The great earthworm bored through the belly hide like Sun Wukong loose inside the sister-in-law's gut, turning everything upside down.

Except the sister-in-law only got poked around by Wukong's size-shifting staff — she cried out in pain but didn't bleed. The Great Iron Bear had its intestines rapidly shredded by the great earthworm, which bored on deeper toward the vital organs, blood pouring without stop.

And here was where the pit — which should never have been able to hold the Great Iron Bear — succeeded in pinning it, keeping it from striking back at the great earthworm.

It couldn't bend its body, so naturally it couldn't get a grip on the earthworm churning up a storm inside its belly.

It tried to climb out, but the moment its claws caught the lip of the pit, Li Xunhuan's flying daggers came streaking at its eyes. It had no choice but to raise a claw to block — and so its lower half, already halfway up, lost the strength of its forelimbs and dropped back down.

Flying daggers, the great earthworm, and a pit sized just right.

Li Xunhuan's hope of hunting the Great Iron Bear had become reality.

Shen Cong's gaze tightened. He'd failed to anticipate that Li Xunhuan would have a great earthworm as his battle pet. With this special jin beast — a match for the fabled Mongolian Death Worm — every inconsistency he'd noticed before now made perfect sense. The nonsensical pit had turned into an exquisite instrument of death.

For a moment, watching Li Xunhuan slowly grind down the Great Iron Bear's life force, Shen Cong felt a stir of kinship.

He and Li Xunhuan really were alike in certain ways.

Li Xunhuan liked to work alone, brought along a great earthworm, dared to take on the Great Iron Bear one-on-one, engineered a trap to bury it — and when the moment called for it, went all-in with a single hard push.

Shen Cong admired the style. Because it was his own style.

Facing the fog, he murmured to himself without meaning to. "Li Xunhuan, you're…