Chapter 277: Yu Zi and I Are the Best in the World

Just as Bai Zhenzhen was looking at her phone in confusion,

A violent tremor suddenly came from the ground, as if a giant beast had slammed into the earth, nearly lifting Bai Zhenzhen, who was standing on the ground, into the air.

Waves of heart-pounding threat surged into her heart, making her feel as if every hair on her body stood on end. Thunder mana instinctively surged out wildly, turning into streaks of lightning that swept across her entire body.

The next moment, with a deafening boom, a gust of wind swept over, causing Bai Zhenzhen’s long hair to rustle violently.

She turned her head toward the direction of the blast and saw a dozens-story apartment building pierced by a blinding flash of light.

In the violent explosion, the entire building collapsed and shattered in an instant, kicking up a cloud of dust that completely swallowed Bai Zhenzhen’s figure.

In the intense shaking, like a major earthquake, Bai Zhenzhen felt the ground beneath her feet undulate like waves.

“What… is happening?”

Watching the entire apartment building crumble before her eyes, Bai Zhenzhen’s mind went blank in that instant.

“A Yu!”

She flickered and was about to rush toward the collapsing building, but the next moment a second wave of explosions erupted, and a visible shockwave swept toward her.

With her muscles and mana working in unison, streaks of lightning shot into the sky as Bai Zhenzhen braced herself against the shockwave, forcing her eyes wide open, glaring furiously in the direction of the explosion.

As the shockwave roared, the dust cloud that had just filled the air was blown away, revealing the apartment building now reduced to rubble.

Seeing this, Bai Zhenzhen felt a sharp pang in her heart, and a suffocating sensation kept rising from within.

Just then, two voices came from the side.

A male voice said, “Rubble search complete. No survivors.”

A female voice said, “Why is the other one outside the building? Never mind, I’ll handle it. You clean up the rubble; we’ll bury it later.”

Bai Zhenzhen turned and saw a man and a woman slowly walking toward her.

The woman had white hair, and her limbs, chest, and abdomen were made of some kind of jade-like magical prosthetic body, with runes flickering inside.

Bai Zhenzhen’s eyes narrowed slightly. The sheer number of magical prosthetics on the other party indicated that they were at least at the Foundation Establishment stage for many years.

The words coming from the woman’s mouth also made Bai Zhenzhen instantly realize that the explosion of the building was no accident—someone was targeting them.

“Hey…” Bai Zhenzhen stared at the two of them, her eyes fixed. “What do you mean by ‘no survivors’ just now?”

The other party clearly had no intention of answering.

But looking at the collapsed ruins of the building before her, the answer seemed obvious.

“Yu-zi.”

“I…” Bai Zhenzhen clenched her fists, feeling as if the whole world had turned gray.

She murmured to herself, “I had already sunk into the bottomless darkness, but Yu-zi stayed with me and helped me crawl out.”

“We finally made it this far.”

“My best friend in the world, the one I can call ‘Dad’ every day—Yu-zi.”

“If it weren’t for keeping me company, he could have entered Wanfa University with his sister two years ago…”

Zhang Yu’s figure kept flashing through Bai Zhenzhen’s mind.

Every word he said, every sentence, seemed to flicker in her heart.

“A Zhen, let’s take the entrance exam for the Top Ten together.”

“This is your spiritual root, so let’s call it Zhenzhen Spiritual Root.”

“Sis, is there really no way to take A Zhen with us?”

“If I stay behind, do you think A Zhen and I can take the normal route and get into the Top Ten, just like you?”

“We’ll still go for a master’s degree, a doctorate, break through to Golden Core together, break through to Nascent Soul, and join Wanfa Sect together.”

Bai Zhenzhen’s body gradually began to tremble. The green lotus mark near her abdomen flickered continuously, and the true spiritual root in her dantian transformed into a green lotus, slowly unfolding.

“These three years with Zhang Yu have been the happiest years of my life.”

“He is my best friend in the world…”

At this moment, an intense emotion, never before felt since birth, surged within Bai Zhenzhen's heart.

A feeling that surpassed all her previous desires to survive, to get into the Top Ten, to obtain the Foundation Establishment certificate...

An unprecedented extreme emotion, greater than any thought she had ever had since being born, gushed out from her mind like a floodgate opening.

"I want... to kill all of you."

Facing Bai Zhenzhen's murderous gaze, the man and woman across from her paid no attention.

As Foundation Establishment cultivators who had lingered on the first stratum for many years, even setting aside their absolute advantages in Dao heart, magical power, and magical remains, their level-20 physical bodies alone were enough to crush Bai Zhenzhen, who had only entered Foundation Establishment for less than a year.

And today, they had come here solely because of a commission from the Oasis Group.

Eliminate Zhang Yu and Bai Zhenzhen.

Although this commission carried some risk, for them—who had idled on the first stratum for so long and were about to exhaust their Foundation Establishment lifespans—any chance to move up was enough to make them take the risk.

After all, they had only a few years left to live.

With a loud bang, accompanied by waves of air pressure, the female cultivator had already shot toward Bai Zhenzhen's position.

But in the next instant, her expression suddenly changed drastically.

As flickering green lotus projections spread out behind Bai Zhenzhen, the spiritual energy between heaven and earth, as if out of control, surged wildly toward Bai Zhenzhen. Even the two peak Foundation Establishment cultivators found themselves unable to absorb even a trace of spiritual energy at that moment.

The female cultivator roared inwardly: "This... could it be a Divine Spiritual Root?!"

The Divine Spiritual Root—surpassing the Human Spiritual Root, Earth Spiritual Root, and Heaven Spiritual Root—was strictly controlled by the Top Ten sects and absolutely forbidden from appearing among the common folk. Many cultivators referred to it as military-grade power.

In the general understanding of cultivators, against an opponent at the same cultivation level, unless one also possessed military-grade power, the probability of victory was zero.

The female cultivator fiercely gritted her teeth, already mobilizing her full magical power: "Go all out! Let's kill her together!"

In her view, Bai Zhenzhen had broken through to Foundation Establishment only very recently, so the two of them joining forces at full strength might still have a chance.

But the next moment, she noticed the male cultivator's figure flicker and vanish into the night—he had directly fled.

"Goddammit!"

Just as she hesitated in her mind for a fraction of a second, torn between fleeing or fighting, Bai Zhenzhen's figure in front of her dispersed like a puff of smoke into the air.

The next moment, streaks of lightning sword light flashed through the air, slashing fiercely toward the female cultivator's body.

After dodging several thunder swords in succession, the female cultivator's expression only grew darker.

She couldn't sense her opponent, couldn't touch her opponent, and even her area-of-effect counterattacks around her seemed not to make contact with the opponent.

It was as if the opponent existed in a different space—only the enemy could attack her, while she was utterly unable to strike the enemy.

"Divine Spiritual Root..." The female cultivator's face became increasingly grim. After just a few seconds of battle, the thought of retreat had already germinated in her mind.

But just then, beams of light descended from the sky, enclosing an area of a thousand meters like a prison.

More than ten minutes later.

As rescue vehicles arrived one after another, the ruins were gradually excavated, and corpse after corpse was carried out.

The man in charge of the on-site rescue looked at Xinghuo Zhenren beside him and said carefully, "Zhenren, please restrain your grief."

Xinghuo Zhenren said calmly, "You think he's dead?"

After eight months of guidance, Xinghuo Zhenren dared to claim that, aside from Zhang Yu himself, he was the one who best understood Zhang Yu's body in the entire world.

He understood it better than any of Zhang Yu's past teachers, any of his classmates, and better than Bai Zhenzhen or Yu Xinghan.

That body, possessing extraordinary impact resistance and terrifying regenerative ability, he believed would not die so easily.

Hearing Xinghuo Zhenren's question, the man was slightly taken aback. Looking at the ruins before him, he thought to himself, "How could he still be alive?"

"Even if he's not dead, he's mostly crippled. Who knows how much it'll cost to treat him? His immortal path potential is as good as destroyed."

"Sigh, to have something like this happen just a month before the college entrance exams."

Thinking this, the man's face was filled with deep regret.

Just then, Xinghuo Zhenren took a step forward, and in the next moment, surging martial true qi burst forth, instantly peeling away layers of debris, revealing a large number of bodies beneath.

Xinghuo Zhenren walked in and, after a moment, came out carrying a bloodied human figure.

Voices came from all around: "Is it Zhang Yu?"

"Ah, what a pity."

Just then, Xinghuo Zhenren said calmly, "He's not dead yet. Get the doctors here."

Looking at the Zhang Yu before him, Xinghuo Zhenren, who had a profound understanding of various martial arts techniques, narrowed his eyes slightly and had already come to a judgment. He thought to himself, "A state of suspended animation from the Spring Autumn Endless Zen?"

"This kid has indeed pushed this body-tempering technique to level 20... Has it only been eight months since he obtained it?"

At the same time, although he hadn't inspected the other's physical body closely, Xinghuo Zhenren could faintly sense an indomitable will within him, like a blazing ember, conveying a desire to survive.

He thought to himself, "It seems that in this crisis, Zhang Yu has made a breakthrough in his mental cultivation method instead. Even though his body is severely injured and his consciousness is unclear, having entered the suspended animation state of Spring Autumn Endless Zen, he can still maintain the operation of the mental method, as if by instinct."

"Compared to his previous state of maintaining a divided mind and constantly running the mental method, this is already a higher realm."

So, under the confused, strange, and puzzled gazes of the crowd, several doctors, under Xinghuo Zhenren's orders, came to Zhang Yu's side.

"Multiple comminuted fractures throughout the body, spinal fracture with dislocation..."

"Over eighty percent of the body's muscles have severe crush injuries."

"Traumatic brain injury..."

"Kidney failure..."

"But..."

At first, they also thought that the Zhang Yu before them had no signs of life, but after a thorough examination, the doctors' faces gradually showed expressions of surprise.

"It seems... he really is still alive."

"Try using medicine."

"The wounds are closing on their own."

"The medicine is taking effect very quickly..."

"Such amazing vitality."

Amid the shocked gazes of the many doctors, the wounds on Zhang Yu's body surface quickly began to heal. Strands of flesh and blood, as if possessing their own will, actively closed and intertwined, continuously accelerating the healing of his injuries.