Chapter 1138: The Unsearchable Heart

Li Jingguan, despite his heart full of doubts, still swiftly stabbed the wooden stick into Xuanwu's heart several times.

Each spot that was pierced simply turned into an endless black void, without even a drop of blood spilling out.

Li Jingguan and Song Qi stared at the heart in their hands for a long time, each lost in their own thoughts.

Song Qi knew this wouldn't go so smoothly. Xuanwu's "Bumie" likely shared similarities with Jiang Shi's "Bumie"—it appeared normal when unharmed, like an ordinary person, but when injured, it replaced the wounds with a pitch-black color resembling a starry sky.

This blackness allowed the owner of "Bumie" to evade all fatal injuries until the effect ended. At that point, if the wounds remained, all the fatal damage would erupt at once, instantly killing the owner.

But would Xuanwu's "Bumie" ever fade?

"I clearly removed this heart... but I have no way to deal with it." Li Jingguan's eyes dimmed. "I don't even know the meaning of everything I've been insisting on..."

"Don't overthink it," Song Qi said. "Fourth Brother, no one here could have done what you did, but you managed it."

"I..."

"Do you realize?" Song Qi lowered his head and looked at Xuanwu again.

"What?"

"Xuanwu has what we have," Song Qi said. "'Bumie,' 'Tan Nang,' 'Wang You'—we're not inferior to her in any way. The only thing we lack is 'Yue Qian,' but Xuanwu is desperate to die, so she'll just stand there waiting for us to come and kill her. Neither she nor we need 'Yue Qian.'"

"What does that prove..." Li Jingguan shook his head. "I hate to say something that would discourage us, but whatever I probe out doesn't affect her, while whatever she probes out can kill us in an instant... We're not even on the same level."

"Fourth Brother..." Song Qi paused. "Don't lose heart. We already have Xuanwu's heart in our hands—surely there's a way to counter it?"

"You have...?"

"Stabbing it like that won't work. Let me handle it." Song Qi slowly extended his hand. "I have a move that might just work."

After hearing this, Li Jingguan nodded slightly and handed over the heart.

The heart was already marked with spots of black, the traces left from repeated stabbings.

Once Song Qi took the heart, he slowly closed his eyes. All he needed now was enough conviction to create the strangest explosion.

But instilling that conviction into the heart in his hand was difficult.

Believing that something could be a bomb wasn't hard for Song Qi at this point, but the challenge was that this heart still had warmth and was beating strongly, clearly a living thing.

Convincing himself deep down that a living thing was an explosive... the success rate was unimaginably low.

Yet, there was that one time when he had done something similar. Who said something warm and beating couldn't become an explosive?

In a no-escape situation, even an ordinary person could unleash a "resonance" beyond conviction.

He remembered that time when he broke all the fingers on one of his hands and threw them at a sturdy earth rabbit—those fingers must have all exploded... That was "conviction."

He still remembered the warmth on those fingers...

If his own flesh and blood could become explosives, why not Xuanwu's heart?

Compared to that time, this situation was still manageable.

Since ordinary piercing couldn't harm Xuanwu or her heart, he'd blow it to pieces.

Song Qi held the heart in his hand for a while, then slowly opened his eyes. By then, sparks had begun to erupt from the heart.

"Song Qi... you..."

"Xuanwu!" Song Qi shouted from above. "Face your heart!"

As soon as he finished speaking, he hurled the heart straight at Xuanwu. Xuanwu felt this scene seemed vaguely familiar.

Not long ago, she had thrown Qinglong's heart back at Qinglong.

But Qinglong had dodged it... Should she dodge too?

Before she could think it through, the heart flying through the air started to twist and deform. The flickering sparks spread across the surrounding space. The "Cat" team members reacted immediately to the situation and quickly retreated, especially those closest to Xuanwu.

Xuanwu dumbly extended her left hand, about to touch the heart, when it exploded with a tremendous boom.

A violent "Bao Ran" swept over Xuanwu's entire body in an instant. They were in an open outdoor area, so Song Qi could pour all his conviction into it without restraint, making the "Bao Ran" larger than ever before.

Whether from pain or shock, Xuanwu's screams echoed from the flames.

There were countless ways to die in this world, but who ever got killed by their own beating heart?

Everyone shielded their eyes, waiting for the shockwave of the "Bao Ran" to dissipate, but Su Shan's eyes never closed. She kept staring at Xuanwu's body, trying to spot a flaw amid the rippling "waves."

Xuanwu was clearly enveloped by "Bumie," yet the heart that Li Jingguan had removed showed no sign of it. The black starry sky only appeared after an attack.

Drawing on years of experience in forensic analysis and research, Su Shan tried to explain the anomalies of "Zhongyan Zhidi" with her expertise.

Did this mean that "Bumie" only covered Xuanwu's surface, leaving her internal organs unprotected? They weren't just vibrant in color—they could also cause her excruciating, heart-wrenching pain in an instant.

"In other words, 'Bumie' is armor that appears whenever needed to protect its owner," Su Shan murmured softly. "But this armor..."

As the explosion's roar faded, Xuanwu's form emerged from it, though she looked different from before.

She was hunched over, her left hand clutching her chest, as if enduring intense pain.

The next second, Xuanwu reached into her own chest, as if searching for something.

She felt her heart aching terribly, yet it seemed so far away from her.

This strange sensation was different from the last time.

The pain was close, but her heart was distant.

Her arm had already plunged into the starry depths of her chest, yet no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't grasp the throbbing heart.

Everyone watched Xuanwu in silence. Who in the world could reach into their own chest? And even if someone could...

Who could do so without their arm protruding from the other side?

Xuanwu's figure was grotesque, tragic, trembling, and helpless, leaving the onlookers speechless.