Chapter 248 Remembering the Past, Harboring a Foolish Heart

Abyssal Circle, Demon Nurturing River.

Two humans and one demon were locked in a stalemate. On one side stood Mei Chengyu and Shang Liu, on the other was the Spider Woman.

The eight spider legs beneath the Spider Woman tapped against the ground, while her human torso beamed at the two of them with a wide grin.

Mei Chengyu frowned and raised her sword to point at her. “You are still alive?”

The Spider Woman widened her eyes in mock hurt. “My good little sister, how could you wish for my death? We are sisters of the same blood. If I die, you really will have no family left.”

Mei Chengyu’s face darkened with anger. “Shut up, you Demonic Creature. You will not confuse me with that trick again.”

“Ha, were you not always pining for the people of the Penglai Sect? You should like this face, shouldn’t you? Or did I guess wrong?” The Spider Woman put on an exaggeratedly thoughtful air. Then her human torso suddenly split open, flesh turning inside out and folding over itself, forming a glistening, bloody ball of meat. The mass writhed and shifted, gradually reshaping into another person’s form.

“Or do you prefer this face?”

Mei Chengyu’s pupils contracted. She gritted her teeth. “You are courting death.”

Shang Liu, at her side, was momentarily stunned. This was… the legendary human-faced spider demon.

Her true form was a ball of flesh and spider limbs. Anyone she killed would be stripped of their appearance and body, and she could use that to transform into their likeness.

The little girl from earlier had features seven-tenths similar to Mei Chengyu. He had always heard that Mei Chengyu once had an elder sister who later died at the hands of the demon race. It could only have been this demon before them.

But then… why was this demon still alive?

Only now did Shang Liu realize how serious this was. A demon of the same era as Mei Chengyu would have at least a thousand years of cultivation. And this Spider Woman had clearly lived even longer than Mei Chengyu had.

Shang Liu tried to stop her. “Do not be impulsive…”

But she did not hear him at all. She pivoted on her heel and charged forward without the slightest hesitation.

The hand that Shang Liu had just extended could only curl back. “…”

As expected, she was still the same as before. Whenever she faced demons, she could never remain calm. She would rather perish together than let slip any chance to kill them.

Mei Chengyu and the human-faced Spider Woman clashed. She swung her sword down toward the Spider Woman’s head, only for it to be blocked by a spider leg. Threads of silk instantly wrapped around her blade.

“Even your former senior martial sister had to give me a wide berth. What makes you think you can defeat me?” The Spider Woman laughed as she spoke.

Fiery spiritual power erupted along Mei Chengyu’s sword. The flames burned the webbing to ash. “Because I am not like you, who has not improved in the slightest for hundreds of years. How does it feel to be steeped in wine jars for centuries? That person was truly merciful to you, not killing you outright.”

At those words, the Spider Woman’s willow brows shot up. “Mei Xiaowu, you really like saying things your elder sister hates to hear.”

The eight spider legs beneath her were not like the rest of her body. Her torso was covered in wounds and old scars, yet the eight legs were fresh and new, as if they had only recently regrown.

It was obvious that her spider legs had once been chopped off. She also carried a faint scent of wine, different from Mei Chengyu. It seeped from within, from beneath her skin and flesh, tinged with a subtle bitterness.

Remembering those centuries of humiliation, the Spider Woman’s body went taut. “Do not worry. Once I am done with you, I will ascend to the Heavenly Return Palace and wash away my shame.”

As soon as she finished speaking, she stopped hiding anything. The myriad fine hairs on her spider claws bristled, each one like a sharp needle. They were tipped with tiny white droplets, which at a glance resembled a layer of autumn frost.

Yet this was far more vicious than frost. It was raw spider-silk essence. Once it stuck, one could not move. Fire would only harden it the more it burned, and it was laced with deadly poison.

Mei Chengyu stepped back twice, her eyes cold as she studied her opponent. The spiritual power around the Spider Woman was swelling more and more violently, mingling with foul miasma that billowed about her like black fog.

Two of her legs stretched forward. The folded joints snapped straight and fitted together. Enveloped in the black mist, the bone legs transformed into a pair of bone maces, each nearly three meters long.

The bone maces scraped across the ground, carving deep furrows wherever they passed.

“Mei Xiaowu, come. Let your elder sister see how much you have improved over the years.” The Spider Woman smiled as she spoke.

Her words had barely fallen when the crimson longsword crashed against the bone mace with a dull metallic clang.

The mace looked fragile, but in truth it was hard beyond imagining. That fierce strike left not the slightest mark upon it.

The Spider Woman seized the opening and raised another leg. The needle-like bristles drove straight toward Mei Chengyu’s body.

Mei Chengyu blasted them aside with a surge of spiritual power. Then she instantly pulled back her sword, twisted to the side, and sliced off one of the spider legs. Her speed was so fast it was almost impossible to follow with the eye.

Flames licked at the wound, scorching it black. Yet the Spider Woman did not react at all. Under the Black Moon she could not feel pain. Thick white fluid gushed from the severed stump, and a new limb rapidly sprouted forth.

“Not bad, you have some skill. Unfortunately, this is my home ground.”

“I have been waiting for you a long time, Mei Xiaowu. The others are all dead. Of that group back then, only you and Shen Minglu are still alive. Once we find the Thousand Mechanisms Pagoda, if I wear your face to go see him, what kind of expression do you think he will have? Just imagining it is fun.”

Hearing this, Shang Liu immediately shouted, “She is trying to shake your heart. Why are you still not retreating!”

The Spider Woman heard the unfamiliar voice. Her eyes rolled, and she glanced toward the source. When she saw Shang Liu’s face, one brow arched.

Catching sight of the sword in his hand, she came to a realization. “So it is an impostor. I thought that little third brat Feng was alive again. You think bringing someone who looks like him can fool me? Even if you invited that one from the Heavenly Return Palace, it would be useless.”

A vicious glint flashed through the Spider Woman’s eyes. Black qi roiled off her body. Under the catalysis of Demonic Qi, her body split apart and reverted to its primitive flesh-ball form. The asymmetrical eyes on the mass rolled back until only the whites showed.

The Demonic Qi had amplified the Spider Woman’s strength, but it had also stripped away her reason, turning her into a puppet that knew only slaughter.

Mei Chengyu did not flinch. The disgust on her face deepened. “At last you show your true form.”

She cast off all restraint in her heart and unleashed her full power.

Going all out, she was evenly matched with the Spider Woman. One human and one demon moved with the speed of lightning.

This battle was far beyond Shang Liu’s level of cultivation. He chose instead to clear out the surrounding Demonic Creatures that were interfering.

The clash of sword and weapon rang out for who knew how long before one side finally began to tire.

Mei Chengyu was knocked back again and again. The Spider Woman, however, showed no sign of fatigue. Under the Black Moon, she stood almost unassailable.

The Spider Woman advanced with both maces raised. One vicious blade pierced straight through Mei Chengyu’s shoulder, lifting her into the air like a skewered insect.

“Even sealed for hundreds of years, my cultivation is still higher than yours, you overreaching thing.”

The mouthparts in the center of the flesh-ball produced a woman’s melodious voice. Coupled with that grotesque appearance, it created a jarring dissonance.

“In the end, you still fell into my hands.” She giggled.

Mei Chengyu spat a mouthful of blood at her. “Nothing but a momentary advantage.”

The Spider Woman’s smile grew even more arrogant. Her other bone mace thrust toward Mei Chengyu’s brow, about to pierce straight through her skull.

Yet just as the mace extended, a sudden thunderous sound exploded in the sky above, like jade and stone colliding, echoing through the clouds.

At that sound, the Spider Woman suddenly felt a splitting headache. The flesh-ball convulsed and trembled uncontrollably.

Mei Chengyu seized the opportunity. She decisively severed the bone mace and dropped back to the ground.

The Spider Woman clutched her head and staggered backward, unable to believe her own ears.

She knew that sound all too well. It was coming from the Heavenly Return Palace. Someone had struck the Immaculate Moon Wheel.

Impossible… how could someone ascend the Heavenly Return Palace before her?

Mei Chengyu also frowned. The sound had come from the direction of the Red Scorched Circle. For it to carry this far, it had to be a high-grade Spirit Artifact.

But she had no time to think it through. Taking advantage of the human-faced Spider Woman’s agony, she slashed several times in quick succession, each strike landing on one of the demon’s weak points.

Spider Woman was instantly put at a disadvantage. She shot a vicious glare at Mei Chengyu, but she no longer had the ability to fight back.

Her entire body was slashed open, flames searing her wounds, her bodily fluids oozing out.

Just as she barely managed to regain her senses, another deafening boom rang out. This time it shattered her eardrums outright.

Unable to endure it, Spider Woman spat out a mouthful of raw spider silk, forcing Mei Chengyu to retreat. She spun around and leaped into the Demon Nurturing River, turning into a streak of darkness that fled into the distance.

Mei Chengyu raised her sword to give chase, but was stopped by Shang Liu, who had just finished dealing with the surrounding Demonic Creatures. He took one look at the blood on her shoulder. “She is already gone. You still want to chase her? You’re this badly injured. What if… You can’t still be drunk, can you? These Demonic Creatures are even stronger than you.”

It was already a blessing that Spider Woman had chosen to retreat of her own accord. If not for that mysterious sound just now that had shaken her, Mei Chengyu would already be dead beneath her claws.

Mei Chengyu stared fixedly in the direction where the shadow had fled. “Help me find Lian Mu and Shen Wuxie. I have to go after her.”

“You really have to do this? What if she still has reinforcements…”

“Shang Liu, just take it as me begging you.”

Shang Liu froze. “You…”

“You have no idea what she means to me. Half of my family and fellow disciples died at her hands,” Mei Chengyu said. “I’ve waited for her for far too long. Now that I finally have a chance, I refuse to let her slip away right under my nose.”

“…Even if it costs you your own life?”

“She’s already heavily injured. Striking while the iron is hot is our best chance.”

She did not answer him with words, but her actions already gave him his answer.

Shang Liu lowered his eyes. “…Fine. I finally see you clearly for the madwoman you are.”

Her obsession with killing those of the demon race had already reached the point of madness. In truth, she had never cared about anyone. Not the man he once was, nor the Lian Mu of today. She cared about neither.

Shang Liu had always known that Mei Chengyu once had several close friends, and Feng Tianche was one of them. In his youth, Shang Liu had been nothing but Feng Tianche’s shadow.

As for whose shadow Lian Mu was, he did not know. But he understood that no matter how much someone resembled that past figure, they could never compete with the person she truly held in her heart.

Her dearest friends and family had all died at a time when she was completely powerless. Now, all she wanted was to lessen the regret of those years by any means available, even if it meant consuming other people’s feelings, even if it meant sacrificing her own life.

She had always been someone who lived in the past and put herself first. They were never people who would walk the same path.

“I don’t need you to say it. I was going to look for Lian Mu anyway.” Shang Liu’s expression smoothed out. His face turned cold and unreadable.

After all, Lian Mu still held secrets related to Xiao You.

“Thank you… As for what happened between us before, I was the one in the wrong. I’m sorry I made you suffer all these years,” Mei Chengyu said.

“From now on, there is no need to speak of it again. It is all in the past,” Shang Liu replied.

He took a lock of hair out from his spatial pouch. It was what Lian Mu had once left on Ying You. Before they came here, Ying You had separated out a portion of herself and asked him to help protect Lian Mu from the shadows.

In this vast exploration area, this lock of hair was just what he needed to pinpoint Lian Mu’s current location.

Shang Liu said nothing more. Holding that strand of dark hair between his fingers, he spread out his spiritual sense and rode his sword into the sky, flying off in another direction.

Mei Chengyu also smoothed her expression and flew off in pursuit of the fleeing shadow.

The two of them had met again for no more than two hours before parting ways once more, each heading down their own road.