Chapter 100 The Fire Ape and the Icy Pool

In the underground cave, the battle had turned into a back-and-forth struggle.

The Fire Ape's guerilla tactics were truly formidable. It moved up and down, as if walking on flat ground. Its leaps and bounds had no discernible pattern, making it unpredictable and swift, difficult to grasp. The entire cave was its three-dimensional battlefield, while the players had few usable positions.

If Xiao Tan and Bei Ling hadn't both had firearms, they would probably have been injured by the Fire Ape already.

"This isn't good. We've used up a lot of bullets, but haven't done much real damage to that monster," Bei Ling said to Xiao Tan at her side. "It might not be worn down before our bullets run out."

Xiao Tan, currently standing with her in a pincer formation, guarding against the Fire Ape's sudden attacks from any direction or angle, replied when he heard this, "I have an idea."

"Speak," Bei Ling responded.

"I'll drink a supplement first to fill my health," Xiao Tan said. "Then I'll put away my gun and settle things with it in close combat."

Bei Ling turned her head to look at him. "Don't need to fight to know it wins and you lose, right?"

"It's okay, I've already seen it," Xiao Tan continued. "This guy's greatest strength is speed, and its attack power is only so-so. Although being on fire all over is troublesome, on the other hand... it doesn't mean its defense is strong. It just means that using melee attacks on it will probably cause some damage." As Xiao Tan spoke, he actually put away his shotgun and took out his main melee weapon, the Damascus Short Sword.

"If I give up using guns and focus on melee... I should be able to keep up with its speed," Xiao Tan continued. "As long as I can touch it, I can use [Bee Sting] to wear down its health. It's better than using bullets to grind it down."

"If you fight like that, I can't coordinate with you," Bei Ling said. "With my shooting ability, against such a fast-moving target, the hit rate is less than thirty percent. Not to mention shooting when it's entangled with you, having to avoid you and hit it..."

"No need, I can handle it alone," Xiao Tan interrupted. "If I feel like I'm in danger of being killed, or I really can't beat it, I'll run back here. Then you can cover me, giving me time to breathe and recover."

"Okay, be careful..." Bei Ling really couldn't think of a better idea, so she had to let Xiao Tan try. After all, Bei Ling's own fighting specialization was only E-level. When facing this kind of super-agile mini-Boss, unless there was a teammate with control skills to support her, she could only do fixed-point cover work.

"Mm, I understand." As Xiao Tan replied, he drank a bottle of survival value supplement. Almost at the same time, the Fire Ape barked again, suddenly flashing out from behind a rock, attacking again. This time, the attack was close to Xiao Tan's side, giving him the chance to cut into the battle.

Xiao Tan didn't directly take the monkey's fire claw. Instead, he dodged to the side, barely avoiding the blow. As he brushed past the Fire Ape, he thrust the short sword forward, successfully grazing the monster's fur. The bleeding effect of his title skill [Bee Sting] was successfully applied, and it began to work from that moment on.

In fact... Xiao Tan's words "I should be able to keep up with its speed" were just him being modest. After this probing and observation, he was ninety percent sure that he could keep up with this speed, so he proposed the idea of ​​solving the battle alone.

Xiao Tan deliberately showed weakness when talking to Bei Ling. First, he took into account Bei Ling's strong personality and wanted to take care of the other party's self-esteem. Second, he quite liked the feeling of being worried about.

"Awoo—" The Fire Ape seemed to become very angry after being injured by the skill. It roared immediately, turned around, and pounced at Xiao Tan again.

This monster was worthy of being agile. It had extremely short stiffness after being attacked, and the subsequent attack came instantly. He saw it turn its head, step forward, and throw both fists together in another dangerous move. Not to mention... the Fire Ape's move faintly had the meaning of martial arts. Its momentum was quite fierce. The scorching wind kicked up by its fists was comparable to the palm wind of a martial arts master.

Facing this surprise attack, Xiao Tan didn't panic. He maintained his defensive posture, moving back a few steps, and easily neutralized the attack.

Xiao Tan's temperament had always been unhurried. Under normal circumstances, he was a very calm person with great patience. Unless he was frightened out of his mind by something he was afraid of, he would rather not act without a proper opportunity.

And if he acted, it meant that the other party had revealed a flaw.

Although the Fire Ape was fierce, it was just a monster after all, with limited intelligence. After being injured by Xiao Tan, it attacked continuously and failed, and suddenly became anxious. Relying on its beastly nature, it rushed forward swiftly and wildly waved its fire claws.

Seeing it rush forward, Xiao Tan didn't retreat but advanced. He had seen that when the Fire Ape swung its claws, its abdomen would reveal a flaw. So he bent his body and lunged diagonally, sweeping the short sword out. As he passed the Fire Ape, he not only cut it, but also added the second layer of [Bee Sting] effect to it.

In these two rounds of confrontation, Xiao Tan used 14% of his stamina value just to use those two skills. Fortunately, the loss of survival value was minimal. It only lost about 1% of health every two seconds when approaching the Fire Ape. As long as he moved slightly away by about a meter, the damage would disappear.

On the Fire Ape's side, although the damage it received was not great, the bleeding effect had already been stacked twice. As an agile Boss, its health was not high to begin with. It had previously lost some when it was grazed by bullets during the guerilla battle. Now, it was attached with a bleeding effect lasting for two minutes, and it was already in a losing position.

What Xiao Tan had to do was to remain patient, and under the premise of ensuring that he was not hit by fatal attacks, lure the Fire Ape to continue its frenzied attacks, so that the monster's bleeding speed would be faster.

But at this moment, unexpectedly, the Fire Ape suddenly gave up on Xiao Tan, turned around abruptly, and rushed towards Bei Ling.

This monster could also see that Xiao Tan's speed was not bad, and it would be futile to continue chasing. It was afraid that it would be worn down to death without the other party being harmed, so it decided to make a desperate gamble, even if it meant killing one of them.

Seeing the Fire Ape rushing over with all its might, showing signs of desperation, Bei Ling naturally wouldn't sit still and wait for death. She turned around and flashed into the corner of two giant rocks, and quickly retreated to the wall, so that the Fire Ape only had one direction to launch an attack on her.

When the monster rushed in from the only angle, the bullets from Bei Ling's MP5 immediately poured out. Taking advantage of the terrain, almost six or seven out of ten bullets hit the target.

After Bei Ling fired the magazine in her gun, the Fire Ape had more than a dozen bullet holes on its body, and blood flowed like a fountain, but this didn't stop its actions. Since it was a desperate fight, it wouldn't stop because of this level of attack.

The Fire Ape let out a final miserable roar, and the ruby-like face lit up with a red light. It was seen that it spun around, and the long tail behind it roared out like a fiery whip. The ruby at the tip of its tail was like a red iron cannonball, attacking Bei Ling's chest.

The position where Bei Ling was standing did restrict the angle of the attack, but it also made her lose the space to detour. She didn't expect this monster to withstand the strafing of the submachine gun and launch a desperate blow. Had she known, she should have switched out the sniper rifle. Although this was at a medium-short distance, if she used sniper rounds, even if the monster didn't die, it would be missing an arm or a leg as long as she hit it.

Seeing that the tail was about to hit her, Bei Ling could only brace herself to block it. She silently prayed in her heart that her survival value could withstand this cannonball-like heavy blow.

With a whoosh, a gust of hot wind brushed past Bei Ling's cheek.

The Fire Ape's attack actually deviated...

Bei Ling stared with her watery eyes, looking at this unbelievable scene in surprise.

But, a little cold light pierced out from the monkey's throat.

At this time, if one looked from behind the Fire Ape, one could see a figure wearing assassin's attire, standing tightly against the burning body. A steady, precise hand, under the scorching heat of the flames, still forcefully pierced a short sword into the monster's cervical vertebra, and pierced through it with all its strength.

With a thud, the Fire Ape fell forward, and Bei Ling saw Xiao Tan behind the monster.

It turned out that when the monster swung its tail, Xiao Tan had already killed his way to within an inch of its back. He didn't care about the damage caused by continuously getting close to the Fire Ape's body. At this second, he was simply like a cold-blooded butcher. Perhaps his medical knowledge flashed, or perhaps some innate killing talent awakened at this moment. Xiao Tan's eyes, in that instant, precisely and quickly captured the only, most fatal attack point on the Fire Ape's body.

The severed cervical vertebra caused the Fire Ape's swinging tail to deviate. Accompanied by inertia, it went awry just before hitting Bei Ling.

"Hoo... hoo hoo hoo... hot, hot, hot..." As soon as the monster fell, Xiao Tan returned to his usual dazed appearance. His movements were as if he had been burned while eating roasted sweet potatoes. He tossed the short sword back and forth between his hands, because the short sword conducted heat, so he couldn't hold it at this moment.

Bei Ling walked forward, looked down at the monster's body, then raised her head, and pointed the muzzle of her MP5 at Xiao Tan (because Bei Ling had attached the flashlight to the gun body), shining it on his face and said, "I really couldn't tell, you are quite reliable at the critical moment."

"No, no... it's luck, good luck..." Xiao Tan was being polite, but he couldn't hide anything on his face. He smiled so brightly, and scratched the back of his head with one hand, almost shyly saying, "I'm not that good."

While the two were talking, the Fire Ape's body on the ground quickly self-combusted into ashes, leaving only the red crystal at the end of its tail on the ground.

"This should be one of the two stone tablets," Xiao Tan said, and bent down to pick up the crystal.

Because the monsters in Thriller Paradise don't drop any equipment, even Xiao Tan knew that this thing was probably a quest item.

When he first touched it, the crystal was quite hot, and Xiao Tan almost couldn't hold it again. However, after touching the player's hand, the originally rhombus-shaped red crystal quickly turned into white light and changed its shape. When the white light dissipated, the red crystal became a magatama shape, just like half of a Bagua (Eight Trigrams).

[Name: Stone Tablet (Yang)]

[Type: Plot Related]

[Quality: Normal]

[Function: Embed it together with the Stone Tablet (Yin) into the Bagua stone disc on the stone gate to open the stone gate]

[Can it be taken out of this script: No]

[Remarks: As a key, the shape and principle of this thing are very puzzling]

After getting the Yang Stone Tablet, Xiao Tan and Bei Ling explored the cave again, wanting to see if they had missed anything, so as not to have to go back later. As a result, they really gained something. In a stalactite crevice, Bei Ling found a consumable item.

[Name: Rock Debris Crystal]

[Type: Consumables]

[Quality: Normal]

[Function: After use, restores 50% of the player's survival value, and increases the survival value recovery speed for a certain period of time]

[Can it be taken out of this script: Yes]

[Remarks: The recovery effect is not affected by the diminishing effect of survival value supplements]

This item should be a kind of compensation measure for players, just like the recovery items dropped after killing a Boss in some games. Obviously, the system also believes that killing this Fire Ape requires a certain price, either consuming health or other resources. In short, it is unlikely to be solved easily.

However, for the two "rich people" present, they never lacked this type of recovery consumable. It was good if they could find it, but it didn't matter if they couldn't. If they felt it was necessary, they wouldn't feel bad about buying dozens or even hundreds of bottles of survival value supplements. If the knapsack wasn't enough to hold them, they would just buy more knapsack slots.

Bei Ling directly gave the [Rock Debris Crystal] to Xiao Tan. After all, he contributed more to dealing with the Fire Ape. He not only drank supplements, but also had a lot of health burned off in order to be a hero and save the beauty. Xiao Tan didn't decline.

The two roughly circled the cave and returned along the road they came from. They passed the crossroads again a few minutes later and entered the tunnel on the right side of the crossroads this time.

This road wasn't long either. It seemed that its length was symmetrical to the tunnel on the opposite side. Five or six minutes later, another cave appeared in front of them. This cave was not very large, and the overall shape was oval. The rocks on the four walls reflected a cyan-blue halo under the light. The center of the cave was almost completely occupied by a pool of water, with only a circle of standing area around the edge of the cave.

When the two stood by the pool, they could feel a chill that pierced their hearts. It could be seen that the water temperature of the pool must be extremely low. They scanned the cave with lights and found nothing of value. It seemed that the Yin Stone Tablet must be at the bottom of the water...

Xiao Tan squatted down and poked his finger into the water. As a result, he was immediately frozen and retracted his hand. "Wow... this must be the legendary zero-degree non-freezing..."

"I'll go." As Bei Ling said, she tied the flashlight to her clothes. The special forces suit she was wearing had many functions, and there were buckle-like settings on the shoulders and the outside of the thighs, which could fix various small objects.

"Hey... it's really cold," Xiao Tan reminded.

"It's okay." She dipped some water on her face and neck. Although her expression didn't change, she was thinking in her heart: I'm freezing to death...

"You can't shoot underwater. If there's any danger, swim back immediately," Xiao Tan said with concern.

"I know..." Bei Ling replied impatiently.

"How about this, if you haven't come up to breathe for three minutes..." Xiao Tan was interrupted before he finished speaking.

"Don't be long-winded!" Bei Ling glared at him, then took a deep breath, ran two steps with a slight run-up, and jumped into the water.

The icy pool water enveloped Bei Ling from head to toe. She endured the pain and barely opened her eyes, but her eyes were still almost completely murky, and the light from the flashlight could only allow her to see a very limited distance. But she still gritted her teeth and swam hard towards the bottom of the pool.

Although Bei Ling usually looks like a very cheerful girl who likes to laugh, she is actually very stubborn and unwilling to admit defeat, especially unwilling to lose to the idiot on the shore. She would rush to go into the water just out of a willful idea: since you can get burned to save me, I can also stand a little cold to get the items out.

Generally speaking, a person wearing ordinary clothes can only withstand a few minutes in zero-degree water. This is still the survival time when remaining still. In reality, due to limb numbness caused by low temperature, loss of mobility, or blind struggle due to fear... most people will drown prematurely before the limit time.

It can be seen that Bei Ling's choice at this moment is extremely dangerous. Xiao Tan is also a doctor, and he knows this kind of knowledge, so he repeatedly reminded her with great concern, but unfortunately she didn't appreciate it, and instead felt underestimated.

Time passed slowly, and every second seemed extremely long.

One minute... two minutes...

In a blink of an eye, almost five minutes had passed. Even someone with good swimming skills should come up to breathe by now. Although drowning in the game wouldn't cause unconsciousness, survival value would still be deducted.

Xiao Tan couldn't wait any longer. He lay down on the shore, held down the miner's hat on his head with one hand, supported himself on the ground with the other, closed his eyes, and suddenly stuck his head into the water. He didn't know how far he could see like this, but he just wanted to try.

Unexpectedly, as soon as Xiao Tan opened his eyes in the water, Bei Ling happened to emerge from the water not far from him. Because Xiao Tan had stuck his entire head into the water, he didn't hear the sound next to him.

Bei Ling climbed ashore in a rather disheveled manner. At this moment, the quest item had already been collected in her knapsack. After going ashore, she was relieved.

She brushed back the hair on her forehead and sticking to her face, and turned her head to look at the idiot who had plunged his head into the water, and couldn't help but smile.

As the saying goes, a lotus emerges from clear water, naturally devoid of artificiality. At this moment, although Gu Xiao Ling's face was pale from the cold, it made her complexion even more crystal clear and jade-like, delicate and beautiful. It's a pity that Xiao Tan couldn't see the smiling peach cheeks and the glances of her beautiful eyes.

A few seconds later, there was a splash, and Xiao Tan was kicked into the water. He came out of the water with a confused expression, and looked back at the shore, "Eh? When did you get behind me?"

"I found the stone tablet, let's go." As Bei Ling said this, she had already turned around and strode away.

"Huh? Then why did you kick me into the water?"

"Sigh... hopeless idiot." Bei Ling chuckled, ignored him, and continued forward on her own.

"Hey! Wait for me!"