V2C13

Parsed with an automated reader. The content accuracy is not guranteed.

Across the sky bridge, the two walked through the arts and languages building to arrive at the laboratory.

The path was filled with countless sneak attacks, and they almost ran face first into the spiders’ traps several times. The closest occasion was when the stairs suddenly broke under them and Lin Jue fell before even realizing it. His entire body had been stuck to the huge web beneath, trapped and only a few meters away from a watchful giant spider!

Thankfully, Song Hanzhang had jumped down and finished the spider in a few stabs, keeping Lin Jue from dying.

It was almost one in the morning when they arrived at the building. It was lightless aside from the green exit sign, but still, no matter where they went, they could hear the faint scuttle of insects. If they ever focused on the sound though, it was as if there was nothing there at all.

“Where should we go now?” Lin Jue asked Song Hanzhang.

Song Hanzhang was still trying to move the vines covering the window away so he could observe the plaza. “Dan Liang has most likely left already, but the other three are still definitively in this building,” he said. “We’ll just need to search around for them.”

Lin Jue had no idea where his theory came from. “How do you know that Dan Liang left?”

Song Hanzhang glanced at him. “Why do you think he suddenly fell down at the sports center?”

Lin Jue thought back carefully. Back then, Dan Liang and the others were being chased by the army ants, and Dan Liang had accidentally tripped on Lin Wei’s machete, almost getting swallowed up by the swarm. Shentu Ming hadn’t given up on him though and had managed to pull him out.

“Are you saying that Dan Liang tripped on purpose?” Lin Jue asked.

“I can’t be certain. Normally, I disapprove of assuming someone’s guilt, but if we view Dan Liang as an enemy first and examine his behavior from a reversed point of view, it’s easy to figure out what his goal is. The fall at the sports center, his choice to let the ants pass by him at the bridge, his concealment of his true reward; I presume he has something that he can rely on to not fear the insects’ attacks.”

Lin Jue smiled bitterly. “Normal people wouldn’t dare to mess around like that.”

“We all saw that when he received the reward, it was some form of canned object. He placed the reward into his pack and took the insecticide out again when introducing us to it. Even though the shape was similar, the real thing should have already been swapped out. His real reward was most likely something that could hide his scent, or a spray that would keep the insects from attacking him. His current goal is most likely to leave the team and kill some of its members on his way out,” Song Hanzhang said.

“But if he wanted to leave the team, why did he join at the start?” Lin Jue asked, confused.

“That’s one of my questions as well. Perhaps he was collecting information and observing everybody else. He’ll leave the team when the time comes as it’ll be difficult for him to pull off any tricks or set up any traps with so many eyes watching.”

“Is he really Judas?” Lin Jue frowned.

“We can’t rule out the possibility yet, but the narrative still contradicts in some places… It doesn’t matter anyways, we’re to go find Shentu first.”

“Do we have to search every room?” Lin Jue’s face contracted in pain.

“There’s no need, we only have to surmise what their actions were. There’s no way for them to stay on level one; it’s too close to the spiders outside. They would have chosen to run upwards, but in order to avoid being surrounded by ants, they would at the very least need to have left an escape route. Hence we can say that the most likely places they chose to go were either level two or level four, both of which possess sky bridges.”

Lin Jue nodded. “Then let’s hurry.”

Song Hanzhang peered through the vines he had ripped off. Lin Jue leaned forwards to take a look as well and his eyes widened.

The plaza was completely different from only an hour ago, now looking like a huge nest, densely packed with white silk wrapping around every tree, every building. Every inch of the ground had been taken over by cobwebs!

Spiders of numerous sizes were still fighting with the army ants.

The ants fought bravely, spraying acid and ripping and biting with their mouthparts, legs struggling and flailing, trapped by the webs. Large amounts of them were wrapped up into cocoons and carried to the giant nest’s center.

And in the fountain, there was the vague outline of something. A spider, terrifyingly large, sat there and laid eggs endlessly like it was a queen ant, the eggs themselves hatching incessantly. The ants became its food for reproduction as it continued pouring out more and more spiders.

It was a battle between insects. As men, they didn’t have the right to intervene.

“It looks like the spiders still have the upper hand,” Lin Jue murmured.

“Only for now. Their weakness is far too obvious; they rely solely on the female spider in the center to reproduce. Once the ants kill the female spider, the tide of battle will shift quickly. The ant nest however is at the faraway Time Plaza; as long as an endless supply of ants hatch from there, they won’t be able to be defeated”

“That’s true,” Lin Jue nodded in agreement.

Suddenly, the loud sound of cracking glass came from above them, as if someone was smashing through a window with a chair.

“Level four, someone is smashing the glass door to the sky bridge!” Song Hanzhang immediately concluded.

They ran towards floor four. As expected, the glass door to the sky bridge was broken, the chair used for the crime thrown to the side.

Last round, Song Hanzhang had also smashed open the door to the sky bridge this way. Thankfully he brought along his ‘master key’ this time1, which helped them avoid smashing open every window on the way.

Lin Jue remembered the tragic fight that night before dawn, something that shook his heart even now.

Song Hanzhang frowned at the chair on the ground and said in a low voice, “Be careful. Something must have happened here, otherwise they wouldn’t have run away in such a rush.”

Lin Jue tightened his grip on the polearm and looked around him solemnly.

The two searched a classroom each. The room was completely dark and Lin Jue was forced to take out his torch.

Everywhere the torchlight touched, small spiders fled into the dark corners of the room, but the larger ones had no fear and would even crawl slowly towards him.

With enough preparation, spiders wouldn’t cause him much trouble. The most difficult thing to deal with was the traps and the sneak attacks.

The only room remaining was the large lecture hall. Lin Jue and Song Hanzhang stood outside the door, both of them reluctant to move.

The two exchanged a glance and Lin Jue twisted open the door handle.

The wooden door swung open with a creak as light flooded into the dark hall.

Dense spider silk covered the entire room. Hatchlings ran from wherever the light touched, hiding behind shade plants or inside crevices in the walls.

“Is this a spider cave?” Lin Jue muttered and stepped inside.

This lecture hall was too big, most of its space hidden from view, especially with the cobwebs everywhere. He had to make certain if the place was hiding anything.

Silk fell down from the roof like a curtain, intertwining into an intricate structure that seemed less like a normal web and more like a large mass of moldy white. Two dead spiders lay in the corner, their killer unknown.

Lin Jue impatiently twisted the webs with his machete until they fell apart.

There was a knock from within the depths of the webs. Lin Jue’s back straightened immediately, his right hand tightening on the polearm.

“Xuezhang, did you hear something?” he asked without turning around, doubting his own senses.

“The corner to your right,” Song Hanzhang replied, inspecting the recently killed spider corpse on the ground.

Lin Jue immediately gained confidence, the machete in his left hand hacking away at the webs with more force.

The knock came again, this time with a strange impact noise, like something wrapped in cotton hitting wood.

Desks and chairs surrounded Lin Jue, all covered in a thick layer of silk. The silk covered even the spaces between the desks, the mottled shadows formed when the torch hit them creating an intricate pattern that made it seem even more sinister, like it hid some vicious monster beneath it. Plants and strangely shaped fungi watched them from every corner of the room, darkness stretching out from under each and every one.

Something was watching him. It was getting closer, closer.

Lin Jue trusted his instincts, but his eyes were unable to see a single creature, nor a single movement.

Where was it? Just where was it?

Anxiety filled his chest. Lin Jue almost wanted to retreat.

“Lin Jue, duck!” Song Hanzhang suddenly shouted.

Lin Jue threw himself onto the ground, tearing through the webs by his feet, the broken strands clinging all over his face. Something sharp whistled through the air above him, followed by the sound of flesh being pierced.

Lin Jue wiped off the strands on his face and flipped around.

That was close!

A spider spread its eight legs wide between two desks and stared down at Lin Jue, its fat, eerily patterned abdomen convulsing slightly like some manner of monster.

It wasn’t hurt? Then the sound just then was…

Lin Jue saw in his peripheral vision an unusual shadow to the side. Another giant spider twisted its body upright, a dagger buried deep in its abdomen.

The creature above him moved!

Lin Jue abandoned the ill-fitting polearm and stabbed upwards with both hands on the machete. The giant spider jumped away with an agility unbefitting of its size and hung itself back up onto the web.

Lin Jue had to end the battle, fast.

Lin Jue waved and slashed at the spider before suddenly, the thing’s abdomen spat out a huge burst of spider silk. It sprayed over Lin Jue’s eyes and he saw himself lose all sight of his surroundings, only dim impressions of light and dark left. But every blurry detail, every shadowy corner, every patch of low brightness formed a clear image in his mind!

The thickly layered spiderwebs seemed to suddenly disappear in an instant. The giant spider was the only thing in his sight!

A swing forwards; the spider began to run.

It would go upwards, Lin Jue’s instincts told him.

His machete broke through the webs hanging down from the ceiling, cutting off its escape routes.

It gave up running; it would jump to attack using the pincers on its forearms.

Lin Jue suddenly arched back, his hands releasing the machete.

The spider was fast, but he was faster. The pain from hitting the ground seemed to have been blocked out of his mind; he didn’t feel a single shred of discomfort, his only thought the slowed-down image of the spider leaping towards him.

Closer and closer.

His right hand grabbed the forgotten spear from the ground and stabbed with all his might-

The momentum from the spider’s pounce along with the force behind his stab allowed the sharp polearm to pierce through the spider’s exoskeleton, piercing through its thorax. Its feet shook violently, flexing and twisting pointlessly before curling up into a small ball.

He won!

It hurted…

Lin Jue twisted his brows in pain. The dull ache from his back made it impossible to stand up for a moment.

On the other side, Song Hanzhang had also finished the wounded spider and was slicing open its abdomen with his dagger.

“What are you doing?” Lin Jue felt disgusted.

Song Hanzhang didn’t explain, only taking off his gloves and throwing them to the side. “The corners to the right, check over there.”

Lin Jue rubbed his sore back and went to clean up the spiderwebs obediently.

In the dark corner of the classroom, a large mess of white webs was layered on top of a cocoon-like object. The cocoon wasn’t tightly bound, even revealing the… human clothing and the left hand protruding out of it.

The light from the torch shone onto the cocoon-like object. Song Hanzhang’s breath hitched when he saw the circlet of silver tattoo on the wrist.

Shentu… Ming.

***

1In quotation marks, so it’s presumably a bobby pin or something similar.

|TOC|

Like this:Like Loading...