He pulled out one of the tokens she had given him previously and chucked it at a group of tightly packed vines, hoping that most would be taken care of in one try.

Of course, that was just wishful thinking. It wasn’t like he expected that to happen.

Then it happened.

William’s jaw dropped when the vines withered into shrunken, black, dead versions of themselves. Different from how the previous attempts shattered the targets, but still very effective. This was great but far too convenient for him to accept without caution.

If this place was the Heart, why was it so easy to destroy anything that existed here? Even if Sophia said he would need to be weak to survive, that didn’t mean any random cultivator that came across this place should be able to cause such destruction.

William didn’t doubt that type of weakness would have caused the Heart to be destroyed long ago. Unless that fetus was actually telling the truth when it was talking to him. About how only people with some type of mark would be allowed in.

Of course, he had no idea how he was marked, unless it was something to do with how much of the oasis’s water he had used. After all, the corrupted beasts certainly targeted him like he was marked by something.

“Amazing!” Princess Jin squealed in excitement, “We can get this done much faster.”

William shoved the additional mystery out of his mind and nodded at the princess. “Aim at the more packed clusters. Hopefully, we’ll have some tokens left after this.”

Princess Jin paused with her arm in a throwing motion before picking a better target that fit his suggestion. A moment later, another large cluster of vines turned into withered husks, disconnecting from the fetus in the process.

“You know it won’t make a difference if every single one has to be destroyed,” Princess Jin commented as she aimed her next throw, “I’d still run out of tokens.”

“True,” William agreed, keeping close watch of the fetus in case it reacted to its tethers being destroyed, “But let’s think about that issue if it happens. I’m hoping it won’t be necessary to destroy all of them.”

It was barely noticeable, but there was a small gap between the fetus and the ground. Of course, small was relative. In this case, it was around ten feet, a fraction of the size of the fetus.

Another cluster of vines was destroyed by Princess Jin. Still, it didn’t even make the fetus move an inch, showing just how much strength the vines held in them… or it could be that there were still far too many vines keeping it supported in place.

They made quick work of a considerable amount of them, the odd mist released from the tokens filling the air briefly before leaving behind dead vines. It felt like a strange game at a carnival since they aimed for static targets, giving zero resistance by retaliating or moving to avoid their destruction.

William thought it was an odd way for the quests he received to be completed. Then again, it should have been expected to be this easy. Sophia did imply that the weaker he was, the easier it would be to succeed. Still, this was too easy.

“Oh right, Wei Liang,” Princess Jin spoke up with it looked like around a tenth of the vines had been destroyed, “You never told me about that martial skill.”

William’s surprise at her comment disturbed his aim so much that the token he threw completely missed the vines hanging above them. He watched incredulously as it traveled in a perfect arc, dodging all the existing vines, sailing only through the already destroyed areas before finally reaching the peak and coming back down untouched.

Only, the place it would land was directly on top of the fetus, right in the middle of where the vines entered its body, creating an odd greenish-brown wall made of tightly packed vines.

His heart skipped a beat, suddenly understanding that Princess Jin’s Luck hadn’t gone into a slumber. It was too perfect, having her speak up at just the right moment to get him to miss so badly that it would land in a spot that could either spell disaster or solve everything at once.

The princess stumbled back into him when she finally realized where it would land, and he didn’t act like a wall to support her. Instead, he pulled her back with him as he chose to be overcautious and put even more space between them and the fetus.

William heard the faint sound of the token breaking as he frantically tried to spread his Qi evenly through his body, wanting to be prepared to go all out if needed. Everything had been going in their favor so far, but who knows if this would be the thing to finally trigger a final burst of defense.

He waited with bated breath to see if there would be any reaction, and that went on for a few seconds until Princess Jin stated the obvious.

“That was anti-climactic. I was hoping it would at least make our job quic-AH!”

It sounded like steel wires had snapped. William stumbled back with her as a wall of dense air slammed into them. It had been the fetus tilting slightly from having over a third of the vines breaking before they quickly deteriorated.

The newly created gap allowed him to see the quickly disappearing mist in the middle. It had likely been used up, which meant no more vines would break unless they failed due to the weight they were supporting.

“That’s good, right?” The princess whispered as if speaking louder would disturb something.

“I would say it is,” William agreed warily, still keeping his Qi ready to activate his newest martial skill.

“… So, should we throw more tokens in there?”

“Well, we certainly can’t go back to aiming at the vines above like idiots, can we?” William wondered why the obvious choice of bombarding the place where the vines were the most packed didn’t register in either of their minds.

“If you have already somehow forgotten, I threw a handful of Sprout Bane Tokens at that thing,” Princess Jin said with narrowed eyes, “When nothing happened, I assumed there was no point in targeting that spot.”

William thought the same thing, really. However, it seemed that direct contact was needed on the vines. Princess Jin had thrown the tokens against the fetus, so the mist released barely touched the vines attached to its top.

He grunted at the princess, pulled a handful of tokens from the spatial stone, and threw them into the created gap. This time, with great accuracy. They crashed into the vines still connected to the fetus and broke apart. The mist then did quick work.

William could see the vines being eaten of their vitality before snapping with a metallic crack. He thought he was ready for the anticipated boom that would come along with the fetus crashing to the floor, but that didn’t come to pass.

Instead of a boom, there was a sickening squelch. Similar to what William imagined would happen when a particularly large human the size of Fatty Xu got squished into a pancake.

However, since this fetus was larger than a decently sized house, it was exponentially more disgusting to his ears, and the smell that came along with the oozing viscera was likely to be scarred into his brain.

Princess Jin gagged loudly, making him lose any sort of control he had left as he dry heaved right beside her.

There was one thing he noted even as he tried to keep the contents inside his stomach where it belonged. The blood of the fetus was red, not gold like the fully grown giants.