"Oh shit, are we really about to watch a chicken win ten straight matches today?"
"The black market's out of stronger pets already!"
As the crowd shouted and jeered, the match was once again put on hold. To her surprise, Jing Shu was actually invited to the top floor of the arena, the so-called nobles' section that most people could only dream of entering.
She couldn't help feeling wary. Were they planning to silence her because they didn't have any pets left to send out? She'd read up on the previous ten-win streaks before—none of them ended cleanly. But this time was different. She'd bet two thousand black market coins right from the start on Xiao Dou winning the ten-match championship instead of placing bets round by round. It was basically an all-in lottery ticket, and she was aiming for the jackpot.
The problem was the odds. If the ratio had been one to one, it wouldn't matter much, but the payout was massive. If Jing Shu actually pulled off the win, the black market would bleed hard. Money usually only flowed into the black market, not out of it. Nobody liked losing their own pile.
The path from the slums to the nobles' floor amazed her. From the arena, it looked like the top and bottom levels were connected, but in reality, there were no direct passages. To reach the upper floors, one had to take a long detour through multiple security checks. Weapons were strictly forbidden, and everyone had to pass through a laser barrier.
They said the barrier was a last line of defense against riots. Once activated, it could slice a person into chunks in an instant. This was Jing Shu's first time seeing this kind of American high-tech weaponry.
So Yang Yang's plan had been right after all. If they'd tried to storm the place, they'd never have made it past the noble zone, much less smuggled out supplies.
Carefully, Jing Shu passed through the laser zone and was escorted into the second floor of the nobles' section overlooking the arena. She didn't even have time to take in the scenery before applause filled the air.
The room smelled strange. On a plush couch sat a blonde, blue-eyed woman with flushed cheeks, lounging lazily in a man's arms. The man was massaging her like an obedient servant.
So this was Peggy, the one who had sent them the mission.
"Ten times leverage means you've already made tens of thousands of black market coins. Time to quit while you're ahead."
Peggy said it in fluent Chinese. Jing Shu frowned. "What do you mean?"
"You won't win the tenth match."
"How would you know if we don't try?"
"Fine then, Miss Mirror," Peggy said with a seductive smile. "Stay here and witness it with us."
Jing Shu couldn't read her intentions, but she had no idea that Peggy was simply trying to keep her away from Xiao Dou so she couldn't use any more of her weird witchcraft. Those Chinese curses were seriously terrifying.
So what would the black market send out for the tenth round? The answer came soon enough. Half an hour later, the sound of heavy engines echoed, and everyone turned as armored trucks rolled in, hauling a massive creature. The black market did have a hidden trump card after all.
"It's coming, it's coming!"
The crowd grew louder as the cage doors opened.
"That looks like a hippo, right? But what's with all that rotting flesh?"
"Wait, that's a zombie hippo! It wiped out three entire teams a few days ago before an Asian squad finally dragged it back. Guns don't even faze it, not even machine guns. It regenerates too! Even if you blow its head off, the damn thing keeps moving!"
"Holy shit, that's insane. So this undead beast is the black market's ultimate trump card!"
"That chicken's done for. Its only trick is that anesthetic spit, but that won't work on something like this. Hell, even poison won't!"
No way would the black market let an Asian outsider walk away with the ten-match jackpot!
The creature clearly had no consciousness left. The moment it was released into the cage, it started searching for food. It really was terrifying—thick-skinned, slow, but practically invincible. None of the previous beasts could even scratch it.
Crocodiles, pythons, whatever—none of them would ever pick a fight with something the size of a truck, especially one that fed on rotten meat. In the apocalypse, these Darklife creatures had no natural predators left. When starving, they'd even eat their own kind.
Peggy smirked when she saw Jing Shu's stunned expression. "It's not too late to regret your decision. No matter what happens, the black market won't lose. So, what now? What's your little hen, or your so-called witchcraft, gonna do this time?"
A chicken versus an undead hippo—what kind of odds were those?
The tenth match instantly reignited the entire arena. Even people who'd sworn off betting were rushing to place wagers now. "Who'd turn down free money?" was the general mood.
Jing Shu didn't answer. She simply smiled, and that smile looked… strange. This thing wasn't like anything else. Unless she chopped the hippo into pieces, there wasn't much she could do. Undead creatures were straight-up nightmares—immune to bullets, immune to pain, made of billions of bacteria packed inside a hippo's massive frame. How the hell was anyone supposed to kill that?
So, a chicken with no weapons, no grenades, and spit that didn't work anymore—how could it possibly take down a multi-ton zombie hippo?
The match began.
The hippo, its flesh dripping and rancid, only had one instinct left—eat. It'd devour anything it could fit in its mouth. No fear, no pain, no emotion.
The moment it entered, it started licking up the leftover scraps on the ground, snorting happily as it ate.
"Feeling any regrets?" Peggy asked, sipping a bright red drink with a satisfied moan. "If you hadn't brought those monsters back the other day, this wouldn't be happening. You could've really won hundreds of thousands of black market coins. Or, as you Chinese say, you dug your own grave."
Jing Shu stayed silent. From this height, she could clearly see the entire arena. She was communicating with Xiao Dou through their link.
"It's useless," Peggy said lazily. "We've tested those things for days. We even extracted key genes from them. They're like bottomless pits. Once they run out of food, they go berserk."
Sure enough, after licking the last of the scraps, the hippo turned and charged straight for Xiao Dou. The hen flapped her wings and dodged, leaping onto the iron bars of the cage. But she couldn't just stay up there forever.
It really looked hopeless. If she'd had grenades, she could've at least blown the thing apart. But now? What could a chicken do on her own?
Then Jing Shu smiled again—slowly, eerily.
She gave her command. "Either you eat it, or it eats you. Your choice."