, striking the specter’s semi-transparent body with the bow limb.
Sizzle— It sounded like red-hot iron plunging into wet wood.
The specter shrieked as black smoke billowed off it, retreating in panic.
Luo Xun didn’t chase it.
He turned to look at the kneeling figure.
Veiled in white, her dark gold robe stained with blood, she was in a wretched state—yet kneeling there, her bearing still made one feel she deserved a red carpet rolled out before her.
Her skin was pale as if she had never seen the sun.
Her long golden hair was dusted with ash and messily draped, yet it still seemed to gleam.
Pointed ears poked out slightly from her hair, looking identical to the elves in movies.
Damn, she really is an elf?
Images of Legolas drawing his bow from *The Lord of the Rings* flashed through Luo Xun’s head again, but he snuffed out the thought immediately.
Doesn’t matter if she is or isn’t, save her first.
Those golden eyes stared dead at him, filled with shock, vigilance, and something unreadable—like a person starving for a month suddenly spotting an open cafeteria.
Luo Xun’s heart skipped a beat.
That look was wrong, but there was no time to ponder it.
Language was clearly a barrier; he hadn’t understood a single syllable of her earlier chanting.
He simply pointed at her wound and gestured “heal,” then pointed at himself and gestured “help.” Without caring if she understood, he squatted down and pulled the first-aid kit from his backpack.
Pressing the gauze onto the wound…
The bleeding didn’t stop.
The skin around her wound turned gray rapidly, black vapor seeping out with the blood and spreading through the gauze toward him.
“Fuck.” Luo Xun yanked his hand back.
This wasn’t a normal injury—it was poison.
No, worse than poison.
As the black vapor surged upward, even his fingertips went numb.
The elf suddenly spoke, her tone urgent and laced with warning.
Her uninjured right hand grabbed Luo Xun’s wrist, trying to pull him away.
And then Luo Xun felt it.
It felt as though something belonging to him was draining out of his body.
It wasn’t strength, but something deeper—like someone had rammed a straw into his soul and taken a deep sip.
In that split second, he understood what it felt like to be dragged off a warm heated brick bed in the dead of winter and thrown into an ice pit.
He tried to pull back, but his body felt hollowed out, entirely devoid of strength.
Her golden eyes locked onto him, their glare shifting from shock to…
something Luo Xun couldn’t describe.
Like a drowning person grabbing onto a piece of driftwood, holding on so tightly her nails dug into the wood.
Evidently, he was that piece of driftwood.
Two seconds.
Maybe three.
The elf finally let go.
Luo Xun stumbled back three steps, raised his bow again, nocked an arrow, and aimed straight at the face behind the white veil.
Panting for breath, he forced out a few words: “Did you just fucking…
drain me?”