After the Immortal Disappeared

Chapter 331: Chapter 330: Second Madam Zhu’s Neighbors

’Just what you’d expect from a Demon Puppet Master,’ Hee Lingchuan thought, turning his head away, refusing to watch. ’The whole process is grotesque and twisted.’

Once a Demon Puppet Master was fully engrossed in his work, he seemed to pay no mind to his own predicament. The five Spider Demons lasted only three days before Dong Rui made a new request to the Guard:

”Next batch!”

...

「Fifteen days passed in the blink of an eye.」

Hee Lingchuan either found himself assisting Dong Rui or answering the Spider Queen’s summons to keep her company.

This Giant Demon had lived in the Demon Nest Swamp for a century, having only left twice in all that time, yet she seemed to know the outside world quite well.

’In other words, she has other ways of communicating with the outside world?’

Hee Lingchuan had fantasized countless times about how to slip a blade into the Giant Demon when she wasn’t paying attention.

But no matter how he ran the numbers, it was never a sure thing. Second Madam Zhu’s twelve eyes were spread across the sides of her head, giving her a full 360-degree field of view with no blind spots.

Besides, an Ancient Great Demon like her projected her Spiritual Sense even in her sleep. A sneak attack from Hee Lingchuan would be anything but easy.

Spiders have no eyelids. As long as she stood perfectly still, who could tell if she was asleep or awake?

What’s more, this type of Demon possessed many bizarre abilities. Hee Lingchuan had once seen her pluck out one of her own eyes, only for the eyeball to sprout legs upon hitting the ground and scuttle away as a small spider.

’I don’t even know where this creature’s weak spot is.’

To say nothing of the Demon Army of spiders at Second Madam Zhu’s command. Though their numbers were a far cry from what they were a century ago, Hee Lingchuan certainly couldn’t face them alone. She had killed even General Nanke—wouldn’t crushing him and Dong Rui be child’s play for her?

Hee Lingchuan had secretly taken out his yuan coins to inspect them a few times, only to find that the Primordial Power clinging to them was as faint as a gossamer thread—so weak it was practically nonexistent.

To put it plainly, Primordial Power stemmed from the principle of ’strength in unity.’ He was now far from his homeland with no soldiers by his side, holding nothing more than a symbolic token. Without that ’unity,’ where would the Primordial Power come from?

Without Primordial Power, he’d have to rely solely on his own abilities. Which gave him even less confidence in his chances against Second Madam Zhu.

Over these past few days, whenever Hee Lingchuan had nothing else to do, he wandered around the swamp. It was partly to familiarize himself with the terrain as quickly as possible, and partly to look for an opportunity, a way out.

The Demon Nest Swamp was so vast that even after days of walking, he hadn’t seen it all. And the Giant Spider simply let him roam, seemingly unconcerned that he might try to escape.

Hee Lingchuan finally asked her about it to her face. Second Madam Zhu just roared with laughter.

”There’s Mirage Mist around the outer edge of the Demon Nest Swamp. You can’t get out at all. What do I have to worry about?”

She giggled. ”With that pathetic little wisp of Primordial Power you have? You’ll never break through the Mirage Mist.”

Although she’d never laid eyes on Hee Lingchuan’s Society Command, her Spiritual Sense was frighteningly sharp. Besides, Hee Lingchuan hadn’t hidden his family background. She knew he was the son of the Governor of Xiazhou in the Yuan Kingdom, which meant he’d hold at least some nominal military rank.

”Where did the Mirage Mist come from?” ’Alright, escaping just got even harder. Even if I could deal with Second Madam Zhu, how would I get past the Mirage Mist?’

”Eighty years ago, a Mirage Demon moved into the Demon Nest Swamp. To get us to agree to let it stay, it laid down a Mirage Mist around the swamp’s perimeter to prevent human intrusion. Since then, the swamp has been much quieter.”

The Demon Nest Swamp was rich in resources, so humans often entered to gather materials, and even secretly hunted Second Madam Zhu’s offspring.

Earth Cave Spiders were a source for several key medicinal ingredients.

Once the Mirage Mist spread, almost no one could enter except for armies possessing Primordial Power.

Though the Giant Spider couldn’t blink, her words screamed, ’I know you want to run.’ Hee Lingchuan rubbed the back of his head. ”You said ’us.’ Who is the ’us’ you’re referring to? Are there other demons in this swamp?”

Second Madam Zhu’s tone instantly turned icy. ”Doesn’t everyone have neighbors they can’t stand? If you run off into their territory and get eaten, don’t come crying to me.”

With that, she strode away on her eight long legs.

One day, as Hee Lingchuan was heading east, he spotted a huge rock standing abruptly in a small ravine. It was over ten feet tall, flat as a monument, and coated in a thick layer of Spider Silk that shimmered with an iridescent luster in the sunlight.

He recognized it at once as Second Madam Zhu’s work. His curiosity piqued, he went down for a closer look and discovered the other side of the monument was draped with a shed skin. The impressions of the scales on it were each larger than his palm.

’Is this snakeskin, or lizard skin?’

’The original owner must have been massive.’

Hee Lingchuan had a good idea of what the huge rock was for. Suddenly, a green and a red snake shot out from the tall grass, lunging for his ankles with fangs bared.

’Snakes in the tall grass? What could be more normal?’ Back when he was a Patrol Guard, Hee Lingchuan had been skilled at flushing out hidden dangers in the wild. He instinctively took two steps back, his hand already on the hilt of his Floating Life Blade.

With a flash of light, the two snakes were severed into four pieces.

Even though he’d killed them in a single strike, he didn’t step forward to inspect the bodies.

Sure enough, the snake pieces fell to the ground in a tangled heap, seemingly dead. But the instant Hee Lingchuan shifted his weight, they lunged at him again!

Of course, they didn’t reach their target.

Just then, a Spider Guard hurried over from behind, shouting:

”Get away from the boundary marker!”

’So this is where Second Madam Zhu’s territory ends,’ he realized. ’Cross this stone, and you’re trespassing.’

Hee Lingchuan scooped the snake carcasses onto the tip of his blade and retreated back across the boundary. ”Whose territory is that?”

”Lord Boshan’s,” the Spider Guard replied, eyeing the snake remains on his blade. ”You killed their sentries.”

”Oh dear. Is that a problem?” It looked like Second Madam Zhu’s neighbor was a Snake Demon. Hee Lingchuan glanced at the snakeskin on the boundary stone. ’Yep, a big one.’

The Spider Guard circled the boundary marker, and finding no other snakes, turned to Hee Lingchuan. ”You want ’em?”

”...You can have them.”

The Spider Guard dragged the snake carcasses a few hundred feet away, until the boundary marker was nearly out of sight, then sank its fangs into them.

The green snake wasn’t quite dead yet, but it was powerless to resist.

Hee Lingchuan was speechless. ’You’re just going to eat it right here? You can just eat their sentries like that?’

The Spider Demon waited patiently for its venom to dissolve the snake’s flesh into a liquid, replying matter-of-factly, ”They sneak over and steal our food all the time.”

Hee Lingchuan looked at the boundary stone, unsure whether to laugh or cry. So it really was just a line on a map. The grunts on both sides crossed back and forth, constantly stealing from one another.

’It made sense when he thought about it. Second Madam Zhu and Lord Boshan were both demons of the swamp; how strict could they possibly be with their subordinates?’

As long as it didn’t start a war, they’d turn a blind eye to such petty trifles.

”That ’Lord Boshan’ on the other side, how many years of Daoist Practice does he have?”

”Four or five hundred years.”

”That’s nothing compared to your matriarch,” Hee Lingchuan said. ”Why doesn’t Second Madam Zhu just wipe him out and take his land?”

One only had to look at the size of Second Madam Zhu’s old nest in the Ghost Needle Stone Forest to know she believed that more offspring meant more prosperity.

The more offspring she had to raise, the more territory she naturally needed.

The Spider Guard said blankly, ”I don’t know.”

Its only duty was to guard the boundary stone; why would it need to know more?

Hee Lingchuan thought for a moment. ”Do your two sides fight often?”

”Of course,” the Spider Guard answered distractedly, its attention focused on its meal. ”Lord Boshan teams up with the other demons to attack us. They just want to take our stuff.”

So Second Madam Zhu’s neighbors—plural—were no pushovers. No wonder she sounded so bitter when she mentioned them.

It seemed the mother spider wasn’t very popular in the Demon Nest Swamp.

”Are there other Great Demons in this swamp?” He only knew that a Mirage Demon also lived in the swamp.

”Yes, there are seven or eight others.” The Demon Nest Swamp is vast.

Hee Lingchuan was taken aback. Great Demons were a rare sight anywhere else, yet there were seven or eight of them right here?

’Why are they all packed into this one swamp?’

He knew full well that the more powerful the individual, the bigger their ego. This was doubly true for demons.

”What do they want to steal?”

”They steal everything!” The Spider Guard grew indignant. ”They even steal our webs! And they want to take the Demon Nest back!”

”Take it back?” Hee Lingchuan asked, surprised. ”Don’t tell me the Demon Nest originally belonged to Lord Boshan?”

”That’s right. Our ancestor drove him off when she came here.”

So Second Madam Zhu was the real invader. Hee Lingchuan scratched his head. No wonder the local demons held such a grudge against her.

「Two days later.」

Hee Lingchuan was by the ruins of the Jiana Race, watching the spiders harvesting their underwater cages, when he noticed two large snakes inside one of them. Both had eaten their fill, their bellies swollen and round.

Each snake was as thick as his thigh and nearly twenty feet long.

After these two gluttons had paid a visit, only two pitifully small and skinny fish remained in the cage.

The furious spiders sprayed streams of Spider Silk. One of the large snakes was quickly ensnared and immobilized, but the other was slippery as an eel. It shot away, diving into the water and vanishing into the distance in an instant.

Most of the spiders couldn’t dive, so they could only chitter in frustration on the bank.

An idea sparked in Hee Lingchuan’s mind. A Sleeve Arrow shot out, accurately striking the snake’s head, and he began to drag it forcefully back to shore.

He didn’t need to lift another finger. The spiders swarmed forward, descending upon the two snakes and stabbing them relentlessly.

The snakes weren’t small, but they couldn’t withstand the spiders’ potent venom. In a short while, they were paralyzed.

The spiders happily began to slurp up the resulting slurry. Clearly, snake was far more delicious than fish.

Because Hee Lingchuan had lent a hand, the spiders no longer seemed to mind his presence when he drew near.

This time, however, killing the snakes wasn’t as consequence-free as it had been at the border.

Barely ten minutes had passed, the spiders not even finished with their snake feast, when Hee Lingchuan noticed the jungle had fallen unnervingly silent. Not a bird chirped, not an insect buzzed.

The ten-foot-tall reeds on the opposite bank suddenly began to sway. Something was moving through the water toward them, parting the reeds as it came.

The spiders abruptly abandoned their meal and scrambled back. The larger Spider Guards moved to the front, spraying layer after layer of white webbing onto the ground.

They braced for a fight.

Naturally, Hee Lingchuan wasn’t about to stand around and be a target. He quickly retreated with the smaller spiders to the safety of high ground, ready to sit back and watch the titans clash.

But just then, Second Madam Zhu herself arrived from the rear.

She paused for a moment on the bank, her massive body swelling by another size, and then she glided across the surface of the water.

Hee Lingchuan was impressed.

’A body the size of a small hill, and she can still skip across water?’

But it looked as if she had just pumped her body full of air, so floating wouldn’t be an issue.

Then, Second Madam Zhu disappeared into the reeds as well.

Of course, she was so tall the reeds couldn’t completely conceal her. From Hee Lingchuan’s vantage point, he could see her crawl into the thicket and then freeze, as if in a standoff.

Suddenly, Second Madam Zhu splayed her eight legs and reared up, making her body seem a size larger and incredibly menacing.