Chapter 89 Underground Pursuit (Part 2)

  "It is the Earth Hole Demon Spider, a second-order spiritual beast. However, those who know it often refer to it as a demon beast. This beast belongs to the earth element and possesses extremely rare earth-traversing abilities, allowing it to quickly move through the ground tens of meters deep. Its body is covered in a hard shell comparable to tempered black iron, with immense strength. It can be said that this is one of the most difficult second-order spiritual beasts to deal with. Moreover, the key point is that this Earth Hole Demon Spider feeds on humans."

  "There's actually such a spiritual beast." Lu Qing was shocked in his heart, this wasn't recorded in the Purple Mist Spiritual Beast Atlas he had copied down. It seemed that the types of spiritual beasts in this world were as numerous as the stars, countless and uncountable, and couldn't be fully recorded by just one book. Lu Qing suddenly came to a realization.

  "Yè Lǎo's meaning is that Zhōng Mín's disappearance now is the doing of this earth cave spider." Lù Qīng thought to himself afterwards.

  "It can't be wrong, this broken sword was obviously bitten off by its sharp serrations with corrosive venom, it's really unexpected that the magic spider tribe that was destroyed by the entire continent at that time still has remnants."

  "The entire continent is joining hands!" Lu Qing was somewhat astonished and asked, "Is this demon spider really that formidable?"

  He paused, and Ye Lao's heavy voice echoed in Lu Qing's mind: "Although their individual strength is not strong, they have a terrible place besides their incredible earth escape ability, that is, they live in groups and have a strong reproductive ability. In the past, these magic spiders almost every time they arrived at a sect, the ordinary sect members would suffer from disaster, until they spawned a large number of young spiders and grew up, then they would attack stronger swordsmen, swordsmen with abundant blood and energy, can be said to be their favorite."

  "So over 20,000 years ago, after dozens of ordinary sects and several Qingfan-level sects were destroyed by these demon spiders, the Sword God Temple issued a decree to exterminate the tribe, gathering the power of the entire continent to completely destroy all the demon spider dens in the Ten Thousand Great Mountains, eliminating this arch-nemesis of humanity."

  Upon hearing this, Lu Qing couldn't help but sigh in his heart. In the 50,000 years of history, there was actually a spiritual beast tribe that could make the entire continent fearful, which was really unthinkable. Now things are easy to explain. If they launched a surprise attack from underground, it's indeed possible to leave no traces and retreat safely. And how would Gu Jianfeng and others use their divine sense to explore underground?

  This land has a strong resistance to the divine sense of swordsmen who do not comprehend the earth's aura, which is also the fundamental reason why Gu Jianfeng and others were unable to investigate. Lu Qing had tried to probe his divine sense into the ground before, but with his current ability to cover an area of fifty feet in diameter, he could only penetrate less than five feet underground, and his divine sense was consumed at an abnormally rapid rate, barely lasting for dozens of breaths before being exhausted.

  "But now there is a great advantage waiting for you." Ye Lao's voice sounded again, "This demon spider will have a day or two of hibernation to digest the large amount of blood and flesh essence in its body after each hunt. This was figured out by countless swordsmen who sacrificed themselves back then. During this period, their six senses are sealed, even if you stab it with a sword, it won't wake up immediately."

  "What did Ye Lao mean?" Lu Qing asked.

  "Sneak into the spider's nest while they're dormant and kill them all. Judging from the current situation, these demonic spiders might have hatched by chance from some leftover eggs, with only about seven or eight of them in total. So, it's been a month since the villagers went missing, but there are only three hundred."

  "If we wait another month for them to accumulate enough energy, a large number of demonic spiders will hatch, and it will be difficult to deal with at that time. If I'm not mistaken, there is a tunnel left by the demonic spider near the bed in this stone house. Let's go quickly and come back quickly. The demonic spider's nest will definitely not be far from this city for hunting purposes. If all goes well, we can return within two hours."

  He nodded, and Lu Qing's figure flashed into the stone house, closing the door behind him. He walked to the bedside, opened a black iron door attached to the ground, and the door's bolt was open, apparently having just gone down to investigate. A layer of purple-blue sword energy floated up from his body, illuminating the surroundings as he descended several steps along the stone stairs.

  "On the left."

  As expected, Lu Qing turned his head to take a look and saw that the soil wall on the left was slightly different from other places in terms of moisture content. The color was also subtly different from the surrounding soil walls if one looked closely. However, if Ye Lao hadn't mentioned the cave-dwelling demonic spider, Lu Qing wouldn't have had any suspicions about it at all, since this was a cellar and it was normal for the soil walls to be damp in some places.

  With a subtle concentration, Lu Qing's fingertips extended more than a foot long of wind and thunder sword energy. Apparently, after the complete fusion of Xun Feng's energy, his cultivation had also increased slightly.

  The sword energy cut through the soil like tofu, without any obstruction, and a deep hole about three feet in diameter suddenly appeared before his eyes. A bloody smell wafted out from inside, indicating that the demon spider had retreated not long ago. Lu Qing's body entered the hole, and the wet blood on the soil was blocked by the sword energy on his body surface. He went several meters deeper and arrived at a passageway about two feet high.

  At Lu Qing's current Sword Guest stage, the visible darkness was over a dozen zhang. With the light from the Wind and Thunder Sword Aura on his body, he could see about thirty zhang in front of him. At this moment, looking around, on the ground in front of him, there were also two broken swords covered with blood and flesh, and several severed fingers stuck in the mud.

  As expected, Lu Qing sighed and another one didn't escape. Thinking of the words they said in front of the wine building, Lu Qing couldn't help but sigh that life is sometimes full of coincidences, making it impossible to reflect on them, and then fell deeply into them.

  All the way in a hurry, this road is good and doesn't need Lu Qing to distinguish directions. However, the white bones that often appear along the way still make Lu Qing's eyebrows slightly wrinkle. After about a few miles of distance, there are dozens of skeletons on the road, each with obvious bite marks and countless cracks all over them.

  At last, after half a column of incense, Lu Qing's path forward was cut off. He estimated that he had walked for nearly five miles, and in this direction, he should have arrived at the southern city wall. In front of him, a large grey stone weighing several thousand catties blocked the path, clearly left behind by the Earth Hole Spider Demon.

  Just as Lu Qing was about to strike with his sword energy, Ye Lao's voice echoed in his mind: "Don't move, Sword Yuan, this is close to the demon spider's lair. If you make too much noise, they'll wake up and you won't be a match for them down here."

  Lu Qing was taken aback, should he really use brute force?

  "Ah, indeed, it's still a matter of insufficient experience," Ye Lao sighed, noticing Lu Qing's confusion. "Treat that stone as your Heart Refining Sword and apply the power you use for the Heart Refining Sword to it. With the power of the Purple Emperor Sword Body, which has surpassed 1,000 catties after passing through the first layer, driving it will be no problem."

  Lu Qing heard the words and lowered his head in deep thought, then suddenly his eyes sparkled with insight. He stepped forward to the front of the giant stone, took a deep breath, and purple light began to swirl in his eyes as he activated the Soul Refining Technique. His mind was calm and focused, and in his eyes, the massive stone in front of him seemed to be shrinking and changing at a visible speed, gradually transforming into the shape of his Heart-Clearing Sword.

  He slowly placed his hand on the stone, and Lu Qing felt as if he had grasped the hilt of his former sword, Xīn Jīng Jiàn. Many scenes of practicing swordplay quickly flashed before his eyes, especially that long period of time when he practiced at Míng Yuè Tán. The defense against the dark currents at the bottom of the lake was now crystal clear in Lu Qing's mind.

  At this moment, if someone were beside him, they would discover that Lu Qing's face was subtly radiating a faint blue-green light, with threads of purple lightning flashing and darting within. A powerful aura gradually spread across his body, and what's more, this aura didn't contain even the slightest hint of sword energy, giving people the feeling of pure physical strength.

  Like the giants of ancient legend, he was born with a powerful divine power. Lu Qing's arms shook like waves, and around his palms pressing on the giant stone, a faint gray wave spread out.

  Drink

  As Lu Qing let out a clear cry, the ground began to shake slowly. Above his head, the dust and dirt turned into fine lines that scattered all over Lu Qing's head. The huge boulder he was pressing down on with both palms actually started moving forward, and the uneven stone bottom scraped out a damp and concave trench in the ground.

  When a gap just large enough for one person to pass through appeared, Lu Qing stopped and looked down at his palms, as if he had suddenly realized something. However, after a moment, he quickly came back to himself, realizing it wasn't the right time yet. Lu Qing thought to himself, then swiftly passed by the giant rock.

  His eyebrows furrowed, and as he passed by the huge stone, Lu Qing suddenly smelled a nauseating stench, along with a strong bloody smell that filled the entire corridor. Looking ahead to the faint yellow light at the corner of the turn, there was also an obvious blood glow, and several low, mournful howls rose and fell in succession.

  At the corner, he exposed half of his head and finally saw what Ye Lao said about the cave-dwelling spider.

  This is a very large cave, about dozens of zhang wide and over ten zhang high. In the middle of the cave, eight huge spiders, each about one zhang high, lie with their eyes closed.

  Jet-black and glossy carapace, a dozen or so feet with sharp claws, each foot as thick as an adult's thigh, nearly two meters long. What caught Lu Qing's attention was the pair of compound eyes below which hung two pairs of fangs dripping with grayish-black corrosive mucus, from which he sensed a dangerous aura.

  Around these eight burrowing spiders, countless white bones and half-eaten flesh almost covered the ground, dyeing the entire cave's soil a dark red color. It's likely that ordinary people, or even swordsmen with insufficient mental fortitude, would be intimidated upon arriving here.