Chapter 350: Friendly Consultation

All the molts contained the cultivation it had shed. Originally, Zhu Xiuer shed its shell to reduce its own burden, and occasionally putting it back on could restore its cultivation—not to mention returning to the peak of the previous period, at least it had five or six parts of its power. But putting this molt back on was easy, while taking it off was difficult. To exert the effect of the molt, it had to fuse the original outer shell with the molt, and to take it off, it had to experience a complete molting process again, which was both painful and dangerous. After molting, there was a two-cup-of-tea awkward period, during which it was weak as a dog.

Zhu Xiuer had originally fought fiercely with two great demon kings and fought the snake demon to death, and had long been injured and tired. Now it had to force itself to molt, which was truly exhausting itself to the point of being oil-depleted, unable to squeeze out any more demon power.

Otherwise, how could He Lingchuan have succeeded so easily?

But it didn't know that this fellow had received face-to-face instructions from General Red in the Panlong Dream: "Zhu Xiuer can put the molt back on to regain combat power, but it won't last long. The cave spider molting period is the most vulnerable; even if it is an ancient demon immortal, it cannot escape this law. Grasp this point, and you might still have a glimmer of survival."

Therefore, when he discovered earlier in the exhibition room that one molt was missing, he knew that the opportunity he had been waiting for for a long time had finally arrived. Later, when he saw Zhu Xiuer's body was larger than usual in the swamp, his heart was confirmed again.

"First, take a blood oath," two cups of tea time was very short, and he had to prioritize his own safety. "By the way, Dong Rui will also leave with me; you are not allowed to obstruct."

Zhu Xiuer had no choice but to swear a fierce blood oath, guaranteeing that neither it nor its descendants would harm He Lingchuan and the other person in the slightest, and that it would help them enter and exit the Demon Nest Swamp freely.

He Lingchuan also saw its attitude clearly—it would rather die than be a pet; this was Zhu Xiuer's bottom line.

Even if he hacked Zhu Xiuer to death, there were thousands of angry spiders outside waiting to avenge the Old Ancestor. Could he escape from these things? He didn't have much confidence, after all, he couldn't get out of the Demon Nest Swamp.

Look for the Mirage Demon? Judging from the results of his probing the spider guards over the past few days, most spiders didn't know where the Mirage Demon lived or what it looked like.

Looking at it this way, what substantial benefit did killing Zhu Xiuer have for him? It was better to have a good talk.

Negotiation is the art of compromise—you retreat and I advance, I advance and you retreat. Both sides were dressed in martial steps, and after a round of friendly (fierce) discussion, they finally reached a deal.

Zhu Xiuer took off two eyeballs on the spot and gave them to He Lingchuan.

These two eyeballs were usually dormant, but with a light tap three times, they could turn into small spiders. Their volume could shrink to the size of a button, and they were fast, moved silently, and had limited attack power, but they were great for stealth and intelligence gathering. He Lingchuan had already witnessed this earlier.

Most importantly, they could share vision with the master. That is to say, whatever the eyeball spider saw, the master could share in real-time. He Lingchuan, an outsider, didn't have this ability, but Zhu Xiuer had been an ancient demon immortal and had its own means to bestow it.

As long as its main body was alive, the eyeball spider could share vision with He Lingchuan. To prevent birds from pecking, they would release an aura that their natural enemies hated when performing tasks. He Lingchuan could just raise them as ordinary spiders. If he was within ten miles of Zhu Xiuer, the eyeball spider could also be used as a real-time communication tool, but they would be out of range if they exceeded ten miles.

To activate these two eyeballs into spiders, Zhu Xiuer had to consume a bit of bloodline power, which it usually wouldn't do lightly. But this time, for the sake of the deal, it had no choice.

He Lingchuan noticed that Zhu Xiuer had another type of eyeball spider that could perform venom-injection assassinations, but it refused to give it up. "This kind must return to my body after being used twice, otherwise it will wither."

Zhu Xiuer also gifted He Lingchuan a poison gland. The venom stored inside could be applied to weapons. Once it drew blood, it would cause the victim's wound to ache intensely, as if suffering from burning flames, and the wound would swell with blisters. If it wasn't pierced within a few breaths, the spider venom would flow into the body with the blood, causing nerve numbness and muscle weakness.

Simply put, the enemy's body would be in a state of "being digested," experiencing the pain of being a spider's prey.

This spider venom could effectively counter ordinary antidote pills, but it was still suppressed by Yuan Power. Depending on the strength of the opponent's Yuan Power, the pain and toxicity it caused might be reduced.

Even so, because of its excellent applicability, this was still a must-have lethal medicine for home and travel.

Interestingly, if this poison gland was used to suck in reverse, it could also pull out the spider venom from the injured person.

In addition, there was a bottle of cave spider oil ointment.

Applying this oil ointment to his body, He Lingchuan wouldn't be stuck by spider silk or other strange sticky substances. Cave spiders did this themselves.

He Lingchuan watched with his own eyes as this oil ointment was spat out of Zhu Xiuer's mouth, and he felt that this should be more saliva than oil.

Besides that, He Lingchuan also squeezed out a pair of fangs from the molt from Zhu Xiuer—yes, the ones on the molt it had just shed—ten bolts of cloud brocade woven by its own hands, a quantity of high-grade spider silk, and several high-grade spider guard shells.

Zhu Xiuer truly didn't want to give this pair of fangs, and He Lingchuan haggled with it for a long time.

The cave spider queen's fangs were dark and non-reflective, and the curved arc was a natural long blade, longer than the Fusheng blade stuck in Zhu Xiuer's skull. Its sharpness was beyond doubt, and there were natural blood-letting grooves on the sides. Because the spider queen used them all year round, they were naturally poisonous without needing to be quenched.

Zhu Xiuer's molt was large, so the fangs were naturally long, but He Lingchuan had seen Li Fubo refine weapons and knew that the size of the refined magic treasure could be adjusted. He had already learned the Clone Technique and had to prepare some powerful equipment for his clone.

The cave spider queen only had one requirement: if this pair of fangs was later refined into twin blades or daggers, they must be named "Zhu Xiuer's Kiss."

Treasures also pay attention to coming from a famous family.

As for the cloud brocade, even for Zhu Xiuer, the weaving difficulty was high, and it took forty or fifty days to weave one bolt, and the existing stock was only ten bolts. Needless to say, this was a key treasure for manufacturing armor and magic treasures.

He Lingchuan wasn't wrong; Zhu Xiuer was indeed full of treasures.

Both sides agreed on these requirements, and the two cups of tea time was almost up. He Lingchuan jumped down to the ground very quickly and said to Zhu Xiuer, "Happy cooperation."

This was all its one-sided payment; what cooperation was there? Zhu Xiuer snorted, its head aching faintly, unable to hide its curiosity: "How did you sneak into the underground palace? I clearly saw you go toward the forest." At that time, it had also used its divine sense to scan, and didn't feel that it was an illusion or a barrier.

He Lingchuan shrugged: "You have to have some trump cards."

How could he tell Zhu Xiuer that he had opened two big moves together at that time: after dodging the net sprayed by the Spider Queen, he used the dense tree crown on the cliff to block his figure, directly summoned his clone, and then performed the Li Dai Tao Jiang (Substitute the Peach for the Plum) technique, swapping his true body with a Shadow Cicada Molt pre-placed at the entrance of the underground palace.

The distance between the big tree and the underground palace entrance was less than three zhang, and the underground palace entrance was only covered by spider webs, which didn't count as physically isolated from the external sinkhole space, all meeting the spellcasting requirements.

The distance between the large tree and the entrance to the underground palace was less than ten meters; the entrance was only covered by spider webs and was not physically isolated from the sinkhole space outside, all of which met the requirements for spellcasting.

In this way, he himself was instantly teleported into the underground palace, while the Ghost Shadow Cicada Shed was swapped onto the large tree.

On a large tree in the wild, let alone a mere bit of cicada shed, it wouldn't be strange even if there were carcasses of birds, insects, or snakes.

At this time, he manipulated the clone to jump and flee outside the sinkhole, and since Zhu Xiuer and her spider army saw it with their own eyes, they naturally pursued it relentlessly.

The problem was that the clone would naturally disappear once it was more than forty meters away from the original body, so in the eyes of the cave spiders, He Lingchuan jumped behind a few large trees and vanished, and no matter how they searched, they couldn't find him.

This is where the clone technique is more precious than the mirror image technique: the mirror image technique only knows how to fight and kill, and cannot act according to the master's will.

Of course, He Lingchuan himself had already appeared at the entrance of the underground palace, and Dong Rui's spider-guard demon puppet was guarding right there.

He Lingchuan mounted the demon puppet and took out the camouflage snake skin scavenged from the mountain bandits, holding it in front of himself—at this time, the spider demons were all outside the cave providing support, and only a few dozen were guarding the home, but the patrols were extremely tight and there were fixed sentry posts.

Although the snake skin's camouflage was good, it would give the game away if it moved. The cave spiders had suffered at the hands of the mountain bandits and were unlikely to be fooled again.

The passageway was narrow, and there were always many sections that couldn't bypass the spider guards, which was why He Lingchuan had asked for Dong Rui's spider puppet. As long as he covered himself with the snake skin and lay on the back of the demon puppet, using this thing as transport, even if he walked past the guards, they wouldn't stop him.

After all, in their eyes, it was just a spider passing by.

The intelligence of these guys is really not high.

Zhu Xiuer and her spider army were searching for He Lingchuan all over the mountains and plains outside, while he himself was riding the demon puppet in the underground palace, advancing unhurriedly, until he reached the front of the display room.

There were also two spider guards standing sentry outside the display room.

But this couldn't stump He Lingchuan.

He had the demon puppet make some noise not far away to lure the spider guards away, and he could slip in himself.

He reckoned that Zhu Xiuer couldn't keep the old shed on for long and would have to come back to shed it sooner or later, so he simply waited here for the rabbit. Anyway, he had plenty of patience.

Luck was good; one strike and it was done.

With the contract settled, Zhu Xiuer removed the spider webs from the display room and ordered the spider guards to collect the supplies He Lingchuan requested.

Now her entire outer shell had hardened, and she had the confidence to go out again.

"Where is my shed?" Zhu Xiuer asked him, "Where exactly is it?"

"It's not in my hands, anyway. If you don't believe me, I can take out all my storage spaces for you to see." He Lingchuan spread his hands righteously, "I really don't know its whereabouts."

He really didn't know what the Divine Bone Necklace used the spider shed for after absorbing it.

Could it have really been stolen by the descendants of Lord Boshan? Zhu Xiuer was suspicious.

He Lingchuan walked out of the underground palace with her, but didn't see that demon puppet along the way; he didn't know where it had slipped off to.

When passing through the workshop, Zhu Xiuer suddenly asked: "Where did Dong Rui go?"

He Lingchuan frankly said he didn't know.

"He has already created a demon puppet, right?"

"How can you tell?" A great demon of many years is still not easy to fool.

"The two children sent into the workshop ten days ago are still alive to this day."

(End of chapter)