Chapter 806: Physical Limit

Di Niu picked up the rope and tied it around her waist, then stood beside the pit.

Under everyone's watchful eyes, she lifted her leg and stepped inside, then lay down on her side with her hands hugging her knees. She looked as relaxed as if she were lounging on an extremely comfortable sofa, her expression calm.

"Are you ready?" Di Niu asked from inside the pit.

The two men at the other end of the rope quickly reached out and gripped it tightly. The fat man stood at the very end, tying the rope around his waist with a dead knot, while Wang Ge in front of him wrapped it around his waist several times.

Qi Xia glanced at the two coldly, feeling that Di Niu was being a bit too soft-hearted. When she had thrown out those two corpses earlier, it was essentially giving them one last chance to back out, but these two were clearly blinded by the massive stakes of Jiǔ Bǎi Liù Shí Kē Dào and hadn't considered escape at all.

"What a pair of dead men walking," Qi Xia said.

"We're ready!" The two men hadn't heard Qi Xia's mutterings and shouted toward Di Niu in the pit while pulling on the rope.

"Then... the game begins," Di Niu said.

The air suddenly froze in that moment, with tension spreading from the two men and gradually enveloping the entire area.

After hearing this, the two men took a deep breath and immediately leaned back while pulling the rope, their hands gripping it tightly and their feet pushing against the ground, both of them tilting at a forty-five-degree angle.

Unfortunately, things didn't go as planned. They put all their strength and weight into it right away, but they still couldn't drag Di Niu directly out of the pit.

Their teeth were clenched, their faces flushed red, and not even a breath could be heard—only the faint sound of the rope swaying in the air.

The rope seemed to be specially made; it was soft in texture but incredibly sturdy, now stretched taut like a steel cable, yet Di Niu on the other end remained completely unmoved.

The two men pulling the rope kept shifting their feet in small movements, as if searching for a better point to exert force. They seemed to be using every ounce of their strength, even leaving deep footprints in the ground.

No matter how hard they tried, it felt like the other end of the rope was anchored to a century-old tree—they couldn't budge it even an inch, let alone a fraction.

Qi Xia watched the two men struggling with all their might and found a wooden box behind her to sit on again. If her guess was right, Di Niu wouldn't end the game right away, just like before.

These two men in front of her wouldn't give up no matter what—that was typical human psychology. Even if they were just one step away from failure, they'd rather try than quit.

Many people go through life experiencing countless failures, and the key is that they won't give up even when they see failure looming.

One of the most misleading sayings in the world is—"Since you're here already."

But "being here" doesn't mean you have to "fail." You could leave first and look for another chance to "try again."

These two had misjudged Di Niu's strength from the start, but she had indeed given them opportunities. Now, in this second round, they were essentially jumping into a death trap of their own accord, beyond any hope of salvation.

The two men and Di Niu stayed locked in this standoff for over two minutes. In a normal tug-of-war, the winner would have been decided by now, but because Di Niu couldn't exert force and was just lying in the pit, the men pulling the rope were stuck in a dilemma.

"Don't give up..." Wang Ge gritted his teeth and forced out a few words through clenched jaws. "Even if she's strong... she has to get tired eventually..."

"I'm... putting in effort..." the fat man said. "Keep going..."

The two seemed to have given themselves a quick self-hypnosis, thinking it might ease the stalemate, but a few seconds later, their legs were shaking more violently than ever.

"The Shēngxiào divine power..." Qi Xia stroked his chin and murmured, "How does this Shén Lì compare to Tiān Xíng Jiàn..."

Qi Xia knew that the entire operation of this space relied on Huíxiǎng, or what could also be called Xiān Fǎ.

If the Tiān Jí and Shén Shòu immortal laws were both Huíxiǎng, then the Shén Lì of Dì Jí must be as well. True Shén Lì was very similar to Tiān Xíng Jiàn.

"But Tiān Xíng Jiàn has self-healing," Qi Xia thought to himself. "Shēngxiào clearly doesn't... Is the issue with Shēngxiào itself, or with Zhang Shan...? Or is there some other ability here like Tiān Xíng Jiàn that just lacks self-healing...?"

He sighed and looked up at Di Niu in the distance.

Di Niu wasn't lying completely still in the pit, just as Qi Xia had suspected—she was trembling slightly, though the movement was so subtle it was hard to notice.

She was using only the strength of her waist and abdomen to hold against the weight of the two men.

Earlier, when she had swung those four corpses and then turned her body into a slingshot to fling herself far away, she had already demonstrated her terrifying waist and abdominal power.

Unfortunately, they still hadn't understood.

The Shēngxiào Ascension Gambling Contract had mentioned that anyone who became a Dì Jí Shēngxiào would have physical abilities at least ten times stronger than an ordinary person.

There were several key points here: first, "at least," and second, "ten times."

In other words, if the person granted Shén Lì had undergone rigorous training beforehand, their physical abilities upon receiving it would far exceed that number, so Dì Jí Shēngxiào could vary in strength.

For example, a chubby Dì Hóu could never defeat a muscular Dì Hǔ in a fight based on brute force.

Similarly, if limb strength was simply multiplied by ten, an ordinary person's muscles and bones couldn't handle it, so their bodies would also be greatly enhanced, leading to increased weight. Even someone with a slender build would have muscle density and bone strength more than ten times that of a normal person.

So, trying to pull a Dì Jí out of a small pit with a rope was like asking these two men to drag a container stuck in the ground.

"Too bad a container doesn't kill people—Dì Jí does," Qi Xia said softly.

Just as the two men were about to exhaust themselves, they felt the rope in their hands twitch slightly.

With their hands already burning and numb, they couldn't tell right away if the rope was moving forward or back.

"It... it moved..." Wang Ge struggled to lift his head and said to the fat man behind him, "Put in more effort... that woman can't hold on..."

"I'm... trying... as hard as I can..."

The two poured their last bit of strength into pulling the rope backward, but Qi Xia noticed sharply that their hands were gradually slipping from their original positions, and blood was dripping from where their palms had rubbed against it.

Their palms had been torn open from the intense pulling.