As blood gushed out once again, she placed her hand over the wound.

A white light emerged from her palm, and the bleeding stopped at a visible rate, forming scabs.

By the time all the wounds had ceased bleeding, Ji He’s forehead was already sweating, and her limbs felt weak.

The amount of energy she expended depended on the size of the wound—smaller wounds required less energy, whereas deep wounds like these demanded a significant amount to heal up to the scabbing stage.

Not wanting to reveal her identity as a healer, Ji He quickly retrieved the white thorns while the man was still unconscious and swiftly left.

She considered it her reward for saving his life.

Although the system only required 60 white thorns, Ji He estimated that this was merely the minimum amount—turning in extra might bring additional benefits.

It was just a guess, but she had to test it out to know for sure.

That guy better not die. If he could survive this game, then at least her effort wouldn’t be wasted!

As long as she could cause some trouble for Nian Nian, then saving him wouldn’t be in vain.

After parting ways with the man, Ji He continued searching for medicinal herbs in the forest.

Along the way, she encountered several groups of people battling large medicinal plants.

It seemed that everyone had realized that relying solely on personal strength wasn’t enough to complete this mission, so they had begun cooperating.

However, cooperation without trust was like loose sand—one had to guard against both the attacks from the medicinal plants and the potential backstabs from fellow competitors.

That entire morning, Ji He had witnessed several instances of betrayal.

It scared her enough to steer clear.

By noon, Ji He still hadn’t found her second required medicinal herb.

There was still time, so she didn’t panic. She found a dense bush and quickly slipped inside.

With a flicker, she entered her personal space.

There was no other choice—she had to feed her livestock. Even though she tried to feed them extra each time to reduce the frequency, it still required time.

After finishing the task, Ji He left the space again.

Since she still had two herbs to find, she didn’t want to waste too much time eating.

She took out a pre-prepared bowl of stir-fried shredded pork with spicy peppers over rice.

Holding the bowl, she devoured her meal in under five minutes.

After storing the bowl back in her space, Ji He once again sighed at how useful it was to have a personal dimension.

That morning, she had observed her surroundings carefully—not only were there no familiar wild vegetables or edible plants in this forest, but she hadn’t even found a water source.

She had no idea where everyone else was supposed to find food and water.

The unlucky ones would probably go hungry for two days.

Starving to death wasn’t likely… but suffering was inevitable.

Of course, since there were water-attribute ability users, it wasn’t her concern.

Ji He only sighed about it for a moment before putting it out of her mind—there was no way she was going to take out her own food.

Forget about giving it away, she wasn’t even willing to sell it right now.

The more you possessed without strength to protect it, the more dangerous it became.

Who knew if someone would get greedy?

If she got hunted down by some dark forces for her supplies, she’d be bringing trouble upon herself.

Saving people should be left to heroes.

She was just an ordinary person.

After finishing her meal, Ji He didn’t linger and immediately resumed searching for medicinal herbs.

She remained extremely cautious, hiding and moving carefully to avoid being discovered.

By mid-afternoon, she still hadn’t found the second medicinal herb but did see several people squatting down to dig up roots.

She wasn’t sure if they were planning to eat them.

The plants here all looked incredibly strange—weren’t they afraid of being poisoned?

Ji He didn’t dare to linger. She glanced at them once before turning away, continuing her search.

Finally, by dusk, she found the second herb listed on her paper.

It was another giant plant, even taller than the first one.

Every branch of the plant bore a lantern-like pod emitting a faint red glow, swaying gently in the air.

Ji He looked down at the paper’s requirements—it specified that the root stem of this plant had “red fuzz.”

Fuzz…

Fuzz…

Ji He’s eyelids twitched uncontrollably.

This was false advertising! How could they call this nearly half-meter-long, thick red bristle “fuzz”?

Did they even know what fuzz was?

That thick, dark-red glowing bristle—where did it look like fuzz at all?!

Though she was internally screaming, Ji He remained expressionless, carefully putting the paper away. She stood up, summoned an iron shovel, and cautiously approached.

At that moment, several people were already engaged in battle with the plant.

Whenever it attacked, it would flip open its hanging red lanterns and attempt to clamp them over people’s heads.

Ji He didn’t know what would happen if the lanterns latched on, but judging by how wary the others were, it was probably something nasty.

When Ji He appeared, the others noticed her immediately.

Some quickly averted their eyes, pretending not to see her.

Others, however, lit up and shouted at her, “Hey, beauty! Let’s work together! You block the lanterns, and I’ll pull out the fuzz!”

“Tch! What a shameless move, making someone else take the hits while you grab the quest reward?”

A blond man turned around and cursed, “What the hell does that have to do with you? Mind your own business, or I’ll deal with you myself!”

“Oh yeah? You think I’m scared of you?” The middle-aged woman who spoke wasn’t intimidated at all. In fact, she swung her oversized tennis racket even harder, smacking one of the lanterns directly toward the blond man.

He shrieked in terror.

Ji He glanced at the two but didn’t comment. She bent down and tried to approach the lantern’s base.

She remained cautious, retreating whenever the branches showed any abnormal movement.

At one point, a lantern attempted to move toward her but soon withdrew.

It was as if the entire plant couldn’t see her, completely ignoring her presence.

The others noticed this strange phenomenon as well.

They began shouting at her.

Ji He pretended not to hear them. She quickly crouched down and attempted to pluck the thick red-black fuzz with her gloved hand.

The first try—no luck.

The second try—she used too much force and fell on her backside.

Startled, she scrambled to her feet.

Yet the plant still ignored her, only its lanterns swaying slightly.

Not only did it refrain from attacking Ji He, but it even struck out at others who got too close to her.

Seeing this, Ji He relaxed a little. She set the plucked bristles at her feet, planning to bundle them up when she was done.

She crouched again and continued pulling.

She needed 50 of these thick bristles.

After a few attempts, she realized they were too tough to pluck, so she switched to using the iron shovel.

At one point, she seemed to have hurt the plant—it suddenly thrust a lantern toward her, knocking her over.

Startled, Ji He quickly promised to be gentler next time.

Only after receiving her promise did the plant retract its lanterns.

From then on, Ji He didn’t dare to use the shovel again and relied purely on brute force.

Though it was exhausting, without the branches attacking her, she successfully gathered all the bristles before night fell.

She had arrived the latest but left the fastest.

Among the others, only one middle-aged man had gathered his quota and departed early—everyone else was still struggling with the fuzz.

Ji He patted the plant in gratitude and swiftly turned to leave.