Cultivation Struggles of a Lowly Fox

After gathering a bit of the silky liquid, it led deeper inside the cave, so Aiko kept snagging those things into her Storage Rings.

It went quite deep inside and Aiko’s rings were filling quite a lot.

At this rate, she would have stored it inside her [Tails Storage], which she didn’t want to. What if her tails got even stickier?!

Fortunately, the narrow cave filled with liquid ended and the rest was just a normal cave.

What was strange was the fact that it was a very dry cave. Aiko could feel a warm current coursing through this place.

She was curious about what created this warmth, but not curious enough to immediately charge forward.

Aiko tilted her head and approached slowly, looking around the narrow opening to see if there was anything that would threaten her.

Another thing that happened was the fact that this place was not covered with that filthy soil. It seems like this heat just burned it away immediately, or maybe that silky liquid protected this place? Aiko was not entirely sure.

Walking deeper inside, she came towards a juncture. She could go either left or right, but she chose right, because left was giving her a bad vibe.

And the right one had a warm current, so Aiko wanted to pick that one up first.

She walked deeper inside until she came to a larger cave opening. It was still small compared to the one that hosted the huge spider and it could barely fit a large house.

Aiko nodded to herself, this place was not bad since she didn’t need to worry about humidity, but that also didn’t mean that she wanted to live there. She would naturally take the source of this heat and place it somewhere where she could live happily without worrying about Human Cultivators robbing her.

There was a slight issue though. This place was empty, like empty-empty, not even her eyes were able to see through it and nothing helped her.

Aiko tilted her head with a strange expression. ’But it’s coming from the middle of this place...’

She could not understand how that was possible.

Aiko slowly approached the middle of this place when suddenly she lost footing.

There was a strange sploshing sound on her right foot, but there was no water around. It was just either soil or rock.

Aiko had so many questions, but no answers. Soon a scorching pain ran through her spine.

”Hot! Hot! Hot!” Aiko kept hopping on one of her legs, since she was holding the other one, trying to rip the boot away from her skin.

After success, she noticed that her leg was quite badly burned, but thanks to the system, it was healing up.

Aiko tilted her head. She could not understand what was happening, so she got a rock from her storage and threw it into the middle of the place.

*Splash*

The middle of this place made the same sound as when you throw a rock into a pond.

Aiko was more and more confused, but she had an idea.

What if she used the tip of the fluff from her tails in order to activate [Tails Storage]?

It should probably work and if it’s really water, she should be able to absorb it!

But first thing first, she should heal her injured leg and dry the boots. Aiko didn’t know if this place was unpolluted because of this heat or silky liquid, so she would like to not walk barefoot in here.

...

After drying and equipping the boots, Aiko waited patiently. She had to figure out where the ’edge’ of this place was, in order to try to use her tip of the tail.

She didn’t want to go blind at it, since it might harm her that way and she definitely didn’t want to test the resilience of her tails.

Aiko nodded to herself as she probed the surroundings.

She was able to figure out the edge of this place and all she had to do now was to gently lower her tails into it.

There was a sucking sound, like Aiko’s tails were drinking that thing.

At first, Aiko was concerned, but the system was not as concerned.

[Unknown Water 128L(Rising)]

It was certainly water, just unknown. Maybe because Aiko didn’t see the actual water, the system tagged it like this, but there was no other warning, so Aiko kept slowly lowering her tail into it.

She would drain this place and see what was so strange with it!

...

Aiko kept draining it for a while, but because she had done it slowly, she didn’t know how much time she spent on this.

She realised that this was a handmade hole, since it was very circular and instead of the normal increasing depth, it was just a hole going straight down.

Like this, Aiko would definitely run out of space in her tails if the volume reached over 1,000m3. She would have to dump that water outside this place and drain more of it later...

Fortunately, that was not the case, as her tails kept making that slurping sound when you emptied a bottle through a straw.

It seems like this part was finished and Aiko could test the waters by jumping down.

However, Aiko was not stupid, so she first dropped a rock down.

It made the natural rock on stone sound, so it seemed like it would be safe for the time being.

Aiko jumped down and the scenery changed. The whole ’illusion’ collapsed, revealing an even more narrow passage and a few marbles on the ground.

Aiko tilted her head. She was somewhat familiar with these marbles. Those were Beast Cores, but they were also slightly different. They were slightly larger with something swimming inside.

On the outside, there was also Runic Language that simply translated into a ’Seal’.

’And now we will conduct the summoning of the final boss.’ Aiko rubbed her chin. She was curious about these marbles, but she was also curious about the overly narrow passage.

Aiko stored the marbles without giving them a proper look and as such the system recorded it as [Colourful Marbles].

She would have to investigate them later, but that could definitely wait!

Aiko wanted to squeeze through and find out what was on the other side of this narrow passage.

’Will I even fit?’ Aiko tilted her head. It would be better if she used her small form, but what if that filth spreads?

Aiko was conflicted on this, but there was not much she could do about it. She would have to choose to either abandon this small, narrow passage or transform into the Fox form...

...

Aiko decided to transform and deal with the consequences later. She would ask Mei about cleaning later, or get cleaned by her team, since there was no way she would be able to clean her tails alone.

While she knew how to clean her body, fur was a completely different league.

Aiko crawled into the narrow passage. She was looking for Treasures or anything remotely valuable now that she committed to this.

At first, she did not hold any hope, since it seemed empty, but she did find quite large eggs. One was definitely dead, considering the numerous cracks, while the other one was intact.

Aiko stored both in her [Tails Storage] since her Rings were full.

She backtracked into the open space. It was quite large without the water and that strange ’illusion’ that she couldn’t see through.

This was a perfect place to hide something, but Aiko could not find anything. It either rotted away due to that filth, or someone already looted the other things.

Aiko could only shake her head and go outside. She found the huge spider again, but for some reason, the temptation persisted.

’Were those strange Beast Cores not enough to satisfy this temptation?’ Aiko tilted her head as she didn’t understand it.

’Do I have to butcher this thing?’ Aiko narrowed her eyes. Every Beast had a Beast Core and the size and efficacy depended on their sizes and Bloodlines.

This huge spider should have quite the sizeable Beast Core, which might be useful for something in the future, but Aiko was not very keen on butchering it.

’I’m already dirty and would definitely get blood on myself...’ Aiko whined in her mind, but she wanted all the Treasures.

She would have to deal with the clean-up later...

Aiko used her [Lacerate] on the spider carcass and it broke apart easily.

She was quite startled by this, but that didn’t stop her from using more [Lacerate] on the carcass.

It was a completely hollow carcass, which startled Aiko.

’Did someone already take the Beast Core away?’ Aiko tilted her head. It was quite possible, but why did she still feel that temptation?

She dismembered the spider with one [Lacerate], it revealed the Beast Core that was hidden behind its eyes.

It was large and green, which made Aiko feel quite strange, but she stashed it away for later.

She dismantled the rest of the carcass only to find a huge black stone buried into the ground. Aiko felt familiar with this stone and she remembered that it was the same one that she used on Yuxi.

Aiko stashed that Black Stone away. She would be able to use it during her Evolution and she might also gain something fun in return~!

...

Aiko stored anything of value before leaving this place.

It was the same thing, boots that freeze the ground into a double jump for speed, while throwing rocks onto the small patches of ice to shatter them.

With this, none would be able to enter like Aiko did and they would have to find their own ways in.

...

Aiko happily made her way outside. She stored all valuables in her [Tails Storage] for the time being and she would sort them later once she asked Mei about that silky liquid.

That was the plan, but first, she needed to take a quick bath. The smell was unbearable and her storage capacity was getting smaller and smaller.

That was not good for Aiko as she would not be able to store more things in her [Tails Storage].

She would have to find some kind of hidden pond that would be nice and not too cold.

With that, she would use some Warming Stones to heat it up a little bit more, so that she could have a pleasant warm bath.

Aiko sneakily made her way out of the dead zone. It was delightful to see greenery around her again, but it would take some time to find the pond, so she would hide until it was night before she would move...