Clumsy Beast, Keep Your Paws Off novel Chapter 89

Chapter 89: Chapter 89: Ancient Snake God?

Su Qinglan groaned, rolling onto her side. Every muscle in her body ached like she had just been tossed around by an angry mountain. For a second, she didn’t move...she was too tired to even open her eyes.

Then suddenly instinct kicked in. Her hand shot to her stomach. She pressed gently, holding her breath, and immediately sighed in relief when she found no pain in her stomach. There was only the dull ache of bruises and scratches on her body.

Her lips twitched into a tired smile. "My baby is brave," she muttered under her breath, her voice soft but full of pride.

Only then did she finally look around.

The forest around her was dark. When she tilted her head back, she couldn’t even see the sky.

The trees were enormous, their thick canopies blocking almost every ray of sunlight. Only faint, ghostly beams of light filtered through, giving everything a gloomy, greenish glow.

"What is this place?" she whispered. "Why is it so damn dense? These trees are... huge."

She blinked, feeling very small, like some lost little insect in a world built for giants. "Great. So she has officially turned into a lily put in the land of giant trees," she muttered.

But before she could complain any further, a low, muffled groan came from somewhere beneath her.

Su Qinglan froze. The sound wasn’t distant...it was right under her.

And then whatever she was sitting on shifted slightly. The surface beneath her moved, just a little, but enough to send her heart jumping into her throat.

She almost yelped and threw her arms out for balance. Her hands pressed against the ground, or at least what she thought was the ground, only to meet something smooth, cold, and oddly slick.

A shiver ran down her spine.

She pulled her hand back, frowning at the strange, sticky texture coating her fingers. It was thick and dark. When she lifted her hand closer, her eyes widened.

"Blood..." she whispered.

Her whole hand was smeared in it. No wonder she felt the entire area smelled of blood.

For a split second, her mind went blank. Then her instincts screamed.

"Oh, hell no."

She immediately rolled off whatever she’d been sitting on and landed on the other side, keeping low. Her eyes darted toward the shape in front of her...a massive shadowy lump of a thing sat silently; if it didn’t move just seconds ago, she would have really thought it was just a big stone.

Her heart pounded. If it was a beast and from the scales and size, it clearly was and it was badly injured. And she was literally sitting on top of it seconds ago.

Perfect. Just perfect.

Injured beasts were the worst. They were desperate and unpredictable and would attack anything that moved just to survive.

Su Qinglan took a careful step back, not daring to breathe too loudly. "Note to self," she screamed in her mind. "Stop falling on living things. Especially the big, scaly, possibly man-eating kind."

Her eyes scanned the forest again.

And she did the first thing any sane person would do...she ran. There was no point in staying to see what kind of giant beast she had been sitting on.

For all she knew, it could wake up any second, decide she looked edible, and swallow her whole.

So she turned on her heel and bolted through the dense forest, not caring about the twigs scratching her legs or the branches slapping her face.

"It was huge, Host!" Xuyu squeaked. "It looked like one of those ancient serpent-type divine beasts! Its aura was scary even through the system screen! You were sitting on top of it! I thought you were going to be eaten alive!"

"Oh, fantastic," Su Qinglan groaned, dragging a hand down her face as she started walking again. "So I wasn’t just sitting on an injured animal... I was sitting on a possible ancient snake god? Wonderful. Just what I needed today."

"Xuyu really didn’t mean to leave you!" the system’s voice sniffled, clearly trying to gain sympathy. "I just needed to install a few updates, optimize your energy usage, and..."

"Optimize my what?!" Su Qinglan cut her off, glaring at nothing. "You left me to die because you wanted a system makeover? What next, you want me to write a review for your new version while falling off a cliff?"

Xuyu hiccupped. "Host, please don’t yell at me! I was working hard! You wouldn’t want an outdated system, right?"

Su Qinglan rolled her eyes so hard it hurt. "Xuyu, I would prefer an outdated system that actually helps me over an updated one that ghosts me during a murder attempt!"

"Xuyu wasn’t ghosting! Xuyu was buffering!" the little voice protested weakly.

"Yeah, well, next time you buffer, I might end up dead!"

There was a long pause, then a small, guilty whisper. "Xuyu promises it won’t happen again..."

Su Qinglan sighed, rubbing her temple. "It better not. Because if I die, you’re getting uninstalled, deleted, and exorcised."

"...Can systems be exorcised?" Xuyu asked quietly.

"Wanna find out?" she muttered darkly.

The system instantly went quiet.