Where Immortals Once Walked

Every one of her molted shells retained a portion of the cultivation she had shed with it. Back then, Zhu Erniang molted to lighten her own burden, yet if she occasionally put an old shell back on, her cultivation would rebound. While her cultivation would not return to the absolute peak of her previous era, she could at least recover fifty to sixty percent of that old might.

But while putting a shell back on was easy, taking it off was hard. To make the shell truly useful, she had to fuse her original outer carapace with the molt itself. And once fused, the only way to remove it was to undergo a full molting process all over again, and this process was painful, perilous, and followed by that awkward “two cups of tea” period where she was incredibly weak.

Zhu Erniang had already endured a chaotic melee with two monster kings, then fought the snake monster to the death. She was injured, exhausted, and wrung dry. Forcing herself to molt again on top of that meant squeezing herself until there was not a single drop of monster energy left to extract.

Otherwise, how could He Lingchuan have gotten his hands on her so easily?

However, Zhu Erniang did not know that this was not some spur-of-the-moment gamble. Back in the Panlong Dreamscape, the Red General had personally told He Lingchuan:

“Zhu Erniang can put her molted shell back on and reclaim her battle strength, but it won’t last. Burrow spiders are at their weakest during molting. Even if she’s an ancient monster immortal, she can’t escape that law. Seize that moment, and you might have a sliver of life.”

So earlier, when He Lingchuan saw that one shell was missing from the display chamber, and saw that it was the smallest one, he knew the chance he had waited for had finally arrived. Later, when he saw Zhu Erniang’s body was larger than usual out in the swamp, that suspicion became certainty.

“First, swear a blood oath.” Two cups of tea was not much time. He had to secure his safety first. “And Dong Rui leaves with me. You and yours cannot stop him.”

Zhu Erniang had no choice. She swore a vicious blood oath, guaranteeing that neither she nor her descendants would harm He Lingchuan or Dong Rui in the slightest, and that they would help the two of them freely enter and exit the Demon Nest Swamp.

He Lingchuan also read her attitude clearly.

She would die before becoming anyone’s pet. That was Zhu Erniang’s bottom line.

And honestly? Even if he chopped Zhu Erniang to pieces, there were still thousands upon thousands of enraged spiders outside, ready to avenge their ancestor. Could he escape from them? He was not confident in that, especially since he could not leave the Demon Nest Swamp.

Was he supposed to find the mirage monster? Based on the last several days of probing spider guards, most spiders did not even know where the mirage monster lived or what it looked like.

So what real benefit would killing Zhu Erniang bring him?

It was a much better option for him to talk and negotiate with her.

Negotiation was the art of compromise: you retreat, I advance; I advance, you retreat. Both sides came dressed in full martial posture, then after a few rounds of very friendly (vicious) consultations (arguments and threats), a deal was finally reached.

On the spot, Zhu Erniang plucked out two eyeballs and gave them to He Lingchuan.

These two eyes normally lie dormant. If you tapped each one three times, it would transform into a tiny spider. The spider could shrink down to the size of a button. They were fast, silent, not particularly lethal, but perfect for stealth and reconnaissance. He Lingchuan had already seen them in action.

Most importantly, they could share vision with their master.

In other words, whatever the eyeball spiders saw, their owner could see in real time. An outsider like He Lingchuan had no such ability, but Zhu Erniang, who was once an ancient monster immortal, had methods to grant it.

As long as her true body lived, the eyeball spiders could share their view with He Lingchuan.

To keep birds from pecking them to death, they released a scent that natural predators found repulsive while on missions. In everyday life, He Lingchuan only needed to raise them like ordinary spiders. And if he stayed within about five kilometers of Zhu Erniang, the eyeball spiders could also serve as an instant voice channel, an improvised conversation tool. Once the two parties separated beyond that range, communication would be cut off.

Activating the eyeballs into spiders required Zhu Erniang to expend a bit of bloodline power, something she normally would not do lightly. This time, though, she had no choice—this was the price of the deal.

He Lingchuan also noticed Zhu Erniang had another type of eyeball spider capable of venom assassination, but she refused to hand those over. “That type has to return to my body after being used twice, or it withers and dies.”

In addition, Zhu Erniang gave He Lingchuan a venom gland. The poison stored inside could be smeared onto weapons; once it drew blood, it caused searing pain in the wound, like being scorched by fire. Blisters would rise immediately, and if they were not punctured within a few breaths, the spider venom would ride the bloodstream and spread, leading to numb nerves and weakening muscles.

Put simply, the enemy’s body would feel like it was being digested, experiencing the full misery of being spider prey.

This venom could effectively counter ordinary antidote pills, though it was still suppressed by origin energy. Depending on how strong the target’s origin energy was, the pain and toxicity could be reduced.

Even so, its versatility made it an essential travel companion—a lethal “household necessity,” so to speak.

Interestingly, if you used this gland to siphon in reverse, it could also draw spider venom out of an injured person and cleanly remove it.

Next came a jar of burrow spider salve.

If He Lingchuan rubbed this salve on his body, he would not get stuck to spider silk or other strange sticky substances. That was how burrow spiders did it themselves.

He Lingchuan personally watched Zhu Erniang spit the salve out of her mouth. He suspected it was more saliva than salve.

Beyond that, he also extorted a pair of venom fangs from one of the molted shells, specifically from the very shell she had just shed, plus ten bolts of her signature cloud-brocade, a quantity of high-strength spider silk, and several high-tier spider guard carapaces.

Zhu Erniang truly, sincerely did not want to give up those fangs. He Lingchuan tugged and haggled for a long time before she relented.

Burrow spider fangs were dark and matte, curved like naturally formed long blades. They were longer even than the Fleeting Life saber embedded in Zhu Erniang’s skull at this moment. Their sharpness spoke for itself. Along one side ran a natural blood groove, and because the Spider Queen had used them for so many years, they carried toxin inherently even without being deliberately infused.

The molted shell was enormous, so naturally, the fangs were enormous too, but He Lingchuan had seen Li Fubo refine artifacts and knew the size of a magical artifact could be adjusted during forging. Now that he had learned the Clone Technique, he intended to equip his clone with powerful gear as well.

Zhu Erniang only requested that if the fangs were ever refined into twin blades or daggers, they must be named Zhu Erniang’s Kiss.

Even treasures, it seemed, wanted a prestigious lineage.

As for the cloud-brocade, even for Zhu Erniang, it was difficult to weave. Each bolt took forty to fifty days. Her current stock was only ten. Needless to say, it was a key material for armor and magical artifacts.

He Lingchuan had not been wrong when he said that Zhu Erniang was a treasure from head to toe.

They finalized these demands, and the “two cups of tea” window was nearly up. He Lingchuan decisively pulled his saber out and hopped down to the ground, then said to Zhu Erniang, “Pleasure doing business with you.”

This was entirely my one-sided loss. What “business” is there for me to be pleased about? Zhu Erniang snorted, her head still faintly aching. Yet curiosity gnawed at her. “How did you sneak into the underground palace? I clearly saw you run into the woods.” At the time, she had even swept with her spiritual sense and had not sensed an illusion or a trick of the eye.

He Lingchuan shrugged. “Everyone has to keep something in the bottom of the trunk.”

How could he tell Zhu Erniang that he had activated two major moves at once?

After dodging her web spray, he used the dense canopy near the cliff to conceal himself, summoned his clone, then cast the substitution technique, swapping his true body with the ghost-shadow cicada shells he had placed earlier just inside the underground palace entrance.

The distance between the tree and the palace entrance was less than ten meters. The entrance was only covered with webbing and was not physically sealed off from the sinkhole’s open space—conditions that satisfied the casting requirements.

So in an instant, he teleported into the underground palace, while the ghost-shadow cicada shells were swapped onto the tree.

Out in the wild, a tree with a few empty cicada husks was nothing remarkable. Even bird or insect corpses would not be unusual.

Then, with his clone “escaping” in full view, Zhu Erniang and the spider army naturally chased it with everything they had.

The key was that a clone automatically vanished once it moved more than twenty meters from the true body. So to the burrow spiders, “He Lingchuan” leaped behind a few trees and simply disappeared. No matter how they searched, they could not find him.

This was what made the clone technique so much more valuable than the Mirror Image Art. The Mirror Image Art could only fight and kill. It could not act according to the master’s intent.

Meanwhile, He Lingchuan himself had already appeared at the underground palace entrance where Dong Rui’s spider guard monster puppet was waiting.

He climbed onto the monster puppet, then produced the disguised snakeskin he had taken from the bandits and held it in front of him.

At that time, most of the spider monsters were outside providing reinforcements. Only a few dozen remained to guard the nest, but their patrols were extremely strict, with fixed posts and careful routes.

The snakeskin’s camouflage was excellent, but the moment you moved, it would give you away. The burrow spiders had already been burned by the bandits’ trick, so they were not so easy to fool as before.

The tunnels were narrow. There were countless stretches where you simply could not avoid passing close to spider guards. That was why He Lingchuan needed Dong Rui’s spider puppet. As long as he lay covered by the snakeskin on the monster puppet’s back and let the thing carry him along, even if he passed right beside a guard, no one would stop him.

Because in their eyes, it was just another spider walking past.

Their intelligence really was... not high.

So while Zhu Erniang and her spider army scoured the forest outside, He Lingchuan traveled through the underground palace on the monster puppet, calm and unhurried, until he reached the display chamber.

Two spider guards stood watch outside the chamber as well.

However, that did not stump him.

He had the monster puppet make some noise at a distance to draw them away, and then he slipped inside.

He had calculated that Zhu Erniang could not sustain the “wearing an old molt” state for long. Sooner or later, she would return to shed it. He simply waited here, like a farmer watching a tree stump for a rabbit. He had plenty of patience.

His patience was rewarded, and the opportunity came. One strike, and it was a success.

Once the pact was set, Zhu Erniang withdrew the webs sealing the display chamber and ordered the spider guards to collect the materials He Lingchuan demanded.

Now her new shell had fully hardened, and she had the confidence to move again.

“My missing molt,” Zhu Erniang demanded. “Where is it? Exactly?”

“Not in my hands.” He Lingchuan spread his hands with righteous confidence. “If you don’t believe me, I’ll show you all my storage spaces. I truly don’t know where it went.”

What the divine bone amulet had done with the shell after absorbing it, he genuinely did not know.

Could it really have been stolen by Mountain Monarch Bo’s descendants? Zhu Erniang’s suspicion churned and twisted.

He Lingchuan followed her out of the underground palace. Along the way, he did not see that monster puppet anywhere. It had slipped off somewhere unknown.

As they passed the workshop, Zhu Erniang suddenly asked, “Where did Dong Rui go?”

He Lingchuan admitted that he did not know.

Zhu Erniang’s voice turned colder. “He’s already made a monster puppet, hasn’t he?”

“And what makes you think that?” Old greater monsters like her really are hard to fool.

“Because the two children delivered to the workroom ten days ago are still alive.”