Where Immortals Once Walked

“He’s poisoned?”

Another bandit jabbed a finger at the spider molt and shouted, “There’s something on it... a red spider!”

By the light of the glowspores, they squinted hard and, sure enough, saw a red spider, a little smaller than a soup bowl, standing atop the mountain-like molt.

This thing had probably ambushed the bandit who had climbed up earlier.

Small as it was, its poison was vicious.

Old Six’s eyes darted, calculating. He pointed at another molt and barked, “Don’t waste time fighting it! Just take a different one!”

It was a sensible suggestion. Another bandit snatched the bag and started climbing the next-smallest molt.

He was only halfway up when someone below yelled, “Careful! The red spider’s gone!”

Gone? If it’s gone, then it’s probably hopped onto the second molt.

The molts were enormous, casting deep shadows. A tiny red spider could hide in that darkness easily enough. And now that they were watching for it, they realized its movements were terrifyingly fast, so fast the human eye could barely track it.

The second climber tried to guard against it, moving with exaggerated caution, slow as a snail, but that did not help, and he still got hit. After the ambush, he tumbled down the shell just like the first.

At the same time, another bandit—silent, quick—threw a grappling hook toward the smallest molt. It caught with almost no effort. He seized the rope and shot upward in a blur.

He climbed with the nimbleness of a monkey, barely pausing, surging in one smooth burst all the way to the top of the molt’s head.

“The bag!”

The men below were ecstatic. They hurriedly threw the bag up to him, only to realize something was wrong.

Huh... Why does this guy not look like one of ours?

The climber kept his head lowered, his face hidden in shadow. No one could see him clearly.

However, his movements were clean and efficient. He took the snakeskin sack—no, the storage pouch—and briskly slipped it over the molt’s head.

It was hard to say whether the pouch grew larger or the molt shrank, but in any case, it went on.

With a whoosh, the man dropped back down to the ground.

The molt was gone.

In his hand was a bulging snakeskin pouch.

The red spider sprang at him, but it lunged straight into empty air. Furious, it actually cried out in a human voice, “He Lingchuan, you’re courting death!”

The man who had appeared from nowhere was indeed He Lingchuan. The bandits jolted as if waking from a dream and lunged to snatch the pouch. He Lingchuan used the Swallow’s Return movement technique to slip past them one by one.

However, rather than a swallow, one might liken him more to a loach.

He Lingchuan flicked his grappling hook again, swung through the air, and carved a wide arc around the cavern before landing atop the largest molt. He tried to pull the pouch down over it.

Huh? Why won’t it go?

He tried again, but it was still no good.

It looked like the snakeskin pouch was full. There was no more room for anything else.

Even so, the capacity of this snakeskin pouch was already far larger than the immortal’s ring he carried.

The red spider skittered closer, sneering coldly. “With a broken little snakeskin pouch, you think you can collect my ancient true body?”

“I’m just trying it, that’s all.” He Lingchuan dodged as he spoke. “Hey, I’m on your side, aren’t I? If they don’t have the pouch, they can’t steal your true body anymore!”

The bandits below snapped fully awake.

“The one he’s talking to is the Spider Queen outside!” Old Six shouted. “Move!”

Mountain Monarch Bo’s scheme to lure the tiger away from the mountain had not been thorough. Zhu Erniang’s true body had been drawn out, yes, but she had left a clone behind to keep watch over her molted shells.

She needed to keep one “eye” personally on them before she could feel at ease.

The bandits knew monsters always had strange, uncanny techniques. If this little spider had already spotted them, then the Spider Queen might come charging back in at any moment!

They did not argue. They abandoned the two injured men and turned to flee.

The red spider did not chase. It only stared at He Lingchuan and commanded, “Put it back!”

He Lingchuan shrugged, walked over, and shook the pouch downward.

The spider molt appeared out of thin air and returned to its original position.

“Returned to its rightful owner.” He hopped down from the molt’s head. “Want to come with me and chase those little thieves?”

The red spider snorted. “The snakeskin pouch. Give it to me!”

He Lingchuan tossed it over.

For some reason, the moment the snakeskin pouch touched the spider’s leg, it shrank, shrinking and shrinking until it vanished entirely. It was as though the red spider had pocketed it somewhere unseen.

Then it leaped onto He Lingchuan’s shoulder, ordering him to carry it out of the cavern to pursue the bandits.

Once they were outside, He Lingchuan halted, looking left and right.

The red spider snapped impatiently, “What are you looking at?!”

“Which way did they go?”

“West!”

“Which way is west?” This underground palace twisted and turned countless ways, and there was no sunlight. Who knew which direction counted as west?

“Left!”

“Ah, alright!” Only then did He Lingchuan take off after them.

As he ran, he asked, “Those bandits were acting under Mountain Monarch Bo’s orders. They wanted to steal your spider molt. You’re a spider, and it’s a snake, what use is your molt to it?”

“I am an ancient monster immortal,” the red spider said with dripping disdain. “My molted shell retains a sliver of power that borders on the miraculous. It’s something those muddied, impure creatures crave day and night. And my abdominal star map is an innate divine object. They want to steal it to comprehend the mysteries of heaven and earth, the stars and constellations.”

He Lingchuan understood at once. “So the Beijia nobles who stole your molt before, they wanted it for the same reason?”

The red spider snorted.

So that’s the case, no wonder the divine bone amulet was eyeing it too.

He had long since known that the divine bone amulet was picky. It did not eat just anything.

He Lingchuan asked another question while he had the chance, “I remember you originally had five molted shells here. Why are there only four now?”

Zhu Erniang had once had six shells, which were her accumulated legacy from the Ancient Era. One had been stolen in Beijia, which should have left five, but he had only counted four just now.

Where did the fifth one go?

The red spider replied languidly, “None of your business.”

So it wasn’t lost, just repurposed? He Lingchuan fell into thought.

They ran into a few spider guards on the way. The moment the guards saw the red spider on He Lingchuan’s shoulder, their aggression vanished. They immediately quieted and fell in behind, obediently following.

After several turns, the red spider suddenly said, “Go find Dong Rui.”

“Huh?” He Lingchuan frowned. “We’re about to catch them.”

“Go,” the red spider repeated, voice dark and icy.

It stood on his shoulder like a tiny red blade pressed to his throat. He Lingchuan was genuinely afraid it would bite him. With no choice, he turned and ran toward Dong Rui’s workroom instead.

Fortunately, it was not far.

In only a dozen breaths, He Lingchuan reached the workshop.

Dong Rui was bent over a table, writing and sketching. Hearing footsteps, he looked up, utterly blank. “What?”

“Zhu Erniang is here to see you.” He Lingchuan pointed at the red spider on his shoulder, quietly exhaling in relief. Earlier, Dong Rui had driven him on the monster puppet to the display chamber and then slipped back. The timing had been tight.

“This is Zhu Erniang?” Dong Rui stared.

The red spider said coldly, “With all the commotion outside, you didn’t hear anything?”

“I heard.” Dong Rui remained unmoved. “What does it have to do with me?”

When this man buried his head in work, he truly shut out the world. The red spider did not bother arguing. It turned to He Lingchuan. “Go chase the bandits.” Then it addressed Dong Rui. “You come too.”

There was only one path from here to the molt display chamber—no branches. Seeing Dong Rui still in the workroom reassured it. It meant the two humans had not plotted against its molted shells.

With its true body outside fighting two greater monsters, the underground palace was short on manpower. It could not afford to leave a monster puppet master sitting idle down here.

What it did not know was this: just after she and He Lingchuan left the display chamber, behind the reclaimed spider molt that had just been returned from the snakeskin pouch, another He Lingchuan stepped out from the shadows!

He wasted not a heartbeat. He pressed the divine bone amulet directly onto the molt.

The divine bone flashed with delighted red light.

Then the molt, which was incredibly hard and ancient, collapsed.

It was like a sand sculpture, crumbling at a single tap.

Yet the “sand” did not scatter.

It was sucked into the vortex at the heart of the divine bone.

The speed was terrifying. In three to five breaths, the massive molt vanished completely. The spot was left spotless—no crumbs, no dust, not even the finest residue.

Immediately after, He Lingchuan disappeared on the spot.

With no one holding it, the divine bone necklace dropped in free fall.

But before it could hit the ground, it vanished too.

The display chamber remained as quiet as ever.

Only now, it was missing one spider molt.

In truth, when He Lingchuan returned the molt earlier, he had also released a clone, ordering it to hide behind the shell with the divine bone necklace.

The molt was huge, standing against the wall. Its shadow was deep enough to conceal several people, let alone one.

The red spider’s attention had been fixed entirely on He Lingchuan’s main body. How could it notice an extra “person” lurking behind the shell?

When He Lingchuan paused for a few breaths after leaving the chamber, it was not confusion but timing. He was waiting for the clone to bring out the divine bone necklace and absorb the molt’s essence.

A clone automatically vanished once it moved more than twenty meters away from him. As for the divine bone necklace, it was the kind of thing he could not get rid of even if he tried. If it went too far, it would automatically return to him.

This theft was completed without anyone noticing.

He Lingchuan let out a long breath.

Hah, how satisfying.

It was the first time he had used the Clone Technique in the waking world, and not for fighting or killing, but for stealing.

If your imagination was wide enough, divine techniques had endless uses.

Zhu Erniang’s molted shells were coveted by so many monsters. They had to be good stuff. If he could not comprehend them, that did not matter—his divine bone necklace clearly had an appetite for them.

He had left together with the red spider. It had no reason to suspect him.

And Dong Rui had been sitting in the workroom the whole time, so she would not think him to be the thief either.

This chaotic battle of monsters had somehow made him the fisherman who scooped up the biggest haul.

The only problem was that he still had to make it out of the swamp alive.

With He Lingchuan’s movement technique, he quickly caught up to the bandits.

He took down two, Dong Rui took down one, and the red spider bit three down. The rest were wiped out by spider guards who arrived after receiving the alarm. Only Old Six remained, shaking like a leaf.

The only reason he was still alive was that the red spider told them to leave one alive for interrogation.

So the spider guards bound him tightly with webbing, trussed him up like a dumpling, and casually tossed him back into the wine cellar.

* * *

When He Lingchuan reached the underground palace entrance, the scent of fresh grass grew stronger and stronger. It was like walking through a wheat field just after harvest.

In theory, it should have smelled crisp and clean.

But the moment it hit his nose, he could not stop himself from wanting to yawn.

If even humans reacted like that, then spiders, who had even less resistance to such odors, would obviously stagger as they walked.

The red spider said coldly, “This is definitely Mountain Monarch Bo’s handiwork. That snake is always coming up with new ways to make its lackeys devour my offspring.” The toxins that that snake produced came in countless variations. Otherwise, Zhu Erniang would not have developed the new monster technique of gathering venom into one of her eyes and casting it out.

He Lingchuan thought to himself, You’re hardly any better, old lady. Your spiders also treat captured little snakes as a delicacy. The two of you are basically neighbors who can’t go a day without throwing punches. Every time you meet, you fight.