Chapter 135: Difficult Choice

Weilna's stronghold was built in a sea cave formed by ancient ruins on the edge of the swamp, with the cave entrance facing the sea, both avoiding the mycelium detection from the swamp direction and using the threat of the Light-Eating Eel to prevent any enemies from approaching from the sea.

The combat meeting room was located deep in the middle main cave of the "Nest". The stalactites hanging upside down from the cave ceiling had been chiseled into the shape of watchtowers by Drow craftsmen, and dark fluorescent paint outlined the silhouette of the entire Weeping Tear Swamp on the stone walls, those glowing lines like the nerves of living things in the dark.

The stone table was a whole piece of basalt, with an uneven surface—not for decoration, but traces left by the previous owner.

Ha Qite was the first to speak. He was Weilna's martial arts chief, with an old scar slashing from his forehead to his jaw, the gray-white scar like a centipede in the dim light.

He pushed a piece of parchment to the center of the stone table, his voice without ups and downs: "Matriarch, twelve scout teams have not returned at the scheduled time, nor have they sent any distress signals. If there are no accidents, they have all been wiped out."

The meeting room was quiet for a while. The five people sitting around the stone table—Ha Qite, Spider Queen Priestess Ma Sha, Adjutant Lady Tali, and two guard captains—did not show surprise.

Drows don't like accidents, and they don't like showing accidents on their faces even more.

Weilna sat in the main seat of the stone table, one foot stepping on the edge of the stone stool, her arms resting on her knees, her posture as relaxed as a cat napping.

Her skin was paler than most Drows, almost translucent, with faint blue blood vessels visible at her temples. Her eyes were dark red, currently staring at the fluorescent map on the stone table, her gaze falling on the Whispering Shoal area at the edge of the swamp.

"Lady Tali," she opened her mouth, her voice not loud, but everyone heard it very clearly, "let your Jackals withdraw from the Gray-White Reed area. The battlefield is no longer safe."

Lady Tali nodded.

Ma Sha stood up at this time and placed a black magic beacon on the table. The surface of the beacon was cracked, and the silver-white liquid seeping from inside had solidified, indicating that the signal had been rudely cut off by external force.

"Matriarch, we received a magic message from the Fifth Scout Team, the content was only one sentence, 'Old Man of Rotten Wood' is gathering troops. Then the beacon failed."

"That is to say," Weilna took the conversation, "they at least successfully sent out the intelligence. It's a pity they couldn't bring it back alive."

Her tone of saying "pity" was about the same as saying "the tide rose slowly today".

Lady Tali finally couldn't hold back, she pressed her hands on the stone table, her face unusually heavy.

"The battle situation is very unfavorable to us now. We only have six thousand warriors in our hands, and two thousand Goblins can't fight hard battles at all—they will collapse during the Toad Demon's first charge, so I think it is necessary for us to temporarily abandon this operation."

The air in the meeting room stagnated for a moment.

Weilna raised her head, her dark red eyes meeting Lady Tali's. She didn't speak immediately, but slowly straightened up from the stone stool, putting the foot that was stepping on the stool back to the ground. The movement was very slow, so slow that everyone saw every rune on the scimitar at her waist.

"Shut up."

Two words, not light or heavy, like a nail hitting a wooden board.

"It's not your turn to teach me how to handle problems here."

Lady Tali's fangs bit tight, but she lowered her head. She had seen Weilna's way of handling problems—half a year ago, right in this meeting room, Weilna personally skinned the previous owner.

Ma Sha pulled the topic back to the right track at the right time. Her voice was steady, like performing some kind of ritual: "Matriarch, if the Old Man of Rotten Wood has completed the troop gathering, he will soon advance toward the Whispering Shoal.

Our stronghold's location is currently still outside the mycelium detection range, but once the front beach is lost, the old thing can lay the mycelium network to the foot of the cliff. By then, even our sea route for retreat will be blocked."

"Then let him stop before the front beach." Weilna said, "Didn't he want to eat all my scouts? Then we will make him unable to digest them."

She stood up, walked to the map on the side of the stone table, and pressed her finger on the area between the Gray-White Reed area and the Whispering Shoal—that is, near the high ground where Kai Nuo and the others were.

"How many troops did he send to hunt down those twelve scout teams?"

Di Er Wa estimated: "At least three thousand Bone-Spur Toad Demons, plus swamp corpses, mycelium puppets, and sporadic Mid-Level demons.

But the main force is still behind, the Old Man of Rotten Wood's guards haven't moved, and there are no signs of other Master Rank demons moving."

"That is to say, what we see now is just his claws." Weilna's finger drew an arc on the map, bypassing the high ground from the reed area, pointing directly to the tide trench entrance of the Whispering Shoal.

"He wanted to use the scout team as bait to lure us out to meet them, and then fight a frontal battle in the wide area of the front beach. He knows we have insufficient troop strength, and we have no chance of winning a frontal battle."

"Then we don't meet them?" Ha Qite asked.

Weilna turned around, the corners of her mouth curling slightly, that kind of smile reminded everyone present of the scene half a year ago—stone table, scimitar, skin being peeled off layer by layer.

"Meet them." She said, "But not from the front."

She paused, her gaze sweeping over everyone present, finally landing on Ma Sha.

"Did you all forget how this 'Nest' fell into our hands?"

No one answered. Of course they didn't forget.

Half a year ago, the owner of this cave was not Weilna, but a Master Rank demon, whom the creatures in the swamp called "Skinner Ge Fu".

Ge Fu's true form was a deformed Six-Armed Snake Demon, who fled to the Gray Water Sanjiaozhou after being defeated in the infighting of Abyss Lords, occupying this ruin.

Ge Fu had a fatal confidence; she believed that this cave could not be attacked from the sea route. There were Light-Eating Eels in the Ash Sea, and any approaching ships would be swallowed several hundred feet away;

And the only entrance to the Whispering Shoal was blocked by tide trenches and black mud. As long as he guarded the tide trench, any enemy could only line up to die in the narrow passage.

The day Weilna came, Ge Fu didn't even leave her skinning workshop. She sat on that chair made of Rotten Scale Crocodile ribs, listening to her subordinates' reports that no enemy was found in the Whispering Shoal, and the sea surface was as calm as ever.

Then she fell off the chair.

Because Weilna didn't come from the Whispering Shoal, nor from the sea surface—she brought twelve guards and dived in from the bottom of the sea cave below the cliff.

The water temperature of the Endless Sea was close to freezing, the Light-Eating Eels avoided the smell of Rotten Scale Crocodile blood, and Drow Elves could hold their breath and march for nearly half an hour in a completely lightless environment.

Ge Fu set up secret sentries at the bottom of the cave, but the secret sentries only stared at the waterway of the tide layer.

No one would have thought that a group of black-skinned elves could drill out like snakes from the bottom cracks deeper, narrower, and colder than the tide layer, dripping with black sea water, appearing silently directly below her skinning workshop.

Ge Fu was later nailed to that chair made of Rotten Scale Crocodile ribs, and Weilna spent three days peeling off her scales and flesh piece by piece.

During this period, Ge Fu begged, cursed, promised allegiance, and cried bitterly more than once, but Weilna didn't respond to a single word, just said to Ma Sha beside her when changing knives:

"Record her screams. Whoever doesn't listen in the future, play it for them."

Ge Fu's skin was peeled off completely, tanned, and hung in Weilna's private room—just blocking the secret passage leading to the upper floor.

And her six arms were severed and inserted into the rock wall at the cave entrance, still maintaining the posture before death: stretching outward, like a deformed octopus, warning all creatures attempting to approach.

"Ge Fu had two hundred Swamp Gray Ogres, one hundred Rotten Scale Crocodiles, and three High-Level Snake Mages at the time."

Weilna said calmly, her fingers tapping gently on the concave hole on the stone table that had once been nailed with skin nails.

"We only had forty people, half of whom had to stay on the ship to guard the rear. Now we have six thousand warriors, twelve scout teams are dragging his main force on the front line, and his mycelium network still doesn't know the exact location of our 'Nest'."

She looked at Lady Tali and smiled slightly. That smile reflected the cold light of the blade in the dim fluorescent map.

"You say we are unfavorable?"

No one spoke in the meeting room again. At the other end of the stone table, the concave marks carved by Skinner Ge Fu with a scimitar that year were still clearly visible.

That was what Weilna deliberately kept to remind everyone sitting at this table: the owner of this cave can change, but Drow Elves will never lose to the abyss.

……

At the same time, the battle on the high ground reached its most tragic peak in the bone spur volley of the Bone-Spur Toad Demons.

Gray-white hollow bone spurs poured down like a rainstorm. Kai Nuo pulled the trigger at the last moment, and that special arrow mixed with Abyss Blood Stone fragments dragged a silver-white tail flame, tearing through the fog, precisely sinking into the Spirit Toad's left eye socket.

The Spirit Toad let out a shrill hiss, its huge body tilted backward, smashing into the mud, splashing black waves several feet high.

Its back glands lost control in the explosive spasm, and the remaining digestive fluid gushed out from the pores, scorching the skin and flesh of several Toad Demons that couldn't dodge in time.

The Toad Demon group did indeed fall into short-term chaos. But in less than half a minute, a "veteran" with dark red bone spurs took over the command. It low-moaned three times, the Toad Demon group re-formed, and the fourth volley covered the front of the high ground densely.

The Rotten Scale Crocodile corpses became the only barrier. Dai Meng's arms were shaken until numb, Rui Wen's thigh was pierced by a bone spur shot from the side, and yellow-green digestive fluid seeped into the wound, the muscles collapsing at a speed visible to the naked eye.

Suo Lun rushed out to help him, but a bone spur pierced into his lower abdomen and came out from his lower back. He knelt on the ground, fell on the medical kit, and never got up again.

"Ke Er! Signal!" Kai Nuo shouted.

Ke Er dragged his useless left arm and crawled to the root of the withered tree at the highest point of the high ground, cut his palm with a dagger, and pressed his bloody hand on the "Homecoming Beacon".

The dark red light pulsed, and a spiritual pulse broke through the interference of the mycelium network and shot toward the edge of the swamp. The pulse carried a few words from Ke Er:

"Fifth Scout Team, high ground surrounded. Old Man of Rotten Wood's main force is gathering, at least three thousand Bone-Spur Toad Demons, coordinates have been sent back."

Before the words fell, a sound completely different from the Toad Demons came from the depths of the swamp.

It was a low, wet friction sound, like huge wet mud being dragged on a stone slab. The fog was torn from the middle, and dozens of huge gray-white figures slowly emerged from the mud.

Their length exceeded seven meters, their trunks were flat like salamanders, dragging a thick tail like a tree trunk.

The gray-white skin was covered with tumor-like nodules and moss, and two curved bone spurs stood on the back, the tube mouths occasionally spraying a group of foul-smelling white mist.

Their limbs were short and powerful, and their webbed claws looked like five curved scythes when spread out. The most chilling thing was their eyes: no pupils, the entire eyeball was murky milky white, but deep in the eyeball faintly revealed a sickly green fluorescence.

"Gray Swamp Lurker..." Dai Meng's voice appeared trembling for the first time, "This is going to be difficult!"

Kai Nuo's heart sank to the bottom. He had heard of this creature, the top hunter in the Gray Water Sanjiaozhou, every move meant no survivors.

Their "Corrupting Gaze" could soften the muscle tissue of living things into paste within a few breaths, the prey wouldn't even have time to scream before collapsing like a melting candle in the mud, and then be swallowed by them with wide lower jaws along with mud and bones.

The first Lurker raised its head. Those milky white eyes aimed at the Drows on the high ground.

"Close your eyes!" Kai Nuo roared.

Too late. Emerald green rays shot from the eye sockets of the Lurker, like two invisible scythes sweeping across the slope. The rays had no heat, no impact, but where they passed—the air twisted.

The surface of the Rotten Scale Crocodile corpses began to bubble and collapse, the hard crocodile skin flowing down like heated cheese.

A young scout, Naide, the last remaining supplementary soldier in the team, was swept by the ray on his left arm.

He didn't even feel pain, just looked down, and then found that his left arm from shoulder to elbow had turned into a pool of gray-white paste, dripping down along the trunk.

Naide opened his mouth, no sound came out, and his whole person collapsed to the ground as if his skeleton had been extracted.

"Scatter! Don't be covered by the rays at the same time!" Kai Nuo roared, dragging Rui Wen and rolling behind the withered tree.

Ke Er pulled the trigger of the hand crossbow, the Abyss Fire Oil arrow hit the head of the first Lurker, and dark green flames exploded on its face.

The Lurker let out a low, cow-like roar, but did not retreat, it shook its head, the flames burned on its slippery skin for a few breaths and then went out, leaving only a few charred scars on the surface.

The second Lurker began to move toward the side of the high ground, its back bone spur breathing tube sprayed two groups of white mist, and its body completely disappeared into the mud, leaving only that pair of bone spur breathing tubes and a pair of milky white eyes.

Its trajectory of lurking under the mud was like a twisted snake, quickly bypassing the east side of the high ground—that was their only possible retreat direction.

The third Lurker crouched in place, but it slightly opened its lower jaw, revealing two rows of inward-curved teeth like a nail board.

It didn't rush to attack, but was waiting—waiting for the prey to be forced into a dead end, waiting for the rays to soften enough meat, waiting for the mycelium tentacles in the mud to entangle every leg that tried to escape.

Knowing he couldn't run, Kai Nuo took out the silver-white "Homecoming Beacon" dagger from his bosom, pulled off the safety buckle, and placed it on the ground.

He took off his helmet, knelt on one knee, and pressed the blade of the dagger against his forehead; this was the ancient ritual of Drow scouts, meaning the champion of Lolth, "Selvitam", witnessed bravery.

However, Lolth's blessing could not pierce through the heavy fog and reach this swamp completely corroded by the abyss. Bravery got no response here.

After a round of ray volleys, only white mud remained on the high ground, steaming, quietly waiting to be decomposed and absorbed by the swamp. ===== CHAPTER 136 =====